gracious way, and the school teacher led them to a garden bench and
begged them to be seated.

"The day is lovely," she said, "and I always find my garden more
cheerful than the house. Grandfather's illness makes the house
unpleasant for strangers, too."

Louise was surprised at this frank reference, and Uncle John coughed to
hide his embarrassment.

"I--I hope the invalid is--is improving," he said, doubtful whether he
should say anything on the delicate subject or not.

"He is always the same, sir," was the quiet response. "I suppose they
have told you that grandfather is a madman? Our great trouble is well
known in this neighborhood."

"He is not dangerous. I suppose?" hazarded Uncle John, remembering the
brutal bellowing.

"Oh, not at all. He is fully paralyzed from his waist down, poor
grandfather, and can do no harm to anyone. But often his outbreaks are
unpleasant to listen to," continued the girl, deprecatingly, as if
suddenly conscious that they had overheard the recent uproar.

"Has he been--this way--for long?" inquired Louise.

"His mind has been erratic and unbalanced since I can remember,"
answered Ethel, calmly, "but he first became violent at the time Captain
Wegg died, some three years ago. Grandfather was very fond of the
Captain, and happened to be with him at the time of his sudden death.
The shock drove him mad."

"Was he paralyzed before that time?" asked Louise, earnestly.

"No; but the paralysis followed almost immediately. The doctor says that
a blood vessel which burst in the brain is responsible for both
afflictions."

The pause that followed was growing awkward when Uncle John said, with
an evident effort to change the subject:

"This is a fine old homestead."

"It is, indeed," responded Ethel, brightly, "and it enjoys the
distinction of being one of the first houses built in the foothills. My
great-grandfather was really the first settler in these parts and
originally located his cabin where the mill now stands. 'Little Bill
Thompson,' he was called, for he was a small, wiry man--very different
from grandfather, who in his prime was a powerful man of over six feet.
Little Bill Hill and Little Bill Creek were named after this pioneer
great-grandsire, who was quite successful raising flocks of sheep on the
plateau. Before he died he built this house, preferring the location to
his first one."

"The garden is beautiful," said Louise, enthusiastically. "And do you
teach in the little brick school-house across the way?"

"Yes. Grandfather built it years ago, without dreaming I would ever
teach there. Now the county supports the school and pays me my salary."

"How long have you taught?"

"For two years. It is necessary, now that grandfather is disabled. He
has a small income remaining, however, and with what I earn we get along
very nicely."

"It was very good of you to assist in getting our house ready for us,"
said Louise. "We might have found things in sorry condition but for your
kindness."

"Oh, I enjoyed the work, I assure you," replied Ethel. "As it is my
vacation, it was a real pleasure to me to have something to do. But I
fear my arrangement of your pretty furniture was very ungraceful."

"We haven't altered a single thing," declared Louise. "You must have
found it a tedious task, unpacking and getting everything in shape."

"Tom and Nora were good help, because they are fond of me and seem to
understand my wishes; and Peggy McNutt brought me some men to do the
lifting and rough work," explained Ethel.

"Have you known Hucks and his wife long?" asked Uncle John.

"Since I can remember, sir. They came here many years ago, with Captain
Wegg."

"And has Thomas always smiled?" Louise inquired.

"Always," was the laughing reply. "It's an odd expression--isn't it?--to
dwell forever on a man's face. But Tom is never angry, or hurt or
excited by anything, so there is no reason he should not smile. At the
time of Captain Wegg's death and poor grandfather's terrible affliction,
Old Hucks kept right on smiling, the same as ever; and perhaps his
pleasant face helped to cheer us all."

Louise drew a long breath.

"Then the smile is a mask," she said, "and is assumed to conceal the
man's real feelings."

"I do not think so," Ethel answered, thoughtfully. "The smile is
habitual, and dominates any other expression his features might be
capable of; but that it is assumed I do not believe. Thomas is a
simple-minded, honest-hearted old fellow, and to face the world
smilingly is a part of his religion. I am sure he has nothing to
conceal, and his devotion to his blind wife is very beautiful."

"But Nora--how long has she been blind?"

"Perhaps all her life; I cannot tell how long. Yet it is wonderful how
perfectly she finds her way without the aid of sight. Captain Wegg used
to say she was the best housekeeper he ever knew."

"Did not his wife keep house for him, when she was alive?"

"I do not remember her."

"They say she was most unhappy."

Ethel dropped her eyes and did not reply.

"How about Cap'n Wegg?" asked Uncle John. "Did you like him? You see,
we're mighty curious about the family, because we've acquired their old
home, and are bound to be interested in the people that used to
live there."

"That is natural," remarked the little school teacher, with a sigh.
"Captain Wegg was always kind to me; but the neighbors as a rule thought
him moody and bad-tempered." After a pause she added: "He was not as
kind to his son as to me. But I think his life was an unhappy one, and
we have no right to reprove his memory too severely for his faults."

"What made him unhappy?" asked Louise, quickly.

Ethel smiled into her eager face.

"No one has solved that problem, they say. The Captain was as silent as
he was morose."

The detective instinct was alive in Louise. She hazarded a startling
query:

"Who killed Captain Wegg?" she demanded, suddenly.

Another smile preceded the reply.

"A dreadful foe called heart disease. But come; let me show you my
garden. There are no such roses as these for miles around."

Louise was confident she had made progress. Ethel had admitted several
things that lent countenance to the suspicions already aroused; but
perhaps this simple country girl had never imagined the tragedy that had
been enacted at her very door.

She cordially urged Ethel Thompson to spend a day with them at the farm,
and Uncle John, who was pleased with the modesty and frankness of the
fair-haired little school teacher, earnestly seconded the invitation.

Then he thought of going home, and the thought reminded him of Dan.

"Do you know," he inquired, "where I could buy a decent horse?"

The girl looked thoughtful a moment; then glanced up with a bright
smile.

"Will you buy one off me?" she asked.

"Willingly, my dear, if you've an animal to sell."

"It's--it's our Joe. He was grandfather's favorite colt when his trouble
came upon him. We have no use for him now, for I always ride or drive my
pony. And grandmother says he's eating his head off to no purpose; so
we'd like to sell him. If you will come to the barn I'll introduce
you to him."

Joe proved on inspection to be an excellent horse, if appearances were
to be trusted, and Ethel assured Mr. Merrick that the steed was both
gentle and intelligent.

"Do you use that surrey?" inquired Uncle John, pointing to a neat
vehicle that seemed to be nearly new.

"Very seldom, sir. Grandmother would like to sell it with the horse."

"It's exactly what I need," declared Mr. Merrick. "How much for Joe and
his harness, and the surrey?"

"I'll go and ask what grandmother wants."

She returned after a few minutes, stating a figure that made Uncle John
lift his brows with a comical expression.

"A hundred dollars! Do you take me for a brigand, little girl? I know
what horses are worth, for I've bought plenty of 'em. Your Joe seems
sound as a dollar, and he's just in his prime. A hundred and fifty is
dirt cheap for him, and the surrey will be worth at least seventy-five.
Put in the harness at twenty-five, and I'll give you two-fifty for the
outfit, and not a cent more or less. Eh?"

"No, indeed," said Ethel. "We could not get more than a hundred dollars
from anyone else around here."

"Because your neighbors are countrymen, and can't afford a proper
investment. So when they buy at all they only give about half what a
thing is actually worth. But I'll be honest with you. The price I offer
is a good deal less than I'd have to pay in the city--Hutchinson would
charge me five hundred, at least--and I need just what you've got to
sell. What do you say, Miss Ethel?"

"The price is one hundred dollars, Mr. Merrick."

"I won't pay it. Let me talk with your grandmother."

"She does not see anyone, sir."

Louise looked up sharply, scenting another clue.

"Isn't she well, dear?" she asked in smooth tones.

"She looks after grandfather, and helps Aunt Lucy with the housework."

"Well, come, Louise; we'll go home," said Uncle John, sadly. "I'd hoped
to be able to drive this fine fellow back, but Dan'll have to groan an'
balk all the way to the farm."

Ethel smiled.

"Better buy at my price, Mr. Merrick," she suggested.

"Tell you what I'll do," he said, pausing. "I'll split the difference.
Take two hundred and well call it a bargain."

"But I cannot do that, sir."

"It will help pay you for the hard work of fixing up the house," he
rejoined, pleadingly. "Your bill wasn't half enough."

"My bill?" wonderingly.

"The one I paid McNutt for your services."

"I made no charge, sir. I could not accept anything for a bit of
assistance to a neighbor."

"Oh! Then McNutt got it, did he?"

"I'm awfully sorry, Mr. Merrick. I told Peggy I would not accept
payment."

"H-m. Never mind. We're not going to quarrel, little neighbor. May I
hitch Joe to the surrey?"

"If you like. I'll help you."

Uncle John led Joe from his stall and together they harnessed the horse
to the surrey. The girl knew better than the man how to buckle the
straps properly, while Louise stood by helplessly and watched the
performance.

Then Uncle John went for old Dan, whom he led, rickety buggy and all,
into the Thompson stable.

"I'll send Hucks over to get him, although we might as well knock him in
the head," he said as he unharnessed the ancient steed. "Now then,
Louise, hop in."

"You'll be sure to come over Thursday, for the day, Miss Thompson?"
asked Louise, taking Joe's reins from her uncle's hands.

"I'll not forget such a delightful engagement, be sure."

Uncle John had his pocketbook out, and now he wadded up some bills and
thrust them into the little school teacher's hand.

"Drive ahead, Louise," he called. "Good morning, my dear. See you on
Thursday."

As the vehicle rolled out of the yard and turned into the highway, Ethel
unrolled the bills with trembling fingers.

"If he has dared--!" she began, but paused abruptly with a smile of
content.

The rich man had given her exactly one hundred dollars.



CHAPTER IX.

THE LIVES OF THE SAINTS.

On Wednesday afternoon McNutt drove the sad-eyed sorrel mare over to the
Wegg farm again. He had been racking his brain for a way to get more
money out of the nabob, for the idea had become a veritable passion with
him and now occupied all his thoughts.

That very morning an inspiration had come to him. Among other
occupations he had at one time adopted that of a book-agent, and by dint
of persistent energy had sold numerous copies of "Radford's Lives of the
Saints" to the surrounding farmers. They had cost him ninety cents a
copy and he had sold them at three dollars each, netting a fine profit
in return for his labor. The books were printed upon cheap paper,
fearfully illustrated with blurred cuts, but the covers were bound in
bright red with gold lettering. Through misunderstandings three of these
copies had come back to him, the subscribers refusing to accept them;
and so thorough had been his canvassing that there remained no other
available customers for the saintly works. So Peggy had kept them on a
shelf in his "office" for several years, and now, when his eye chanced
to light upon them, he gave a snort of triumph and pounced upon them
eagerly. Mr. Merrick was a newcomer. Without doubt he could be induced
to buy a copy of Radford's Lives.

An hour later McNutt was on his mission, the three copies, which had
been carefully dusted, reclining on the buggy seat beside him. Arrived
at the Wegg farm, he drove up to the stile and alighted.

Louise was reading in the hammock, and merely glanced at the little man,
who solemnly stumped around to the back door with the three red volumes
tucked underneath his arm. He had brought them all along to make his
errand "look like business."

"Where's the nabob?" he asked blind Nora.

"What's that, Mr. McNutt?" she inquired, as if puzzled. She knew his
voice, as she did that of nearly everyone with whom she had ever been
brought in contact.

"Why, the nabob; the boss; Mr. Merrick."

"Oh. He's in the barn with Tom, I guess."

McNutt entered the barn. Uncle John was seated upon an overturned pail
watching Old Hucks oil Joe's harness. The agent approached him with a
deferential bow.

"Sir," said he, "you'll 'scuse my comin' agin so soon to be a-botherin';
but I hev here three copies of Radford's famis wucks on the Lives o' the
Saints, in a edishun dee looks----"

"A what?"

"A edishun dee looks, which means extry fine. It's a great book an'
they's all out'n print 'cept these three, which I hain't no doubt many
folks would be glad to give their weight in gold fer, an' some over."

"Stand out of the light, McNutt."

The agent shifted his position.

"Them books, sir----"

"Oh, take 'em away."

"What!"

"I don't read novels."

McNutt scratched his head, perplexed at the rebuff. His "dee looks"
speech had usually resulted in a sale. An idea flashed across his
brain--perhaps evolved by the scratching.

"The young lady, sir--"

"Oh, the girls are loaded with books," growled the nabob.

The agent became desperate.

"But the young lady in the hammick, sir, as I jest now left, says to
tell ye she wants one o' these books mighty bad, an' hopes you'll buy it
for her eddificationing."

"Oh; she does, eh?"

"Mighty bad, sir."

Uncle John watched Thomas polish a buckle.

"Is it a moral work?" he asked.

"Nuthin' could be moraler, sir. All 'bout the lives o'--"

"How much is it?"

"Comes pretty high, sir. Three dollars. But it's--"

"Here. Take your money and get out. You're interrupting me."

"Very sorry, sir. Much obleeged, sir. Where'll I leave the book?"

"Throw it in the manger."

McNutt selected a volume that had a broken corner and laid it carefully
on the edge of the oat-bin. Then he put his money in his pocket and
turned away.

"Morn'n' to ye, Mr. Merrick."

"Stop a bit," said Uncle John, suddenly.

The agent stopped.

"I believe I paid you ten dollars for Miss Ethel Thompson's services. Is
that correct?"

"Ye--yes, Mr. Merrick."

McNutt's heart was in his shoes and he looked guiltily at his accuser,
the pale blue eyes bulging fearfully.

"Very well; see that she gets it."

"Of course, Mr. Merrick."

"And at once. You may go."

McNutt stumped from the barn. He felt that a dreadful catastrophe had
overtaken him. Scarcely could he restrain the impulse to sob aloud. Ten
dollars!--Ten dollars gone to the dogs as the result of his visit to the
nabob that morning! To lose ten dollars in order to gain three was very
bad business policy. McNutt reflected bitterly that he would have been
better off had he stayed at home. He ought to have been contented with
what he had already made, and the severe manner the nabob had used in
addressing him told the agent plainly that he need not expect further
pickings from this source.

In the midst of his despair the comforting thought that Ethel would
surely refuse the money came to sustain him; so he recovered somewhat
his former spirits. As he turned the corner of the house he observed
Louise still reading in the hammock.

In some ways McNutt was a genius. He did not neglect opportunities.

"Here's my las' chance at these idjits," he muttered, "an' I'll learn
thet nabob what it costs, to make Marsh McNutt stand out'n his light."

Then he hastened over to the hammock.

"'Scuse me, miss," said he, in his most ingratiating voice. "Is yer
uncle 'round anywheres?"

"Isn't he in the barn?" asked the girl, looking up.

"Can't find him, high ner low. But he ordered a book of me t'other
day--'Radford's Lives o' the Saints'--an' perhaps you'll take it an' pay
me the money, so's I kin go home."

Louise gazed at the man musingly. He was one of the people she intended
to pump for information concerning the mystery of Captain Wegg, and she
must be gracious to him in order to win his good-will and induce him to
speak freely. With this thought in mind she drew out her purse
and asked:

"How much were you to be paid for the book?"

"Three dollars, miss."

"Here is the money, then. Tell me--your name is McNutt, isn't it?--how
long have you lived in this place?"

"All my life, miss. Thank 'e, miss. Good day to ye, miss."

He placed the book in the hammock beside her.

"Don't go, please." said the girl. "I'd like you to tell me something
about Captain Wegg, and of his poor wife who died, and--"

"Nuther time, miss, I'll be glad to. Ye'll find me in my orfice, any
time. Jest now I'm in the dumdest hurry ye ever knew. Good day to ye,
miss," he repeated, and stumped quickly to the buggy awaiting him. Next
moment he had seized the reins and was urging the sorrel mare along the
stony lane at her best pace.

Louise was both astonished and disappointed, but after a little thought
she looked after the departing agent with a shrewd smile.

"He's afraid to talk," she murmured, "and that only confirms my
suspicions that he knows more than he cares to tell."

Meantime McNutt was doing his best to get away from the premises before
the discovery was made that he had sold two "Lives of the Saints" to one
family. That there might be future consequences to follow his deception
never occurred to him; only the immediate necessity for escape
occupied his mind.

Nor were his fears altogether groundless. Turning his head from time to
time for a glance behind, he had seen Mr. Merrick come from the barn
with a red book in his hand and approach the hammock, whereupon the
young lady arose and exhibited a second book. Then they both dropped the
books and ran into the lane and began shouting for him to stop--the
man's voice sounding especially indignant and imperative.

But McNutt chose to be deaf. He did not look around again, and was
congratulating himself that he would soon be out of earshot when a
sudden apparition ahead caused the mare to halt abruptly. It also caused
the cold chills to run down the agent's back. Beth and Patsy had stepped
into the lane from a field, being on their way home from their
daily walk.

"They're calling to you, sir," said Patsy to the agent. "Didn't you hear
them?"

"I--I'm a little deaf, miss," stammered McNutt, who recognized the young
ladies as Mr. Merrick's nieces.

"I think they wish you to go back," remarked Beth, thoughtfully watching
the frantic waves of Uncle John's chubby arms and Louise's energetic
beckonings. They were too far off to be heard plainly, but their actions
might surely be understood.

McNutt with reluctance looked over his shoulder, and a second shudder
went through him.

"I hain't got time to go back," he said, as an inspiration came to him;
"but I guess you kin do jest as well. This book here," picking up the
last of the three from the seat, "I offered to sell yer uncle fer five
dollars; but he wanted it fer four. I ain't no haggler, you understan',
so I jest driv away. Now Mr. Merrick has changed his mind an' is willin'
to give five fer it; but there ain't nuthin' small about me. Ef you
gals'll jest give me the four dollars ye kin take the book to yer uncle,
with my compliments; an' I won't hev t' go back. I'm in a
drea'ful hurry."

Patsy laughed at the little man's excited manner.

"Fortunately I have some money with me," she said; "but you may as well
take the five dollars, for unless Uncle had been willing to pay it he
would not have called you back."

"I think so, myself, miss," he rejoined, taking the money and handing
her the volume.

Uncle John and Louise, glaring at the distant group, saw the third red
book change hands, and in answer to their renewed cries and gestures
Patsy waved the "Lives of the Saints" at them reassuringly and came on
at a brisk walk, followed by Beth.

McNutt slapped the sorrel with the ends of the reins so energetically
that the mare broke into a trot, and before the girls had come within
speaking distance of their uncle, the agent was well out of sight and
exulting in the possession of eleven dollars to pay for his morning's
work. Even if Ethel accepted that ten, he reflected, he would still be a
dollar ahead. But he was sure she would tell him to keep it; and he'd
"jest like to see thet air nabob git a penny back agin."

Meantime Uncle John's wrath, which was always an effervescent quality
with the little gentleman, had changed to wonder when he saw his nieces
approaching with the third red-and-gold book. Louise was leaning against
the rail fence and laughing hysterically, and suddenly a merry smile
appeared and spread over her uncle's round face as he said:

"Did you ever hear of such an audacious swindle in all your born days?"

"What will you do, Uncle?" asked the girl, wiping the tears of merriment
from her eyes. "Have the man arrested?"

"Of course not, my dear. It's worth the money just to learn what talents
the fellow possesses. Tell me, Patsy," he continued, as the other nieces
joined them, "what did you pay for your book?"

"Five dollars. Uncle. He said--"

"Never mind what he said, my dear. It's all right. I wanted it to add to
my collection. So far I've got three 'Lives of the Saints'--and I'm
thankful they're not cats, or there'd be nine lives for me to
accumulate."



CHAPTER X.

THE MYSTERY DEEPENS.

Ethel Thompson came over the next day, as she had promised, and the
sweet-faced, gentle school-mistress won the hearts of Uncle John's three
nieces without an effort. She was the eldest of them all, but her
retired country life had kept her fresh and natural, and Ethel seemed no
more mature than the younger girls except in a certain gravity that
early responsibility had thrust upon her.

Together the four laughing, light-hearted maids wandered through the
pines, where the little school-ma'am showed them many pretty nooks and
mossy banks that the others had not yet discovered. By following an
unsuspected path, they cut across the wooded hills to the waterfall,
where Little Bill Creek made a plunge of twenty feet into a rocky basin
below. In spite of the bubbles, the water here showed clear as crystal,
and the girls admiringly christened it the "Champagne Cup." They shed
their shoes and stockings and waded in the pool, enjoying the sport with
shrieks of merry laughter--more because they were happy than that there
was anything to laugh at.

Afterward they traced the stream down to a lovely glade a half mile
above Millville, where Ethel informed them the annual Sunday-school
picnic was always held, and then trailed across the rocky plateau to the
farm. By the time they reached home their appetites were well sharpened
for Mary's excellent luncheon, and the afternoon was devoted to rest
under the shady pines that grew beside the house.

It was now, when they felt thoroughly acquainted and at ease in one
another's society, that the girls indulged in talks concerning events in
their past, and Ethel was greatly interested in the nieces' recital of
their recent trip abroad with Uncle John. They also spoke frankly of
their old life together at Elmhurst, where Aunt Jane, who was Uncle
John's sister, had congregated her three nieces for the purpose of
choosing from among them one to inherit her vast estates. It seemed no
source of regret to any of them that a boy, Kenneth Forbes, had finally
succeeded to Aunt Jane's property, and this may be explained by the fact
that Uncle John had at that interesting juncture appeared to take charge
of the nieces. It was quite evident that the eccentric but kindly old
fellow had succeeded in making these three girls as happy as their
dispositions would allow them to be.

After the most interesting phases of their personal history had been
discussed, the nieces began, perhaps unconsciously, to draw from Ethel
her own story. It was simple enough, and derived its interest mainly
from the fact that it concerned their new friend. Her parents had both
passed away while she was young, and Ethel had always lived with her
father's father, big Will Thompson, a man reputed very well-to-do for
this section, and an energetic farmer from his youth.

Old Will had always been accused of being unsociable and considering
himself above the neighboring farmers; and it was true that Bob West,
the implement dealer, was his only associate before Captain Wegg
arrived. A casual acquaintance with the Millville people might easily
explain this.

With the advent of the Weggs, however, a strong friendship seemed to
spring up between the retired sea captain and the bluff, erratic old
farmer, which lasted until the fatal day when one died and the other
became a paralytic and a maniac.

"We have always thought," said Ethel, "that the shock of the Captain's
death unsettled my grandfather's mind. They had been sitting quietly in
Captain Wegg's room one evening, as they were accustomed to do, when
there was a sudden fall and a cry. Thomas ran in at once, and found
grandfather raving over the Captain's dead body. The old seaman had
heart disease, it seems, and had often declared he would die suddenly.
It was a great blow to us all, but especially to Joe."

Her voice softened at this last remark, and Patsy exclaimed,
impulsively:

"Tell us about Joe Wegg. Did you like him?"

"Yes," said Ethel, simply; "we were naturally thrown much together in
our childhood, and became staunch friends. Grandpa often took me with
him on his visits to the Weggs, and sometimes, but not often, the
Captain would bring Joe to see us. He was a quiet, thoughtful boy; much
like his mother, I imagine; but for some reason he had conceived an
intense dislike for his father and an open hatred for this part of the
country, where he was born. Aside from these morbid notions, Joe was
healthy-minded and frank and genuine. Had he been educated in any other
atmosphere than the gloomy one of the Wegg household I am sure Joe's
character would have been wholly admirable, and I have never blamed the
boy much for his peculiarities. Captain Wegg would not permit him to go
to school, but himself attended to such instructions as Joe could
acquire at home, and this was so meager and the boy so ambitious that I
think it was one cause of his discontent. I remember, when I was sent to
school at Troy, that Joe sobbed for days because he could not have the
same advantages. He used to tell me wonderful stories of what he would
accomplish if he could only get out into the world.

"When he implored his father to let him go away, Captain Wegg used to
assure Joe that he would some day be rich, and there was no need of his
preparing himself for either a business or a profession; but that did
not satisfy Joe's ambition, as you may imagine. And, when the end came,
scarcely a dollar of money could be found among the Captain's
possessions, and no other property than this farm; so it is evident he
deceived his son for some selfish purpose.

"Joe was at last free, and the only thing I reproach him for is going
away without a word to me or any of his friends. I heard, indirectly, of
his working his way through a technical school, for he was always crazy
about mechanics, and then he went to New York and I lost all further
trace of him."

"What do you suppose became of Captain Wegg's money?" asked Louise.

"I've no idea. It is a singular thing that most of my grandfather's
savings disappeared at the same time. On account of his mental condition
he can never tell us what became of his little fortune; but luckily the
returns from the farm, which we rent on shares, and my own salary as
teacher of the district school, enable us to live quite comfortably,
although we must be economical."

"Why, it's really a romance!" cried Patsy, who had listened eagerly.

"There are many romances in real life," added Beth, in her
undemonstrative way.

Louise said nothing, but her heart was throbbing with excitement
engendered by the tale, which so strongly corroborated the suspicions
she had begun to entertain. When Ethel had gone home Louise still
deliberated upon this fascinating mystery, and her resolve grew to force
some sort of an explanation from the smiling lips of Old Hucks. For the
sole available witness of that fatal night's tragedy, when one strong
man died and another was driven mad, was Thomas Hucks. The old servitor
was also in a position to know much of the causes leading up to the
catastrophe, he having been the confidential retainer of Captain Wegg
for many years. Hucks must speak; but the girl was wise enough to
realize that he would not do so unless urged by coaxing or forced by
strategy. There was doubtless good reason why the old man had remained
silent for three years. Her plan was to win his confidence. Interest him
in Joe's welfare, and then the truth must come out.

The frankly related story of Ethel had supplied Louise with the motive
for the crime, for that a crime had been committed she was now doubly
sure. Captain Wegg had money; old Will Thompson had money; both were
well-to-do men. In a retired country district, where there were no
banks, it was reasonable to suppose they kept large sums of money on
hand, and the knowledge of this fact had tempted some one to a dreadful
deed. Captain Wegg had been killed and old Thompson perhaps injured by a
blow upon the head from which he had never recovered. Any suspicion the
fair young detective may have entertained that Thompson himself had
killed his friend was eradicated by the fact that he had been robbed at
the same time.

Louise had originally undertaken her investigation through curiosity and
a desire to amuse herself by unveiling the mystery. Now she began to
reflect that she was an instrument of justice, for a discovery of the
truth might restore a fortune to poor Joe Wegg, now struggling with the
world, and put sweet Ethel Thompson in a position where the necessity
for her to teach school would be abolished. This thought added a strong
impulse to her determination to succeed.

Sunday afternoon the girl took blind Nora for a long drive through the
country, taking pains to explain to her all the points of interest they
came to, and delighting the old woman with her bright chatter. Louise
had been kind to Nora from the beginning, and her soft, sympathetic
voice had quite won the poor creature's heart.

On the way home, in the delightful summer twilight, the girl dexterously
led the conversation toward Nora's past history.

"Was Thomas a sailor when you married him?" she asked.

"Yes, miss. He were bos'n on Cap'n Wegg's schooner the 'Lively Kate,'
an' I were livin' with Miss Mary, as come to be Mrs. Wegg arterward."

"Oh, I see. And were you blind then, Nora?"

"No, miss. I went blind arter our great trouble come to us."

"Trouble? Oh, I'm so sorry, dear. What was it?"

The old woman was silent for a time. Then she said:

"I'd better not mention it, I guess. Thomas likes to forgit, an' when I
gets cryin' an' nervous he knows I've been thinkin' 'bout the
old trouble."

Louise was disappointed, but changed the subject adroitly.

"And Miss Mary, who was afterward Mrs. Wegg. Did you love her, Nora?"

"Indeed I did, child."

"What was she like?"

"She were gentle, an' sweet, an' the mos' beautiful creetur in
all--in--in the place where we lived. An' her fambily was that proud an'
aristocratic thet no one could tech 'em with a ten-foot pole."

"I see. Did she love Captain Wegg?"

"Nat'rally, sense she married of him, an' fit all her fambily to do it.
An' the Cap'n were thet proud o' her thet he thought the world lay in
her sweet eyes."

"Oh. I had an idea he didn't treat her well," remarked the girl,
soberly.

"That's wrong," declared Nora, promptly. "Arter the trouble come--fer it
come to the Weggs as well as to Tom an' me--the Cap'n sort o' lost heart
to see his Mary cry day arter day an' never be comforted. He were hard
hit himself, ye see, an' that made it a gloomy house, an' no mistake."

"Do you mean after you moved here, to the farm?"

"Yes, deary."

"I hear Captain Wegg was very fond of Ethel's grandfather," continued
Louise, trying to find an opening to penetrate old Nora's reserve.

"They was good friends always," was the brief reply.

"Did they ever quarrel, Nora?"

"Never that I knows of."

"And what do you suppose became of their money?" asked the girl.

"I don't know, child. Air we gettin' near home?"

"We are quite near, now. I wish you would open your heart to me, and
tell me about that great trouble, Nora. I might be able to comfort you
in some way."

The blind woman shook her head.

"There's no comfort but in forgettin'," she said; "an' the way to forgit
ain't to talk about it."

The unsatisfactory result of this conversation did not discourage
Louise, although she was sorry to meet with no better success. Gradually
she was learning the inside history of the Weggs. When she discovered
what that "great trouble" had been she would secure an important clue in
the mystery, she was sure. Nora might some time be induced to speak more
freely, and it was possible she might get the desired information from
Old Hucks. She would try, anyway.

A dozen theories might be constructed to account for this "great
trouble." The one that Louise finally favored was that Captain Wegg had
been guilty of some crime on the high seas in which his boatswain, Old
Hucks, was likewise implicated. They were obliged to abandon the sea and
fly to some out-of-the-way corner inland, where they could be safely
hidden and their whereabouts never discovered. It was the knowledge of
this crime, she conjectured, that had ruined sweet Mrs. Wegg's life and
made her weep day after day until her guilty husband became surly and
silent and unsociable.

Louise now began to cultivate Thomas, but her progress was slow. Patsy
seemed to be the old man's favorite, and for some reason he became glum
and uncommunicative whenever Louise was around. The girl suspected that
Nora had told her husband of the recent conversation, in spite of her
assertion that she wished to avoid all reference to their great trouble.



CHAPTER XI.

THREE AMATEUR DETECTIVES.

Puzzling her brain what to do next, Louise suddenly decided to confide
her secret to her two cousins. Not that she considered them capable of a
greater success than she could herself accomplish, but they might prove
valuable assistants in the capacity of lieutenants. She had great
respect for Beth's calm judgment and keen intuitions, and Patsy had a
way of accomplishing difficult things with ease.

The two girls listened to Louise with expressions of mingled wonder and
amusement while she confided to them her first suspicions that Captain
Wegg had been murdered, and then the bits of information she had
gathered to strengthen the surmise and assure her she was justified in
her efforts to untangle the web of mystery.

"You see, my dears," she explained, impressively, as the three lounged
upon the grass in the shade of the right wing of the house, "there is a
very interesting story about these people that ought to guide us
directly to a solution of the puzzle. A roving sea captain marries a
girl of good family in spite of the opposition of her relatives. His
boatswain, a confidential servant, marries the girl's maid. The next
thing we know is that a 'great trouble' causes them to flee--doubtless
some crime committed by the captain. It may have been robbery, or
perhaps piracy on the high seas; who knows? Anyhow, he steals away to
this forsaken spot, far from the sea or the railroads, and builds a fine
house on a worthless farm, showing that he has money, but that
retirement is his main object. Here the Weggs make no friends: but the
wife cries her eyes out until she dies miserably, leaving a son to the
tender mercies of a wicked father. So fearful is he of discovery that he
will not allow the boy to go to school, but tries to educate
him himself."

"Probably the captain's real name was not Wegg, at all," suggested
Patsy, entering into the spirit of the relation.

"Probably not, dear. He would assume some name, of course, so that it
might be more difficult to trace him," answered Louise. "But now--mark
me well, girls!--a Nemesis was on the track of this wicked sinner. After
many years the man Captain Wegg had wronged, or stolen from, or
something, discovered his enemy's hiding place. He promptly killed the
Captain, and probably recovered the money, for it's gone. Old Thompson,
Ethel's grandfather, happened to be present. The murderer also took his
money, and--"

"Oh, Louise! That isn't reasonable," objected Beth, who had been
following the story carefully.

"Why not?"

"Because you are making the wronged party as wicked as the man who
wronged him. When the avenger found his enemy he might force him to give
up his ill-gotten gains; I agree with you there; but he wouldn't be
liable to rob old Thompson, I'm sure."

"Beth is right," said Patsy, stoutly.

"But old Thompson lost his money at the same time, you know; at least
his money could never be found afterward. And I'm sure he was dealt some
blow on the head that made him crazy," answered Louise, positively.

They thought that over.

"I believe I can explain it, girls," said Beth, presently. "The avenger
found Captain Wegg, all right--just as Louise has said--and when he
found him he demanded a restitution of his money, threatening to send
the criminal to jail. That would be very natural, wouldn't it? Well,
Captain Wegg had spent a good deal of the money, and couldn't pay it all
back; so Ethel's grandfather, being his friend, offered to makeup the
balance himself rather than see his friend go to prison. That accounts
for the disappearance of all the money."

"If that is so," observed Patsy, "I don't see why the man, having got
his money back, should murder one and knock the other on the head."

It way a puzzle, they all acknowledged, and after discussing the matter
from every conceivable standpoint they were no nearer an explanation.
That's the way with mysteries; they're often hard to understand.

"The only thing that occurs to me as being sensible," said Louise,
finally, "is that after the money was paid over they got into a quarrel.
Then the avenger lost his temper and committed the murders."

"This talk about an avenger is all guess work," asserted Beth, calmly.
"I don't believe the facts point to an avenger at all."

"But the old crime--the great trouble--"

"Oh, we'll allow all that," returned Beth; "and I don't say that an
avenger wouldn't be the nicest person to exact retribution from the
wicked captain. But avengers don't always turn up, in real life, when
they ought to, girls; so we mustn't be too sure that one turned up in
this case."

"But now else can you account for the captain's murder?" objected
Louise.

"Well, some one else might know he had money, and that Ethel's
grandfather had money, too," was the reply. "Suppose the robbery and
murder had nothing to do with the old crime at all, but that the
murderer knew this to be a deserted place where he could make a good
haul without being discovered. The two old men sat in the right wing,
quite unsuspicious, when----"

"When in walks Mr. Murderer, chokes the captain, knocks his friend on
the brain-box, and makes off with the money!" continued Patsy,
gleefully. "Oh, girls, I'm sure we've got it right this time."

Louise reflected a moment.

"This country is almost a wilderness," she mused, aloud, "and few
strangers ever come here. Besides, a stranger would not know positively
that these two men had money. If we abandon the idea of an avenger, and
follow Beth's clue, then the murderer is still right here in Millville,
and unsuspected by any of his neighbors."

"Oh, Louise!" with startled glances over their shoulders.

"Let us be sensible, reasoning girls; not silly things trying to figure
out possible romances," continued Louise, with a pretty and impressive
assumption of dignity. "Do you know, I feel that some angel of
retribution has guided us to this lonely farmhouse and put the idea into
my head to discover and expose a dreadful crime."

"Succotash!" cried Patsy, irrelevantly. "You're romancing this minute,
Louise. The way you figure things out I wouldn't be surprised if you
accused me, or Uncle John, any time during the next half hour. Adopting
your last supposition, for the sake of argument, I'm interested to know
what inhabitant of sleepy old Millville you suspect."

"Don't get flighty, Patricia," admonished Beth. "This is a serious
matter, and Louise is in earnest. If we're going to help her we mustn't
talk rubbish. Now, it isn't a bad suggestion that we ought to look
nearer home for the key to this mystery. There's old Hucks."

"Hucks!"

"To be sure. No one knew so well as he the money affairs of the two men
who were robbed."

"I'm ashamed of you," said Patsy.

"And the man's smile is a mask!" exclaimed Louise.

"Oh, no!" protested Patsy.

"My dear, no person who ever lived could smile every minute, winter and
summer, rain or shine, day and night, and always have a reason for
the smile."

"Of course not," agreed Beth. "Old Hucks is a curious character. I
realized that when I had known him five minutes."

"But he's poor," urged Patsy, in defense of the old man. "He hasn't a
penny in the world, and McNutt told me if we turned Thomas and Nora away
they'd have to go to the poorhouse."

"That is no argument at all," said Louise, calmly. "If we consider the
fact that Old Hucks may be a miser, and have a craving for money without
any desire to spend it, then we are pretty close to a reason why he
should bide his time and then murder his old master to obtain the riches
he coveted. Mind you, I don't say Hucks is guilty, but it is our duty to
consider this phase of the question."

"And then," added Beth, "if Hucks should prove to be a miser, it is easy
to guess he would hide his wealth where he could secretly gloat over it,
and still continue to pose as a pauper."

"I don't believe it," said Patsy, stoutly.

"You'll never make a successful detective if you allow your personal
feelings to influence you," returned Louise. "I, too, sincerely hope
that Thomas is innocent; but we are not justified in acquitting him
until we have made a careful investigation and watched his actions."

"I'm quite sure he's connected with the mystery in some way," said Beth.
"It will do no harm to watch Old Hucks, as Louise suggests."

"And you might try to pump him, Patsy, and see if you can get him to
talk of the murder. Some careless remark might give us just the clue we
need and guide us to the real criminal. That would free Thomas from all
suspicion, you see."

"But why do you ask me to do this?" demanded Patsy. "Thomas and I are
good friends, and I'd feel like a traitor to try to get him to confess
a murder."

"If he is innocent, you have done no harm," said her eldest cousin; "and
if he is guilty you don't want him for your friend."

"He likes you, dear," added Beth, "and perhaps he will tell you frankly
all we want to know. There's another person, though, Louise, who might
tell us something."

"Who is that?"

"The little man with the golf-ball eyes; McNutt."

"Now, there's some sense in suspecting him," exclaimed Patsy. "We know
he's a robber, already, and a man who is clever enough to sell Uncle
John three 'Lives of the Saints' would stick at nothing, I'm sure."

"He hasn't enough courage to commit a great crime," observed Beth.

"But he may be able to give us some information," Louise asserted; "so I
propose we walk over to the town tomorrow morning and interview him."

This was promptly agreed to, for even Patsy, the least enthusiastic
detective of the three, was eager to find some sort of a solution of the
Wegg mystery. Meantime they decided to watch Old Hucks very carefully.

Beth happened to be present when Uncle John paid Thomas his weekly wage
that evening, and was interested to notice how the old man's hand
trembled with eagerness as he took the money.

"How much are you accustomed to receive?" Uncle John had asked.

"Nothing 'tall, sir, since Cap'n Wegg died," was the reply. "We was glad
enough to have a home, Nora an' me, 'thout 'spectin' wages."

"And there was no one here for you to serve," mused Uncle John. "But in
Captain Wegg's day, how much did he give you?"

Thomas hesitated, and his smile wavered an instant.

"My old master was also my old friend," said he, in a low voice; "an' I
ast him fer little money because my needs were little."

"Well, the conditions are now different," remarked Uncle John,
carelessly; "and while you are in my employ you shall have your wages
regularly. Will ten dollars a week be satisfactory?"

"Oh, sir!"

"And five for Nora."

"You are too good, sir. I--I--"

"Never mind, Thomas. If you want more at any time let me know."

It was then, as the old man took the fifteen dollars extended to him,
that Beth noted a flash in the mild blue eyes and a trembling of the
horny hands. Hucks was very glad to get the money; there was little
doubt of that.

She spoke of this incident to Louise, and the following morning they
tested the man again. All three girls being present, Beth tendered Old
Hucks two dollars, saying it was intended as a slight mark of her
appreciation of his attention. Thomas demurred at first, but on being
urged took the money with the same eager gesture he had before
displayed. Louise followed with a donation of a like sum, and Patsy gave
the old man still another two dollar bill. This generosity so amazed him
that tears stood in his eyes as he tried to thank them all. It was
noticed that the smile did not give way even to the tears, although it
was tinged with a pathetic expression that proved wonderfully affecting.
He concealed the offerings with a stealthy motion, as if ashamed of his
weakness in accepting them, and then hurried away to his work.

"Well," said Louise, when they were alone, "is Thomas a miser or not?"

"He clutched the money almost as if he loved it," observed Beth, in a
musing and slightly regretful tone.

"But think how poor he has been," pleaded Patsy, "and how destitute both
he and Nora are yet. Can we blame him for being glad to earn something
substantial at last?"

Somehow that did not seem to explain fully the old man's behavior, and
the girl who had championed him sighed and then gave a sudden shiver as
she remembered the awful suspicion that had fallen upon this strange
individual. If the proof must be accepted that Hucks had miserly
instincts, had not Beth accidentally stumbled upon a solution of the
whole mystery?

But Patsy would not believe it. If Thomas' open countenance lied, it was
hard to put faith in any one.



CHAPTER XII.

THE BAITING OF PEGGY M'NUTT.

By this time the three nieces were so thoroughly impressed with the
importance of the task they had undertaken that more ordinary things
failed to interest them. Louise longed to solve the mystery. Beth wanted
to punish the wrongdoers. Patsy yearned to exonerate the friends whom
she imagined unjustly accused. Therefore the triple alliance for
detective purposes was a strong one.

By mutual agreement they kept the matter secret from Uncle John, for
they realized what a triumph it would be to surprise the old gentleman
with proofs of their cleverness. To confide in him now would mean to
invite no end of ridicule or good natured raillery, for Uncle John had
not a grain of imagination or romance in his nature and would be unable
to comprehend the delights of this secret investigation.

Because he was in the dark the significant looks and unnatural gravity
of his nieces in the succeeding days puzzled the poor man greatly.

"What's wrong, girls?" he would ask. "Aren't you happy here? Do you miss
anything you'd like? Is it too quiet and dull at Millville to suit you?"

"Oh, no!" they would exclaim. "We are having a splendid time, and would
not leave the farm for anything."

And he often noticed them grouped in isolated places and conversing in
low, eager tones that proved "something was up." He felt somewhat
grieved that he was not their confidant, since these girls and their
loyal affection for him constituted the chief joy of his life. When he
put on his regulation fishing costume and carried his expensive rod and
reel, his landing net and creel to the brook for a day's sport, he could
no longer induce one of his girls to accompany him. Even Patsy pleaded
laughingly that she had certain "fish to fry" that were not to be found
in the brook.

Soon the three nieces made their proposed visit to McNutt, their idea
being to pump that individual until he was dry of any information he
might possess concerning the Wegg mystery. They tramped over to the
village after breakfast one morning and found the agent seated on the
porch before his little "office," by which name the front room of his
cottage was dignified. He was dressed in faded overalls, a checked shirt
and a broad-brimmed cheap straw hat. His "off foot," as he called it
with grim humor, was painted green and his other foot was bare and might
have been improved in color. Both these extremities rested on the rail
of the porch, while McNutt smoked a corncob pipe and stared at his
approaching visitors with his disconcerting, protruding eyes.

"Good morning, Mr. McNutt," said Louise, pleasantly. "We've come to see
if you have any books to sell."

The agent drew a long breath. He had at first believed they had come to
reproach him for his cruel deception; for although his conscience was
wholly dormant, he had at times been a bit uneasy concerning his
remarkable book trade.

"Uncle is making a collection of the 'Lives of the Saints.'" announced
Patsy, demurely. "At present he has but three varieties of this work,
one with several pages missing, another printed partly upside down, and
a third with a broken corner. He is anxious to secure some further
variations of the 'dee looks' Lives, if you can supply them."

Peggy's eyes couldn't stare any harder, so they just stared.

"I--I hain't got no more on hand," he stammered, fairly nonplussed by
the remarkable statement.

"No more? Oh, how sad. How disappointed we are," said Beth.

"We were depending so much on you. Mr. McNutt," added Louise, in a tone
of gentle reproach.

McNutt wiggled the toes of his good foot and regarded them reflectively.
These city folks were surely the "easiest marks" he had ever
come across.

"Ef ye could wait a few days," he began, hopefully, "I might----"

"Oh, no; we can't possibly wait a single minute," declared Patsy.
"Unless Uncle can get the Saints right away he will lose interest in the
collection, and then he won't care for them at all."

McNutt sighed dismally. Here was a chance to make good money by fleecing
the lambs, yet he was absolutely unable to take advantage of it.

"Ye--ye couldn't use any duck eggs, could ye?" he said, a sudden thought
seeming to furnish him with a brilliant idea.

"Duck eggs?"

"I got the dum-twistedest, extry fine lot o' duck eggs ye ever seen."

"But what can we do with duck eggs?" inquired Beth, wonderingly, while
Patsy and Louise tried hard not to shriek with laughter.

"W'y, set 'em under a hen, an' hatch 'em out."

"Sir," said Beth, "I strongly disapprove of such deceptions. It seems to
me that making a poor hen hatch out ducks, under the delusion that they
are chickens, is one of the most cruel and treacherous acts that
humanity can be guilty of. Imagine the poor thing's feelings when her
children take to water! I'm surprised you could suggest such a wicked
use for duck eggs."

McNutt wiggled his toes again, desperately.

"Can't use any sas'frass roots, can ye?"

"No, indeed; all we crave is the 'Lives of the Saints.'"

"Don't want to buy no land?"

"What have you got to sell?"

"Nuth'n, jest now. But ef ye'll buy I kin git 'most anything."

"Don't go to any trouble on our account, sir; we are quite content with
our splendid farm."

"Shoo! Thet ain't no good."

"Captain Wegg thought it was," answered Louise, quickly seizing this
opening. "Otherwise he would not have built so good a house upon it."

"The Cap'n were plumb crazy," declared the agent, emphatically. "He
didn't want ter farm when he come here; he jest wanted to hide."

The girls exchanged quick glances of intelligence.

"Why?"

"Why?" repeated McNutt. "Thet's a thing what's puzzled us fer years,
miss. Some thinks Wegg were a piret; some thinks he kidnaped thet pretty
wife o' his'n an' took her money; some thinks he tried to rob ol' Will
Thompson, an' Will killed him an' then went crazy hisself. There's all
sorts o' thinks goin' 'round; but who _knows_?"

"Don't you, Mr. McNutt?"

The agent was flattered by the question. As he had said, the Weggs had
formed the chief topic of conversation in Millville for years, and no
one had a more vivid interest in their history than Marshall McMahon
McNutt. He enjoyed gossiping about the Weggs almost as much as he did
selling books.

"I never thought I had no call to stick my nose inter other folkses
privit doin's," he said, after a few puffs at the corncob pipe. "But
they kain't hide much from Marsh McNutt, when he has his eyes open."

Patsy wondered if he could possibly close them. The eyelids seemed to be
shy and retiring.

"I seen what I seen," continued the little man, glancing impressively at
his attentive audience. "I seen Cap'n Wegg livin' without workin', fer
he never lifted a hand to do even a chore. I seen him jest settin'
'round an' smokin' his pipe an' a glowerin' like a devil on ev'ryone
thet come near. Say, once he ordered me off'n his premises--me!"

"What a dreadful man," said Patsy. "Did he buy any 'Lives of the
Saints?'"

"Not a Life. He made poor Ol' Hucks fetch an' carry fer him ev'ry
blessid minnit, an' never paid him no wages."

"Are you sure?" asked Louise.

"Sure as shootin'. Hucks hain't never been seen to spend a cent in all
the years he's been here."

"Hasn't he sold berries and fruit since the Captain's death?"

"Jest 'nough to pay the taxes, which ain't much. Ye see, young Joe were
away an' couldn't raise the tax money, so Ol' Hucks had to. But how they
got enough ter live on, him an' Nora, beats me."

"Perhaps Captain Wegg left some money," suggested Patsy.

"No; when Joe an' Hucks ransacked the house arter the Cap'n's death they
couldn't find a dollar. Cur'ous. Plenty o' money till he died, 'n' then
not a red cent. Curiouser yet. Ol' Will Thompson's savin's dis'peared,
too, an' never could be located to this day."

"Were they robbed, do you suppose?" asked Louise.

"Nat'rally. But who done it? Not Ol' Hucks, fer he's too honest, an'
hasn't showed the color of a nickel sense. Not Joe; 'cause he had to
borrer five dollars of Bob West to git to the city with. Who then?"

"Perhaps," said Louise, slowly, "some burglar did it."

"Ain't no burglers 'round these parts."

"I suppose not. Only book agents," remarked Beth.

McNutt flushed.

"Do ye mean as I did it?" he demanded, angrily. "Do ye mean as I killed
Cap'n Wegg an' druv 01' Will crazy, an' robbed the house?"

His features were fairly contorted, and his colorless eyes rolled
fearfully.

"If you did," said Beth, coolly, "you would be sure to deny it."

"I kin prove a alybi," answered the little man, calming down somewhat.
"I kin prove my ol' woman had me locked up in the chicken-coop thet
night 'cause I wouldn't split a lot o' cordwood thet were full o'
knots." He cast a half fearful glance over his shoulder toward the
interior of the cottage. "Next day I split 'em," he added, mildly.

"Perhaps," said Louise, again, "someone who knew Captain Wegg in the
days before he came here followed him to his retreat and robbed and
murdered him."

"Now ye've hit the nail on the head!" cried the agent, slapping his fat
thigh energetically. "Thet's what I allus claimed, even when Bob West
jest shook his head an' smiled sort o' superior like."

"Who is Bob West?" asked Louise, with interest.

"He's our implement man, an' hardware dealer. Bob were the on'y one o'
the Millville folks thet could git along with Cap'n Wegg, an' even he
didn't manage to be any special friend. Bob's rich, ye know. Rich as
blazes. Folks do say he's wuth ten thousan' dollars; but it don't set
Bob up any. He jest minds his business an' goes on sellin' plows an'
harvesters to the farmers an' takin' notes fer 'em."

"And you say he knew Captain Wegg well?" inquired Patsy.

"Better 'n' most folks 'round here did. Once er twicet a year the Cap'n
'd go to Bob's office an' set around an' smoke his pipe. Sometimes Bob
would go to the farm an' spend an' ev'nin'; but not often. Ol' Will
Thompson might be said to be the on'y friend the Cap'n really
hankered fer."

"I'd like to meet Mr. West," said Louise, casting a shrewd look at her
cousins. For here was another clue unearthed.

"He's in his store now." remarked McNutt, "Last buildin' on the left. Ye
can't miss it."

"Thank you. Good morning, sir."

"Can't use any buttermilk er Dutch cheese?"

"No, thank you."

McNutt stared after them disconsolately. These girls represented so much
money that ought to be in his pockets, and they were, moreover,
"innercent as turtle doves"; but he could think of no way to pluck their
golden quills or even to arrest their flight.

"Well, let 'em go," he muttered. "This thing ain't ended yit."



CHAPTER XIII.

BOB WEST, HARDWARE DEALER.

A few steps down the little street brought the girls to the hardware
store, quite the most imposing building in town. They crossed the broad
platform on which stood samples of heavy farm machinery and entered a
well-stocked room where many articles of hardware and house furnishings
were neatly and systematically arranged.

The place seemed deserted, for at that time of day no country people
were at Millville; but on passing down the aisle the visitor approached
a little office built at the rear of the store. Behind the desk Bob West
sat upon his high stool, gravely regarding his unusual customers over
the rims of his spectacles.

"Good morning," said Louise, taking the lead. "Have you a stew pan?"

The merchant left the office and silently walked behind the counter.

"Large or small, miss?" he then asked.

The girls became interested in stew pans, which they were scarcely able
to recognize by their official name. Mr. West offered no comment as they
made their selection.

"Can you send this to the Wegg farm?" asked Louise, opening her purse to
make payment.

West smiled.

"I have no means of delivering goods," said he; "but if you can wait a
day or two I may catch some farmer going that way who will consent
to take it."

"Oh. Didn't Captain Wegg purchase his supplies in the village?" asked
the girl.

"Some of them. But it is our custom here to take goods that we purchase
home with us. As yet Millville is scarcely large enough to require a
delivery wagon."

The nieces laughed pleasantly, and Beth said:

"Are you an old inhabitant, Mr. West?"

"I have been here thirty-five years."

"Then you knew Captain Wegg?" Louise ventured.

"Very well."

The answer was so frank and free from embarrassment that his questioner
hesitated. Here was a man distinctly superior to the others they had
interviewed, a man of keen intellect and worldly knowledge, who would be
instantly on his guard if he suspected they were cross-examining him. So
Louise, with her usual tact, decided to speak plainly.

"We have been much interested in the history of the Wegg family," she
remarked, easily; "and perhaps it is natural for us to speculate
concerning the characters of our predecessors. It was so odd that
Captain Wegg should build so good a house on such a poor farm."

"Yes."

"And he was a sea captain, who retired far from the sea, which he must
have loved."

"To be sure."

"It made him dissatisfied, they say, as well as surly and unsociable;
but he stuck it out even after his poor wife died, and until the day of
the murder."

"Murder?" in a tone of mild surprise.

"Was it not murder?" she asked, quickly.

He gave his shoulders a quiet shrug.

"The physician pronounced it heart disease, I believe."

"What physician?"

"Eh? Why, one who was fishing in the neighborhood for trout, and staying
at the hotel. Old Dr. Jackson was in Huntington at the time, I
remember."

The girls exchanged significant glances, and West noted them and smiled
again.

"That murder theory is a new one to me," he said; "but I see now why it
originated. The employment of a strolling physician would give color to
the suspicion."

"What do you think, sir?" asked Patsy, who had been watching the man's
expression closely.

"I? What do I think? Why, that Captain Wegg died from heart disease, as
he had often told me he was sure to do in time."

"Then what made old Mr. Thompson go mad?" inquired Beth.

"The shock of his friend's sudden death. He had been mentally unbalanced
for some time previous--not quite mad, you understand, but showing by
his actions at times that his brain was affected."

"Can you explain what became of their money?" asked Louise, abruptly.

West gave a start, but collected himself in an instant and covered the
action with another shrug.

"I cannot say what become of their money," he answered.

It struck both Beth and Louise that his tone indicated he would not,
rather than that he could not say. Before they had time to ask another
questioned he continued:

"Will you take the saucepan with you, then, or shall I try to send it in
a day or so?"

"We will take it, if you please," answered Louise. But as he wrapped it
into a neat parcel she made one more effort.

"What sort of a young man was Joseph Wegg?"

"Joe? A mere boy, untried and unsettled. A bright boy, in his way, and
ambitious to have a part in the big world. He's there now, I believe."

He spoke with an air of relief, and handed Louise the parcel.

"Thank you, young ladies. Pray call again if I can be of service to
you," he added, in a brisker tone.

They had no recourse but to walk out, which they did without further
words. Indeed, they were all three silent until they had left the
village far behind and were half way to the farm.

Then Patsy said, inquiringly:

"Well, girls?"

"We have progressed," announced Louise, seriously.

"In what way?"

"Several things are impressed upon my mind," replied the girl. "One is
McNutt's absurd indignation when he thought we hinted that he was the
murderer."

"What do you make of that?" queried Patsy.

"It suggests that he knows something of the murder, even if he is
himself wholly innocent. His alibi is another absurdity."

"Then that exonerated Old Hucks," said Patsy, relieved.

"Oh, not at all. Hucks may have committed the deed and McNutt knows
about it. Or they might have been partners in the crime."

"What else have you learned, Louise?" asked Beth.

"That the man West knows what became of the money."

"He seems like a very respectable man," asserted Patsy.

"Outwardly, yes; but I don't like the cold, calculating expression in
his eyes. He is the rich man of this neighborhood. Do you suppose he
acquired a fortune honestly in this forsaken district, where everyone
else is poor as a church mouse?"

"Seems to me," said Patsy, discontentedly, "that the plot thickens, as
they say in novels. If we interview many more people we shall find
ourselves suspecting an army."

"Not at all, my dear," replied Louise, coldly. "From our present
knowledge the murder lies between the unknown avenger and Hucks, with
the possibility that McNutt is implicated. This avenger may be the
stranger who posed as a physician and said Captain Wegg died of heart
disease, in order to prevent the simple people from suspecting a murder.
His fishing was all a blind. Perhaps McNutt was his accomplice. That
staring scarecrow would do anything for money. And then we come to the
robbery. If Hucks did the murder he took the money, and perhaps West,
the hardware dealer, knows this. Or West may have arrived at the house
after the mysterious stranger committed the deed, and robbed the two
men himself."

"And perhaps he didn't," said Patsy, skeptically. "Do you know, girls,
I'd like to find Joe Wegg. He could put us right, I'm sure."

"Joe!"

"Yes. Why don't we suspect him of something? Or Ethel; or old Nora?"

"Do be sensible, Patsy," said Beth, impatiently.

But Louise walked on a way in silence. Presently she remarked:

"I'm glad you mentioned Joe Wegg. The boy gives me an idea that may
reconcile many conflicting suspicions."

"In what way, Louise?"

"I'll tell you when I've thought it out," she replied.



CHAPTER XIV.

THE MAJOR IS PUZZLED.

Ethel came frequently to visit the girls at the Wegg farm, and at such
times Uncle John treated her with the same affectionate consideration he
bestowed upon his nieces, and made her so cordially welcome that the
little school teacher felt entirely at her ease. The girls did not
confide to Ethel their investigation of the Wegg mystery, but in all
other matters gave her their full confidence. Together they made
excursions to the Falls, to the natural caves on the rocky hill called
Mount Parnassus, or rowed on the lake, or walked or drove, as the mood
seized them. But mostly they loved the shade of the pines and the broad
green beside the quaint mansion Captain Wegg had built, and which now
contained all the elements of a modern summer home.

Once Louise asked Ethel, casually, if she knew what "great trouble" had
come to Hucks and his wife in their early life, but the girl frankly
answered that the old people had never referred to anything of the kind
in her presence.

Finally a telegram announced the arrival of Major Doyle to join the
party at the farm. Patsy was in the seventh heaven of delight, and drove
Joe over to the Junction to meet her father on the arrival of the
morning train.

The Major was a prime favorite with all the party and his coming infused
new life into the household. He was the type of educated, polished,
open-hearted Irish gentleman it is always a delight to meet, and Uncle
John beamed upon his brother-in-law in a way that betokened a hearty
welcome. It was a source of much satisfaction to lug the Major over the
farm and prove to him how wise Mr. Merrick had been in deciding to spend
the summer on his own property; and the Major freely acknowledged that
he had been in error and the place was as charming as anyone could wish.
It was a great treat to the grizzled old warrior to find himself in the
country, away from every responsibility of work, and he promised himself
a fortnight of absolute rest, with the recreation of beholding his
beloved Patsy as often as he pleased.

Of course, the girl would tell her father about the Wegg mystery, for
Patsy had a habit of telling him everything; therefore the cousins
decided to take the Major freely into their confidence, so as to obtain
the benefit of his opinion. That could not be done the first day, of
course, for on that day Uncle John insisted on displaying the farm and
afterward carrying the Major a willing prisoner to watch him fish in the
brook. But on the following morning the girls surrounded Patsy's father
and with solemn faces recounted their suspicions, the important clues
they had unearthed, and their earnest desire to right the great wrong
that had been done by apprehending the criminal.

The Major smoked his after breakfast cigar and listened attentively. The
story, told consecutively, was quite impressive. In spite of his long
experience in buffeting the world, the old soldier's heart was still as
simple as that of a child, and the recital awakened his sympathies
at once.

"'Tis evident, me children," said he, in his quaint way, "that you've
shtumbled on the inside of a crime that doesn't show on the outside.
Many of the things you mention are so plain that he who runs may read;
but I've remarked that it's just the things ye don't suspect in real
life that prove to be the most important."

"That is true, Major," commented Louise. "At first it was just to amuse
ourselves that we became amateur detectives, but the developments are so
startling and serious that we now consider it our duty to uncover the
whole dreadful crime, in the interests of justice."

"Just so," he said, nodding.

"But I'm sure Old Hucks is innocent!" declared Patsy, emphatically.

"Then he is," asserted the Major; "for Patsy's always right, even when
she's wrong. I've had me eye on that man Hucks already, for he's the
merriest faced villain I ever encountered. Do you say he's shy with
you girls?"

"He seems afraid of us, or suspicious, and won't let us talk to him,"
answered Beth.

"Leave him to me," proposed the Major, turning a stern face but
twinkling eyes upon the group. "'Twill be my task to detect him. Leave
him to me, young women, an' I'll put the thumb-screws on him in
short order."

Here was the sort of energetic confederate they had longed for. The
Major's assurance of co-operation was welcome indeed, and while he
entered heartily into their campaign he agreed that no mention of the
affair ought to reach Uncle John's ears until the case was complete and
they could call upon the authorities to arrest the criminal.

"It's me humble opinion," he remarked, "that the interesting individual
you call the 'avenger' was put on the trail by someone here--either
Thomas Hucks, or the timber-toed book agent, or the respectable hardware
man. Being invited to come and do his worst, he passed himself as a
docther on a fishing excursion, and having with deliberate intent
murthered Captain Wegg, got himself called by the coroner to testify
that the victim died of heart disease. A very pretty bit of
scoundrelism; eh, me dears?"

"But the robber--who do you think he was?" asked Louise.

"That I've still to discover. You inform me that Hucks is eager for
money and acts like a miser. I've seen the time I was eager for money
meself, and there's not a miserly hair on me bald head. But exceptions
prove the rule. I'll watch our smiling Thomas and make a report later."

Within half an hour he was telling Hucks a funny story and slapping the
old man upon the back as familiarly as if he had known him for years. He
found an opportunity that same day to give Thomas a dollar in return for
a slight service, and was amazed at the eagerness with which the coin
was clutched and the earnestness of the thanks expressed. It really did
seem as if the man was fond of money. But when the Major tried to draw
Hucks into speaking of his past history and of Captain Wegg's singular
life and death, the old fellow became reserved at once and evaded the
inquiries most skillfully.

That night, as the Major strolled in the orchard to smoke his last cigar
after all the others had retired to bed, he noticed Hucks leave the back
door of the lean-to with a parcel under his arm and pass hurriedly
around the barn. After a little hesitation he decided to follow the man,
and crept stealthily along in the shadow of the trees and buildings
until he found himself at the edge of the berry-patch that was in the
rear of the outbuildings. But there he paused irresolutely, for Thomas
had completely disappeared.

The Major was puzzled, but decided to watch for the man's return. So he
took a position where he could watch the rear door of the house and
smoked patiently for nearly an hour before Hucks returned and let
himself quietly in.

He said nothing to the girls next day of this mysterious proceeding, but
on the following night again took his station in the orchard to watch.

Sure enough, as soon as the house was quiet the old servant came out
with a bundle underneath his arm; but this time he led his blind wife by
the other hand.

The Major gave a low whistle and threw away his cigar. The night was so
dark that he had little difficulty in following the aged pair closely
enough to keep their shadowy forms in sight, without the risk of being
discovered. They passed around the barn and along a path that led
through the raspberry bushes back of the yard. There were several acres
of these bushes, and just now they were full-leaved and almost shoulder
high. The path wound this way and that, and branched in several
directions. Twice the Major thought he had lost his quarry, but was
guided aright by their soft footfalls. The ground dipped here and there,
and as they entered one of the hollows Major Doyle was startled to
observe the twinkle of a dim light ahead. A minute later he saw the
outlines of a little frame building, and within this Old Hucks and Nora
presently disappeared.



CHAPTER XV.

THE MAN IN HIDING.

Cautiously the Major approached the cabin, which seemed to have been
built as a place for the berry pickers to assemble and pack their fruit.
It was constructed of rough boards and had a little window in the side
nearest the dwelling house and a door on the opposite side.

Creeping near to the window the Major obtained a clear view of the
interior. Upon a dilapidated wicker settee, which had one end propped
with a box, partially reclined the form of a man whose right arm was in
splints and supported by a sling, while his head was covered with
plasters and bandages. The man's back was toward the window, but from
his slender form and its graceful poise the Major imagined him young.

Old Nora held the left hand of this mysterious person in a warm clasp,
bending now and then to press a kiss upon it, while Hucks busied himself
opening the parcel he had brought and arranging various articles of food
on a rickety stand at the head of the couch. The old man's smile was
more benevolent and cheery than ever, and his actions denoted that
strange, suppressed eagerness the Major had marked when he had taken
the money.

The three spoke little, and in tones so low that the spy outside the
window failed to catch them. Soon the injured man began to eat, feeding
himself laboriously with his left hand. But his hunger was quickly
satisfied, and then he lay back wearily upon his pillows, while Nora
tenderly spread a coverlet over him.

After this the old couple did not linger long. Hucks poured some water
from a jug into a tumbler, glanced around the little room to see that
everything was in order, and then--after he and Nora had both kissed the
bandaged forehead--blew out the candle and retired.

The Major crouched low in the berry bushes until the couple had passed
by; then he rose and thoughtfully followed after them.

Whatever Patsy's father might have thought of the Wegg farm mystery
before, this adventure convinced him that the girls were not altogether
foolish in imagining a romance connected with the place. And,
notwithstanding Patsy's loyal defense of Old Hucks, he was evidently
tangled up in the affair to a large extent, and could explain if he
chose much that was now puzzling the girl detectives.

After careful thought the Major decided to confide in Uncle John, at
this juncture, rather than in the nieces; since the latest developments
were more fitted for a man's interference.

By good fortune the girls had an engagement the next day, and set out
together in the surrey to visit Ethel Thompson and lunch with her in the
rose bower, which was the pride of the little school teacher's garden.
As soon as they were gone the Major hunted up Uncle John and said:

"Come with me, sir."

"I won't," was the brisk reply; "I'm going fishing, and whoever wishes
my society must come with me."

"You'll not catch anything fishing, but you're very liable to catch
something if you follow my lead," said the Major, meaningly.

"What's up, Gregory?"

"I'm not sure what it is, John." And then he carefully explained his
discovery that an injured man was occupying the cabin in the berry
patch, and seemed to be the object of the Hucks' tender care.

"It's the secrecy of the thing that astounds me most, sir," he added.
"If all was open and above board, I'd think little enough of it."

Uncle John's kindly interest was at once aroused, and he proposed that
they go directly to the cabin and interview the man in hiding. Hucks
being at the time busy in the barn, the two men sauntered into the berry
patch without being observed, and then walked briskly along the winding
paths until they sighted the building.

Pausing at the window, they saw the man still reclining upon his cot,
and holding in his left hand a book--one of Patsy's, the Major
observed--which he was quietly engaged in reading. Then they moved
around to the door, which Uncle John pushed open.

Without hesitation, the two men entered and stood gazing down upon the
strange occupant of the place.

"Good morning," said Mr. Merrick, while the Major nodded a greeting.

The man half arose, moving stiffly.

"Pardon me, sirs," he said, rather startled at the interruption; "I
regret that I am physically unable to receive you with more courtesy."

The Major gazed into the partially bandaged face with a glimmer of
awakening recognition.

"H-m! Ha! If I'm not mistaken," said he, "it's Joseph Wegg."

"Oh; is it?" asked Uncle John, looking upon the young man curiously.
"What's happened to you, Joseph?"

"Just an automobile accident, sir. The steering gear broke, and we went
over an embankment."

"I see."

"Are you Mr. Merrick, sir."

"Yes."

"I owe you an apology for intruding upon your premises in this way, and
beg you to forgive the seeming impertinence. But I've been rather
unlucky of late, sir, and without this refuge I don't know what would
have become of me. I will explain, if you will permit me."

Uncle John nodded.

"After I had squandered the money you paid me, through Major Doyle, for
this farm, in a vain endeavor to protect a patent I had secured, I was
forced to become a chauffeur to earn my livelihood. I understand
automobiles, you know, and obtained employment with a wealthy man who
considered me a mere part of his machine. When the accident occurred,
through no fault of mine, I was, fortunately, the only person injured;
but my employer was so incensed over the damage to his automobile that
he never even sent to inquire whether I lived or died. At a charity
hospital they tried to mend my breaks and tinker up my anatomy. My
shoulder-blade was shattered, my arm broken in three places, and four
ribs were crashed in. The wounds in my head are mere abrasions of the
scalp, and not serious. But it has taken me a long time to mend, and the
crowded, stuffy hospital got on my nerves and worried me. Being
penniless and friendless, I wrote to Thomas and asked him if he could
find a way to get me to the old farm, for I never imagined you would
yourself take possession of the deserted place you had bought.

"Thomas and Nora have cared for me since I was born, you know, and the
old man was greatly distressed by the knowledge of my sad condition. He
did not tell me you were here, for fear I would hesitate to come, but he
sent me the money you had given him and Nora for wages, together with
all that the young ladies had kindly given him. I was thus enabled to
leave the hospital, which I had come to detest, and journey to my old
home. I arrived at the Junction on a night train, and Thomas met me with
your surrey, drove me here under cover of darkness, and concealed me in
this out-of-the-way place, hoping you would not discover me.

"I regret that I was thus foisted upon you, believe me, sir; but, being
here, I have no means of getting away again. Thomas Hucks has had little
worldly experience, and cannot realize the full extent of the imposition
he has practiced. He feeds me from your table, and is hoarding up his
money for me against the time I shall have recovered sufficiently to
leave. I think that is the full explanation, Mr. Merrick."

Again Uncle John nodded.

"How are you?" he asked.

"Doing finely, sir. I can walk a little, and my appetite is improving.
The doctors said my shoulder would never be very strong again, but I'm
beginning to hope they were mistaken. My ribs seem all right, and in
another ten days I shall remove the splints from my arm."

"You have no medical attendance?"

"Not since I left the hospital. But I imagine this pure, bracing air is
better for me than a dozen doctors," was the cheerful reply.

"And what are your future plans?"

The young man smiled. He was little more than a boy, but his questioner
noticed that he had a fine manly face and his eye was clear and
steadfast.

"Nothing further than to get to work again as soon as I am able to
undertake it," he said.

Uncle John looked thoughtfully, and drummed with his finger upon the
little table.

"Joseph," he remarked, presently, "I bought this farm at a price
altogether too small, considering its value."

The boy flushed.

"Please do not say that!" he exclaimed, hastily. "I am well aware that I
virtually robbed you, and my only excuse is that I believed I would win
my fight and be able to redeem the place. But that is over now, and you
must not think that because I am ill and helpless I am an object
of charity."

"Phoo!" said the little man; "aren't you accepting charity from Old
Hucks?"

"But he stands as a second father to me. He is an old retainer of my
family, and one of my ambitions is to secure a home for him and Nora in
their old age. No; I do not feel at all embarrassed in accepting money
or assistance from Thomas."

"Young man," said Uncle John, sternly, "one of the follies of youth is
the idea of being independent of the good-will of your fellow-creatures.
Every person who lives is dependent on some other person for something
or other, and I'll not allow you to make a fool of yourself by refusing
to let me take you in hand. Your brain is affected--"

"It is not!"

"You are mentally unbalanced, and need a guardian. That's me. You are
helpless and cannot resist, so you're my prisoner. Dare to defy me, dare
to oppose my wishes in any way, and I'll have you put in a
straight-jacket and confined in a padded cell. Understand me, sir?"

Joseph Wegg looked into the little man's round face until the tears
filled his own eyes and blurred his vision.

"Won't you protect me, Major Doyle?" he asked, weakly.

"Not I," said the Major, stoutly. "This brother-in-law of mine, who
connected himself with me without asking permission, is a perfect demon
when 'roused, and I'll not meddle with any opposition to his desires. If
you value your life and happiness, Joseph Wegg, you'll accept Mr.
Merrick as a guardian until he resigns of his own accord, and then it's
likely you'll wish he hadn't."

"I don't deserve----" began the young man, brokenly; but Uncle John
quickly interrupted him.

"No one deserves anything," said he; "but everyone gets something or
other, nevertheless, in this vale of tears. If you'll kindly remember
that you've no right to express an opinion in the presence of your
guardian, we'll get along better together. Now, then, you're going to
leave here, because the place is not comfortable. My guests fill every
room in my house, so you can't go there. But the hotel in Millville is a
cheerful-looking place, and I've noticed some vine-covered windows that
indicate pleasant and sunny rooms. Major, go and tell Hucks to hitch
that groaning, balky Daniel to the ancient buggy, and then to drive this
young man over to the hotel. We'll walk."

The Major started at once, and Uncle John continued: "I don't know
whether this arrangement suits you or not, Joseph, but it suits me; and,
as a matter of fact, it's none of your business. Feel able to take
a ride?"

The boy smiled, gratefully.

"Yes, indeed, Mr. Merrick," said he, and was shrewd enough not to
venture a word of thanks.



CHAPTER XVI.

A MATTER OF SPECULATION.

Old Hucks, still smiling, but dreadfully nervous over the discovery of
Joe, and Mr. Merrick's sudden activity in the boy's behalf, speedily
harnessed Daniel and induced the reluctant steed to amble down the path
to the cabin. Leaning on Uncle John's arm, the invalid walked to the
buggy and was assisted to mount to the seat beside Thomas. Then away
they started, and, although Dan obeyed Hucks more willingly than any
other driver, the Major and Uncle John walked 'cross-lots and reached
the hotel a good fifteen minutes in advance of the equipage.

The Millville Hotel depended almost entirely for patronage upon the
commercial travelers who visited the place periodically to sell goods to
the merchants, and these did not come too often, because trade was never
very energetic and orders never very large. Bob West boarded at the
hotel, and so did Ned Long, a "farm hand," who did sundry odd jobs for
anyone who needed him, and helped pay his "keep" by working for Mrs.
Kebble when not otherwise engaged.

Mrs. Kebble was the landlady, and a famous cook. Kate Kebble, a
slatternly girl of sixteen, helped her mother do the work and waited on
the table. Chet Kebble, the landlord, was a silent old man, with
billy-goat whiskers and one stray eye, which, being constructed of
glass, usually assumed a slanting gaze and refused to follow the
direction of its fellow. Chet minded the billiard-room, which was mostly
patronized Saturday nights, and did a meager business in fire insurance;
but he was "so eternal lazy an' shifless," as Mrs. Kebble sharply
asserted, that he was considered more a "hanger-on" of the establishment
than its recognized head.

The little rooms of the hotel were plainly furnished but maintained with
exceptional neatness.

The one in the east corner of the second floor met with the approval of
Uncle John and the Major, and was promptly engaged. It was cheerful and
sunny, with outlooks on the lake and the village, and contained a lounge
as well as the bed.

When the invalid arrived, he was assisted to this apartment and
installed as its permanent occupant.

"Any baggage?" asked Mr. Merrick.

"There's a small trunk lying at the Junction," said Joe; "but it
contains little of importance."

"Well, make yourself at home, my boy, and get well at your leisure,"
remarked Uncle John. "Mrs. Kebble has promised to look after you, and
the Major and I will stop in now and then and see how you progress."

Then he went out, engaged Nick Thorne to go to the Junction for the
boy's trunk, and selected several things at the store that he thought
might be useful to the invalid. Afterward he marched home again beside
the Major, feeling very well pleased with his morning's work.

When the girls reached home late in the afternoon, they were thrown into
a state of great excitement by the news, briefly related by their uncle,
that Joseph Wegg had returned to Millville "considerably smashed" by an
automobile accident, and was now stopping at the village hotel
for repairs.

They refrained from making remarks upon the incident until they were
alone, when the secret council of three decided to make Joe Wegg's
acquaintance as soon as possible, to discover what light the young man
might be able to throw upon the great mystery.

"Do you know, girls," said Louise, impressively, "it almost seems as if
fate had sent Joe Wegg here to be an instrument in the detection of the
murderer and robber of his poor father."

"If Joe knew about it, why didn't he track the villain down himself?"
inquired Patsy.

"Perhaps he hasn't suspected the truth," said Beth. "Often those who are
closely concerned with such tragedies do not observe the evidences of
crime as clearly as outsiders."

"Where did you get that information?" demanded Patsy.

"From one of Anna Doyle Oppenheim's detective stories," answered Beth,
seriously. "I've been reading up on such things, lately."

"Detective stories," said Louise, reflectively, "are only useful in
teaching us to observe the evidences of crime. This case, for example,
is so intricate and unusual that only by careful thought, and following
each thread of evidence to its end, can we hope to bring the criminal
to justice."

"That seems to me conceited," observed Miss Doyle, composedly.
"Detective stories don't have to stick to facts; or, rather, they can
make the facts to be whatever they please. So I don't consider them as
useful as they are ornamental. And this isn't a novel, girls; it's
mostly suspicion and slander."

"You don't seem able to be in earnest about anything," objected Beth,
turning a little red.

"But I try to be." said Patricia.

"We are straying from the subject now under discussion," remarked
Louise. "I must say that I feel greatly encouraged by the sudden
appearance of the Wegg boy. He may know something of his father's former
associates that will enable us to determine the object of the murder and
who accomplished it."

"Captain Wegg was killed over three years ago," suggested Miss Doyle,
recovering easily from her rebuff. "By this time the murderer may have
died or moved to Madagascar."

"He is probably living within our reach, never suspecting that justice
is about to overtake him," asserted Louise. "We must certainly go to
call upon this Wegg boy, and draw from him such information as we can. I
am almost certain that the end is in sight."

"We haven't any positive proof at all, yet," observed Patsy, musingly.

"We have plenty of circumstantial evidence," returned Beth. "There is
only one way to explain the facts we have already learned, and the
theory we have built up will be a hard one to overthrow. The flight of
Captain Wegg to this place, his unhappy wife, the great trouble that old
Nora has hinted at, the--"

"The great trouble ought to come first," declared Louise. "It is the
foundation upon which rest all the mysterious occurrences following, and
once we have learned what the great trouble was, the rest will be
plain sailing."

"I agree with you," said Beth; "and perhaps Joseph Wegg will be able to
tell us what the trouble was that ruined the lives of his parents, as
well as of Old Hucks and his wife, and caused them all to flee here to
hide themselves."

It was not until the following morning that the Major found an
opportunity to give the confederates a solemn wink to indicate he had
news to confide to them. They gathered eagerly on the lawn, and he told
them of the finding of Joe Wegg in the isolated cabin, and how old
Thomas and Nora, loving the boy as well as if he had been their own
child, had sacrificed everything to assist him in his extremity.

"So ye see, my avenging angels, that ye run off the track in the Hucks
matter," he added, smiling at their bewildered faces.

Patsy was delighted at this refutation of the slanderous suspicions that
Thomas was a miser and his smiling face a mask to hide his innate
villainy. The other girls were somewhat depressed by the overthrow of
one of their pet theories, and reluctantly admitted that if Hucks had
been the robber of his master and old Will Thompson, he would not have
striven so eagerly to get enough money to send to Joe Wegg. But they
pointed out that the old servant was surely hiding his knowledge of
Captain Wegg's past, and could not be induced to clear up that portion
of the mystery which he had full knowledge of. So, while he might be
personally innocent of the murder or robbery, both Beth and Louise were
confident he was attempting to shield the real criminal.

"But who is the real criminal?" inquired Patsy.

"Let us consider," answer Louise, with the calm, businesslike tone she
adopted in these matters. "There is the strolling physician, whom we
call the Unknown Avenger, for one. A second suspect is the man McNutt,
whose nature is so perverted that he would stick at nothing. The third
suspicious individual is Mr. Bob West."

"Oh, Louise! Mr. West is so respectable, and so prosperous," exclaimed
Patsy.

"It's a far jump from McNutt to West," added Beth.

"Leaving out Hucks," continued Louise, her eyes sparkling with the
delightful excitement of maintaining her theories against odds, "here
are three people who might have been concerned in the robbery or murder.
Two of them are under our hands; perhaps Joseph Wegg may be able to tell
us where to find the third."

They pleaded so hard with the Major to take them to call upon the
injured youth that very day, that the old gentleman consented, and,
without telling Uncle John of their plans, they drove to Millville in
the afternoon and alighted at the hotel.

The Major went first to the boy's room, and found him not only very
comfortable, but bright and cheerful in mood.

"At this rate, sir," he said, smilingly, "I shall be able to discharge
my guardian in quick time. I'm twice the man I was yesterday."

"I've brought some young ladies to call upon you," announced the Major.
"Will you see them?"

Joe flushed at first, remembering his plastered skull and maimed
condition. But he could not well refuse to receive his callers, whom he
guessed to be the three girls Old Hucks had praised to him so highly.

"It will give me great pleasure, sir," he replied.

An invalid is usually of interest to women, so it is no wonder that the
three young ladies were at once attracted by the bright-faced boy, who
reclined upon his couch before the vine-covered windows. They thought of
Ethel, too, and did not marvel that the girl grieved over the loss of
this friend of her childhood.

Joe had to recount the adventure with the automobile, which led to his
injuries, and afterward give an account of his life at the hospital.
That led, naturally, to the timely assistance rendered him by the
faithful Thomas, so that Louise was able to broach the subject nearest
her heart.

"We have been greatly interested in your old servants--whom we acquired
with the farm, it seems--and all of us admire their simplicity and
sincerity," she began.

"Nora is a dear," added Beth.

"And Thomas is so cheerful that his smile is enough to vanquish any
attack of the blues," said Patsy.

"The Hucks are the right sort, and no mistake," declared the Major,
taking his cue from the others.

This praise evidently delighted the boy. They could have found no more
direct way to win his confidence.

"Nora was my mother's maid from the time she was a mere girl," said he;
"and Thomas sailed with my father many years before I was born."

They were a little surprised to hear him speak so frankly. But Louise
decided to take advantage of the opening afforded her.

"Nora has told us that some great trouble came to them years ago--a
trouble that also affected your own parents. But they do not wish to
talk about it to us."

His face clouded.

"No, indeed," said he. "Their loving old hearts have never recovered
from the blow. Would you like to know their history? It is a sad story,
and pitiful; but I am sure you would understand and appreciate my old
friends better after hearing it."

Their hearts fairly jumped with joy. Would they like to hear the story?
Was it not this very clue which they had been blindly groping for to
enable them to solve the mystery of the Wegg crime? The boy marked their
interest, and began his story at once, while the hearts of the three
girls sang-gladly: "At last--at last!"



CHAPTER XVII.

JOE TELLS OF "THE GREAT TROUBLE."

"As a young man, my father was a successful sea captain," said the boy,
"and, before he was thirty, owned a considerable interest in the ship he
sailed. Thomas Hucks was his boatswain,--an honest and able seaman in
whom my father became much interested. Hucks was married, and his wife
was an attendant in the employ of Hugh Carter, a wealthy ship chandler
of Edmunton, the port from which my fathers ship sailed. Thomas had some
difficulty in enjoying his wife's society when on shore, because old
Carter did not want him hanging around the house; so Captain Wegg
good-naturedly offered to intercede for him.

"Carter was a gruff and disagreeable man, and, although my father had
been a good customer, he refused his request and threatened to discharge
Nora, which he did. This made Captain Wegg angry, and he called upon
Mary Carter, whose especial attendant Nora had been, to ask her to take
the girl back. Mary was a mild young lady, who dared not oppose her
father; but the result of the interview was that the sea captain and
Mary Carter fell mutually in love. During the next two or three years,
whenever the ship was in port, the lovers frequently met by stealth at
the cottage of Mrs. Hucks, a little place Thomas had rented. Here my
father and mother were finally married.

"Meantime Nora had a son, a fine young chap, I've heard; and presently
my mother, who had a little fortune of her own, plucked up enough
courage to leave her father's roof, and took up her abode in a pretty
villa on the edge of a bluff overlooking the sea. Nora came to live with
her again, bringing her child, and the two women were company for one
another while their husbands were at sea.

"In course of time my mother had two children, a girl and a boy, and
because the Hucks boy was considerably older than they, he took care of
them, to a great extent, and the three youngsters were always together.
Their favorite playground was on the beach, at the foot of the bluff,
and before young Tom was ten years old he could swim like a duck, and
manage a boat remarkably well. The Wegg children, having something of
their mother's timid nature, perhaps, were not so adventurous, but they
seldom hesitated to go wherever Tom led them.

"One day, while my mother was slightly ill and Nora was attending to
her, Tom disobeyed the commands that had been given him, and took his
younger companions out on the ocean for a ride in his boat. No one knows
how far they went, or exactly what happened to them; but a sudden squall
sprang up, and the children being missed, my mother insisted, ill as she
was, in running down to the shore to search for her darlings. Braving
the wind and drenched by rain, the two mothers stood side by side,
peering into the gloom, while brave men dared the waves to search for
the missing ones. The body of the girl was first washed ashore, and my
mother rocked the lifeless form in her arms until her dead son was laid
beside her. Then young Tom's body was recovered, and the horror
was complete.

"When my father arrived, three days later, he not only found himself
bereaved of the two children he had loved so tenderly, but his young
wife was raving with brain fever, and likely to follow her babies to the
grave. During that terrible time, Nora, who could not forget that it was
her own adventurous son who had led all three children to their death,
went suddenly blind--from grief, the doctors said.

"My father pulled his wife back to life by dint of careful nursing; but
whenever she looked at the sea she would scream with horror; so it
became necessary to take her where the cruel sound of the breakers could
never reach her ears. I think the grief of Thomas and Nora was scarcely
less than that of my own parents, and both men had suffered so severely
that they were willing to abandon the sea and devote their lives to
comforting their poor wives. Captain Wegg sold all his interests and his
wife's villa, and brought the money here, where he established a home
amid entirely different surroundings. He was devoted to my mother, I
have heard, and when she died, soon after my birth, the Captain seemed
to lose all further interest in life, and grew morose and unsociable
with all his fellow-creatures.

"That, young ladies, is the story of what Thomas and Nora call their
'great trouble'; and I think it is rightly named, because it destroyed
the happiness of two families. I was born long after the tragedy, but
its shadow has saddened even my own life."

When the boy had finished, his voice trembling with emotion as he
uttered the last words, his auditors were much affected by the sad tale.
Patsy was positively weeping, and the Major blew his nose vigorously and
advised his daughter to "dry up an' be sinsible." Beth's great eyes
stared compassionately at the young fellow, and even Louise for the
moment allowed her sympathy to outweigh the disappointment and chagrin
of seeing her carefully constructed theory of crime topple over like the
house of cards it was. There was now no avenger to be discovered,
because there had been nothing to avenge. The simple yet pathetic story
accounted for all the mystery that, in her imagination, enveloped the
life and death of Captain Wegg. But--stay!

"How did your father die?" she asked, softly.

"Through a heart trouble, from which he had suffered for years, and
which had obliged him to lead a very quiet life," was the reply. "That
was one of the things which, after my mother's death, helped to sour his
disposition. He could not return to the sea again, because he was told
that any sudden excitement was likely to carry him off; and, indeed,
that was exactly what happened."

"How is that, sir?" asked the Major.

"It is more difficult to explain than the first of the story," replied
the boy, thoughtfully gazing through the window; "perhaps because I do
not understand it so well. Our simple life here never made much of an
inroad into my father's modest fortune; for our wants were few; but
Captain Wegg was a poor man of business, having been a sailor during all
his active life. His only intimate friend--an honest, bluff old farmer
named Will Thompson--was as childish regarding money matters as my
father, but had a passion for investments, and induced my father to join
some of his schemes. Mr. Thompson's mind was somewhat erratic at times,
but keen in some ways, nevertheless. Fearing to trust his judgment
entirely, my father chose to lean upon the wisdom and experience of a
shrewd merchant of Millville, named Robert West."

"The hardware dealer?" asked Louise, impulsively.

"Yes; I see you have met him," replied Joseph Wegg, with a smile at the
eager, pretty face of his visitor. "Bob West was a prosperous man and
very careful about his own investments; so he became a sort of business
adviser to my father and Mr. Thompson, and arbitrated any differences of
opinion they might have. For several years, due to West's good offices,
the two oddly mated friends were successful in their ventures, and added
to their capital. Finally West came to them himself with a proposition.
He had discovered a chance to make a good deal of money by purchasing an
extensive pine forest near Almaquo, just across the border in Canada.
West had taken an option on the property, when he found by accident that
the Pierce-Lane Lumber Company was anxious to get hold of the tract and
cut the timber on a royalty that would enable the owners to double their
investment."

"Howld on a jiffy!" cried the Major, excitedly. "Did I understand you to
say the Pierce-Lane Lumber Company?"

"That was the firm, sir. I used to overhear my father and Will Thompson
talking about this matter; but I must admit my knowledge is somewhat
imperfect, because I never was allowed to ask questions. I remember
learning the fact that West had not enough money to swing his option,
and so urged his friends to join him. Relying upon West's judgment, they
put all their little fortunes into the deal, although Thompson grumbled
at doing so, because he claimed he had another investment that was
better, and this matter of West's would prevent him from undertaking it.
The Almaquo tract was purchased, and a contract made with the lumber
company to cut the timber and pay them a royalty of so much a thousand
feet. Yet, although the prospects for profit seemed so good, I know that
for some reason both my father and Thompson were dissatisfied with the
deal, and this may be accounted for by the fact that every penny of
their money was tied up in one investment. West used to come to the
house and argue with them that the property was safe as the Bank of
England, and then old Will would tell him how much more he could have
made out of another investment he had in mind; so that a coolness grew
up between West and the others that gradually led to their estrangement.

"I can well remember the evening when Bob West's pretty financial bubble
burst. Thompson and my father were sitting together in the right wing,
smoking solemnly, and exchanging a few words, as was their custom, when
West arrived with a while face, and a newspaper under his arm. I was in
the next room, lying half asleep upon the sofa, when I heard West cry
despairingly: 'Ruined--ruined--ruined!' I crept to the half-opened
door, then, and looked in. Both men were staring, open-mouthed and
half-dazed, at West, who was explaining in a trembling voice that a
terrible forest fire had swept through the Almaquo section and wiped out
every tree upon the property. He had the full account in the newspaper,
and had begun reading it, when my father uttered a low moan and tumbled
off his chair to the floor.

"Will Thompson gave a wild cry and knelt beside him.

"'My God! he's dead, Bob,--he's dead!--and you've killed him with your
good news!' he screamed, already raving; and then Old Hucks ran in just
in time to prevent the madman from throttling West, for his fingers were
even then twined around Bob's throat. There was a desperate struggle,
and I remember that, scared as I was, I joined Thomas in trying to pull
Thompson off his prey. But suddenly old Will threw up his arms and
toppled backward, still raving like a demon, but unable to move his body
from the waist downward. West helped us to put him in bed, and said he
was paralyzed, which afterward proved to be the truth. Also, his mind
was forever gone; and I think it was father's death that did that,
rather than the loss of his money."

They were all staring, white-faced, at the speaker. Most of the mystery
was being cleared away; indeed, there was now little of mystery
remaining at all.

"West hurried after a doctor," continued Joe, who was almost as much
absorbed in his story as were his listeners, and spoke in a reflective,
musing way, "and he succeeded in finding one who was stopping for a few
days at the hotel. Poor Bob was very kind to us in our trouble, and I
never heard him mention a word about his own losses, which must have
been severe. After the funeral was over, and I found I had nothing to
inherit but the farm, I decided to go to the city and make my way there,
as I had long wished to do. West gave me a little money to start me on
my way, and the rest of my story is not very interesting to anybody.
Major Doyle knows something of it, after the time when I got through my
technical school by working as a servant to pay for my instruction. I'm
a failure in life, so far, young ladies; but if you'll not bear that
against me I'll try to do better in the future."

"Good!" cried the Major, approvingly, as he took the boy's left hand in
both his own and pressed it. "You're developing the right spirit,
Joseph, me lad, and we'll think no more about the sadness of the past,
but look forward to the joy of your future."

"Of course," said Patsy, nodding gravely; "Joe Wegg is bound to be a
great man, some day."



CHAPTER XVIII.

THE LOCKED CUPBOARD.

Louise and Beth returned to the farm in dismal silence. Every prop had
been knocked from beneath their carefully erected temple of mystery. Now
there was no mystery at all.

In a few words, Joe Wegg had explained everything, and explained all so
simply and naturally that Louise felt like sobbing with the bitterness
of a child deprived of its pet plaything. The band of self-constituted
girl detectives had been "put out of business," as Patsy said, because
the plain fact had developed that there was nothing to detect, and never
had been. There had been no murder, no robbery, no flight or hiding on
the part of the Weggs to escape an injured enemy; nothing even
mysterious, in the light of the story they had just heard. It was
dreadfully humiliating and thoroughly disheartening, after all their
earnest endeavor to investigate a crime that had never been committed.

Uncle John rallied his nieces on their somber faces at the dinner table,
and was greatly amused when the Major, despite the appealing looks
directed at him, gave Mr. Merrick a brief resume of the afternoon's
developments.

"Well, I declare!" said the little man, merrily; "didn't I warn you,
Louise, not to try to saddle a murder onto my new farm? How you foolish
girls could ever have imagined such a carnival of crime in connection
with the Weggs is certainly remarkable."

"I don't know about that, sir," returned the Major, seriously. "I was
meself inoculated with the idea, and for a while I considered meself and
the girls the equals of all the Pinkertons in the country. And when ye
come to think of it, the history of poor Captain Wegg and his wife, and
of Nora and Thomas as well, is out of the ordinary entirely, and,
without the explanation, contained all the elements of a
first-class mystery."

"How did you say the Weggs lost their money?" inquired Uncle John,
turning the subject because he saw that it embarrassed his nieces.

"Why, forest fires at Almaquo, in Canada, burned down the timber they
had bought," replied the Major. "And, by the way, John, you're
interested in that matter yourself, for the Pierce-Lane Lumber Company,
in which you own a lot of stock, had contracted to cut the timber on
a royalty."

"How long ago?"

"Three years, sir."

"Well, we've been cutting timber at Almaquo ever since," said Mr.
Merrick.

Louise dropped her fork with a clatter, disclosing, in this well-bred
young lady, an unusual degree of excitement.

"Then there _is_ something to detect!" she cried.

"Eh? What do you mean?" inquired her uncle.

"If you've been cutting timber at Almaquo for three years, the trees
couldn't have burned down," Louise declared, triumphantly.

"That is evident," said the Major, dryly. "I've had it in me mind,
Louise, to take that matter up for investigation; but you are so imbued
with the detective spirit that there's no heading you off a trail."

"Before the dessert comes on," announced Uncle John, impressively, "I
want to make a statement. You folks have tried your hands at the
detective business and made a mess of it. Now it's my turn. I'll be a
detective for three days, and if I don't succeed better than you did,
young women, we'll mingle our tears in all humility. Eh, Major?"

"Put me in the bunch, sir," said the old soldier, "I was as bad as any
of them. And go ahead in your own way, if ye like. It's me humble
opinion, John, that you're no Sherlock Holmes; but ye won't believe it
'til ye satisfy yourself of the fact."

Next morning the loungers around Sam Cotting's store were thrown into a
state of great excitement when "the nabob" came over from the Wegg farm
and held the long-distance telephone for more than an hour, while he
talked with people in New York. The natives knew that their telephone,
which was built into a small booth at one end of the store--next the
post-office boxes--was part of a system that made it possible for one to
talk to those in far away cities. Often the country people would eye the
mysterious-looking instrument with awe and whisper to each other of its
mighty powers; but no one had ever before used it to telephone farther
than the Junction, and then only on rare occasions.

"It'll cost a heap o' money, Sam," said McNutt, uneasily, while Uncle
John was engaged in his remarkable conversation. They could see him in
the booth, through the little window.

"It will, Mac," was the solemn reply. "But the fool nabob may as well
spend it thet way as any other. It's mighty little of his capital er
surplus gits inter _my_ cash-drawer; 'n' thet's a fact."

Uncle John came from the booth, perspiring, but smiling and happy. He
walked across the street to see Joe Wegg, and found the youth seated in
a rocking-chair and looking quite convalescent. But he had company. In a
chair opposite sat a man neatly dressed, with a thin, intelligent face,
a stubby gray moustache, and shrewd eyes covered by horn-rimmed
spectacles.

"Good morning, Mr. Merrick," said Joe, cheerily; "this is Mr. Robert
West, one of the Millville merchants, who is an old friend of
our family."

"I've heard of Mr. West, and I'm glad to meet him," replied Uncle John,
looking at the other calmly, but not offering to shake hands. "I believe
you are the president and treasurer of the Almaquo Timber Tract Company,
are you not?"

Joseph looked startled, and then embarrassed, as he overheard the
question. West, without altering his position of careless ease, glanced
over the rims of his glasses at the speaker.

"I am the humble individual you refer to, Mr. Merrick," he said,
briefly.

"But the Almaquo timber all burned down." remarked Joe, thinking an
explanation was needed.

"That's a mistake," returned Mr. Merrick. "My company has paid Mr. West,
as treasurer of his company, more than fifty thousand dollars during the
last three years."

West's jaw dropped.

"Your company!" he exclaimed, as if mystified.

"Yes; I own the controlling interest in the Pierce-Lane Lumber Company,
which has the contract to cut your timber," answered Mr. Merrick.

The hardware dealer slowly arose and glanced at his watch.

"I must get back to my store," he said. "You are somewhat in error about
your company, Mr. Merrick; but I suppose your interests are so large and
varied that you cannot well keep track of them. Good morning, sir. I'll
see you again soon, Joe. Glad you're improving so rapidly. Let me know
if I can do anything to help you."

With these quiet words, he bowed and left the room, and when he had
gone, Joe said, in a deprecating tone:

"Poor Bob must be very unhappy about having lost my father's money in
that speculation, for he advocated the plan very strongly, believing it
was a good investment. I'm afraid your mistake about paying him all that
money upset him. Don't mind if he was a little brusque, sir. Bob West is
a simple, kindly man, whom my father fully trusted. It was he that
loaned me the money to get away from here with."

"Tell me," said Uncle John, thoughtfully, "did your father receive stock
in the Almaquo Timber Tract Company in exchange for his money?"

"Oh, yes; I have seen it in the steel cupboard," replied Joe.

"Where is that?"

"Why, it is the cupboard in the right wing of our house, which was the
Captain's own room. It was one of his whims, when he built, to provide
what he called his 'bank.' You may have noticed the wooden doors of a
cupboard built into the stone wall, sir?"

"Yes; I occupy the room."

"Behind the wooden doors are others of steel. The entire cupboard is
steel-lined. Near the bottom is a sliding-plate, which, when pushed
aside, discovers a hidden drawer--a secret my father never confided to
anyone but me. He once told me that if his heart trouble earned him off
suddenly I ought to know of the existence of this drawer; so he showed
me how to find it. On the day after his death I took the keys, which he
always carried on a small chain around his neck and concealed underneath
his clothing, and opened the cupboard to see if I could find anything of
value. It is needless to say, I could not discover anything that could
be converted into a dollar. The Captain had filled the cupboard with old
letters and papers of no value, and with relics he had brought from
foreign lands during his many voyages. These last are mere rubbish, but
I suppose he loved them for their association. In the secret drawer I
found his stock in the timber company, and also that of old Will
Thompson, who had doubtless left it with my father for safekeeping.
Knowing it was now worthless, I left it in the drawer."

"I'd like to see it," announced Uncle John.

Joe laughed.

"I've lost the keys," he said.

"How's that, my lad?"

"Why, on the day of the funeral the keys disappeared. I could never
imagine what became of them. But I did not care to look in the cupboard
a second time, so the loss did not matter."

Mr. Merrick seemed thoughtful.

"I suppose I own that cupboard now," he remarked.

"Of course," said Joe. "But without the keys it is not serviceable. If
you drill through the steel doors you destroy their security."

"True; but I may decide to do that."

"If you do, sir, I'd like you to clear out the rubbish and papers and
send them to me. They are family matters, and I did not intend to sell
them with the place."

"You shall have them, Joe."

"Just underneath the left end of the lower shelf you will find the
sliding steel plate. It slides toward the front. In the drawer you will
find the worthless stock and a picture of my mother. I'd like to keep
the picture."

"You shall, Joseph. How are you getting on?"

"Why, I'm a new man, Mr. Merrick, and today I'm feeling as strong as a
buffalo--thanks to your kind guardianship."

"Don't overdo, sir. Take it easy. There's a young lady coming to see you
today."

"Ethel!" the boy exclaimed, his face turning crimson.

"Yes," returned Uncle John, tersely. "You've treated that girl
shamefully, Joseph Wegg. Try to make proper amends."

"I never could understand," said Joe, slowly, "why Ethel refused to
answer the letter I wrote her when I went away. It explained
everything, yet--"

"I'll bet the farm against your lame shoulder she never got your
letter," declared Uncle John. "She thought you left her without a word."

"I gave it to McNutt to deliver after I was gone. But you say she's
coming today?"

"That is her intention, sir."

Joe said nothing more, but his expressive face was smiling and eager.
Uncle John pressed the boy's hand and left him, promising to call
again soon.

"Now, then," muttered the little millionaire, as he walked down the
street, "to beard the lion in his den."

The den proved to be the hardware store, and the lion none other than
Robert West. Mr. Merrick found the merchant seated at his desk in the
otherwise deserted store, and, with a nod, helped himself to the only
other chair the little office contained.

"Sir," said he, "I am here to demand an explanation."

"Of what?" asked West, coldly.

"Of your action in the matter of the Almaquo Timber Tract Company. I
believe that you falsely asserted to Captain Wegg and Mr. Thompson that
the timber had burned and their investment was therefore worthless. The
news of the disaster killed one of your confiding friends and drove the
other mad; but that was a consequence that I am sure you did not intend
when you planned the fraud. The most serious thing I can accuse you of
is holding the earnings of the Wegg and Thompson stock--and big earnings
they are, too--for your own benefit, and defrauding the heirs of your
associates of their money."

West carefully balanced a penholder across his fingers, and eyed it with
close attention.

"You are a queer man, Mr. Merrick," he said, quietly. "I can only excuse
your insults on the grounds of ignorance, or the fact that you have been
misinformed. Here is the newspaper report of the Almaquo fire, which I
showed my friends the night of Captain Wegg's sudden death." He took a
clipping from a drawer of the desk and handed it to Uncle John, who read
it carefully.

"As a matter of fact," continued West, "you are not cutting that portion
of the Almaquo tract which this fire refers to, and which Thompson and
Wegg were interested in, but the north half of the tract, which they had
never acquired any title to."

"I suppose the stock will show that," suggested Mr. Merrick.

"Of course, sir."

"I will look it up."

West smiled.

"You will have some trouble doing that," he said.

"Why?"

"Wegg and Thompson had transferred their entire stock to me before one
died and the other went mad," was the quiet reply.

"Oh, I see." The lie was so evident that Uncle John did not try to
refute it.

"I am rather busy, Mr. Merrick. Anything more, sir?"

"Not today. Bye and bye, Mr. West."

He marched out again and climbed into his buggy to drive home. The
interview with Bob West had made him uneasy, for the merchant's cold,
crafty nature rendered him an opponent who would stick at nothing to
protect his ill-gotten gains. Uncle John had thought it an easy matter
to force him to disgorge, but West was the one inhabitant of Millville
who had no simplicity in his character. He was as thoroughly imbued with
worldly subtlety and cunning as if he had lived amid the grille of a
city all his life; and Mr. Merrick was by no means sure of his own
ability to unmask the man and force him to make restitution.



CHAPTER XIX.

THE COURT'N OF SKIM CLARK.

By this time the summer was well advanced, and the rich people at the
Wegg farm had ceased to be objects of wonder to the Millville folk. The
girls were still regarded with curious looks when they wandered into the
village on an errand, and Mr. Merrick and Major Doyle inspired a certain
amount of awe; but time had dulled the edge of marvelous invasion and
the city people were now accepted as a matter of course.

Peggy McNutt was still bothering his head over schemes to fleece the
strangers, in blissful ignorance of the fact that one of his neighbors
was planning to get ahead of him.

The Widow Clark was a shrewd woman. She had proven this by becoming one
of the merchants of Millville after her husband's death. The poor man
had left an insurance of five hundred dollars and the little frame
building wherein he had conducted a harness shop. Mrs. Clark couldn't
make and repair harness; so she cleared the straps and scraps and
wax-ends out of the place, painted the interior of the shop bright
yellow, with a blue ceiling, erected some shelves and a counter and
turned part of the insurance money into candy, cigars, stationery, and a
meager stock of paper-covered novels.

Skim, her small son, helped her as far as he was able, and between them
they managed things so frugally that at the end of eight years the widow
still had her five hundred dollars capital, and the little store had
paid her living expenses.

Skim was named after his uncle, Peter Skimbley, who owned a farm near
Watertown. The widow's hopeful was now a lank, pale-faced youth of
eighteen, whose most imposing features were his big hands and a long
nose that ended in a sharp point. The shop had ruined him for manual
labor, for he sat hunched up by the stove in winter, and in summer hung
around Cotting's store and listened to the gossip of the loungers. He
was a boy of small conversational powers, but his mother declared that
Skim "done a heap o' thinkin' that nobody suspected."

The widow was a good gossip herself, and knew all the happenings in the
little town. She had a habit of reading all her stock of paper-covered
novels before she sold them, and her mind was stocked with the mass of
romance and adventure she had thus absorbed. "What I loves more'n eat'n'
or sleep'n'," she often said, "is a rattlin' good love story. There
don't seem to be much love in real life, so a poor lone crittur like me
has to calm her hankerin's by a-readin' novels."

No one had been more interested in the advent of the millionaire at the
Wegg farm than the widow Clark. She had helped "fix up" the house for
the new owner and her appreciative soul had been duly impressed by the
display of wealth demonstrated by the fine furniture sent down from the
city. She had watched the arrival of the party and noticed with eager
eyes the group of three pretty and stylishly dressed nieces who
accompanied their rich uncle. Once or twice since the young ladies had
entered her establishment to purchase pens or stationery, and on such
occasions the widow was quite overcome by their condescension.

All this set her thinking to some purpose. One day she walked over to
the farm and made her way quietly to the back door. By good fortune she
found blind Nora hemming napkins and in a mood to converse. Nora was an
especially neat seamstress, but required some one to thread her needles.
Mary the cook had been doing this, but now Mrs. Clark sat down beside
Nora to "hev a little talk" and keep the needles supplied with thread.

She learned a good deal about the nieces, for old Nora could not praise
them enough. They were always sweet and kind to her and she loved to
talk about them. They were all rich, too, or would be; for their uncle
had no children of his own and could leave several millions to each one
when he died.

"An' they're so simple, too," said the old woman; "nothin' cityfied ner
stuck-up about any on 'em, I kin tell ye. They dresses as fine as the
Queen o' Sheba, Tom says; but they romp 'round just like they was borned
in the country. Miss Patsy she's learnin' to milk the cow, an' Miss Beth
takes care o' the chickens all by herself. They're reg'lar girls, Marthy
Clark, an' money hain't spiled 'em a bit."

This report tended to waken a great ambition in the widow's heart. Or
perhaps the ambition had already taken form and this gossip confirmed
and established it. Before she left the farm she had a chance to
secretly observe the girls, and they met with her full approval.

At supper that evening she said to her hopeful:

"Skim, I want ye to go courtin'."

Skim looked up in amazement.

"Me, ma?" he asked.

"Yes, you. It's time you was thinkin' of gittin' married."

Skim held his knife in his mouth a moment while he thought over this
startling proposition. Then he removed the cutlery, heaved a deep sigh,
and enquired:

"Who at, ma?"

"What's that?"

"Who'll I go courtin' at?"

"Skim, you 'member in thet las' book we read, 'The Angel Maniac's
Revenge,' there was a sayin' that fate knocks wunst on ev'ry man's door.
Well, fate's knockin' on your door."

Skim listened, with a nervous glance toward the doorway. Then he shook
his head.

"All fool fancy, ma," he remarked. "Don't ye go an' git no rumantic
notions out'n books inter yer head."

"Skim, am I a fool, er ain't I?"

"'Tain't fer me ter say, ma."

"Fate's knockin', an' if you don't open to it, Skim, I'll wash my hands
o' ye, an' ye kin jest starve to death."

The boy looked disturbed.

"What's aggrivatin' of ye, then?" he enquired, anxiously.

"A millionaire is come right under yer nose. He's here in Millville,
with three gals fer nieces thet's all got money to squander an's bound
to hev more."

Skim gave a low whistle.

"Ye don't mean fer me to be courtin' at them gals, do ye?" he demanded.

"Why not? Yer fambly's jest as respectible as any, 'cept thet yer Uncle
Mell backslided after the last revival, an' went to a hoss race. Yer
young, an' yer han'some; an' there's three gals waitin' ready to be won
by a bold wooer. Be bold, Skim; take fate by the fetlock, an' yer
fortun's made easy!"

Skim did not reply at once. He gulped down his tea and stared at the
opposite wall in deep thought. It wasn't such a "tarnal bad notion,"
after all, and so thoroughly impressed was he with his own importance
and merit that it never occurred to him he would meet with any
difficulties if he chose to undertake the conquest.

"Peggy says marri'ge is the mark of a fool; an' Peggy married money,
too," he remarked slowly.

"Pah! money! Mary Ann Cotting didn't hev but a hundred an' forty
dollars, all told, an' she were an old maid an' soured an' squint-eyed
when Peggy hitched up with her."

"I hain't seen nuthin' o' the world, yit," continued Skim, evasively.

"Ner ye won't nuther, onless ye marry money. Any one o' them gals could
take ye to Europe an' back a dozen times."

Skim reflected still farther.

"Courtin' ought to hev some decent clothes," he said. "I kain't set in
the nabob's parlor, with all thet slick furnitur', in Nick Thorne's
cast-off Sunday suit."

"The cloth's as good as ever was made, an' I cut 'em down myself, an'
stitched 'em all over."

"They don't look like store clothes, though," objected Skim.

The widow sighed.

"Tain't the coat that makes the man, Skim."

"It's the coat thet makes decent courtin', though," he maintained,
stubbornly. "Gals like to see a feller dressed up. It shows he means
business an' 'mounts to somethin'."

"I give Nick Thorne two dollars an' a packidge o' terbacker fer them
clotlies, which the on'y thing wrong about was they'd got too snug fer
comfert. Nick said so himself. But I'll make a bargain with ye, Skim. Ef
you'll agree to give me fifty dollars after yer married, I'll buy ye
some store clothes o' Sam Cotting, to do courtin' in."

"Fifty dollars!"

"Well, I've brung ye up, hain't I?" "I've worked like a nigger, mindin'
shop." "Say forty dollars. I ain't small, an' ef ye git one o' them city
gals, Skim, forty dollars won't mean no more'n a wink of an eye to ye."

Skim frowned. Then he smiled, and the smile disclosed a front tooth
missing.

"I'll dream on't," he said. "Let ye know in the mornin', ma. But I won't
court a minite, mind ye, 'nless I git store clothes."



CHAPTER XX.

A LOST CAUSE.

The boy's musings confirmed him in the idea that his mother's scheme was
entirely practical. He didn't hanker much to marry, being young and
fairly satisfied with his present lot; but opportunities like this did
not often occur, and it seemed his bounden duty to take advantage of it.

He got the "store clothes" next day, together with a scarlet necktie
that was "all made up in the latest style," as Sam Cotting assured him,
and a pair of yellow kid gloves "fit fer a howlin' swell." Skim wasn't
sure, at first, about the gloves, but capitulated when Sam declared they
were "real cityfied."

In the evening he "togged up," with his mother's help, and then walked
over to the Wegg farm.

Beth answered the knock at the door. The living room was brightly
lighted; Uncle John and the Major were playing checkers in a corner and
Patsy was softly drumming on the piano. Louise had a book and Beth had
been engaged upon some fancy-work.

When the door opened Skim bobbed his head and said:

"Evenin', mom. I've come a-visitin'."

Beth conquered an inclination to smile.

"Won't you come in?" she said, sweetly.

"Thankee; I will. I'm Skimbley Clark, ye know; down t' the village. Ma
keeps a store there."

"I'm pleased to meet you, Mr. Clark. Allow me to introduce to you my
uncle and cousins," said the girl, her eyes dancing with amusement.

Skim acknowledged the introductions with intense gravity, and then sat
down upon a straight-backed chair near the piano, this being the end of
the room where the three girls were grouped. Uncle John gave a chuckle
and resumed his game with the Major, who whispered that he would give a
dollar for an oil painting of Mr. Clark--if it couldn't be had for less.

Louise laid down her book and regarded the visitor wonderingly. Patsy
scented fun and drew a chair nearer the group. Beth resumed her
embroidery with a demure smile that made Skim decide at once that "he
picked the pretty one."

Indeed, the decision did justice to his discretion. Beth De Graf was a
rarely beautiful girl and quite outshone her cousins in this respect.
Louise might be attractive and Patsy fascinating; but Beth was the real
beauty of the trio, and the most charming trait in her character was her
unconsciousness that she excelled in good looks.

So Skim stared hard at Beth, and answered the preliminary remarks
addressed to him by Patsy and Louise in a perfunctory manner.

"Won't you take off your gloves?" asked Louise, soberly. "It's so warm
this evening, you know."

The boy looked at his hands.

"It's sech a tarnal job to git 'em on agin," he replied.

"Don't put them on, then," advised Patsy. "Here in the country we are
allowed to dispense with much unnecessary social etiquette."

"Air ye? Then off they come. I ain't much stuck on gloves, myself; but
ma she 'lowed that a feller goin' courtin' orter look like a sport."

A chorus of wild laughter, which greeted this speech, had the effect of
making Skim stare at the girls indignantly. He couldn't find anything
funny in his remark; but there they sat facing him and uttering
hysterical peals of merriment, until the tears ran down their cheeks.

Silently and with caution he removed the yellow gloves from his hands,
and so gave the foolish creatures a chance "to laugh out their
blamed giggle."

But they were watching him, and saw that he was disconcerted. They had
no mind to ruin the enjoyment in store for them by offending their
guest, so they soon resumed a fitting gravity and began to assist the
youth to forget their rudeness.

"May I ask," said Patsy, very graciously, "which one of us you intend to
favor with your attentions?"

"I ain't much used to sech things," he replied, looking down at his big
hands and growing a little red-faced. "P'raps I hadn't orter tell,
before the rest o' ye."

"Oh, yes; do tell!" pleaded Louise. "We're so anxious to know."

"I don't s'pose it's right clever to pick an' choose when ye're all by,"
said Skim, regaining confidence. "But ma, she 'lowed thet with three
gals handy I orter git one on 'em, to say the least."

"If you got more than one," remarked Beth, calmly, "it would be
illegal."

"Oh, one's enough," said Skim, with a grin. "Peggy says it's too many,
an' a feller oughtn't to take his gal out'n a grab-bag."

"I should think not, indeed," returned Patsy. "But here are three of us
openly displayed, and unless you turn us all down as unworthy, it will
be necessary for you to make a choice."

"What foolishness are you girls up to now?" demanded Uncle John,
catching a stray word from the other corner while engaged in a desperate
struggle with the Major.

"This is a time for you to keep quiet, Uncle," retorted Patsy, merrily.
"We've got important things to consider that are none of your affairs,
whatever."

Skim reflected that he didn't want this one, except as a last resort.
She was "too bossy."

"When I started out," he said, "I jest come a-courtin', as any feller
might do thet wasn't much acquainted. But ef I've got to settle down to
one o' ye--"

He hesitated.

"Oh, you must really take one at a time, you know," asserted Louise.
"It's the only proper way."

"Then I'll start on thet dark-eyed one thet's a sewin'," he said,
slowly.

Beth looked up from her work and smiled.

"Go ahead, Mr. Clark," she said, encouragingly. "My name is Beth. Had
you forgotten it?"

"Call me Skim," he said, gently.

"Very well, Skim,--Now look here, Patsy Doyle, if you're going to sit
there and giggle you'll spoil everything. Mr. Clark wants to court, and
it's getting late."

"P'raps I've went fur enough fer tonight," remarked Skim, uneasily.
"Next time they'll leave us alone, an' then----"

"Oh, don't postpone it, please!" begged Beth, giving the boy a demure
glance from her soft brown eyes. "And don't mind my cousins. I don't."

"These things kain't be hurried," he said. "Si Merkle courted three
weeks afore he popped. He tol' me so."

"Then he was a very foolish man," declared Patsy, positively. "Just look
at Beth! She's dying to have you speak out. What's the use of waiting,
when she knows why you are here?"

By this time Skim had been flattered to the extent of destroying any
stray sense he might ever have possessed. His utter ignorance of girls
and their ways may have been partly responsible for his idiocy, or his
mother's conviction that all that was necessary was for him to declare
himself in order to be accepted had misled him and induced him to
abandon any native diffidence he might have had. Anyway, the boy fell
into the snare set by the mischievous young ladies without a suspicion
of his impending fate.

"Miss Beth," said he, "ef yer willin', I'll marry ye; any time ye say. I
agreed t' help Dick Pearson with the harvestin', but I'll try to' git
Ned Long to take my place, an' it don't matter much, nohow."

"But I couldn't have you break an engagement," cried Beth, hastily.

"Why not?"

"Oh, it wouldn't be right, at all. Mr. Pearson would never forgive me,"
she asserted.

"Can't ye--"

"No; not before harvest, Skim. I couldn't think of it."

"But arterward--"

"No; I've resolved never to marry after harvest. So, as you're engaged,
and I don't approve of breaking engagements, I must refuse your
proposition entirely."

Skim looked surprised; then perplexed; then annoyed.

"P'raps I didn't pop jest right," he murmured, growing red again.

"You popped beautifully," declared Patsy. "But Beth is very peculiar,
and set in her ways. I'm afraid she wouldn't make you a good
wife, anyhow."

"Then p'raps the gal in blue----"

"No;" said Louise. "I have the same prejudices as my cousin. If you
hadn't been engaged for the harvest I might have listened to you; but
that settles the matter definitely, as far as I am concerned."

Skim sighed.

"Ma'll be mad as a hornet ef I don't get any of ye," he remarked, sadly.
"She's paid Sam Cotting fer this courtin' suit, an' he won't take back
the gloves on no 'count arter they've been wore; an' thet'll set ma
crazy. Miss Patsy, ef yo' think ye could----"

"I'm sure I couldn't," said Patsy, promptly. "I'm awfully sorry to break
your heart, Skim, dear, and ruin your future life, and make you
misanthropic and cynical, and spoil your mother's investment and make
her mad as a hornet. All this grieves me terribly; but I'll recover from
it, if you'll only give me time. And I hope you'll find a wife that will
be more congenial than I could ever be."

Skim didn't understand all these words, but the general tenor of the
speech was convincing, and filled him with dismay.

"Rich gals is tarnal skeerce in these parts," he said, regretfully.

Then they gave way again, and so lusty was the merriment that Uncle John
and the Major abandoned their game and came across the room to discover
the source of all this amusement.

"What's up, young women?" asked their Uncle, glancing from their
laughing faces to the lowering, sullen one of the boy, who had only now
begun to suspect that he was being "poked fun at."

"Oh, Uncle!" cried Patsy; "you've no idea how near you have been to
losing us. We have each had an offer of marriage within the last
half hour!"

"Dear me!" ejaculated Uncle John.

"It shows the young man's intelligence and good taste," said the Major,
much amused. "But is it a Mormon ye are, sir, to want all three?"
directing a keen glance at Skim.

"Naw, 'tain't," he returned, wholly disgusted with the outcome of his
suit. "All three got as't 'cause none of 'em's got sense enough t' know
a good thing when they seen it."

"But I do," said the Major, stoutly; "and I maintain that you're a good
thing, and always will be. I hope, sir, you'll call 'round and see me in
Baltimore next year. I'll not be there, but ye can leave your card, just
the same."

"Please call again, sir," added Uncle John; "about October--just before
snow flies."

The boy got up.

"I don't keer none," he said, defiantly. "It's all ma's fault, gittin'
me laughed at, an' she won't hear the last of it in a hurry, nuther."

"Be gentle with her, Skim," suggested Beth, softly. "Remember she has to
face the world with you by her side."

Having no retort for this raillery, which he felt rather than
understood, Skim seized his hat and fled. Then Patsy wiped the tears
from her eyes and said:

"Wasn't it grand, girls? I haven't had so much fun since I was born."



CHAPTER XXI.

THE TRAP IS SET.

Uncle John was forced to acknowledge to his nieces that his boast to
unmask Bob West within three days was mere blustering. If he
accomplished anything in three weeks he would consider himself
fortunate. But he had no wish to conceal anything from the girls, so he
told them frankly of his interview with the hardware merchant, and also
what Joe Wegg had said about the stock in the locked cupboard. They
were, of course, greatly interested in this new phase of the matter and
canvassed it long and eagerly.

"The man is lying, of course," said Patsy, "for Captain Wegg and poor
Mr. Thompson could not transfer their stock to West after that fatal
night when he brought to them the news of the fire."

"I believe the stock is still in this cupboard," declared Uncle John.

"Unless West stole the keys and has taken it away," suggested Louise.

"I'm sure he did not know about the secret drawer," said her uncle.
"Probably he stole the keys and searched the cupboard; if he had found
the stock he would have left the keys, which would then be of no further
use to him. As he did not find the stock certificates, he carried the
keys away, that he might search again at his leisure. And they've never
yet been returned."

"Why, John, ye're possessed of the true detective instinct," the Major
remarked, admiringly. "Your reasoning is at once clever and
unassailable."

"I wonder," mused Beth, "if we could tempt Mr. West to come again to
search the cupboard."

"He will scarcely venture to do that while we are here," replied Uncle
John.

"I said 'tempt him,' Uncle."

"And what did you mean by that expression, Beth?"

"I'll think it over and tell you later," she returned, quietly.

       *       *       *       *       *

Ethel Thompson would have shown Joe Wegg how much she resented his
leaving Millville without a word to her, had she not learned from Mr.
Merrick the boy's sad condition. Knowing her old friend was ill, she
determined to ignore the past and go to him at once, and Uncle John knew
very well there would be explanations to smooth away all the former
misunderstandings.

Joe was now aware of the fact that his letter to Ethel had never reached
its destination, so, as soon as the girl had arrived and the first
rather formal greetings were over, he sent Kate Kebble to McNutt's to
ask the agent to come over to the hotel at once.

The girl returned alone.

"Peggy says as he can't come," she announced.

"Why not?" asked Joe.

"Says he's jest painted his off foot blue an' striped it with red, an'
it hain't dried yit."

"Go back," said Joe, firmly. "Tell Peggy he's in trouble, and it's
likely to cost him more than a new coat of paint for his foot if he
doesn't come here at once."

Kate went back, and in due time the stump of McNutt's foot was heard on
the stairs. He entered the room looking worried and suspicious, and the
stern faces of Ethel and Joe did not reassure him, by any means. But he
tried to disarm the pending accusation with his usual brazen
impertinence.

"Nice time ter send fer me, this is, Joe," he grumbled. "It's gittin' so
a feller can't even paint his foot in peace an' quiet."

"Peggy," said Joe, "when I went away, three years ago, I gave you a
letter for Miss Ethel. What did you do with it?"

Peggy's bulging eyes stared at his blue foot, which he turned first one
side and then the other to examine the red stripes.

"It's this way, Joe," he replied; "there wa'n't no postige stamp on the
letter, an' Sam Cotting said it couldn't be posted no way 'thout
a stamp."

"It wasn't to be sent through the post-office," said the boy. "I gave
you a quarter to deliver it in person to Miss Ethel."

"Did ye, Joe? did ye?"

"Of course I did."

"Cur'ous," said McNutt, leaning over to touch the foot cautiously with
one finger, to see if the paint was dry.

"Well, sir!"

"Well, Joe, there's no use gittin' mad 'bout it. Thet blamed quarter ye
giv me rolled down a crack in the stoop, an' got lost. Sure. Got lost as
easy as anything."

"Well, what was that to me?"

"Oh, I ain't blamin' you," said Peggy; "but 'twere a good deal to me, I
kin tell ye. A whole quarter lost!"

"Why didn't you take up a board, and get it again?"

"Oh, I did," said McNutt. cheerfully. "I did, Joe. But the money was all
black an' tarnished like, by thet time, an' didn't look at all like
silver. Sam he wouldn't take it at the store, so my ol' woman she 'lowed
she'd polish it up a bit. Ye know how sort o' vig'rous she is, Joe. She
polished that blamed quarter the same way she jaws an' sweeps; she
polished it 'til she rubbed both sides smooth as glass, an' then Sam
wouldn't take it, nuther, 'n' said it wasn't money any more. So I
drilled two holes in it an' sewed it on my pants fer a 'spender butt'n."

"But why didn't you deliver the letter?"

"Did ye 'spect I'd tramp way t' Thompson's Crossing fer nuthin'?"

"I gave you a quarter."

"An' it turned out to be on'y a 'spender butt'n. Be reason'ble, Joe."

"Where is the letter?"

"'Tain't a letter no more. It's on'y ol' fambly papers by this time.
Three years is----"

"Where is it? By thunder, Peggy, if you don't answer me I'll put you in
jail for breach of trust!"

"Ye've changed, Joe," sadly. "Ye ain't no more like----"

"Where is it?"

"Behind the lookin'-glass in my sett'n-room."

"Go and get it immediately, sir!"

"Ef I hev to cross thet dusty road twic't more, I'll hev to paint all
over agin, an' thet's a fact."

"Ethel," said Joe, with the calmness of despair, "you'll have to
telephone over to the Junction and ask them to send a constable here
at once."

"Never mind," cried McNutt, jumping up hastily; "I'll go. Paint don't
cost much, nohow."

He stumped away, but on his return preferred to let Kate carry the
soiled, torn envelope up to the young folks. The letter had palpably
been tampered with. It had been opened and doubtless read, and the flap
clumsily glued down again.

But Ethel had it now, and even after three years her sweet eyes dimmed
as she read the tender words that Joe had written because he lacked the
courage to speak them. "My one great ambition is to win a home for us,
dear," he had declared, and with this before her eyes Ethel reproached
herself for ever doubting his love or loyalty.

When she rode her pony over to the Wegg farm next day Ethel's bright
face was wreathed with smiles. She told her girl friends that she and
Joe had had a "good talk" together, and understood each other better
than ever before. The nieces did not tell her of their newly conceived
hopes that the young couple would presently possess enough money to
render their future comfortable, because there were so many chances that
Bob West might win the little game being played. But at this moment
Ethel did not need worldly wealth to make her heart light and happy, for
she had regained her childhood's friend, and his injuries only rendered
the boy the more interesting and companionable.

Meantime Uncle John had been busily thinking. It annoyed him to be so
composedly defied by a rascally country merchant, and he resolved, if he
must fight, to fight with all his might.

So he wired to his agent in New York the following words:

"What part of the Almaquo timber tract burned in forest fire three years
ago?"

The answer he received made him give a satisfied grunt.

"No forest fires near Almaquo three years ago. Almadona, seventy miles
north, burned at that time, and newspaper reports confounded the names."

"Very good!" exclaimed Uncle John. "I've got the rascal now."

He issued instructions to the lumber company to make no further payments
of royalties to Robert West until otherwise advised, and this had the
effect of bringing West to the farm white with rage.

"What do you mean by this action, Mr. Merrick?" he demanded.

"We've been paying you money that does not belong to you for three
years, sir," was the reply. "In a few days, when my investigations are
complete, I will give you the option of being arrested for embezzlement
of funds belonging to Joseph Wegg and the Thompsons, or restoring to
them every penny of their money."

West stared.

"You are carrying matters with a high hand, sir," he sneered.

"Oh, no; I am acting very leniently," said Uncle John.

"Neither Joe nor the Thompsons own a dollar's interest in the Almaquo
property. It is all mine, and mine alone."

"Then produce the stock and prove it!" retorted Mr. Merrick,
triumphantly.

At that moment Louise interrupted the interview by entering the room
suddenly.

"Oh, Uncle," said she, "will you join us in a picnic to the Falls
tomorrow afternoon? We are all going."

"Then I won't be left behind," he replied, smiling upon her.

"We shall take even Thomas and Nora, and come home late in the evening,
by moonlight."

"That suits me, my dear," said he.

West stood silent and scowling, but as the girl tripped away she saw him
raise his eyes and glance slyly toward the cupboard, for they were in
the right wing room.

"Mr. Merrick," he resumed, in a harsh voice; "I warn you that if your
company holds up the payment of my royalties it will break the contract,
and I will forbid them to cut another tree. You are doubtless aware that
there are a dozen firms willing to take your place and pay me higher
royalties."

"Act as you please, sir," said Uncle John, indifferently. "I believe you
are face to face with ruin, and it won't matter much what you do."

West went away more quietly than he had come, and the girls exclaimed,
delightedly:

"The trap is set, Uncle!"

"I think so, myself," he rejoined. "That picnic was a happy thought,
Louise."

Early the next afternoon they started out with hammocks and baskets and
all the paraphernalia of a picnic party. The three girls, Nora and Uncle
John squeezed themselves into the surrey, while the Major and Old Hucks
rode after them in the ancient buggy, with Dan moaning and groaning
every step he took. But the old horse moved more briskly when following
Joe, and Hucks could get more speed out of him than anyone else; so he
did not lag much behind.

The procession entered Millville, where a brief stop was made at the
store, and then made its exit by the north road. West was standing in
the door of his hardware store, quietly observing them. When they
disappeared in the grove he locked the door of his establishment and
sauntered in the direction of the Pearson farm, no one noticing him
except Peggy McNutt, who was disappointed because he had intended to go
over presently and buy a paper of tacks.

When the village was left behind, Uncle John drove swiftly along,
following the curve of the lake until he reached a primitive lane that
he had discovered formed a short cut directly back to the Wegg farm. Old
Thomas was amazed by this queer action on the part of the picnic party,
but aside from blind Nora, who had no idea where they were, the others
seemed full of repressed eagerness, and in no way surprised.

The lane proved very rocky though, and they were obliged to jolt slowly
over the big cobble stones. So Beth and Patsy leaped out of the surrey
and the former called out:

"We will run through the forest, Uncle, and get home as soon as you do."

"Be careful not to show yourselves, then," he replied. "Remember our
plans."

"We will. And don't forget to tie the horses in the thicket, and warn
Thomas and Nora to keep quiet until we come for them," said Patsy.

"I'll attend to all that, dear," remarked Louise, composedly. "But if
you girls are determined to walk, you must hurry along, or you will keep
us waiting."

The nieces had explored every path in the neighborhood by this time, so
Beth and Patsy were quite at home in the pine forest. The horses started
up again, and after struggling along another quarter of a mile a wheel
of the surrey dished between two stones, and with a bump the axle struck
the ground and the journey was promptly arrested.

"What shall we do now?" asked Uncle John, much annoyed, as the party
alighted to examine the wreck.

"Send Thomas back to the village for another wheel" suggested the Major.

"Not today!" cried Louise. "We mustn't appear in the village again this
afternoon, on any account. It is absolutely necessary we should keep out
of sight."

"True," agreed Uncle John, promptly. "Thomas and Nora must picnic here
all by themselves, until nearly midnight. Then they may drive the buggy
home, leading Daniel behind them. It will be time enough tomorrow to get
a new buggy wheel, and the broken surrey won't be in anybody's way until
we send for it."

If Old Hucks thought they had all gone crazy that day he was seemingly
justified in the suspicion, for his master left the baskets of good
things to be consumed by himself and Nora and started to walk to the
farm, the Major and Louise accompanying him.

"We mustn't loiter," said the girl, "for while West may wait until
darkness falls to visit the farm, he is equally liable to arrive at any
time this afternoon. He has seen us all depart, and believes the house
deserted."

But they were obliged to keep to the lane, where walking was difficult,
and meantime Patsy and Beth were tripping easily along their woodland
paths and making much better progress.



CHAPTER XXII.

CAUGHT.

"We're early," said Beth, as they came to the edge of the woods and
sighted the farm house; "but that is better than being late."

Then she stopped suddenly with a low cry and pointed to the right wing,
which directly faced them. Bob West turned the corner of the house,
tried the door of Uncle John's room, and then walked to one of the
French windows. The sash was not fastened, so he deliberately opened it
and stepped inside.

"What shall we do?" gasped Patsy, clasping her hands excitedly.

Beth was always cool in an emergency.

"You creep up to the window, dear, and wait till you hear me open the
inside door," said she. "I'll run through the house and enter from the
living-room. The key is under the mat, you know."

"But what can we do? Oughtn't we to wait until Uncle John and father
come?" Patsy asked, in a trembling voice.

"Of course not. West might rob the cupboard and be gone by that time.
We've got to act promptly, Patsy; so don't be afraid."

Without further words Beth ran around the back of the house and
disappeared, while Patsy, trying to control the beating of her heart,
stole softly over the lawn to the open window of Uncle John's room.

She could not help looking in, at the risk of discovery. Bob West--tall,
lean and composed as ever--was standing beside the cupboard, the doors
of which were wide open. The outer doors were of wood, panelled and
carved; the inner ones were plates of heavy steel, and in the lock that
secured these latter doors were the keys that had so long been missing.
Both were attached to a slender silver chain.

As Patsy peered in at the man West was engaged in deliberately examining
packet after packet of papers, evidently striving to find the missing
stock certificates. He was in no hurry, believing he would have the
house to himself for several hours; so he tumbled Captain Wegg's
souvenirs of foreign lands in a heap on the floor beside him, thrusting
his hand into every corner of the cupboard in order that the search
might be thorough. He had once before examined the place in vain; this
time he intended to succeed.

Presently West drew a cigar from his pocket, lighted it, and was about
to throw the match upon the floor when the thought that it might later
betray his presence made him pause and then walk to the open window. As
he approached, Patsy became panic-stricken and, well knowing that she
ought to run or hide, stood rooted to the spot, gazing half appealingly
and half defiantly into the startled eyes of the man who suddenly
confronted her.

So for a moment they stood motionless. West was thinking rapidly. By
some error be had miscounted the picnic party and this girl had been
left at home. She had discovered his intrusion, had seen him at the
cupboard, and would report the matter to John Merrick. This being the
case, it would do him no good to retreat without accomplishing his
purpose. If once he secured the stock certificates he could afford to
laugh at his accusers, and secure them he must while he had the
opportunity.

So clearly did these thoughts follow one another that West's hesitation
seemed only momentary. Without a word to the girl he tossed the match
upon the grass, calmly turned his back, and started for the
cupboard again.

But here a new surprise awaited him. Brief as had been his absence,
another girl had entered the room. Beth opened the door even as West
turned toward the window, and, taking in the situation at a glance, she
tiptoed swiftly to the cupboard, withdrew the keys from the lock and
dropped them noiselessly into a wide-mouthed vase that stood on the
table and was partially filled with flowers. The next instant West
turned and saw her, but she smiled at him triumphantly. "Good afternoon,
sir," said the girl, sweetly; "can I do anything to assist you?"

West uttered an impatient exclamation and regarded Beth savagely.

"Is the house full of girls?" he demanded.

"Oh, no; Patsy and I are quite alone," she replied, with a laugh. "Come
in, Patsy dear, and help me to entertain our guest," she added.

Patsy came through the window and stood beside her cousin. The man
stared at them, bit his lip, and then turned again to the cupboard. If
he noted the absence of the keys he did not remark upon the fact, but
with hurried yet thorough examination began anew to turn over the
bundles of papers.

Beth sat down and watched him, but Patsy remained standing behind her
chair. West emptied all the shelves, and then after a pause took out his
pocket knife and began tapping with its end the steel sides of the
cupboard. There was no doubt he suspected the existence of a secret
aperture, and Beth began to feel uneasy.

Slowly the man worked his way downward, from shelf to shelf, and began
to sound the bottom plates, wholly oblivious of the fascinated gaze of
the two young girls. Then a sudden gruff ejaculation startled them all,
and West swung around to find a new group of watchers outside the
window. In the foreground appeared the stern face of John Merrick.

The scene was intensely dramatic to all but the singular man who had
been battling to retain a fortune. West knew in an instant that his
attempt to secure the certificates was a failure. He turned from the
cupboard, dusted his hands, and nodded gravely to the last arrivals.

"Come in, Mr. Merrick," said he, seating himself in a chair and removing
his hat, which he had been wearing. "I owe you an apology for intruding
upon your premises in your absence."

Uncle John strode into the room angry and indignant at the fellow's cool
impertinence. The Major and Louise followed, and all eyes centered upon
the face of Bob West.

"The contents of this cupboard," remarked the hardware merchant, calmly,
"belong to the estate of Captain Wegg, and can scarcely be claimed by
you because you have purchased the house. You falsely accused me the
other day, sir, and I have been searching for proof that the Almaquo
Timber Tract stock is entirely my property."

"Have you found such proof?" inquired Mr. Merrick.

"Not yet."

"And you say the stock was all issued to you?"

West hesitated.

"It was all transferred to me by Captain Wegg and Will Thompson."

"Does the transfer appear upon the stock itself?"

"Of course, sir."

"In that case," said Uncle John, "I shall be obliged to ask your pardon.
But the fact can be easily proved."

He walked to the open cupboard, felt for the slide Joe had described to
him, and drew it forward. A small drawer was behind the orifice, and
from this Mr. Merrick drew a packet of papers.

West gave a start and half arose. Then he settled back into his chair
again.

"H-m. This appears to be the stock in question," said Uncle John. He
drew a chair to the table, unfolded the documents and examined them with
deliberate care.

The nieces watched his face curiously. Mr. Merrick first frowned, then
turned red, and finally a stern, determined look settled upon his
rugged features.

"Take your stock, Mr. West," he said, tossing it toward the man; "and
try to forgive us for making fools of ourselves!"



CHAPTER XXIII.

MR. WEST EXPLAINS.

A cry of amazed protest burst from the girls. The Major whistled softly
and walked to the window.

"I find the stock properly transferred," continued Uncle John, grimly
conscious that he was as thoroughly disappointed as the girls. "It is
signed by both Wegg and Thompson, and witnessed in the presence of a
notary. I congratulate you, Mr. West. You have acquired a fortune."

"But not recently," replied the hardware dealer, enjoying the confusion
of his recent opponents. "I have owned this stock for more than three
years, and you will see by the amount endorsed upon it that I paid a
liberal price for it, under the circumstances."

Uncle John gave a start and a shrewd look.

"Of course you did," said he. "On paper."

"I have records to prove that both Captain Wegg and Will Thompson
received their money," said West, quietly. "I see it is hard for you to
abandon the idea that I am a rogue."

There could be no adequate reply to this, so for a time all sat in moody
silence. But the thoughts of some were busy.

"I would like Mr. West to explain what became of the money he paid for
this stock," said Louise; adding: "That is, if he will be so courteous."

West did not answer for a moment. Then he said, with a gesture of
indifference:

"I am willing to tell all I know. But you people must admit that the
annoyances you have caused me during the past fortnight, to say nothing
of the gratuitous insults heaped upon my head, render me little inclined
to favor you."

"You are quite justified in feeling as you do," replied Uncle John,
meekly. "I have been an ass, West; but circumstances warranted me in
suspecting you, and even Joseph Wegg did not know that the Almaquo stock
had been transferred to you. He merely glanced at it at the time of his
father's death, without noticing the endorsement, and thought the fire
had rendered it worthless. But if you then owned the stock, why was it
not in your possession?"

"That was due to my carelessness," was the reply. "The only notary
around here is at Hooker's Falls, and Mr. Thompson offered to have him
come to Captain Wegg's residence and witness the transfer. As my
presence was not necessary for this, and I had full confidence in my
friends' integrity, I paid them their money, which they were eager to
secure at once, and said I would call in a few days for the stock. I did
call, and was told the notary had been here and the transfer had been
legally made. Wegg said he would get the stock from the cupboard and
hand it to me; but we both forgot it at that time. After his death I
could not find it, for it was in the secret drawer."

"Another thing, sir," said Uncle John. "If neither Wegg nor Thompson was
then interested in the Almaquo property, why did the news of its
destruction by fire shock them so greatly that the result was Captain
Wegg's death?"

"I see it will be necessary for me to explain to you more fully,"
returned West, with a thoughtful look. "It is evident, Mr. Merrick, from
your questions, that some of these occurrences seem suspicious to a
stranger, and perhaps you are not so much to be blamed as, in my
annoyance and indignation, I have imagined."

"I would like the matter cleared up for the sake of Ethel and Joe," said
Mr. Merrick, simply.

"And so would I," declared the hardware dealer. "You must know, sir,
that Will Thompson was the one who first led Captain Wegg into investing
his money. I think the Captain did it merely to please Will, for at that
time he had become so indifferent to worldly affairs that he took no
interest in anything beyond a mild wish to provide for his son's future.
But Thompson was erratic in judgment, so Wegg used to bring their
matters to me to decide upon. I always advised them as honestly as I was
able. At the time I secured an option on the Almaquo tract, and wanted
them to join me, Will Thompson had found another lot of timber, but
located in an out-of-the-way corner, which he urged the Captain to join
him in buying. Wegg brought the matter to me, as usual, and I pointed
out that my proposed contract with the Pierce-Lane Lumber Company would
assure our making a handsome profit at Almaquo, while Thompson had no
one in view to cut the other tract. Indeed, it was far away from any
railroad. Wegg saw the force of my argument, and insisted that Thompson
abandon his idea and accept my proposition. Together we bought the
property, having formed a stock company, and the contract for cutting
the timber was also secured. Things were looking bright for us and
royalty payments would soon be coming in.

"Then, to my amazement, Wegg came to me and wanted to sell out their
interests. He said Thompson had always been dissatisfied because they
had not bought the other tract of timber, and that the worry and
disappointment was affecting his friend's mind. He was personally
satisfied that my investment was the best, but, in order to sooth old
Will and prevent his mind from giving way, Wegg wanted to withdraw and
purchase the other tract.

"I knew there was a fortune in Almaquo, so I went to New York and
mortgaged all I possessed, discounting a lot of notes given me by
farmers in payment for machinery, and finally borrowing at a high rate
of interest the rest of the money I needed. In other words I risked all
my fortune on Almaquo, and brought the money home to pay Wegg and
Thompson for their interest. The moment they received the payment they
invested it in the Bogue tract--"

"Hold on!" cried Uncle John. "What tract did you say?"

"The Bogue timber tract, sir. It lies--"

"I know where it lies. Our company has been a whole year trying to find
out who owned it."

"Wegg and Thompson bought it. I was angry at the time, because their
withdrawal had driven me into a tight corner to protect my investment,
and I told them they would bitterly regret their action. I think Wegg
agreed with me, but Will Thompson was still stubborn.

"Then came the news of the fire at Almaquo. It was a false report, I
afterward learned, but at that time I believed the newspapers, and the
blow almost deprived me of reason. In my excitement I rushed over to
Wegg's farm and found the two men together, whereupon I told them I
was ruined.

"The news affected them powerfully because they had just saved
themselves from a like ruin, they thought. Wegg was also a sympathetic
man, in spite of his reserve. His old heart trouble suddenly came upon
him, aggravated by the excitement of the hour, and he died with scarcely
a moan. Thompson, whose reason was tottering long before this, became
violently insane at witnessing his friend's death, and has never since
recovered. That is all I am able to tell you, sir."

"The Bogue tract," said Uncle John, slowly, "is worth far more than the
Almaquo. Old Will Thompson was sane enough when insisting on that
investment. But where is the stock, or deed, to show they bought that
property?"

"I do not know, sir. I only know they told me they had effected the
purchase."

"Pardon me," said the Major. "Have you not been through this cupboard
before?"

West looked at him with a frown.

"Yes; in a search for my own stock," he said. "But I found neither that
nor any deed to the Bogue property. I am not a thief, Major Doyle."

"You stole the keys, though," said Louise, pointedly.

"I did not even do that," said West. "On the day of the funeral Joe
carelessly left them lying upon a table, so I slipped them into my
pocket. When I thought of them again Joe had gone away and I did not
know his address. I came over and searched the cupboard unsuccessfully.
But it was not a matter of great importance at that time if the stock
was mislaid, since there was no one to contest my ownership of it. It
was only after Mr. Merrick accused me of robbing my old friends and
ordered my payments stopped that I realized it was important to me to
prove my ownership. That is why I came here today."

Again a silence fell upon the group. Said Uncle John, finally:

"If the deed to the Bogue tract can be found, Joe and Ethel will be
rich. I wonder what became of the paper."

No one answered, for here was another mystery.



CHAPTER XXIV.

PEGGY HAS REVENGE.

Joe Wegg made a rapid recovery, his strength returning under the
influence of pleasant surroundings and frequent visits from Ethel and
Uncle John's three nieces. Not a word was hinted to either the invalid
or the school teacher regarding the inquiries Mr. Merrick was making
about the deed to the Bogue timber lands, which, if found, would make
the young couple independent. Joe was planning to exploit a new patent
as soon as he could earn enough to get it introduced, and Ethel
exhibited a sublime confidence in the boy's ability that rendered all
question of money insignificant.

Joe's sudden appearance in the land of his birth and his generally
smashed up condition were a nine days' wonder in Millville. The gossips
wanted to know all the whys and wherefores, but the boy kept his room in
the hotel, or only walked out when accompanied by Ethel or one of the
three nieces. Sometimes they took him to ride, as he grew better, and
the fact that Joe "were hand an' glove wi' the nabobs" lent him a
distinction he had never before possessed.

McNutt, always busy over somebody else's affairs, was very curious to
know what had caused the accident Joe had suffered. Notwithstanding the
little affair of the letter, in which he had not appeared with especial
credit, Peggy made an effort to interview the young man that resulted in
his complete discomfiture. But that did not deter him from indulging in
various vivid speculations about Joe Wegg, which the simple villagers
listened to with attention. For one thing, he confided to "the boys" at
the store that, in his opinion, the man who had murdered Cap'n Wegg had
tried to murder his son also, and it wasn't likely Joe could manage to
escape him a second time. Another tale evolved from Peggy's fertile
imagination was that Joe, being about to starve to death in the city,
had turned burglar and been shot in the arm in an attempt at
housebreaking.

"Wouldn't be s'prised," said the agent, in an awed voice, "ef the p'lice
was on his track now. P'raps there's a reward offered, boys; let's keep
an eye on him!"

He waylaid the nieces once or twice, and tried to secure from them a
verification of his somber suspicions, which they mischievously
fostered.

The girls found him a source of much amusement, and relieved their own
disappointment at finding the "Wegg Mystery" a pricked bubble by getting
McNutt excited over many sly suggestions of hidden crimes. They knew he
was harmless, for even his neighbors needed proof of any assertion he
made; moreover, the investigation Uncle John was making would soon set
matters right; so the young ladies did not hesitate to "have fun" at the
little agent's expense.

One of McNutt's numerous occupations was raising a "patch" of
watermelons each year on the lot back of the house. These he had
fostered with great care since the plants had first sprouted through the
soil, and in these late August days two or three hundreds of fine, big
melons were just getting ripe. He showed the patch with much pride one
day to the nieces, saying:

"Here's the most extry-fine melling-patch in this county, ef I do say it
myself. Dan Brayley he thinks he kin raise mellings, but the ol' fool
ain't got a circumstance to this. Ain't they beauties?"

"It seems to me," observed Patsy, gravely, "that Brayley's are just as
good. We passed his place this morning and wondered how he could raise
such enormous melons."

"'Normous! Brayley's!"

"I'm sure they are finer than these," said Beth.

"Well, I'll be jiggered!" Peggy's eyes stared as they had never stared
before. "Dan Brayley, he's a miser'ble ol' skinflint. Thet man couldn't
raise decent mellings ef he tried."

"What do you charge for melons, Mr. McNutt?" inquired Louise.

"Charge? Why--er--fifty cents a piece is my price to nabobs; an' dirt
cheap at that!"

"That is too much," declared Patsy. "Mr. Brayley says he will sell his
melons for fifteen cents each."

"Him! Fifteen cents!" gasped Peggy, greatly disappointed. "Say,
Brayley's a disturbin' element in these parts. He oughter go to jail fer
asking fifteen cents fer them mean little mellings o' his'n."

"They seem as large as yours," murmured Louise.

"But they ain't. An' Brayley's a cheat an' a rascal, while a honester
man ner me don't breathe. Nobody likes Brayley 'round Millville. Why,
on'y las' winter he called me a meddler--in public!--an' said as I shot
off my mouth too much. Me!"

"How impolite."

"But that's Dan Brayley. My mellings at fifty cents is better 'n his'n
at fifteen."

"Tell me," said Patsy, with a smile, "did you ever rob a melon-patch,
Mr. McNutt?"

"Me? I don't hev to. I grow 'em."

"But the ones you grow are worth fifty cents each, are they not?"

"Sure; mine is."

"Then every time you eat one of your own melons you eat fifty cents. If
you were eating one of Mr. Brayley's melons you would only eat
fifteen cents."

"And it would be Brayley's fifteen cents, too," added Beth, quickly.

Peggy turned his protruding eyes from one to the other, and a smile
slowly spread over his features.

"By jinks, let's rob Brayley's melling-patch!" he cried.

"All right; we'll help you," answered Patsy, readily.

"Oh, my dear!" remonstrated Louise, not understanding.

"It will be such fun," replied her cousin, with eyes dancing merrily.
"Boys always rob melon-patches, so I don't see why girls shouldn't. When
shall we do it, Mr. McNutt?"

"There ain't any moon jest now, an' the nights is dark as blazes. Let's
go ternight."

"It's a bargain," declared Patsy. "We will come for you in the surrey at
ten o'clock, and all drive together to the back of Brayley's yard and
take all the melons we want."

"It'll serve him right," said Peggy, delightedly. "Ol' Dan called me a
meddler onc't--in public--an' I'm bound t' git even with him."

"Don't betray us, sir," pleaded Beth.

"I can't," replied McNutt, frankly; "I'm in it myself, an' we'll jest
find out what his blame-twisted ol' fifteen-cent mellings is like."

Patsy was overjoyed at the success of her plot, which she had conceived
on the spur of the moment, as most clever plots are conceived. On the
way home she confided to her cousins a method of securing revenge upon
the agent for selling them the three copies of the "Lives of
the Saints."

"McNutt wants to get even with Brayley, he says, and we want to get even
with McNutt. I think our chances are best, don't you?" she asked.

And they decided to join the conspiracy.

There was some difficulty escaping from Uncle John and the Major that
night, but Patsy got them interested in a game of chess that was likely
to last some hours, while Beth stole to the barn and harnessed Joe to
the surrey. Soon the others slipped out and joined her, and with Patsy
and Beth on the front seat and Louise Inside the canopy they drove
slowly away until the sound of the horse's feet on the stones was no
longer likely to betray them.

McNutt was waiting for them when they quietly drew up before his house.
The village was dark and silent, for its inhabitants retired early to
bed. By good fortune the sky was overcast with heavy clouds and not even
the glimmer of a star relieved the gloom.

They put McNutt on the back seat with Louise, cautioned him to be quiet,
and then drove away. Dan Brayley's place was two miles distant, but in
answer to Peggy's earnest inquiry if she knew the way Beth declared she
could find it blind-folded. In a few moments Louise had engaged the
agent in a spirited discussion of the absorbing "mystery" and so
occupied his attention that he paid no heed to the direction they had
taken. The back seat was hemmed in by side curtains and the canopy, so
it would be no wonder if he lost all sense of direction, even had not
the remarks of the girl at his side completely absorbed him.

Beth drove slowly down the main street, up a lane, back by the lake road
and along the street again; and this programme was repeated several
times, until she thought a sufficient distance had been covered to
convince the agent they had arrived at Brayley's. They way was pitch
dark, but the horse was sensible enough to keep in the middle of the
road, so they met with no accident more than to jolt over a stone
now and then.

But now the most difficult part of the enterprise lay before them. The
girls turned down the lane back of the main street and bumped over the
ruts until they thought they had arrived at a spot opposite McNutt's own
melon patch.

"What's wrong?" asked the agent, as they suddenly stopped with a jerk.

"This ought to be Brayley's," said Beth; "but it's so dark I'm not
certain just where we are."

McNutt thrust his head out and peered into the blackness.

"Drive along a little," he whispered.

The girl obeyed.

"Stop--stop!" said he, a moment later. "I think that's them contwisted
fifteen-cent mellings--over there!"

They all got out and Beth tied the horse to the fence. Peggy climbed
over and at once whispered:

"Come on! It's them, all right."

Through the drifting clouds there was just enough light to enable them
to perceive the dark forms of the melons lying side by side upon their
vines. The agent took out his big clasp knife and recklessly slashed one
of them open.

"Green's grass!" he grumbled, and slashed another.

Patsy giggled, and the others felt a sudden irresistible impulse to join
her.

"Keep still!" cautioned McNutt. "Wouldn't ol' Dan be jest ravin' ef he
knew this? Say--here's a ripe one. Hev a slice."

They all felt for the slices he offered and ate the fruit without being
able to see it. But it really tasted delicious.

As the girls feasted they heard a crunching sound and inquired in low
voices what it was.

McNutt was stumping over the patch and plumping his wooden foot into
every melon he could find, smashing them wantonly against the ground.
The discovery filled them with horror. They had thought inducing the
agent to rob his own patch of a few melons, while under the delusion
that they belonged to his enemy Brayley, a bit of harmless fun; but here
was the vindictive fellow actually destroying his own property by the
wholesale.

"Oh, don't! Please don't, Mr. McNutt!" pleaded Patsy, in frightened
accents.

"Yes, I will," declared the agent, stubbornly. "I'll git even with Dan
Brayley fer once in my life, ef I never do another thing, by gum!"

"But it's wrong--it's wicked!" protested Beth.

"Can't help it; this is my chance, an' I'll make them bum fifteen-cent
mellings look like a penny a piece afore I gits done with 'em."

"Never mind, girls," whispered Louise. "It's the law of retribution.
Poor Peggy will be sorry for this tomorrow."

The man had not the faintest suspicion where he was. He knew his own
melon patch well enough, having worked in it at times all the summer;
but he had never climbed over the fence and approached it from the rear
before, so it took on a new aspect to him from this point of view, and
moreover the night was dark enough to deceive anybody.

If he came across an especially big melon McNutt would lug it to the
carriage and dump it in. And so angry and energetic was the little man
that in a brief space the melon patch was a scene of awful devastation,
and the surrey contained all the fruit that survived the massacre.

Beth unhitched the horse and they all took their places in the carriage
again, having some difficulty to find places for their feet on account
of the cargo of melons. McNutt was stowed away inside, with Louise, and
they drove away up the lane. The agent was jubilant and triumphant, and
chuckled in gleeful tones that thrilled the girls with remorse as they
remembered the annihilation of McNutt's cherished melons.

"Ol' Dan usu'lly has a dorg," said Peggy, between his fits of laughter;
"but I guess he had him chained up ternight."

"I'm not positively sure that was Brayley's place," remarked Beth; "it's
so very dark."

"Oh, it were Brayley's, all right," McNutt retorted. "I could tell by
the second-class taste o' them mellings, an' their measley little size.
Them things ain't a circumstance to the kind I raise."

"Are you sure?" asked Louise.

"Sure's shootln'. Guess I'm a jedge o' mellings, when I sees 'em."

"No one could see tonight," said Beth.

"Feelin's jest the same," declared the little man, confidently.

After wandering around a sufficient length of time to allay suspicion,
Beth finally drew up before McNutt's house again.

"I'll jest take my share o' them mellings," said Peggy, as he alighted.
"They ain't much 'count, bein' Brayley's; but it'll save me an' the ol'
woman from eatin' our own, or perhaps I kin sell 'em to Sam Cotting."

He took rather more than his share of the spoils, but the girls had no
voice to object. They were by this time so convulsed with suppressed
merriment that they had hard work not to shriek aloud their laughter.
For, in spite of the tragic revelations the morrow would bring forth,
the situation was so undeniably ridiculous that they could not resist
its humor.

"I've had a heap o' fun," whispered McNutt. "Good night, gals. Ef ye
didn't belong to thet gum-twisted nabob, ye'd be some pun'kins."

"Thank you, Mr. McNutt. Good night."

And it was not until well on their journey to the farm that the girls
finally dared to abandon further restraint. Then, indeed, they made the
grim, black hills of the plateau resound to the peals of their
merry laughter.



CHAPTER XXV.

GOOD NEWS AT LAST.

It was on the morning following this adventure that Uncle John received
a bulky envelope from the city containing the result of the
investigation he had ordered regarding the ownership of the Bogue tract
of pine forest. It appeared that the company in which he was so largely
interested had found the tract very valuable, and had been seeking for
the owners in order to purchase it or lease the right to cut the timber.
But although they had traced it through the hands of several successive
owners the present holders were all unknown to them until Mr. Merrick's
information had furnished them with a clue. A year ago the company had
paid up the back taxes--two years overdue--in order to establish a claim
to the property, and now they easily succeeded in finding the record of
the deed from a certain Charles Walton to Jonas Wegg and William
Thompson. The deed itself could not be found, but Uncle John considered
the county record a sufficient claim to entitle the young folks to the
property unless the ownership should be contested by others, which was
not likely.

Uncle John invited Ethel and Joe to dine with him that evening, and Mary
was told the occasion merited the best menu she could provide. The young
folks arrived without any idea of receiving more than a good dinner and
the pleasure of mingling with the cordial, kindly household at the farm;
but the general air of hilarity and good fellowship pervading the family
circle this evening inspired the guests with like enthusiasm, and no
party could be merrier than the one that did full justice to Mary's
superior cookery.

One of the last courses consisted of iced watermelon, and when it
appeared the three girls eyed one another guiltily and then made frantic
attempts to suppress their laughter, which was unseemly because no one
but themselves understood the joke. But all else was speedily forgotten
in the interest of the coming ceremony, which Mr. Merrick had carefully
planned and prepared.

The company was invited to assemble in the room comprising the spacious
right wing, and when all were seated the little gentleman coughed to
clear his throat and straightway began his preamble.

He recited the manner in which Captain Wegg and Will Thompson, having
money to invest, were led into an enterprise which Bob West had
proposed, but finally preferred another venture and so withdrew their
money altogether from the Almaquo tract.

This statement caused both Joe and Ethel to stare hard, but they said
nothing.

"Your grandfather, Ethel," continued the narrator, "was much impressed
by the value of another timber tract, although where he got his
information concerning it I have been unable to discover. This piece of
property, called the Bogue tract, was purchased by Wegg and Thompson
with the money they withdrew from Almaquo, and still stands in
their name."

Then he recounted, quite frankly, his unjust suspicions of the hardware
dealer, and told of the interview in which the full details of this
transaction were disclosed by West, as well as the truth relating to the
death of Captain Wegg and the sudden insanity and paralysis of old
Will Thompson.

Joe could corroborate this last, and now understood why Thompson had
cried out that West's "good news" had killed his father. He meant, of
course, their narrow escape from being involved in West's supposed ruin,
for at that time no one knew the report of the fire was false.

Finally, these matters being cleared up, Uncle John declared that the
Pierce-Lane Lumber Company was willing to contract to cut the timber on
the Bogue property, or would pay a lump sum of two hundred thousand
dollars for such title to the tract as could be given. He did not add
that he had personally offered to guarantee the title. That was an
unnecessary bit of information.

You may perhaps imagine the happiness this announcement gave Joe and
Ethel. They could scarcely believe the good news was true, even when the
kindly old gentleman, with tears in his eyes, congratulated the young
couple on the fortune in store for them. The Major followed with a happy
speech of felicitation, and then the three girls hugged the little
school teacher rapturously and told her how glad they were.

"I think, sir," said Joe, striving to curb his elation, "that it will be
better in the end for us to accept the royalty. Don't you?"

"I do, indeed, my boy," was the reply. "For if our people make an offer
for the land of two hundred thousand you may rest assured it is worth
much more. The manager has confided to me in his letter that if we are
obliged to pay royalties the timber will cost us nearly double what it
would by an outright purchase of the tract."

"In that case, sir," began Joe, eagerly, "we will--"

"Nonsense. The company can afford the royalty, Joe, for it is making a
heap of money--more than I wish it were. One of my greatest trials is to
take care of the money I've already made, and--"

"And he couldn't do it at all without my help," broke in the Major.
"Don't ye hesitate to take an advantage of him, Joseph, if ye can get
it--which I doubt--for Mr. Merrick is most disgracefully rich already."

"That's true," sighed the little millionaire. "So it will be a royalty,
Joe. We are paying the same percentage to Bob West for the Almaquo
tract, but yours is so much better that I am sure your earnings will
furnish you and Ethel with all the income you need."

They sat discoursing upon the happy event for some time longer, but Joe
had to return to the hotel early because he was not yet strong enough to
be out late.

"Before I go, Mr. Merrick," he said, "I'd like you to give me my
mother's picture, which is in the secret drawer of the cupboard. You
have the keys, now, and Ethel is curious to see how my mother looked."

Uncle John went at once to the cupboard and unlocked the doors. Joe
himself pushed the slide and took out of the drawer the picture, which
had lain just beneath the Almaquo stock certificates.

The picture was passed reverently around. A sweet-faced, sad little
woman it showed, with appealing eyes and lips that seemed to quiver even
in the photograph.

As Louise held it in her hand something induced her to turn it over.

"Here is some writing upon the back," she said.

Joe bent over and read it aloud. It was in his father's handwriting.

"'Press the spring in the left hand lower corner of the secret drawer.'"

"Hah!" cried Uncle John, while the others stared stupidly. "That's it!
That's the information we've been wanting so long, Joseph!"

He ran to the cupboard, even as he spoke, and while they all thronged
about him thrust in his hand, felt for the spring, and pressed it.

The bottom of the drawer lifted, showing another cavity beneath. From
this the searcher withdrew a long envelope, tied with red tape.

"At last, Joseph!" he shouted, triumphantly waving the envelope over his
head. And then he read aloud the words docketed upon the outside:
"'Warranty Deed and Conveyance from Charles Walton to Jonas Wegg and
William Thompson.' Our troubles are over, my boy, for here is the key to
your fortune."

"Also," whispered Louise to her cousins, rather disconsolately, "it
explains the last shred of mystery about the Wegg case. Heigh-ho! what a
chase we've had for nothing!"

"Not for nothing, dear," replied Patsy, softly, "for we've helped make
two people happy, and that ought to repay us for all our anxiety
and labor."

       *       *       *       *       *

A knock was heard at the door, and Old Hucks entered and handed Mr.
Merrick a paper.

"He's waiting, sir," said he, ambiguously.

"Oh, Tom--Tom!" cried Joe Wegg, rising to throw his arms around the old
man's neck, "I'm rich, Tom--all my troubles are over--and Mr. Merrick
has done it all--for Ethel and me!"

The ever smiling face of the ancient retainer did not change, but his
eyes softened and filled with tears as he hugged the boy close to
his breast.

"God be praised. Joe!" he said in a low voice. "I allus knew the
Merricks 'd bring us luck."

"What the devil does this mean?" demanded Uncle John at this juncture,
as he fluttered the paper and glared angrily around.

"What is it, dear?" inquired Louise.

"See for yourself," he returned.

She took the paper and read it, while Patsy and Beth peered over her
shoulder. The following was scrawled upon a sheet of soiled stationery:


"John Merrak, esquare, to
  Marshall McMahon McNutt, detter.

"To yur gals Smashin' 162 mellings at 50 cents a one
  .....................$81.00
    Pleas remitt & save trouble."

The nieces screamed, laughing until they cried, while Uncle John
spluttered, smiled, beamed, and then requested an explanation.

Patsy told the story of the watermelon raid with rare humor, and it
served to amuse everybody and relieve the strain that had preceded the
arrival of McNutt's bill.

"Did you say the man is waiting, Thomas?" asked Uncle John.

"Yes, sir."

"Here--give him five dollars and tell him to receipt the bill. If he
refuses, I'll carry the matter to the courts. McNutt's a rascal, and a
fool in the bargain; but we've had some of his melons and the girls have
had five dollars' worth of fun in getting them. But assure him that this
squares accounts, Thomas."

Thomas performed his mission.

McNutt rolled his eyes, pounded the floor with his stump to emphasize
his mingled anger and satisfaction, and then receipted the bill.

"It's jest five more'n I 'spected to git, Hucks," he said with a grin.
"But what's the use o' havin' nabobs around, ef ye don't bleed 'em?"

       *       *       *       *       *

This story is one of the delightful "Aunt Jane Series" in which are
chronicled the many interesting adventures in the lives of those
fascinating girls and dear old "Uncle John." The other volumes can be
bought wherever books are sold. A complete list of titles, which is
added to from time to time, is given on page 3 of this book.

(_ Complete catalog sent free on request._)







THE MAN AGAINST THE SKY

A Book of Poems

by Edwin Arlington Robinson



[Note on text:  Italicized words or phrases are capitalized.
Lines longer than 78 characters are broken and the continuation
is indented two spaces.  Some obvious errors may have been corrected.]



               To
               the memory of
               WILLIAM EDWARD BUTLER





Several of the poems included in this book are reprinted
from American periodicals, as follows:  "The Gift of God",
"Old King Cole", "Another Dark Lady", and "The Unforgiven";
"Flammonde" and "The Poor Relation"; "The Clinging Vine";
"Eros Turannos" and "Bokardo"; "The Voice of Age"; "Cassandra";
"The Burning Book"; "Theophilus"; "Ben Jonson Entertains
a Man from Stratford".




Contents



     Flammonde
     The Gift of God
     The Clinging Vine
     Cassandra
     John Gorham
     Stafford's Cabin
     Hillcrest
     Old King Cole
     Ben Jonson Entertains a Man from Stratford
     Eros Turannos
     Old Trails
     The Unforgiven
     Theophilus
     Veteran Sirens
     Siege Perilous
     Another Dark Lady
     The Voice of Age
     The Dark House
     The Poor Relation
     The Burning Book
     Fragment
     Lisette and Eileen
     Llewellyn and the Tree
     Bewick Finzer
     Bokardo
     The Man against the Sky





THE MAN AGAINST THE SKY





Flammonde



     The man Flammonde, from God knows where,
     With firm address and foreign air,
     With news of nations in his talk
     And something royal in his walk,
     With glint of iron in his eyes,
     But never doubt, nor yet surprise,
     Appeared, and stayed, and held his head
     As one by kings accredited.

     Erect, with his alert repose
     About him, and about his clothes,
     He pictured all tradition hears
     Of what we owe to fifty years.
     His cleansing heritage of taste
     Paraded neither want nor waste;
     And what he needed for his fee
     To live, he borrowed graciously.

     He never told us what he was,
     Or what mischance, or other cause,
     Had banished him from better days
     To play the Prince of Castaways.
     Meanwhile he played surpassing well
     A part, for most, unplayable;
     In fine, one pauses, half afraid
     To say for certain that he played.

     For that, one may as well forego
     Conviction as to yes or no;
     Nor can I say just how intense
     Would then have been the difference
     To several, who, having striven
     In vain to get what he was given,
     Would see the stranger taken on
     By friends not easy to be won.

     Moreover, many a malcontent
     He soothed and found munificent;
     His courtesy beguiled and foiled
     Suspicion that his years were soiled;
     His mien distinguished any crowd,
     His credit strengthened when he bowed;
     And women, young and old, were fond
     Of looking at the man Flammonde.

     There was a woman in our town
     On whom the fashion was to frown;
     But while our talk renewed the tinge
     Of a long-faded scarlet fringe,
     The man Flammonde saw none of that,
     And what he saw we wondered at--
     That none of us, in her distress,
     Could hide or find our littleness.

     There was a boy that all agreed
     Had shut within him the rare seed
     Of learning.  We could understand,
     But none of us could lift a hand.
     The man Flammonde appraised the youth,
     And told a few of us the truth;
     And thereby, for a little gold,
     A flowered future was unrolled.

     There were two citizens who fought
     For years and years, and over nought;
     They made life awkward for their friends,
     And shortened their own dividends.
     The man Flammonde said what was wrong
     Should be made right; nor was it long
     Before they were again in line,
     And had each other in to dine.

     And these I mention are but four
     Of many out of many more.
     So much for them.  But what of him--
     So firm in every look and limb?
     What small satanic sort of kink
     Was in his brain?  What broken link
     Withheld him from the destinies
     That came so near to being his?

     What was he, when we came to sift
     His meaning, and to note the drift
     Of incommunicable ways
     That make us ponder while we praise?
     Why was it that his charm revealed
     Somehow the surface of a shield?
     What was it that we never caught?
     What was he, and what was he not?

     How much it was of him we met
     We cannot ever know; nor yet
     Shall all he gave us quite atone
     For what was his, and his alone;
     Nor need we now, since he knew best,
     Nourish an ethical unrest:
     Rarely at once will nature give
     The power to be Flammonde and live.

     We cannot know how much we learn
     From those who never will return,
     Until a flash of unforeseen
     Remembrance falls on what has been.
     We've each a darkening hill to climb;
     And this is why, from time to time
     In Tilbury Town, we look beyond
     Horizons for the man Flammonde.




The Gift of God



     Blessed with a joy that only she
     Of all alive shall ever know,
     She wears a proud humility
     For what it was that willed it so,--
     That her degree should be so great
     Among the favored of the Lord
     That she may scarcely bear the weight
     Of her bewildering reward.

     As one apart, immune, alone,
     Or featured for the shining ones,
     And like to none that she has known
     Of other women's other sons,--
     The firm fruition of her need,
     He shines anointed; and he blurs
     Her vision, till it seems indeed
     A sacrilege to call him hers.

     She fears a little for so much
     Of what is best, and hardly dares
     To think of him as one to touch
     With aches, indignities, and cares;
     She sees him rather at the goal,
     Still shining; and her dream foretells
     The proper shining of a soul
     Where nothing ordinary dwells.

     Perchance a canvass of the town
     Would find him far from flags and shouts,
     And leave him only the renown
     Of many smiles and many doubts;
     Perchance the crude and common tongue
     Would havoc strangely with his worth;
     But she, with innocence unwrung,
     Would read his name around the earth.

     And others, knowing how this youth
     Would shine, if love could make him great,
     When caught and tortured for the truth
     Would only writhe and hesitate;
     While she, arranging for his days
     What centuries could not fulfill,
     Transmutes him with her faith and praise,
     And has him shining where she will.

     She crowns him with her gratefulness,
     And says again that life is good;
     And should the gift of God be less
     In him than in her motherhood,
     His fame, though vague, will not be small,
     As upward through her dream he fares,
     Half clouded with a crimson fall
     Of roses thrown on marble stairs.




The Clinging Vine



     "Be calm?  And was I frantic?
      You'll have me laughing soon.
     I'm calm as this Atlantic,
      And quiet as the moon;
     I may have spoken faster
      Than once, in other days;
     For I've no more a master,
      And now--'Be calm,' he says.

     "Fear not, fear no commotion,--
      I'll be as rocks and sand;
     The moon and stars and ocean
      Will envy my command;
     No creature could be stiller
      In any kind of place
     Than I...  No, I'll not kill her;
      Her death is in her face.

     "Be happy while she has it,
      For she'll not have it long;
     A year, and then you'll pass it,
      Preparing a new song.
     And I'm a fool for prating
      Of what a year may bring,
     When more like her are waiting
      For more like you to sing.

     "You mock me with denial,
      You mean to call me hard?
     You see no room for trial
      When all my doors are barred?
     You say, and you'd say dying,
      That I dream what I know;
     And sighing, and denying,
      You'd hold my hand and go.

     "You scowl--and I don't wonder;
      I spoke too fast again;
     But you'll forgive one blunder,
      For you are like most men:
     You are,--or so you've told me,
      So many mortal times,
     That heaven ought not to hold me
      Accountable for crimes.

     "Be calm?  Was I unpleasant?
      Then I'll be more discreet,
     And grant you, for the present,
      The balm of my defeat:
     What she, with all her striving,
      Could not have brought about,
     You've done.  Your own contriving
      Has put the last light out.

     "If she were the whole story,
      If worse were not behind,
     I'd creep with you to glory,
      Believing I was blind;
     I'd creep, and go on seeming
      To be what I despise.
     You laugh, and say I'm dreaming,
      And all your laughs are lies.

     "Are women mad?  A few are,
      And if it's true you say--
     If most men are as you are--
      We'll all be mad some day.
     Be calm--and let me finish;
      There's more for you to know.
     I'll talk while you diminish,
      And listen while you grow.

     "There was a man who married
      Because he couldn't see;
     And all his days he carried
      The mark of his degree.
     But you--you came clear-sighted,
      And found truth in my eyes;
     And all my wrongs you've righted
      With lies, and lies, and lies.

     "You've killed the last assurance
      That once would have me strive
     To rouse an old endurance
      That is no more alive.
     It makes two people chilly
      To say what we have said,
     But you--you'll not be silly
      And wrangle for the dead.

     "You don't?  You never wrangle?
      Why scold then,--or complain?
     More words will only mangle
      What you've already slain.
     Your pride you can't surrender?
      My name--for that you fear?
     Since when were men so tender,
      And honor so severe?

     "No more--I'll never bear it.
      I'm going.  I'm like ice.
     My burden?  You would share it?
      Forbid the sacrifice!
     Forget so quaint a notion,
      And let no more be told;
     For moon and stars and ocean
      And you and I are cold."




Cassandra



     I heard one who said:  "Verily,
      What word have I for children here?
     Your Dollar is your only Word,
      The wrath of it your only fear.

     "You build it altars tall enough
      To make you see, but you are blind;
     You cannot leave it long enough
      To look before you or behind.

     "When Reason beckons you to pause,
      You laugh and say that you know best;
     But what it is you know, you keep
      As dark as ingots in a chest.

     "You laugh and answer, 'We are young;
      O leave us now, and let us grow.'--
     Not asking how much more of this
      Will Time endure or Fate bestow.

     "Because a few complacent years
      Have made your peril of your pride,
     Think you that you are to go on
      Forever pampered and untried?

     "What lost eclipse of history,
      What bivouac of the marching stars,
     Has given the sign for you to see
      Millenniums and last great wars?

     "What unrecorded overthrow
      Of all the world has ever known,
     Or ever been, has made itself
      So plain to you, and you alone?

     "Your Dollar, Dove and Eagle make
      A Trinity that even you
     Rate higher than you rate yourselves;
      It pays, it flatters, and it's new.

     "And though your very flesh and blood
      Be what your Eagle eats and drinks,
     You'll praise him for the best of birds,
      Not knowing what the Eagle thinks.

     "The power is yours, but not the sight;
      You see not upon what you tread;
     You have the ages for your guide,
      But not the wisdom to be led.

     "Think you to tread forever down
      The merciless old verities?
     And are you never to have eyes
      To see the world for what it is?

     "Are you to pay for what you have
      With all you are?"--No other word
     We caught, but with a laughing crowd
      Moved on.  None heeded, and few heard.




John Gorham



     "Tell me what you're doing over here, John Gorham,
     Sighing hard and seeming to be sorry when you're not;
     Make me laugh or let me go now, for long faces in the moonlight
     Are a sign for me to say again a word that you forgot."--

     "I'm over here to tell you what the moon already
     May have said or maybe shouted ever since a year ago;
     I'm over here to tell you what you are, Jane Wayland,
     And to make you rather sorry, I should say, for being so."--

     "Tell me what you're saying to me now, John Gorham,
     Or you'll never see as much of me as ribbons any more;
     I'll vanish in as many ways as I have toes and fingers,
     And you'll not follow far for one where flocks have been before."--

     "I'm sorry now you never saw the flocks, Jane Wayland,
     But you're the one to make of them as many as you need.
     And then about the vanishing.  It's I who mean to vanish;
     And when I'm here no longer you'll be done with me indeed."--

     "That's a way to tell me what I am, John Gorham!
     How am I to know myself until I make you smile?
     Try to look as if the moon were making faces at you,
     And a little more as if you meant to stay a little while."--

     "You are what it is that over rose-blown gardens
     Makes a pretty flutter for a season in the sun;
     You are what it is that with a mouse, Jane Wayland,
     Catches him and lets him go and eats him up for fun."--

     "Sure I never took you for a mouse, John Gorham;
     All you say is easy, but so far from being true
     That I wish you wouldn't ever be again the one to think so;
     For it isn't cats and butterflies that I would be to you."--

     "All your little animals are in one picture--
     One I've had before me since a year ago to-night;
     And the picture where they live will be of you, Jane Wayland,
     Till you find a way to kill them or to keep them out of sight."--

     "Won't you ever see me as I am, John Gorham,
     Leaving out the foolishness and all I never meant?
     Somewhere in me there's a woman, if you know the way to find her.
     Will you like me any better if I prove it and repent?"

     "I doubt if I shall ever have the time, Jane Wayland;
     And I dare say all this moonlight lying round us might as well
     Fall for nothing on the shards of broken urns that are forgotten,
     As on two that have no longer much of anything to tell."




Stafford's Cabin



     Once there was a cabin here, and once there was a man;
     And something happened here before my memory began.
     Time has made the two of them the fuel of one flame
     And all we have of them is now a legend and a name.

     All I have to say is what an old man said to me,
     And that would seem to be as much as there will ever be.
     "Fifty years ago it was we found it where it sat."--
     And forty years ago it was old Archibald said that.

     "An apple tree that's yet alive saw something, I suppose,
     Of what it was that happened there, and what no mortal knows.
     Some one on the mountain heard far off a master shriek,
     And then there was a light that showed the way for men to seek.

     "We found it in the morning with an iron bar behind,
     And there were chains around it; but no search could ever find,
     Either in the ashes that were left, or anywhere,
     A sign to tell of who or what had been with Stafford there.

     "Stafford was a likely man with ideas of his own--
     Though I could never like the kind that likes to live alone;
     And when you met, you found his eyes were always on your shoes,
     As if they did the talking when he asked you for the news.

     "That's all, my son.  Were I to talk for half a hundred years
     I'd never clear away from there the cloud that never clears.
     We buried what was left of it,--the bar, too, and the chains;
     And only for the apple tree there's nothing that remains."

     Forty years ago it was I heard the old man say,
     "That's all, my son."--And here again I find the place to-day,
     Deserted and told only by the tree that knows the most,
     And overgrown with golden-rod as if there were no ghost.




Hillcrest

         (To Mrs. Edward MacDowell)



     No sound of any storm that shakes
     Old island walls with older seas
     Comes here where now September makes
     An island in a sea of trees.

     Between the sunlight and the shade
     A man may learn till he forgets
     The roaring of a world remade,
     And all his ruins and regrets;

     And if he still remembers here
     Poor fights he may have won or lost,--
     If he be ridden with the fear
     Of what some other fight may cost,--

     If, eager to confuse too soon,
     What he has known with what may be,
     He reads a planet out of tune
     For cause of his jarred harmony,--

     If here he venture to unroll
     His index of adagios,
     And he be given to console
     Humanity with what he knows,--

     He may by contemplation learn
     A little more than what he knew,
     And even see great oaks return
     To acorns out of which they grew.

     He may, if he but listen well,
     Through twilight and the silence here,
     Be told what there are none may tell
     To vanity's impatient ear;

     And he may never dare again
     Say what awaits him, or be sure
     What sunlit labyrinth of pain
     He may not enter and endure.

     Who knows to-day from yesterday
     May learn to count no thing too strange:
     Love builds of what Time takes away,
     Till Death itself is less than Change.

     Who sees enough in his duress
     May go as far as dreams have gone;
     Who sees a little may do less
     Than many who are blind have done;

     Who sees unchastened here the soul
     Triumphant has no other sight
     Than has a child who sees the whole
     World radiant with his own delight.

     Far journeys and hard wandering
     Await him in whose crude surmise
     Peace, like a mask, hides everything
     That is and has been from his eyes;

     And all his wisdom is unfound,
     Or like a web that error weaves
     On airy looms that have a sound
     No louder now than falling leaves.


drawing-room and say how d'you do to God, Mark was allowed to go to
church in his ordinary clothes and after church to play at whatever he
wanted to play, so that he learned to regard the assemblage of human
beings to worship God as nothing more remarkable than the song of birds.
He was too young to have experienced yet a personal need of religion;
but he had already been touched by that grace of fellowship which is
conferred upon a small congregation, the individual members of which are
in church to please themselves rather than to impress others. This was
always the case in the church of Nancepean, which had to contend not
merely with the popularity of methodism, but also with the situation of
the Chapel in the middle of the village. On the dark December evenings
there would be perhaps not more than half a dozen worshippers, each one
of whom would have brought his own candle and stuck it on the shelf of
the pew. The organist would have two candles for the harmonium; the
choir of three little boys and one little girl would have two between
them; the altar would have two; the Vicar would have two. But when all
the candle-light was put together, it left most of the church in shadow;
indeed, it scarcely even illuminated the space between the worshippers,
so that each one seemed wrapped in a golden aura of prayer, most of all
when at Evensong the people knelt in silence for a minute while the
sound of the sea without rose and fell and the noise of the wind
scuttling through the ivy on the walls was audible. When the
congregation had gone out and the Vicar was standing at the churchyard
gate saying "good night," Mark used to think that they must all be
feeling happy to go home together up the long hill to Pendhu and down
into twinkling Nancepean. And it did not matter whether it was a night
of clear or clouded moonshine or a night of windy stars or a night of
darkness; for when it was dark he could always look back from the valley
road and see a company of lanthorns moving homeward; and that more than
anything shed upon his young spirit the grace of human fellowship and
the love of mankind.




CHAPTER VIII

THE WRECK


One wild night in late October of the year before he would be thirteen,
Mark was lying awake hoping, as on such nights he always hoped, to hear
somebody shout "A wreck! A wreck!" A different Mark from that one who
used to lie trembling in Lima Street lest he should hear a shout of
"Fire! or Thieves!"

And then it happened! It happened as a hundred times he had imagined its
happening, so exactly that he could hardly believe for a moment he was
not dreaming. There was the flash of a lanthorn on the ceiling, a
thunderous, knocking on the Vicarage door. Mark leapt out of bed;
flinging open his window through which the wind rushed in like a flight
of angry birds, he heard voices below in the garden shouting "Parson!
Parson! Parson Trehawke! There's a brig driving in fast toward Church
Cove." He did not wait to hear more, but dashed along the passage to
rouse first his grandfather, then his mother, and then Emma, the Vicar's
old cook.

"And you must get soup ready," he cried, standing over the old woman in
his flannel pyjamas and waving his arms excitedly, while downstairs the
cuckoo popped in and out of his door in the clock twelve times. Emma
blinked at him in terror, and Mark pulled off all the bedclothes to
convince the old woman that he was not playing a practical joke. Then he
rushed back to his own room and began to dress for dear life.

"Mother," he shouted, while he was dressing, "the Captain can sleep in
my bed, if he isn't drowned, can't he?"

"Darling, do you really want to go down to the sea on such a night?"

"Oh, mother," he gasped, "I'm practically dressed. And you will see
that Emma has lots of hot soup ready, won't you? Because it'll be much
better to bring all the crew back here. I don't think they'd want to
walk all that way over Pendhu to Nancepean after they'd been wrecked, do
you?"

"Well, you must ask grandfather first before you make arrangements for
his house."

"Grandfather's simply tearing into his clothes; Ernie Hockin and Joe
Dunstan have both got lanthorns, and I'll carry ours, so if one blows
out we shall be all right. Oh, mother, the wind's simply shrieking
through the trees. Can you hear it?"

"Yes, dearest, I certainly can. I think you'd better shut your windows.
It's blowing everything about in your room most uncomfortably."

Mark's soul expanded in gratitude to God when he found himself neither
in a dream nor in a story, but actually, and without any possibility of
self-deception hurrying down the drive toward the sea beside Ernie and
Joe, who had come from the village to warn the Vicar of the wreck and
were wearing oilskins and sou'westers, thus striking the keynote as it
were of the night's adventure. At first in the shelter of the holm-oaks
the storm seemed far away overhead; but when they turned the corner and
took the road along the valley, the wind caught them full in the face
and Mark was blown back violently against the swinging gate of the
drive. The light of the lanthorns shining on a rut in the road showed a
field-mouse hurrying inland before the rushing gale. Mark bent double to
force himself to keep up with the others, lest somebody should think, by
his inability to maintain an equal pace that he ought to follow the
field-mouse back home. After they had struggled on for a while a bend of
the valley gave them a few minutes of easy progress and Mark listened
while Ernie Hockin explained to the Vicar what had happened:

"Just before dark Eddowes the coastguard said he reckoned there was a
brig making very heavy weather of it and he shouldn't be surprised if
she come ashore tonight. Couldn't seem to beat out of the bay noways, he
said. And afterwards about nine o'clock when me and Joe here and some
of the chaps were in the bar to the Hanover, Eddowes come in again and
said she was in a bad way by the looks of her last thing he saw, and he
telephoned along to Lanyon to ask if they'd seen her down to the
lifeboat house. They reckoned she was all right to the lifeboat, and old
man Timbury who do always go against anything Eddowes do say shouted
that of course she was all right because he'd taken a look at her
through his glass before it grew dark. Of course she was all right.
'She's on a lee shore,' said Eddowes. 'It don't take a coastguard to
tell that,' said old man Timbury. And then they got to talking one
against the other the same as they belong, and they'd soon got back to
the same old talk whether Jackie Fisher was the finest admiral who ever
lived or no use at all. 'What's the good in your talking to me?' old man
Timbury was saying. 'Why afore you was born I've seen' . . . and we all
started in to shout 'ships o' the line, frigates, and cavattes,' because
we belong to mock him like that, when somebody called 'Hark, listen,
wasn't that a rocket?' That fetched us all outside into the road where
we stood listening. The wind was blowing harder than ever, and there was
a parcel of sea rising. You could hear it against Shag Rock over the
wind. Eddowes, he were a bit upset to think he should have been talking
and not a-heard the rocket. But there wasn't a light in the sky, and
when we went home along about half past nine we saw Eddowes again and he
said he'd been so far as Church Cove and should walk up along to the
Bar. No mistake, Mr. Trehawke, he's a handy chap is Eddowes for the
coastguard job. And then about eleven o'clock he saw two rockets close
in to Church Cove and he come running back and telephoned to Lanyon, but
they said no one couldn't launch a boat to-night, and Eddowes he come
banging on the doors and windows shouting 'A Wreck' and some of us took
ropes along with Eddowes, and me and Joe here come and fetched you
along. Eddowes said he's afeard she'll strike in Dollar Cove unless
she's lucky and come ashore in Church Cove."

"How's the tide?" asked the Vicar.

"About an hour of the ebb," said Ernie Hockin. "And the moon's been up
this hour and more."

Just then the road turned the corner, and the world became a waste of
wind and spindrift driving inland. The noise of the gale made it
impossible for anybody to talk, and Mark was left wondering whether the
ship had actually struck or not. The wind drummed in his ears, the
flying grit and gravel and spray stung his face; but he struggled on
hoping that this midnight walk would not come to an abrupt end by his
grandfather's declining to go any farther. Above the drumming of the
wind the roar of the sea became more audible every moment; the spume was
thicker; the end of the valley, ordinarily the meeting-place of sand and
grass and small streams with their yellow flags and forget-me-nots, was
a desolation of white foam beyond which against the cliffs showing black
in the nebulous moonlight the breakers leapt high with frothy tongues.
Mark thought that they resembled immense ghosts clawing up to reach the
summit of the cliff. It was incredible that this hell-broth was Church
Cove.

"Hullo!" yelled Ernie Hockin. "Here's the bridge."

It was true. One wave at the moment of high tide had swept snarling over
the stream and carried the bridge into the meadow beyond.

"We'll have to get round by the road," shouted the Vicar.

They turned to the right across a ploughed field and after scrambling
through the hedge emerged in the comparative shelter of the road down
from Pendhu.

"I hope the churchyard wall is all right," said the Vicar. "I never
remember such a night since I came to Nancepean."

"Sure 'nough, 'tis blowing very fierce," Joe Dunstan agreed. "But don't
you worry about the wall, Mr. Trehawke. The worst of the water is broken
by the Castle and only comes in sideways, as you might say."

When they drew near the gate of the churchyard, the rain of sand and
small pebbles was agonizing, as it swept across up the low sandstone
cliffs on that side of the Castle. Two or three excited figures shouted
for them to hurry because she was going to strike in Dollar Cove, and
everybody began to scramble up the grassy slope, clutching at the
tuffets of thrift to aid their progress. It was calm here in the lee;
and Mark panting up the face thought of those two princesses who were
wrecked here ages ago, and he understood now why one of them had
insisted on planting the tower deep in the foundation of this green
fortress against the wind and weather. While he was thinking this, his
head came above the sky line, his breath left him at the assault of the
wind, and he had to crawl on all fours toward the sea. He reached the
edge of the cliff just as something like the wings of a gigantic bat
flapped across the dim wet moonlight, and before he realized that this
was the brig he heard the crashing of her spars. The watchers stood up
against the wind, battling with it to fling lines in the vain hope of
saving some sailor who was being churned to death in that dreadful
creaming of the sea below. Yes, and there were forms of men visible on
board; two had climbed the mainmast, which crashed before they could
clutch at the ropes that were being flung to them from land, crashed and
carried them down shrieking into the surge. Mark found it hard to
believe that last summer he had spent many sunlit hours dabbling in the
sand for silver dollars of Portugal lost perhaps on such a night as this
a hundred years ago, exactly where these two poor mariners were lost. A
few minutes after the mainmast the hull went also; but in the nebulous
moonlight nothing could be seen of any bodies alive or dead, nothing
except wreckage tossing upon the surge. The watchers on the cliff turned
away from the wind to gather new breath and give their cheeks a rest
from the stinging fragments of rock and earth. Away up over the towans
they could see the bobbing lanthorns of men hurrying down from Chypie
where news of the wreck had reached; and on the road from Lanyon they
could see lanthorns on the other side of Church Cove waiting until the
tide had ebbed far enough to let them cross the beach.

Suddenly the Vicar shouted:

"I can see a poor fellow hanging on to a ledge of rock. Bring a rope!
Bring a rope!"

Eddowes the coastguard took charge of the operation, and Mark with
beating pulses watched the end of the rope touch the huddled form below.
But either from exhaustion or because he feared to let go of the
slippery ledge for one moment the sailor made no attempt to grasp the
rope. The men above shouted to him, begged him to make an effort; but he
remained there inert.

"Somebody must go down with the rope and get a slip knot under his
arms," the Vicar shouted.

Nobody seemed to pay attention to this proposal, and Mark wondered if he
was the only one who had heard it. However, when the Vicar repeated his
suggestion, Eddowes came forward, knelt down by the edge of the cliff,
shook himself like a bather who is going to plunge into what he knows
will be very cold water, and then vanished down the rope. Everybody
crawled on hand and knees to see what would happen. Mark prayed that
Eddowes, who was a great friend of his, would not come to any harm, but
that he would rescue the sailor and be given the Albert medal for saving
life. It was Eddowes who had made him medal wise. The coastguard
struggled to slip the loop under the man's shoulders along his legs; but
it must have been impossible, for presently he made a signal to be
raised.

"I can't do it alone," he shouted. "He's got a hold like a limpet."

Nobody seemed anxious to suppose that the addition of another rescuer
would be any more successful.

"If there was two of us," Eddowes went on, "we might do something."

The people on the cliff shook their heads doubtfully.

"Isn't anybody coming down along with me to have a try?" the coastguard
demanded at the top of his voice.

Mark did not hear his grandfather's reply; he only saw him go over the
cliff's edge at the end of one rope while Eddowes went down on another.
A minute later the slipknot came untied (or that was how the accident
was explained) and the Vicar went to join the drowned mariners,
dislodging as he fell the man whom he had tried to save, so that of the
crew of the brig _Happy Return_ not one ever came to port.

It would be difficult to exaggerate the effect upon Mark Lidderdale of
that night. He was twelve years old at the time; but the years in
Cornwall had retarded that precocious development to which he seemed
destined by the surroundings of his early childhood in Lima Street, and
in many ways he was hardly any older than he was when he left London. In
after years he looked back with gratitude upon the shock he received
from what was as it were an experience of the material impact of death,
because it made him think about death, not morbidly as so many children
and young people will, but with the apprehension of something that
really does come in a moment and for which it is necessary for every
human being to prepare his soul. The platitudes of age may often be for
youth divine revelations, and there is nothing so stimulating as the
unaided apprehension of a great commonplace of existence. The awe with
which Mark was filled that night was too vast to evaporate in sentiment,
and when two days after this there came news from Africa that his father
had died of black-water fever that awe was crystallized indeed. Mark
looking round at his small world perceived that nobody was safe.
To-morrow his mother might die; to-morrow he might die himself. In any
case the death of his grandfather would have meant a profound change in
the future of his mother's life and his own; the living of Nancepean
would fall to some other priest and with it the house in which they
lived. Parson Trehawke had left nothing of any value except Gould's
_Birds of Great Britain_ and a few other works of ornithology. The
furniture of the Vicarage was rich neither in quality nor in quantity.
Three or four hundred pounds was the most his daughter could inherit.
She had spoken to Mark of their poverty, because in her dismay for the
future of her son she had no heart to pretend that the dead man's money
was of little importance.

"I must write and ask your father what we ought to do." . . . She
stopped in painful awareness of the possessive pronoun. Mark was
unresponsive, until there came the news from Africa, which made him
throw his arms about his mother's neck while she was still alive. Mrs.
Lidderdale, whatever bitterness she may once have felt for the ruin of
her married life, shed fresh tears of sorrow for her husband, and
supposing that Mark's embrace was the expression of his sympathy wept
more, as people will when others are sorry for them, and then still more
because the future for Mark seemed hopeless. How was she to educate him?
How clothe him? How feed him even? At her age where and how could she
earn money? She reproached herself with having been too ready out of
sensitiveness to sacrifice Mark to her own pride. She had had no right
to leave her husband and live in the country like this. She should have
repressed her own emotion and thought only of the family life, to the
maintenance of which by her marriage she had committed herself. At first
it had seemed the best thing for Mark; but she should have remembered
that her father could not live for ever and that one day she would have
to face the problem of life without his help and his hospitality. She
began to imagine that the disaster of that stormy night had been
contrived by God to punish her, and she prayed to Him that her
chastisement should not be increased, that at least her son might be
spared to her.

Mrs. Lidderdale was able to stay on at the Vicarage for several weeks,
because the new Vicar of Nancepean was not able to take over his charge
immediately. This delay gave her time to hold a sale of her father's
furniture, at which the desire of the neighbours to be generous fought
with their native avarice, so that in the end the furniture fetched
neither more nor less than had been expected, which was little enough.
She kept back enough to establish herself and Mark in rooms, should she
be successful in finding some unfurnished rooms sufficiently cheap to
allow her to take them, although how she was going to live for more than
two years on what she had was a riddle of which after a month of
sleepless nights she had not found the solution.

In the end, and as Mrs. Lidderdale supposed in answer to her prayers,
the solution was provided unexpectedly in the following letter:

     Haverton House,

     Elmhurst Road,

     Slowbridge.

     November 29th.

     Dear Grace,

     I have just received a letter from James written when he was at the
     point of death in Africa. It appears that in his zeal to convert
     the heathen to Popery he omitted to make any provision for his wife
     and child, so that in the event of his death, unless either your
     relatives or his relatives came forward to support you I was given
     to understand that you would be destitute. I recently read in the
     daily paper an account of the way in which your father Mr. Trehawke
     lost his life, and I caused inquiries to be made in Rosemarket
     about your prospects. These my informant tells me are not any too
     bright. You will, I am sure, pardon my having made these inquiries
     without reference to you, but I did not feel justified in offering
     you and my nephew a home with my sister Helen and myself unless I
     had first assured myself that some such offer was necessary. You
     are probably aware that for many years my brother James and myself
     have not been on the best of terms. I on my side found his
     religious teaching so eccentric as to repel me; he on his side was
     so bigoted that he could not tolerate my tacit disapproval. Not
     being a Ritualist but an Evangelical, I can perhaps bring myself
     more easily to forgive my brother's faults and at the same time
     indulge my theories of duty, as opposed to forms and ceremonies,
     theories that if carried out by everybody would soon transform our
     modern Christianity. You are no doubt a Ritualist, and your son has
     no doubt been educated in the same school. Let me hasten to give
     you my word that I shall not make the least attempt to interfere
     either with your religious practices or with his. The quarrel
     between myself and James was due almost entirely to James'
     inability to let me and my opinions alone.

     I am far from being a rich man, in fact I may say at once that I am
     scarcely even "comfortably off" as the phrase goes. It would
     therefore be outside my capacity to undertake the expense of any
     elaborate education for your son; but my own school, which while it
     does not pretend to compete with some of the fashionable
     establishments of the time is I venture to assert a first class
     school and well able to send your son into the world at the age of
     sixteen as well equipped, and better equipped than he would be if
     he went to one of the famous public schools. I possess some
     influence with a firm of solicitors, and I have no doubt that when
     my nephew, who is I believe now twelve years old, has had the
     necessary schooling I shall be able to secure him a position as an
     articled clerk, from which if he is honest and industrious he may
     be able to rise to the position of a junior partner. If you have
     saved anything from the sale of your father's effects I should
     advise you to invest the sum. However small it is, you will find
     the extra money useful, for as I remarked before I shall not be
     able to afford to do more than lodge and feed you both, educate
     your son, find him in clothes, and start him in a career on the
     lines I have already indicated. My local informant tells me that
     you have kept back a certain amount of your father's furniture in
     order to take lodgings elsewhere. As this will now be unnecessary I
     hope that you will sell the rest. Haverton House is sufficiently
     furnished, and we should not be able to find room for any more
     furniture. I suggest your coming to us next Friday. It will be
     easiest for you to take the fast train up to Paddington when you
     will be able to catch the 6.45 to Slowbridge arriving at 7.15. We
     usually dine at 7.30, but on Friday dinner will be at 8 p.m. in
     order to give you plenty of time. Helen sends her love. She would
     have written also, but I assured her that one letter was enough,
     and that a very long one.

     Your affectionate brother-in-law,

     Henry Lidderdale.

Mrs. Lidderdale would no doubt have criticized this letter more sharply
if she had not regarded it as inspired, almost actually written by the
hand of God. Whatever in it was displeasing to her she accepted as the
Divine decree, and if anybody had pointed out the inconsistency of some
of the opinions therein expressed with its Divine authorship, she would
have dismissed the objection as made by somebody who was incapable of
comprehending the mysterious action of God.

"Mark," she called to her son. "What do you think has happened? Your
Uncle Henry has offered us a home. I want you to write to him like a
dear boy and thank him for his kindness." She explained in detail what
Uncle Henry intended to do for them; but Mark would not be enthusiastic.
He on his side had been praying to God to put it into the mind of Samuel
Dale to offer him a job on his farm; Slowbridge was a poor substitute
for that.

"Where is Slowbridge?" he asked in a gloomy voice.

"It's a fairly large place near London," his mother told him. "It's near
Eton and Windsor and Stoke Poges where Gray wrote his Elegy, which we
learned last summer. You remember, don't you?" she asked anxiously, for
she wanted Mark to cut a figure with his uncle.

"Wolfe liked it," said Mark. "And I like it too," he added ungraciously.
He wished that he could have said he hated it; but Mark always found it
difficult to tell a lie about his personal feelings, or about any facts
that involved him in a false position.

"And now before you go down to tea with Cass Dale, you will write to
your uncle, won't you, and show me the letter?"

Mark groaned.

"It's so difficult to thank people. It makes me feel silly."

"Well, darling, mother wants you to. So sit down like a dear boy and get
it done."

"I think my nib is crossed."

"Is it? You'll find another in my desk."

"But, mother, yours are so thick."

"Please, Mark, don't make any more excuses. Don't you want to do
everything you can to help me just now?"

"Yes, of course," said Mark penitently, and sitting down in the window
he stared out at the yellow November sky, and at the magpies flying
busily from one side of the valley to the other.

     The Vicarage,

     Nancepean,

     South Cornwall.

     My dear Uncle Henry,

     Thank you very much for your kind invitation to come and live with
     you. We should enjoy it very much. I am going to tea with a friend
     of mine called Cass Dale who lives in Nancepean, and so I must stop
     now. With love,

     I remain,

     Your loving nephew,

     Mark.

And then the pen must needs go and drop a blot like a balloon right over
his name, so that the whole letter had to be copied out again before his
mother would say that she was satisfied, by which time the yellow sky
was dun and the magpies were gone to rest.

Mark left the Dales about half past six, and was accompanied by Cass to
the brow of Pendhu. At this point Cass declined to go any farther in
spite of Mark's reminder that this would be one of the last walks they
would take together, if it were not absolutely the very last.

"No," said Cass. "I wouldn't come up from Church Cove myself not for
anything."

"But I'm going down by myself," Mark argued. "If I hadn't thought you'd
come all the way with me, I'd have gone home by the fields. What are you
afraid of?"

"I'm not afraid of nothing, but I don't want to walk so far by myself.
I've come up the hill with 'ee. Now 'tis all down hill for both of us,
and that's fair."

"Oh, all right," said Mark, turning away in resentment at his friend's
desertion.

Both boys ran off in opposite directions, Cass past the splash of light
thrown across the road by the windows of the Hanover Inn, and on toward
the scattered lights of Nancepean, Mark into the gloom of the deep lane
down to Church Cove. It was a warm and humid evening that brought out
the smell of the ferns and earth in the high banks on either side, and
presently at the bottom of the hill the smell of the seaweed heaped up
in Church Cove by weeks of gales. The moon, about three days from the
full, was already up, shedding her aqueous lustre over the towans of
Chypie, which slowly penetrated the black gulfs of shadow in the
countryside until Mark could perceive the ghost of a familiar landscape.
There came over him, whose emotion had already been sprung by the
insensibility of Cass, an overwhelming awareness of parting, and he
gave to the landscape the expression of sentiment he had yearned to give
his friend. His fear of seeing the spirits of the drowned sailors, or as
he passed the churchyard gate of perceiving behind that tamarisk the
tall spectre of his grandfather, which on the way down from Pendhu had
seemed impossible to combat, had died away; and in his despair at losing
this beloved scene he wandered on past the church until he stood at the
edge of the tide. On this humid autumnal night the oily sea collapsed
upon the beach as if it, like everything else in nature, was overcome by
the prevailing heaviness. Mark sat down upon some tufts of samphire and
watched the Stag Light occulting out across St. Levan's Bay, distant
forty miles and more, and while he sat he perceived a glow-worm at his
feet creeping along a sprig of samphire that marked the limit of the
tide's advance. How did the samphire know that it was safe to grow where
it did, and how did the glow-worm know that the samphire was safe?

Mark was suddenly conscious of the protection of God, for might not he
expect as much as the glow-worm and the samphire? The ache of separation
from Nancepean was assuaged. That dread of the future, with which the
impact of death had filled him, was allayed.

"Good-night, sister glow-worm," he said aloud in imitation of St.
Francis. "Good-night, brother samphire."

A drift of distant fog had obliterated the Stag Light; but of her
samphire the glow-worm had made a moonlit forest, so brightly was she
shining, yes, a green world of interlacing, lucid boughs.

_Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works,
and glorify your Father which is in heaven._

And Mark, aspiring to thank God Who had made manifest His protection,
left Nancepean three days later with the determination to become a
lighthouse-keeper, to polish well his lamp and tend it with care, so
that men passing by in ships should rejoice at his good works and call
him brother lighthouse-keeper, and glorify God their Father when they
walked again upon the grass, harking to the pleasant song of birds and
the hum of bees.




CHAPTER IX

SLOWBRIDGE


When Mark came to live with Uncle Henry Lidderdale at Slowbridge, he was
large for his age, or at any rate he was so loosely jointed as to appear
large; a swart complexion, prominent cheek-bones, and straight lank hair
gave him a melancholic aspect, the impression of which remained with the
observer until he heard the boy laugh in a paroxysm of merriment that
left his dark blue eyes dancing long after the outrageous noise had died
down. If Mark had occasion to relate some episode that appealed to him,
his laughter would accompany the narrative like a pack of hounds in full
cry, would as it were pursue the tale to its death, and communicate its
zest to the listener, who would think what a sense of humour Mark had,
whereas it was more truly the gusto of life.

Uncle Henry found this laughter boisterous and irritating; if his nephew
had been a canary in a cage, he would have covered him with a
table-cloth. Aunt Helen, if she was caught up in one of Mark's
narratives, would twitch until it was finished, when she would rub her
forehead with an acorn of menthol and wrap herself more closely in a
shawl of soft Shetland wool. The antipathy that formerly existed between
Mark and his father was much sharper between Mark and his uncle. It was
born in the instant of their first meeting, when Uncle Henry bent over,
his trunk at right angles to his legs, so that one could fancy the
pelvic bones to be clicking like the wooden joints of a monkey on a
stick, and offered his nephew an acrid whisker to be saluted.

"And what is Mark going to be?" Uncle Henry inquired.

"A lighthouse-keeper."

"Ah, we all have suchlike ambitions when we are young. I remember that
for nearly a year I intended to be a muffin-man," said Uncle Henry
severely.

Mark hated his uncle from that moment, and he fixed upon the throbbing
pulse of his scraped-out temples as the feature upon which that dislike
should henceforth be concentrated. Uncle Henry's pulse seemed to express
all the vitality that was left to him; Mark thought that Our Lord must
have felt about the barren fig-tree much as he felt about Uncle Henry.

Aunt Helen annoyed Mark in the way that one is annoyed by a cushion in
an easy chair. It is soft and apparently comfortable, but after a minute
or two one realizes that it is superfluous, and it is pushed over the
arm to the floor. Unfortunately Aunt Helen could not be treated like a
cushion; and there she was soft and comfortable in appearance, but
forever in Mark's way. Aunt Helen was the incarnation of her own
drawing-room. Her face was round and stupid like a clock's; she wore
brocaded gowns and carpet slippers; her shawls resembled antimacassars;
her hair was like the stuff that is put in grates during the summer; her
caps were like lace curtains tied back with velvet ribbons; cameos leant
against her bosom as if they were upon a mantelpiece. Mark never
overcame his dislike of kissing Aunt Helen, for it gave him a sensation
every time that a bit of her might stick to his lips. He lacked that
solemn sense of relationship with which most children are imbued, and
the compulsory intimacy offended him, particularly when his aunt
referred to little boys generically as if they were beetles or mice. Her
inability to appreciate that he was Mark outraged his young sense of
personality which was further dishonoured by the manner in which she
spoke of herself as Aunt Helen, thus seeming to imply that he was only
human at all in so far as he was her nephew. She continually shocked his
dignity by prescribing medicine for him without regard to the presence
of servants or visitors; and nothing gave her more obvious pleasure than
to get Mark into the drawing-room on afternoons when dreary mothers of
pupils came to call, so that she might bully him under the appearance of
teaching good manners, and impress the parents with the advantages of a
Haverton House education.

As long as his mother remained alive, Mark tried to make her happy by
pretending that he enjoyed living at Haverton House, that he enjoyed his
uncle's Preparatory School for the Sons of Gentlemen, that he enjoyed
Slowbridge with its fogs and laburnums, its perambulators and
tradesmen's carts and noise of whistling trains; but a year after they
left Nancepean Mrs. Lidderdale died of pneumonia, and Mark was left
alone with his uncle and aunt.

"He doesn't realize what death means," said Aunt Helen, when Mark on the
very afternoon of the funeral without even waiting to change out of his
best clothes began to play with soldiers instead of occupying himself
with the preparation of lessons that must begin again on the morrow.

"I wonder if you will play with soldiers when Aunt Helen dies?" she
pressed.

"No," said Mark quickly, "I shall work at my lessons when you die."

His uncle and aunt looked at him suspiciously. They could find no fault
with the answer; yet something in the boy's tone, some dreadful
suppressed exultation made them feel that they ought to find severe
fault with the answer.

"Wouldn't it be kinder to your poor mother's memory," Aunt Helen
suggested, "wouldn't it be more becoming now to work harder at your
lessons when your mother is watching you from above?"

Mark would not condescend to explain why he was playing with soldiers,
nor with what passionate sorrow he was recalling every fleeting
expression on his mother's face, every slight intonation of her voice
when she was able to share in his game; he hated his uncle and aunt so
profoundly that he revelled in their incapacity to understand him, and
he would have accounted it a desecration of her memory to share his
grief with them.

Haverton House School was a depressing establishment; in after years
when Mark looked back at it he used to wonder how it had managed to
survive so long, for when he came to live at Slowbridge it had actually
been in existence for twenty years, and his uncle was beginning to look
forward to the time when Old Havertonians, as he called them, would be
bringing their sons to be educated at the old place. There were about
fifty pupils, most of them the sons of local tradesmen, who left when
they were about fourteen, though a certain number lingered on until they
were as much as sixteen in what was called the Modern Class, where they
were supposed to receive at least as practical an education as they
would have received behind the counter, and certainly a more genteel
one. Fine fellows those were in the Modern Class at Haverton House,
stalwart heroes who made up the cricket and football teams and strode
about the playing fields of Haverton House with as keen a sense of their
own importance as Etonians of comparable status in their playing fields
not more than two miles away. Mark when everything else in his school
life should be obliterated by time would remember their names and
prowess. . . . Borrow, Tull, Yarde, Corke, Vincent, Macdougal, Skinner,
they would keep throughout his life some of that magic which clings to
Diomed and Deiphobus, to Hector and Achilles.

Apart from these heroic names the atmosphere of Haverton House was not
inspiring. It reduced the world to the size and quality of one of those
scratched globes with which Uncle Henry demonstrated geography. Every
subject at Haverton House, no matter how interesting it promised to be,
was ruined from an educative point of view by its impedimenta of dates,
imports, exports, capitals, capes, and Kings of Israel and Judah.
Neither Uncle Henry nor his assistants Mr. Spaull and Mr. Palmer
believed in departing from the book. Whatever books were chosen for the
term's curriculum were regarded as something for which money had been
paid and from which the last drop of information must be squeezed to
justify in the eyes of parents the expenditure. The teachers considered
the notes more important than the text; genealogical tables were exalted
above anything on the same page. Some books of history were adorned with
illustrations; but no use was made of them by the masters, and for the
pupils they merely served as outlines to which, were they the outlines
of human beings, inky beards and moustaches had to be affixed, or were
they landscapes, flights of birds.

Mr. Spaull was a fat flabby young man with a heavy fair moustache, who
was reading for Holy Orders; Mr. Palmer was a stocky bow-legged young
man in knickerbockers, who was good at football and used to lament the
gentle birth that prevented his becoming a professional. The boys called
him Gentleman Joe; but they were careful not to let Mr. Palmer hear
them, for he had a punch and did not believe in cuddling the young. He
used to jeer openly at his colleague, Mr. Spaull, who never played
football, never did anything in the way of exercise except wrestle
flirtatiously with the boys, while Mr. Palmer was bellowing up and down
the field of play and charging his pupils with additional vigour to
counteract the feebleness of Mr. Spaull. Poor Mr. Spaull, he was
ordained about three years after Mark came to Slowbridge, and a week
later he was run over by a brewer's dray and killed.




CHAPTER X

WHIT-SUNDAY


Mark at the age of fifteen was a bitter, lonely, and unattractive boy.
Three years of Haverton House, three years of Uncle Henry's desiccated
religion, three years of Mr. Palmer's athletic education and Mr.
Spaull's milksop morality, three years of wearing clothes that were too
small for him, three years of Haverton House cooking, three years of
warts and bad haircutting, of ink and Aunt Helen's confident purging had
destroyed that gusto for life which when Mark first came to Slowbridge
used to express itself in such loud laughter. Uncle Henry probably
supposed that the cure of his nephew's irritating laugh was the
foundation stone of that successful career, which it would soon be time
to discuss in detail. The few months between now and Mark's sixteenth
birthday would soon pass, however dreary the restrictions of Haverton
House, and then it would be time to go and talk to Mr. Hitchcock about
that articled clerkship toward the fees for which the small sum left by
his mother would contribute. Mark was so anxious to be finished with
Haverton House that he would have welcomed a prospect even less
attractive than Mr. Hitchcock's office in Finsbury Square; it never
occurred to him that the money left by his mother could be spent to
greater advantage for himself. By now it was over £500, and Uncle Henry
on Sunday evenings when he was feeling comfortably replete with the
day's devotion would sometimes allude to his having left the interest to
accumulate and would urge Mark to be up and doing in order to show his
gratitude for all that he and Aunt Helen had conferred upon him. Mark
felt no gratitude; in fact at this period he felt nothing except a kind
of surly listlessness. He was like somebody who through the carelessness
of his nurse or guardian has been crippled in youth, and who is
preparing to enter the world with a suppressed resentment against
everybody and everything.

"Not still hankering after a lighthouse?" Uncle Henry asked, and one
seemed to hear his words snapping like dry twigs beneath the heavy tread
of his mind.

"I'm not hankering after anything," Mark replied sullenly.

"But you're looking forward to Mr. Hitchcock's office?" his uncle
proceeded.

Mark grunted an assent in order to be left alone, and the entrance of
Mr. Palmer who always had supper with his headmaster and employer on
Sunday evening, brought the conversation to a close.

At supper Mr. Palmer asked suddenly if the headmaster wanted Mark to go
into the Confirmation Class this term.

"No thanks," said Mark.

Uncle Henry raised his eyebrows.

"I fancy that is for me to decide."

"Neither my father nor my mother nor my grandfather would have wanted me
to be confirmed against my will," Mark declared. He was angry without
knowing his reasons, angry in response to some impulse of the existence
of which he had been unaware until he began to speak. He only knew that
if he surrendered on this point he should never be able to act for
himself again.

"Are you suggesting that you should never be confirmed?" his uncle
required.

"I'm not suggesting anything," said Mark. "But I can remember my
father's saying once that boys ought to be confirmed before they are
thirteen. My mother just before she died wanted me to be confirmed, but
it couldn't be arranged, and now I don't intend to be confirmed till I
feel I want to be confirmed. I don't want to be prepared for
confirmation as if it was a football match. If you force me to go to the
confirmation I'll refuse to answer the Bishop's questions. You can't
make me answer against my will."

"Mark dear," said Aunt Helen, "I think you'd better take some Eno's
Fruit Salts to-morrow morning." In her nephew's present mood she did not
dare to prescribe anything stronger.

"I'm not going to take anything to-morrow morning," said Mark angrily.

"Do you want me to thrash you?" Uncle Henry demanded.

Mr. Palmer's eyes glittered with the zeal of muscular Christianity.

"You'll be sorry for it if you do," said Mark. "You can of course, if
you get Mr. Palmer to help you, but you'll be sorry if you do."

Mr. Palmer looked at his chief as a terrier looks at his master when a
rabbit is hiding in a bush. But the headmaster's vanity would not allow
him to summon help to punish his own nephew, and he weakly contented
himself with ordering Mark to be silent.

"It strikes me that Spaull is responsible for this sort of thing," said
Mr. Palmer. "He always resented my having any hand in the religious
teaching."

"That poor worm!" Mark scoffed.

"Mark, he's dead," Aunt Helen gasped. "You mustn't speak of him like
that."

"Get out of the room and go to bed," Uncle Henry shouted.

Mark retired with offensive alacrity, and while he was undressing he
wondered drearily why he had made himself so conspicuous on this Sunday
evening out of so many Sunday evenings. What did it matter whether he
were confirmed or not? What did anything matter except to get through
the next year and be finished with Haverton House?

He was more sullen than ever during the week, but on Saturday he had the
satisfaction of bowling Mr. Palmer in the first innings of a match and
in the second innings of hitting him on the jaw with a rising ball.

The next day he rose at five o'clock on a glorious morning in early June
and walked rapidly away from Slowbridge. By ten o'clock he had reached a
country of rolling beech-woods, and turning aside from the high road he
wandered over the bare nutbrown soil that gave the glossy leaves high
above a green unparagoned, a green so lambent that the glimpses of the
sky beyond seemed opaque as turquoises amongst it. In quick succession
Mark saw a squirrel, a woodpecker, and a jay, creatures so perfectly
expressive of the place, that they appeared to him more like visions
than natural objects; and when they were gone he stood with beating
heart in silence as if in a moment the trees should fly like
woodpeckers, the sky flash and flutter its blue like a jay's wing, and
the very earth leap like a squirrel for his amazement. Presently he came
to an open space where the young bracken was springing round a pool. He
flung himself down in the frondage, and the spice of it in his nostrils
was as if he were feeding upon summer. He was happy until he caught
sight of his own reflection in the pool, and then he could not bear to
stay any longer in this wood, because unlike the squirrel and the
woodpecker and the jay he was an ugly intruder here, a scarecrow in
ill-fitting clothes, round the ribbon of whose hat like a chain ran the
yellow zigzag of Haverton House. He became afraid of the wood,
perceiving nothing round him now except an assemblage of menacing
trunks, a slow gathering of angry and forbidding branches. The silence
of the day was dreadful in this wood, and Mark fled from it until he
emerged upon a brimming clover-ley full of drunken bees, a merry
clover-ley dancing in the sun, across which the sound of church bells
was being blown upon a honeyed wind. Mark welcomed the prospect of
seeing ugly people again after the humiliation inflicted upon him by the
wood; and he followed a footpath at the far end of the ley across
several stiles, until he stood beneath the limes that overhung the
churchyard gate and wondered if he should go inside to the service. The
bells were clanging an agitated final appeal to the worshippers; and
Mark, unable to resist, allowed himself to flow toward the cool dimness
within. There with a thrill he recognized the visible signs of his
childhood's religion, and now after so many years he perceived with new
eyes an unfamiliar beauty in the crossings and genuflexions, in the
pictures and images. The world which had lately seemed so jejune was
crowded like a dream, a dream moreover that did not elude the
recollection of it in the moment of waking, but that stayed with him
for the rest of his life as the evidence of things not seen, which is
Faith.

It was during the Gospel that Mark began to realize that what was being
said and done at the Altar demanded not merely his attention but also
his partaking. All the services he had attended since he came to
Slowbridge had demanded nothing from him, and even when he was at
Nancepean he had always been outside the sacred mysteries. But now on
this Whit-sunday morning he heard in the Gospel:

_Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of this world
cometh and hath nothing in me._

And while he listened it seemed that Jesus Christ was departing from
him, and that unless he were quick to offer himself he should be left to
the prince of this world; so black was Mark's world in those days that
the Prince of it meant most unmistakably the Prince of Darkness, and the
prophecy made him shiver with affright. With conviction he said the
Nicene Creed, and when the celebrating priest, a tall fair man, with a
gentle voice and of a mild and benignant aspect, went up into the pulpit
and announced that there would be a confirmation in his church on the
Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Mark felt in this
newly found assurance of being commanded by God to follow Him that
somehow he must be confirmed in this church and prepared by this kindly
priest. The sermon was about the coming of the Holy Ghost and of our
bodies which are His temple. Any other Sunday Mark would have sat in a
stupor, while his mind would occasionally have taken flights of
activity, counting the lines of a prayer-book's page or following the
tributaries in the grain of the pew in front; but on this Sunday he sat
alert, finding every word of the discourse applicable to himself.

On other Sundays the first sentence of the Offertory would have passed
unheeded in the familiarity of its repetition, but this morning it took
him back to that night in Church Cove when he saw the glow-worm by the
edge of the tide and made up his mind to be a lighthouse-keeper.

_Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works,
and glorify your Father which is in heaven._

"I will be a priest," Mark vowed to himself.

_Give grace, O heavenly Father, to all Bishops and Curates that they may
both by their life and doctrines set forth thy true and lively word, and
rightly and duly administer thy holy Sacraments._

"I will, I will," he vowed.

_Hear what comfortable words our Saviour Christ saith unto all that
truly turn to him. Come unto me all that travail and are heavy laden,
and I will refresh you._

Mark prayed that with such words he might when he was a priest bring
consolation.

_Through Jesus Christ our Lord; according to whose most true promise,
the Holy Ghost came down as at this time from heaven with a sudden great
sound, as it had been a mighty wind, in the likeness of fiery tongues,
lighting upon the Apostles, to teach them and to lead them to all
truth;_

The red chasuble of the priest glowed with Pentecostal light.

_giving them both the gift of divers languages, and also boldness with
fervent seal constantly to preach the Gospel unto all nations; whereby
we have been brought out of darkness and error into the clear light and
true knowledge of thee, and of thy Son Jesus Christ._

And when after this proper preface of Whit-sunday, which seemed to Mark
to be telling him what was expected of his priesthood by God, the quire
sang the Sanctus, _Therefore with Angels and Archangels, and with all
the company of heaven, we laud and magnify thy glorious Name; evermore
praising thee, and saying, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Hosts, heaven
and earth are full of thy glory: Glory be to thee, O Lord most High.
Amen_, that sublime proclamation spoke the fullness of his aspiring
heart.

Mark came out of church with the rest of the congregation, and walked
down the road toward the roofs of the little village, on the outskirts
of which he could not help stopping to admire a small garden full of
pinks in front of two thatched cottages that had evidently been made
into one house. While he was standing there looking over the trim
quickset hedge, an old lady with silvery hair came slowly down the road,
paused a moment by the gate before she went in, and then asked Mark if
she had not seen him in church. Mark felt embarrassed at being
discovered looking over a hedge into somebody's garden; but he managed
to murmur an affirmative and turned to go away.

"Stop," said the old lady waving at him her ebony crook, "do not run
away, young gentleman. I see that you admire my garden. Pray step inside
and look more closely at it."

Mark thought at first by her manner of speech that she was laughing at
him; but soon perceiving that she was in earnest he followed her inside,
and walked behind her along the narrow winding paths, nodding with an
appearance of profound interest when she poked at some starry clump and
invited his admiration. As they drew nearer the house, the smell of the
pinks was merged in the smell of hot roast beef, and Mark discovered
that he was hungry, so hungry indeed that he felt he could not stay any
longer to be tantalized by the odours of the Sunday dinner, but must go
off and find an inn where he could obtain bread and cheese as quickly as
possible. He was preparing an excuse to get away, when the garden wicket
clicked, and looking up he saw the fair priest coming down the path
toward them accompanied by two ladies, one of whom resembled him so
closely that Mark was sure she was his sister. The other, who looked
windblown in spite of the serene June weather, had a nervous energy that
contrasted with the demeanour of the other two, whose deliberate pace
seemed to worry her so that she was continually two yards ahead and
turning round as if to urge them to walk more quickly.

The old lady must have guessed Mark's intention, for raising her stick
she forbade him to move, and before he had time to mumble an apology and
flee she was introducing the newcomers to him.

"This is my daughter Miriam," she said pointing to one who resembled her
brother. "And this is my daughter Esther. And this is my son, the Vicar.
What is your name?"

Mark told her, and he should have liked to ask what hers was, but he
felt too shy.

"You're going to stay and have lunch with us, I hope?" asked the Vicar.

Mark had no idea how to reply. He was much afraid that if he accepted he
should be seeming to have hung about by the Vicarage gate in order to be
invited. On the other hand he did not know how to refuse. It would be
absurd to say that he had to get home, because they would ask him where
he lived, and at this hour of the morning he could scarcely pretend that
he expected to be back in time for lunch twelve miles and more from
where he was.

"Of course he's going to stay," said the old lady.

And of course Mark did stay; a delightful lunch it was too, on chairs
covered with blue holland in a green shadowed room that smelt of dryness
and ancientry. After lunch Mark sat for a while with the Vicar in his
study, which was small and intimate with its two armchairs and
bookshelves reaching to the ceiling all round. He had not yet managed to
find out his name, and as it was obviously too late to ask as this stage
of their acquaintanceship he supposed that he should have to wait until
he left the Vicarage and could ask somebody in the village, of which by
the way he also did not know the name.

"Lidderdale," the Vicar was saying meditatively, "Lidderdale. I wonder
if you were a relative of the famous Lidderdale of St. Wilfred's?"

Mark flushed with a mixture of self-consciousness and pleasure to hear
his father spoken of as famous, and when he explained who he was he
flushed still more deeply to hear his father's work praised with such
enthusiasm.

"And do you hope to be a priest yourself?"

"Why, yes I do rather," said Mark.

"Splendid! Capital!" cried the Vicar, his kindly blue eye beaming with
approval of Mark's intention.

Presently Mark was talking to him as though he had known him for years.

"There's no reason why you shouldn't be confirmed here," the Vicar said.
"No reason at all. I'll mention it to the Bishop, and if you like I'll
write to your uncle. I shall feel justified in interfering on account of
your father's opinions. We all look upon him as one of the great
pioneers of the Movement. You must come over and lunch with us again
next Sunday. My mother will be delighted to see you. She's a dear old
thing, isn't she? I'm going to hand you over to her now and my youngest
sister. My other sister and I have got Sunday schools to deal with. Have
another cigarette? No. Quite right. You oughtn't to smoke too much at
your age. Only just fifteen, eh? By Jove, I suppose you oughtn't to have
smoked at all. But what rot. You'd only smoke all the more if it was
absolutely forbidden. Wisdom! Wisdom! Wisdom with the young! You don't
mind being called young? I've known boys who hated the epithet."

Mark was determined to show his new friend that he did not object to
being called young, and he could think of no better way to do it than by
asking him his name, thus proving that he did not mind if such a
question did make him look ridiculous.

"Ogilvie--Stephen Ogilvie. My dear boy, it's we who ought to be ashamed
of ourselves for not having had the gumption to enlighten you. How on
earth were you to know without asking? Now, look here, I must run. I
expect you'll be wanting to get home, or I'd suggest your staying until
I get back, but I must lie low after tea and think out my sermon. Look
here, come over to lunch on Saturday, haven't you a bicycle? You could
get over from Slowbridge by one o'clock, and after lunch we'll have a
good tramp in the woods. Splendid!"

Then chanting the _Dies Irae_ in a cheerful tenor the Reverend Stephen
Ogilvie hurried off to his Sunday School. Mark said good-bye to Mrs.
Ogilvie with an assured politeness that was typical of his new found
ease; and when he started on his long walk back to Slowbridge he felt
inclined to leap in the air and wake with shouts the slumberous Sabbath
afternoon, proclaiming the glory of life, the joy of living.

Mark had not expected his uncle to welcome his friendship with the Vicar
of Meade Cantorum; but he had supposed that after a few familiar sneers
he should be allowed to go his own way with nothing worse than silent
disapproval brooding over his perverse choice. He was surprised by the
vehemence of his uncle's opposition, and it must be added that he
thoroughly enjoyed it. The experience of that Whit-sunday had been too
rich not to be of enduring importance to his development in any case;
but the behaviour of Uncle Henry made it more important, because all
this criticism helped Mark to put his opinions into shape, consolidated
the position he had taken up, sharpened his determination to advance
along the path he had discovered for himself, and gave him an immediate
target for arrows that might otherwise have been shot into the air until
his quiver was empty.

"Mr. Ogilvie knew my father."

"That has nothing to do with the case," said Uncle Henry.

"I think it has."

"Do not be insolent, Mark. I've noticed lately a most unpleasant note in
your voice, an objectionably defiant note which I simply will not
tolerate."

"But do you really mean that I'm not to go and see Mr. Ogilvie?"

"It would have been more courteous if Mr. Ogilvie had given himself the
trouble of writing to me, your guardian, before inviting you out to
lunch and I don't know what not besides."

"He said he would write to you."

"I don't want to embark on a correspondence with him," Uncle Henry
exclaimed petulantly. "I know the man by reputation. A bigoted
Ritualist. A Romanizer of the worst type. He'll only fill your head with
a lot of effeminate nonsense, and that at a time when it's particularly
necessary for you to concentrate upon your work. Don't forget that this
is your last year of school. I advise you to make the most of it."

"I've asked Mr. Ogilvie to prepare me for confirmation," said Mark, who
was determined to goad his uncle into losing his temper.

"Then you deserve to be thrashed."

"Look here, Uncle Henry," Mark began; and while he was speaking he was
aware that he was stronger than his uncle now and looking across at his
aunt he perceived that she was just a ball of badly wound wool lying in
a chair. "Look here, Uncle Henry, it's quite useless for you to try to
stop my going to Meade Cantorum, because I'm going there whenever I'm
asked and I'm going to be confirmed there, because you promised Mother
you wouldn't interfere with my religion."

"Your religion!" broke in Mr. Lidderdale, scornful both of the pronoun
and the substantive.

"It's no use your losing your temper or arguing with me or doing
anything except letting me go my own way, because that's what I intend
to do."

Aunt Helen half rose in her chair upon an impulse to protect her brother
against Mark's violence.

"And you can't cure me with Gregory Powder," he said. "Nor with Senna
nor with Licorice nor even with Cascara."

"Your behaviour, my boy, is revolting," said Mr. Lidderdale. "A young
Mohawk would not talk to his guardians as you are talking to me."

"Well, I don't want you to think I'm going to obey you if you forbid me
to go to Meade Cantorum," said Mark. "I'm sorry I was rude, Aunt Helen.
I oughtn't to have spoken to you like that. And I'm sorry, Uncle Henry,
to seem ungrateful after what you've done for me." And then lest his
uncle should think that he was surrendering he quickly added: "But I'm
going to Meade Cantorum on Saturday." And like most people who know
their own minds Mark had his own way.




CHAPTER XI

MEADE CANTORUM


Mark did not suffer from "churchiness" during this period. His interest
in religion, although it resembled the familiar conversions of
adolescence, was a real resurrection of emotions which had been stifled
by these years at Haverton House following upon the paralyzing grief of
his mother's death. Had he been in contact during that time with an
influence like the Vicar of Meade Cantorum, he would probably have
escaped those ashen years, but as Mr. Ogilvie pointed out to him, he
would also never have received such evidence of God's loving kindness as
was shown to him upon that Whit-sunday morning.

"If in the future, my dear boy, you are ever tempted to doubt the wisdom
of Almighty God, remember what was vouchsafed to you at a moment when
you seemed to have no reason for any longer existing, so black was your
world. Remember how you caught sight of yourself in that pool and shrank
away in horror from the vision. I envy you, Mark. I have never been
granted such a revelation of myself."

"You were never so ugly," said Mark.

"My dear boy, we are all as ugly as the demons of Hell if we are allowed
to see ourselves as we really are. But God only grants that to a few
brave spirits whom he consecrates to his service and whom he fortifies
afterwards by proving to them that, no matter how great the horror of
their self-recognition, the Holy Ghost is within them to comfort them. I
don't suppose that many human beings are granted such an experience as
yours. I myself tremble at the thought of it, knowing that God considers
me too weak a subject for such a test."

"Oh, Mr. Ogilvie," Mark expostulated.

"I'm not talking to you as Mark Lidderdale, but as the recipient of the
grace of God, to one who before my own unworthy eyes has been lightened
by celestial fire. _Mine eyes have seen thy salvation, O Lord._ As for
yourself, my dear boy, I pray always that you may sustain your part,
that you will never allow the memory of this Whitsuntide to be obscured
by the fogs of this world and that you will always bear in mind that
having been given more talents by God a sharper account will be taken of
the use you make of them. Don't think I'm doubting your steadfastness,
old man, I believe in it. Do you hear? I believe in it absolutely. But
Catholic doctrine, which is the sum of humanity's knowledge of God and
than which nothing more can be known of God until we see Him face to
face, insists upon good works, demanding as it were a practical
demonstration to the rest of the world of the grace of God within you.
You remember St. Paul? _Faith, Hope, and Love. But the greatest of these
is Love._ The greatest because the least individual. Faith will move
mountains, but so will Love. That's the trouble with so many godly
Protestants. They are inclined to stay satisfied with their own
godliness, although the best of them like the Quakers are examples that
ought to make most of us Catholics ashamed of ourselves. And one thing
more, old man, before we get off this subject, don't forget that your
experience is a mercy accorded to you by the death of our Lord Jesus
Christ. You owe to His infinite Love your new life. What was granted to
you was the visible apprehension of the fact of Holy Baptism, and don't
forget St. John the Baptist's words: _I indeed baptize you with water
unto repentance, but he that cometh after me is mightier than I. He
shall baptise you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire: whose fan is in
his hand, and he will thoroughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat
into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire._
Those are great words for you to think of now, and during this long
Trinitytide which is symbolical of what one might call the humdrum of
religious life, the day in day out sticking to it, make a resolution
never to say mechanically _The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the
love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost, be with us all
evermore. Amen._ If you always remember to say those wonderful words
from the heart and not merely with the lips, you will each time you say
them marvel more and more at the great condescension of Almighty God in
favouring you, as He has favoured you, by teaching you the meaning of
these words Himself in a way that no poor mortal priest, however
eloquent, could teach you it. On that night when you watched beside the
glow-worm at the sea's edge the grace of our Lord gave you an
apprehension, child as you were, of the love of God, and now once more
the grace of our Lord gives you the realization of the fellowship of the
Holy Ghost. I don't want to spoil your wonderful experience with my
parsonic discoursing; but, Mark, don't look back from the plough."

Uncle Henry found it hard to dispose of words like these when he
deplored his nephew's collapse into ritualism.

"You really needn't bother about the incense and the vestments," Mark
assured him. "I like incense and vestments; but I don't think they're
the most important things in religion. You couldn't find anybody more
evangelical than Mr. Ogilvie, though he doesn't call himself
evangelical, or his party the Evangelical party. It's no use your trying
to argue me out of what I believe. I know I'm believing what it's right
for me to believe. When I'm older I shall try to make everybody else
believe in my way, because I should like everybody else to feel as happy
as I do. Your religion doesn't make you feel happy, Uncle Henry!"

"Leave the room," was Mr. Lidderdale's reply. "I won't stand this kind
of talk from a boy of your age."

Although Mark had only claimed from his uncle the right to believe what
it was right for him to believe, the richness of his belief presently
began to seem too much for one. His nature was generous in everything,
and he felt that he must share this happiness with somebody else. He
regretted the death of poor Mr. Spaull, for he was sure that he could
have persuaded poor Mr. Spaull to cut off his yellow moustache and
become a Catholic. Mr. Palmer was of course hopeless: Saint Augustine of
Hippo, St. Paul himself even, would have found it hard to deal with Mr.
Palmer; as for the new master, Mr. Blumey, with his long nose and long
chin and long frock coat and long boots, he was obviously absorbed by
the problems of mathematics and required nothing more.

Term came to an end, and during the holidays Mark was able to spend most
of his time at Meade Cantorum. He had always been a favourite of Mrs.
Ogilvie since that Whit-sunday nearly two months ago when she saw him
looking at her garden and invited him in, and every time he revisited
the Vicarage he had devoted some of his time to helping her weed or
prune or do whatever she wanted to do in her garden. He was also on
friendly terms with Miriam, the elder of Mr. Ogilvie's two sisters, who
was very like her brother in appearance and who gave to the house the
decorous loving care he gave to the church. And however enthralling her
domestic ministrations, she had always time to attend every service;
while, so well ordered was her manner of life, her religious duties
never involved the household in discomfort. She never gave the
impression that so many religious women give of going to church in a
fever of self-gratification, to which everything and everybody around
her must be subordinated. The practice of her religion was woven into
her life like the strand of wool on which all the others depend, but
which itself is no more conspicuous than any of the other strands. With
so many women religion is a substitute for something else; with Miriam
Ogilvie everything else was made as nearly and as beautifully as it
could be made a substitute for religion. Mark was intensely aware of her
holiness, but he was equally aware of her capable well-tended hands and
of her chatelaine glittering in and out of a lawn apron. One tress of
her abundant hair was grey, which stood out against the dark background
of the rest and gave her a serene purity, an austere strength, but yet
like a nun's coif seemed to make the face beneath more youthful, and
like a cavalier's plume more debonair. She could not have been over
thirty-five when Mark first knew her, perhaps not so much; but he
thought of her as ageless in the way a child thinks of its mother, and
if any woman should ever be able to be to him something of what his
mother had been, Mark thought that Miss Ogilvie might.

Esther Ogilvie the other sister was twenty-five. She told Mark this
when he imitated the villagers by addressing her as Miss Essie and she
ordered him to call her Esther. He might have supposed from this that
she intended to confer upon him a measure of friendliness, even of
sisterly affection; but on the contrary she either ignored him
altogether or gave him the impression that she considered his frequent
visits to Meade Cantorum a nuisance. Mark was sorry that she felt like
that toward him, because she seemed unhappy, and in his desire for
everybody to be happy he would have liked to proclaim how suddenly and
unexpectedly happiness may come. As a sister of the Vicar of the parish,
she went to church regularly, but Mark did not think that she was there
except in body. He once looked across at her open prayer book during the
_Magnificat_, and noticed that she was reading the Tables of Kindred and
Affinity. Now, Mark knew from personal experience that when one is
reduced to reading the Tables of Kindred and Affinity it argues a mind
untouched by the reality of worship. In his own case, when he sat beside
his uncle and aunt in the dreary Slowbridge church of their choice, it
had been nothing more than a sign of his own inward dreariness to read
the Tables of Kindred and Affinity or speculate upon the Paschal full
moons from the year 2200 to the year 2299 inclusive. But St. Margaret's,
Meade Cantorum, was a different church from St. Jude's, Slowbridge, and
for Esther Ogilvie to ignore the joyfulness of worshipping there in
order to ponder idly the complexities of Golden Numbers and Dominical
Letters could not be ascribed to inward dreariness. Besides, she wasn't
dreary. Once Mark saw her coming down a woodland glade and almost turned
aside to avoid meeting her, because she looked so fay with her wild blue
eyes and her windblown hair, the colour of last year's bracken after
rain. She seemed at once the pursued and the pursuer, and Mark felt that
whichever she was he would be in the way.

"Taking a quick walk by myself," she called out to him as they passed.

No, she was certainly not dreary. But what was she?

Mark abandoned the problem of Esther in the pleasure of meeting the
Reverend Oliver Dorward, who arrived one afternoon at the Vicarage with
a large turbot for Mrs. Ogilvie, and six Flemish candlesticks for the
Vicar, announcing that he wanted to stay a week before being inducted to
the living of Green Lanes in the County of Southampton, to which he had
recently been presented by Lord Chatsea. Mark liked him from the first
moment he saw him pacing the Vicarage garden in a soutane, buckled
shoes, and beaver hat, and he could not understand why Mr. Ogilvie, who
had often laughed about Dorward's eccentricity, should now that he had
an opportunity of enjoying it once more be so cross about his friend's
arrival and so ready to hand him over to Mark to be entertained.

"Just like Ogilvie," said Dorward confidentially, when he and Mark went
for a walk on the afternoon of his arrival. "He wants spiking up. They
get very slack and selfish, these country clergy. Time he gave up Meade
Cantorum. He's been here nearly ten years. Too long, nine years too
long. Hasn't been to his duties since Easter. Scandalous, you know. I
asked him, as soon as I'd explained to the cook about the turbot, when
he went last, and he was bored. Nice old pussy cat, the mother. Hullo,
is that the _Angelus_? Damn, I knelt on a thistle."

"It isn't the _Angelus_," said Mark quietly. "It's the bell on that
cow."

But Mr. Dorward had finished his devotion before he answered.

"I was half way through before you told me. You should have spoken
sooner."

"Well, I spoke as soon as I could."

"Very cunning of Satan," said Dorward meditatively. "Induced a cow to
simulate the _Angelus_, and planted a thistle just where I was bound to
kneel. Cunning. Cunning. Very cunning. I must go back now and confess to
Ogilvie. Good example. Wait a minute, I'll confess to-morrow before
Morning Prayer. Very good for Ogilvie's congregation. They're stuffy,
very stuffy. It'll shake them. It'll shake Ogilvie too. Are you staying
here to-night?"

"No, I shall bicycle back to Slowbridge and bicycle over to Mass
to-morrow."

"Ridiculous. Stay the night. Didn't Ogilvie invite you?"

Mark shook his head.

"Scandalous lack of hospitality. They're all alike these country clergy.
I'm tired of this walk. Let's go back and look after the turbot. Are you
a good cook?"

"I can boil eggs and that sort of thing," said Mark.

"What sort of things? An egg is unique. There's nothing like an egg.
Will you serve my Mass on Monday? Saying Mass for Napoleon on Monday."

"For whom?" Mark exclaimed.

"Napoleon, with a special intention for the conversion of the present
government in France. Last Monday I said a Mass for Shakespeare, with a
special intention for an improvement in contemporary verse."

Mark supposed that Mr. Dorward must be joking, and his expression must
have told as much to the priest, who murmured:

"Nothing to laugh at. Nothing to laugh at."

"No, of course not," said Mark feeling abashed. "But I'm afraid I
shouldn't be able to serve you. I've never had any practice."

"Perfectly easy. Perfectly easy. I'll give you a book when we get back."

Mark bicycled home that afternoon with a tall thin volume called _Ritual
Notes_, so tall that when it was in his pocket he could feel it digging
him in the ribs every time he was riding up the least slope. That night
in his bedroom he practised with the help of the wash-stand and its
accessories the technique of serving at Low Mass, and in his enthusiasm
he bicycled over to Meade Cantorum in time to attend both the Low Mass
at seven said by Mr. Dorward and the Low Mass at eight said by Mr.
Ogilvie. He was able to detect mistakes that were made by the village
boys who served that Sunday morning, and he vowed to himself that the
Monday Mass for the Emperor Napoleon should not be disfigured by such
inaccuracy or clumsiness. He declined the usual invitation to stay to
supper after Evening Prayer that he might have time to make perfection
more perfect in the seclusion of his own room, and when he set out about
six o'clock of a sun-drowsed morning in early August, apart from a faint
anxiety about the _Lavabo_, he felt secure of his accomplishment. It was
only when he reached the church that he remembered he had made no
arrangement about borrowing a cassock or a cotta, an omission that in
the mood of grand seriousness in which he had undertaken his
responsibility seemed nothing less than abominable. He did not like to
go to the Vicarage and worry Mr. Ogilvie who could scarcely fail to be
amused, even contemptuously amused at such an ineffective beginning.
Besides, ever since Mr. Dorward's arrival the Vicar had been slightly
irritable.

While Mark was wondering what was the best thing to do, Miss Hatchett, a
pious old maid who spent her nights in patience and sleep, her days in
worship and weeding, came hurrying down the churchyard path.

"I am not late, am I?" she exclaimed. "I never heard the bell. I was so
engrossed in pulling out one of those dreadful sow-thistles that when my
maid came running out and said 'Oh, Miss Hatchett, it's gone the five
to, you'll be late,' I just ran, and now I've brought my trowel and left
my prayer book on the path. . . ."

"I'm just going to ring the bell now," said Mark, in whom the horror of
another omission had been rapidly succeeded by an almost unnatural
composure.

"Oh, what a relief," Miss Hatchett sighed. "Are you sure I shall have
time to get my breath, for I know Mr. Ogilvie would dislike to hear me
panting in church?"

"Mr. Ogilvie isn't saying Mass this morning."

"Not saying Mass?" repeated the old maid in such a dejected tone of
voice that, when a small cloud passed over the face of the sun, it
seemed as if the natural scene desired to accord with the chill cast
upon her spirit by Mark's announcement.

"Mr. Dorward is saying Mass," he told her, and poor Miss Hatchett must
pretend with a forced smile that her blank look had been caused by the
prospect of being deprived of Mass when really. . . .

But Mark was not paying any more attention to Miss Hatchett. He was
standing under the bell, gazing up at the long rope and wondering what
manner of sound he should evoke. He took a breath and pulled; the rope
quivered with such an effect of life that he recoiled from the new force
he had conjured into being, afraid of his handiwork, timid of the
clamour that would resound. No louder noise ensued than might have been
given forth by a can kicked into the gutter. Mark pulled again more
strongly, and the bell began to chime, irregularly at first with
alternations of sonorous and feeble note; at last, however, when the
rhythm was established with such command and such insistence that the
ringer, looking over his shoulder to the south door, half expected to
see a stream of perturbed Christians hurrying to obey its summons. But
there was only poor Miss Hatchett sitting in the porch and fanning
herself with a handkerchief.

Mark went on ringing. . . .

Clang--clang--clang! All the holy Virgins were waving their palms.
Clang--clang--clang! All the blessed Doctors and Confessors were
twanging their harps to the clanging. Clang--clang--clang! All the holy
Saints and Martyrs were tossing their haloes in the air as schoolboys
toss their caps. Clang--clang--clang! Angels, Archangels, and
Principalities with faces that shone like brass and with forms that
quivered like flames thronged the noise. Clang--clang--clang! Virtues,
Powers, and Dominations bade the morning stars sing to the ringing.
Clang--clang--clang! The ringing reached up to the green-winged Thrones
who sustain the seat of the Most High. Clang--clang--clang! The azure
Cherubs heard the bells within their contemplation: the scarlet Seraphs
felt them within their love. Clang--clang--clang! The lidless Eye of God
looked down, and Miss Hatchett supposing it to be the sun crossed over
to the other side of the porch.

Clang--clang--clang--clang--clang--clang--clang--clang. . . .

"Hasn't Dorward come in yet? It's five past eight already. Go on
ringing for a little while. I'll go and see how long he'll be."

Mark in the absorption of ringing the bell had not noticed the Vicar's
approach, and he was gone again before he remembered that he wanted to
borrow a cassock and a cotta. Had he been rude? Would Mr. Ogilvie think
it cheek to ring the bell without asking his permission first? But
before these unanswered questions had had time to spoil the rhythm of
his ringing, the Vicar came back with Mr. Dorward, and the congregation,
that is to say Miss Hatchett and Miss Ogilvie, was already kneeling in
its place.

Mark in a cassock that was much too long for him and in a cotta that was
in the same ratio as much too short preceded Mr. Dorward from the
sacristy to the altar. A fear seized him that in spite of all his
practice he was kneeling on the wrong side of the priest; he forgot the
first responses; he was sure the Sanctus-bell was too far away; he
wished that Mr. Dorward would not mutter quite so inaudibly. Gradually,
however, the meetness of the gestures prescribed for him by the ancient
ritual cured his self-consciousness and included him in its pattern, so
that now for the first time he was aware of the significance of the
preface to the Sanctus: _It is very meet, right, and our bounden duty,
that we should at all times, and in all places, give thanks unto thee, O
Lord, Holy Father, Almighty Everlasting God._

Twenty minutes ago when he was ringing the church bell Mark had
experienced the rapture of creative noise, the sense of individual
triumph over time and space; and the sound of his ringing came back to
him from the vaulted roof of the church with such exultation as the
missal thrush may know when he sits high above the fretted boughs of an
oak and his music plunges forth upon the January wind. Now when Mark was
ringing the Sanctus-bell, it was with a sense of his place in the scheme
of worship. If one listens to the twitter of a single linnet in open
country or to the buzz of a solitary fly upon a window pane, how
incredible it is that myriads of them twittering and buzzing together
should be the song of April, the murmur of June. And this Sanctus-bell
that tinkled so inadequately, almost so frivolously when sounded by a
server in Meade Cantorum church, was yet part of an unimaginable volume
of worship that swelled in unison with Angels and Archangels lauding and
magnifying the Holy Name. The importance of ceremony was as deeply
impressed upon Mark that morning as if he had been formally initiated to
great mysteries. His coming confirmation, which had been postponed from
July 2nd to September 8th seemed much more momentous now than it seemed
yesterday. It was no longer a step to Communion, but was apprehended as
a Sacrament itself, and though Mr. Ogilvie was inclined to regret the
ritualistic development of his catechumen, Mark derived much strength
from what was really the awakening in him of a sense of form, which more
than anything makes emotion durable. Perhaps Ogilvie may have been a
little jealous of Dorward's influence; he also was really alarmed at the
prospect, as he said, of so much fire being wasted upon poker-work. In
the end what between Dorward's encouragement of Mark's ritualistic
tendencies and the "spiking up" process to which he was himself being
subjected, Ogilvie was glad when a fortnight later Dorward took himself
off to his own living, and he expressed a hope that Mark would perceive
Dorward in his true proportions as a dear good fellow, perfectly
sincere, but just a little, well, not exactly mad, but so eccentric as
sometimes to do more harm than good to the Movement. Mark was shrewd
enough to notice that however much he grumbled about his friend's visit
Mr. Ogilvie was sufficiently influenced by that visit to put into
practice much of the advice to which he had taken exception. The
influence of Dorward upon Mark did not stop with his begetting in him an
appreciation of the value of form in worship. When Mark told Mr. Ogilvie
that he intended to become a priest, Mr. Ogilvie was impressed by the
manifestation of the Divine Grace, but he did not offer many practical
suggestions for Mark's immediate future. Dorward on the contrary
attached as much importance to the manner in which he was to become a
priest.

"Oxford," Mr. Dorward pronounced. "And then Glastonbury."

"Glastonbury?"

"Glastonbury Theological College."

Now to Mark Oxford was a legendary place to which before he met Mr.
Dorward he would never have aspired. Oxford at Haverton House was merely
an abstraction to which a certain number of people offered an illogical
allegiance in order to create an excuse for argument and strife.
Sometimes Mark had gazed at Eton and wondered vaguely about existence
there; sometimes he had gazed at the towers of Windsor and wondered what
the Queen ate for breakfast. Oxford was far more remote than either of
these, and yet when Mr. Dorward said that he must go there his heart
leapt as if to some recognized ambition long ago buried and now abruptly
resuscitated.

"I've always been Oxford," he admitted.

When Mr. Dorward had gone, Mark asked Mr. Ogilvie what he thought about
Oxford.

"If you can afford to go there, my dear boy, of course you ought to go."

"Well, I'm pretty sure I can't afford to. I don't think I've got any
money at all. My mother left some money, but my uncle says that that
will come in useful when I'm articled to this solicitor, Mr. Hitchcock.
Oh, but if I become a priest I can't become a solicitor, and perhaps I
could have that money. I don't know how much it is . . . I think five
hundred pounds. Would that be enough?"

"With care and economy," said Mr. Ogilvie. "And you might win a
scholarship."

"But I'm leaving school at the end of this year."

Mr. Ogilvie thought that it would be wiser not to say anything to his
uncle until after Mark had been confirmed. He advised him to work hard
meanwhile and to keep in mind the possibility of having to win a
scholarship.

The confirmation was held on the feast of the Nativity of the Blessed
Virgin. Mark made his first Confession on the vigil, his first Communion
on the following Sunday.




CHAPTER XII

THE POMEROY AFFAIR


Mark was so much elated to find himself a fully equipped member of the
Church Militant that he looked about him again to find somebody whom he
could make as happy as himself. He even considered the possibility of
converting his uncle, and spent the Sunday evening before term began in
framing inexpugnable arguments to be preceded by unanswerable questions;
but always when he was on the point of speaking he was deterred by the
lifelessness of his uncle. No eloquence could irrigate his arid creed
and make that desert blossom now. And yet, Mark thought, he ought to
remember that in the eyes of the world he owed his uncle everything.
What did he owe him in the sight of God? Gratitude? Gratitude for what?
Gratitude for spending a certain amount of money on him. Once more Mark
opened his mouth to repay his debt by offering Uncle Henry Eternal Life.
But Uncle Henry fancied himself already in possession of Eternal Life.
He definitely labelled himself Evangelical. And again Mark prepared one
of his unanswerable questions.

"Mark," said Mr. Lidderdale. "If you can't keep from yawning you'd
better get off to bed. Don't forget school begins to-morrow, and you
must make the most of your last term."

Mark abandoned for ever the task of converting Uncle Henry, and pondered
his chance of doing something with Aunt Helen. There instead of
exsiccation he was confronted by a dreadful humidity, an infertile ooze
that seemed almost less susceptible to cultivation than the other.

"And I really don't owe _her_ anything," he thought. "Besides, it isn't
that I want to save people from damnation. I want people to be happy.
And it isn't quite that even. I want them to understand how happy I am.
I want people to feel fond of their pillows when they turn over to go to
sleep, because next morning is going to be what? Well, sort of
exciting."

Mark suddenly imagined how splendid it would be to give some of his
happiness to Esther Ogilvie; but a moment later he decided that it would
be rather cheek, and he abandoned the idea of converting Esther Ogilvie.
He fell back on wishing again that Mr. Spaull had not died; in him he
really would have had an ideal subject.

In the end Mark fixed upon a boy of his own age, one of the many sons of
a Papuan missionary called Pomeroy who was glad to have found in Mr.
Lidderdale a cheap and evangelical schoolmaster. Cyril Pomeroy was a
blushful, girlish youth, clever at the routine of school work, but in
other ways so much undeveloped as to give an impression of stupidity.
The notion of pointing out to him the beauty and utility of the Catholic
religion would probably never have occurred to Mark if the boy himself
had not approached him with a direct complaint of the dreariness of home
life. Mark had never had any intimate friends at Haverton House; there
was something in its atmosphere that was hostile to intimacy. Cyril
Pomeroy appealed to that idea of romantic protection which is the common
appendage of adolescence, and is the cause of half the extravagant
affection at which maturity is wont to laugh. In the company of Cyril,
Mark felt ineffably old than which upon the threshold of sixteen there
is no sensation more grateful; and while the intercourse flattered his
own sense of superiority he did feel that he had much to offer his
friend. Mark regarded Cyril's case as curable if the right treatment
were followed, and every evening after school during the veiled summer
of a fine October he paced the Slowbridge streets with his willing
proselyte, debating the gravest issues of religious practice, the
subtlest varieties of theological opinion. He also lent Cyril suitable
books, and finally he demanded from him as a double tribute to piety and
friendship that he should prove his metal by going to Confession.
Cyril, who was incapable of refusing whatever Mark demanded, bicycled
timorously behind him to Meade Cantorum one Saturday afternoon, where he
gulped out the table of his sins to Mr. Ogilvie, whom Mark had fetched
from the Vicarage with the urgency of one who fetches a midwife. Nor was
he at all abashed when Mr. Ogilvie was angry for not having been told
that Cyril's father would have disapproved of his son's confession. He
argued that the priest was applying social standards to religious
principles, and in the end he enjoyed the triumph of hearing Mr. Ogilvie
admit that perhaps he was right.

"I know I'm right. Come on, Cyril. You'd better get back home now. Oh,
and I say, Mr. Ogilvie, can I borrow for Cyril some of the books you
lent me?"

The priest was amused that Mark did not ask him to lend the books to his
friend, but to himself. However, when he found that the neophyte seemed
to flourish under Mark's assiduous priming, and that the fundamental
weakness of his character was likely to be strengthened by what, though
it was at present nothing more than an interest in religion, might later
on develop into a profound conviction of the truths of Christianity,
Ogilvie overlooked his scruples about deceiving parents and encouraged
the boy as much as he could.

"But I hope your manipulation of the plastic Cyril isn't going to turn
_you_ into too much of a ritualist," he said to Mark. "It's splendid of
course that you should have an opportunity so young of proving your
ability to get round people in the right way. But let it be the right
way, old man. At the beginning you were full of the happiness, the
secret of which you burnt to impart to others. That happiness was the
revelation of the Holy Spirit dwelling in you as He dwells in all
Christian souls. I am sure that the eloquent exposition I lately
overheard of the propriety of fiddle-backed chasubles and the
impropriety of Gothic ones doesn't mean that you are in any real danger
of supposing chasubles to be anything more important relatively than,
say, the uniform of a soldier compared with his valour and obedience
and selflessness. Now don't overwhelm me for a minute or two. I haven't
finished what I want to say. I wasn't speaking sarcastically when I said
that, and I wasn't criticizing you. But you are not Cyril. By God's
grace you have been kept from the temptations of the flesh. Yes, I know
the subject is distasteful to you. But you are old enough to understand
that your fastidiousness, if it isn't to be priggish, must be
safeguarded by your humility. I didn't mean to sandwich a sermon to you
between my remarks on Cyril, but your disdainful upper lip compelled
that testimony. Let us leave you and your virtues alone. Cyril is weak.
He's the weak pink type that may fall to women or drink or anything in
fact where an opportunity is given him of being influenced by a stronger
character than his own. At the moment he's being influenced by you to go
to Confession, and say his rosary, and hear Mass, and enjoy all the
other treats that our holy religion gives us. In addition to that he's
enjoying them like the proverbial stolen fruit. You were very severe
with me when I demurred at hearing his confession without authority from
his father; but I don't like stolen fruit, and I'm not sure even now if
I was right in yielding on that point. I shouldn't have yielded if I
hadn't felt that Cyril might be hurt in the future by my scruples. Now
look here, Mark, you've got to see that I don't regret my surrender. If
that youth doesn't get from religion what I hope and pray he will get
. . . but let that point alone. My scruples are my own affair. Your
convictions are your own affair. But Cyril is our joint affair. He's
your convert, but he's my penitent; and Mark, don't overdecorate your
building until you're sure the foundations are well and truly laid."

Mark was never given an opportunity of proving the excellence of his
methods by the excellence of Cyril's life, because on the morning after
this conversation, which took place one wet Sunday evening in Advent he
was sent for by his uncle, who demanded to know the meaning of This.
This was a letter from the Reverend Eustace Pomeroy.

     The Limes,

     38, Cranborne Road,

     Slowbridge.

     December 9.

     Dear Mr. Lidderdale,

     My son Cyril will not attend school for the rest of this term.
     Yesterday evening, being confined to the house by fever, I went up
     to his bedroom to verify a reference in a book I had recently lent
     him to assist his divinity studies under you. When I took down the
     book from the shelf I noticed several books hidden away behind, and
     my curiosity being aroused I examined them, in case they should be
     works of an unpleasant nature. To my horror and disgust, I found
     that they were all works of an extremely Popish character, most of
     them belonging to a clergyman in this neighbourhood called Ogilvie,
     whose illegal practices have for several years been a scandal to
     this diocese. These I am sending to the Bishop that he may see with
     his own eyes the kind of propaganda that is going on. Two of the
     books, inscribed Mark Lidderdale, are evidently the property of
     your nephew to whom I suppose my son is indebted for this wholesale
     corruption. On questioning my son I found him already so sunk in
     the mire of the pernicious doctrines he has imbibed that he
     actually defied his own father. I thrashed him severely in spite of
     my fever, and he is now under lock and key in his bedroom where he
     will remain until he sails with me to Sydney next week whither I am
     summoned to the conference of Australasian missionaries. During the
     voyage I shall wrestle with the demon that has entered into my son
     and endeavour to persuade him that Jesus only is necessary for
     salvation. And when I have done so, I shall leave him in Australia
     to earn his own living remote from the scene of his corruption. In
     the circumstances I assume that you will deduct a proportion of his
     school fees for this term. I know that you will be as much
     horrified and disgusted as I was by your nephew's conduct, and I
     trust that you will be able to wrestle with him in the Lord and
     prove to him that Jesus only is necessary to salvation.

     Yours very truly,

     Eustace Pomeroy.

     P.S. I suggest that instead of £6 6s. 0d. I should pay £5 5s. 0d.
     for this term, plus, of course, the usual extras.

The pulse in Mr. Lidderdale's temple had never throbbed so remarkably
as while Mark was reading this letter.

"A fine thing," he ranted, "if this story gets about in Slowbridge. A
fine reward for all my kindness if you ruin my school. As for this man
Ogilvie, I'll sue him for damages. Don't look at me with that expression
of bestial defiance. Do you hear? What prevents my thrashing you as you
deserve? What prevents me, I say?"

But Mark was not paying any attention to his uncle's fury; he was
thinking about the unfortunate martyr under lock and key in The Limes,
Cranborne Road, Slowbridge. He was wondering what would be the effect of
this violent removal to the Antipodes and how that fundamental weakness
of character would fare if Cyril were left to himself at his age.

"I think Mr. Pomeroy is a ruffian," said Mark. "Don't you, Uncle Henry?
If he writes to the Bishop about Mr. Ogilvie, I shall write to the
Bishop about him. I hate Protestants. I hate them."

"There's your father to the life. You'd like to burn them, wouldn't
you?"

"Yes, I would," Mark declared.

"You'd like to burn me, I suppose?"

"Not you in particular."

"Will you listen to him, Helen," he shouted to his sister. "Come here
and listen to him. Listen to the boy we took in and educated and clothed
and fed, listen to him saying he'd like to burn his uncle. Into Mr.
Hitchcock's office you go at once. No more education if this is what it
leads to. Read that letter, Helen, look at that book, Helen. _Catholic
Prayers for Church of England People by the Reverend A.H. Stanton._ Look
at this book, Helen. _The Catholic Religion by Vernon Staley._ No wonder
you hate Protestants, you ungrateful boy. No wonder you're longing to
burn your uncle and aunt. It'll be in the _Slowbridge Herald_ to-morrow.
Headlines! Ruin! They'll think I'm a Jesuit in disguise. I ought to have
got a very handsome sum of money for the good-will. Go back to your
class-room, and if you have a spark of affection in your nature, don't
brag about this to the other boys."

Mark, pondering all the morning the best thing to do for Cyril,
remembered that a boy called Hacking lived at The Laurels, 36, Cranborne
Road. He did not like Hacking, but wishing to utilize his back garden
for the purpose of communicating with the prisoner he made himself
agreeable to him in the interval between first and second school.

"Hullo, Hacking," he began. "I say, do you want a cricket bat? I shan't
be here next summer, so you may as well have mine."

Hacking looked at Mark suspicious of some hidden catch that would make
him appear a fool.

"No, really I'm not ragging," said Mark. "I'll bring it round to you
after dinner. I'll be at your place about a quarter to two. Wait for me,
won't you?"

Hacking puzzled his brains to account for this generous whim, and at
last decided that Mark must be "gone" on his sister Edith. He supposed
that he ought to warn Edith to be about when Mark called; if the bat was
not forthcoming he could easily prevent a meeting. The bat however
turned out to be much better than he expected, and Hacking was on the
point of presenting Cressida to Troilus when Troilus said:

"That's your garden at the back, isn't it?"

Hacking admitted that it was.

"It looks rather decent."

Hacking allowed modestly that it wasn't bad.

"My father's rather dead nuts on gardening. So's my kiddy sister," he
added.

"I vote we go out there," Mark suggested.

"Shall I give a yell to my kiddy sister?" asked Pandarus.

"Good lord, no," Mark exclaimed. "Don't the Pomeroys live next door to
you? Look here, Hacking, I want to speak to Cyril Pomeroy."

"He was absent this morning."

Mark considered Hacking as a possible adjutant to the enterprise he was
plotting. That he finally decided to admit Hacking to his confidence was
due less to the favourable result of the scrutiny than to the fact that
unless he confided in Hacking he would find it difficult to communicate
with Cyril and impossible to manage his escape. Mark aimed as high as
this. His first impulse had been to approach the Vicar of Meade
Cantorum, but on second thoughts he had rejected him in favour of Mr.
Dorward, who was not so likely to suffer from respect for paternal
authority.

"Look here, Hacking, will you swear not to say a word about what I'm
going to tell you?"

"Of course," said Hacking, who scenting a scandal would have promised
much more than this to obtain the details of it.

"What will you swear by?"

"Oh, anything," Hacking offered, without the least hesitation. "I don't
mind what it is."

"Well, what do you consider the most sacred thing in the world?"

If Hacking had known himself, he would have said food; not knowing
himself, he suggested the Bible.

"I suppose you know that if you swear something on the Bible and break
your oath you can be put in prison?" Mark demanded sternly.

"Yes, of course."

The oath was administered, and Hacking waited goggle-eyed for the
revelation.

"Is that all?" he asked when Mark stopped.

"Well, it's enough, isn't it? And now you've got to help him to escape."

"But I didn't swear I'd do that," argued Hacking.

"All right then. Don't. I thought you'd enjoy it."

"We should get into a row. There'd be an awful shine."

"Who's to know it's us? I've got a friend in the country. And I shall
telegraph to him and ask if he'll hide Pomeroy."

Mark was not sufficiently sure of Hacking's discretion or loyalty to
mention Dorward's name. After all this business wasn't just a rag.

"The first thing is for you to go out in the garden and attract
Pomeroy's attention. He's locked in his bedroom."

"But I don't know which is his bedroom," Hacking objected.

"Well, you don't suppose the whole family are locked in their bedrooms,
do you?" asked Mark scornfully.

"But how do you know his bedroom is on this side of the house?"

"I don't," said Mark. "That's what I want to find out. If it's in the
front of the house, I shan't want your help, especially as you're so
funky."

Hacking went out into the garden, and presently he came back with the
news that Pomeroy was waiting outside to talk to Mark over the wall.

"Waiting outside?" Mark repeated. "What do you mean, waiting outside?
How can he be waiting outside when he's locked in his bedroom?"

"But he's not," said Hacking.

Sure enough, when Mark went out he found Cyril astride the party wall
between the two gardens waiting for him.

"You can't let your father drag you off to Australia like this," Mark
argued. "You'll go all to pieces there. You'll lose your faith, and take
to drink, and--you must refuse to go."

Cyril smiled weakly and explained to Mark that when once his father had
made up his mind to do something it was impossible to stop him.

Thereupon Mark explained his scheme.

"I'll get an answer from Dorward to-night and you must escape to-morrow
afternoon as soon as it's dark. Have you got a rope ladder?"

Cyril smiled more feebly than ever.

"No, I suppose you haven't. Then what you must do is tear up your sheets
and let yourself down into the garden. Hacking will whistle three times
if all's clear, and then you must climb over into his garden and run as
hard as you can to the corner of the road where I'll be waiting for you
in a cab. I'll go up to London with you and see you off from Waterloo,
which is the station for Green Lanes where Father Dorward lives. You
take a ticket to Galton, and I expect he'll meet you, or if he doesn't,
it's only a seven mile walk. I don't know the way, but you can ask when
you get to Galton. Only if you could find your way without asking it
would be better, because if you're pursued and you're seen asking the
way you'll be caught more easily. Now I must rush off and borrow some
money from Mr. Ogilvie. No, perhaps it would rouse suspicions if I were
absent from afternoon school. My uncle would be sure to guess,
and--though I don't think he would--he might try to lock me up in my
room. But I say," Mark suddenly exclaimed in indignation, "how on earth
did you manage to come and talk to me out here?"

Cyril explained that he had only been locked in his bedroom last night
when his father was so angry. He had freedom to move about in the house
and garden, and, he added to Mark's annoyance, there would be no need
for him to use rope ladders or sheets to escape. If Mark would tell him
what time to be at the corner of the road and would wait for him a
little while in case his father saw him going out and prevented him, he
would easily be able to escape.

"Then I needn't have told Hacking," said Mark. "However, now I have told
him, he must do something, or else he's sure to let out what he knows. I
wish I knew where to get the money for the fare."

"I've got a pound in my money box."

"Have you?" said Mark, a little mortified, but at the same time relieved
that he could keep Mr. Ogilvie from being involved. "Well, that ought to
be enough. I've got enough to send a telegram to Dorward. As soon as I
get his answer I'll send you word by Hacking. Now don't hang about in
the garden all the afternoon or your people will begin to think
something's up. If you could, it would be a good thing for you to be
heard praying and groaning in your room."

Cyril smiled his feeble smile, and Mark felt inclined to abandon him to
his fate; but he decided on reflection that the importance of
vindicating the claims of the Church to a persecuted son was more
important than the foolishness and the feebleness of the son.

"Do you want me to do anything more?" Hacking asked.

Mark suggested that Hacking's name and address should be given for Mr.
Dorward's answer, but this Hacking refused.

"If a telegram came to our house, everybody would want to read it. Why
can't it be sent to you?"

Mark sighed for his fellow-conspirator's stupidity. To this useless clod
he had presented a valuable bat.

"All right," he said impatiently, "you needn't do anything more except
tell Pomeroy what time he's to be at the corner of the road to-morrow."

"I'll do that, Lidderdale."

"I should think you jolly well would," Mark exclaimed scornfully.

Mark spent a long time over the telegram to Dorward; in the end he
decided that it would be safer to assume that the priest would shelter
and hide Cyril rather than take the risk of getting an answer. The final
draft was as follows:--

     Dorward Green Lanes Medworth Hants

     Am sending persecuted Catholic boy by 7.30 from Waterloo Tuesday
     please send conveyance Mark Lidderdale.

Mark only had eightpence, and this message would cost tenpence. He took
out the _am_, changed _by 7.30 from Waterloo_ to _arriving 9.35_ and
_send conveyance_ to _meet_. If he had only borrowed Cyril's sovereign,
he could have been more explicit. However, he flattered himself that he
was getting full value for his eightpence. He then worked out the cost
of Cyril's escape.

                                                s.   d.
Third Class single to Paddington                1    6
Third Class return to Paddington (for self)     2    6
Third Class single Waterloo to Galton           3   11
Cab from Paddington to Waterloo                 3    6?
Cab from Waterloo to Paddington (for self)      3    6?
Sandwiches for Cyril and Self                   1    0
Ginger-beer for Cyril and Self (4 bottles)           8
                                               ________
Total                                          16    7

The cab of course might cost more, and he must take back the eightpence
out of it for himself. But Cyril would have at least one and sixpence
in his pocket when he arrived, which he could put in the offertory at
the Mass of thanksgiving for his escape that he would attend on the
following morning. Cyril would be useful to old Dorward, and he (Mark)
would give him some tips on serving if they had an empty compartment
from Slowbridge to Paddington. Mark's original intention had been to
wait at the corner of Cranborne Road in a closed cab like the proverbial
postchaise of elopements, but he discarded this idea for reasons of
economy. He hoped that Cyril would not get frightened on the way to the
station and turn back. Perhaps after all it would be wiser to order a
cab and give up the ginger-beer, or pay for the ginger-beer with the
money for the telegram. Once inside a cab Cyril was bound to go on.
Hacking might be committed more completely to the enterprise by waiting
inside until he arrived with Cyril. It was a pity that Cyril was not
locked in his room, and yet when it came to it he would probably have
funked letting himself down from the window by knotted sheets. Mark
walked home with Hacking after school, to give his final instructions
for the following day.

"I'm telling you now," he said, "because we oughtn't to be seen together
at all to-morrow, in case of arousing suspicion. You must get hold of
Pomeroy and tell him to run to the corner of the road at half-past-five,
and jump straight into the fly that'll be waiting there with you
inside."

"But where will you be?"

"I shall be waiting outside the ticket barrier with the tickets."

"Supposing he won't?"

"I'll risk seeing him once more. Go and ask if you can speak to him a
minute, and tell him to come out in the garden presently. Say you've
knocked a ball over or something and will Master Cyril throw it back. I
say, we might really put a message inside a ball and throw it over. That
was the way the Duc de Beaufort escaped in _Twenty Years After_."

Hacking looked blankly at Mark.

"But it's dark and wet," he objected. "I shouldn't knock a ball over on
a wet evening like this."

"Well, the skivvy won't think of that, and Pomeroy will guess that
we're trying to communicate with him."

Mark thought how odd it was that Hacking should be so utterly blind to
the romance of the enterprise. After a few more objections which were
disposed of by Mark, Hacking agreed to go next door and try to get the
prisoner into the garden. He succeeded in this, and Mark rated Cyril for
not having given him the sovereign yesterday.

"However, bunk in and get it now, because I shan't see you again till
to-morrow at the station, and I must have some money to buy the
tickets."

He explained the details of the escape and exacted from Cyril a promise
not to back out at the last moment.

"You've got nothing to do. It's as simple as A B C. It's too simple,
really, to be much of a rag. However, as it isn't a rag, but serious, I
suppose we oughtn't to grumble. Now, you are coming, aren't you?"

Cyril promised that nothing but physical force should prevent him.

"If you funk, don't forget that you'll have betrayed your faith and
. . ."

At this moment Mark in his enthusiasm slipped off the wall, and after
uttering one more solemn injunction against backing out at the last
minute he left Cyril to the protection of Angels for the next
twenty-four hours.

Although he would never have admitted as much, Mark was rather
astonished when Cyril actually did present himself at Slowbridge station
in time to catch the 5.47 train up to town. Their compartment was not
empty, so that Mark was unable to give Cyril that lesson in serving at
the altar which he had intended to give him. Instead, as Cyril seemed in
his reaction to the excitement of the escape likely to burst into tears
at any moment, he drew for him a vivid picture of the enjoyable life to
which the train was taking him.

"Father Dorward says that the country round Green Lanes is ripping. And
his church is Norman. I expect he'll make you his ceremonarius. You're
an awfully lucky chap, you know. He says that next Corpus Christi, he's
going to have Mass on the village green. Nobody will know where you
are, and I daresay later on you can become a hermit. You might become a
saint. The last English saint to be canonized was St. Thomas Cantilupe
of Hereford. But of course Charles the First ought to have been properly
canonized. By the time you die I should think we should have got back
canonization in the English Church, and if I'm alive then I'll propose
your canonization. St. Cyril Pomeroy you'd be."

Such were the bright colours in which Mark painted Cyril's future; when
he had watched him wave his farewells from the window of the departing
train at Waterloo, he felt as if he were watching the bodily assumption
of a saint.

"Where have you been all the evening?" asked Uncle Henry, when Mark came
back about nine o'clock.

"In London," said Mark.

"Your insolence is becoming insupportable. Get away to your room."

It never struck Mr. Lidderdale that his nephew was telling the truth.

The hue and cry for Cyril Pomeroy began at once, and though Mark
maintained at first that the discovery of Cyril's hiding-place was due
to nothing else except the cowardice of Hacking, who when confronted by
a detective burst into tears and revealed all he knew, he was bound to
admit afterward that, if Mr. Ogilvie had been questioned much more, he
would have had to reveal the secret himself. Mark was hurt that his
efforts to help a son of Holy Church should not be better appreciated by
Mr. Ogilvie; but he forgave his friend in view of the nuisance that it
undoubtedly must have been to have Meade Cantorum beleaguered by half a
dozen corpulent detectives. The only person in the Vicarage who seemed
to approve of what he had done was Esther; she who had always seemed to
ignore him, even sometimes in a sensitive mood to despise him, was full
of congratulations.

"How did you manage it, Mark?"

"Oh, I took a cab," said Mark modestly. "One from the corner of
Cranborne Road to Slowbridge, and another from Paddington to Waterloo.
We had some sandwiches, and a good deal of ginger-beer at Paddington
because we thought we mightn't be able to get any at Waterloo, but at
Waterloo we had some more ginger-beer. I wish I hadn't told Hacking. If
I hadn't, we should probably have pulled it off. Old Dorward was up to
anything. But Hacking is a hopeless ass."

"What does your uncle say?"

"He's rather sick," Mark admitted. "He refused to let me go to school
any more, which as you may imagine doesn't upset me very much, and I'm
to go into Hitchcock's office after Christmas. As far as I can make out
I shall be a kind of servant."

"Have you talked to Stephen about it?"

"Well, he's a bit annoyed with me about this kidnapping. I'm afraid I
have rather let him in for it. He says he doesn't mind so much if it's
kept out of the papers."

"Anyway, I think it was a sporting effort by you," said Esther. "I
wasn't particularly keen on you until you brought this off. I hate pious
boys. I wish you'd told me beforehand. I'd have loved to help."

"Would you? I say, I am sorry. I never thought of you," said Mark much
disappointed at the lost opportunity. "You'd have been much better than
that ass Hacking. If you and I had been the only people in it, I'll bet
the detectives would never have found him."

"And what's going to happen to the youth now?"

"Oh, his father's going to take him to Australia as he arranged. They
sail to-morrow. There's one thing," Mark added with a kind of gloomy
relish. "He's bound to go to the bad, and perhaps that'll be a lesson to
his father."

The hope of the Vicar of Meade Cantorum and equally it may be added the
hope of Mr. Lidderdale that the affair would be kept out of the papers
was not fulfilled. The day after Mr. Pomeroy and his son sailed from
Tilbury the following communication appeared in _The Times_:

     Sir,--The accompanying letter was handed to me by my friend the
     Reverend Eustace Pomeroy to be used as I thought fit and subject to
     only one stipulation--that it should not be published until he and
     his son were out of England. As President of the Society for the
     Protection of the English Church against Romish Aggression I feel
     that it is my duty to lay the facts before the country. I need
     scarcely add that I have been at pains to verify the surprising and
     alarming accusations made by a clergyman against two other
     clergymen, and I earnestly request the publicity of your columns
     for what I venture to believe is positive proof of the dangerous
     conspiracy existing in our very midst to romanize the Established
     Church of England. I shall be happy to produce for any of your
     readers who find Mr. Pomeroy's story incredible at the close of the
     nineteenth century the signed statements of witnesses and other
     documentary evidence.

     I am, Sir,

     Your obedient servant,

     Danvers.


     The Right Honble. the Lord Danvers, P.C.

     President of the Society for the Protection of the English Church
     against Romish Aggression.

     My Lord,

     I have to bring to your notice as President of the S.P.E. C.R.A.
     what I venture to assert is one of the most daring plots to subvert
     home and family life in the interests of priestcraft that has ever
     been discovered. In taking this step I am fully conscious of its
     seriousness, and if I ask your lordship to delay taking any
     measures for publicity until the unhappy principal is upon the high
     seas in the guardianship of his even more unhappy father, I do so
     for the sake of the wretched boy whose future has been nearly
     blasted by the Jesuitical behaviour of two so-called Protestant
     clergymen.

     Four years ago, my lord, I retired from a lifelong career as a
     missionary in New Guinea to give my children the advantages of
     English education and English climate, and it is surely hard that I
     should live to curse the day on which I did so. My third son Cyril
     was sent to school at Haverton House, Slowbridge, to an educational
     establishment kept by a Mr. Henry Lidderdale, reputed to be a
     strong Evangelical and I believe I am justified in saying rightly
     so reputed. At the same time I regret that Mr. Lidderdale, whose
     brother was a notorious Romanizer I have since discovered, should
     not have exercised more care in the supervision of his nephew, a
     fellow scholar with my own son at Haverton House. It appears that
     Mr. Lidderdale was so lax as to permit his nephew to frequent the
     services of the Reverend Stephen Ogilvie at Meade Cantorum, where
     every excess such as incense, lighted candles, mariolatry and
     creeping to the cross is openly practised. The Revd. S. Ogilvie I
     may add is a member of the S.S.C., that notorious secret society
     whose machinations have been so often exposed and the originators
     of that filthy book "The Priest in Absolution." He is also a member
     of the Guild of All Souls which has for its avowed object the
     restoration of the Romish doctrine of Purgatory with all its
     attendant horrors, and finally I need scarcely add he is a member
     of the Confraternity of the "Blessed Sacrament" which seeks openly
     to popularize the idolatrous and blasphemous cult of the Mass.

     Young Lidderdale presumably under the influence of this disloyal
     Protestant clergyman sought to corrupt my son, and was actually so
     far successful as to lure him to attend the idolatrous services at
     Meade Cantorum church, which of course he was only able to do by
     inventing lies and excuses to his father to account for his absence
     from the simple worship to which all his life he had been
     accustomed. Not content with this my unhappy son was actually
     persuaded to confess his sins to this self-styled "priest"! I
     wonder if he confessed the sin of deceiving his own father to
     "Father" Ogilvie who supplied him with numerous Mass books, several
     of which I enclose for your lordship's inspection. You will be
     amused if you are not too much horrified by these puerile and
     degraded works, and in one of them, impudently entitled "Catholic
     Prayers for Church of England People" you will actually see in cold
     print a prayer for the "Pope of Rome." This work emanates from that
     hotbed of sacerdotal disloyalty, St. Alban's, Holborn.

     These vile books I discovered by accident carefully hidden away in
     my son's bedroom. "Facilis descensus Averni!" You will easily
     imagine the humiliation of a parent who, having devoted his life to
     bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the heathen, finds that his own
     son has fallen as low as the lowest savage. As soon as I made my
     discovery, I removed him from Haverton House, and warned the
     proprietor of the risk he was running by not taking better care of
     his pupils. Having been summoned to a conference of missionaries in
     Sydney, N.S.W., I determined to take my son with me in the hope
     that a long voyage in the company of a loving parent, eager to help
     him back to the path of Truth and Salvation from which he had
     strayed, might cure him of his idolatrous fancies, and restore him
     to Jesus.

     What followed is, as I write this, scarcely credible to myself;
     but however incredible, it is true. Young Lidderdale, acting no
     doubt at the instigation of "Father" Ogilvie (as my son actually
     called him to my face, not realizing the blasphemy of according to
     a mortal clergyman the title that belongs to God alone), entered
     into a conspiracy with another Romanizing clergyman, the Reverend
     Oliver Dorward, Vicar of Green Lanes, Hants, to abduct my son from
     his own father's house, with what ultimate intention I dare not
     think. Incredible as it must sound to modern ears, they were so far
     successful that for a whole week I was in ignorance of his
     whereabouts, while detectives were hunting for him up and down
     England. The abduction was carried out by young Lidderdale, with
     the assistance of a youth called Hacking, so coolly and skilfully
     as to indicate that the abettors behind the scenes are USED TO SUCH
     ABDUCTIONS. This, my lord, points to a very grave state of affairs
     in our midst. If the son of a Protestant clergyman like myself can
     be spirited away from a populous but nevertheless comparatively
     small town like Slowbridge, what must be going on in great cities
     like London? Moreover, everything is done to make it attractive for
     the unhappy youth who is thus lured away from his father's hearth.
     My own son is even now still impenitent, and I have the greatest
     fears for his moral and religious future, so rapid has been the
     corruption set up by evil companionship.

     These, my lord, are the facts set out as shortly as possible and
     written on the eve of my departure in circumstances that militate
     against elegance of expression. I am, to tell the truth, still
     staggered by this affair, and if I make public my sorrow and my
     shame I do so in the hope that the Society of which your lordship
     is President, may see its way to take some kind of action that will
     make a repetition of such an outrage upon family life for ever
     impossible.

     Believe me to be,

     Your lordship's obedient servant,

     Eustace Pomeroy.

The publication of this letter stirred England. _The Times_ in a leading
article demanded a full inquiry into the alleged circumstances. _The
English Churchman_ said that nothing like it had happened since the days
of Bloody Mary. Questions were asked in the House of Commons, and
finally when it became known that Lord Danvers would ask a question in
the House of Lords, Mr. Ogilvie took Mark to see Lord Hull who wished to
be in possession of the facts before he rose to correct some
misapprehensions of Lord Danvers. Mark also had to interview two
Bishops, an Archdeacon, and a Rural Dean. He did not realize that for a
few weeks he was a central figure in what was called THE CHURCH CRISIS.
He was indignant at Mr. Pomeroy's exaggeration and perversions of fact,
and he was so evidently speaking the truth that everybody from Lord Hull
to a reporter of _The Sun_ was impressed by his account of the affair,
so that in the end the Pomeroy Abduction was decided to be less
revolutionary than the Gunpowder Plot.

Mr. Lidderdale, however, believed that his nephew had deliberately tried
to ruin him out of malice, and when two parents seized the opportunity
of such a scandal to remove their sons from Haverton House without
paying the terminal fees, Mr. Lidderdale told Mark that he should recoup
himself for the loss out of the money left by his mother.

"How much did she leave?" his nephew asked.

"Don't ask impertinent questions."

"But it's my money, isn't it?"

"It will be your money in another six years, if you behave yourself.
Meanwhile half of it will be devoted to paying your premium at the
office of my friend Mr. Hitchcock."

"But I don't want to be a solicitor. I want to be a priest," said Mark.

Uncle Henry produced a number of cogent reasons that would make his
nephew's ambition unattainable.

"Very well, if I can't be a priest, I don't want the money, and you can
keep it yourself," said Mark. "But I'm not going to be a solicitor."

"And what are you going to be, may I inquire?" asked Uncle Henry.

"In the end I probably _shall_ be a priest," Mark prophesied. "But I
haven't quite decided yet how. I warn you that I shall run away."

"Run away," his uncle echoed in amazement. "Good heavens, boy, haven't
you had enough of running away over this deplorable Pomeroy affair?
Where are you going to run to?"

"I couldn't tell you, could I, even if I knew?" Mark asked as tactfully
as he was able. "But as a matter of fact, I don't know. I only know that
I won't go into Mr. Hitchcock's office. If you try to force me, I shall
write to _The Times_ about it."

Such a threat would have sounded absurd in the mouth of a schoolboy
before the Pomeroy business; but now Mr. Lidderdale took it seriously
and began to wonder if Haverton House would survive any more of such
publicity. When a few days later Mr. Ogilvie, whom Mark had consulted
about his future, wrote to propose that Mark should live with him and
work under his superintendence with the idea of winning a scholarship at
Oxford, Mr. Lidderdale was inclined to treat his suggestion as a
solution of the problem, and he replied encouragingly:

     Haverton House,

     Slowbridge.

     Jan. 15.

     Dear Sir,

     Am I to understand from your letter that you are offering to make
     yourself responsible for my nephew's future, for I must warn you
     that I could not accept your suggestion unless such were the case?
     I do not approve of what I assume will be the trend of your
     education, and I should have to disclaim any further responsibility
     in the matter of my nephew's future. I may inform you that I hold
     in trust for him until he comes of age the sum of £522 8s. 7d.
     which was left by his mother. The annual interest upon this I have
     used until now as a slight contribution to the expense to which I
     have been put on his account; but I have not thought it right to
     use any of the capital sum. This I am proposing to transfer to you.
     His mother did not execute any legal document and I have nothing
     more binding than a moral obligation. If you undertake the
     responsibility of looking after him until such time as he is able
     to earn his own living, I consider that you are entitled to use
     this money in any way you think right. I hope that the boy will
     reward your confidence more amply than he has rewarded mine. I need
     not allude to the Pomeroy business to you, for notwithstanding your
     public denials I cannot but consider that you were as deeply
     implicated in that disgraceful affair as he was. I note what you
     say about the admiration you had for my brother. I wish I could
     honestly say that I shared that admiration. But my brother and I
     were not on good terms, for which state of affairs he was entirely
     responsible. I am more ready to surrender to you all my authority
     over Mark because I am only too well aware how during the last year
     you have consistently undermined that authority and encouraged my
     nephew's rebellious spirit. I have had a great experience of boys
     during thirty-five years of schoolmastering, and I can assure you
     that I have never had to deal with a boy so utterly insensible to
     kindness as my nephew. His conduct toward his aunt I can only
     characterize as callous. Of his conduct towards me I prefer to say
     no more. I came forward at a moment when he was likely to be sunk
     in the most abject poverty, and my reward has been ingratitude. I
     pray that his dark and stubborn temperament may not turn to vice
     and folly as he grows older, but I have little hope of its not
     doing so. I confess that to me his future seems dismally black. You
     may have acquired some kind of influence over his emotions, if he
     has any emotions, but I am not inclined to suppose that it will
     endure.

     On hearing from you that you persist in your offer to assume
     complete responsibility for my nephew, I will hand him over to your
     care at once. I cannot pretend that I shall be sorry to see the
     last of him, for I am not a hypocrite. I may add that his clothes
     are in rather a sorry state. I had intended to equip him upon his
     entering the office of my old friend Mr. Hitchcock and with that
     intention I have been letting him wear out what he has. This, I may
     say, he has done most effectually.

     I am, Sir,

     Yours faithfully,

     Henry Lidderdale.

To which Mr. Ogilvie replied:

     The Vicarage,

     Meade Cantorum,

     Bucks.

     Jan. 16.

     Dear Mr. Lidderdale,

     I accept full responsibility for Mark and for Mark's money. Send
     both of them along whenever you like. I'm not going to embark on
     another controversy about the "rights" of boys. I've exhausted
     every argument on this subject since Mark involved me in his
     drastic measures of a month ago. But please let me assure you that
     I will do my best for him and that I am convinced he will do his
     best for me.

     Yours truly,

     Stephen Ogilvie.




CHAPTER XIII

WYCH-ON-THE-WOLD


Mark rarely visited his uncle and aunt after he went to live at Meade
Cantorum; and the break was made complete soon afterward when the living
of Wych-on-the-Wold was accepted by Mr. Ogilvie, so complete indeed that
he never saw his relations again. Uncle Henry died five years later;
Aunt Helen went to live at St. Leonard's, where she took up palmistry
and became indispensable to the success of charitable bazaars in East
Sussex.

Wych, a large village on a spur of the Cotswold hills, was actually in
Oxfordshire, although by so bare a margin that all the windows looked
down into Gloucestershire, except those in the Rectory; they looked out
across a flat country of elms and willow-bordered streams to a flashing
spire in Northamptonshire reputed to be fifty miles away. It was a high
windy place, seeming higher and windier on account of the numbers of
pigeons that were always circling round the church tower. There was
hardly a house in Wych that did not have its pigeon-cote, from the great
round columbary in the Rectory garden to the few holes in a gable-end of
some steep-roofed cottage. Wych was architecturally as perfect as most
Cotswold villages, and if it lacked the variety of Wychford in the vale
below, that was because the exposed position had kept its successive
builders too intent on solidity to indulge their fancy. The result was
an austere uniformity of design that accorded fittingly with a landscape
whose beauty was all of line and whose colour like the lichen on an old
wall did not flauntingly reveal its gradations of tint to the transient
observer. The bleak upland airs had taught the builders to be sparing
with their windows; the result of such solicitude for the comfort of the
inmates was a succession of blank spaces of freestone that delighted
the eye with an effect of strength and leisure, of cleanliness and
tranquillity.

The Rectory, dating from the reign of Charles II, did not arrogate to
itself the right to retire behind trees from the long line of the single
village street; but being taller than the other houses it brought the
street to a dignified conclusion, and it was not unworthy of the noble
church which stood apart from the village, a landmark for miles, upon
the brow of the rolling wold. There was little traffic on the road that
climbed up from Wychford in the valley of the swift Greenrush five miles
away, and there was less traffic on the road beyond, which for eight
miles sent branch after branch to remote farms and hamlets until itself
became no more than a sheep track and faded out upon a hilly pasturage.
Yet even this unfrequented road only bisected the village at the end of
its wide street, where in the morning when the children were at school
and the labourers at work in the fields the silence was cloistral, where
one could stand listening to the larks high overhead, and where the
lightest footstep aroused curiosity, so that one turned the head to peep
and peer for the cause of so strange a sound.

Mr. Ogilvie's parish had a large superficial area; but his parishioners
were not many outside the village, and in that country of wide pastures
the whole of his cure did not include half-a-dozen farms. There was no
doctor and no squire, unless Will Starling of Rushbrooke Grange could be
counted as the squire.

Halfway to Wychford and close to the boundary of the two parishes an
infirm signpost managed with the aid of a stunted hawthorn to keep
itself partially upright and direct the wayfarer to Wych Maries. Without
the signpost nobody would have suspected that the grassgrown track thus
indicated led anywhere except over the top of the wold.

"You must go and explore Wych Maries," the Rector had said to Mark soon
after they arrived. "You'll find it rather attractive. There's a disused
chapel dedicated to St. Mary the Virgin and St. Mary Magdalene. My
predecessor took me there when we drove round the parish on my first
visit; but I haven't yet had time to go again. And you ought to have a
look at the gardens of Rushbrooke Grange. The present squire is away. In
the South Seas, I believe. But the housekeeper, Mrs. Honeybone, will
show you round."

It was in response to this advice that Mark and Esther set out on a
golden May evening to explore Wych Maries. Esther had continued to be
friendly with Mark after the Pomeroy affair; and when he came to live at
Meade Cantorum she had expressed her pleasure at the prospect of having
him for a brother.

"But you'll keep off religion, won't you?" she had demanded.

Mark promised that he would, wondering why she should suppose that he
was incapable of perceiving who was and who was not interested in it.

"I suppose you've guessed my fear?" she had continued. "Haven't you?
Haven't you guessed that I'm frightened to death of becoming religious?"

The reassuring contradiction that one naturally gives to anybody who
voices a dread of being overtaken by some misfortune might perhaps have
sounded inappropriate, and Mark had held his tongue.

"My father was very religious. My mother is more or less religious.
Stephen is religious. Miriam is religious. Oh, Mark, and I sometimes
feel that I too must fall on my knees and surrender. But I won't.
Because it spoils life. I shall be beaten in the end of course, and I'll
probably get religious mania when I am beaten. But until then--" She did
not finish her sentence; only her blue eyes glittered at the challenge
of life.

That was the last time religion was mentioned between Mark and Esther,
and since both of them enjoyed the country they became friends. On this
May evening they stood by the signpost and looked across the shimmering
grass to where the sun hung in his web of golden haze above the edge of
the wold.

"If we take the road to Wych Maries," said Mark, "we shall be walking
right into the sun."

Esther did not reply, but Mark understood that she assented to his
truism, and they walked on as silent as the long shadows that followed
them. A quarter of a mile from the high road the path reached the edge
of the wold and dipped over into a wood which was sparse just below the
brow, but which grew denser down the slope with many dark evergreens
interspersed, and in the valley below became a jungle. After the bare
upland country this volume of May verdure seemed indescribably rich and
the valley beyond, where the Greenrush flowed through kingcups toward
the sun, indescribably alluring. Esther and Mark forgot that they were
exploring Wych Maries and thinking only of reaching that wide valley
they ran down through the wood, rejoicing in the airy green of the
ash-trees above them and shouting as they ran. But presently cypresses
and sombre yews rose on either side of the path, and the road to Wych
Maries was soft and silent, and the serene sun was lost, and their
whispering footsteps forbade them to shout any more. At the bottom of
the hill the trees increased in number and variety; the sun shone
through pale oak-leaves and the warm green of sycamores. Nevertheless a
sadness haunted the wood, where the red campions made only a mist of
colour with no reality of life and flowers behind.

"This wood's awfully jolly, isn't it?" said Mark, hoping to gain from
Esther's agreement the dispersal of his gloom.

"I don't care for it much," she replied. "There doesn't seem to be any
life in it."

"I heard a cuckoo just now," said Mark.

"Yes, out of tune already."

"Mm, rather out of tune. Mind those nettles," he warned her.

"I thought Stephen said he drove here."

"Perhaps we've come the wrong way. I believe the road forked by the ash
wood above. Anyway if we go toward the sun we shall come out in the
valley, and we can walk back along the banks of the river to Wychford."

"We can always go back through the wood," said Esther.

"Yes, if you don't mind going back the way you came."

"Come on," she snapped. She was not going to be laughed at by Mark, and
she dared him to deny that he was not as much aware as herself of an
eeriness in the atmosphere.

"Only because it seems dark in here after that dazzling sunlight on the
wold. Hark! I hear the sound of water."

They struggled through the undergrowth toward the sound; soon from a
steep wooded bank they were gazing down into a millpool, the surface of
which reflected with a gloomy deepening of their hue the colour but not
the form of the trees above. Water was flowing through a rotten sluice
gate down from the level of the stream upon a slimy water-wheel that
must have been out of action for many years.

"The dark tarn of Auber in the misty mid region of Weir!" Mark
exclaimed. "Don't you love _Ulalume_? I think it's about my favourite
poem."

"Never heard of it," Esther replied indifferently. He might have taken
advantage of this confession to give her a lecture on poetry, if the
millpool and the melancholy wood had not been so affecting as to make
the least attempt at literary exposition impertinent.

"And there's the chapel," Mark exclaimed, pointing to a ruined edifice
of stone, the walls of which were stained with the damp of years rising
from the pool. "But how shall we reach it? We must have come the wrong
way."

"Let's go back! Let's go back!" Esther exclaimed, surrendering to the
command of an intuition that overcame her pride. "This place is
unlucky."

Mark looking at her wild eyes, wilder in the dark that came so early in
this overshadowed place, was half inclined to turn round at her behest;
but at that moment he perceived a possible path through the nettles and
briers at the farther end of the pool and unwilling to go back to the
Rectory without having visited the ruined chapel of Wych Maries he
called on her to follow him. This she did fearfully at first; but
gradually regaining her composure she emerged on the other side as cool
and scornful as the Esther with whom he was familiar.

"What frightened you?" he asked, when they were standing on a grassgrown
road that wound through a rank pasturage browsed on by a solitary black
cow and turned the corner by a clump of cedars toward a large building,
the presence of which was felt rather than seen beyond the trees.

"I was bored by the brambles," Esther offered for explanation.

"This must be the driving road," Mark proclaimed. "I say, this chapel is
rather ripping, isn't it?"

But Esther had wandered away across the rank meadow, where her
meditative form made the solitary black cow look lonelier than ever.
Mark turned aside to examine the chapel. He had been warned by the
Rector to look at the images of St. Mary the Virgin and St. Mary
Magdalene that had survived the ruin of the holy place of which they
were tutelary and to which they had given their name. The history of the
chapel was difficult to trace. It was so small as to suggest that it was
a chantry; but there was no historical justification for linking its
fortunes with the Starlings who owned Rushbrooke Grange, and there was
no record of any lost hamlet here. That it was called Wych Maries might
show a connexion either with Wychford or with Wych-on-the-Wold; it lay
about midway between the two, and in days gone by there had been
controversy on this point between the two parishes. The question had
been settled by a squire of Rushbrooke's buying it in the eighteenth
century, since when a legend had arisen that it was built and endowed by
some crusading Starling of the thirteenth century. There was record
neither of its glory nor of its decline, nor of what manner of folk
worshipped there, nor of those who destroyed it. The roofless haunt of
bats and owls, preserved from complete collapse by the ancient ivy that
covered its walls, the mortar between its stones the prey of briers, its
floor a nettle bed, the chapel remained a mystery. Yet over the arch of
the west door the two Maries gazed heavenward as they had gazed for six
hundred years. The curiosity of the few antiquarians who visited the
place and speculated upon its past had kept the images clear of the ivy
that covered the rest of the fabric. Mark did not put this to the credit
of the antiquarians; but now perceiving for the first time these two
austere shapes of divine women under conditions of atmosphere that
enhanced their austerity and unearthliness he ascribed their freedom
from decay to the interposition of God. To Mark's imagination, fixed
upon the images while Esther wandered solitary in the field beyond the
chapel, there was granted another of those moments of vision which
marked like milestones his spiritual progress. He became suddenly
assured that he would neither marry nor beget children. He was
astonished to find himself in the grip of this thought, for his mind had
never until this evening occupied itself with marriage or children, nor
even with love. Yet here he was obsessed by the conviction of his finite
purpose in the scheme of the world. He could not, he said to himself, be
considered credulous if he sought for the explanation of his state of
mind in the images of the two Maries. He looked at them resolved to
illuminate with reason's eye the fluttering shadows of dusk that gave to
the stone an illusion of life's bloom.

"Did their lips really move?" he asked aloud, and from the field beyond
the black cow lowed a melancholy negative. Whether the stone had spoken
or not, Mark accepted the revelation of his future as a Divine favour,
and thenceforth he regarded the ruined chapel of Wych Maries as the
place where the vow he made on that Whit-sunday was accepted by God.

"Aren't you ever coming?" the voice of Esther called across the field,
and Mark hurried away to rejoin her on the grassgrown drive that led
round the cedar grove to Rushbrooke Grange.

"It's too late now to go inside," he objected.

They were standing before the house.

"It's not too late at all," she contradicted eagerly. "Down here it
seems later than it really is."

Rushbrooke Grange lacked the architectural perfection of the average
Cotswold manor. Being a one-storied building it occupied a large
superficial area, and its tumbling irregular roofs of freestone, the
outlines of which were blurred by the encroaching mist of vegetation
that overhung them, gave the effect of water, as if the atmosphere of
this dank valley had wrought upon the substance of the building and as
if the architects themselves had been confused by the rivalry of the
trees by which it was surrounded. The owners of Rushbrooke Grange had
never occupied a prominent position in the county, and their estates had
grown smaller with each succeeding generation. There was no conspicuous
author of their decay, no outstanding gamester or libertine from whose
ownership the family's ruin could be dated. There was indeed nothing of
interest in their annals except an attack upon the Grange by a party of
armed burglars in the disorderly times at the beginning of the
nineteenth century, when the squire's wife and two little girls were
murdered while the squire and his sons were drinking deep in the Stag
Inn at Wychford four miles away. Mark did not feel much inclined to
blunt his impression of the chapel by perambulating Rushbrooke Grange
under the guidance of Mrs. Honeybone, the old housekeeper; but Esther
perversely insisted upon seeing the garden at any rate, giving as her
excuse that the Rector would like them to pay the visit. By now it was a
pink and green May dusk; the air was plumy with moths' wings, heavy with
the scent of apple blossom.

"Well, you must explain who we are," said Mark while the echoes of the
bell died away on the silence within the house and they waited for the
footsteps that should answer their summons. The answer came from a
window above the porch where Mrs. Honeybone's face, wreathed in
wistaria, looked down and demanded in accents that were harsh with alarm
who was there.

"I am the Rector's sister, Mrs. Honeybone," Esther explained.

"I don't care who you are," said Mrs. Honeybone. "You have no business
to go ringing the bell at this time of the evening. It frightened me to
death."

"The Rector asked me to call on you," she pressed.

Mark had already been surprised by Esther's using her brother as an
excuse to visit the house and he was still more surprised by hearing her
speak so politely, so ingratiatingly, it seemed, to this grim woman
embowered in wistaria.

"We lost our way," Esther explained, "and that's why we're so late. The
Rector told me about the water-lily pool, and I should so much like to
see it."

Mrs. Honeybone debated with herself for a moment, until at last with a
grunt of disapproval she came downstairs and opened the front door. The
lily pool, now a lily pool only in name, for it was covered with an
integument of duckweed which in twilight took on the texture of velvet,
was an attractive place set in an enclosure of grass between high grey
walls.

"That's all there is to see," said Mrs. Honeybone.

"Mr. Starling is abroad?" Esther asked.

The housekeeper nodded.

"And when is he coming back?" she went on.

"That's for him to say," said the housekeeper disagreeably. "He might
come back to-night for all I know."

Almost before the sentence was out of her mouth the hall bell jangled,
and a distant voice shouted:

"Nanny, Nanny, hurry up and open the door!"

Mrs. Honeybone could not have looked more startled if the voice had been
that of a ghost. Mark began to talk of going until Esther cut him short.

"I don't think Mr. Starling will mind our being here so much as that,"
she said.

Mrs. Honeybone had already hurried off to greet her master; and when she
was gone Mark looked at Esther, saw that her face was strangely flushed,
and in an instant of divination apprehended either that she had already
met the squire of Rushbrooke Grange or that she expected to meet him
here to-night; so that, when presently a tall man of about thirty-five
with brick-dust cheeks came into the close, he was not taken aback when
Esther greeted him by name with the assurance of old friendship. Nor was
he astonished that even in the wan light those brick-dust cheeks should
deepen to terra-cotta, those hard blue eyes glitter with recognition,
and the small thin-lipped mouth lose for a moment its immobility and
gape, yes, gape, in the amazement of meeting somebody whom he never
could have expected to meet at such an hour in such a place.

"You," he exclaimed. "You here!"

By the way he quickly looked behind him as if to intercept a prying
glance Mark knew that, whatever the relationship between Esther and the
squire had been in the past, it had been a relationship in which
secrecy had played a part. In that moment between him and Will Starling
there was enmity.

"You couldn't have expected him to make a great fuss about a boy," said
Esther brutally on their way back to the Rectory.

"I suppose you think that's the reason why I don't like him," said Mark.
"I don't want him to take any notice of me, but I think it's very odd
that you shouldn't have said a word about knowing him even to his
housekeeper."

"It was a whim of mine," she murmured. "Besides, I don't know him very
well. We met at Eastbourne once when I was staying there with Mother."

"Well, why didn't he say 'How do you do, Miss Ogilvie?' instead of
breathing out 'you' like that?"

Esther turned furiously upon Mark.

"What has it got to do with you?"

"Nothing whatever to do with me," he said deliberately. "But if you
think you're going to make a fool of me, you're not. Are you going to
tell your brother you knew him?"

Esther would not answer, and separated by several yards they walked
sullenly back to the Rectory.




CHAPTER XIV

ST. MARK'S DAY


Mark tried next day to make up his difference with Esther; but she
repulsed his advances, and the friendship that had blossomed after the
Pomeroy affair faded and died. There was no apparent dislike on either
side, nothing more than a coolness as of people too well used to each
other's company. In a way this was an advantage for Mark, who was having
to apply himself earnestly to the amount of study necessary to win a
scholarship at Oxford. Companionship with Esther would have meant
considerable disturbance of his work, for she was a woman who depended
on the inspiration of the moment for her pastimes and pleasures, who was
impatient of any postponement and always avowedly contemptuous of Mark's
serious side. His classical education at Haverton House had made little
of the material bequeathed to him by his grandfather's tuition at
Nancepean. None of his masters had been enough of a scholar or enough of
a gentleman (and to teach Latin and Greek well one must be one or the
other) to educate his taste. The result was an assortment of grammatical
facts to which he was incapable of giving life. If the Rector of
Wych-on-the-Wold was not a great scholar, he was at least able to repair
the neglect of, more than the neglect of, the positive damage done to
Mark's education by the meanness of Haverton House; moreover, after Mark
had been reading with him six months he did find a really first-class
scholar in Mr. Ford, the Vicar of Little Fairfield. Mark worked
steadily, and existence in Oxfordshire went by without any great
adventures of mind, body, or spirit. Life at the Rectory had a kind of
graceful austerity like the well-proportioned Rectory itself. If Mark
had bothered to analyze the cause of this graceful austerity, he might
have found it in the personality of the Rector's elder sister Miriam.
Even at Meade Cantorum, when he was younger, Mark had been fully
conscious of her qualities; but here they found a background against
which they could display themselves more perfectly. When they moved from
Buckinghamshire and the new rector was seeing how much Miriam
appreciated the new surroundings, he sold out some stock and presented
her with enough ready money to express herself in the outward beauty of
the Rectory's refurbishing. He was luckily not called upon to spend a
great deal on the church, both his predecessors having maintained the
fabric with care, and the fabric itself being sound enough and
magnificent enough to want no more than that. Miriam, though shaking one
of those capable and well-tended fingers at her beloved brother's
extravagance, accepted the gift with an almost childish determination to
give full value of beauty in return, so that there should not be a
servant's bedroom nor a cupboard nor a corridor that did not display the
evidence of her appreciation in loving care. The garden was handed over
to Mrs. Ogilvie, who as soon as May warmed its high enclosures bloomed
there like one of her own favourite peonies, rosy of face and fragrant,
ample of girth, golden-hearted.

Outside the Rectory Mark spent most of his time with Richard Ford, the
son of the Vicar of Little Fairfield, with whom he went to work in the
autumn after his arrival in Oxfordshire. Here again Mark was lucky, for
Richard, who was a year or two older than himself and a student at
Cooper's Hill whence he would emerge as a civil engineer bound for
India, was one of those entirely admirable young men who succeed in
being saintly without any rapture or righteousness.

Mark said one day:

"Rector, you know, Richard Ford really is a saint; only for goodness'
sake don't tell him I said so, because he'd be furious."

The Rector stopped humming a joyful _Miserere_ to give Mark an assurance
of his discretion. But Mark having said so much in praise of Richard
could say no more, and indeed he would have found it hard to express in
words what he felt about his friend.

Mark accompanied Richard on his visits to Wychford Rectory where in
this fortunate corner of England existed a third perfect family. Richard
was deeply in love with Margaret Grey, the second daughter, and if Mark
had ever been intended to fall in love he would certainly have fallen in
love with Pauline, the youngest daughter, who was fourteen.

"I could look at her for ever," he confided in Richard. "Walking down
the road from Wych-on-the-Wold this morning I saw two blue butterflies
on a wild rose, and they were like Pauline's eyes and the rose was like
her cheek."

"She's a decent kid," Richard agreed fervently.

Mark had had such a limited experience of the world that the amenities
of the society in which he found himself incorporated did not strike his
imagination as remarkable. It was in truth one of those eclectic,
somewhat exquisite, even slightly rarefied coteries which are produced
partly by chance, partly by interests shared in common, but most of all,
it would seem, by the very genius of the place. The genius of Cotswolds
imparts to those who come beneath his influence the art of existing
appropriately in the houses that were built at his inspiration. They do
not boast of their privilege like the people of Sussex. They are not
living up to a landscape so much as to an architecture, and their voices
lowered harmoniously with the sigh of the wind through willows and
aspens have not to compete with the sea-gales or the sea.

Mark accepted the manners of the society in which good fortune had set
him as the natural expression of an inward orderliness, a traditional
respect for beauty like the ritual of Christian worship. That the three
daughters of the Rector of Wychford should be critical of those who
failed to conform to their inherited refinement of life did not strike
him as priggish, because it never struck him for a moment that any other
standard than theirs existed. He felt the same about people who objected
to Catholic ceremonies; their dislike of them did not present itself to
him as arising out of a different religious experience from his own; but
it appeared as a propensity toward unmannerly behaviour, as a kind of
wanton disregard of decency and good taste. He was indeed still at the
age when externals possess not so much an undue importance, but when
they affect a boy as a mould through which the plastic experience of his
youth is passed and whence it emerges to harden slowly to the ultimate
form of the individual. In the case of Mark there was the revulsion from
the arid ugliness of Haverton House and the ambition to make up for
those years of beauty withheld, both of which urged him on to take the
utmost advantage of this opportunity to expose the blank surface of
those years to the fine etching of the present. Miriam at home, the
Greys at Wychford, and in some ways most of all Richard Ford at
Fairfield gave him in a few months the poise he would have received more
gradually from a public school education.

So Mark read Greek with the Vicar of Little Fairfield and Latin with the
Rector of Wych-on-the-Wold, who, amiable and holy man, had to work
nearly twice as hard as his pupil to maintain his reserve of
instruction. Mark took long walks with Richard Ford when Richard was
home in his vacations, and long walks by himself when Richard was at
Cooper's Hill. He often went to Wychford Rectory, where he learnt to
enjoy Schumann and Beethoven and Bach and Brahms.

"You're like three Saint Cecilias," he told them. "Monica is by Luini
and Margaret is by Perugino and Pauline. . . ."

"Oh, who am I by?" Pauline exclaimed, clapping her hands.

"I give it up. You're just Saint Cecilia herself at fourteen."

"Isn't Mark foolish?" Pauline laughed.

"It's my birthday to-morrow," said Mark, "so I'm allowed to be foolish."

"It's my birthday in a week," said Pauline. "And as I'm two years
younger than you I can be two years more foolish."

Mark looked at her, and he was filled with wonder at the sanctity of her
maidenhood. Thenceforth meditating upon the Annunciation he should
always clothe Pauline in a robe of white samite and set her in his
mind's eye for that other maid of Jewry, even as painters found holy
maids in Florence or Perugia for their bright mysteries.

While Mark was walking back to Wych and when on the brow of the first
rise of the road he stood looking down at Wychford in the valley below,
a chill lisping wind from the east made him shiver and he thought of the
lines in Keats' _Eve of St. Mark_:

    _The chilly sunset faintly told_
    _Of unmatured green vallies cold,_
    _Of the green thorny bloomless hedge,_
    _Of rivers new with spring-tide sedge,_
    _Of primroses by shelter'd rills,_
    _And daisies on the aguish hills._

The sky in the west was an unmatured green valley tonight, where Venus
bloomed like a solitary primrose; and on the dark hills of Heaven the
stars were like daisies. He turned his back on the little town and set
off up the hill again, while the wind slipped through the hedge beside
him in and out of the blackthorn boughs, lisping, whispering, snuffling,
sniffing, like a small inquisitive animal. He thought of Monica,
Margaret, and Pauline playing in their warm, candle-lit room behind him,
and he thought of Miriam reading in her tall-back chair before dinner,
for Evensong would be over by now. Yes, Evensong would be over, he
remembered penitently, and he ought to have gone this evening, which was
the vigil of St. Mark and of his birthday. At this moment he caught
sight of the Wych Maries signpost black against that cold green sky. He
gave a momentary start, because seen thus the signpost had a human look;
and when his heart beat normally it was roused again, this time by the
sight of a human form indeed, the form of Esther, the wind blowing her
skirts before her, hurrying along the road to which the signpost so
crookedly pointed. Mark who had been climbing higher and higher now felt
the power of that wind full on his cheeks. It was as if it had found
what it wanted, for it no longer whispered and lisped among the boughs
of the blackthorn, but blew fiercely over the wide pastures, driving
Esther before it, cutting through Mark like a sword. By the time he had
reached the signpost she had disappeared in the wood.

Mark asked himself why she was going to Rushbrooke Grange.

"To Rushbrooke Grange," he said aloud. "Why should I think she is going
to Rushbrooke Grange?"

Though even in this desolate place he would not say it aloud, the answer
came back from this very afternoon when somebody had mentioned casually
that the Squire was come home again. Mark half turned to follow Esther,
but in the moment of turning he set his face resolutely in the direction
of home. If Esther were really on her way to meet Will Starling, he
would do more harm than good by appearing to pry.

Esther was the flaw in Mark's crystal clear world. When a year ago they
had quarrelled over his avowed dislike of Will Starling, she had gone
back to her solitary walks and he conscious, painfully conscious, that
she regarded him as a young prig, had with that foolish pride of youth
resolved to be so far as she was concerned what she supposed him to be.
His admiration for the Greys and the Fords had driven her into jeering
at them; throughout the year Mark and she had been scarcely polite to
each other even in public. The Rector and Miriam probably excused Mark's
rudeness whenever he let himself give way to it, because their sister
did not spare either of them, and they were made aware with exasperating
insistence of the dullness of the country and of the dreariness of
everybody who lived in the neighbourhood. Yet, Mark could never achieve
that indifference to her attitude either toward himself or toward other
people that he wished to achieve. It was odd that this evening he should
have beheld her in that relation to the wind, because in his thoughts
about her she always appeared to him like the wind, restlessly sighing
and fluttering round a comfortable house. However steady the
candle-light, however bright the fire, however absorbing the book,
however secure one may feel by the fireside, the wind is always there;
and throughout these tranquil months Esther had always been most
unmistakably there.

In the morning Mark went to Mass and made his Communion. It was a
strangely calm morning; through the unstained windows of the clerestory
the sun sloped quivering ladders of golden light. He looked round with
half a hope that Esther was in the church; but she was absent, and
throughout the service that brief vision of her dark transit across the
cold green sky of yester eve kept recurring to his imagination, so that
for all the rich peace of this interior he was troubled in spirit, and
the intention to make this Mass upon his seventeenth birthday another
spiritual experience was frustrated. In fact, he was worshipping
mechanically, and it was only when Mass was over and he was kneeling to
make an act of gratitude for his Communion that he began to apprehend
how he was asking fresh favours from God without having moved a step
forward to deserve them.

"I think I'm too pleased with myself," he decided, "I think I'm
suffering from spiritual pride. I think. . . ."

He paused, wondering if it was blasphemous to have an intuition that God
was about to play some horrible trick on him. Mark discussed with the
Rector the theological aspects of this intuition.

"The only thing I feel," said Mr. Ogilvie, "is that perhaps you are
leading too sheltered a life here and that the explanation of your
intuition is your soul's perception of this. Indeed, once or twice
lately I have been on the point of warning you that you must not get
into the habit of supposing you will always find the onset of the world
so gentle as here."

"But naturally I don't expect to," said Mark. "I was quite long enough
at Haverton House to appreciate what it means to be here."

"Yes," the Rector went on, "but even at Haverton House it was a passive
ugliness, just as here it is a passive beauty. After our Lord had fasted
forty days in the desert, accumulating reserves of spiritual energy,
just as we in our poor human fashion try to accumulate in Lent reserves
of spiritual energy that will enable us to celebrate Easter worthily, He
was assailed by the Tempter more fiercely than ever during His life on
earth. The history of all the early Egyptian monks, the history indeed
of any life lived without losing sight of the way of spiritual
perfection displays the same phenomena. In the action and reaction of
experience, in the rise and fall of the tides, in the very breathing of
the human lungs, you may perceive analogies of the divine rhythm. No, I
fancy your intuition of this morning is nothing more than one of those
movements which warn us that the sleeper will soon wake."

Mark went away from this conversation with the Rector dissatisfied. He
wanted something more than analogies taken from the experience of
spiritual giants, Titans of holiness whose mighty conquests of the flesh
seemed as remote from him as the achievements of Alexander might appear
to a captain of the local volunteers. What he had gone to ask the Rector
was whether it was blasphemous to suppose that God was going to play a
horrible trick on him. He had not wanted a theological discussion, an
academic question and reply. Anything could be answered like that,
probably himself in another twenty years, when he had preached some
hundreds of sermons, would talk like that. Moreover, when he was alone
Mark understood that he had not really wanted to talk about his own
troubles to the Rector at all, but that his real preoccupation had been
and still was Esther. He wondered, oh, how much he wondered, if her
brother had the least suspicion of her friendship with Will Starling, or
if Miriam had had the least inkling that Esther had not come in till
nine o'clock last night because she had been to Wych Maries? Mark,
remembering those wild eyes and that windblown hair when she stood for a
moment framed in the doorway of the Rector's library, could not believe
that none of her family had guessed that something more than the whim to
wander over the hills had taken her out on such a night. Did Mrs.
Ogilvie, promenading so placidly along her garden borders, ever pause in
perplexity at her daughter's behaviour? Calling them all to mind, their
attitudes, the expressions of their faces, the words upon their lips,
Mark was sure that none of them had any idea what Esther was doing. He
debated now the notion of warning Miriam in veiled language about her
sister; but such an idea would strike Miriam as monstrous, as a mad and
horrible nightmare. Mark shivered at the mere fancy of the chill that
would come over her and of the disdain in her eyes. Besides, what right
had he on the little he knew to involve Esther with her family?
Superficially he might count himself her younger brother; but if he
presumed too far, with what a deadly retort might she not annihilate his
claim. Most certainly he was not entitled to intervene unless he
intervened bravely and directly. Mark shook his head at the prospect of
doing that. He could not imagine anybody's tackling Esther directly on
such a subject. Seventeen to-day! He looked out of the window and felt
that he was bearing upon his shoulders the whole of that green world
outspread before him.

The serene morning ripened to a splendid noontide, and Mark who had
intended to celebrate his birthday by enjoying every moment of it had
allowed the best of the hours to slip away in a stupor of indecision.
More and more the vision of Esther last night haunted him, and he felt
that he could not go and see the Greys as he had intended. He could not
bear the contemplation of the three girls with the weight of Esther on
his mind. He decided to walk over to Little Fairfield and persuade
Richard to make a journey of exploration up the Greenrush in a canoe. He
would ask Richard his opinion of Will Starling. What a foolish notion!
He knew perfectly well Richard's opinion of the Squire, and to lure him
into a restatement of it would be the merest self-indulgence.

"Well, I must go somewhere to-day," Mark shouted at himself. He secured
a packet of sandwiches from the Rectory cook and set out to walk away
his worries.

"Why shouldn't I go down to Wych Maries? I needn't meet that chap. And
if I see him I needn't speak to him. He's always been only too jolly
glad to be offensive to me."

Mark turned aside from the high road by the crooked signpost and took
the same path down under the ash-trees as he had taken with Esther for
the first time nearly a year ago. Spring was much more like Spring in
these wooded hollows; the noise of bees in the blossom of the elms was
murmurous as limes in June. Mark congratulated himself on the spot in
which he had chosen to celebrate this fine birthday, a day robbed from
time like the day of a dream. He ate his lunch by the old mill dam,
feeding the roach with crumbs until an elderly pike came up from the
deeps and frightened the smaller fish away. He searched for a
bullfinch's nest; but he did not find one, though he saw several of the
birds singing in the snowberry bushes; round and ruddy as October apples
they looked. At last he went to the ruined chapel, where after
speculating idly for a little while upon its former state he fell as he
usually did when he visited Wych Maries into a contemplation of the two
images of the Blessed Virgin and St. Mary Magdalene. While he sat on a
hummock of grass before the old West doorway he received an impression
that since he last visited these forms of stone they had ceased to be
mere relics of ancient worship unaccountably preserved from ruin, but
that they had somehow regained their importance. It was not that he
discerned in them any miraculous quality of living, still less of
winking or sweating as images are reputed to wink and sweat for the
faithful. No, it was not that, he decided, although by regarding them
thus entranced as he was he could easily have brought himself to the
point of believing in a supernatural manifestation. He was too well
aware of this tendency to surrender to it; so, rousing himself from the
rapt contemplation of them and forsaking the hummock of grass, he
climbed up into the branches of a yew-tree that stood beside the chapel,
that there and from that elevation, viewing the images and yet unviewed
by them directly, he could be immune from the magic of fancy and
discover why they should give him this impression of having regained
their utility, yes, that was the word, utility, not importance. They
were revitalized not from within, but from without; and even as his mind
leapt at this explanation he perceived in the sunlight, beyond the
shadowy yew-tree in which he was perched, Esther sitting upon that
hummock of grass where but a moment ago he had himself been sitting.

For a moment, as if to contradict a reasonable explanation of the
strange impression the images had made upon him, Mark supposed that she
was come there for a tryst. This vanished almost at once in the
conviction that Esther's soul waited there either in question or appeal.
He restrained an impulse to declare his presence, for although he felt
that he was intruding upon a privacy of the soul, he feared to destroy
the fruits of that privacy by breaking in. He knew that Esther's pride
would be so deeply outraged at having been discovered in a moment of
weakness thus upon her knees, for she had by now fallen upon her knees
in prayer, that it might easily happen she would never in all her life
pray more. There was no escape for Mark without disturbing her, and he
sat breathless in the yew-tree, thinking that soon she must perceive his
glittering eye in the depths of the dark foliage as in passing a
hedgerow one may perceive the eye of a nested bird. From his position he
could see the images, and out of the spiritual agony of Esther kneeling
there, the force of which was communicated to himself, he watched them
close, scarcely able to believe that they would not stoop from their
pedestals and console the suppliant woman with benediction of those
stone hands now clasped aspiringly to God, themselves for centuries
suppliant like the woman at their feet. Mark could think of nothing
better to do than to turn his face from Esther's face and to say for her
many _Paternosters_ and _Aves_. At first he thought that he was praying
in a silence of nature; but presently the awkwardness of his position
began to affect his concentration, and he found that he was saying the
words mechanically, listening the while to the voices of birds. He
compelled his attention to the prayers; but the birds were too loud. The
_Paternosters_ and the _Aves_ were absorbed in their singing and
chirping and twittering, so that Mark gave up to them and wished for a
rosary to help his feeble attention. Yet could he have used a rosary
without falling out of the yew-tree? He took his hands from the bough
for a moment and nearly overbalanced. _Make not your rosary of yew
berries_, he found himself saying. Who wrote that? _Make not your rosary
of yew berries._ Why, of course, it was Keats. It was the first line of
the _Ode to Melancholy_. Esther was still kneeling out there in the
sunlight. And how did the poem continue? _Make not your rosary of yew
berries._ What was the second line? It was ridiculous to sit astride a
bough and say _Paternosters_ and _Aves_. He could not sit there much
longer. And then just as he was on the point of letting go he saw that
Esther had risen from her knees and that Will Starling was standing in
the doorway of the chapel looking at her, not speaking but waiting for
her to speak, while he wound a strand of ivy round his fingers and
unwound it again, and wound it round again until it broke and he was
saying:

"I thought we agreed after your last display here that you'd give this
cursed chapel the go by?"

"I can't escape from it," Esther cried. "You don't understand, Will,
what it means. You never have understood."

"Dearest Essie, I understand only too well. I've paid pretty handsomely
in having to listen to reproaches, in having to dry your tears and stop
your sighs with kisses. Your damned religion is a joke. Can't you grasp
that? It's not my fault we can't get married. If I were really the
scoundrel you torment yourself into thinking I am, I would have married
and taken the risk of my strumpet of a wife turning up. But I've treated
you honestly, Essie. I can't help loving you. I went away once. I went
away again. And a third time I went just to relieve your soul of the sin
of loving me. But I'm sick of suffering for the sake of a myth, a
superstition."

Esther had moved close to him, and now she put a hand upon his arm.

"To you, Will. Not to me."

"Look here, Essie," said her lover. "If you knew that you were liable to
these dreadful attacks of remorse and penitence, why did you ever
encourage me?"

"How dare you say I encouraged you?"

"Now don't let your religion make you dishonest," he stabbed. "No man
seduces a woman of your character without as much goodwill as deserves
to be called encouragement, and by God _is_ encouragement," he went on
furiously. "Let's cut away some of the cant before we begin arguing
again about religion."

"You don't know what a hell you're making for me when you talk like
that," she gasped. "If I did encourage you, then my sin is a thousand
times blacker."

"Oh, don't exaggerate, my dear girl," he said wearily. "It isn't a sin
for two people to love each other."

"I've tried my best to think as you do, but I can't. I've avoided going
to church. I've tried to hate religion, I've mocked at God . . ." she
broke off in despair of explaining the force of grace, against the gift
of which she had contended in vain.

"I always thought you were brave, Essie. But you're a real coward. The
reason for all this is your fear of being pitchforked into a big bonfire
by a pantomime demon with horns and a long tail." He laughed bitterly.
"To think that you, my adored Essie, should really have the soul of a
Sunday school teacher. You, a Bacchante of passion, to be puling about
your sins. You! You! Girl, you're mad! I tell you there is no such thing
as damnation. It's a bogey invented by priests to enchain mankind. But
if there is and if that muddle-headed old gentleman you call God really
exists and if he's a just God, why then let him damn me and let him give
you your harp and your halo while I burn for both. Essie, my mad foolish
frightened Essie, can't you understand that if you give me up for this
God of yours you'll drive me to murder. If I must marry you to hold you,
why then I'll kill that cursed wife of mine. . . ."

It was his turn now to break off in despair of being able to express his
will to keep Esther for his own, and because argument seemed so hopeless
he tried to take her in his arms, whereupon Mark who was aching with the
effort to maintain himself unobserved upon the bough of the yew-tree
said his _Paternosters_ and _Aves_ faster than ever, that she might have
the strength to resist that scoundrel of Rushbrooke Grange. He longed to
have the eloquence to make some wonderful prayer to the Blessed Virgin
and St. Mary Magdalene so that a miracle might happen and their images
point accusing hands at the blasphemer below.

And then it seemed as if a miracle did happen, for out of the jangle of
recriminations and appeals that now signified no more than the noise of
trees in a storm he heard the voice of Esther gradually gain its right
to be heard, gradually win from its rival silence until the tale was
told.

"I know that I am overcome by the saving grace of God," she was saying.
"And I know that I owe it to them." She pointed to the holy women above
the door. The squire shook his fist; but he still kept silence. "I have
run away from God since I knew you, Will. I have loved you as much as
that. I have gone to church only when I had to go for my brother's sake,
but I have actually stuffed my ears with cotton wool so that no word
there spoken might shake my faith in my right to love you. But it was
all to no purpose. You know that it was you who told me always to come
to our meetings through the wood and past the chapel. And however fast I
went and however tight I shut myself up in thoughts of you and your love
and my love I have always felt that these images spoke to me
reproachfully in passing. It's not mere imagination, Will. Why, before
we came to Wych-on-the-Wold when you went away to the Pacific that I
might have peace of mind, I used always to be haunted by the idea that
God was calling me back to Him, and I would run, yes, actually run
through the woods until my legs have been torn by brambles."

"Madness! Madness!" cried Starling.

"Let it be madness. If God chooses to pursue a human soul with madness,
the pursuit is not less swift and relentless for that. And I shook Him
off. I escaped from religion; I prayed to the Devil to keep me wicked,
so utterly did I love you. Then when my brother was offered
Wych-on-the-Wold I felt that the Devil had heard my prayer and had
indeed made me his own. That frightened me for a moment. When I wrote to
you and said we were coming here and you hurried back, I can't describe
to you the fear that overcame me when I first entered this hollow where
you lived. Several times I'd tried to come down before you arrived here,
but I'd always been afraid, and that was why the first night I brought
Mark with me."

"That long-legged prig and puppy," grunted the squire.

Mark could have shouted for joy when he heard this, shouted because he
was helping with his _Paternosters_ and his _Aves_ to drive this
ruffian out of Esther's life for ever, shouted because his long legs
were strong enough to hold on to this yew-tree bough.

"He's neither a prig nor a puppy," Esther said. "I've treated him badly
ever since he came to live with us, and I treated him badly on your
account, because whenever I was with him I found it harder to resist the
pursuit of God. Now let's leave Mark out of this. Everything was in your
favour, I tell you. I was sure that the Devil. . . ."

"The Devil!" Starling interrupted. "Your Devil, dear Essie, is as
ridiculous as your God. It's only your poor old God with his face
painted black like the bogey man of childhood."

"I was sure that the Devil," Esther repeated without seeming to hear the
blasphemy, "had taken me for his own and given us to each other. You to
me. Me to you, my darling. I didn't care. I was ready to burn in Hell
for you. So, don't call me coward, for mad though you think me I was
ready to be damned for you, and _I_ believe in damnation. You don't. Yet
the first time I passed by this chapel on my way to meet you again after
that endless horrible parting I had to run away from the holy influence.
I remember that there was a black cow in the field near the gates of the
Grange, and I waited there while Mark poked about in this chapel, waited
in the twilight afraid to go back and tell him to hurry in case I should
be recaptured by God and meet you only to meet you never more."

"I suppose you thought my old Kerry cow was the Devil, eh?" he sneered.

She paid no attention, but continued enthralled by the passion of her
spiritual adventure.

"It was no use. I couldn't come by here every day and not go back. Why,
once I opened the Bible at hazard just to show my defiance and I read
_Her sins which are many are forgiven for she loved much._ This must be
the end of our love, my lover, for I can't go on. Those two stone Maries
have brought me back to God. No more with you, my own beloved. No more,
my darling, no more. And yet if even now with one kiss you could give me
strength to sin I should rejoice. But they have made my lips as cold as
their own, and my arms that once knew how to clasp you to my heart they
have lifted up to Heaven like their own. I am going into a convent at
once, where until I die I shall pray for you, my own love."

The birds no longer sang nor twittered nor cheeped in the thickets
around, but all passion throbbed in the voice of Esther when she spoke
these words. She stood there with her hair in disarray transfigured like
a tree in autumn on which the sunlight shines when the gale has died,
but from which the leaves will soon fall because winter is at hand. Yet
her lover was so little moved by her ordeal that he went back to
mouthing his blasphemies.

"Go then," he shouted. "But these two stone dolls shall not have power
to drive my next mistress into folly. Wasn't Mary Magdalene a sinner?
Didn't she fall in love with Christ? Of course, she did! And I'll make
an example of her just as Christians make an example of all women who
love much."

The squire pulled himself up by the ivy and struck the image of St. Mary
Magdalene on the face.

"When you pray for me, dear Essie, in your convent of greensick women,
don't forget that your patron saint was kicked from her pedestal by your
lover."

Starling was as good as his word; but the effort he made to overthrow
the saint carried him with it; his foot catching in the ivy fell head
downward and striking upon a stone was killed.

Mark hesitated before he jumped down from his bough, because he dreaded
to add to Esther's despair the thought of his having overheard all that
went before. But seeing her in the sunlight now filled again with the
voices of birds, seeing her blue eyes staring in horror and the nervous
twitching of her hands he felt that the shock of his irruption might
save her reason and in a moment he was standing beside her looking down
at the dead man.

"Let me die too," she cried.

Mark found himself answering in a kind of inspiration:

"No, Esther, you must live to pray for his soul."

"He was struck dead for his blasphemy. He is in Hell. Of what use to
pray for his soul?"

"But Esther while he was falling, even in that second, he had time to
repent. Live, Esther. Live to pray for him."

Mark was overcome with a desire to laugh at the stilted way in which he
was talking, and, from the suppression of the desire, to laugh wildly at
everything in the scene, and not least at the comic death of Will
Starling, even at the corpse itself lying with a broken neck at his
feet. By an effort of will he regained control of his muscles, and the
tension of the last half hour finding no relief in bodily relaxation was
stamped ineffaceably upon his mind to take its place with that afternoon
in his father's study at the Lima Street Mission which first inspired
him with dread of the sexual relation of man to woman, a dread that was
now made permanent by what he had endured on the bough of that yew-tree.

Thanks to Mark's intervention the business was explained without
scandal; nobody doubted that the squire of Rushbrooke Grange died a
martyr to his dislike of ivy's encroaching upon ancient images. Esther's
stormy soul took refuge in a convent, and there it seemed at peace.




CHAPTER XV

THE SCHOLARSHIP


The encounter between Esther and Will Starling had the effect of
strengthening Mark's intention to be celibate. He never imagined himself
as a possible protagonist in such a scene; but the impression of that
earlier encounter between his mother and father which gave him a horror
of human love was now renewed. It was renewed, moreover, with the light
of a miracle to throw it into high relief. And this miracle could not be
explained away as a coincidence, but was an old-fashioned miracle that
required no psychical buttressing, a hard and fast miracle able to
withstand any criticism. It was a pity that out of regard for Esther he
could not publish it for the encouragement of the faithful and the
confusion of the unbelievers.

The miracle of St. Mary Magdalene's intervention on his seventeenth
birthday was the last violent impression of Mark's boyhood.
Thenceforward life moved placidly through the changing weeks of a
country calendar until the date of the scholarship examination held by
the group of colleges that contained St. Mary's, the college he aspired
to enter, but for which he failed to win even an exhibition. Mr. Ogilvie
was rather glad, for he had been worried how Mark was going to support
himself for three or four years at an expensive college like St. Mary's.
But when Mark was no more successful with another group of colleges, his
tutors began to be alarmed, wondering if their method of teaching Latin
and Greek lacked the tradition of the public school necessary to
success.

"Oh, no, it's obviously my fault," said Mark. "I expect I go to pieces
in examinations, or perhaps I'm not intended to go to Oxford."

"I beg you, my dear boy," said the Rector a little irritably, "not to
apply such a loose fatalism to your career. What will you do if you
don't go to the University?"

"It's not absolutely essential for a priest to have been to the
University," Mark argued.

"No, but in your case I think it's highly advisable. You haven't had a
public school education, and inasmuch as I stand to you _in loco
parentis_ I should consider myself most culpable if I didn't do
everything possible to give you a fair start. You haven't got a very
large sum of money to launch yourself upon the world, and I want you to
spend what you have to the best advantage. Of course, if you can't get a
scholarship, you can't and that's the end of it. But, rather than that
you should miss the University I will supplement from my own savings
enough to carry you through three years as a commoner."

Tears stood in Mark's eyes.

"You've already been far too generous," he said. "You shan't spend any
more on me. I'm sorry I talked in that foolish way. It was really only a
kind of affectation of indifference. I'm feeling pretty sore with myself
for being such a failure; but I'll have another shot and I hope I shall
do better."

Mark as a last chance tried for a close scholarship at St. Osmund's Hall
for the sons of clergymen.

"It's a tiny place of course," said the Rector. "But it's authentic
Oxford, and in some ways perhaps you would be happier at a very small
college. Certainly you'd find your money went much further."

The examination was held in the Easter vacation, and when Mark arrived
at the college he found only one other candidate besides himself. St.
Osmund's Hall with its miniature quadrangle, miniature hall, miniature
chapel, empty of undergraduates and with only the Principal and a couple
of tutors in residence, was more like an ancient almshouse than an
Oxford college. Mark and his rival, a raw-boned youth called Emmett who
was afflicted with paroxysms of stammering, moved about the precincts
upon tiptoe like people trespassing from a high road.

On their first evening the two candidates were invited to dine with the
Principal, who read second-hand book catalogues all through dinner, only
pausing from their perusal to ask occasionally in a courtly tone if Mr.
Lidderdale or Mr. Emmett would not take another glass of wine. After
dinner they sat in his library where the Principal addressed himself to
the evidently uncongenial task of estimating the comparative fitness of
his two guests to receive Mr. Tweedle's bounty. The Reverend Thomas
Tweedle was a benevolent parson of the eighteenth century who by his
will had provided the money to educate the son of one indigent clergyman
for four years. Mark was shy enough under the Principal's courtly
inquisition, but poor Emmett had a paroxysm each time he was asked the
simplest question about his tastes or his ambitions. His tongue
appearing like a disturbed mollusc waved its tip slowly round in an
agonized endeavour to give utterance to such familiar words as "yes" or
"no." Several times Mark feared that he would never get it back at all
and that Emmett would either have to spend the rest of his life with it
protruding before him or submit it to amputation and become a mute. When
the ordeal with the Principal was over and the two guests were strolling
back across the quadrangle to their rooms, Emmett talked normally and
without a single paroxysm about the effect his stammer must have had
upon the Principal. Mark did his best to reassure poor Emmett.

"Really," he said, "it was scarcely noticeable to anybody else. You
noticed it, because you felt your tongue getting wedged like that
between your teeth; but other people would hardly have noticed it at
all. When the Principal asked you if you were going to take Holy Orders
yourself, I'm sure he only thought you hadn't quite made up your mind
yet."

"But I'm sure he did notice something," poor Emmett bewailed. "Because
he began to hum."

"Well, but he was always humming," said Mark. "He hummed all through
dinner while he was reading those book catalogues."

"It's very kind of you, Lidderdale," said Emmett, "to make the best of
it for me, but I'm not such a fool as I look, and the Principal
certainly hummed six times as loud whenever he asked me a question as
he did over those catalogues. I know what I look like when I get into
one of those states. I once caught sight of myself in a glass by
accident, and now whenever my tongue gets caught up like that I'm
wondering all the time why everybody doesn't get up and run out of the
room."

"But I assure you," Mark persisted, "that little things like that--"

"Little things like that!" Emmett interrupted furiously. "It's all very
well for you, Lidderdale, to talk about little things like that. If you
had a tongue like mine which seems to get bigger instead of smaller
every year, you'd feel very differently."

"But people always grow out of stammering," Mark pointed out.

"Thanks very much," said Emmett bitterly, "but where shall I be by the
time I've grown out of it? You don't suppose I shall win this
scholarship, do you, after they've seen me gibbering and mouthing at
them like that? But if only I could manage somehow to get to Oxford I
should have a chance of being ordained, and--" he broke off, perhaps
unwilling to embarrass his rival by any more lamentations.

"Do forget about this evening," Mark begged, "and come up to my room and
have a talk before you turn in."

"No, thanks very much," said Emmett. "I must sit up and do some work.
We've got that general knowledge paper to-morrow morning."

"But you won't be able to acquire much more general knowledge in one
evening," Mark protested.

"I might," said Emmett darkly. "I noticed a Whitaker's almanack in the
rooms I have. My only chance to get this scholarship is to do really
well in my papers; and though I know it's no good and that this is my
last chance, I'm not going to neglect anything that could possibly help.
I've got a splendid memory for statistics, and if they'll only ask a few
statistics in the general knowledge paper I may have some luck
to-morrow. Good-night, Lidderdale, I'm sorry to have inflicted myself on
you like this."

Emmett hurried away up the staircase leading to his room and left his
rival standing on the moonlit grass of the quadrangle. Mark was turning
toward his own staircase when he heard a window open above and Emmett's
voice:

"I've found another Whitaker of the year before," it proclaimed. "I'll
read that, and you'd better read this year's. If by any chance I did win
this scholarship, I shouldn't like to think I'd taken an unfair
advantage of you, Lidderdale."

"Thanks very much, Emmett," said Mark. "But I think I'll have a shot at
getting to bed early."

"Ah, you're not worrying," said Emmett gloomily, retiring from the
window.

When Mark was sitting by the fire in his room and thinking over the
dinner with the Principal and poor Emmett's stammering and poor Emmett's
words in the quad afterwards, he began to imagine what it would mean to
poor Emmett if he failed to win the scholarship. Mark had not been so
successful himself in these examinations as to justify a grand
self-confidence; but he could not regard Emmett as a dangerous
competitor. Had he the right in view of Emmett's handicap to accept this
scholarship at his expense? To be sure, he might urge on his own behalf
that without it he should himself be debarred from Oxford. What would
the loss of it mean? It would mean, first of all, that Mr. Ogilvie would
make the financial effort to maintain him for three years as a commoner,
an effort which he could ill afford to make and which Mark had not the
slightest intention of allowing him to make. It would mean, next, that
he should have to occupy himself during the years before his ordination
with some kind of work among people. He obviously could not go on
reading theology at Wych-on-the-Wold until he went to Glastonbury. Such
an existence, however attractive, was no preparation for the active life
of a priest. It would mean, thirdly, a great disappointment to his
friend and patron, and considering the social claims of the Church of
England it would mean a handicap for himself. There was everything to be
said for winning this scholarship, nothing to be said against it on the
grounds of expediency. On the grounds of expediency, no, but on other
grounds? Should he not be playing the better part if he allowed Emmett
to win? No doubt all that was implied in the necessity for him to win a
scholarship was equally implied in the necessity for Emmett to win one.
It was obvious that Emmett was no better off than himself; it was
obvious that Emmett was competing in a kind of despair. Mark remembered
how a few minutes ago his rival had offered him this year's Whitaker,
keeping for himself last year's almanack. Looked at from the point of
view of Emmett who really believed that something might be gained at
this eleventh hour from a study of the more recent volume, it had been a
fine piece of self-denial. It showed that Emmett had Christian talents
which surely ought not to be wasted because he was handicapped by a
stammer.

The spell that Oxford had already cast on Mark, the glamour of the
firelight on the walls and raftered ceiling of this room haunted by
centuries of youthful hope, did not persuade him how foolish it was to
surrender all this. On the contrary, this prospect of Oxford so
beautiful in the firelight within, so fair in the moonlight without,
impelled him to renounce it, and the very strength of his temptation to
enjoy all this by winning the scholarship helped him to make up his mind
to lose it. But how? The obvious course was to send in idiotic answers
for the rest of his papers. Yet examinations were so mysterious that
when he thought he was being most idiotic he might actually be gaining
his best marks. Moreover, the examiners might ascribe his answers to ill
health, to some sudden attack of nerves, especially if his papers to-day
had been tolerably good. Looking back at the Principal's attitude after
dinner that night, Mark could not help feeling that there had been
something in his manner which had clearly shown a determination not to
award the scholarship to poor Emmett if it could possibly be avoided.
The safest way would be to escape to-morrow morning, put up at some
country inn for the next two days, and go back to Wych-on-the-Wold; but
if he did that, the college authorities might write to Mr. Ogilvie to
demand the reason for such extraordinary behaviour. And how should he
explain it? If he really intended to deny himself, he must take care
that nobody knew he was doing so. It would give him an air of
unbearable condescension, should it transpire that he had deliberately
surrendered his scholarship to Emmett. Moreover, poor Emmett would be so
dreadfully mortified if he found out. No, he must complete his papers,
do them as badly as he possibly could, and leave the result to the
wisdom of God. If God wished Emmett to stammer forth His praises and
stutter His precepts from the pulpit, God would know how to manage that
seemingly so intractable Principal. Or God might hear his prayers and
cure poor Emmett of his impediment. Mark wondered to what saint was
entrusted the patronage of stammerers; but he could not remember. The
man in whose rooms he was lodging possessed very few books, and those
few were mostly detective stories.

It amused Mark to make a fool of himself next morning in the general
knowledge paper. He flattered himself that no candidate for a
scholarship at St. Osmund's Hall had ever shown such black ignorance of
the facts of every-day life. Had he been dropped from Mars two days
before, he could scarcely have shown less knowledge of the Earth. Mark
tried to convey an impression that he had been injudiciously crammed
with Latin and Greek, and in the afternoon he produced a Latin prose
that would have revolted the easy conscience of a fourth form boy.
Finally, on the third day, in an unseen passage set from the Georgics he
translated _tonsisque ferunt mantelia villis_ by _having pulled down the
villas (i. e. literally shaved) they carry off the mantelpieces_ which
he followed up with translating _Maeonii carchesia Bacchi_ as the _lees
of Maeonian wine (i.e. literally carcases of Maeonian Bacchus)_.

"I say, Lidderdale," said Emmett, when they came out of the lecture room
where the examination was being held. "I had a tremendous piece of luck
this afternoon."

"Did you?"

"Yes, I've just been reading the fourth Georgics last term, and I don't
think I made a single mistake in that unseen."

"Good work," said Mark.

"I wonder when they'll let us know who's got the scholarship," said
Emmett. "But of course you've won," he added with a sigh.

"I did very badly both yesterday and to-day."

"Oh, you're only saying that to encourage me," Emmett sighed. "It sounds
a dreadful thing to say and I ought not to say it because it'll make you
uncomfortable, but if I don't succeed, I really think I shall kill
myself."

"All right, that's a bargain," Mark laughed; and when his rival shook
hands with him at parting he felt that poor Emmett was going home to
Rutland convinced that Mark was just as hard-hearted as the rest of the
world and just as ready to laugh at his misfortune.

It was Saturday when the examination was finished, and Mark wished he
could be granted the privilege of staying over Sunday in college. He had
no regrets for what he had done; he was content to let this experience
be all that he should ever intimately gain of Oxford; but he should like
to have the courage to accost one of the tutors and to tell him that
being convinced he should never come to Oxford again he desired the
privilege of remaining until Monday morning, so that he might
crystallize in that short space of time an impression which, had he been
successful in gaining the scholarship, would have been spread over four
years. Mark was not indulging in sentiment; he really felt that by the
intensity of the emotion with which he would live those twenty-four
hours he should be able to achieve for himself as much as he should
achieve in four years. So far as the world was concerned, this
experience would be valueless; for himself it would be beyond price. So
far as the world was concerned, he would never have been to Oxford; but
could he be granted this privilege, Oxford would live for ever in his
heart, a refuge and a meditation until the grave. Yet this coveted
experience must be granted from without to make it a perfect experience.
To ask and to be refused leave to stay till Monday would destroy for him
the value of what he had already experienced in three days' residence;
even to ask and to be granted the privilege would spoil it in
retrospect. He went down the stairs from his room and stood in the
little quadrangle, telling himself that at any rate he might postpone
his departure until twilight and walk the seven miles from Shipcot to
Wych-on-the-Wold. While he was on his way to notify the porter of the
time of his departure he met the Principal, who stopped him and asked
how he had got on with his papers. Mark wondered if the Principal had
been told about his lamentable performance and was making inquiries on
his own account to find out if the unsuccessful candidate really was a
lunatic.

"Rather badly, I'm afraid, sir."

"Well, I shall see you at dinner to-night," said the Principal
dismissing Mark with a gesture before he had time even to look
surprised. This was a new perplexity, for Mark divined from the
Principal's manner that he had entirely forgotten that the scholarship
examination was over and that the candidates had already dined with him.
He went into the lodge and asked the porter's advice.

"The Principal's a most absent-minded gentleman," said the porter. "Most
absent-minded, he is. He's the talk of Oxford sometimes is the
Principal. What do you think he went and did only last term. Why, he was
having some of the senior men to tea and was going to put some coal on
the fire with the tongs and some sugar in his cup. Bothered if he didn't
put the sugar in the fire and a lump of coal in his cup. It didn't so
much matter him putting sugar in the fire. That's all according, as they
say. But fancy--well, I tell you we had a good laugh over it in the
lodge when the gentlemen came out and told me."

"Ought I to explain that I've already dined with him?" Mark asked.

"Are you in any what you might call immediate hurry to get away?" the
porter asked judicially.

"I'm in no hurry at all. I'd like to stay a bit longer."

"Then you'd better go to dinner with him again to-night and stay in
college over the Sunday. I'll take it upon myself to explain to the Dean
why you're still here. If it had been tea I should have said 'don't
bother about it,' but dinner's another matter, isn't it? And he always
has dinner laid for two or more in case he's asked anybody and
forgotten."

Thus it came about that for the second time Mark dined with the
Principal, who disconcerted him by saying when he arrived:

"I remember now that you dined with me the night before last. You should
have told me. I forget these things. But never mind, you'd better stay
now you're here."

The Principal read second-hand book catalogues all through dinner just
as he had done two nights ago, and he only interrupted his perusal to
inquire in courtly tones if Mark would take another glass of wine. The
only difference between now and the former occasion was the absence of
poor Emmett and his paroxysms. After dinner with some misgivings if he
ought not to leave his host to himself Mark followed him upstairs to the
library. The principal was one of those scholars who live in an
atmosphere of their own given off by old calf-bound volumes and who
apparently can only inhale the air of the world in which ordinary men
move when they are smoking their battered old pipes. Mark sitting
opposite to him by the fireside was tempted to pour out the history of
himself and Emmett, to explain how he had come to make such a mess of
the examination. Perhaps if the Principal had alluded to his papers Mark
would have found the courage to talk about himself; but the Principal
was apparently unaware that his guest had any ambitions to enter St.
Osmund's Hall, and whatever questions he asked related to the ancient
folios and quartos he took down in turn from his shelves. A clock struck
ten in the moonlight without, and Mark rose to go. He felt a pang as he
walked from the cloudy room and looked for the last time at that tall
remote scholar, who had forgotten his guest's existence at the moment he
ceased to shake his hand and who by the time he had reached the doorway
was lost again in the deeps of the crabbed volume resting upon his
knees. Mark sighed as he closed the library door behind him, for he knew
that he was shutting out a world. But when he stood in the small silver
quadrangle Mark was glad that he had not given way to the temptation of
confiding in the Principal. It would have been a feeble end to his first
denial of self. He was sure that he had done right in surrendering his
place to Emmett, for was not the unexpected opportunity to spend these
few more hours in Oxford a sign of God's approval? _Bright as the
glimpses of eternity to saints accorded in their mortal hour._ Such was
Oxford to-night.

Mark sat for a long while at the open window of his room until the moon
had passed on her way and the quadrangle was in shadow; and while he sat
there he was conscious of how many people had inhabited this small
quadrangle and of how they too had passed on their way like the moon,
leaving behind them no more than he should leave behind from this one
hour of rapture, no more than the moon had left of her silver upon the
dim grass below.

Mark was not given to gazing at himself in mirrors, but he looked at
himself that night in the mirror of the tiny bedroom, into which the
April air came up sweet and frore from the watermeadows of the Cherwell
close at hand.

"What will you do now?" he asked his reflection. "Yet, you have such a
dark ecclesiastical face that I'm sure you'll be a priest whether you go
to Oxford or not."

Mark was right in supposing his countenance to be ecclesiastical. But it
was something more than that: it was religious. Even already, when he
was barely eighteen, the high cheekbones and deepset burning eyes gave
him an ascetic look, while the habit of prayer and meditation had added
to his expression a steadfast purpose that is rarely seen in people as
young as him. What his face lacked were those contours that come from
association with humanity; the ripeness that is bestowed by long
tolerance of folly, the mellowness that has survived the icy winds of
disillusion. It was the absence of these contours that made Mark think
his face so ecclesiastical; however, if at eighteen he had possessed
contours and soft curves, they would have been nothing but the contours
and soft curves of that rose, youth; and this ecclesiastical bonyness
would not fade and fall as swiftly as that.

Mark turned from the glass in sudden irritation at his selfishness in
speculating about his appearance and his future, when in a short time he
should have to break the news to his guardian that he had thrown away
for a kindly impulse the fruit of so many months of diligence and care.

"What am I going to say to Ogilvie?" he exclaimed. "I can't go back to
Wych and live there in pleasant idleness until it's time to go to
Glastonbury. I must have some scheme for the immediate future."

In bed when the light was out and darkness made the most fantastic
project appear practical, Mark had an inspiration to take the habit of a
preaching friar. Why should he not persuade Dorward to join him?
Together they would tramp the English country, compelling even the
dullest yokels to hear the word of God . . . discalced . . . over hill,
down dale . . . telling stories of the saints and martyrs in remote inns
. . . deep lanes . . . the butterflies and the birds . . . Dorward
should say Mass in the heart of great woods . . . over hill, down dale
. . . discalced . . . preaching to men of Christ. . . .

Mark fell asleep.

In the morning Mark heard Mass at the church of the Cowley Fathers, a
strengthening experience, because the Gregorian there so strictly and so
austerely chanted without any consideration for sentimental humanity
possessed that very effect of liberating and purifying spirit held in
the bonds of flesh which is conveyed by the wind blowing through a grove
of pines or by waves quiring below a rocky shore.

If Mark had had the least inclination to be sorry for himself and
indulge in the flattery of regret, it vanished in this music. Rolling
down through time on the billows of the mighty Gregorian it were as
grotesque to pity oneself as it were for an Arctic explorer to build a
snowman for company at the North Pole.

Mark came out of St. John's, Cowley, into the suburban prettiness of
Iffley Road, where men and women in their Sunday best tripped along in
the April sunlight, tripped along in their Sunday best like newly
hatched butterflies and beetles. Mark went in and out of colleges all
day long, forgetting about the problem of his immediate future just as
he forgot that the people in the sunny streets were not really
butterflies and beetles. At twilight he decided to attend Evensong at
St. Barnabas'. Perhaps the folk in the sunny April streets had turned
his thoughts unconsciously toward the simple aspirations of simple
human nature. He felt when he came into the warm candle-lit church like
one who has voyaged far and is glad to be at home again. How everybody
sang together that night, and how pleasant Mark found this
congregational outburst. It was all so jolly that if the organist had
suddenly turned round like an Italian organ-grinder and kissed his
fingers to the congregation, his action would have seemed perfectly
appropriate. Even during the _Magnificat_, when the altar was being
censed, the tinkling of the thurible reminded Mark of a tambourine; and
the lighting and extinction of the candles was done with as much
suppressed excitement as if the candles were going to shoot red and
green stars or go leaping and cracking all round the chancel.

It happened this evening that the preacher was Father Rowley, that
famous priest of the Silchester College Mission in the great naval port
of Chatsea. Father Rowley was a very corpulent man with a voice of such
compassion and with an eloquence so simple that when he ascended into
the pulpit, closed his eyes, and began to speak, his listeners
involuntarily closed their eyes and followed that voice whithersoever it
led them. He neither changed the expression of his face nor made use of
dramatic gestures; he scarcely varied his tone, yet he could keep a
congregation breathlessly attentive for an hour. Although he seemed to
be speaking in a kind of trance, it was evident that he was unusually
conscious of his hearers, for if by chance some pious woman coughed or
turned the pages of a prayer-book he would hold up the thread of his
sermon and without any change of tone reprove her. It was strange to
watch him at such a moment, his eyes still tightly shut and yet giving
the impression of looking directly at the offending member of the
congregation. This evening he was preaching about a naval disaster which
had lately occurred, the sinking of a great battleship by another great
battleship through a wrong signal. He was describing the scene when the
news reached Chatsea, telling of the sweethearts and wives of the lost
bluejackets who waited hoping against hope to hear that their loved ones
had escaped death and hearing nearly always the worst news.

"So many of our own dear bluejackets and marines, some of whom only
last Christmas had been eating their plum duff at our Christmas dinner,
so many of my own dear boys whom I prepared for Confirmation, whose
first Confession I had heard, and to whom I had given for the first time
the Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ."

He spoke too of what it meant in the future of material suffering on top
of their mental agony. He asked for money to help these women
immediately, and he spoke fiercely of the Admiralty red tape and of the
obstruction of the official commission appointed to administer the
relief fund.

The preacher went on to tell stories from the lives of these boys,
finding in each of them some illustration of a Christian virtue and
conveying to his listeners a sense of the extraordinary preciousness of
human life, so that there was no one who heard him but was fain to weep
for those young bluejackets and marines taken in their prime. He
inspired in Mark a sense of shame that he had ever thought of people in
the aggregate, that he had ever walked along a crowded street without
perceiving the importance of every single human being that helped to
compose its variety. While he sat there listening to the Missioner and
watching the large tears roll slowly down his cheeks from beneath the
closed lids, Mark wondered how he could have dared to suppose last night
that he was qualified to become a friar and preach the Gospel to the
poor. While Father Rowley was speaking, he began to apprehend that
before he could aspire to do that he must himself first of all learn
about Christ from those very poor whom he had planned to convert.

This sermon was another milestone in Mark's religious life. It
discovered in him a hidden treasure of humility, and it taught him to
build upon the rock of human nature. He divined the true meaning of Our
Lord's words to St. Peter: _Thou art Peter and on this rock I will build
my church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it._ John was
the disciple whom Jesus loved, but he chose Peter with all his failings
and all his follies, with his weakness and his cowardice and his vanity.
He chose Peter, the bedrock of human nature, and to him he gave the keys
of Heaven.

Mark knew that somehow he must pluck up courage to ask Father Rowley to
let him come and work under him at Chatsea. He was sure that if he could
only make him grasp the spirit in which he would offer himself, the
spirit of complete humility devoid of any kind of thought that he was
likely to be of the least use to the Mission, Father Rowley might accept
his oblation. He would have liked to wait behind after Evensong and
approach the Missioner directly, so that before speaking to Mr. Ogilvie
he might know what chance the offer had of being accepted; but he
decided against this course, because he felt that Father Rowley's
compassion might be embarrassed if he had to refuse his request, a point
of view that was characteristic of the mood roused in him by the sermon.
He went back to sleep for the last time in an Oxford college, profoundly
reassured of the rightness of his action in giving up the scholarship to
Emmett, although, which was characteristic of his new mood, he had by
this time begun to tell himself that he had really done nothing at all
and that probably in any case Emmett would have been the chosen scholar.

If Mark had still any doubts of his behaviour, they would have vanished
when on getting into the train for Shipcot he found himself in an
otherwise empty third-class smoking carriage opposite Father Rowley
himself, who with a small black bag beside him, so small that Mark
wondered how it could possibly contain the night attire of so fat a man,
was sitting back in the corner with a large pipe in his mouth. He was
wearing one of those square felt hats sometimes seen on the heads of
farmers, and if one had only seen his head and hat without the grubby
clerical attire beneath one might have guessed him to be a farmer. Mark
noticed now that his eyes of a limpid blue were like a child's, and he
realized that in his voice while he was preaching there had been the
same sweet gravity of childhood. Just at this moment Father Rowley
caught sight of someone he knew on the platform and shouting from the
window of the compartment he attracted the attention of a young man
wearing an Old Siltonian tie.

"My dear man," he cried, "how are you? I've just made a most idiotic
mistake. I got it into my head that I should be preaching here on the
first Sunday in term and was looking forward to seeing so many
Silchester men. I can't think how I came to make such a muddle."

Father Rowley's shoulders filled up all the space of the window, so that
Mark only heard scattered fragments of the conversation, which was
mostly about Silchester and the Siltonians he had hoped to see at
Oxford.

"Good-bye, my dear man, good-bye," the Missioner shouted, as the train
moved out of the station. "Come down and see us soon at Chatsea. The
more of you men who come, the more we shall be pleased."

Mark's heart leapt at these words, which seemed of good omen to his own
suit. When Father Rowley was ensconced in his corner and once more
puffing away at his pipe, Mark thought how ridiculous it would sound to
say that he had heard him preach last night at St. Barnabas' and that,
having been much moved by the sermon, he was anxious to be taken on at
St. Agnes' as a lay helper. He wished that Father Rowley would make some
remark to him that would lead up to his request, but all that Father
Rowley said was:

"This is a slow train to Birmingham, isn't it?"

This led to a long conversation about trains, and slow though this one
might be it was going much too fast for Mark, who would be at Shipcot in
another twenty minutes without having taken any advantage of his lucky
encounter.

"Are you up at Oxford?" the priest at last inquired.

It was now or never; and Mark took the opportunity given him by that one
question to tell Father Rowley twenty disjointed facts about his life,
which ended with a request to be allowed to come and work at Chatsea.

"You can come and see us whenever you like," said the Missioner.

"But I don't want just to come and pay a visit," said Mark. "I really do
want to be given something to do, and I shan't be any expense. I only
want to keep enough money to go to Glastonbury in four years' time. If
you'd only see how I got on for a month. I don't pretend I can be of any
help to you. I don't suppose I can. But I do so tremendously want you
to help me."

"Who did you say your father was?"

"Lidderdale, James Lidderdale. He was priest-in-charge of the Lima
Street Mission, which belonged to St. Simon's, Notting Hill, in those
days. St. Wilfred's, Notting Dale, it is now."

"Lidderdale," Father Rowley echoed. "I knew him. I knew him well. Lima
Street. Viner's there now, a dear good fellow. So you're Lidderdale's
son?"

"I say, here's my station," Mark exclaimed in despair, "and you haven't
said whether I can come or not."

"Come down on Tuesday week," said Father Rowley. "Hurry up, or you'll
get carried on to the next station."

Mark waved his farewell, and he knew, as he drove back on the omnibus
over the rolling wold to Wych that he had this morning won something
much better than a scholarship at St. Osmund's Hall.




CHAPTER XVI

CHATSEA


When Mark had been exactly a week at Chatsea he celebrated his
eighteenth birthday by writing a long letter to the Rector of Wych:

     St. Agnes' House,

     Keppel Street,

     Chatsea.

     St. Mark's Day.

     My dear Rector,

     Thank you very much for sending me the money. I've handed it over
     to a splendid fellow called Gurney who keeps all the accounts
     (private or otherwise) in the Mission House. Poor chap, he's
     desperately ill with asthma, and nobody thinks he can live much
     longer. He suffers tortures, particularly at night, and as I sleep
     in the next room I can hear him.

     You mustn't think me inconsiderate because I haven't written
     sooner, but I wanted to wait until I had seen a bit of this place
     before I wrote to you so that you might have some idea what I was
     doing and be able to realize that it is the one and only place
     where I ought to be at the moment.

     But first of all before I say anything about Chatsea I want to try
     to express a little of what your kindness has meant to me during
     the last two years. I look back at myself just before my sixteenth
     birthday when I was feeling that I should have to run away to sea
     or do something mad in order to escape that solicitor's office, and
     I simply gasp! What and where should I be now if it hadn't been for
     you? You have always made light of the burden I must have been, and
     though I have tried to show you my gratitude I'm afraid it hasn't
     been very successful. I'm not being very successful now in putting
     it into words. I know my failure to gain a scholarship at Oxford
     has been a great disappointment to you, especially after you had
     worked so hard yourself to coach me. Please don't be anxious about
     my letting my books go to the wall here. I had a talk about this
     with Father Rowley, who insisted that anything I am allowed to do
     in the district must only be done when I have a good morning's work
     with my books behind me. I quite realize the importance of a
     priest's education. One of the assistant priests here, a man called
     Snaith, took a good degree at Cambridge both in classics and
     theology, so I shall have somebody to keep me on the lines. If I
     stay here three years and then have two years at Glastonbury I
     don't honestly think that I shall start off much handicapped by
     having missed both public school and university. I expect you're
     smiling to read after one week of my staying here three years! But
     I assure you that the moment I sat down to supper on the evening of
     my arrival I felt at home. I think at first they all thought I was
     an eager young Ritualist, but when they found that they didn't get
     any rises out of ragging me, they shut up.

     This house is a most extraordinary place. It is an old
     Congregational chapel with a gallery all round which has been made
     into cubicles, scarcely one of which is ever empty or ever likely
     to be empty so far as I can see! I should think it must be rather
     like what the guest house of a monastery used to be like in the old
     days before the Reformation. The ground floor of the chapel has
     been turned into a gymnasium, and twice a week the apparatus is
     cleared away and we have a dance. Every other evening it's used
     furiously by Father Rowley's "boys." They're such a jolly lot, and
     most of them splendid gymnasts. Quite a few have become
     professional acrobats since they opened the gymnasium. The first
     morning after my arrival I asked Father Rowley if he'd got anything
     special for me to do and he told me to catalogue the books in his
     library. Everybody laughed at this, and I thought at first that
     some joke was intended, but when I got to his room I found it
     really was in utter confusion with masses of books lying about
     everywhere. So I set to work pretty hard and after about three days
     I got them catalogued and in good order. When I told him I had
     finished he looked very surprised, and a solemn visit of inspection
     was ordered. As the room was looking quite tidy at last, I didn't
     mind. I've realized since that Father Rowley always sets people the
     task of cataloguing and arranging his books when he doubts if they
     are really worth their salt, and now he complains that I have
     spoilt one of his best ordeals for slackers. I said to him that he
     needn't be afraid because from what I could see of the way he
     treated books they would be just as untidy as ever in another week.
     Everybody laughed, though I was afraid at first they might consider
     it rather cheek my talking like this, but you've got to stand up
     for yourself here because there never was such a place for turning
     a man inside out. It's a real discipline, and I think if I manage
     to deserve to stay here three years I shall have the right to feel
     I've had the finest training for Holy Orders anybody could possibly
     have.

     You know enough about Father Rowley yourself to understand how
     impossible it would be for me to give any impression of his
     personality in a letter. I have never felt so strongly the absolute
     goodness of anybody. I suppose that some of the great mediæval
     saints like St. Francis and St. Anthony of Padua must have been
     like that. One reads about them and what they did, but the facts
     one reads don't really tell anything. I always feel that what we
     really depend on is a kind of tradition of their absolute
     saintliness handed on from the people who experienced it. I suppose
     in a way the same applies to Our Lord. I always feel it wouldn't
     matter a bit to me if the four Gospels were proved to be forgeries
     to-morrow, because I should still be convinced that Our Lord was
     God. I know this is a platitude, but I don't think until I met
     Father Rowley that I ever realized the force and power that goes
     with exceptional goodness. There are so many people who are good
     because they were born good. Richard Ford, for example, he couldn't
     have ever been anything else but good, but I always feel that
     people like him remain practically out of reach of the ordinary
     person and that the goodness is all their own and dies with them
     just as it was born with them. What I feel about a man like Father
     Rowley is that he probably had a tremendous fight to be good. Of
     course, I may be perfectly wrong and he may have had no fight at
     all. I know one of the people at the Mission House told me that,
     though there is nobody who likes smoking better than he or more
     enjoys a pint of beer with his dinner, he has given up both at St.
     Agnes merely to set an example to weak people. I feel that his
     goodness was with such energy fought for that it now exists as a
     kind of complete thing and will go on existing when Father Rowley
     himself is dead. I begin to understand the doctrine of the treasury
     of merit. I remember you once told me how grateful I ought to be to
     God because I had apparently escaped the temptations that attack
     most boys. I am grateful; but at the same time I can't claim any
     merit for it! The only time in my life when I might have acquired
     any merit was when I was at Haverton House. Instead of doing that,
     I just dried up, and if I hadn't had that wonderful experience at
     Whitsuntide in Meade Cantorum church nearly three years ago I
     should be spiritually dead by now.

     This is a very long letter, and I don't seem to have left myself
     any time to tell you about St. Agnes' Church. It reminds me of my
     father's mission church in Lima Street, and oddly enough a new
     church is being built almost next door just as one was being built
     in Lima Street. I went to the children's Mass last Sunday, and I
     seemed to see him walking up and down the aisle in his alb, and I
     thought to myself that I had never once asked you to say Mass for
     his soul. Will you do so now next time you say a black Mass? This
     is a wretched letter, and it doesn't succeed in the least in
     expressing what I owe to you and what I already owe to Father
     Rowley. I used to think that the Sacred Heart was a rather material
     device for attracting the multitude, but I'm beginning to realize
     in the atmosphere of St. Agnes' that it is a gloriously simple
     devotion and that it is human nature's attempt to express the
     inexpressible. I'll write to you again next week. Please give my
     love to everybody at the Rectory.

     Always your most affectionate

     Mark.

Father Rowley had been at St. Agnes' seven or eight years when Mark
found himself attached to the Mission, in which time he had transformed
the district completely. It was a small parish (actually of course it
was not a parish at all, although it was fast qualifying to become one)
of something over a thousand small houses, few of which were less than a
century old. The streets were narrow and crooked, mostly named after
bygone admirals or forgotten sea-fights; the romantic and picturesque
quarter of a great naval port to the casual glance of a passer-by, but
heartbreaking to any except the most courageous resident on account of
its overcrowded and tumbledown condition. Yet it lacked the dreariness
of an East End slum, for the sea winds blew down the narrowest streets
and alleys, sailors and soldiers were always in view, and the windows of
the pawnbrokers were filled with the relics of long voyages, with idols
and large shells, with savage weapons and the handiwork of remote
islands.

When Mark came to live in Keppel Street, most of the brothels and many
of the public houses had been eliminated from the district, and in their
place flourished various clubs and guilds. The services in the church
were crowded: there was a long roll of communicants; the civilization of
the city of God was visible in this Chatsea slum. One or two of the lay
helpers used to horrify Mark with stories of early days there, and when
he seemed inclined to regret that he had arrived so late upon the scene,
they used to tease him about his missionary spirit.

"If he can't reform the people," said Cartwright, one of the lay
helpers, a tall thin young man with a long nose and a pleasant smile,
"he still has us to reform."

"Come along, Mark Anthony," said Warrender, another lay helper, who
after working for seven years among the poor had at last been charily
accepted by the Bishop for ordination. "Come along. Why don't you try
your hand on us?"

"You people seem to think," said Mark, "that I've got a mania for
reforming. I don't mean that I should like to see St. Agnes' where it
was merely for my own personal amusement. The only thing I'm sorry about
is that I didn't actually see the work being done."

Father Rowley came in at this moment, and everybody shouted that Mark
was going to preach a sermon.

"Splendid," said the Missioner whose voice when not moved by emotion was
rich in a natural unction that encouraged everyone round to suppose he
was being successfully humorous, such a savour did it add to the most
innutritious chaff. Those who were privileged to share his ordinary life
never ceased to wonder how in the pulpit or in the confessional or at
prayer this unction was replaced by a remote beauty of tone, a plangent
and thrilling compassion that played upon the hearts of all who heard
him.

"Now really, Father Rowley," Mark protested. "Do I preach a great deal?
I'm always being chaffed by Cartwright and Warrender about an alleged
mania for reforming people, which only exists in their imagination."

Indeed Mark had long ago grown out of the desire to reform or to convert
anybody, although had he wished to keep his hand in, he could have had
plenty of practice among the guests of the Mission House. Nobody had
ever succeeded in laying down the exact number of casual visitors that
could be accommodated therein. However full it appeared, there was
always room for one more. Taking an average, day in, day out through the
year, one might fairly say that there were always eight or nine casual
guests in addition to the eight or nine permanent residents, of whom
Mark was soon glad to be able to count himself one. The company was
sufficiently mixed to have been offered as a proof to the sceptical that
there was something after all in simple Christianity. There would
usually be a couple of prefects from Silchester, one or two 'Varsity
men, two or three bluejackets or marines, an odd soldier or so, a naval
officer perhaps, a stray priest sometimes, an earnest seeker after
Christian example often, and often a drunkard who had been dumped down
at the door of St. Agnes' Mission House in the hope that where everybody
else had failed Father Rowley might succeed. Then there were the tramps,
some who had heard of a comfortable night's lodging, some who came
whining and cringing with a pretence of religion. This last class was
discouraged as much as possible, for one of the first rules of the
Mission House was to show no favour to any man who claimed to be
religious, it being Father Rowley's chief dread to make anybody's
religion a paying concern. Sometimes a jailbird just released from
prison would find in the Mission House an opportunity to recover his
self-respect. But whoever the guest was, soldier, sailor, tinker,
tailor, apothecary, ploughboy, or thief, he was judged at the Mission
House as a man. Some of the visitors repaid their host by theft or
fraud; but when they did, nobody uttered proverbs or platitudes about
mistaken kindness. If one lame dog bit the hand that was helping him
over the stile, the next dog that came limping along was helped over
just as freely.

"What right has one miserable mortal to be disillusioned by another
miserable mortal?" Father Rowley demanded. "Our dear Lord when he was
nailed to the cross said 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what
they do.' He did not say, 'I am fed up with these people I have come
down from Heaven to save. I've had enough of it. Send an angel with a
pair of pincers to pull out these nails.'"

If the Missioner's patience ever failed, it was when he had to deal with
High Church young men who made pilgrimages to St. Agnes' because they
had heard that this or that service was conducted there with a finer
relish of Romanism than anywhere else at the moment in England. On one
occasion a pietistic young creature, who brought with him his own lace
cotta but forgot to bring his nightshirt, begged to be allowed the joy
of serving Father Rowley at early Mass next morning. When they came back
and were sitting round the breakfast table, this young man simpered in a
ladylike voice:

"Oh, Father, couldn't you keep your fingers closed when you give the
_Dominus vobiscum_?"

"Et cum spiritu tuo," shouted Father Rowley. "I can keep my fingers
closed when I box your ears."

And he proved it.

It was a real box on the ears, so hard a blow that the ladylike young
man burst into tears to the great indignation of a Chief Petty Officer
staying in the Mission House, who declared that he was half in a mind to
catch the young swab such a snitch on the conk as really would give him
something to blubber about. Father Rowley evidently had no remorse for
his violence, and the young man went away that afternoon saying how
sorry he was that the legend of the good work being done at St. Agnes'
had been so much exaggerated.

Mark wrote an account of this incident, which had given him intense
pleasure, to Mr. Ogilvie. Perhaps the Rector was afraid that Mark in his
ambition to avoid "churchiness" was inclining toward the opposite
extreme; or perhaps, charitable and saintly man though he was, he felt a
pang of jealousy at Mark's unbounded admiration of his new friend; or
perhaps it was merely that the east wind was blowing more sharply than
usual that morning over the wold into the Rectory garden. Whatever the
cause, his answering letter made Mark feel that the Rector did not
appreciate Father Rowley as thoroughly as he ought.

     The Rectory,

     Wych-on-the-Wold.

     Oxon.

     Dec. 1.

     My dear Mark,

     I was glad to get your long and amusing letter of last week. I am
     delighted to think that as the months go by you are finding work
     among the poor more and more congenial. I would not for the world
     suggest your coming back here for Christmas after what you tell me
     of the amount of extra work it will entail for everybody in the
     Mission House; at the same time it would be useless to pretend that
     we shan't all be disappointed not to see you until the New Year.

     On reading through your last letter again I feel just a little
     worried lest, in the pleasure you derive from Father Rowley's
     treatment of what was no doubt a very irritating young man, you may
     be inclined to go to the opposite extreme and be too ready to laugh
     at real piety when it is not accompanied by geniality and good
     fellowship, or by an obvious zeal for good works. I know you will
     acquit me of any desire to defend extreme "churchiness," and I have
     no doubt you will remember one or two occasions in the past when I
     was rather afraid that you were tending that way yourself. I am not
     in the least criticizing Father Rowley's method of dealing with it,
     but I am a trifle uneasy at the inordinate delight it seems to have
     afforded you. Of course, it is intolerable for any young man
     serving a priest at Mass to watch his fingers all the time, but I
     don't think you have any right to assume because on this occasion
     the young man showed himself so sensitive to mere externals that he
     is always aware only of externals. Unfortunately a very great deal
     of true and fervid piety exists under this apparent passion for
     externals. Remember that the ordinary criticism by the man in the
     street of Catholic ceremonies and of Catholic methods of worship
     involves us all in this condemnation. I suppose that you would
     consider yourself justified, should the circumstances permit (which
     in this case of course they do not), in protesting against a
     priest's not taking the Eastward Position when he said Mass. I was
     talking to Colonel Fraser the other day, and he was telling me how
     much he had enjoyed the ministrations of the Reverend Archibald
     Tait, the Leicestershire cricketer, who throughout the "second
     service" never once turned his back on the congregation, and, so
     far as I could gather from the Colonel's description, conducted
     this "second service" very much as a conjuror performs his tricks.
     When I ventured to argue with the Colonel, he said to me: "That is
     the worst of you High Churchmen, you make the ritual more important
     than the Communion itself." All human judgments, my dear Mark, are
     relative, and I have no doubt that this unpleasant young man (who,
     as I have already said, was no doubt justly punished by Father
     Rowley) may have felt the same kind of feeling in a different
     degree that I should feel if I assisted at the jugglery of the
     Reverend Archibald Tait. At any rate you, my dear boy, are bound to
     credit this young man with as much sincerity as yourself, otherwise
     you commit a sin against charity. You must acquire at least as much
     toleration for the Ritualist as I am glad to notice you are
     acquiring for the thief. When you are a priest yourself, and in a
     comparatively short time you will be a priest, I do hope you won't,
     without his experience, try to imitate Father Rowley too closely in
     his summary treatment of what I have already I hope made myself
     quite clear in believing to be in this case a most insufferable
     young man. Don't misunderstand this letter. I have such great hopes
     of you in the stormy days to come, and the stormy days are coming,
     that I should feel I was wrong if I didn't warn you of your
     attitude towards the merest trifles, for I shall always judge you
     and your conduct by standards that I should be very cautious of
     setting for most of my penitents.

     Your ever affectionate,

     Stephen Ogilvie.


     My mother and Miriam send you much love. We miss you greatly at
     Wych. Esther seems happy in her convent and will soon be clothed as
     a novice.

When Mark read this letter, he was prompt to admit himself in the
wrong; but he could not bear the least implied criticism of Father
Rowley.

     St. Agnes' House,

     Keppel Street,

     Chatsea.

     Dec. 3.

     My dear Mr. Ogilvie,

     I'm afraid I must have expressed myself very badly in my last
     letter if I gave you the least idea that Father Rowley was not
     always charity personified. He had probably come to the conclusion
     that the young man was not much good and no doubt he deliberately
     made it impossible for him to stay on at the Mission House. We do
     get an awful lot of mere loafers here; I don't suppose that anybody
     who keeps open house can avoid getting them. After all, if the
     young man had been worth anything he would have realized that he
     had made a fool of himself and by the way he took his snubbing have
     re-established himself. What he actually did was to sulk and clear
     out with a sneer at the work done here. I'm sorry I gave you the
     impression that I was triumphing so tremendously over his
     discomfiture. By writing about it I probably made the incident
     appear much more important than it really was. I've no doubt I did
     triumph a little, and I'm afraid I shall never be able not to feel
     rather glad when a fellow like that is put in his place. I am not
     for a moment going to try to argue that you can carry Christian
     charity too far. The more one meditates on the words, and actions
     of Our Lord, the more one grasps how impossible it is to carry
     charity too far. All the same, one owes as much charity to Father
     Rowley as to the young man. This sounds now I have written it down
     as if I were getting in a hit at you, and that is the worst of
     writing letters to justify oneself. What I am trying to say is that
     if I were to have taken up arms for the young man and supposed him
     to be ill-used or misjudged I should be criticizing Father Rowley.
     I think that perhaps you don't quite realize what a saint he is in
     every way. This is my fault, no doubt, because in my letters to you
     I have always emphasized anything that would bring into relief his
     personality. I expect that I've been too much concerned to draw a
     picture of him as a man, in doing which I've perhaps been
     unsuccessful in giving you a picture of him as a priest. It's
     always difficult to talk or write about one's intimate religious
     feelings, and you've been the only person to whom I ever have been
     able to talk about them. However much I admire and revere Father
     Rowley I doubt if I could talk or write to him about myself as I do
     to you.

     Until I came here I don't think I ever quite realized all that the
     Blessed Sacrament means. I had accepted the Sacrifice of the Mass
     as one accepts so much in our creed, without grasping its full
     implication. If anybody were to have put me through a catechism
     about the dogma I should have answered with theological exactitude,
     without any appearance of misapprehending the meaning of it; but it
     was not until I came here that its practical reality--I don't know
     if I'm expressing myself properly or not, I'm pretty sure I'm not;
     I don't mean practical application and I don't mean any kind of
     addition to my faith; perhaps what I mean is that I've learnt to
     grasp the mystery of the Mass outside myself, outside that is to
     say my own devotion, my own awe, as a practical fact alive to these
     people here. Sometimes when I go to Mass I feel as people who
     watched Our Lord with His disciples and followers must have felt. I
     feel like one of those people who ran after Him and asked Him what
     they could do to be saved. I feel when I look at what has been done
     here as if I must go to each of these poor people in turn and beg
     them to bring me to the feet of Christ, just as I suppose on the
     shores of the sea of Galilee people must have begged St. Peter or
     St. Andrew or St. James or St. John to introduce them, if one can
     use such a word for such an occasion. This seems to me the great
     work that Father Rowley has effected in this parish. I have only
     had one rather shy talk with him about religion, and in the course
     of it I said something in praise of what his personality had
     effected.

     "My personality has effected nothing," he answered. "Everything
     here is effected by the Blessed Sacrament."

     That is why he surely has the right without any consideration for
     the dignity of churchy young men to box their ears if they question
     his outward respect for the Blessed Sacrament. Even Our Lord found
     it necessary at least on one occasion to chase the buyers and
     sellers out of the Temple, and though it is not recorded that He
     boxed the ears of any Pharisee, it seems to me quite permissible to
     believe that He did! He lashed them with scorn anyway.

     To come back to Father Rowley, you know the great cry of the
     so-called Evangelical party "Jesus only"? Well, Father Rowley has
     really managed to make out of what was becoming a sort of
     ecclesiastical party cry something that really is evangelical and
     at the same time Catholic. These people are taught to make the
     Blessed Sacrament the central fact of their lives in a way that I
     venture to say no Welsh revivalist or Salvation Army captain has
     ever made Our Lord the central fact in the lives of his converts,
     because with the Blessed Sacrament continually before them, Which
     is Our Lord Jesus Christ, their conversion endures. I could fill a
     book with stories of the wonderful behaviour of these poor souls.
     The temptation is to say of a man like Father Rowley that he has
     such a natural spring of human charity flowing from his heart that
     by offering to the world a Christlike example he converts his
     flock. Certainly he does give a Christlike example and undoubtedly
     that must have a great influence on his people; but he does not
     believe, and I don't believe, that a Christlike example is of any
     use without Christ, and he gives them Christ. Even the Bishop of
     Silchester had to admit the other day that Vespers of the Blessed
     Sacrament as held at St. Agnes' is a perfectly scriptural service.
     Father Rowley makes of the Blessed Sacrament Christ Himself, so
     that the poor people may flock round Him. He does not go round
     arguing with them, persuading them, but in the crises of their
     lives, as the answer to every question, as the solution of every
     difficulty and doubt, as the consolation in every sorrow, he offers
     them the Blessed Sacrament. All his prayers (and he makes a great
     use of extempore prayer, much to the annoyance of the Bishop, who
     considers it ungrammatical), all his sermons, all his actions
     revolve round that one great fact. "Jesus Christ is what you need,"
     he says, "and Jesus Christ is here in your church, here upon your
     altar."

     You can't go into the little church without finding fifty people
     praying before the Blessed Sacrament. The other day when the "King
     Harry" was sunk by the "Trafalgar," the people here subscribed I
     forget how many pounds for the widows and children of the
     bluejackets and marines of the Mission who were drowned, and when
     it was finished and the subscription list was closed, they
     subscribed all over again to erect an altar at which to say Masses
     for the dead. And the old women living in Father Rowley's free
     houses that were once brothels gave up their summer outing so that
     the money spent on them might be added to the fund. When the Bishop
     of Silchester came here last week for Confirmation he asked Father
     Rowley what that altar was.

     "That is the ugliest thing I've ever seen," he said. But when
     Father Rowley told him about the poor people and the old women who
     had no money of their own, he said: "That is the most beautiful
     thing I've ever heard."

     I am beginning to write as if it was necessary to convince you of
     the necessity of making the Blessed Sacrament the central feature
     of the religious life to-day and for ever until the end of the
     world. But, I know you won't think I'm doing anything of the kind,
     for really I am only trying to show you how much my faith has been
     strengthened and how much my outlook has deepened and how much more
     than ever I long to be a priest to be able to give poor people
     Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament.

     Your ever affectionate

     Mark.




CHAPTER XVII

THE DRUNKEN PRIEST


Gradually, Mark found to his pleasure and his pride that he was
becoming, if not indispensable to Father Rowley (the Missioner found no
human being indispensable) at any rate quite evidently useful. Perhaps
Father Rowley though that in allowing himself to rely considerably upon
Mark's secretarial talent he was indulging himself in a luxury to which
he was not entitled. That was Father Rowley's way. The moment he
discovered himself enjoying anything too much, whether it was a cigar or
a secretary, he cut himself off from it, and this not in any spirit of
mortification for mortification's sake, but because he dreaded the
possibility of putting the slightest drag upon his freedom to criticize
others. He had no doubt at all in his own mind that he was perfectly
justified in making use of Mark's intelligence and energy. But in a
place like the Mission House, where everybody from lay helper to casual
guest was supposed to stand on his own feet, the Missioner himself felt
that he must offer an example of independence.

"You're spoiling me, Mark Anthony," he said one day. "There's nothing
for me to do this evening."

"I know," Mark agreed contentedly. "I want to give you a rest for once."

"Rest?" the priest echoed. "You don't seriously expect a fat man like me
to sit down in an armchair and rest, do you? Besides, you've got your
own reading to do, and you didn't come to Chatsea as my punkah walla."

Mark insisted that he was getting along in his own way quite fast
enough, and that he had plenty of time on his hands to keep Father
Rowley's correspondence in some kind of order.

"All these other people have any amount to do," said Mark. "Cartwright
has his boys every evening and Warrender has his men."

"And Mark Anthony has nothing but a fat, poverty-stricken, slothful
mission priest," Father Rowley gurgled.

"Yes, and you're more trouble than all the rest put together. Look here,
I've written to the Bishop's chaplain about that confirmation; I
explained why we wanted to hold a special confirmation for these two
boys we are emigrating, and he has written back to say that the Bishop
has no objection to a special confirmation's being held by the Bishop of
Matabeleland when he comes to stay here next week. At the same time, he
says the Bishop doesn't want it to become a precedent."

"No. I can quite understand that," Father Rowley chuckled. "Bishops are
haunted by the creation of precedents. A precedent in the life of a
bishop is like an illegitimate child in the life of a respectable
churchwarden. No, the only thing I fear is that if I devour all your
spare time you won't get quite what you wanted to get by coming to live
with us."

He laid a fat hand on Mark's shoulder.

"Please don't bother about me," said Mark. "I get all I want and more
than I expected if I can be of the least use to you. I know I'm rather
disappointing you by not behaving like half the people who come down
here and want to get up a concert on Monday, a dance on Tuesday, a
conjuring entertainment on Wednesday, a street procession on Thursday, a
day of intercession on Friday, and an amateur dramatic entertainment on
Saturday, not to mention acting as ceremonarius on Sunday. I know you'd
like me to propose all sorts of energetic diversions, so that you could
have the pleasure of assuring me that I was only proposing them to
gratify my own vanity, which of course would be perfectly true. Luckily
I'm of a retiring disposition, and I don't want to do anything to help
the ten thousand benighted parishioners of Saint Agnes', except
indirectly by striving to help in my own feeble way the man who really
is helping them. Now don't throw that inkpot at me, because the room's
quite dirty enough already, and as I've made you sit still for five
minutes I've achieved something this evening that mighty few people
have achieved in Keppel Street. I believe the only time you really rest
is in the confessional box."

"Mark Anthony, Mark Anthony," said the priest, "you talk a great deal
too much. Come along now, it's bedtime."

One of the rules of the Mission House was that every inmate should be in
bed by ten o'clock and all lights out by a quarter past. The day began
with Mass at seven o'clock at which everybody was expected to be
present; and from that time onward everybody was so fully occupied that
it was essential to go to bed at a reasonable hour. Guests who came down
for a night or two were often apt to forget how much the regular workers
had to do and what a tax it put upon the willing servants to manage a
house of which nobody could say ten minutes before a meal how many would
sit down to it, nor even until lights out for how many people beds must
be made. In case any guest should forget this rule by coming back after
ten o'clock, Father Rowley made a point of having the front door bell to
ring in his bedroom, so that he might get out of bed at any hour of the
night and admit the loiterer. Guests were warned what would be the
effect of their lack of consideration, and it was seldom that Father
Rowley was disturbed.

Among the guests there was one class of which a representative was
usually to be found at the Mission House. This was the drunken
clergyman, which sounds as if there was at this date a high proportion
of drunken clergymen in the Church of England; but which means that when
one did come to St. Agnes' he usually stayed for a long time, because he
would in most cases have been sent there when everybody else had
despaired of him to see what Father Rowley could effect.

About the time when Mark was beginning to be recognized as Father
Rowley's personal vassal, it happened that the Reverend George Edward
Mousley who had been handed on from diocese to diocese during the last
five years had lately reached the Mission House. For more than two
months now he had spent his time inconspicuously reading in his own
room, and so well had he behaved, so humbly had he presented himself to
the notice of his fellow guests, that Father Rowley was moved one
afternoon to dictate a letter about him to Mark, who felt that the
Missioner by taking him so far into his confidence had surrendered to
his pertinacity and that thenceforth he might consider himself
established as his private secretary.

"The letter is to the Lord Bishop Suffragan of Warwick, St. Peter's
Rectory, Warwick," Father Rowley began. "My dear Bishop of Warwick, I
have now had poor Mousley here for two months. It is not a long time in
which to effect a lasting reformation of one who has fallen so often and
so grievously, but I think you know me well enough not to accuse me of
being too sanguine about drunken priests. I have had too many of them
here for that. In his case however I do feel justified in asking you to
agree with me in letting him have an opportunity to regain the respect
due to himself and the reverence due to his priesthood by being allowed
once more to the altar. I should not dream of allowing him to officiate
without your permission, because his sad history has been so much a
personal burden to yourself. I'm afraid that after the many
disappointments he has inflicted upon you, you will be doubtful of my
judgment. Yet I do think that the critical moment has arrived when by
surprising him thus we might clinch the matter of his future behaviour
once and for all. His conduct here has been so humble and patient and in
every way exemplary that my heart bleeds for him. Therefore, my dear
Bishop of Warwick, I hope you will agree to what I firmly trust will be
the completion of his spiritual cure. I am writing to you quite
impersonally and informally, as you see, so that in replying to me you
will not be involving yourself in the affairs of another diocese. You
will, of course, put me down as much a Jesuit as ever in writing to you
like this, but you will equally, I know, believe me to be, Yours ever
affectionately in Our Blessed Lord.

"And I'll sign it as soon as you can type it out," Father Rowley wound
up.

"Oh, I do hope he will agree," Mark exclaimed.

"He will," the Missioner prophesied. "He will because he is a wise and
tender and godly man and therefore will never be more than a Bishop
Suffragan as long as he lives. Mark!"

Mark looked up at the severity of the tone.

"Mark! Correct me when I fall into the habit of sneering at the
episcopate."

That night Father Rowley was attending a large temperance demonstration
in the Town Hall for the purpose of securing if possible a smaller
proportion of public houses than one for every eighty of the population,
which was the average for Chatsea. The meeting lasted until nearly ten
o'clock; and it had already struck the hour when Father Rowley with Mark
and two or three others got back to Keppel Street. There was nothing
Father Rowley disliked so much as arriving home himself after ten, and
he hurried up to his room without inquiring if everybody was in.

Mark's window looked out on Keppel Street; and the May night being warm
and his head aching from the effects of the meeting, he sat for nearly
an hour at the open window gazing down at the passers by. There was not
much to see, nothing more indeed than couples wandering home, a
bluejacket or two, an occasional cat, and a few women carrying jugs of
beer. By eleven o'clock even this slight traffic had ceased, and there
was nothing down the silent street except a salt wind from the harbour
that roused a memory of the beach at Nancepean years ago when he had sat
there watching the glow-worm and decided to be a lighthouse-keeper
keeping his lamps bright for mariners homeward bound. It was of streets
like Keppel Street that they would have dreamed, with the Stag Light
winking to port, and the west wind blowing strong astern. What a
lighthouse-keeper Father Rowley was! How except by the grace of God
could one explain such goodness as his? Fashions in saintliness might
change, but there was one kind of saint that always and for every creed
spoke plainly of God's existence, such saints as St. Francis of Assisi
or St. Anthony of Padua, who were manifestly the heirs of Christ. With
what a tender cynicism Our Lord had called St. Peter to be the
foundation stone of His Church, with what a sorrowful foreboding of the
failure of Christianity. Such a choice appeared as the expression of
God's will not to be let down again as He was let down by Adam. Jesus
Christ, conscious at the moment of what He must shortly suffer at the
hands of mankind, must have been equally conscious of the failure of
Christianity two thousand years beyond His Agony and Bloody Sweat and
Crucifixion. Why, within a short time after His life on earth it was
necessary for that light from heaven to shine round about Saul on the
Damascus road, because already scoffers, while the disciples were still
alive, may have been talking about the failure of Christianity. It must
have been another of God's self-imposed limitations that He did not give
to St. John that capacity of St. Paul for organization which might have
made practicable the Christianity of the master Who loved him. _Woman,
behold thy son! Behold thy mother!_ That dying charge showed that Our
Lord considered John the most Christlike of His disciples, and he
remained the most Christlike man until twelve hundred years later St.
Francis was born at Assisi. St. Paul, St. Augustine, St. Dominic, if
Christianity could only produce mighty individualists of Faith like
them, it could scarcely have endured as it had endured. _And now abideth
faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is
charity._ There was something almost wistful in those words coming from
the mouth of St. Paul. It was scarcely conceivable that St. John or St.
Francis could ever have said that; it would scarcely have struck either
that the three virtues were separable.

Keppel Street was empty now. Mark's headache had been blown away by the
night wind with his memories and the incoherent thoughts which had
gathered round the contemplation of Father Rowley's character. He was
just going to draw away from the window and undress when he caught sight
of a figure tacking from one pavement to the other up Keppel Street.
Mark watched its progress, amused at the extraordinary amount of trouble
it was giving itself, until one tack was brought to a sharp conclusion
by a lamp-post to which the figure clung long enough to be recognized as
that of the Reverend George Edward Mousley, who had been tacking like
this to make the harbour of the Mission House. Mark, remembering the
letter which had been written to the Bishop of Warwick, wondered if he
could not at any rate for to-night spare Father Rowley the
disappointment of knowing that his plea for re-instatement was already
answered by the drunken priest himself. He must make up his mind
quickly, because even with the zigzag course Mousley was taking he would
soon be ringing the bell of the Mission House, which meant that Father
Rowley would be woken up and go down to let him in. Of course, he would
have to know all about it in the morning, but to-night when he had gone
to bed tired and full of hope for temperance in general and the
reformation of Mousley in particular it was surely right to let him
sleep in ignorance. Mark decided to take it upon himself to break the
rules of the house, to open the door to Mousley, and if possible to get
him upstairs to bed quietly. He went down with a lighted candle, crept
across the gymnasium, and opened the door. Mousley was still tacking
from pavement to pavement and making very little headway against a
strong current of drink. Mark thought he had better go out and offer his
services as pilot, because Mousley was beginning to sing an
extraordinary song in which the tune and the words of _Good-bye, Dolly,
I must leave you_, had got mixed up with _O happy band of pilgrims_.

"Look here, Mr. Mousley, you mustn't sing now," said Mark taking hold of
the arm with which the drunkard was trying to beat time. "It's after
eleven o'clock, and you're just outside the Mission House."

"I've been just outside the Mission House for an hour and three
quarters, old chap," said Mr. Mousley solemnly. "Most incompatible thing
I've ever known. I got back here at a quarter past nine, and I was just
going to walk in when the house took two paces to the rear, and I've
been walking after it the whole evening. Most incompatible thing I've
ever known. Most incompatible thing that's ever happened to me in my
life, Lidderdale. If I were a superstitious man, which I'm not, I should
say the house was bewitched. If I had a moment to spare, I should sit
down at once and write an account of my most incompatible experience to
the Society of Psychical Research, if I were a superstitious man, which
I'm not. Yes. . . ."

Mr. Mousley tried to focus his glassy eyes upon the arcana of
spiritualism, rocking ambiguously the while upon the kerb. Mark murmured
something more about the need for going in quietly.

"It's very kind of you to come out and talk to me like this," the
drunken priest went on. "But what you ought to have done was to have
kept hold of the house for a minute or two so as to give me time to get
in quietly. Now we shall probably both be out here all night trying to
get in quietly. It's impossible to keep warm by this lamp-post. Most
inadequate heating arrangement. It is a lamp-post, isn't it? Yes, I
thought it was. I had a fleeting impression that it was my bedroom
candle, but I see now that I was mistaken, I see now perfectly clearly
that it is a lamp-post, if not two. Of course, that may account for my
not being able to get into the Mission House. I was trying to decide
which front door I should go in by, and while I was waiting I think I
must have gone in by the wrong one, for I hit my nose a most severe blow
on the nose. One has to remember to be very careful with front doors. Of
course, if it was my own house I should have used a latch-key instanter;
for I inevitably, I mean invariably, carry a latch-key about with me and
when it won't open my front door I use it to wind my watch. You know,
it's one of those small keys you can wind up watches with, if you know
the kind of key I mean. I'd draw you a picture of it if I had a pencil,
but I haven't got a pencil."

"Now don't stay talking here," Mark urged. "Come along back, and do try
to come quietly. I keep telling you it's after eleven o'clock, and you
know Father Rowley likes everybody to be in by ten."

"That's what I've been saying to myself the whole evening," said Mr.
Mousley. "Only what happened, you see, was that I met the son of a man
who used to know my father, a very nice fellow indeed, a very
intellectual fellow. I never remember spending a more intellectual
evening in my life. A feast of reason and a flowing bowl, I mean soul,
s-o-u-l, not b-o-u-l. Did I say bowl? Soul. . . . Soul. . . ."

"All right," said Mark. "But if you've had such a jolly evening, come in
now and don't make a noise."

"I'll come in whenever you like," Mr. Mousley offered. "I'm at your
disposition entirely. The only request I have to make is that you will
guarantee that the house stays where it was built. It's all very fine
for an ordinary house to behave like this, but when a mission house
behaves like this I call it disgraceful. I don't know what I've done to
the house that it should conceive such a dislike to me. I say,
Lidderdale, have they been taking up the drains or something in this
street? Because I distinctly had an impression just then that I put my
foot into a hole."

"The street's perfectly all right," said Mark. "Nothing has been done to
it."

"There's no reason why they shouldn't take up the drains if they want
to, I'm not complaining. Drains have to be taken up and I should be the
last man to complain; but I merely asked a question, and I'm convinced
that they have been taking up the drains. Yes, I've had a very
intellectual evening. My head's whirling with philosophy. We've talked
about everything. My friend talked a good deal about Buddhism. And I
made rather a good joke about Confucius being so confusing, at which I
laughed inordinately. Inordinately, Lidderdale. I've had a very keen
sense of humour ever since I was a baby. I say, Lidderdale, you
certainly know your way about this street. I'm very much obliged to me
for meeting you. I shall get to know the street in time. You see, my
object was to get beyond the house, because I said to myself 'the house
is in Keppel Street, it can dodge about _in_ Keppel Street, but it can't
be in any other street,' so I thought that if I could dodge it into the
corner of Keppel Street--you follow what I mean? I may be talking a bit
above your head, we've been talking philosophy all the evening, but if
you concentrate you'll follow my meaning."

"Here we are," said Mark, for by this time he had persuaded Mr. Mousley
to put his foot upon the step of the front door.

"You managed the house very well," said the clergyman. "It's
extraordinary how a house will take to some people and not to others.
Now I can do anything I like with dogs, and you can do anything you like
with houses. But it's no good patting or stroking a house. You've got to
manage a house quite differently to that. You've got to keep a house's
accounts. You haven't got to keep a dog's accounts."

They were in the gymnasium by now, which by the light of Mark's small
candle loomed as vast as a church.

"Don't talk as you go upstairs," Mark admonished.

"Isn't that a dog I see there?"

"No, no, no," said Mark. "It's the horse. Come along."

"A horse?" Mousley echoed. "Well, I can manage horses too. Come here,
Dobbin. If I'd known we were going to meet a horse I should have brought
back some sugar with me. I suppose it's too late to go back and buy some
sugar now?"

"Yes, yes," said Mark impatiently. "Much too late. Come along."

"If I had a piece of sugar he'd follow us upstairs. You'll find a horse
will go anywhere after a piece of sugar. It is a horse, isn't it? Not a
donkey? Because if it was a donkey he would want a thistle, and I don't
know where I can get a thistle at this time of night. I say, did you
prod me in the stomach then with anything?" asked Mr. Mousley severely.

"No, no," said Mark. "Come along, it was the parallel bars."

"I've not been near any bars to-night, and if you are suggesting that
I've been in bars you're making an insinuation which I very much resent,
an insinuation which I resent most bitterly, an insinuation which I
should not allow anybody to make without first pointing out that it was
an insinuation."

"Do come down off that ladder," Mark said.

"I beg your pardon, Lidderdale. I was under the impression for the
moment that I was going upstairs. I have really been so confused by
Confucius and by the extraordinary behaviour of the house to-night,
recoiling from me as it did, that for the moment I was under the
impression that I was going upstairs."

At this moment Mr. Mousley fell from the ladder, luckily on one of the
gymnasium mats.

"I do think it's a most ridiculous habit," he said, "not to place a
doormat in what I might describe as a suitable cavity. The number of
times in my life that I've fallen over doormats simply because people
will not take the trouble to make the necessary depression in the floor
with which to contain such a useful domestic receptacle you would
scarcely believe. I must have fallen over thousands of doormats in my
life," he shouted at the top of his voice.

"You'll wake everybody up in the house," Mark exclaimed in an agony.
"For heaven's sake keep quiet."

paper by mice at Schloss Lischnitz. And this was what it had come to,
her "Song of Songs."

It held out no message of hope now; it was no refuge for the future. No
faithful Eckart, no guide to dizzy golden heights. It was a mere
derelict, used up though never used, a time-honoured bit of lumber
that one drags about without knowing why--an extinguished light, a
masterpiece of wisdom that had become meaningless.

Shrugging her shoulders, she hastily gathered together the disarranged
rolls of paper and tried to thrust one inside the other, regardless of
how they came--she was in such a hurry!

"I can arrange them some time later," she thought, dimly conscious that
she would never take the trouble.

Adele came with the box. She seemed to have been a remarkably long time
getting it. Her eyes kept wandering guiltily to the clock, and her
answers were absent-minded. Then she threw back the lid, and Lilly
threw the score into the bottom of the box. Its yawning depths seemed
to cry out for further booty. There lay the dresses spread out on the
bed. Her row of shoes stood by the washstand. Hats, blouses, veils,
lace wraps, silk petticoats--all were waiting as much as to say, "Take
us too!"

For a moment she closed her eyes with a moan, remembering the one and
only sacrifice he had asked of her. But it must be done--both their
futures depended on it.

"Frau Laue will hide them for me, and afterwards Frau Laue can keep
them," she thought.

Then, with a rapid resolve, she made a dash at the clothes, and
gathered up blindly anything and everything she could lay hands on.
She seized even the gold-coroneted ivory brushes, the three-winged
hand-mirror, the bromide, the recipe for the summer storage of her
furs, and a dozen other little indispensable articles of the toilette.

And jewels were not forgotten! "_He_ may want money later," she
thought.

Meanwhile Adele had been sent out for a four-wheeler, and again it was
ages before she came back. The porter helped to carry down the trunk,
and Adele held the hat-boxes in her free hand. One last caress of the
bullfinch's grey-green wings, a kiss on the small monkey's velvety
snout, and the door closed behind her for ever.

"Will not the _gnädige Frau_ leave an address?" Adele inquired. How sly
she looked!

"Later on I will write to you, dear Adele, and I hope you may come and
live with me again."

"Dear Adele" did not respond, but glanced down the street expectantly.

A few minutes afterwards, as Lilly drove along the canal, she saw from
the cab window a smart yellow-striped hired motor whiz past from the
opposite direction. Richard was inside. She recognised him as he
flashed by. Red as a lobster, his head slanting, he stared past her,
with wild and searching glances, at the house that she had just left.

She hurriedly directed her driver to turn into a side street, for she
had no desire to meet him till her fate with regard to the world had
been decided. But in a few minutes she heard, with a beating heart, the
same clatter of wheels that had died away in the distance coming behind
her, and drawing nearer and nearer. The yellow side of the motor had
almost shot beyond her, when the word "Stop!" brought it to a
standstill, and at the same moment her cab drew up too.

Richard confronted her with his hand on the door-handle: "Where are you
going?"

His voice rose to a feminine shrillness. Above his high starched collar
his throat worked up and down convulsively.

She felt perfectly calm and mistress of the situation.

He appeared to her now a poor, helpless shadow of a creature, he who so
long had been her lord and master.

"Please let me drive on, Richard," she said. "I have said good-bye to
you by letter. I wanted a few things, and have been to fetch them. Why
should we annoy each other further?"

"Turn round!" he said, grinding his teeth. "Turn round!"

"Why should I turn round?"

"I say you shall! You know where your home is. I will not allow you to
knock about the world by yourself any longer, God knows what mayn't
happen to you. Driver, turn round!"

The driver, with his red face, looked inquiringly at his fare before
obeying.

"Really, Richard, I alone have the control of this cab, and of my
future proceedings--as you have control of yours."

"What rot! If you are thinking about the American heiress, she may go
to the deuce for all I care. But _you_--you _must_ come back. You must!
you shall!"

He grasped with both hands the hem of her skirt as if he would drag her
out of the cab by her clothes.

"I beg you to come back.... I can't sleep, I can't work.... I have got
so used to you.... If it had come off, I should have joined you again
directly the wedding was over. And everything in your rooms is as you
left it that you have seen for yourself. Peterle won't eat, Adele says,
and Adele is moped. She says she simply can't exist without you. I'll
give you twenty thousand--no, thirty thousand--marks a year for life.
Mother won't mind.... She understands ... for, you know, I've given up
the idea of marrying for good; that need never worry you again.... And
you may come to the office when you like.... And you shall have the
carriage instead of a hired one. I'll have the telephone put on between
your flat and the stable. Or perhaps you'd prefer a motor-car? If so,
you shall have one, ten thousand times better than this."

He had played his trump-card. What dreams of earthly grandeur could
exceed a motor-car? He paused and, kneeling on the step, stared hard
into her face to see the effect of his speech.

She saw clearly that she would never be free of him unless she told him
the truth. She was sorry for him, but it was her duty.

"Look here, Richard. All that you offer me is no good to me now, for I
love another man who can give me far more than you can--far, far more!"

"What! What! You've caught a young Vanderbilt?" he exclaimed in jealous
rage. "Well, I must say I never suspected that side to your character."

"No, dear Richard; it's not a young Vanderbilt. On the contrary, he is
so poor that he lives from hand to mouth. But, all the same, he and I
are engaged, and as his future wife I must ask you to leave me free to
do as I like."

His jaw dropped, his eyes grew round; he reeled back against the hind
wheel of the yellow car.

"Drive on!" called Lilly to the cabman.

She leaned back in her corner with a sigh of relief, and yet with a
slight sense of guilt at having got rid so lightly of the old love.

The whole way she heard the puffing of a slowly progressing motor
behind her, and when she descended from the cab, Richard got out of his
motor at a little distance, but near enough for her to see an
expression in his eyes like that of a whipped dog.

She ran up the four flights of stairs as if pursued by furies,
forgetting all about her box. A moment afterwards the cabman came up,
panting under its weight, and when she offered him his fare he declined
to take the money.

"The gentleman downstairs," he said, "has already settled everything."




                               CHAPTER XX


It was the evening of the next day. The carriage, which was bearing
Lilly to the most dreaded interview of her life, drew up at the door of
the Unter den Linden Restaurant, which had been a favourite haunt of
the _beaumonde_ for generations. Although Lilly had not been there for
a long time, she knew every inch of it. She knew, too, the giant
commissionaire, Albert, who stood at the entrance and laid his hand
respectfully on his braided cap. It was he who of old used to apprise
her of the approach of the handsome officer of Hussars. With downcast
eyes and her head pressed against Konrad's shoulder, she glided past
him, trusting that he no longer remembered her.

"Uncle, this is Lilly!"

An old gentleman below middle height, with bow legs, and in an
ill-fitting lounge-jacket and limp collar, came swaggering out of a
private room and held out to her a broad fleshy hand, the skin of which
was as loose and brown as a dog-skin glove. She cast a shy,
scrutinising glance at this all-powerful person, whom she had pictured
as a man of commanding presence and iron will, and who, after all, was
only a shaky, corpulent, rather common-looking dwarf.

Then, as she told herself that her own and Konrad's happiness depended
on her conduct now and during the next hour or two, she felt the old
paralysing nervousness which had not troubled her much of late years
come over her. When suffering from these attacks she became as wooden
as a doll, and could do nothing but smile inanely, and hardly knew how
to pronounce her own name.

The old uncle, too, seemed frozen into silence at the first sight of
her. He scanned her from head to foot, and from foot to head, and
nearly forgot to invite her into the private room.

This room, with its gold Japanese wall-paper, its carnation silk
hangings, its blue Persian rugs, and high-backed sofa, was as familiar
to her as everything else in the place. Many a festive midnight hour
had she caroused away here with Richard and his chance acquaintances at
the time when it was still his ambition to hobnob with the _crême de la
crême_ of fast society.

An immaculately shaved waiter took her brocaded evening coat and lace
scarf, and measured her as he did so with an eye that seemed to say,
"Surely I must have seen _you_ before?"

That was an agonising moment.

The old uncle, who had never ceased to regard her stealthily with awed
but grim glances, pulled himself together and said:

"Well, now we are going to have a jolly time together, children ...
cosy and friendly--eh? Jolly cosy."

Lilly bowed.

Her bow was a stiff enough inclination of the head, apparently, to
increase the bandy-legged old gentleman's reverent esteem for her. He
seemed puzzled and ill at ease, trampled restlessly about the room,
toyed with the gold charms that dangled from his watch-chain, and
nodded two or three times at Konrad in solemn appreciation.

Then they seated themselves at the gleaming white table, which was a
mass of glittering cut-glass and flowers. Round the bronze lamp, with
its claws and dainty iris stem--Lilly remembered it well--hung a
festoon of lilac orchids, which must have cost an immense sum.
Evidently this slovenly old rascal understood the art of good living.

Lilly saw herself reflected in a mirror as she sat in her place on the
sofa, a radiant picture of composure and distinction. She had chosen a
sunray pleated black Liberty silk dress with a bodice of Chantilly
lace, which, despite its costliness, clung in the simplest lines
gracefully about her neck and shoulders. An innocent masculine mind
might easily believe that such a costume could be bought anywhere
between San Francisco and St. Petersburg, or Cape Town and Christiania,
for two hundred marks.

She had wisely left her jewellery at home. Only the slender gold chain,
which she generally wore with a low bodice, encircled in maidenly
unpretentiousness her high transparent collar.

She looked like a strictly reared young gentlewoman of quality making
her first _dêbut_ in the great world, full of shyness and curiosity.

Konrad occupied the chair on her right. The third place, nearest the
door, his uncle had retained for himself.

From the moment he sat down to table he seemed to be in his element. He
growled and issued orders, and found fault with everything.

"Look here, my boy," he said to the waiter as he placed the _hors
d'[oe]uvres_ in front of him, "do you call that the correct decanter for
port wine? Don't you know that if port wine doesn't sparkle in the
decanter it assuages thirst?"

Intimidated by his bullying tone, the waiter was going off for another
decanter, but Konrad's uncle declared he couldn't spare the time, he
must have a "starter" straight away.

"I am still feeling a little stiff," he said apologetically, "I am
unaccustomed to entertaining such very beautiful and at the same time
stand-offish ladies."

Lilly felt a stab at her heart.

Her lover's eyes met hers with a glance full of reproach and
encouragement which said: "You mustn't be so silent. You must try to be
nice to him." And in the same mute language she answered humbly and
deprecatingly: "I cannot; _you_ talk for both of us."

And then he began in his anxiety to converse as if he had been
paid to entertain the company. He described the antiques which his
uncle had collected in his castle on the Rhine, referred to threatened
American competition, passed on to Italy and the evils of the Lex
Pacca--goodness only knew what topic he didn't touch on.

It was quite an illuminating little discourse, which his uncle appeared
to follow with modified interest, as he squinted across at Lilly and
smacked his lips while he let morsels of tunny in oil slip down his
throat.

Suddenly he said, "All very well, my son. Highly instructive and
proper. But I wonder if you could not be equally enlightening on the
subject of what sort of whisky they provide here?"

Konrad sprang up to look for the bell, but his uncle pulled him back.

"Stop! stop! This is my private entertainment. The port wine is for
you. And a beautiful woman, after all, is a beautiful woman, even when
she is someone else's beautiful wife. So here's to the health of our
beauty."

That sounded very like sarcasm. Was it his intention to make game of
her before finally rejecting her claims?

"Permit me," he continued, "to give you my congratulations. You have
worked wonders already with the boy.... He dances prettily to your
piping--eh?"

Now she was bound to make some answer.

"I don't pipe and he doesn't dance," she said, with an effort. "We are
neither of us light-hearted enough for that."

"Ah, that's a nasty one for me," he laughed; but his laugh sounded
cross and irritable.

"Lilly meant no harm," interposed Konrad, coming to her rescue. "And
certainly the time of stress that we are passing through at present is
not easy. If it were not for the help she gives me daily with her
understanding and kindness of heart, I am not sure that I could
struggle on."

"Very good, very good," he replied; "or perhaps I should say, very
pitiable. But your old uncle hasn't had as much as one pretty look or
speech from her yet as a seal of our future relationship."

"Oh, that's what he wants, is it?" thought Lilly; and she raised her
glass to his, and sought to mollify him with a coquettish little
shamefaced smile.

It filled him with evident satisfaction. He twirled his pointed beard,
and ogled her familiarly with his twinkling eyes, as if he wished to
elicit a sign of secret understanding betwixt them.

"Thank God, perhaps he's not so very formidable after all!" she
thought, and gave a sigh of deep relief that the ice was broken at
last.

When the waiter came back, a lively discussion ensued between him and
Konrad's uncle as to the brands of whisky the hotel boasted.... The
debate ended in the manager of the establishment appearing on the
scene, and offering to go down into the cellar himself to search for a
bottle, which he thought he had somewhere, bearing the label of a
certain celebrated firm, and the date of a certain famous year.

Not till this important matter was settled did the old gentleman again
devote his attention to his fair future niece-in-law.

"I am an old mud-lark," he said. "I have done business in guano, train
oil, Australian pitch, ship grease, and other such unclean things. So
you can't wonder at my wishing to refresh myself for once in a way with
an appetising object like yourself, dear ungracious lady. All I require
is a little return of my interest."

"Ah well, then, I'll just be impudent," thought Lilly. And aloud she
said: "You know, Herr Rennschmidt, I am sitting here trembling
in my shoes like a poor, unlucky candidate for an examination! I
implore you"--she raised her clasped hands towards him--"don't play
cat-and-mouse with me."

Now she had struck the right note and given him the opening he desired.

"Her lips are unsealed at last!" he exclaimed, beaming. "And I say,
Konrad, what pretty lips she has! I like those long teeth that make the
upper lip say to the lower, 'If you won't kiss when I do, I'll have a
separation.' Do you see what I mean, Konrad, you dullard?"

Lilly could not help laughing heartily, and at once they were on the
best of terms. Even Konrad's dear, haggard face lighted up for a moment
with a reassuring smile which did her heart good. For his sake she
could almost have thrown herself under his uncle's feet, so dearly did
she love him. And with a feeling of rising triumph she thought, "I'll
just show him how awfully nice I can be to the old curmudgeon."

It was not so difficult, after all. When she looked at his round,
puckered, mischievous old face, with the keen shrewd grey eyes and the
beautifully waved snow-white wig--it was actually a wig peaked on the
forehead and brushed into two outstanding curls over his ears like a
judge's--she felt more and more that he was a good and tried comrade,
with whom she had often had good times in the past. And yet she had
certainly never met him before.

He had a masterful air of breeding about him, despite his plebeian
exterior. His choice of the menu was simply admirable. The 'sixty-eight
Steinberger, which flowed into the crystal glasses like liquid amber,
suited the blue trout to such perfection that it might have been their
native element; and the sweet-bread patties _à la Montgelas_ were
worthy accompaniments. Neither Richard nor any of his crew understood
so well the gourmet's art.

If only he had not drunk whisky so perpetually in between!

"My brain has been so deadened by money-making," he said in
justification, "I am obliged to give it a fillip now and then, or it
would become completely dulled."

With the punch _à la romaine_, a brief and vivacious debate arose as to
the merits of certain American drinks, in which Lilly, with her
extensive knowledge of bars and beverages, scored. She even knew the
exact ingredients of her host's speciality, the "South Sea Bowl," in
which sherry, cognac, angostura bitters, with the yolks of eggs and
Château d'Yquem, or, if necessary, moselle, contributed to make a fiery
mixture. She went so far as to offer to prepare this curious mixture
for him after dinner with the skill of an expert, so that he would have
to confess he had never drunk anything more delicious between Singapore
and Melbourne.

Konrad, who obviously had never suspected her genius in this direction,
listened to her with an amazement that filled her with pride. She
telegraphed to him one secret signal after the other, asking, "Aren't
you pleased? Am I not being very, very nice to him?"

But somehow he would not respond. He was silent and absent-minded, and
it often seemed as if he did not belong to the party.

"Well, he may dream if he likes," she thought blissfully. "I'll look
after our interests."

Thus every minute the friendship between her and the old worldling grew
apace.

By the time they had got to the wild-duck and the dark glowing
burgundy, which slid down their throats like warm caresses, she had
already begun to call him "dear uncle." He, on his side, declared over
and over again that he was "totally wrapped up in his dear, dear little
Lilly."

So this was the test, the cruel probation, which she had dreaded with
all her soul, through which she had expected to come dissected and
unmasked, with every rag of concealment rudely torn off!

When she thought of how differently things were turning out, she could
hardly contain herself for glee. There sat the mighty, dreaded peril,
whose money-bags meant victory or defeat, a little wild beast tamed,
who squeezed her fingers in his repulsive shrivelled hands and fawned
on her for a smile.

He was undoubtedly quite amusing, especially when he told good stories.

What a lot of scandal he had gathered in the Colonies! In one evening
he told more anecdotes than she had heard for a year. There was, for
example, the story of the German Governor, Herr von So-and-So--she had
once met him herself at Uhl's--who took up his duties abroad with a
suite consisting of secretary, valet, and cook. In six months the cook
came and said, "Herr Governor, I am----" He gave her two thousand marks
and said, "Here you are, but keep quiet." Then she went to the
secretary and said, "Herr Müller, I am----" He gave her three hundred
marks and said, "Not a word." Then she went to the valet and said,
"Johann, I'm so far gone, we'd better marry." After three months the
valet came to the Governor and said, "Your Excellency, the hussy took
us all in. The child is black!" And many another yarn followed of the
same sort. In short, she nearly died of laughing.

"Konrad, why don't you laugh? Laugh, dearest."

And then he really did smile, but his eyes remained grave and his brow
tense.

When the champagne came, they drank each other's health again, and
kissed. The touch of those thick sensual old lips was horrible, but to
ensure her future happiness it had to be endured. She was going to give
Konrad a kiss too, but he declined it. Still worse, he tried to prevent
her drinking so much.

"She ought to be more careful," he urged. "Please, uncle, don't fill up
her glass so often. We never drink so much as this."

The other two laughed at him.

"He always was a bit of a muff," jeered his old uncle, "and never knew
what was good. He's not good enough for you, Lilly; you ought to have a
fellow like me--not a prig. He's like a mute at a funeral."

But she saw no joke in this.

"You shan't abuse my darling Konni, you old wretch! Go on telling your
old chestnuts. _Allons_! Fire away!"

No, not a word should be breathed against her dear, sweet Konni!

So uncle started telling good stories again. This time he related them
in pigeon-English, that gibberish which the Chinese and other
interesting inhabitants of the far East use as a medium of
communication with the white sahibs. "Tom and Paddy in the Tea-house";
"The virtuous spinster Miss Laura"; "The Guide and the Bayadere." Each
was received with a box of the ears.

"But we mustn't let Konni hear any more, uncle dear. Konni might be
corrupted."

So saying, she inclined her left ear very close to dear uncle's lips,
and made with her hollowed hand between them a "whispering-tube," which
was the custom of "the crew" when any of them wanted to flirt unheard,
or do anything else particularly outrageous.

It would be a sad mistake to suppose that she was in the least abashed
or unequal to giving as good as she got. The general's "lullabies" were
spicy enough, and she had learned from "the crew" much that was of
unquestionable origin and questionable taste. For such an appreciative
audience as uncle proved to be, it was worth while doing one's best.
But the innocent Konrad had to submit to his ears being stuffed up with
the wadding on which the Colville apples had been served.

After the coffee, uncle challenged her to keep her promise about
brewing the South Sea Bowl, her vaunted knowledge of which, of course,
had been mere brag.

She would show him! He shouldn't scoff at her a second time. A variety
of bottles were brought; besides the sherry and the angostura, an old,
sweet liqueur. It was a pity, uncle thought, to mix such good things,
and he took two or three glasses of the latter neat, and she followed
his example.

The tiresome eggs broke at the wrong place, it was true, and emptied
their contents on her dress and the carpet. But what did that matter?
It merely increased the fun ... and dear old uncle was paying for
everything. To make up for the eggs smashing, the blue flame of the
alcohol-lamp leapt up merrily as high as the orchids, as high as the
ceiling.... She would have loved to lick up the flames, as the witches
did.

"Your luck, Konni!--_our_ luck, Konni!"

"Don't drink it," she heard him say, and his voice sounded harder than
usual. Indeed, she hardly recognised it as his voice at all.

"Muff!" she laughed, and thrust out her tongue at him. "Muff!"

"Don't drink it!" the warning voice said again. "You are not used to
it."

_She_ not used to drinking! How dared he say so? This was an insult to
her honour; yes, an insult to her honour.

"How do you know what I am used to? I am used to plenty of things you
don't guess.... Here, on this seat where I am sitting now, I have sat
more than once--more than ten times--and have drunk ten times more."

"Dearest heart, you don't know what you are saying. It isn't true."

Once more his voice sounded gentle and soothing, as if he were
reproving a naughty child.

"How dare you say it isn't true? Do you take me for an impostor? I
suppose you think I am not at home in swell places like this!... Pooh!
Shall I give you a proof? I can--I can!... You'll find my name
scratched at the foot of this lamp. Look and you'll find it.... 'Lilly
Czepanek ... Lilly Czepanek.' Look! Look, I say!"

He had started to his feet, his face rigid, and fixed his eyes in
horror on the polished silver mirror of the lamp, on which was a jumble
of scribbled hieroglyphics. He could not distinguish amongst them the
L. C. for which he was looking till she came to his assistance. Here,
no; there, no. The letters swam into one another. It was like trying to
catch hold of the goldfish in the aquarium.

Hurrah! here it was. That was it--"L. v. M." and the coronet above. For
in those days she had often had the audacity to call herself by the
forbidden title as a temporary adornment.

"Now, do you see, Konni, that I was right? Now you won't mind how much
I drink, will you, you dear, precious little muff?"

Utterly crushed by the proof, he sank back in his chair without a
single word.

His uncle and Lilly went on drinking and laughing at him.

At this moment she happened to catch sight of herself in the glass.
Through a billowy haze she beheld a flushed, puffy face with
dishevelled hair falling about it from under a crooked hat, and two
deeply marked lines running from mouth to chin. It was not a pleasing
spectacle, and she was a little disturbed at it; but before she could
distress herself further, the old uncle claimed her attention with a
new joke.

"Do you know, Lilly dear, how the Chinese sing 'Die Lorelei'?"

Before she had heard a syllable she went into a fit of giggles. He
crossed his bandy legs and played a prelude on the side of his foot as
if it were a banjo, "Ping, pang, ping"; and then he began in a cracked,
nasal, gurgling voice, drawling his "l's."


           "O, my belong too much sorry
            And can me no savy, what kind;
            Have got one olo piccy story,
            No won't she go outside my mind."


When he came to the second verse:


           "Dat night belang dark and colo"


he heightened the effect by tearing the wig from his head, and now he
looked for all the world like an old nodding mandarin, with his slits
of eyes and his polished bare ivory skull.

It was fascinatingly and overwhelmingly funny. Never in her life had
she seen such a mirth-provoking, side-splitting piece of clowning. You
could have died of envy if you hadn't been Lilly Czepanek, the renowned
mimic and impersonator, who, when the spirit moved her, had only to
open her lips to rouse a tornado of applause.

Her incomparable _repertoire_ had been growing rusty for too long. "La
belle Otéro" was not yet stale, and Tortajada was dancing her ravishing
dances, while Matchiche was just becoming the rage.

All you had to do was to tilt your hat a little further back, to raise
your black skirt--the _dessous_ was part of what had been brought away
yesterday, and would not have disgraced a Saharet--and then you were
off!

And she was off! Off like a whirlwind over the carpet, slippery with
the yolks of eggs that she had spilt. Hop, skip--olé! olé! Yes, you
must shout "Olé!" and clap your hands. "Olé-é-é----"

Dear uncle bawled; the floor rocked in great waves.... Lamps and
mirrors danced with her. All hell seemed to be let loose.

"Konni, why don't you shout 'Olé'? ... Don't be so down ... Olé!"

"Uncle, you will have this on your conscience!"

What did he mean by saying that? Why was he sobbing? Why did he stand
there as white as the tablecloth?

"Olé--ol-é-é-é!"




                               CHAPTER XXI


Towards noon Lilly awoke in a rapture of joy.

The formidable uncle had been won--the last obstacle cleared from her
path--the future lay spread out at her feet like a land of milk and
honey. The probation looked forward to with such anxiety and terror had
turned out, after all, only a delightful spree. What a mountebank and
buffoon that shrewd old man of the world was, who probably had ground
women's hearts under his heel as indifferently as he crunched walnuts.
When she tried, however, to review the events of the previous evening
she felt a slight dismay at nothing emerging from her blurred memory
but the sounds of song and uproarious laughter, just as it used to be
in that other life when she had spent the night in mad revels with
Richard and his friends.

As the mist lifted a little, she saw a deadly white face petrified by
pained surprise, heard an exclamation that was half a sob and half a
groan, and saw herself, sobbing too, kneeling before someone who pushed
her away with his hands.

Had that happened, or had she dreamed it?

And she had danced and sung so beautifully! She had exhibited her art
at its best. Could there have been anything displeasing in it? Had she,
perhaps, gone a little too far in her high spirits?

Her anxiety grew. She sprang out of bed, and her one thought was that
she must go to him instantly.

At twelve the bell rang.

That was Konrad; it must be Konrad. But, when she flew to the lobby
door to throw herself into his arms with a cry of joy and relief, she
found that she was standing face to face with his uncle, who stood
twirling his hat in his horrid fingers, and looked at her with a
significant smile that she did not like at all.

"Is it to come all over again--the probation," she thought, "or is it
now only coming off for the first time?"

"How do you do?" died in her throat. She let him in without speaking. A
sensation of faintness came over her, as if she were going to fall
backwards through the wall into her room.

It was the old man who opened the door and walked in, with the air of
an acquaintance who knew his way about.

"Where is Konrad?"

"Konrad?" he repeated, and scratched the silk band of his wig with his
little finger. "I've something to say about Konrad."

He drew out his glittering watch, with its massive chain, and studied
the hands.

"I make it just ten minutes past twelve. By now he will be on his way
to the station--most probably he has started."

"Is he ... going away?" she stammered, while her breath began to fail
her.

"Yes, yes. He is going away.... We settled that last night.... He needs
a change."

"It's nonsense," she thought; "how can he go away for a change without
me?"

But she put a restraint on herself and asked casually, "Where is he
thinking of going so suddenly?"

"Oh! he's taking a little trip abroad hardly worth speaking about. It
seemed a favourable opportunity. A double cabin was going begging on
the steamer leaving--er--never mind where!... an outside cabin, you
know; on the promenade deck; pleasantest position, you know; no
splashing, and lots of air.... One wants plenty of air, especially
during those four days in the Red Sea."

Then she was right. Her suspicions that the probation of her character
and intentions was only to begin seriously now were being verified.

"What takes people to the Red Sea, uncle dear?" she asked, with her
most ingenuous smile.

"Yes, what takes them to the Red Sea? Four thousand years ago the
ancient Jews asked the same question, and everyone asks it to-day when
he finds himself sweltering there. But still, if you want to go to
India, you must pass through the Red Sea.... And I want to go to India
once more. I've been quite long enough trotting about the pavements at
home. And as our Konrad is overworked--you'll admit he is, child--I
have talked him into coming to travel with me a bit. For in cases like
this I believe change of scene is the best remedy. Do you see?"

Lilly felt a lump rise in her throat as if all the links of his gold
watch-chain were choking her.

"This joke isn't in the best of taste," she thought; "and God knows
what he means by it."

But whether she liked it or not, she had to play at the game. "Konrad
might have had the grace to come and say goodbye to me prettily," she
replied, pouting a little, as if a journey to Potsdam or Dresden was in
question.

"Well, you see, child, that's what he wanted to do, of course. But I
said to him, 'Look here, my boy, farewells are far too exciting and
unnerving, and may bring on apoplexy.' He agreed, and left it to me to
put matters straight with you."

"Well, by all means let us put matters straight," she answered, with
the patronising smile that such a farce merited.

"I shouldn't be surprised," she thought, "if he were not waiting
outside in the cab for a signal to come in."

"Uncle" placed his smart panama hat beside him on the floor, leaned his
short body back in Frau Laue's red plush arm-chair, and affected an
expression of distress and sympathy.

What an old clown he was! It mystified her more than anything that he
seemed so absolutely to have forgotten the alliance they had entered
into on the previous evening. But perhaps this was only part of the
probation farce.

"If it were only a question of me, my dear," he went on, "it wouldn't
matter. I honestly confess I'm mad about you--'wrapped up,' as I said
last night. I have met womenfolk in all parts of the globe, and it's as
clear to me as palm-oil that you are made of the choicest materials
it's possible to find. But there are people, you know, who take life
seriously and cherish grand illusions.... people who have no notion
that a human being must be a human being. They think they are something
extra, and expect life to afford them extra titbits. And then come
disappointments, of course ... reproaches, despair ... tearing of hair,
wringing of hands. I'm blowed if he didn't try to thrash me last
night!"

"Whom are you talking about?" asked Lilly, becoming every moment more
uneasy.

"Just as if I had led you on into the little overshooting of the mark!
No, no ... that's not my way. I don't lay man-traps. And so I told him
ten times over. The misfortune is, that you and I understood each other
too well. You and I are in the same line of business.... We two are
like two old colleagues."

"We two ...? You and I?" gasped Lilly in frigid amazement.

"Yes, you and I, my dear child. Don't have a fit--you and I; you and I.
It's true that you are a splendid beauty of twenty-five, and I am a
damned old fool of sixty.... But life has tarred us with the same
brush. How am I to explain it to you?... Have you ever hunted for
diamonds? I don't mean at the jeweller's. I'll lay a wager you know
that way of hunting them. Well, a diamond lies embedded in hard rock,
in tunnels ... so-called blue ground. If you find a blue-ground
tunnel, you may imagine what it is; you just sit in it. Once I went
diamond-hunting with a party of twenty, day and night, week after week.
The blue ground was there all right, but the diamonds had been washed
out of it. Do you follow me? The fine ground is still in both of us;
but what made it fine the devil has in the meantime walked off with."

"Why do you tell me all this?" Lilly asked. Tears of bewilderment
sprang to her eyes, for this couldn't possibly have anything to do with
the probation.

"Now, child, I'll tell you why.... There are people who when they have
given their word think there is no going back on it. They must swallow
whatever they've put in their mouths, even if it's a strychnine
pill.... My opinion, on the contrary, is that no one ought deliberately
to plunge into misfortune--neither he nor you. And since the quickest
method is to wash the wool while it's on the sheep, I've come to you to
make a little proposition. See, here's a cheque-book. You know what
cheque-books are, I expect. On the right side are printed figures from
five hundred upwards: All the figures that make the amount bigger than
the sum inscribed on the cheque are cut off, in case a little swindler
should take it into his head with one little stroke of the pen to cheat
one out of a little hundred thousand. Well now, look here. This cheque
is signed and dated; the figures alone want to be filled in. I should
never permit myself to offer you a certain sum, but I should like you
to say what you think would be a decent provision for your future."

He tore the cheque out and laid it on the table in front of her.

"Thank Heaven," thought Lilly, "I had nothing to be afraid of! My heart
need not have misgiven me."

Who could be so blind as not to see through this clumsy trick whereby
he intended to put to the test her unselfishness about money? So she
did not send the old man about his business, as she might with justice
have done, if such a proposal had been made to her seriously, but she
took the cheque off the table, smiling, tore it carefully to atoms, and
flipped them one after the other into his face.

He fidgeted about in his arm-chair.

"Allow me," he said; "please allow me ..."

"No! Such scurvy little jokes I certainly will not allow, dear uncle,"
she replied.

"But you are declining a fortune, my child. Think what you are doing.
We've upset the tenor of your life. We have, as it were, cast you on
the gutter. That you shan't perish there is our responsibility. And if
you think you will lower yourself in his eyes by accepting, I can swear
to you he knows nothing about it; and never will, I'll swear too."

She only smiled.

His small slits of eyes grew bright and hard. Suddenly they began to
threaten her.

"Or ... is it your intention not to give up the good boy--to hang his
promise like a halter about his neck?... Are you one of that kind, eh?"

"No. I am not one of that kind."

Her smile reached far beyond him. It flew to greet the beloved who
soon, very soon now, would be ascending the stairs; for surely he
couldn't have patience to wait there outside in the cab much longer.

"His promise is his own. He's never given it. And if he had wanted to I
would never have let him. And even if what you said just now was true,
he might go away if he liked, and come back again, and I would not
write to him or meet him, or remind him in any way of what he is and
always will be to me as long as I live. But I know that it is _not_
true. He loves me, and I love him. And take care, uncle, not to play so
low down with his future wife as to offer her blank cheques and such
disgraceful proposals. If I were to tell him, you would find yourself
all at once a lonely old man whose fortune might go to endow a home for
lost dogs."

He was obliged to see at last what a blunder he had committed. He
jumped from his seat, evidently annoyed at his mistake, and ejaculated
an irritable "Bah!" as he began to pace the room, jingling the charms
on his watch-chain. Once or twice he murmured something that sounded
like "A hangman's job." But she couldn't have heard right.

At last he seemed to arrive at a decision. He stopped close in front of
her, laid his repulsive hands on her shoulders and said, suddenly
becoming affectionate and familiar again:

"Listen, sweetheart, girlie, pretty one. Something has to be done. We
can't shirk the point. There must be a conclusion. If only I weren't
such a damned mangy old hound and hadn't to consider the dear boy's
feelings in the matter, things would be simple enough. I should merely
say, 'Come along with me to the nearest registry-office. But hurry up;
I haven't time to waste!' Don't stare! Yes--me. I'd ask you to marry
_me_. You wouldn't have reason to regret it. But Konrad--you must see
yourself it won't do--won't do. It would be a fatal mistake from
beginning to end. He is a rising man. He wants to climb to the top; he
is still blessed with faith, and you haven't any left. You fell too
early into the great sausage-machine which minces us all sooner or
later into average meat.... You wouldn't be happy with him long. You
couldn't keep up to him. You'd drag on him like a dead weight, and
would always be conscious of it. As for last night's revelation, which
opened his eyes, I don't lay so much stress on that. It's not a
question of what the coastline looks like--sand or palms, it's all the
same--but it's the interior that counts. And there I see waste land,
burnt-up scorched deserts; no birds flying across it; no ground in
which confidence can strike root. Child, creep into any shelter life
offers you, cling to those who have brought you to this pass; but let
the boy go. He is not made for you. Be honest; haven't you long ago
said so yourself?"

Ah, so this was what he meant! It was not a probation, but the end--the
end!

She gazed into vacancy. She seemed to hear steps growing fainter; one
after the other they slowly died away, like _his_ footsteps when at
break of day he had softly stolen downstairs.

But this was final. They had died away for ever.

A dull sense of disappointment gnawed at her heart. That was all. The
worst would come later, as she knew by experience.

And then she saw a vision of herself dancing and yelling, laughing at
foul jests, with her hat awry and her skirts held high--a drunken
wanton! She, the "lofty-minded saint" with the "brow divine," a drunken
wanton--nothing more and nothing less.

Now she knew why he had stood there with his face as white as the
tablecloth--why that sobbing groan of pain had burst from his lips. And
it was pity for him as much as shame of herself that made of this
moment a boiling hell.

"How is he bearing it?" she asked, stammering.

"You can guess how," he replied, "but I believe I shall pull him
through."

"Oh, uncle ... I ... didn't ... I didn't want to do it ..." she cried,
sobbing.

"I know, child; I know. He told me all."

For an instant her wounded pride flamed up within her. She stooped, and
gathering together a handful of the bits of torn paper, she held them
out to him on her open palm.

"And you dared to offer me _that_?"

"What was I to do, my dear? And what am I to do with you now?"

"Pah!" and she struck at him with both hands, but the next moment she
threw her arms round his neck and wept on his shoulder. Perhaps her
cheek touched the very place which Konrad last night might have wetted
with his tears!

He began to reason with her again. He made suggestions for her future.
He would help her to begin a new life, and provide tier with the means
to cultivate her brilliant histrionic talents; she should come out on
the stage or the concert platform. But she shook her head.

"Too late, uncle.... Waste land--didn't you say so yourself?--ground
where no confidence can take root. I might aspire to be a music-hall
star, but honestly I don't think it would pay."

"Cursed hounds!" he growled.

"Who are cursed hounds?"

"You know well enough, my child."

She reflected a moment as to whom he could mean. Then she said:

"There was only one ... no, two, and then afterwards one more ... and
then two more who didn't count."

"Well, that seems to me to be plenty, dear."

He patted her cheeks and smiled kindly, and somehow she did not find
his fingers repulsive any more.

She felt that she must smile too, though she began crying again
directly.

Konrad's uncle prepared to take his departure, and she clung on tightly
to his shoulder. She couldn't bear to let him go. He was the last link
with her vanished dream of happiness.

"What message shall I take him?" he asked.

She drew herself erect. Her eyes widened. She wanted to pour out the
full flood of her grief. Her shattered and squandered love sought for
winged words which should bear it to him, sanctified and hallowed anew.
But no words came.

She looked wildly round the room, as if from some quarter of it help
must come. The portraits of defunct actors smiled down on her; once so
eloquent, they were dumb now dumb as her own frozen soul. The specimen
lamp-shade in its frame greeted her, presaging a future to be passed at
Frau Laue's side.

"I have nothing to say," she faltered. Then she thought of something
after all. "Ask him ... ask him, please, why he didn't come himself to
say good-bye. I know that he is not a coward."

Uncle made one of his queerest faces.

"As you have been so astoundingly sensible, little woman, I'll tell you
the secret. He wanted to come and say good-bye--most dreadfully, of
course. And I promised him that I'd try and bring you to the station."

In an instant she was making a dash for her straw hat.

"Stop!"

He had laid his hand on her arm. The short, squat figure seemed to grow
taller.

"You won't go."

"What? Konni is expecting me, wants to speak to me? And I am not to
go?"

"I say again, 'You won't go.' If you are the plucky girl I take you
for, you will not spoil your work of sacrifice. For, depend upon it, if
once he sees you again you'll hang on to each other for evermore."

The straw hat slipped from her hand.

"Then ... tell him ... I shall always love him, always and always, that
he will be my last thought on earth.... And ... I don't know what else
to say."

He silently made his way out of the room.

And then she broke down.




                              CHAPTER XXII


The world wagged on, calmly, merrily, busily, as if nothing had
happened, as if nowhere on the ocean of life a lost happiness was
drifting every minute farther and farther away, as if no forsaken and
abandoned human child cowered in a corner, staring with despairing eyes
helplessly at the floor.

Frau Laue tapped at her lamp-shades, the fried potatoes frizzled
in the fat-lined pan; the stove in the lobby smoked, and the frowsy
poor-people's odour exhaled a welcome to all who came within its
radius. She did not cry her heart out of her body, as she had done
after her expulsion from the castle. She neither lapsed into a dazed
apathy nor wrestled desperately with fate. Instead, she felt that a
grey yawning void stretched before her endlessly, the silence of which
was broken now and then by a shrill cry of almost animal longing and
despair, a sense of feeble submission to the inevitable, a
consciousness of being incarcerated without hope of escape, a baffled
slipping down into life's dark depths, a dreary death unmarked by grace
or dignity.

Between to-day and to-morrow--the to-morrow that seemed to beckon from
every corner--Lilly's tearless eyes saw the railings of the bridge that
her feet had tested on the way home from "Rosmersholm." And, as she
stared into space, she beheld the dark, purple-flecked waters rolling
languidly on far below, and heard the iron chains clank under her feet.

This sound grew into a perpetual sing-song that accompanied everything
she did, floated over and swallowed up everything that the eventless
days brought forth. It pierced her brain, hammered in her temples, and
throbbed painfully in every nerve and pore of her body.

Only one word was set to this haunting melody, and that was "Die."
Yes--die. What could be simpler? What more irresistible?

Die! not to-day; but to-morrow perhaps, or the day after. Something
might happen yet. A letter might come, or he himself. Or if not this,
who could know that fate was not holding some other miracle of good
fortune up its sleeve?

So it was worth while living to-day, to drag through its countless
hours of deadly monotony.

Then one evening, a week after Konrad's sudden departure, Frau Laue
appeared in Lilly's room at an unaccustomed hour. Her manner denoted
determination.

"Now look here, Lilly dear," she began. "Things can't go on like this.
If you were crying your heart out I shouldn't say anything. But, as you
are acting now, matters will never mend. There is only one sensible
course that you can take; you must return to your Herr Dehnicke. If he
had any inkling of how things were going with you here, trust him, he
would have come and taken you away long ago. So I tell you plainly,
either you sit down and write him a nice letter or I shall leave my
work in the lurch and go straight off to his office to-morrow morning.
He'll pay my expenses fast enough."

Lilly felt a strong impulse to turn the old woman out of the room, but
she was too depressed to do more than turn away from her with impotent
distaste.

"I haven't too much time to spare now," Frau Laue continued; "the dozen
must be completed before bedtime.... But you can make your mind easy as
to one thing. If he is not here by ten o'clock to-morrow, he'll be here
by twelve, for I shall have gone to fetch him. Good-night, Lilly dear."

In melancholy scorn she sent a scoffing laugh after Frau Laue. This,
then, was the stroke of good fortune which fate had in store for the
morrow? Once more she was to cringe to man's puerile supremacy, and
live in enervating servitude--vegetate amidst fleeting and unprofitable
pleasures in a perfumed lethargy, or be goaded by ennui and disgust to
walk the streets.

Yet, if he came the next day, she knew she would not have the power to
resist. Richard would only have to look at her with that whipped-dog
expression, which was something quite new for him, and the mere thought
of which filled her with a shamefaced tenderness, and she would throw
her arms round his neck and have a good cry on his shoulder.

Was it worth waiting another to-morrow for that? No; better to die
to-day.

To-day! A feeling of ecstasy came over her. She ran about the room,
with folded hands, weeping and exulting. She would be a heroine like
Isolde, a martyr for her love.

And there the railings of the bridge were waiting ready for her. How
they would creak and groan when she set her feet on them!

Now the sing-song in her head was so loud that she thought it must kill
her. The air resounded with a whirl of tones. The walls echoed them.
The noise of the street, the capital's roar of traffic, all sang ...
"Die--die--die!"

She pulled off her evening wrapper and dressed herself to go out. At
first she thought of putting on one of the badly fitting dresses
because they were connected with Konrad, but her heart failed her.

"Die beautifully," Hedda Gabler had said.

"If only I had his photograph that I might take a farewell look into
his eyes," she thought. But she had nothing but his letters and a few
verses. They should accompany her on her last walk.

They lay at the bottom of the leather trunk, which was still concealed
in Frau Laue's box-room, though there had long been no one from whom it
was necessary to conceal it. As she rummaged in its depths to find the
little packet, she put her hand by accident on the roll of old music
manuscript.

She looked tenderly at the yellow-stained sheet into which the rest was
fitted. She was no longer vexed with her "Song of Songs," and did not
despise it, as on that ill-fated morning when she had hunted it up
again; the morning on which she had gone out to break her vow to
Konrad.

Now once more it was a dear, precious possession, not a guide,
philosopher, and friend, not a miracle-working sacred relic, but just
an old keepsake which we treasure and water with our tears because it
is a bit of our own life.

And a bit of our own blood!

For there were still those dark stains on the paper. Her blood had
fallen on it when she set forth on life's journey, and now that the
journey was ending the deep waters should wash the blood-stains away.

With the score lying in her lap, she looked beyond it into the
sorrowful past. It seemed to her as if mists were lifting and curtains
were being drawn aside, and she saw the path that she had trodden
winding backwards at her feet, like a clearly defined boundary.

She had been weak and often stupid. Her own interests and the main
chance she had never considered. Every man who had entered her life had
been able to do what he liked with her. Not once had she barred her
soul, shown fight, or exercised to the full the sovereignty of her
beauty. She had only been eager to oblige and to love and be kind to
everyone. In reward, she had been hunted and bullied and dragged
through the mud all her life long. Even the one man who had respected
her had gone away without saying good-bye.

"But I've never hated anybody," she thought. "And no matter what I have
suffered, or how I have transgressed, I have always been able to feel
there was something in me out of the common, and this at the last seems
as if it had been a gift from Heaven."

Did it not really seem as if this "Song of Songs," which now lay before
her, defaced, stained, and rotted, like her own career, had been all
along blessing and absolving her the presiding genius she had believed
it to be as a child, and fancied it afterwards during the rapture of
her abandonment to her love for Konrad?

"Yes, you shall come too," she said. "You shall die when I die."

And she carefully wrapped the battered papers together. Then she found
the letters, and read them through two or three times, but without
taking in what she read.


                           *   *   *   *   *


The clock struck twelve as she stepped softly out on to the landing.
Frau Laue was asleep. She met no one on the stairs, and unseen walked
into the street.

Since her flight to Konrad that memorable night she had not been out
alone in the streets so late. Everything looked as if she saw it for
the first time: the long rows of houses bathed in crude light, the
trolleys of the electric trams in between, and the gliding figures of
night-revellers.

A numbing terror seized her. Her legs felt wooden, as if stilts were
screwed on to them, propelling her forward whether she would or not,
without rest; and her heels tapped ceaselessly on the pavement,
carrying her nearer and nearer her goal. Whenever she met anyone she
felt an impulse to hide herself, fancying that it would be noticed
where she was going. For this reason she dived into dark back-streets,
which were unevenly paved and where fading lime-trees scattered their
drops of rain. She passed straggling brick buildings inhospitably shut
in behind high back-garden walls; slaughter-houses and factories; and
all the time her heels went tap-tap-tap, as if she had a pedometer
attached to them, registering every inch which shortened her road.

She tried to remember other short-cuts to her bridge, but couldn't find
them, and gave up the attempt.

"What thou doest, let it be done quickly," she had read somewhere. So
she pressed forward with clenched teeth.

The Engelbecken was dark and deserted; yellow lights were reflected
dimly in its unfathomable waters. "Here it would be easier," she
thought, breathless from the oppression at her heart. But, shuddering,
she retreated from the grass slopes. The bridge must be somewhere over
there to the north-west. Fate had ordained that she should go to the
bridge.

It was still a long way off, quite an hour's walk. She came into more
frequented ways. The rows of lights in front of the dancing saloons,
where prostitutes caroused, cast their garish beams like finger-posts
into the night. Cabs were waiting there, and sounds of revelry came
from within. Forwards, forwards--always forwards! Hot, garlic-laden
fumes were wafted to her nostrils from a cellar-café that kept its
doors open. When had she smelt something like that before? Why, of
course, when Frau Redlich was cooking the sausages for her son's
farewell dinner.

In front of her a hose as thick as her wrist sent a cleansing
shower-bath over the street. What did that hissing, gurgling sound
remind her of? Why, of course, of old Haberland watering the lawn with
the old-fashioned sprinkler. And then all at once the thought shot
through her brain: "None of this is really happening. I am lying in bed
between the bookcases, and behind me the hanging lamp that I took down
is smoking ... and this is all in an old novel that I am reading, while
Frau Asmussen has luckily gone to sleep after taking her medicine."

A growing tumult called her back to actual life. She had reached the
heart of the city, the spot where the whirl of Berlin's never-flagging
nightly dissipations reaches its height. She came to the Spittelmarkt,
and onwards the huge Leipziger Strasse unrolled its chain of lights
like a pearl necklace. Buried in a mist of silver, dotted with the
glimmering red lanterns of night cafés and cabarets, it was like a
brilliant picture toned down with sepia.

The numb feeling in Lilly's legs increased. She walked, and was hardly
conscious that she moved at all. She only felt the tremendous force of
her heart-beats, which made her whole body vibrate like a mill.

In the Friedrichstrasse there were nearly as many people about as by
day. Young men pursued their smiling quarry, and the lamplight was
reflected in the silk hose of the tripping _grisettes_.

"Once submerged in this sort of world," Lilly thought with a gruesome
envy, "and one is disturbed by no sense of wounded honour or suicidal
impulses."

Ah! but on the other side of this bright, laughing, jostling crowd came
peace and darkness again, in the shelter of which you might die unseen
and unknown.

Through the noise she still heard her heels tapping. Why shouldn't she
go into some café, she asked herself? Even if someone saw her, what did
it matter? It would give her one miserable quarter of an hour's
breathing space. Lights, mirrors, velvet seats, blue cigarette-smoke, a
clink of crystal, a pricking in her parched throat. Just once--once
more ... not a quarter ... but a whole hour, and one more poor little
bit of life would be hers, which could do no one else any harm. But she
could find no justification for such a cowardly action, and determined
that her last walk should be disgraced by no such weakness. And she
went on, on and on.

The merry vortex of the Kranzlerecke was left behind; the daggers of
light stabbed her no more. Lilly hardly knew where she was going. Most
likely she was in one of those quiet cross-streets which led to the
north-west end. The middle of the deserted street glistened with
puddles. The rainy autumnal wind came sweeping along between the
houses, and the cold lamplight was reflected in their dark windowpanes.
Everything round her here seemed lifeless and extinct; only a human
phantom glided forth at intervals, and cats chased each other
noiselessly into obscurity.

Lilly shivered, and clasped the score tighter in her arms. As she tried
to catch a sight of her reflection in the glass window of a florist's,
the blinds of which were not drawn down, she started. There she saw
stiff branches of evergreen laurels and cypresses encircling a bust of
the Kaiser; that recalled something strongly to her mind. What was it?
Ah! of course. They reminded her of the Clytie which reigned on the
pretentious private staircase of Liebert & Dehnicke's, smiling and
dreaming. Lilly Czepanek would never now ascend that green-shaded
stairway, either as a penitent or a triumphant sinner.

She had chosen a better way, which led more directly to the great goal.

She came to a bridge, and crossed it quickly. That other bridge, with
the iron palisade, which sung her such alluring cradle-songs, was
further away in the open, buried in darkness and silence.

"You overflow with a superfluity of love ... three kinds of love: love
emanating from the heart, the senses, and from compassion. One kind
everybody has; two are dangerous; all three lead to ruin!"

Who had said that?

Why, to be sure, her first flame--that poor consumptive lecturer on the
history of art, whom she and Rosalie Katz had clubbed together to send
to the promised land, the land which she herself had never seen. He had
spoken of the blue haze of the olives, of fields of shining asphodel,
and the black sirocco sea.

"Fields of shining asphodel." What sort of fields could they be, fields
of asphodel?

The foreign word sounded strange, and oh, how full of enchantment! But
her heels still went tap-tap, and the cradle-song of the palisade
thundered in between.

A man addressed her: "Would she ...?"

She shook him off as if he had been a reptile.

Then she remembered another warning that had been given her, also
divided into three heads--whose was that? Oh, now she recollected: Dr.
Pieper's. It came back to her, every word and sentence of the pompous
utterance sounding in her ears as clearly as if it had been spoken only
yesterday, "There are three things to beware of: Exchange no
superfluous glances; demand no superfluous rendering of accounts; make
no superfluous confessions."

"If I had not exchanged superfluous glances I should have seen my
promised land. If I had not superfluously demanded a rendering of
account, I should never have been kicked out of Lischnitz. And if I had
not made superfluous confessions...."

Well, what then?

"Konni! Konni!" she wailed. A shudder of yearning overwhelmed her
painfully, and restrained her wandering thoughts.

She walked on, staggering. Fresh lines of street vanished in mist, and
at one spot a grass lawn reared its unevenly clipped hedge.

"What sort of fields could they be, fields of shining asphodel?"

Ah! here was the bridge. The bridge!

Like a thief in the night it loomed in the darkness, above the wide,
deserted spaces, where the lights of thousands of street-lamps dwindled
into infinitesimal sparks. Somewhere in the dark sky shone the mild
face of a full-moon. It was the illuminated clock of a railway station,
the shadowy outline of which was swallowed up by the darkness. The
hands pointed to half-past one.

Lilly saw it all dimly, as through a haze. She had sunk, paralysed with
terror, against the corner of the wall, which she had intended to turn.
Her heart throbbed so convulsively that she thought she must fall down
dead.

"No; I can't do it!" she said to herself. And then came her own answer:
"But I can--I will!"

She tried to stagger a few steps further, on to the bridge where the
railings seemed to be waiting for her in malice; but her legs refused
to carry her. The singing in her head rose to a roar of thunder. She
stood hesitating on the dark, forsaken spot; with both hands she
struggled to tear the score and crumple it into a ball, but it would
not yield. Her "Song of Songs" was stronger than she was. Then, all at
once, her feet began to move as if of their own accord, and took her
step by step beyond the lamp-post to the railings. Yes, now the chains
of the palisade were between her fingers. She could see nothing of the
water below but a dark slimy shimmer. So murky was it that even the
lamps were not reflected in it.

Now all she had to do was to jump--and it would be over.

"Yes, I'll do it! I'll do it!" a voice within her cried.

But "The Song of Songs" must go first. It would be in the way, and
hinder her climbing over the railings.

She threw it. A white flash, a splash below, harsh and shrill, which
made her shake in every limb, as if her face had been slapped. And when
she heard it, she knew instantly that she would never do it. No, never!
Lilly Czepanek was no heroine. No martyr to her love was Lilly
Czepanek. No Isolde, who finds in the will not to exist the highest
form of self-existence. But she was only a poor exploited and plundered
human creature who must drag on through life as best she could. She
would not go back to the old round of degrading dissipations, however
much Richard might look like a whipped dog. Of that she was determined;
and she began forthwith to review the few possibilities left of her
earning an honest living.

Perhaps all would come right in the end, though she could not disguise
the fact that she had completely lost her zeal for work, and was never
likely to find it again. All she asked was to be allowed to live in
peace and the exercise of virtue. Did not millions of human beings
think there was nothing better?

She cast one more searching glance at the sullenly rolling river in
which "The Song of Songs" had found its grave, and then turned and
walked away.


                           *   *   *   *   *


In the business circles of Berlin there was a flutter of surprise the
following spring when the papers announced that Herr Richard Dehnicke,
senior partner of the well-known old firm of Liebert & Dehnicke, art
bronze manufacturers, had married Lilly Czepanek, a notorious beauty of
the _demimonde_. The announcement added that the pair had taken up
their quarters temporarily in Southern Italy. Those who knew her were
not surprised--they said that they had always felt Lilly Czepanek was a
dangerous woman.









http://bencrowder.net/books/mtp. Volunteers: Hilton
Campbell, Ben Crowder, Meridith Crowder, Eric Heaps, Tod
Robbins, Dave Van Leeuwen.








JOSEPH SMITH
AS
SCIENTIST

A CONTRIBUTION TO
MORMON PHILOSOPHY

BY

John A. Widtsoe, A. M., Ph. D.


THE GENERAL BOARD
YOUNG MEN'S MUTUAL IMPROVEMENT
ASSOCIATIONS
SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH
1908




Copyright
1908
by John A. Widtsoe.




Preface


In the life of every person, who receives a higher education, in or
out of schools, there is a time when there seems to be opposition
between science and religion; between man-made and God-made knowledge.
The struggle for reconciliation between the contending forces is not
an easy one. It cuts deep into the soul and usually leaves scars that
ache while life endures. There are thousands of young people in the
Church to-day, and hundreds of thousands throughout the world, who are
struggling to set themselves right with the God above and the world
about them. It is for these young people, primarily, that the
following chapters have been written.

This volume is based on the conviction that there is no real
difference between science and religion. The great, fundamental laws
of the Universe are foundation stones in religion as well as in
science. The principle that matter is indestructible belongs as much
to theology as to geology. The theology which rests upon the few basic
laws of nature is unshakable; and the great theology of the future
will be such a one.

"Mormonism" teaches and has taught from the beginning that all
knowledge must be included in the true theology. Because of its
comprehensive philosophy, "Mormonism" will survive all religious
disturbances and become the system of religious faith which all men
may accept without yielding the least part of the knowledge of nature
as discovered in the laboratories or in the fields. The splendid
conceptions of "Mormonism" concerning man and nature, and man's place
in nature are among the strongest testimonies of the divine nature of
the work founded by Joseph Smith, the Prophet.

This little volume does not pretend to be a complete treatment of
"Mormon" philosophy; it is only a small contribution to the subject.
There is room for elaboration and extension in this field for many
generations to come. The attempt has been made to sketch, briefly, the
relation of "Mormonism" to some features of modern scientific
philosophy, and to show that not only do "Mormonism" and science
harmonize; but that "Mormonism" is abreast of the most modern of the
established views of science, and that it has held them many years--in
some cases before science adopted them. The only excuse for the scant
treatment of such an important subject is that it is as extensive as
the duties of a busy life would allow. In the future, the subject may
be given a fuller treatment.

Some readers may urge that "the testimony of the Spirit," which has
been the final refuge of so many Christians, has received little
consideration in the following chapters. This is due to the avowed
purpose of the work to harmonize science and religion, on the basis of
accepted science. "Mormonism" is deeply and rationally spiritual; the
discussion in this volume is confined to one phase of Gospel
philosophy.

The majority of the following chapters were originally published in
the _Improvement Era_ for 1903-1904 as a series of articles bearing
the main title of this book. These articles are here republished with
occasonal changes and additions. The new chapters have been cast into
the same form as the original articles. The publication as independent
articles will explain the apparent lack of connection between the
chapters in this book. The statements of scientific facts have been
compared very carefully with standard authorities. However, in
popularizing science there is always the danger that the
simplification may suggest ideas that are not wholly accurate. Those
who have tried this kind of work will understand and pardon such
errors as may appear. However, corrections are invited.

My thanks are due and cheerfully given the management of the
_Improvement Era_ for the help and encouragement given. I am under
especial obligations to Elder Edward H. Anderson, the associate editor
of the _Era_, to whose efforts it is largely due that this volume has
seen the light of day. I desire to render my thanks also to the
committee appointed by the First Presidency to read the manuscript,
Elders George Albert Smith, Edward H. Anderson and Joseph F. Smith,
Jr.

This volume has been written in behalf of "Mormonism." May God speed
the truth!




Contents.


INTRODUCTORY.

  Chapter I. Joseph's Mission and Language

THE FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPTS OF THE UNIVERSE.

  Chapter II. The Indestructibility of Matter
  Chapter III. The Indestructibility of Energy
  Chapter IV. The Universal Ether
  Chapter V. The Reign of Law

THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNIVERSE.

  Chapter VI. The New Astronomy
  Chapter VII. Geological Time
  Chapter VIII. Organized Intelligence

THE LAWS GOVERNING THE INDIVIDUAL.

  Chapter IX. Faith
  Chapter X. Repentance
  Chapter XI. Baptism
  Chapter XII. The Gift of the Holy Ghost
  Chapter XIII. The Word of Wisdom

THE DESTINY OF EARTH AND MAN.

  Chapter XIV. The Law of Evolution
  Chapter XV. The Plan of Salvation

THE REGION OF THE UNKNOWN.

  Chapter XVI. The Sixth Sense

THE FORCE OF FORCES.

  Chapter XVII. The Nature of God

CONCLUSION.

  Chapter XVIII. Joseph Smith's Education
  Chapter XVIV. A Summary Restatement
  Chapter XX. Concluding Thoughts

APPENDIX.

  Chapter XXI. The Testimony of the Soil




INTRODUCTORY.

Chapter I.

JOSEPH'S MISSION AND LANGUAGE.


[Sidenote: Scientific discussions not to be expected in the Prophet's
work.]

The mission of Joseph Smith was of a spiritual nature; and therefore,
it is not to be expected that the discussion of scientific matters
will be found in the Prophet's writings. The revelations given to the
Prophet deal almost exclusively with the elucidation of so-called
religious doctrines, and with such difficulties as arose from time to
time in the organization of the Church. It is only, as it appears to
us, in an incidental way that other matters, not strictly of a
religious nature, are mentioned in the revelations. However, the
Church teaches that all human knowledge and all the laws of nature are
part of its religious system; but that some principles are of more
importance than others in man's progress to eternal salvation.[A]
While on the one hand, therefore, it cannot reasonably be expected
that Joseph Smith should deal in his writings with any subject
peculiar to natural science, yet, on the other hand, it should not
surprise any student to find that the Prophet at times considered
matters that do not come under the ordinary definition of religion,
especially if they in any way may be connected with the laws of
religion. Statements of scientific detail should not be looked for in
Joseph Smith's writings, though these are not wholly wanting; but
rather, we should expect to find general views of the relations of the
forces of the universe.

[Footnote A: "And truth is knowledge of things as they are, and as
they were and as they are to come."--Doctrine and Covenants, 93:24.

"Teach ye diligently and my grace shall attend you, that you may be
instructed more perfectly in theory, in principle, in doctrine, in the
law of the Gospel, in all things that pertain unto the Kingdom of God,
that are expedient for you to understand;

"Of things both in heaven and in the earth, and under the earth;
things which have been, things which are, things which must shortly
come to pass; things which are at home, things which are abroad; the
wars and the perplexities of the nations, and the judgments which are
on the land, and a knowledge also of countries and kingdoms,

"That ye may be prepared in all things when I shall send you again to
magnify the calling, whereunto I have called you, and the mission with
which I have commissioned you."--Doctrine and Covenants, 88:78-80.

"And verily, I say unto you, that it is my will that you should hasten
to translate my Scriptures, and to obtain a knowledge of history, and
of countries, and of kingdoms, of laws of God and man, and all this
for the salvation of Zion."--Doctrine and Covenants, 93:53.

"It (theology) is the science of all other sciences and useful arts,
being in fact the very foundation from which they emanate. It includes
philosophy, astronomy, history, mathematics, geography, languages, the
science of letters, and blends the knowledge of all matters of fact,
in every branch of art and research.......All that is useful, great
and good, all that is calculated to sustain, comfort, instruct, edify,
purify, refine or exalt intelligences, originated by this science, and
this science alone, all other sciences being but branches growing out
of this, the root."--Pratt, Key to Theology, chap. 1.]

[Sidenote: Man must not expect direct revelation in matters that he
can solve for himself.]

It is not in harmony with the Gospel spirit that God, except in
special cases, should reveal things that man by the aid of his natural
powers may gain for himself. The Lord spoke to the Prophet as
follows:--"Behold, you have not understood; you have supposed that I
would give it unto you, when you took no thought, save it was to ask
me; but, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your
mind; then you must ask me if it be right, and if it is right I will
cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore, you shall feel
that it is right."[A] Such a doctrine makes it unreasonable to look to
the Prophet's work for a gratuitous mass of scientific or other
details, which will relieve man of the labor of searching out for
himself nature's laws. So well established is this principle that in
all probability many of the deepest truths contained in the writings
of Joseph Smith will not be clearly understood, even by his followers,
until, by the laborious methods of mortality, the same truths are
established. It is even so with the principles to be discussed in the
following papers. They were stated seventy years ago, yet it is only
recently that the Latter-day Saints have begun to realize that they
are identical with recently developed scientific truths; and the world
of science is not yet aware of it. However, whenever such harmony is
observed, it testifies of the divine inspiration of the humble,
unlearned boy prophet of the nineteenth century.

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants 9:7, 8.]

[Sidenote: The absence of the language, details and methods of science
in the Prophet's writings proves him unfamiliar with the written
science of his day.]

The Prophet Joseph does not use the language of science; which is
additional proof that he did not know the science of his day. This may
be urged as an objection to the assertion that he understood
fundamental scientific truths, but the error of this view is easily
comprehended when it is recalled that the language of science is made
by men, and varies very often from age to age, and from country to
country. Besides, the God who spoke to Joseph Smith, says, "These
commandments were given unto my servants in their weakness, after the
manner of their language, that they might come to understanding."[A]
If God had spoken the special language of science, the unlearned
Joseph Smith would not, perhaps, have understood. Every wise man
explains that which he knows in the language of those to whom he is
speaking, and the facts and theories of science can be quite easily
expressed in the language of the common man. It is needless to expect
scientific phraselogy in the writings of Joseph Smith.

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants 1:24.]

Scientific details are almost wholly wanting in the writings of Joseph
Smith. Had the Prophet known the science of his day, his detailed
knowledge would have been incorporated somehow in his writings. The
almost complete absence of such scientific detail as would in all
probability have been used, had the Prophet known of it, is additional
testimony that he did not get his information from books.

Finally, another important fact must be mentioned. Men in all ages
have speculated about the things of the universe, and have invented
all kinds of theories to explain natural phenomena. In all cases,
however, these theories have been supported by experimental evidence,
or else they have been proposed simply as personal opinions. Joseph
Smith, on the contrary, laid no claim to experimental data to support
the theories which he proposed, nor did he say that they were simply
personal opinions, but he repeatedly asserted that God had revealed
the truths to him, and that they could not, therefore, be false. If
doctrines resting upon such a claim can be shown to be true, it is
additional testimony of the truth of the Prophet's work.

[Sidenote: Purpose of the following chapters.]

In the following chapters it will be shown, by a series of
comparisons, that, in 1833, or soon thereafter, the teachings of
Joseph Smith, the Mormon Prophet, were in full harmony with the most
advanced scientific thought of today, and that he anticipated the
world of science in the statement of fundamental facts and theories of
physics, chemistry, astronomy and biology.




THE FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPTS OF THE UNIVERSE.

Chapter II.

THE INDESTRUCTIBILITY OF MATTER.


[Sidenote: Until recent days many believed that matter could be
created or destroyed.]

It was believed by the philosophers of ancient and mediaeval times,
especially by those devoted to the study of alchemy, that it was
possible through mystical powers, often of a supernatural order, to
annihilate matter or to create it from nothing. Men with such powers
transcended all known laws of nature, and became objects of fear,
often of worship to the masses of mankind. Naturally enough, the
systems of religion became colored with the philosophical doctrines of
the times; and it was held to be a fundamental religious truth that
God created the world from nothing. Certainly, God could do what his
creatures, the magicians, were able to do--that part of the reasoning
was sound.

In support of this doctrine, attention was called to some of the
experiences of daily life. A piece of coal placed in a stove, in a
short time disappear--it is annihilated. From the clear air of a
summer's day raindrops start--created out of nothing. A fragment of
gold placed in contact with sufficiently strong acids, disappears--it
is destroyed.

[Sidenote: Matter is eternal, its form only can be changed.]

Towards the end of the eighteenth century, facts and laws of chemistry
were discovered, which enabled scientists to follow in great detail
the changes, visible or invisible, to which matter in its various
forms is subject. Then it was shown that the coal placed in a stove
unites with a portion of the air entering through the drafts, and
becomes an invisible gas, but that, were this gas collected as it
issues from the chimney, it would be found to contain a weight of the
elements of the coal just equal to the weight of the coal used. In a
similar manner it was shown that the raindrops are formed from the
water found in the air, as an invisible vapor. The gold dissolved in
the acid, may be wholly recovered so that every particle is accounted
for. Numerous investigations on this subject were made by the most
skillful experimenters of the age, all of which showed that it is
absolutely impossible to create or destroy the smallest particle of
matter; that the most man can do is to change the form in which matter
exists.

After this truth had been demonstrated, it was a necessary conclusion
that matter is eternal, and that the quantity of matter in the
universe cannot be diminished nor increased. This great
generalization, known as the law of the Persistence of Matter or Mass,
is the foundation stone of modern science. It began to find general
acceptance among men about the time of Joseph Smith's birth, though
many religious sects still hold that God, as the Supreme Ruler, is
able at will to create matter from nothing. The establishment of this
law marked also the final downfall of alchemy and other kindred occult
absurdities.

[Sidenote: Mormonism teaches that all things are material.]

No doctrine taught by Joseph Smith is better understood by his
followers than that matter in its elementary condition is eternal, and
that it can neither be increased nor diminished. As early as May,
1833, the Prophet declared that "the elements are eternal,"[A] and in
a sermon delivered in April, 1844, he said "Element had an existence
from the time God had. The pure principles of element are principles
which can never be destroyed; they may be organized and reorganized,
but not destroyed. They had no beginning, and can have no end."[B]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 93:33.]

[Footnote B: The Contributor, Vol. 4, p. 257.]

It is thus evident that from the beginning of his work, Joseph Smith
was in perfect harmony with the fundamental doctrine of science; and
far in advance of the religious sects of the world, which are, even at
this time, slowly accepting the doctrine of the persistence of matter
in a spiritual as well as in a material sense.

Mormonism has frequently been charged with accepting the doctrine of
materialism. In one sense, the followers of Joseph Smith plead yes to
this charge. In Mormon theology there is no place for immateralism;
i.e. for a God, spirits and angels that are not material. Spirit is
only a refined form of matter. It is beyond the mind of man to
conceive of an immaterial thing. On the other hand, Joseph Smith did
not teach that the kind of tangible matter, which impresses our mortal
senses, is the kind of matter which is associated with heavenly
beings. The distinction between the matter known to man and the spirit
matter is very great; but no greater than is the difference between
the matter of the known elements and that of the universal ether which
forms one of the accepted dogmas of science.

Science knows phenomena only as they are associated with matter;
Mormonism does the same.




Chapter III.

THE INDESTRUCTIBILITY OF ENERGY.


[Sidenote: All forms of energy may be converted into each other.
Energy can not be destroyed.]

It is only when matter is in motion, or in the possession of energy,
that it is able to impress our senses. The law of the
indestructibility and convertibility of energy, is of equal
fundamental value with that of the indestructibility of matter. A
great variety of forces exist in nature, as, for instance,
gravitation, electricity, chemical affinity, heat and light. These
forces may all be made to do work. Energy, in fact, may be defined as
the power of doing work. In early days these forces were supposed to
be distinct and not convertible, one into the other, just as gold and
silver, with our present knowledge, are distinct and not convertible
into other elements.

In the early part of the nineteenth century students of light and heat
began to demonstrate that these two natural forces were different
manifestations of one universal medium. This in turn led to the
thought that possibly these forces, instead of being absolutely
distinct, could be converted one into the other. This idea was
confirmed in various experimental ways. Sir Humphrey Davy, about the
end of the eighteenth century, rubbed together two pieces of ice until
they were nearly melted. Precautions had been taken that no heat could
be abstracted from the outside by the ice. The only tenable conclusion
was that the energy expended in rubbing, had been converted into heat,
which had melted the ice. About the same time, Count Rumford, a
distinguished American, was superintending the boring of a cannon at
the arsenal at Munich, and was forcibly struck with the heating of the
iron due to this process. He, like Davy, believed that the energy of
the boring instruments had been converted into the heat.[A]

[Footnote A: The Conservation of Heat--Stewart, pp. 38, 39.]

From 1843 to 1849, Dr. Joule of Manchester, England, published the
results of experiments on the relation between mechanical energy and
heat. Dr. Joule attached a fixed weight to a string which was passed
over a pulley, while the other end was connected with paddles moving
in water. As the weight descended, the paddles were caused to revolve;
and it was observed that, as the weight fell and the paddles revolved,
the water became warmer and warmer. Dr. Joule found further that for
each foot of fall, the same amount of heat energy was given to the
water. In fact, he determined that when a pound weight falls seven
hundred and seventy two feet it gives out energy enough to raise the
temperature of one pound of water one degree Fahrenheit.[A] This
experiment, frequently repeated, gave the same result and established
largely the law of the convertibility of energy.

[Footnote A: The Conservation of Energy--Stewart, pp. 44, 45. Recent
Advances in Physical Science--Tait, pp. 63, 65.]

About the same time, it was shown that light can be converted into
heat; and later it was proved that electricity may be changed into
heat or light. In all these cases it was found that the amount of
energy changed was exactly equal to the amount of energy produced.

Thus, by countless experiments, it was finally determined that energy
is indestructible; that, when any form of energy disappears, it
reappears immediately in another form. This is the law of the
persistence of force or energy. In more recent days, it has been
suggested that all known forces are variations of a great universal
force, which may or may not be known. The very nature of force or
energy is not understood. In the language of Spencer, "By the
persistence of force, we really mean the persistence of some cause
which transcends our knowledge and conception."[A]

[Footnote A: First Principles, Spencer, 4th ed., p. 200.]

It need hardly be explained that energy cannot exist independently of
matter; and that the law of the persistence of matter is necessary for
the existence of the law of persistence of force.

[Sidenote: Universal intelligence, comparable to universal energy is
indestructible, according to Joseph Smith.]

Joseph Smith was not a scientist; and he made no pretense of solving
the scientific questions of this day. The discussion relative to the
convertibility of various forms of energy was in all probability not
known to him. Still, in his writings is found a doctrine which in all
respects resembles that of the conservation of energy.

Joseph Smith taught, and the Church now teaches, that all space is
filled with a subtle, though material substance of wonderful
properties, by which all natural phenomena are controlled. This
substance is known as the Holy Spirit. Its most important
characteristic is intelligence. "Its inherent properties embrace all
the attributes of intelligence."[A] The property of intelligence is to
the Holy Spirit what energy is to the gross material of our senses.

[Footnote A: Key to Theology, P. P. Pratt, 5th ed., p. 40.]

In one of the generally accepted works of the Church, the energy of
nature is actually said to be the workings of the Holy Spirit. The
passage reads as follows: "Man observes a universal energy in
nature--organization and disorganization succeed each other--the
thunders roll through the heavens; the earth trembles and becomes
broken by earthquakes; fires consume cities and forests; the waters
accumulate, flow over their usual bounds, and cause destruction of
life and property; the worlds perform their revolutions in space with
a velocity and power incomprehensible to man, and he, covered with a
veil of darkness, calls this universal energy, God, when it is the
workings of his Spirit, the obedient agent of his power, the
wonder-working and life-giving principle in all nature."[A]

[Footnote A: Compendium, Richards and Little, 3rd ed., p. 150.]

In short, the writings of the Church clearly indicate that the various
forces of nature, the energy of nature, are only manifestations of the
great, pervading force of intelligence. We do not understand the real
nature of intelligence any better than we understand the true nature
of energy. We only know that by energy or intelligence gross matter is
brought within reach of our senses.

Intelligence or energy was declared by Joseph Smith in May, 1833, to
be eternal: "Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or
made, neither indeed can be."[A] In the sermon already referred to the
Prophet said, "The intelligence of spirits had no beginning, neither
will it have an end."

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 93:29.]

These quotations, and many others to which attention might be called,
show clearly that Joseph Smith taught the doctrine that the energy of
the universe can in nowise be increased or diminished, though, it may
manifest itself in various forms.

The great Latter-day prophet is thus shown to be in harmony with the
second fundamental law of science. It is not a valid objection to this
conclusion to say that Joseph Smith did not use the accepted terms of
science. Words stand only for ideas; the ideas are essential. The
nomenclature of a science is often different in different lands, and
is often changed as knowledge grows.

It is hardly correct to say that he was in harmony with the law; the
law as stated by the world of science was rather in harmony with him.
Let it be observed that Joseph Smith enunciated the principle of the
conservation of the energy, or intelligence as he called it, of the
universe, in May, 1833, ten years before Dr. Joule published his
famous papers on energy relations, and fifteen or twenty years before
the doctrine was clearly understood and generally accepted by the
learned of the world. Let it be also remembered that the unlearned boy
from the backwoods of New York state, taught with the conviction of
absolute certainty that the doctrine was true, for God had revealed it
to him.

If God did not reveal it to him, where did he learn it, and whence
came the courage to teach it as an eternal truth?




Chapter IV.

THE UNIVERSAL ETHER.


[Sidenote: The modern theory of light was established only about the
year 1830.]

The nature of light has been in every age a fascinating subject for
study and reflection. Descartes, the French mathematician and
philosopher, advanced the hypothesis that light consists of small
particles emitted by luminous bodies, and that the sensation of light
is produced by the impact of these particles upon the retina of the
eye. Soon after this emission or corpuscular theory had been proposed,
Hooke, an English investigator of great note, stated publicly that the
phenomena of light, as he had observed them, led him to the belief
that the nature of light could best be explained on the assumption
that light was a kind of undulation or wave in some unknown medium,
and that the sensation of light was. produced when these waves struck
upon the retina of the eye. This new hypothesis, known as the theory
of undulations, after the great Isaac Newton had declared himself in
favor of the corpuscular theory, was finally adjudged by the majority
of students to be erroneous.

About the year 1800, more than a century after the days of Descartes,
Hooke and Newton, an English physician, Dr. Thomas Young, who had long
experimented on the nature of light, asserted that the emission theory
could not explain many of the best known phenomena of light. Dr. Young
further claimed that correct explanations could be made only by the
theory of waves of undulation of an etherial medium diffused through
space, and presented numerous experimental evidences in favor of this
view. This revival of the old theory of undulation met at first with
violent opposition from many of the greatest scientific minds of the
day. Sometime after Dr. Young's publication, a French army officer,
Augustine Fresnel, undertook the study of the nature of light, and
arrived, almost independently, at the conclusion stated by Dr. Young.
Later, other investigators discovered light phenomena which could be
explained only on the undulatory hypothesis, and so, little by little,
the new theory gained ground and adherents.

Still, even as late as 1827, the astronomer Herschel published a
treatise on light, in which he appeared to hold the real merit of the
theory of undulations in grave doubt.[A] Likewise, the Imperial
Academy at St. Petersburg, in 1826, proposed a prize for the best
attempt to relieve the undulatory theory of light of some of the main
objections against it.[B] It was several years later before the great
majority of the scientific world accepted the theory of undulations as
the correct explanation of the phenomena of light.

[Footnote A: History of the Inductive Sciences, Whewell, 3rd edition,
Vol. II, p. 114.]

[Footnote B: Loc. cit., 117.]

[Sidenote: A subtle substance, the ether, fills all space.]

In brief, this theory assumes that a very attenuated, but very
elastic, substance, called the ether, fills all space, and is found
surrounding the ultimate particles of matter. Thus, the pores of wood,
soil, lead, gold and the human body, are filled with the ether. It is
quite impossible by any known process to obtain a portion of space
free from it. A luminous body is one in which the ultimate particles
of matter, the atoms or molecules, are moving very rapidly, and thus
causing disturbances in the ether, similar to the disturbances in
quiet water when a rock is thrown into it; and, like the water wave,
proceeding from the point of disturbance, so the ether waves radiate
from the luminous body into space. When a wave strikes the retina of
the eye, the sensation of light is produced. This new-found ether was
soon used for the explanation of other natural phenomena.

[Sidenote: Light, heat, electricity and other forces are forms of
ether motion.]

The nature of heat had long been discussed when the world of science
decided in favor of the undulatory theory of light. One school held
that the sensation of heat was caused by the cannonading of heat
particles by the heated body; the other school, with few adherents,
insisted that heat was simply a form of motion of the ether already
adopted in the theory of light. The later discoveries of science
proved with considerable certainty that the undulatory theory of heat
is right, but it was well towards the middle of the last century
before the emission theory of heat lost its ground. In fact,
Dr.Whewell, in the third edition of his classic book on the _History
of Inductive Sciences_, published in 1859, says that the undulatory
theory of heat "has not by any means received full confirmation;"[A]
and Dr. John Tyndall, in a book published in 1880, says, that the
emission theory "held its ground until quite recently among the
chemists of our own day."[B] Today, the evidences of modern science
are overwhelmingly in favor of the undulatory theory of heat.

[Footnote A: Vol. II, p. 184.]

[Footnote B: Heat, A Mode of Motion, Tyndall, 6th ed., p. 38.]

The wonderful developments of the last century, in electricity and
magnetism, led to much speculation concerning the nature of the subtle
electrical and magnetic forces. The most popular theories for many
years were those that presupposed various electrical and magnetic
fluids, which could be collected, conducted, dispersed and otherwise
controlled. In 1867, the eminent English mathematician, Clerk Maxwell,
proposed the theory that electrical and magnetic phenomena were simply
peculiar motions of the ether, bearing definite relationship to light
waves. Later researches, one result of which is the now famous
Roentgen or X-rays, have tended to confirm Maxwell's theory. A recent
text-book on physics, of unquestioned authority,[A] states that the
ether theory of electricity and magnetism is now susceptible of direct
demonstration; and another eminent authority frankly states that "when
we explain the nature of electricity, we explain it by a motion of the
luminiferous ether."[B]

[Footnote A: Lehrbuch der Physik, Riecke, (1896), 2ter Band, p. 315.]

[Footnote B: Popular Lectures and Addresses, Kelvin (1891) Vol. 1,
page 334.]

Other recent discoveries have hinted at the possibility of matter
itself being only the result of peculiar forms of this all-pervading
substance, the luminiferous ether. The properties of the element
radium, and other radioactive elements, as at present understood,
suggest the possibility of a better understanding of the nature of the
ether, and of its relation to the world of phenomena.

[Sidenote: The existence of the ether is a certainty of science.]

That the present knowledge of the world of science compels a faith in
an all-pervading substance, of marvelous properties, and of intimate
relationship to all forms of energy, is shown by the following
quotations from Lord Kelvin, who is generally regarded as the world's
greatest physicist: "The luminferous ether, that is the only substance
we are confident of in dynamics. One thing we are sure of, and that is
the reality and substantiality of the luminiferous ether." "What can
this luminiferous ether be? It is something that the planets move
through with the greatest ease. It permeates our air; it is nearly in
the same condition, so far as our means of judging are concerned, in
our air and in the interplanetary space." "You may regard the
existence of the luminiferous ether as a reality of science." "It is
matter prodigiously less dense than air--of such density as not to
produce the slightest resistance to any body going through it."[A]

[Footnote A: Kelvin's Lectures, Vol. 1, pp. 317, 334, 336, 354.]

The theory of the ether is one of the most helpful assumptions of
modern science. By its aid the laws of energy have been revealed.
There is at the present time no grander or more fundamental doctrine
in science than that of the ether. The nature of the ether is, of
course, far from being clearly understood, but every discovery in
science demonstrates that the hypothetical ether stands for an
important reality of nature. Together with the doctrines of the
indestructibility of matter and energy, the doctrine of the ether
welds and explains all the physical phenomena of the universe.

Joseph Smith, in a revelation received on December 27, 1832, wrote:

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith taught space is filled with a substance
comparable to the ether of science.]

"The light which now shineth, which giveth you light, is through him
who enlighteneth your eyes, which is the same light that quickeneth
your understandings; which light proceedeth forth from the presence of
God to fill the immensity of space. The light which is in all things:
which is the law by which all things are governed: even the power of
God."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, section 88:11-13.]

This quotation gives undoubted evidence of the prophet's belief that
space is filled with some substance which bears important relations to
all natural phenomena. The word substance is used advisedly; for in
various places in the writings of Joseph Smith, light, used as above
in a general sense, means spirit,[A] and "all spirit is matter, but it
is more fine and pure."[B]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 84:45.]

[Footnote B: Ibid, 131:7.]

True, the passage above quoted does not furnish detailed explanation
of the Prophet's view concerning the substance filling all space, but
it must be remembered that it is simply an incidental paragraph in a
chapter of religious instruction. True, also, the Prophet goes farther
than some modern scientists, when he says that this universal
substance bears a controlling relation to all things; yet, when it is
recalled that eminent, sober students have suggested that the facts of
science make it possible to believe that matter itself is simply a
phenomenon of the universal ether, the statement of the "Mormon"
prophet seems very reasonable. The paragraph already quoted is not an
accidental arrangement of words suggesting an idea not intended by the
prophet, for in other places, he presents the idea of an omnipresent
substance binding all things together. For instance, in speaking of
the controlling power of the universe he says:

"He comprehendeth all things, and all things are before him, and all
things are round about him; and he is above all things, and in all
things, and is through all things, and is round about all things."[A]

[Footnote A: Ibid, 88:41.]

That Joseph Smith does not here have in mind an omnipresent God, is
proved by the emphatic doctrine that God is personal and cannot be
everywhere present.[A]

[Footnote A: Ibid, 130:22.]

Lest it be thought that the words are forced, for argument's sake, to
give the desired meaning, it may be well to examine the views of some
of the persons to whom the Prophet explained in detail the meanings of
the statements in the revelations which he claimed to have received
from God.

Parley P. Pratt, who, as a member of the first quorum of apostles, had
every opportunity of obtaining the Prophet's views on any subject,
wrote in considerable fullness on the subject of the Holy Spirit, or
the light of truth:

"As the mind passes the boundaries of the visible world, and enters
upon the confines of the more refined and subtle elements, it finds
itself associated with certain substances in themselves invisible to
our gross organs, but clearly manifested to our intellect by their
tangible operations and effects." "The purest, most refined and subtle
of all these substances--is that substance called the Holy Spirit."
"It is omnipresent." "It is in its less refined particles, the
physical light which reflects from the sun, moon and stars, and other
substances; and by reflection on the eye makes visible the truths of
the outward world."[A]

[Footnote A: Key to Theology, 5th ed., pp. 38-41.]

Elder C. W. Penrose, an accepted writer on Mormon doctrine, writes,
"It is by His Holy Spirit, which permeates all things, and is the life
and light of all things, that Deity is everywhere present. * * By that
agency God sees and knows and governs all things."[A]

[Footnote A: Rays of Living Light, No. 2, p. 3.]

Such quotations, from the men intimately associated or acquainted with
the early history of the Church, prove that Joseph Smith taught in
clearness the doctrine that a subtle form of matter, call it ether or
Holy Spirit, pervades all space; that all phenomena of nature,
including, specifically, heat, light and electricity, are definitely
connected with this substance. He taught much else concerning this
substance which science will soon discover, but which lies without the
province of this paper to discuss.

By the doctrine of the ether, it is made evident all the happenings in
the universe are indelibly inscribed upon the record of nature. A word
is spoken. The air movements that it causes disturbs the ether. The
ether waves radiate into space and can never die. Anywhere, with the
proper instrument, one of the waves may be captured, and the spoken
word read. That is the simple method of wireless telegraphy. It is
thus that all our actions shall be known on the last great day. By the
ether, or the Holy Spirit as named by the Prophet, God holds all
things in His keeping. His intelligent will radiates into space, to
touch whomsoever it desires. He who is tuned aright can read the
message, flashed across the ether ocean, by the Almighty. Thus, also,
God, who is a person, filling only a portion of space is, by His power
carried by the ether, everywhere present.

The ether of science though material is essentially different from the
matter composing the elements. So, also, in Mormon theology, is the
Holy Spirit different from the grosser elements. In science there is a
vast distinction between the world of the elements, and that of the
ether; in theology, there is an equally great difference between the
spiritual and material worlds. Though the theology of Joseph Smith
insists that immaterialism is an absurdity, yet it permits no
overlapping of the earthly and the spiritual.

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith stated the existence of a universe-filling
substance before science had generally accepted it.]

It must not be overlooked that the broad statement of this doctrine
was made by Joseph Smith, at least as early as 1832, at a time when
the explanation of light phenomena on the hypothesis of a universal
ether was just beginning to find currency among learned men; and many
years before the same hypothesis was accepted in explaining the
phenomena of heat and electricity.

The idea of an influence pervading the universe is not of itself new.
Poets and philosophers of all ages have suggested it in a vague,
hesitating manner, without connecting it with the phenomena of nature,
but burdening it with the greatest absurdity of religion or
philosophy, that of immaterialism. Joseph Smith said the doctrine had
been taught him by God, and gave it to the world unhesitatingly and
rationally. The men of science, to whom Joseph Smith appears only as
an imposter, and who know nothing of his writings, have later
discovered the truth for themselves, and incorporated it in their
books of learning.

Had Joseph Smith been the clever imposter that some claim he was, he
probably would not have dealt in any way with the theories of the
material world, at least would not have claimed revelations laying
down physical laws; had he been the stupid fool, others tell us he
was, his mind would not have worried itself with the fundamental
problems of nature.

However that may be, it is certain that Joseph Smith, in the broad and
rational statement of the existence of an omnipresent, material though
subtle substance, anticipated the workers in science. In view of that
fact, it is not improbable that at some future time, when science
shall have gained a wider view, the historian of the physical sciences
will say that Joseph Smith, the clear-sighted, first stated correctly
the fundamental physical doctrine of the universal ether.




Chapter V.

THE REIGN OF LAW.


In the seventh book of the _Republic of Plato_[A] occurs the following
passage:

[Footnote A: Golden Treasury edition, pp. 235, 236.]

[Sidenote: The realities of nature are known by their effects.]

"Imagine a number of men living in an underground cavernous chamber,
with an entrance open to the light, extending along the entire length
of the cavern, in which they have been confined, from childhood, with
their legs and necks so shackled, that they are obliged to sit still
and look straight forward, because their chains render it impossible
for them to turn their heads round; and imagine a bright fire burning
some way off, above and behind them, and an elevated roadway passing
between the fire and the prisoners, with a low wall built along it,
like the screens which conjurers put up in front of their audiences,
and above which they exhibit their wonders. Also figure to yourself a
number of persons walking behind the wall, and carrying with them
statues of men and images of other animals, wrought in wood and stone
and all kinds of materials, together with various other articles,
which overtop the wall; and, as you might expect, let some of the
passers-by be talking, and the others silent.

"Let me ask whether persons so confined could have seen anything of
themselves or of each other, beyond the shadows thrown by the fire
upon the part of the cavern facing them? And is not their knowledge of
the things carried past them equally limited? And if they were able to
converse with one another, would they not be in the habit of giving
names to the objects which they saw before them? If their prison house
returned an echo from the part facing them, whenever one of the
passers-by opened his lips, to what could they refer the voice, if not
to the shadow which was passing? Surely such person would hold the
shadows of those manufactured articles to be the only realities."

With reference to our absolute knowledge of the phenomena of nature,
this splendid comparison is as correct today as it was in the days of
Plato, about 400 B. C.; we are only as prisoners in a great cave,
watching shadows of passing objects thrown upon the cavern wall, and
reflecting upon the real natures of the things whose shadows we see.
We know things only by their effects; the essential nature of matter,
ether and energy is far from our understanding.

[Sidenote: The progress of science rests on the law of cause and
effect.]

In early and mediaeval times, the recognition of the fact that nature
in its ultimate form is unknowable, led to many harmful superstitions.
Chief among the fallacies of the early ages was the belief that God at
will could, and did, cause various phenomena to appear in nature,
which were contrary to all human experience. As observed in chapter 4,
a class of men arose who claimed to be in possession of knowledge
which made them also able, at will, to cause various supernatural
manifestations. Thus arose the occult sciences, so called,--alchemy,
astrology, magic, witchcraft, and all other similar abominations of
the intellect. Such beliefs made the logical study of nature
superfluous, for any apparent regularity or law in nature might at any
time be overturned by a person in possession of a formula of the black
art or a properly treated broomstick.

While such ideas prevailed among the majority of men, the rational
study of science could make little progress. In the march of the ages
as the ideas of men were classified, it began to be understood that
the claims of the devotees of the mystical arts not only could not be
substantiated but were in direct opposition to the known operations of
nature. It became clear to the truthseekers, that in nature a given
cause, acting upon any given object, providing all surrounding
conditions be left unchanged, will always produce the same effect.
Thus, coal of a certain quality, brought to a high temperature in the
presence of air, will burn and produce heat; a stick held in water at
the right angle will appear crooked; iron kept in contact with
moisture and air, at the right temperature, will be changed into rust;
sunlight passed through a glass prism will be broken into rainbow
colors; ordinary plants placed in a dark cellar will languish and die.
No matter how often trials are made, the above results are obtained;
and today it is safe to assert that in the material world no relation
of cause and effect, once established, has failed to reappear at the
will of the investigator. As this principle of the constancy in the
relations between cause and effect was established, the element of
chance in natural phenomena, with its attendant arts of magic, had to
disappear. It is now well understood by intelligent persons that the
law of order controls all the elements of nature.

It is true that the cause of any given effect may, itself, be the
effect of other causes, and that the first cause of daily phenomena is
not and probably cannot be understood. It is also true that very
seldom is the mind able to comprehend why certain causes, save the
simpler ones, should produce certain effects. In that respect we are
again nothing more than Plato's cave prisoners, seeing the shadows of
ultimate realities. However, the recognition of the principle of the
invariable relation between cause and effect was a great onward stride
in the intellectual development of the world.

[Sidenote: Laws of nature are man's simplest expression of many
related facts.]

Now, as men began to investigate nature with her forces, according to
the new light, numerous relations of the forces were discovered--in
number far beyond the comprehension of the human mind. Then it was
found necessary to group all facts of a similar nature, and invent, if
possible, some means by which the properties of the whole group might
be stated in language so simple as to reach the understanding. Thus
came the laws of nature.

For instance, men from earliest times observed the heavenly bodies and
the regularity of their motions. Theories of the universe were
invented which should harmonize with the known facts. As new facts
were discovered, the theories had to be changed and extended. First it
was believed that the earth was fixed in mid-space, and sun and stars
were daily carried around it. Hipparchus improved this theory by
placing the earth not exactly in the center of the sun's circle.
Ptolemy, three hundred years later, considered that the sun and moon
move in circles, yearly, around the earth, and the other planets in
circles, whose centers again described circles round the earth.
Copernicus simplified the whole system by teaching that the earth
rotated around its axis, and around the sun. Keppler next showed that
the earth moved around the sun in certain curves termed ellipses.
Finally, Newton hit upon the wide-embracing law of gravitation, which
unifies all the known facts of astronomy.[A] All the earlier laws were
correct, so far as they included all the knowledge of the age in which
they were proposed, but were insufficient to include the new
discoveries.

[Footnote A: See The Grammar of Science, Pearson, pp. 117, 118.]

Laws of nature are, therefore, man's simplest and most comprehensive
expression of his knowledge of certain groups of natural phenomena.
They are man-made, and subject to change as knowledge grows; but, as
they change, they approach or should approach more and more nearly to
the perfect law. Modern science is built upon the assumption that the
relations between cause and effect are invariable, and that these
relations may be grouped to form great natural laws, which express the
modes by which the forces of the universe manifest themselves.

[Sidenote: A miracle is a law not understood.]

In this matter, science is frankly humble, and acknowledges that the
region of the unknown is far greater than that of the known. Forces,
relations and laws may exist as yet unknown to the world of science,
which, used by a human or superhuman being, might to all appearances
change well-established relations of known forces. That would be a
miracle; but a miracle simply means a phenomenon not understood, in
its cause and effect relations. It must also be admitted that men
possess no absolute certainty that though certain forces, brought into
a certain conjunction a thousand times, have produced the same effect,
they will continue to do so. Should a variation occur, however, that
also must be ascribed to an inherent property of the forces or
conditions, or the existence of a law not understood.[A] There can be
no chance in the operations of nature. This is a universe of law and
order.

[Footnote A: The Credentials of Science, the Warrant of Faith, Cooke,
pp. 169, 170.]

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith taught the invariable relation of cause and
effect.]

Were it not for the sake of the completeness of the argument running
through these chapters, it would be unnecessary to call attention to
the fact that Joseph Smith in a very high degree held views similar to
those taught by science relative to cause and effect, and the reign of
law.

From the beginning of his career, the Prophet insisted upon order, or
system, as the first law in the religion or system of philosophy which
he founded.[A] Moreover, the order which he taught was of an
unchangeable nature, corresponding to the invariable relation between
cause and effect. He wrote, "There is a law, irrevocably decreed in
heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings
are predicated; and when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by
obedience to that law upon which it is predicated."[B] No text book in
science has a clearer or more positive statement than this, of the
fact that like causes have like effects, like actions like results.
The eternal nature of natural law is further emphasized as follows:

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 28:13; 132; 8.]

[Footnote B: Doctrine and Covenants, 130:20, 21.]

"If there be bounds set to the heavens, or to the seas: or to the dry
land, or to the sun, moon or stars; all the times of their
revolutions; all the appointed days, months, and years, and all the
days of their days, months, and years, and all their glories, laws,
and set times, shall be revealed, in the days of the dispensation of
the fullness of times, according to that which was ordained in the
midst of the Council of the Eternal God of all other Gods before this
world was."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 121:30-32.]

Those who may be inclined to believe that this doctrine was taught in
a spiritual sense only, should recall that Joseph Smith taught also
that spirit is only a pure form of matter,[A] so that the principles
of the material world must have their counterparts in the spiritual
world. Besides, in the last quotation reference is made to such
material bodies as sun, moon, and stars. In other places, special
mention is made of the fact that the material universe is controlled
by law. For instance:

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 131:7.]

"All kingdoms have a law given: and there are many kingdoms; * * * *
and unto every kingdom is given a law; and unto every law there are
certain bounds also and conditions. * * * * And again, verily I say
unto you, he hath given a law unto all things by which they move in
their times and their seasons; and their courses are fixed; even the
courses of the heavens and the earth, which comprehend the earth and
all the planets."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 88:36-33, 42, 43.]

This also is a clear, concise statement of law and its nature, which
is not excelled by the definitions of science. There can be no doubt
from these quotations, as from many others that might be made, that
Joseph Smith based his teachings upon the recognition that law
pervades the universe, and that none can transcend law. In the
material world or in the domain of ether or spirit, like causes
produced like effects--the reign of law is supreme.

[Sidenote: "The law also maketh you free."]

Certainly the claim cannot be made that Joseph Smith anticipated the
world of science in the recognition of this important principle; but
it is a source of marvel that he should so clearly recognize and state
it, at a time when many religious sects and philosophical creeds chose
to assume that natural laws could be set aside easily by mystical
methods that might be acquired by anyone. In some respects, the
scientific test of the divine inspiration of Joseph Smith lies here.
Ignorant and superstitious as his enemies say he was, the mystical
would have attracted him greatly, and he would have played for his own
interest upon the superstitious fears of his followers. Instead, he
taught doctrines absolutely free from mysticism, and built a system of
religion in which the invariable relation of cause and effect is the
cornerstone. Instead of priding himself, to his disciples, upon his
superiority to the laws of nature, he taught distinctly that "the law
also maketh you free."[A] Herein he recognized another great
principle--that freedom consists in the adaptation to law, not in the
opposition to it.

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 98:8.]

However, whatever else the Prophet Joseph Smith was, he most certainly
was in full harmony with the scientific principle that the universe is
controlled by law.




THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNIVERSE.

Chapter VI.

THE NEW ASTRONOMY.


[Sidenote: The laws of the motions of the heavenly bodies have been
learned very slowly.]

From the dawn of written history, when the first men, watching through
the nights, observed the regular motions of the moon and stars,
humanity has been striving to obtain a correct understanding of the
relation of the earth to the. First it was believed that the sun,
moon, and stars revolved in circles around the earth (which for a time
was supposed to be flat instead of spherical). The great Greek
philosopher, Hipparchus, after observing the movements of the heavenly
bodies, suggested that the earth was not exactly in the middle of the
circles. Three hundred years later, Ptolemy discovered a number of
facts concerning the movements of the sun, moon and planets, which
were unknown to Hipparchus, and which led him to suggest that the sun
and moon move in circles around the earth, but that the planets move
around the earth in circles, whose centres again move around the
earth. This somewhat complex theory explained very well what was known
of astronomy in the days of the ancients. In fact, the views of
Ptolemy were quite generally accepted for 1300 years.

About 1500, A. D., Copernicus, a Dutch astronomer, having still more
facts in his possession than had Ptolemy, concluded that the simplest
manner in which the apparent movements of the sun, moon, and planets
could be explained, was to assume that the sun is the center of the
planetary system, and that the earth, with the moon and planets,
revolves according to definite laws around the sun. This theory,
supported by numerous confirmatory observations, was generally
accepted by astronomers, and really did explain very simply and
clearly many of the facts of planetary motion.

Fifty years after the death of Copernicus, the celebrated astronomer,
Kepler, proposed extensions and improvements of the Copernican
doctrine, which made the theory that the planets revolve about the sun
more probable than ever before. He suggested first that the planets
move around the sun in closed curves, resembling flattened circles,
and known as ellipses. By assuming this to be true, and assisted by
other discoveries, he was also able to state the times required by the
planets for their revolutions around the sun, and the velocity of
their motions at different times of the year. Later investigations
have proved the great laws proposed by Copernicus and Kepler to be
true; and from their days is dated the birth of modern astronomy.

[Sidenote: The law of gravitation is universal and explains many of
the motions of celestial bodies.]

After the laws of the motions of the planets had been determined, it
was only natural that men should ask themselves what forces were
concerned in these motions. The ancient philosophers had proposed the
idea that the sun attracts all heavenly bodies, but the suggestion had
not been accepted by the world at large. However, after the
discoveries of Kepler, the English, philosopher Newton advanced the
theory that there is in the universe an attractive force which
influences all matter, beyond the limits of known space. He further
proved that the intensity of this force varies directly with the
product of the attractive masses, and inversely, with the square of
the distances between them--that is, the greater the bodies the
greater the attraction; the greater the distance between them, the
smaller the attraction. This law of gravitation has been verified by
repeated experiments, and, taken in connection with the astronomical
theories of Copernicus and Kepler, has made celestial mechanics what
they are today.

By the aid of the law of gravitation, many astronomical predictions
have been fulfilled. Among the most famous is the following incident:

In the early part of the last century, astronomers noticed that the
motions of the planet Uranus did not agree with those derived from
calculations based upon the law of gravitation. About 1846, two
investigators, M. Leverrier, of France, and Mr. Adams of England,
stated, as their opinion, that the discordance between theory and
observation in the case of the motions of Uranus, was due to the
attraction of a planet, not yet known, and they calculated by means of
the law of gravitation, the size and orbit of the unknown planet. In
the fall of 1846, this planet was actually discovered and named
Neptune. It was found to harmonize with the predictions made by the
astronomers before its discovery.

During the days of Newton, the question was raised if the celestial
bodies outside of the solar system obey the law of gravitation. Among
the stars, there are some which are called double stars, and which
consist of two stars so near to each other that the telescope alone
can separate them to the eye. In 1803, after twenty years of
observation, William Herschel discovered that some of these couples
were revolving around each other with various angular velocities. The
son of William Herschel continued this work, and many years later, he
discovered that the laws of motion of these double stars are the same
as those that prevail in the the solar system.[A] This result
indicated not only the universality of the law of gravitation, but
also the probability that all heavenly bodies are in motion.

[Footnote A: History of the Inductive Sciences, Whewell, 3rd ed. Vol.
I, pp. 467-469.]

[Sidenote: The invention of the spectroscope laid the foundation of
the new astronomy.]

Then, early in the nineteenth century, a new method of research began
to be developed, which was destined to form a new science of
astronomy. It had long been known that white light when passed through
a glass prism is broken into a colored spectrum, with colors similar
to those observed in the rainbow. Now it was discovered that when
white light passes through vapors of certain composition, dark lines
appear in the spectrum, and that the position of the lines varies with
the chemical composition of the vapors. By the application of these
principles, it was shown, towards the middle of the last century, that
the chemical composition of the heavenly bodies may be determined.
Later,it was discovered that by noting the positions of the dark lines
in the spectrum, it could be known when a star or any heavenly body is
moving, as also the direction and amount of its motion. These
unexpected discoveries led to a study of the heavens from the
spectroscopic point of view, which has resulted in a marvelous advance
in the science of astronomy.

[Sidenote: All heavenly bodies are in motion.]

It has been determined that all heavenly bodies are in motion, and
that their velocities are great compared with our ordinary conceptions
of motion. Most of the stars move at the rate of about seven miles per
second, though some have a velocity of forty-five miles, or more, per
second. Many stars, formerly thought to be single, have been resolved
into two or more components. The rings of Saturn have been proved to
consist of small bodies revolving about the planet in obedience to
Kepler's law.[A] Clusters of stars have been found that move through
space as one body, as possible counterparts of the planetary
system.[B] It has been demonstrated, further, that the sun itself,
with its planets, is moving through space at a very rapid rate.
Professor Simon Newcomb, perhaps the greatest astronomer of the day,
says, "The sun, and the whole solar system with it, have been speeding
their way toward the star of which I speak (Alpha Lyrae) on a journey
of which we know neither the beginning nor the end. During every
clock-beat through which humanity has existed, it has moved on this
journey by an amount which we cannot specify more exactly than to say
that it is probably between five and nine miles per second. The
conclusion seems unavoidable that a number of stars are moving with a
speed such that the attraction of all the bodies of the universe could
never stop them."[C] In brief, the new astronomy holds that all
heavenly bodies are in motion, and that the planetary system is but a
small cluster of stars among the host of heaven. Further, it has
weighed the stars, measured the intensity of their light, and
determined their chemical composition, and it affirms that there are
suns in the heavens, far excelling our sun in size and lustre, though
built of approximately the same elements.

[Footnote A: See C. G. Abbott, Report of Smithsonian Institution, for
1901, pp. 153-155.]

[Footnote B: Light Science for Leisure Hours, Proctor, pp. 42-52.]

[Footnote C: The Problems of Astronomy, S. Newcomb, Science, May 21,
1897.]

[Sidenote: The solar system is only one of many.]

Sir Robert Ball expresses his views as follows: "The group to which
our sun belongs is a limited one. This must be so, even though the
group included all the stars in the milky way. This unnumbered host is
still only a cluster, occupying, comparatively speaking, an
expressibly small extent in the ocean of infinite space. The
imagination will carry us further still--it will show us that our star
cluster may be but a unit in a cluster of an order still higher, so
that a yet higher possibility of movement is suggested for our
astonishment."[A]

[Footnote A: The Story of the Sun, R. S. Ball, pp. 360, 361.]

Another eminent astronomer expresses the same idea briefly but
eloquently: "It is true that from the highest point of view the sun is
only one of a multitude--a single star among millions--thousands of
which, most likely, exceed him in brightness, magnitude and power. He
is only a private in the host of heaven."[A]

[Footnote A: The Sun, C. A. Young, p. 11.]

And still another student of the stars propounds the following
questions: "Does there exist a central sun of the universe? Do the
worlds of Infinitude gravitate as a hierarchy round a divine focus?
Some day the astronomers of the planets which gravitate in the light
of Hercules (towards which constellation the solar system is moving)
will see a little star appear in their sky. This will be our sun,
carrying us along in its rays; perhaps at this very moment we are
visible dust of a sidereal hurricane, in a milky way, the transformer
of our destinies. We are mere playthings in the immensity of
Infinitude."[A]

[Footnote A: Popular Astronomy, C. Flammarion, p. 309.]

[Sidenote: Scientists believe that heavenly bodies are inhabited by
living, thinking beings.]

It is not strange that men who have learned to look at the universe in
this lofty manner should go a step farther, beyond the actually known,
and suggest that some of these countless heavenly bodies must be
inhabited by living, thinking beings. Sober, thoughtful truthseekers,
who never advance needlessly a new theory, have suggested, in all
seriousness, that other worlds than ours are peopled. For instance,
"What sort of life, spiritual and intellectual, exists in distant
worlds? We can not for a moment suppose that our little planet is the
only one throughout the whole universe on which may be found the
fruits of civilization, warm firesides, friendship, the desire to
penetrate the mysteries of creation."[A]

[Footnote A: The Problems of Astronomy, S. Newcomb.]

Such, then, is in very general terms the view of modern astronomy with
reference to the constitution of the universe. Most of the information
upon which this view rests has been gathered during the last fifty
years.

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith taught that all heavenly bodies are in
motion.]

Joseph Smith was doubtlessly impressed with the beauty of the starry
heavens, and, in common with all men of poetical nature, allowed his
thoughts to wander into the immensity of space. However, he had no
known opportunity of studying the principles of astronomy, or of
becoming familiar with the astronomical questions that were agitating
the thinkers of his day. Naturally, very little is said in his
writings that bears upon the planetary and stellar constitution of the
universe; yet enough to prove that he was in perfect harmony with the
astronomical views developed since his day.

First, he believed that stellar bodies are distributed throughout
space. "And worlds without number have I created."[A] "And there are
many kingdoms; for there is no space in which there is no kingdom."[B]
He is further in harmony with modern views in that he claims that
stars may be destroyed, and new ones formed. "For, behold, there are
many worlds that have passed away by the word of my power."[C] "And as
one earth shall pass away, and the heavens thereof, even so shall
another come."[D]

[Footnote A: Book of Moses, 1:33.]

[Footnote B: Doctrine and Covenants, 88:37.]

[Footnote C: Book of Moses, 1:35.]

[Footnote D: Doctrine and Covenants, 1:38.]

At the time that Joseph Smith wrote, there was considerable discussion
as to whether the laws of the solar system were effective with the
stars. The Prophet had no doubts on that score, for he wrote, "And
unto every kingdom is given a law; and unto every law there are
certain bounds also and conditions."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 88:38.]

Likewise, his opinions concerning the motions of celestial objects
were very definite and clear. "He hath given a law unto all things by
which they move in their times and seasons; and their courses are
fixed; even the courses of the heavens and the earth, which comprehend
the earth and all the planets. The earth rolls upon her wings, and the
sun giveth his light by day, and the moon giveth her light by night,
and the stars also giveth their light, as they roll upon their wings
in glory, in the midst of the power of God."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 88:43, 45.]

In another place the same thought is expressed. "The sun, moon or
stars; all the times of their revolutions; all the appointed days,
months, and years, and all the days of their days, months, and years,
and all their glories, laws, and set times, shall be revealed."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 121:30, 31.]

The two revelations from which these quotations are made, were given
to the Prophet in 1832 and 1839 respectively, many years before the
fact that all celestial bodies are in motion was understood and
accepted by the world of science.

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith taught that the solar system is only one of
many--in advance of the astronomers of his day.]

The accepted conception that groups or clusters of stars form systems
which revolve around some one point or powerful star, was also clearly
understood by Joseph Smith, for he speaks of stars of different orders
with controlling stars for each order. "And I saw the stars that they
were very great, and that one of them was nearest unto the throne of
God; and there were many great ones which were near unto it: and the
Lord said unto me: These are the governing ones; and the name of the
great one is Kolob because it is near unto me--I have set this one to
govern all those which belong to the same order as that upon which
thou standest."[A] That the governing star, Kolob, is not the sun is
evident, since the statement is made later in the chapter that the
Lord showed Abraham "Shinehah, which is the sun." Kolob, therefore,
must be a mighty star governing more than the solar system; and is
possibly the central sun around which the sun with its attendant
planets is revolving. The other great stars near Kolob are also
governing stars, two of which are mentioned by name Oliblish and
Enish-go-ondosh, though nothing is said of the order or stars that
they control. The reading of the third chapter of the _Book of
Abraham_ leaves complete conviction that Joseph Smith taught that the
celestial bodies are in great groups, controlled (under gravitational
influence) by large suns. In this doctrine, he anticipated the world
of science by many years.

[Footnote A: Book of Abraham, chapter 3.]

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith taught that other worlds are inhabited.]

It is perhaps less surprising to find that Joseph Smith believed that
there are other peopled worlds than ours. For instance, "The reckoning
of God's time, angel's time, prophet's time, and man's time, is
according to the planet on which they reside,"[A] which distinctly
implies that other planets are inhabited. Another passage reads, "The
angels do not reside on a planet like this earth, but they reside in
the presence of God, on a globe like a sea of glass and fire."[B]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 130:4.]

[Footnote B: Loc. cit., verses 6 and 7. See also 88:61.]

While the idea that the planets and stars may be inhabited is not at
all new, yet it is interesting to note that Joseph Smith taught as an
absolute truth that such is the case. Probably no other philosopher
has gone quite that far.

These brief quotations go to show that the doctrines of the Prophet of
the Latter-day Saints are in full accord with the views that
distinguish the new astronomy. It is also to be noted that in
advancing the theories of universal motion among the stars, and of
great stars or suns governing groups of stars, he anticipated by many
years the corresponding theories of professional astronomers.

In various sermons the Prophet dealt more fully with the doctrines
here set forth and showed more strongly than is done in his doctrinal
writings, that he understood perfectly the far reaching nature of his
astronomical teachings.

Did Joseph Smith teach these truths by chance? or, did he receive
inspiration from a higher power?




Chapter VII.

GEOLOGICAL TIME.


[Sidenote: The history of the world written in the rocks.]

God speaks in various ways to men. The stars, the clouds, the
mountains, the grass and the soil, are all, to him who reads aright,
forms of divine revelation. Many of the noblest attributes of God may
be learned by a study of the laws according to which Omnipotent Will
directs the universe.

Nowhere is this principle more beautifuly illustrated and confirmed
than in the rocks that constitute the crust of the earth. On them is
written in simple plainness the history of the earth almost from that
beginning, when the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
Yet, for centuries, men saw the rocks, their forms and their
adaptations to each other, without understanding the message written
in them. Only, as the wonderful nineteenth century approached, did the
vision open, and the interpretation of the story of the rocks become
apparent.

[Sidenote: Water and heat among the shaping forces of the earth.]

How the earth first came into being has not yet been clearly revealed.
From the first, however, the mighty forces which act today, have
shaped and fashioned the earth and prepared it for man's habitation.
Water, entering the tiny cracks of the rocks, and expanding as, in
winter, it changed to ice, crumbled the mighty mountans; water,
falling as rain from the clouds, washed the rock fragments into the
low-lying places to form soil; the water in mighty rivers chiseled the
earth with irresistible force, as shown by the Grand Canyon of the
Colorado. The internal heat of the earth, aided by the translocation
of material by water, produced large cracks in the earth's crust,
through which oceans of molten matter flowed and spread themselves
over the land; the same heat appeared in volcanoes, through which were
spurted liquid earth, cinders and foul gases; as the earth heat was
lost, the crust cooled, contracted and great folds appeared,
recognized as mountains, and as time went on, many of the mountains
were caused to sink and the ocean beds were brought up in their stead.
Wonderful and mighty have been the changes on the earth's surface
since the Lord began its preparation for the race of men.

[Sidenote: The geological history of the earth is in many chapters.]

In the beginning, it appears that water covered the whole earth. In
that day, the living creatures of earth dwelt in the water, and it was
the great age of fishes and other aquatic animals. Soon the first land
lifted itself timidly above the surface of the ocean, and formed
inviting places for land animals and plants. Upon the land came,
first, according to the story of the rocks, a class of animals known
as amphibians, like frogs, that could live both in water and on land.
Associated with these creatures were vast forests of low orders of
plants, that cleared the atmosphere of noxious gases, and made it fit
for higher forms of life. Then followed an age in which the
predominating animals were gigantic reptiles, a step higher than the
amphibians, but a step lower than the class of Mammals to which man
belongs. During the age of these prehistoric monsters, the earth was
yet more fully prepared for higher life. Following the age of
reptiles, came the age of mammals, which still persists, though, since
the coming of man upon the earth, the geological age has been known as
the age of man.

This rapid sketch of the geological history of the earth does very
poor justice to one of the most complete, wonderful and beautiful
stories brought to the knowledge of man. The purpose of this chapter
is not, however, to discuss the past ages of the earth.

It is, of course, readily understood that such mighty changes as those
just described, and the succession of different kinds of organic life,
could not have taken place in a few years. Vast periods of time must
of necessity have been required for the initiation, rise, domination
and final extinction of each class of animals. A year is too small a
unit of measurement in geological time; a thousand years or, better, a
million years, would more nearly answer the requirements.

[Sidenote: The earth is probably millions of years old.]

It is possible in various ways to arrive at a conception of the age of
the earth since organic life came upon it. For instance, the gorge of
the Niagara Falls was begun in comparatively recent days, yet, judging
by the rate at which the falls are now receding, it must have been at
least 31,000 years since the making of the gorge was first begun, and
it may have been nearly 400,000 years.[A] Lord Kelvin, on almost
purely physical grounds, has estimated that the earth cannot be more
than 100,000,000 years old, but that it may be near that age.[B] It
need not be said, probably, that all such calculations are very
uncertain, when the actual number of years are considered; but, all
human knowledge, based upon the present appearance of the earth and
the laws that control known phenomena, agree in indicating that the
age of the earth is very great, running in all probability into
millions of years. It must have been hundreds of thousands of years
since the first life was placed upon earth.

[Footnote A: Dana's New Text Book of Geology, p. 375.]

[Footnote B: Lectures and Addresses, vol. 2, p. 10.]

[Sidenote: The war concerning the earth's age has helped theology and
science.]

When these immense periods of time were first suggested by students of
science, a great shout of opposition arose from the camp of the
theologians. The Bible story of creation had been taken literally,
that in six days did the Lord create the heavens and the earth; and it
was held to be blasphemy to believe anything else. The new revelation,
given by God in the message of the rocks, was received as a man-made
theory, that must be crushed to earth. It must be confessed likewise
that many of the men of science, exulting in the new light, ridiculed
the story told by Moses, and claimed that it was an evidence that the
writings of Moses were not inspired, but merely man-made fables.

The war between the Mosaic and the geological record of creation
became very bitter and lasted long, and it led to a merciless
dissection and scrutiny of the first chapter of Genesis, as well as of
the evidence upon which rests the geological theory of the age of the
earth. When at last the din of the battle grew faint, and the smoke
cleared away, it was quickly perceived by the unbiased on-lookers,
that the Bible and science had both gained by the conflict. Geology
had firmly established its claim, that the earth was not made in six
days of twenty-four hours each; and the first chapter of Genesis had
been shown to be a marvelously truthful record of the great events of
creation.

[Sidenote: The word day in Genesis refers to indefinite time periods.]

Moses, in the first chapter of Genesis, enumerates the order of the
events of creation. First, light was brought to the earth and was
divided from darkness, "and the evening and the morning were the first
day." Then the firmament was established in the midst of the waters,
"and the evening and the morning were the second day." After each
group of creative events, the same expression occurs, "and the evening
and the morning were the third [fourth, fifth, and sixth] days." Those
who insisted upon the literal interpretation of the language of the
Bible maintained that the word day, as used in Genesis 1, referred to
a day of twenty-four hours, and that all the events of creation were
consummated by an all-powerful God in one hundred and forty-four
earthly hours. An examination of the original Hebrew for the use of
the word translated "day" in Genesis, revealed that it refers more
frequently to periods of time of indefinite duration.[A] When this
became clear, and the records of the rocks became better known, some
theologians suggested, that as we are told that a thousand years are
as one day to God, the day of Genesis 1 refers to periods of a
thousand years each. This did not strengthen the argument. The best
opinion of today, and it is well-nigh universal, is that the Mosaic
record refers to indefinite periods of time corresponding to the great
divisions of historical geology.

[Footnote A: Compare The Mosaic Record of Creation, A. McCaul, D. D.,
p. 213.]

Even as late as the sixties and seventies of the last century this
question was still so unsettled as to warrant the publication of books
defending the Mosaic account of creation.[A]

[Footnote A: For instance Aids to Faith, containing McCaul's most able
discussion. The Origin of the World, J. W. Dawson.]

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith's teachings concerning creation found in the
Book of Abraham.]

In 1830, certain visions, given to the Jewish lawgiver Moses, were
revealed to the Prophet Joseph Smith. These visions are now
incorporated with other matter in the Pearl of Great Price, under the
title, The Book of Moses. In chapter two of this book is found an
account of the creation, which is nearly identical with the account
found in Genesis 1. The slight variations which occur tend only to
make the meaning of the writer clearer. In this account, the
expression "and the evening and the morning were the first [etc.]
day," occurs just as it does in the Mosaic account in the Bible. In
1835, certain ancient records found in the catacombs of Egypt fell
into the hands of Joseph Smith, who found them to be some of the
writings of Abraham, while he was in Egypt. The translation of these
records is also found in the Pearl of Great Price, under the title,
The Book of Abraham. In the fourth and fifth chapters of the book is
found an account of the creation according to the knowledge of
Abraham. The two accounts are essentially the same, but the Abrahamic
version is so much fuller and clearer that it illumines the obscurer
parts of the Mosaic account. We shall concern ourselves here only with
the variation in the use of the word "day."

[Sidenote: The Book of Abraham conveys the idea that the creative
periods included much time.]

In Genesis 1:5 we read, "And God called the light Day, and the
darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the
fist day." The corresponding period is discussed in the Book of
Abraham 4:5 as follows: "And the Gods called the light Day, and the
darkness they called Night. And it came to pass that from the evening
until the morning they called night; and from the morning until the
evening they called day; _and this was the first, or the beginning, of
that which they called night and day."_

It is to be noted that in Abraham's version names were given to the
intervals between evening and morning, and morning and evening; but
absolutely nothing is said about a _first_ day: the statement is
simply made, that this was the beginning of the alternating periods of
light and darkness which _they,_ the Gods, had named night and day.
According to this version, the first creative period occupied an
unknown period of time.

In Genesis 1:8 it further says: "And God called the firmament Heaven.
And the evening and the morning were the second day."

The corresponding passage in the Book of Abraham 4:8, reads, "And the
Gods called the expanse Heaven. And it came to pass that it was from
evening until morning that they called night; and it came to pass that
it was from morning until evening that they called day, and this was
_the second time that they called night and day."_

Here it must be noted that nothing is said about a second day. It is
said that it was the second time that _they_ called day--which leaves
the second creative period entirely indefinite so far as time limits
are concerned.

In Genesis 1:13, it reads, "and the evening and the morning were the
third day."

In Abraham 4:13, the corresponding passage reads, "And it came to pass
that they numbered the days; from the evening until the morning they
called night; and it came to pass, from the morning until the evening
they called day; and it was the third time."

Here it is explicitly stated that the Gods numbered the days;
evidently, they counted the days that had passed during the third
creative period, and it was the third time that the numbering had been
done. Again, the third creative period is left indefinite, as to time
limits.

Gen. 1:19, reads, "And the evening and the morning were the fourth
day."

Correspondingly, in Abraham 4:19, is found, "And it came to pass that
it was from evening until morning that it was night; and it came to
pass that it was from morning until evening that it was day; and it
was the fourth time."

This quotation from Abraham, standing alone, would be somewhat
ambiguous, for it might indicate that it was the fourth time that the
periods between evening and morning, and morning and evening were
called night and day. In the light of previous passages, however, the
meaning of the passage becomes clear. Certainly there is nothing in
the verse to confine the fourth creative period within certain time
limits.

The fifth day in Genesis closes as does the fourth; and the fifth time
in Abraham closes as does the fourth. The remarks made concerning the
fourth creative period apply to the fifth.

Concerning the sixth creative period, Gen. 1:31, says, "And God saw
everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the
evening and the morning were the sixth day."

Of the same period Abraham says, "And the Gods said: We will do
everything that we have said, and organize them; and behold, they
shall be very obedient. And it came to pass that it was from morning
until evening that they called night; and it came to pass that it was
from evening until morning that they called day; and they numbered the
sixth time."

As in the previous periods, the sixth ended by the Gods numbering the
days of the creative period; the sixth period, like those preceding,
being indeterminate as to time.

Repeated reading and study of the Abrahamic account, as revealed
through Joseph Smith, make it certain beyond doubt that the intent is
to convey the idea that the creative periods included much time, and
that, at the end of each period, the measure of night and day, was
applied to the period, in order that its length might be determined.
Whether or not the different creative periods represented days to the
mighty beings concerned in the creation, we do not know, and it
matters little to the argument of this article.[A]

[Footnote A: The writer understands the creation, reported in Abraham,
4th chapter, to be spiritual in its nature; but he also believes that
this spiritual account is a perfect picture of the actual material
creation. If chapter 4 of Abraham represents the Gods planning
creation, the measuring of time becomes easily understood. It then
means, "How long will it take to accomplish the work?" All this,
however, has no bearing upon the present argument.]

Now, then, we must remember that Joseph Smith made this translation
long before the theologians of the world had consented to admit that
the Mosaic days meant long periods of time; and long before geology
had established beyond question that immense time periods had been
consumed in the preparation of the earth for man.

Joseph Smith, the humble, unlearned, despised boy, unfamiliar with
books and the theories of men, stated with clear and simple certainty,
if his works be read with the eye of candid truth, this fundamental
truth of geological science and the Bible, long before the learned of
the world had agreed upon the same truth.[A]

[Footnote A: It may be remarked that other geological doctrines were
taught by the Prophet, that science has since confirmed. One of these
was discussed by Dr. J.E. Talmage in the Improvement Era, Vol. 7, p.
481.]

Standing alone, this fact might be called a chance coincidence, a
result of blind fate. But recalling that it is one of many similar and
even more striking facts, what shall be said, Has ever impostor dared
what Joseph Smith did? Has ever false prophet lived beyond his
generation, if his prophecies were examined? Shall we of this foremost
age accept convincing, logical truth, though it run counter to our
preconceived notions? Glorious were the visions of Joseph the Prophet;
unspeakable would be our joy, should they be given to us.




Chapter VIII.

ORGANIZED INTELLIGENCE.


[Sidenote: A complete philosophy must consider living beings.]

The student of the constitution of the universe must take into account
living beings. Plants, animals and men are essentially different from
the mass of matter. The rock, apparently, is the same forever; but the
plant has a beginning, and after a comparatively short existence dies.
Animals and men, likewise, begin their earthly existence; then, after
a brief life, die, or disappear from the immediate knowledge of living
things.

Man, the highest type of living things, differs from the rock,
moreover, in that he possesses the power to exercise his will in
directing natural forces. Animals and even plants seem to possess a
similar power to a smaller degree. The rock on the hillside is pulled
downward by gravitation, but can move only if the ground is removed
from beneath it by some external force. Man, on the other hand, can
walk up or down the hill, with or against the pull of gravity.

[Sidenote: Science teaches that all phenomena may be referred to
matter and ether in motion.]

Modern science refers all phenomena to matter and motion; in other
words, to matter and force or energy. In this general sense, matter
includes the universal ether, and force includes any or all of the
forces known, or that may be known, to man.

To illustrate: the electrician develops a current of electricity,
which to the scientist is a portion of the universal ether moving in a
certain definite manner. When the vibrations of the ether are caused
to change, light, or magnetism or chemical affinity may result from
the electricity. In every case, matter is in motion. The ear perceives
a certain sound. It is produced by the movements of the air. In fact,
sounds are carried from place to place by great air waves. The heat of
the stove is due to the rapid vibration of the molecules in the iron
of the stove, which set up corresponding vibrations in the ether.

In nature no exceptions have been found to the great scientific claim
that all natural phenomena may be explained by referring them to
matter in motion.[A] Variations in the kind of matter and the kind of
motion, lead to all the variations found in the universe.

[Footnote A: Tyndall, Fragments of Science, I. chaps. I and II.]

[Sidenote: Life is a certain form of motion.]

By many it has been held that life and its phenomena transcend the
ordinary explanations of nature. Yet, those who have learned, by
laborious researches, that the fundamental ideas of the universe are
only eternal matter, eternal energy and the universe-filling medium,
the ether, find it very difficult to conceive of a special force of
life, which concerns itself solely with very limited portions of
matter, and is wholly distinct from all other natural forces.

To the student of science it seems more consistent to believe that
life is nothing more than matter in motion; that, therefore, all
matter possesses a kind of life; and that the special life possessed
by plants, animals and man, is only the highest or most complex motion
in the universe. The life of man, according to this view, is
essentially different from the life of the rock; yet both are certain
forms of the motion of matter, and may be explained ultimately by the
same fundamental conceptions of science. Certainly, such an idea is
more beautifully simple than that of a special force of life, distinct
from all other natural forces.

It is argued by those who uphold this view, that the simple forces of
nature are converted by living things into the higher forces that
characterize life. For instance, to keep the human body, with its
wonderful will and intelligence, in health, it is necessary to feed
it. The food is actually burned within the body. The heat thus
obtained gives to the man both physical and intellectual vigor. It
would really appear, therefore, that heat, which is a well known,
simple physical force, may be converted by the animal body into other
and more complex forces, or modes of motion, such as the so-called
life force.

[Sidenote: A certain organization characterizes life.]

Naturally, should science class life as the highest or most complex of
the modes of material motion, the question would arise concerning the
manner in which this conversion were made possible. The answer must be
that the ultimate particles of the matter composing the living thing
are so arranged or organized that the great natural forces may be
converted into life force. It is possible by passing heat through
certain substances to make them luminous, thus converting heat into
light; by employing a dynamo, mechanical energy may be converted into
electrical energy; by coiling a wire around a rod of soft iron,
electricity may be converted into magnetism. In short, it is well
understood in science, that by the use of the right machines one form
of energy may be changed into another. It is generally assumed, that
the human body is so organized that the forces of heat, light and
undoubtedly others, may be converted into higher forms, peculiar to
living things.[A]

[Footnote A: Compare, Fiske, Outlines of Cosmic Philiosophy, chap.
XVI. Pearson, Grammar of Science, pp. 404-407. Dolbear, Matter, Ether
and Motion, chap. XI, pp. 294-297.]

[Sidenote: Protoplasm, a highly organized body, is always associated
with life.]

To substantiate this view, it may be recalled that the fundamental
chemical individual in living thing is a very complex, unstable
substance known as protoplasm. No living cell exists without the
presence of this substance. It is far from being known well, as yet,
but enough is known to enable science to say that it is composed of
several elements, so grouped and regrouped as to transcend all present
methods of research.[A] By means of this highly organized body, it is
assumed that the ordinary forces of nature are worked over and made
suited for the needs of the phenomena of life.

[Footnote A: Pearson, Grammar of Science, p. 408.]

The existence of the complex life-characteristic substance protoplasm,
renders probable the view that living things, after all, differ from
the rest of creation only in the kind and degree of their
organization, and that life, as the word is ordinarily used, depends
upon a certain kind or organization of matter,[A] which leads to a
certain kind of motion.

[Footnote A: Tyndall, Fragments of Science. II, chaps. IV and VI.]

As to the origin of the special organization called life, science has
nothing to say. Science is helpless when she deals with the beginning
of things. The best scientific explanation of life is that it is a
very complex mode of motion occasioned by a highly complex
organization of the matter and ether of the living body.

There are still some students who prefer to believe in the existence
of a special vital force, which is not subject to the laws that govern
other forces. This view, however, is so inconsistent with the modern
understanding of the contents of the universe that it has few
followers.

[Sidenote: The modern conception of life is very recent.]

The view that life is a special organization by which the great
natural forces are focussed and concentrated, so as to accomplish the
greatest works, necessarily implies a belief in the modern laws of
nature. Since modern science is of very recent development it was
quite improbable for such a conception of life to have been held
clearly before modern times. In fact it is within the last thirty or
forty years that these views have found expression among scientific
investigations.

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith taught the universality of life.]

As observed in chapters two and three, Joseph Smith taught that the
energy of matter or of ether is a form of intelligence. If, according
to this doctrine, matter and ether are intelligent; then life also
must reside in all matter and ether. Hence everything in the universe
is alive. Further, since all force is motion, universal motion is
universal life. The difference between rock, plant, beast and man is
in the amount and organization of its life or intelligence. For
instance, in harmony with this doctrine, the earth must possess
intelligence or life. In fact the Prophet says "the earth......shall
be sanctified; yea, notwithstanding it shall die, it shall be
quickened again, and shall abide the power by which it is
quickened."[A] The statement that the earth shall die and shall be
quickened again, certainly implies that the earth possess life,
though, naturally, of an order wholly different from that of men or
other higher living things.

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants 88:25, 26.]

[Sidenote: Man is coexistent with God.]

It is an established "Mormon" doctrine that man is coexistent with
God. Note the following statements: "Ye were also in the beginning
with the Father." "Man was also in the beginning with God.
Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither
indeed can be."[A] "Yet these two spirits, notwithstanding one is more
intelligent than the other, have no beginning; they existed before,
they shall have no end, they shall exist after for they are
eternal."[B]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants 93:23 and 29.]

[Footnote B: Book of Abraham 3:19.]

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith taught that man is organized from matter,
spirit and intelligence.]

In the account of the Creation, given in the Book of Abraham, it is
clearly stated that the Gods organized the earth and all upon it from
available materials, and as the fitting climax to their labors they
"went down to organize man in their own image, in the image of Gods to
form him."[A] The creation of man was in part at least the
organization of individuals from eternal materials and forces. The
nature of that organization is made partly clear by the Prophet when
he says "The spirit and the body are the soul of man."[B] The spirit
here referred to may be compared to the ether of science, vibrating
with the force of intelligence, which is the first and highest of the
many forces of nature. The body, similarly, refers to the grosser
elements, also fired with the universal energy--intelligence. The word
_Soul,_ in the above quotation, means man as he is on earth and is
used as in Genesis. Man, according to this, is composed of matter; the
spirit which may be likened to ether, and energy. The organization of
man at the beginning of our earth history, was only the clothing of
the eternal spiritual man with the matter which constitutes the
perishable body. In confirmation of this view note another statement,
"For man is spirit. The elements are eternal, and spirit and element,
inseparably connected, receiveth a fullness of joy, and when
separated, man can not receive a fullness of joy."[C] Here also it is
taught that man is composed of matter, spirit and energy.

[Footnote A: Book of Abraham, 4th chap. (Note verse 27.)]

[Footnote B: Doctrine and Covenants 88:15.]

[Footnote C: Doctrine and Covenants 93:33 and 34.]

[Sidenote: Intelligence is universal.]

President Brigham Young has left an interesting paragraph that
confirms the statement that according to "Mormon" doctrine, all matter
is intelligent, and that man is superior only because of his higher
organization. "Is this earth, the air and the water, composed of
life.....?......If the earth, air and water, are composed of life is
there any intelligence in this life?....Are those particles of matter
life; if so, are they in possession of intelligence according to the
grade of their organization?......We suggest the idea that there is an
eternity of life, an eternity of organization, and an eternity of
intelligence from the highest to the lowest grade, every creature in
its order, from the Gods to the animalculae."[A]

[Footnote A: The Resurrection, p. 3. Ed. of 1884.]

[Sidenote: Spirit unaided knows matter with difficulty.]

The statement that man can receive a fullness of joy only when spirit
and element are united, is of itself a scientific doctrine of high
import. This is a world of matter; and a spiritual man, that is one
made only of the universal ether, would not be able to receive fully
the impressions that come from the contact of element with element. To
enjoy and understand this world, it is necessary for the spirit to be
clothed with matter. The ether or spirit world is not within our
immediate view; and it is probable that the material world is far away
from purely spiritual beings.

[Sidenote: God is the Master-builder.]

This whole doctrine means that God is the organizer of worlds, and all
upon them. He is not the Creator of the materials and forces of the
universe, for they are eternal; He is the master buidler who uses the
simple elements of nature for his purposes. It is also plain that,
according to "Mormon" doctrine, there is no special life force. The
intelligence residing in a stone is in quality, as far as it goes, the
same as the intelligence possessed by man. But, man is so organized
that a greater amount of intelligence, a fullness of it, centers in
him, and he is as a consequence essentially and eternally different
from the stone. President Young also said, "The life that is within us
is a part of an eternity of life, and is organized spirit, which is
clothed upon by tabernacles, thereby constituting our present being,
which is designed for the attainment of further intelligence. The
matter comprising our bodies and spirits has been organized from the
eternity of matter that fills immensity."[A]

[Footnote A: Journal of Discourses, vol. 7:285. (Brigham Young.)]

[Sidenote: A lower intelligence cannot become a higher intelligence
except by disorganization.]

This doctrine does not permit of the interpretation that a lower
intelligence, such as that of an animal, may in time become the
intelligence of a man. "It remaineth in the sphere in which I, God,
created it."[A] The horse will ever remain a horse, though the
intelligence of the animal may increase. To make any of the
constituent parts or forces of an animal, part of the intelligence of
a man, it would be necessary to disorganize the animal; to organize
the elements into a man, and thus to begin over again.

[Footnote A: Book of Moses 3:9.]

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith anticipated science in the modern conception
of life.]

Men, beasts and plants--those beings that possess the higher life,
differ from inanimate nature, so called, by a higher degree of
organization. That is the dogma of "Mormonism," and the doctrine of
science. About 1831 Joseph Smith gave this knowledge to the world; a
generation later, scientific men arrived independently at the same
conclusion.

[Sidenote: The thinkers and writers of Mormonism have taught the
foregoing doctrine of life.]

The thinkers and writers of "Mormonism" have more or less directly
taught the same doctrine. Apostle Orson Pratt believed that the body
of man, both spiritual and earthly, was composed of atoms or ultimate
particles--of the Holy Spirit for the spiritual body and material
elements for the mortal body. It has already been shown that the Holy
Spirit of "Mormonism" may be compared with the ether of science,
vibrating with the greater force of the universe--intelligence. For
instance: "The intelligent particles of a man's spirit are by their
peculiar union, but one human spirit."[A] "Several of the atoms of
this spirit exist united together in the form of a person."[B]
Undoubtedly Elder Pratt believed that the living man is simply
organized from the elements and elementary forces of the universe.

[Footnote A: Absurdities of Immaterialism, ed. 1849, p. 26.]

[Footnote B: Ibid, p. 29.]

Perhaps the best and safest exposition of the philosophy of
"Mormonism" is Parley P. Pratt's Key to Theology. In it he states
definitely that the spirit of man is organized from the elementary
Holy Spirit. "The holiest of all elements, the Holy Spirit, when
organized in individual form, and clothed upon with flesh and bones,
contains, etc."[A] That the earthly body was likewise organized is
equally plain for he says "At the commencement--the elements--were
found in a state of chaos."[B] Then man was "moulded from the earth as
a brick."[C] Again, "The spirit of man consists of an organization of
the elements of spiritual matter,"[D] which finds entrance into its
tabernacle of flesh. In another place he defines creation by asking
"What is creation? Merely organization...... The material of which
this earth was made always did exist, and it was only an organization
which took place during the time spoken of by Moses."[E]

[Footnote A: Key to Theology, 5th ed., p. 46.]

[Footnote B: Ibid, p. 49.]

[Footnote C: Ibid, p. 51.]

[Footnote D: Ibid, p. 131.]

[Footnote E: Roberts, Mormon Doctrine of Deity, pp. 278, 279.]

Numerous other authorities might be quoted to prove that the above is
the "Mormon" view.[A]

[Footnote A: See especially the Prophet Joseph Smith's Sermon,
Contributor, vol. 4, pp. 256-268.]

In this chapter the intention has not been to explain fully the
doctrines of Joseph Smith relating to the nature of man, but to call
attention to the fact that the present scientific conception of the
nature of living things is the same as that of "Mormonism." That
"Mormonism" goes farther than science, and completes the explanation,
is to the credit of the Prophet.

It must not be forgotten that in stating the doctrine that man is
organized from the eternal elements and elementary forces of the
universe, in such a way as to produce the phenomena of higher life,
Joseph Smith anticipated the workers in science by nearly a
generation.

How wonderful was this boy-prophet of "Mormonism," if all this was
orginated within his own mind! At every point of contact, the sanest
of modern philosophy finds counterpart in the theological structure of
the Gospel as taught by Joseph Smith. Is the work divine?




THE LAWS GOVERNING THE INDIVIDUAL.

Chapter IX.

FAITH.


[Sidenote: Faith is the assurance of the existence of "things not
seen."]

For the government of the individual the first principle in Mormon
theology is faith. Joseph Smith defined faith in the words of the
Apostle Paul, "Now, faith is the substance of things hoped for; the
evidence of things not seen." To this the Prophet added "From this we
learn that faith is the assurance which men have of things which they
have not seen."[A] On this principle, with this definition, many young
persons who have ventured upon the sea of unbelief have wrecked the
religion of their childhood; for, the human mind, in some stages of
its development, is disinclined to accept as knowledge anything that
can not be sensed directly.

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, Lecture I, verses 8, 9.]

Nowadays, the young doubter who can not accept as the foundation of
his religion "things which he has not seen," usually turns for comfort
and future growth to the results of science. There he finds truths
upon truths, glorious in their beauty and susceptibility to direct and
unmistakeable proof; and soon he declares that in so-called natural
science, there is no need of faith, for, if a person has only advanced
far enough, every concern of science may be known through one, two or
several senses.

[Sidenote: Such faith lies at the formation of science.]

It is true that in the beginning of science no faith seems to be
required; for every statement is based on experiments and observations
that may be repeated by every student; and nothing is "taken on
trust." As the deeper parts of science are explored, however, it is
soon discovered that in science as in theology, a faith in "things
that can not be seen," is an essential requisite for progress. In
fact, the fundamental laws of the great divisions of science deal with
realities that are wholly and hopelessly beyond the reach of man's
five senses.

[Sidenote: The molecules are beyond man's direct senses.]

An exposition of the fundamental conception of chemical science will
illustrate the nature of scientific faith. A fragment of almost any
substance may easily be divided into two or three pieces by a stroke
of a hammer. Each of the pieces may be broken into smaller pieces and
this process of division continued until the powder is as fine as
dust. Still, each particle of the dust may be divided again and again,
if we only have instruments fine enough to continue the process. A
question which philosophy asked itself near its beginning was: Is it
possible to keep on dividing the dust particles forever, or is there a
particle so small that it can not be divided again? Neither science
nor abstract philosophy has yet been able to answer this question
fully. However, science has learned that if such a process of division
occurs, in course of time a particle will be obtained which is so
small that if it is divided or broken, the fragments will no longer be
of the same nature as the original substance. These smallest particles
in which the properties of the original substance inhere, are known as
_molecules._ Thus a molecule of sugar, when broken, falls into the
elements carbon, hydrogen and oxygen; of salt, into sodium and
chlorine and of water into hydrogen and oxygen.

The size of such a molecule can not be comprehended by the human mind;
its smallness seems infinite. The mortal eye, though aided by the most
powerful miscroscopes of modern days could not distinguish a sugar
molecule or even a pile of thousands of them; placed on the tongue,
there would be no sensation of sweetness; though it were hurled
against our body with the velocity of lightning we should not feel the
impact. To all our senses, the molecule is wholly unknown and no doubt
shall remain so while the earth is as it is. Yet, no fact is better
established than the existence of the realities that we interpret as
molecules. Their relative weights and other properties have been
securely determined. The existence of such a particle is as certain as
is the existence of the sun in the high heavens.

[Sidenote: Science teaches the composition of the directly unknowable
molecules.]

Not only does science teach the existence of molecules; it looks
within them and reveals their composition. For instance, a molecule of
the sugar known as glucose, and used by candy makers, is made up of
six particles of the element carbon, twelve of the element hydrogen
and six of the element oxygen. The particles of carbon in the glucose
molecule are so small that if one were divided it would no longer be
carbon; the same with the particles of hydrogen and oxygen: if divided
they would change into something else--into what is not yet known to
man. These smallest particles are called _atoms_ of the elements
charcoal, hydrogen and oxygen. If instead of an atom of carbon,
hydrogen and oxygen, we write C, H, O, the composition of a molecule
of glucose would be written C_{6}H_{12}O_{6}. These are also
indisputable facts of science. If the molecules are far beyond the
range of our senses, the atoms are of course much further removed from
the known world.

[Sidenote: Science teaches the arrangements of the atoms within the
molecules.]

But the chemist does not stop here. He is able to state accurately how
the invisible, unsensed atoms are arranged within the unknowable
molecule. In nature are found several glucose-like sugars, the
molecules of which contain the same numbers of carbon, hydrogen and
oxygen atoms. The varying properties of these sugars have been found
to result from the different arrangements of the atoms within the
molecules. The structure of the molecules of three of the most common
sugars are as follows:

----------------------------------------------------------------------
       I                 II                  III
    DEXTROSE [A]      LAEVULOSE [A]       GALACTOSE [A]
    H2=C-OH           H2=C-O H             H2=C-OH
       |                 |                    |
    HO-C-H           H O-C-H               HO-C H
       |                 |                    |
    HO-C-H           H O-C-H                 HC-OH
       |                 |                    |
     H-C-O-H           H C-O H               HC-OH
       |                 |                    |
    HO-C-H               C=O               HO-CH
       |                 |                    |
     H-C=O             H C=O                H-C=O
----------------------------------------------------------------------

[Footnote A: Dextrose and laevulose combine to form ordinary cane or
beet sugar. Dextrose and galactose combine to form the sugar found in
milk.]

Referring to the above diagrams it will be observed that although each
arrangement contains the same number of atoms, yet, because of the
difference in arrangement, they are far from being identical. In fact,
the difference in the properties of the sugars may be referred to the
arrangement of the atoms in the molecules. This truth is one of the
most splendid achievements of modern science. All the facts, here
briefly outlined, are included in the atomic hypothesis, which is the
foundation of the modern science of chemistry.

[Sidenote: Science requires a strong faith in "things not seen."]

Science asks us to believe in the existence of particles, unknowable
to our senses, the molecules; then to believe in still smaller
particles, the atoms, which make up the molecules but whose relative
weights and general properties have been determined. Here, a faith is
required in "things that can not be seen," and in the properties of
these things. True, the scientist does not pretend to describe the
atoms in detail, he does not need to do that to establish the
certainty of their existence. He looks upon them as ultimate causes of
effects that he may note with his physical senses. Does theology
require more? Does any sane man in asking us to believe in God, for
instance, attempt to describe him in detail?

The scientist goes farther than this, however, for he asks us not only
to have faith in the invisible, untasteable, unfeelable atoms, but
also in the exact manner in which these atoms are arranged within the
molecule. True, it is claimed, only, that the relative arrangement is
known, yet the faith required still leads us far beyond the simple
faith in atoms. Has any man asked us to believe that he can describe
the structure of God's dwelling? No principle taught by Joseph Smith
requires a larger faith than this.

[Sidenote: The conception of the ether requires large faith.]

Not only in chemistry are such transcendent truths required. The
fundamental conception of physics requires, if possible, a larger
faith. The explanations of modern physics rest largely upon the
doctrine of the universal ether. This ether is everywhere present,
between the molecules and atoms; in fact the things of the universe
are, as it were, suspended in the ocean of ether. This ether is so
attenuated that it fills the pores of the human body without
impressing itself upon our consciousness, yet some of its properties
indicate that its elasticity is equal to that of steel. As shown in
chapter 5, the most eminent scientists of the day declare that the
existence of this world-ether is one of the few things of which men
may be absolutely sure. Yet the ether cannot be seen, heard, tasted,
smelled or felt. To our senses it has neither weight nor substance. To
believe the existence of this ether requires a faith which is
certainly as great as the greatest faith required by Mormon theology.

Numerous other illustrations might be cited, without greatly
emphasizing the truth that the great fundamental doctrines of science
require a great faith in realities that are beyond the reach of our
senses.

[Sidenote: Faith comes slowly and naturally.]

The great foundations of science have not come as a "great wakening
light," but have come slowly, through a process of normal, guided
growth. The first experiment was made, from which a simple conclusion
was drawn; the second experiment furnished a second conclusion; the
two results combined produced a third conclusion, and so on through
thousands of experiments and conclusions, until the brilliant
conceptions of modern science were attained. In short, the scientist
works very simply by careful observation of nature, "the earth and its
fullness," and by as careful reasoning from the observed facts. The
mind builds noble structures of the materials the senses bring. The
same method may be employed in gaining faith in the principles of
theology; and the Apostle Paul tells us distinctly that the
righteousness of God is revealed from "faith to faith," and that the
eternal power of God and the Godhead and "the invisible things of Him
from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by
the things that are made." The scientist, likewise, begins with the
things that are made and proceeds "from faith to faith," gaining "here
a little, and there a little," until a faith is reached which, to him
who has not followed its growth, may seem absurd in its loftiness.

[Sidenote: Science cannot progress without faith.]

Certainly, no man can progress in science unless he has faith in the
great inductions of scientific men. Faith is as indispensable for
scientific progress as for theological advancement. In both cases it
is the great principle of action.

This subject merits more extended discussion, but the exposition of
the nature of faith is outside the argument running through these
chapters. It must be sufficient to remark again that Mormonism is
strictly scientific in stating as the first principle of the guidance
of the individual, that of faith in unseen things; for that is the
basic principle for the beginner in modern science.[A]

[Footnote A: Read for a fuller exposition, We walk by Faith,
Improvement Era, Volume 3, p. 561.]




Chapter X.

REPENTANCE.


The second principle for the government of the individual, according
to Mormon theology, is repentance. So commonly has this principle been
discussed from its relation to moral law that its counterpart in all
human effort has often been overlooked.

[Sidenote: Repentance follows faith.]

To repent is first to turn from old practices. Thus, he who violates
any of God's laws renders himself liable to certain punishment, but,
if he repents, and sins no more, the punishments are averted.
Naturally, such a change of heart and action can come only after faith
has been established. No man will change a habit without a
satisfactory reason. In fact, all the actions of men should be guided
by reason. Repentance then is a kind of obedience or active faith; and
is great in proportion to the degree of faith possessed by the
individual. Certainly, the repentance of no man can transcend his
faith, which includes his knowledge.

[Sidenote: Scientific repentance follows scientific faith.]

So it is in science. For centuries, wounds of the body were treated
according to certain methods, assumed to be correct; and, especially
in time of war, large numbers of the patients died. Then it was found
that low forms of life--the bacteria--infected the wounds, and caused
the high mortality. This led to the antiseptic treatment in surgery,
which destroys germ life, and leaves the wound absolutely clean. As a
consequence the mortality from flesh and other wounds has diminished
remarkably. The medical profession repented, or turned away, from its
former methods, and the reward was immediately felt. However, before
antisceptic surgery was finally and fully established, faith in the
practice had to be awakened among the members of the profession. A
chemist, making refined analysis may apply a certain factor, assumed
to be correct in his calculations, but in reality incorrect. As a
result, the determinations are wrong. When later, the correct factor
is discovered, and applied, the results of the work become correct.
Repentance from the previous error, changes the chemist's work from
wrong to right. In fact, in any department of knowledge, when it is
discovered that a law of nature has been violated, it becomes
necessary, if further progress is desired, to cease the violation.
Should a scientist persist in violation of a known law, he knows that
the consequences, great or small will certainly follow.

[Sidenote: Repentance means adopting new habits; not simply turning
from old ones.]

To repent is more than to turn from incorrect practices. It implies
also the adoption of new habits. The man who has turned from his sins,
may learn of a law, which he has never violated, yet which if obeyed,
means progress for him. If he does not follow such a law, but remains
neutral in its presence, he certainly is a sinner. To repent from such
sin, is to obey each higher law as it appears. In the spiritual life,
it is impossible for the person who desires the greatest joy to remain
passive in the presence of new principles. He must embrace them; live
them; make them his own.

Not only must the worker in science turn from scientific error; he
must also accept new science as it is discovered. When the chemist,
working with the best known analytical methods, learns that a more
rapid or more accurate method has been found, he must adopt the new
fact, in order to make the results of his work more accurate. When the
chemists of a hundred years ago learned of the atomic hypothesis, it
became necessary to adopt it, in order to insure more rapid progress
in chemistry. Those who failed to accept the new doctrine worked in
greater darkness, and made no material progress. Newton's doctrine of
gravitation opened a new method of investigating the universe. Those
who did not adopt it were soon outdistanced by their more active
colleagues.

In every such case, the obedience yielded to the new knowledge is a
kind of repentance. When a person, in religion or science, ceases to
break law, he ceases from active evil; when he accepts a new law, he
ceases from passive evil. No repentance can be complete which does not
cease from both active and passive evil.

[Sidenote: Repentance is active faith.]

Viewed in this manner, then, repentance is obedience to law and is
active faith. The law, before it is obeyed, must be understood--that
is, faith must precede repentance. Therefore, the obedience yielded
can increase only with the knowledge or faith of the individual. As
the Prophet Joseph Smith stated it, "No man can be saved in ignorance"
and "a person is saved no faster than he gains intelligence."

Repentance is as truly the second principle of action for individuals,
in the domain of science as of theology.




Chapter XI.

BAPTISM.


A repentant man turns from previous violation of law, and accepts
every new law that may be revealed to him. Repentance is obedience;
and the repentant person is always ready to obey righteous laws.

Baptism is one of the laws of the Kingdom of God. "Except ye repent
and be baptized ye can in nowise enter the Kingdom of God." The
repentant person must of necessity accept this law with the others
with which he may be familiar.

[Sidenote: The equivalent of baptism found in science.]

Students of science, who agree that faith and repentance have a place
in science, frequently assert that the equivalent of baptism is not
found in external nature. This claim may be proved false by examining
the nature of law.

The chemist must frequently produce the gas hydrogen. To do it, an
acid must be poured upon fragments of certain metals. In thus
producing the gas, the chemist obeys law. The astronomer who studies
the stars discovers that by using a piece of glass properly ground,
his powers of vision appear to be strengthened. He therefore prepares
such lenses for his telescopes, and thus obeys law. The surgeon uses
antisceptics in the treatment of wounds because he has learned that
such application will destroy germ life, and thus the surgeon obeys
law. The electrician has found that by winding a wire in a certain
manner around iron and rotating it near a magnet, electric currents
are set up. He builds dynamos according to such principles, and thus
shows his obedience to law.

It must be noted that the scientist does not know just _why_ acid
added to metal produces hydrogen, or _why_ a certain curved lens
brings the stars nearer; or _why_ certain chemicals destroy low forms
of life or _why_ wire wound in a certain way when rotated in the
magnetic field will produce electricity. Nature requires, without
volunteering an explanation, that to produce hydrogen, see the stars,
destroy germs and produce the electric current, certain invariable
laws must be obeyed.

Baptism is essentially of the same nature. To enter the Kingdom of
God, a person must be baptized. Just _why_ baptism should be the
ordinance that opens the door, no man knows. It undoubtedly has high
symbolic value; but the symbolism might be expressed in many other
ways. All that man can do is to obey.

[Sidenote: It is unreasonable to do only what is fully understood.]

Men say at times that they will do nothing which they do not fully
understand, and therefore they will not be baptized. It would be as
unreasonable for a man to say that because he does not fully
understand why a certain winding of the wire is necessary to produce
electricity he will not produce this wonderful natural force. All
theology and all science contain laws that must be obeyed in order to
obtain certain results, although the full reasons for the required
combinations are not understood.

He who is baptized, enters the Kingdom of God. He who throws acid on
metal enters the kingdom of hydrogen; he who grinds the lens right,
enters the kingdom of the stars; he who uses antisceptics right,
enters the kingdom of lower life, and he who winds the wire correctly,
enters the kingdom of electricity. Yielding obedience to any of these
various laws, is a form of baptism, which gives entrance to a kingdom.

[Sidenote: Baptism is obedience to law.]

The essential virtue of baptism is obedience to law. The prime value
of any natural law is attained only after obedience has been yielded
to it. Baptism is conformity to certain details in entering God's
Kingdom. Scientific baptism is conformity to certain details in
entering the kingdom of science. Only by baptism can a man attain
salvation; only by using lenses of the right curvature can a man view
the stars. Religious success does not rest in the degree to which
every law is explained; but rather in the degree to which all known
laws are obeyed. Scientific success does not rest upon the degree to
which every law is explained; but rather in the degree to which every
discovered law is obeyed and applied for man's advancement.

In science and in theology man must be content "to see through a
glass, darkly." Until the essential nature of infinitude itself shall
be understood, man must be content to learn to use unexplained laws.
Science is the great explainer, but she explains relations and not the
absolute foundations of phenomena.

After faith or knowledge has been obtained, the alpha and omega of
religious or scientific progress is obedience. The cry of universal
nature is, Obedience!

Viewed rationally, therefore, the baptism taught in theology is an
ordinance which has its counterpart in every department of science.
Joseph Smith was strcitly scientific in classing baptism as the third
great principle governing human action.




Chapter XII.

THE GIFT OF THE HOLY GHOST.


[Sidenote: The gift of the Holy Ghost is a gift of intelligence.]

Baptism by water is insufficient to open the door to God's Kingdom.
The Gift of the Holy Ghost, obtained by the laying on of Hands by one
having authority, completes the ordinance. Not only Joseph Smith, but
the Savior Himself taught distinctly that to enter the Kingdom of God,
a person must be baptized by water and by fire; and the promise is
given that those are "baptized by water for the remission of sins,
shall receive the Holy Ghost."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 84:63, 64.]

Jesus, speaking to His disciples, taught that "the Comforter, which is
the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, He shall teach
you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I
have said unto you."[A] This clearly implies that the promised gift is
essentially a gift of increased intelligence with the added power that
results from a more intelligent action. That this is the Mormon view
of the effect of the Gift of the Holy Ghost may be amply demonstrated
from the standard works of the Church and from the writings of the
leading interpreters of Mormon doctrine. Parley P. Pratt in the Key to
Theology says, "It quickens all the intellectual faculties, increases,
enlarges, expands and purifies all the natural passions and affection
* * * *. It develops and invigorates all the faculties of the physical
and intellectual man."[B] The Prophet Joseph Smith declared "This
first Comforter or Holy Ghost has no other effect than pure
intelligence. It is * * * * powerful in expanding the mind,
enlightening the understanding, and storing the intellect with present
knowledge."[C] Concisely expressed, therefore, Joseph Smith and the
Church he restored, teach that the Gift of the Holy Ghost, is a gift
of "intelligence."

[Footnote A: John 14:26.]

[Footnote B: Key to Theology, 5th ed., pp. 101, 102.]

[Footnote C: History of the Church, Vol. III, p. 380.]

[Sidenote: Science furnishes an equivalent of the gift of the Holy
Ghost.]

If the equivalents of faith, repentance and baptism are irrevocable
laws for the individual who studies science, the question arises, Is
there also, a scientific equivalent for the Gift of the Holy Ghost?
Even a superficial view of the matter will reveal such an equivalent.
To use again the illustrations employed in the preceding chapter, if
the chemist has obeyed natural law in producing hydrogen, that is, has
been baptized into the kingdom of hydrogen, he may by the proper use
and study of the gas obtained, add much to his knowledge. He may learn
that it is extremely light; that it forms an explosive mixture with
air; that it will destroy many vegetable colors, and will burn with an
almost invisible flame. Thus, the possession of the gas enlarges the
knowledge and develops the intelligence of the scientist. Is not this
another form of the Gift of the Holy Ghost?

The man who is baptized into the kingdom of heavenly bodies by
grinding the lenses right, is enabled to learn many new facts
concerning the nature and motions of celestial bodies; and thus
receives intelligence. He who obediently winds the wire correctly
around the iron core, may generate a current of electricity with which
many mighty works may be accomplished. Do not these men, as their
intelligences are expanded, receive a Gift of the Holy Ghost, as a
reward for their obedience to the demands of nature?

It would be possible to carry the comparisons into every scientific
action without strengthening the argument. In science, if a person has
faith, repentance and is baptized, that is obeys, he will receive
added intelligence, which is the equivalent of the Gift of the Holy
Ghost as taught in theology. The four fundamental laws for the
guidance of the individual are identical in Mormon theology, and in
modern science.

Just why the laying on of hands should be necessary to complete the
ordinance of baptism is not known, any more than the reasons are known
for the results that follow the numberless relations that may be
established by mortal man. However, the dogma of the Gift of the Holy
Ghost, is logically the fourth step in attaining scientific salvation.

Thus, each of the minor laws of Mormonsim might be investigated, and
be shown to have a scientific counterpart. For the purpose of this
volume, however, a more extended consideration of the laws governing
the actions of the individual, is unnecessary.




Chapter XIII.

THE WORD OF WISDOM.


It has already been remarked that the nature of the mission of Joseph
Smith made it unlikely that references to scientific matters, and much
less to isolated scientific facts, obtainable by proper methods of
experimentation should be found in the writings of the Prophet.
Nevertheless, in a revelation given March 8, 1883, statements are made
that can now be connected with facts of science, not generally or not
at all known, at the time the revelation was received.

"Inasmuch as any man drinketh wine or strong drink among you, it is
not good, * * * strong drinks are not for the belly but for the
washing of your bodies."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 89:5, 7.]

[Sidenote: The doctrine that alcohol is injurious to man is
scientific.]

At the time this was written, many persons believed that the use of
alcoholic drinks was injurious to human health; but more, especially
among the uneducated classes, held quite the opposite opinion. Since
that day, the question concerning the value of alcohol in any form has
been greatly agitated, and much new light has been obtained. This is
not the place to examine this famous controversy, but a few quotations
from authoritative books, which are not controversial in their nature,
will show the coincidence between the position of science, and the
doctrine of Joseph Smith, in respect to this matter.

The _United States Dispensatory_ (17th ed.) speaks of the medicinal
properties of alcohol as follows, "It is irritant even to the skin,
and much more so to the delicate organs; hence, the various abdominal
inflammations that are so frequent in habitual drunkards. A single
dose of it, if large enough, may produce death. The nervous symptoms
caused by alcohol show that it has a very powerful and direct
influence upon the nerve-centers. The arterial pressure and the
pulse-rate are both increased by moderate doses of alcohol, by a
direct influence upon the heart itself. * * * Taken habitually in
excess, alcohol produces the most deplorable results, and is a very
common cause of fatal maladies."[A]

[Footnote A: Page 129, art., Alcohol Ethylicum.]

Dr. W. Gilman Thompson in his authoritative book on _Practical
Dietetics,_ speaking of the constant use of alcoholic beverages, says,
"The use of alcohol in any shape is wholly unnecessary for the use of
the human organism in health. * * * * The lifelong use of alcohol in
moderation does not necessarily shorten life or induce disease in some
persons, while in others it undoubtedly produces gradual and permanent
changes which tend to weaken vital organs so that the resistance of
the body to disease is materially impaired. * * * * Many persons
should be particularly warned against the use of alcohol. * * * *
Although alcohol is such a strong force-producer and heat-generator,
its effect in this direction is very soon counter-balanced by its
stronger influence in lowering the general tone of the nervous system
and in producing positive degeneration in the tissues."[A]

[Footnote A: Pages 206, 207.]

The recent newspaper statements that alcohol has been shown to be a
food are based on a complete misunderstanding. The experiments
demonstrated that alcohol is burned within the body--which is the
simplest manner in which the body can rid itself of the alcohol.

No more authoritative opinions on this subject can be found than those
contained in the two volumes from which quotations have been made--and
the strongest opinions are not quoted. In spite of the isolated claims
made for alcohol, the fact remains that the knowledge of the world
indicates that alcohol is a poison to the human system; that it is not
"for the belly." However, the value of the external use of alcohol,
for various purposes, has never been denied. On the contrary almost
every up to date practitioner recommends the external use of alcohol,
as for instance after baths for lowering the temperature of fever
patients. In this matter, then, Joseph Smith was in perfect harmony
with the latest results of science. It is strange that he, unlearned
as he was, should have stated what is now known as truth, so clearly
and simply, yet so emphatically, more than seventy years ago, before
the main experiments on the effect of alcohol on the human organsim
had been made.

[Sidenote: The doctrine that tobacco is injurious to man is
scientific.]

"And again, tobacco is not for the body, neither for the belly, and is
not good for man, but is an herb for bruises and all sick cattle, to
be used with judgment and skill."[A] Although tobacco has been used
for several centuries by civilized man, the real cause of the effect
which it has upon the human body was not understood until the early
part of the last century. In 1809, a chemist separated from tobacco an
active principle, in an impure state, some of the properties of which
he observed. In 1822, two other chemists succeeded in isolating the
same principle, in a pure condition, and found it to be a colorless,
oily liquid, of which two to eight per cent is found in all tobacco.
This substance has been called nicotine; later investigations have
shown it to be one of the most active poisons known. Tobacco owes its
activity entirely to this poison."[B]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 89:8.]

[Footnote B: Wormley, Micro-chemistry of Poisons, 2nd ed., pp. 434,
435.]

The intensely poisonous nature of nicotine is illustrated by a number
of cases on record. One drop placed on the tongue of a cat caused
immediate prostration, and death in seventy-eight seconds. A smaller
drop was placed on the tongue of another cat, which resulted in death
after two minutes and a half. A third cat to which a similar quantity
had been administered was dead after seventy-five seconds. A man who
was accustomed to smoking took a chew of tobacco, and after a quarter
of an hour accidently swallowed the mass. An hour later he became
unconscious and died. In another case, in which an ounce of tobacco
had been swallowed, death resulted in seven hours. In still another
case, one ounce of tobacco was boiled in water, and the solution drunk
as an remedy for constipation. The patient died in three quarters of
an hour.[A] These, and numerous other cases, illustrate the intensely
poisonous nature of tobacco. The evil effects of the repeated use of
small amounts of tobacco, in smoking or chewing are also well
understood.

[Footnote A: Ibid, pp. 436, 437.]

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith probably did not know the poisonous nature of
tobacco in 1833.]

It was in 1828, about five years before Joseph Smith's doctrine with
respect to tobacco was given, that nicotine was obtained in a pure
state. Many years later the chemists and physiologists learned to
understand the dangerous nature of the tobacco poison. It does not
seem probable that Joseph Smith had heard of the discovery of nicotine
in 1833; the discovery was announced in a German scientific journal,
and in those days of few newspapers, scientific news, even of public
interest, was not made generally known as quickly as is the case
today. In fact, Hyrum Smith, the brother of the Prophet, on May 29,
1842, delivered a sermon upon the Word of Wisdom in which he says,
"Tobacco is a nauseous, stinking, abominable thing;"[A] but nothing
worse, thus basing his main objection to it on the revealed word of
the Lord. Had Joseph and his associates been familiar with the
isolation of nicotine and its properties, they would undoubtedly have
mentioned it in sermons especially directed against the use of
tobacco. In any case, at a time when it was but vaguely known that
tobacco contained a poisonous principle, it would have been extremely
hazardous for the reputation of an impostor to have claimed a
revelation from God, stating distinctly the injurious effects of
tobacco.

[Footnote A: The Contributor, vol. iv., p. 13; Improvement Era, Vol.
4. pp. 943-9.]

It should also be noted that Joseph Smith says that when tobacco is
used for bruises and all sick cattle, it should be used with judgment
and skill, thus impressing caution even in the external application of
the herb. This is fully borne out by facts, for it has been found that
"the external application of tobacco to abraded surfaces, and even to
the healthy skin, has been attended with violent symptoms, and even
death."[A]

[Footnote A: Wormley, Micro-chemistry of Poisons, p. 436.]

In the matter of the chemistry and physiological action of tobacco,
then, the Prophet, in 1833, was in full accord with the best knowledge
of 1908. In the emphasis of his doctrine, he even anticipated the
world of science.

"And again, hot drinks are not for the body or belly."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 89:9.]

[Sidenote: The doctrine that tea and coffee are injurious to man is
scientific.]

When this statement was made, in 1833, the meaning of the expression
hot drinks was not clearly understood. Many believed that the only
meaning of the above statement was that drinks that are hot enough to
burn the mouth should not be used. Others, however, claimed for the
doctrine a deeper meaning. To settle the difficulty, appeal was made
to Joseph Smith who explained that tea, coffee and similar drinks were
meant by the expression hot drinks. From that time on, the Church has
taught that tea and coffee should not be used by mankind.[A]

[Footnote A: See The Contributor, vol. iv. p. 13; Improvement Era, vol
4, pp. 943-9.]

In the year 1821, several chemists isolated from coffee a bitter
principle, of peculiar properties, which was named caffein. In 1827,
the same substance was found to occur in tea. Numerous analysis show
that there are between one and two per cent of caffein in coffee, and
between three and six percent in tea. Later investigations have shown
that caffein belongs to the vegetable poisons, and that its poisonous
action is very strong.

Among the medical properties of caffein are the following, "in doses
of three to five grains, it produces a peculiar wakefulness--after a
dose of twelve grains, it produces intense physical restlessness and
mental anxiety. Upon the muscles it acts as a powerful poison--it is
used in medicines as a brain and heart stimulant."[A] Fatal cases of
poisoning are also on record.

[Footnote A: U. S. Dispensatory, 17th ed., pp. 278 and 279.]

Caffein is not in any sense a food, but, as a stimulant, must be
classed with tobacco, opium and other similar substances. Owing to its
action on the heart and circulation, the body becomes heated, and in
that sense a solution of caffein is a "hot drink." The use of tea and
coffee in health is now generally condemned by the best informed
persons in and out of the medical profession. Dr. W. Gilman Thompson
says, "The continuance of the practice of drinking coffee to keep
awake soon results in forming a coffee or tea habit, in which the
individual becomes a slave to the beverage. * * * Muscular tremors are
developed, with nervousness, anxiety, dread of impending evil,
palpitation, heartburn, dyspepsia and insomnia. * * * It produces
great irritability of the whole nervous system and one may even
overexcite the mind."[A] While it is true that one cup of coffee or
tea does not contain enough caffein to injure the system, yet the
continual taking of these small doses results in a weakening of the
whole system, that frequently leads to premature death.

[Footnote A: Practical Dietetics, p. 199.]

The U. S. Consular and Trade Report for January, 1906,[A] warns
against the use of coffee in the following words, "The important
connection between consumption of coffee and epilepsy which deserves
to be known everywhere, serves as a warning to be extremely careful
with coffee made of beans containing caffein, and at any rate,
children should be deprived of it entirely, otherwise their health
will be exposed to great danger."

[Footnote A: Page 249.]

Besides caffein, both tea and coffee contain an astringent known as
tannic acid. In coffee this substance is present only in small
quantity, but in tea from four to twelve per cent occurs. Tannic acid
is the substance found in oak bark, and has the property of making
animal tissues hard--that is, makes leather of them. The habitual tea
drinker subjects the delicate lining of the stomach and intestines to
the action of this powerful drug.

Without going into further details, it is readily seen that the
teachings of Joseph Smith, in 1833, in relation to the value of tea
and coffee in human drinks, harmonizes with the knowledge of today.
Moreover, he was in advance, in the certainty of his expressions, of
the scientists of his day. It is true that caffein had been found in
coffee and tea a few years before the revelation of 1833, but the
physiological action of the drug was not known until many years
afterwards. Besides, as in the case of tobacco, the Church leaders in
speaking against the use of tea and coffee did not mention the
poisonous principle that had recently been discovered in them; thus
revealing their ignorance of the matter.

[Sidenote: The doctrines regarding the values of herbs and fruits
harmonize with recent scientific truths.]

"And again, * * * all wholesome herbs God hath ordained for the
constitution, nature, and use of man. Every herb in the season
thereof, and every fruit in the season thereof; all these to be used
with prudence and thanksgiving."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants 89:10, 11.]

This doctrine, which seems self-evident now, also evidences the divine
inspiration of the Prophet Joseph. At the time this revelation was
given, food chemistry was not understood; and, in fact, it was not
until about 1860, that the basis upon which rests our knowledge of
food chemistry, was firmly established. We now know that every plant
contains four great classes of compounds: mineral substances, fats,
sugars and starches, and protein, or the flesh-forming elements. We
further know that no plant can live and grow without containing these
groups of nutrients. It is also well understood that these substances
are necessary for the food of the animal body, and that animal tissues
are, themselves, composed of these groups, though in different
proportions. In short, it has long been an established fact of science
that any plant that does not contain a poisonous principle, may by
proper cooking be used as a food for man.

When Joseph Smith wrote, this was a daring suggestion to make, for
there was absolutely no fact aside from popular experience, upon which
to base the conclusion. The qualifying phrase, "all wholesome herbs,"
undoubtedly refers to the existence of classes of plants like coffee,
tea, tobacco, etc., which contain some special principle injurious to
the health.

[Sidenote: The doctrine concerning the use of meats is scientific.]

"Yea, flesh also of beasts and of the fowls of the air, I, the Lord,
have ordained for the use of man with thanksgiving; nevertheless they
are to be used sparingly; and it is pleasing unto me that they should
not be used only in times of winter, or of cold, or of famine."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 89:12, 13.]

The breadth of this doctrine lies in the fact that it is not
absolutely forbidden to eat meat, as in all probability a fanatic,
guided by his own wisdom, might have done; yet it must be observed,
the implication is clear that it is possible for man to live without
meat. Vegetarianism had been taught and practiced long before the days
of Joseph Smith; but there had been no direct, positive proof that
plants contain all the substances necessary for the sustenance of
life. As stated above, it is now known that every class of nutritive
substance found in meat is also found in plants. This is in full
harmony with the implied meaning of Joseph Smith in the statement
regarding the abstaining from meat.

[Sidenote: The distinction between the values of grains is also
scientific.]

"All grain is ordained for the use of man and of beasts, to be the
staff of life. * * * All grain is good for the food of man, as also
the fruit of the vine, that which yieldeth fruit, whether in the
ground or above the ground. Nevertheless, wheat for man, and corn for
the ox, and oats for the horse, and rye for the fowls and for swine,
and for all beasts of the field, and barley for all useful animals,
and for mild drinks, as also other grain."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 89:14, 16 and 17.]

The first part of this teaching, that all grain can be used by man and
beast, corresponds to the earlier statement that all wholesome plants
may be used by man. The latter part respecting the best grain for
certain classes of animals, is of a different nature and merits
special consideration. As already mentioned, all plants and plant
parts contain four great groups of nutritive substances. The relative
proportions of these grains are different in different plants or plant
parts. For instance, wheat contains about 71.9 per cent of starch and
sugar; corn, 70.2 per cent; oats, 59.7 per cent; rye, 72.5 per cent;
and barley, 69.8 per cent. Wheat contains about 11.9 per cent of
protein or the flesh-forming elements; corn, 11.4 per cent; oats, 11.8
per cent; rye, 10.6 per cent; and barley 12.4 per cent.[A] It has
further been demonstrated that a man or beast doing heavy work,
requires a larger proportion of starch and sugar in his dietary than
does one which has less work to do. Likewise, different classes of
animals require different proportions of the various nutrients, not
only through life but at the various periods of their lives. This
principle has been recognized so fully that during the last
thirty-five or forty years the attention of experimenters has been
directed toward the elucidation of laws which would make known the
best combinations of foods for the various classes of farm animals, as
well as for man. It must also be remarked that recent discoveries in
science are showing more deep-seated differences in the composition of
grains, than those here mentioned, as also corresponding differences
in various classes of animals. Science will soon throw more light on
this subject, and in all probability will confirm the views of Joseph
Smith, with respect to the grain best adapted to certain animals.

[Footnote A: The Feeding of Animals, Jordan, p. 424.]

A thoughtful reading of the above quotation clearly shows that Joseph
Smith recognized the fundamental truth of food chemistry; namely, that
while all plants contain the elements necessary for animal growth, yet
the proportions of these elements are so different as to make some
plants better adapted than others to a certain class of animals. That
the "Mormon" prophet should have enunciated this principle from twenty
to thirty years in advance of the scientific world, must excite wonder
in the breast of any person, be he follower or opponent of Joseph
Smith.

The discussion of the important statements made in section 89 of the
book of _Doctrine and Covenants,_ might be elaborated into a volume.
The merest outline has been given here. The physiological teachings of
the prophet concerning work, cleanliness and sleep, might also be
considered with profit.

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith anticipated the world of science in the word
of wisdom.]

To summarize the contents of this chapter: Joseph Smith clearly
recognized and taught the physiological value of alcohol, tobacco,
anticipated the tea and coffee, at a time when scientific world of
science discoveries were just beginning to reveal the active
principles of these commodities. The probability is that he knew
nothing of what the world of science was doing in this direction, at
the time the doctrine was taught. Joseph Smith clearly recognized and
taught the fundamental truths of food chemistry, and the food relation
of vegetable products to man, nearly a generation before scientists
had arrived at the same doctrine. Whence came his knowledge?



THE DESTINY OF EARTH AND MAN.

Chapter XIV.

THE LAW OF EVOLUTION.


[Sidenote: Whence? Where?]

To every intelligence the question concerning the purpose of all
things must at some time present itself. Every philosophical system
has for its ultimate problem the origin and the destiny of the
universe. Whence? Where?--the queries which arise before every human
soul, and which have stimulated the truth-seekers of every age in
their wearisome task of searching out nature's laws. Intelligent man
cannot rest satisfied with the recognition of the forces at work in
the universe, and the nature of their actions; he must know, also, the
resultant of the interaction of the forces, or how the whole universe
is affected by them; in short, man seeks the law of laws, by the
operation of which, things have become what they are, and by which
their destiny is controlled. This law when once discovered, is the
foundation of religion as well as of science, and will explain all
phenomena.

[Sidenote: The only rational philosophy is based on science.]

It was well toward the beginning of the last century before
philosophical doctrines rose above mere speculation, and were based
upon the actual observation of phenomena. As the scientific method of
gathering facts and reasoning from them became established, it was
observed that in all probability the great laws of nature were
themselves controlled by some greater law. While many attempts have
been made to formulate this law, yet it must be confessed, frankly,
that only the faintest outline of it is possesesd by the world of
science.

The sanest of modern philosophers, and the one who most completely
attempted to follow the method of science in philosophical writings,
was Herbert Spencer. Early in his life, he set himself the task of
constructing a system of philosophy which should be built upon man's
reliable knowledge of nature. A long life permitted him to realize
this ambition. Though his works are filled with conclusions which
cannot be accepted by most men, yet the facts used in his reasoning
are authentic. By the world at large, the philosophy of Herbert
Spencer is considered the only philosophy that harmonizes with the
knowledge of today.

[Sidenote: All things are continually changing.--This is the
foundation of evolution.]

After having discussed, with considerable fullness, the elements of
natural phenomena, such as space, time, matter, motion and force, Mr.
Spencer concludes that all evidence agrees in showing that "every
object, no less than the aggregate of objects, undergoes from instant
to instant some alteration of state."[A] That is to say that while the
universe is one of system and order, no object remains exactly as it
is, but changes every instant of time.

[Footnote A: First Principles, p. 287.]

In two directions only can this ceaseless change affect an object; it
either becomes more complex or more simple; it moves forward or
backward; it grows or decays. In the words of Spencer, "All things are
growing or decaying, accumulating matter or wearing away, integrating
or disintegrating."[A] This, then, is the greatest known fundamental
law of the universe, and of all things in it--that nothing stands
still, but either progresses (evolution), or retrogrades
(dissolution). Now, it has been found that under normal conditions all
things undergo a process of evolution; that is, become more complex,
or advance.[B] This, in its essence, is the law of evolution, about
which so much has been said during the last fifty years. Undoubtedly,
this law is correct, and in harmony with the known facts of the
universe. It certainly throws a flood of light upon the phenomena of
nature; though of itself, it tells little of the force behind it, in
obedience to which it operates.

[Footnote A: Loc. cit., p. 292.]

[Footnote B: Loc. cit., p. 337.]

Spencer himself most clearly realized the insufficiency of the law of
evolution alone, for he asks, "May we seek for some all-pervading
principle which underlies this all pervading process!"[A] and proceeds
to search out this "all-pervading principle" which at last he
determines to be the persistence of force--the operation of the
universal, indestructible, incomprehensible force, which appears as
gravitation, light, heat, electricity, magnetism, chemical affinity
and in other forms.[B]

[Footnote A: First Principles, p. 408.]

[Footnote B: Loc. cit., p. 494.]

[Sidenote: Evolution does not admit a final death.]

A natural question now is, Is there any limit to the changes undergone
by matter, and which we designate as evolution? "Will they go on
forever? or will there be an end to them?"[A] As far as our knowledge
goes, there is an end to all things, a death which is the greatest
known change, and as far as human experience goes, all things tend
toward a death-like state of rest. That this rest is permanent is not
possible under law of evolution; for it teaches that an ulterior
process initiates a new life; that there are alternate eras of
evolution and dissolution. "And thus there is suggested the conception
of a past during which there have been successive evolutions analogous
to that which is now going on; and a future during which successive
other such evolutions may go on ever the same in principle but never
the same in concrete result."[B] This is practically the same as
admitting eternal growth.

[Footnote A: Loc. cit., p. 496.]

[Footnote B: Loc. cit., p. 550.]

The final conclusion is that "we can no longer contemplate the visible
creation as having a definite beginning or end, or as being isolated.
It becomes unified with all existence before and after; and the force
which the universe presents falls into the same category with space
and time, as admitting of no limitation in thought."[A]

[Footnote A: Loc. cit., p. 564.]

[Sidenote: Spirit and matter are alike.]

It is interesting to note the conclusion concerning spirit and matter,
to which Mr. Spencer is led by the law of evolution. "The materialist
and spiritualist controversy is a mere war of words, in which the
disputants are equally absurd--each thinking that he understands that
which it is impossible for any man to understand. Though the relation
of subject and object renders necessary to us these antithetical
conceptions of spirit and matter; the one is no less than the other to
be regarded as but a sign of the Unknown Reality which underlies
both."[A]

[Footnote A: First Principles, pp. 570 and 572.]

While the law of evolution, as formulated by Spencer and accepted by
the majority of modern thinkers, is the nearest approach to the truth
possessed by the world of science, yet there is no disposition on the
part of the writer to defend the numerous absurdities into which
Spencer and his followers have fallen when reasoning upon special
cases.

[Sidenote: Evolution and natural selection do not necessarily go
together.]

Many years before Mr. Spencer's day, it had been suggested, vaguely,
that advancement seemed to be the great law of nature. Students of
botany and zoology were especially struck by this fact, for they
observed how animals and plants could be made to change and improve
under favorable conditions, by the intervention of man's protection.
In 1859, Mr. Charles Darwin published a theory to account for such
variation, in which he assumed that there is a tendency on the part of
all organisms to adapt themselves to their surroundings, and to change
their characteristics, if necessary, in this attempt. He further
showed that in the struggle for existence among animals and plants,
the individual best fitted for its environment usually survives. These
facts, Mr. Darwin thought, led to a process of natural selection, by
which, through long ages, deep changes were caused in the structure of
animals. In fact, Darwin held that the present-day plants and animals
have descended from extinct and very different ancestors.[A] The
experiences of daily life bear out the assertion that organic forms
may be changed greatly--witness the breeding of stock and crops,
practiced by all intelligent farmers--and all in all the theory seemed
so simple that numerous biologists immediately adopted it, and began
to generalize upon it. Having once accepted the principle that the
present-day species have descended from very unlike ancestors, it was
easy to assume that all organic nature had descended from one common
stock. It was claimed that man, in a distant past, was a monkey; still
earlier, perhaps, a reptile; still earlier a fish, and so on. From
that earliest form, man had become what he is by a system of natural
selection. In spite of the absence of proofs, such ideas became
current among the scientists of the day. In this view was included, of
course, the law of evolution or growth, and thus, too, the law became
associated with the notion that man has descended from the lower
animals. In fact, however, the law of evolution is just as true,
whether or not Darwin's theory of natural selection be adopted.

[Footnote A: Origin of Species, p. 6.]

In justice to Darwin, it should be said that he in nowise claimed that
natural selection was alone sufficient to cause the numerous changes
in organic form and life; but, on the contrary, held that it is only
one means of modification.[A]

[Footnote A: Origin of Species, p. 6; also Darwin and After Darwin
Romanes, Vol. II. pp. 2-6.]

Professor Huxley, who, from early manhood, was an eminent and ardent
supporter of the Darwinian hypothesis frankly says, "I adopt Mr.
Darwin's hypothesis, therefore, subject to the production of proof
that physiological species may be produced by selective breeding; and
for the reason that it is the only means at present within reach of
reducing the chaos of observed facts to order."[A] After writing a
book to establish the descent of man from apes, Professor Huxley is
obliged to confess that "the fossil remains of man hitherto discovered
do not seem to take us appreciably nearer to that lower pithecoid
form, by the modification of which he has, probably, become what he
is."[B]

[Footnote A: Man's Place in Nature, p. 128.]

[Footnote B: Loc. cit., p. 183.]

This is not the place to enter into this famous controversy. The
relation of the theory of natural selection to the law of evolution is
not established; that man and the great classes of animals and plants
have sprung from one source is far from having been proved; that the
first life came upon this earth by chance is as unthinkable as ever.
Even at the present writing, recent discoveries have been reported
which throw serious doubt upon natural selection as an all-sufficient
explanation of the wonderful variety of nature. The true scientific
position of the Darwinian hypothesis is yet to be determined.

The moderate law of evolution which claims that all normal beings are
advancing, without asserting that one form of life can pass into
another, is, however, being more and more generally accepted, for it
represents an eternal truth, of which every new discovery bears
evidence.

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith taught the law of eternal growth--evolution.]

Were it not that the law of evolution is of such fundamental value in
the understanding of natural phenomena, it would hardly be expected
that the calling of Joseph Smith would necessitate any reference to
it. Besides, upwards of fifteen years elapsed after the martyrdom of
Joseph and Hyrum Smith before the world of science conceived the
hypothesis. One of the leading doctrines of the Church resembles the
spirit of the law of universal growth so nearly that one is forced to
believe that the great truth embodied by this doctrine is the truth
shadowed forth by the law of evolution.

The doctrine of God, as taught by Joseph Smith, is the noblest of
which the human mind can conceive. No religion ascribes to God more
perfect attributes than does that of the Latter-day Saints. Yet the
Church, asserts that God was not always what he is today. Through
countless ages he has grown towards greater perfection, and at the
present, though in comparison with humankind, he is omniscient and
omnipotent, he is still progressing. Of the beginning of God, we have
no record, save that he told his servant Abraham, "I came down in the
beginning in the midst of all the intelligences thou hast seen."[A]

[Footnote A: Book of Abraham, 3:21.]

As told by Joseph Smith, in May, 1833, John the Apostle said of God,
Jesus Christ, "And I, John, saw that he received not of the fulness at
first, but continued from grace to grace, until he received a fulness;
and thus he was called the Son of God, because he received not of the
fulness at first."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 93:12-14.]

[Sidenote: Man will develop until he becomes like God.]

Man, likewise, is to develop until, in comparison with his present
condition, he becomes a God. For instance, in speaking of the
salvation to which all men who live correct lives shall attain, the
Prophet says, "For salvation consists in the glory, authority,
majesty, power and dominion which Jehovah possesses;"[A] and in
another place, "Then shall they be Gods, because they have no end;
therefore shall they be from everlasting to everlasting, because they
continue; then shall they be above all, because all things are subject
unto them. Then shall they be Gods, because they have all power."[B]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, Lectures on Faith, 7:8.]

[Footnote B: Doctrine and Covenants, 132:20.]

That this is not a sudden elevation, but a gradual growth, is evident
from many of the writings of Joseph Smith, of which the following are
illustrations. "He that receiveth light and continueth in God,
receiveth more light, and that light groweth brighter and brighter
until the perfect day."[A] "For if you keep my commandments you shall
receive of his fulness, and be glorified in me as I am in the Father;
therefore, I say unto you, you shall receive grace for grace."[B]

[Footnote A: Ibid., 50:24.]

[Footnote B: Ibid., 93:20.]

In various sermons Joseph Smith enlarged upon the universal principle
of advancement, but few of them have been preserved for us. In a
sermon delivered in April, 1844, the following sentences occur, "God
himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted Man, and sits
enthroned in yonder heavens. You have got to learn how to be Gods
yourselves, and to be kings and priests to God, the same as all Gods
have done before you; namely, by going from one small degree to
another, and from a small capacity to a great one; from grace to
grace, from exaltation to exaltation."[A]

[Footnote A: Contributor, vol. 4, pp. 254 and 255.]

[Sidenote: Joseph Smith anticipated science in the statement of the
law of evolution.]

The preceding quotations suffice to show that with regard to man,
Joseph Smith taught a doctrine of evolution which in grandeur and
extent surpasses the wildest speculations of the scientific
evolutionist. Yet Joseph Smith taught this doctrine as one of eternal
truth, taught him by God. There can be no doubt that the truth behind
Spencer's law of evolution, and the doctrine taught by the "Mormon"
prophet, are the same. The great marvel is that Joseph Smith, who knew
not the philosophies of men, should have anticipated by thirty years
or more the world of science in the enunciation of the most
fundamental law of the universe of living things.

[Sidenote: Animals are subject to evolution.]

Now, it is true that Joseph Smith did not extend this law to the lower
animals; but it must be remembered that his mission on earth was to
teach a system of redemption for men. Yet, it is an interesting
observation that he taught that men and animals had a spiritual
existence, before they were placed on earth. "For I, the Lord God,
created all things of which I have spoken, spiritually, before they
were naturally upon the face of the earth. And out of the ground made
I, the Lord God, to grow every tree, naturally, that is pleasant to
the sight of man; and man could behold it. And it became also a living
soul. For it was spiritual in the day that I created it; for it
remaineth in the sphere in which I, God, created it."[A]

[Footnote A: Book of Moses, 3:5 and 9. See also Doctrine and
Covenants, 29:31, 32.]

If, in common with men, animals and plants were created spiritually,
it may not be an idle speculation that the lower forms of life will
advance, in their respective fields, as man advances in his. However,
a statement in the above quotation must not be overlooked, "It
remaineth in the sphere in which I, God, created it." This would
preclude any notion that by endless development a plant may become an
animal, or that one of the lower classes of animals become a high
animal, or a man. Is not this the place where, perhaps, the evolution
of science has failed? All things advance, but each order of creation
within its own sphere. There is no jumping from order to order. The
limits of these orders are yet to be found.

Spencer's belief that one period of evolution follows another[A] is
brought strongly to mind in contemplating the doctrine of Joseph Smith
that man, and other things, had first a spiritual existence, now an
earthly life, then a higher existence after death. Is not the
parallelism strong--and may it not be that here, also, the "Mormon"
prophet could have shown the learned philosopher the correct way?

[Footnote A: First Principles, p. 550.]

[Sidenote: God is the compelling power of evolution.]

Finally, one other suggestion must be made. Spencer, after a long and
involved argument, concludes (or proves as he believes) that the great
law of evolution is a necessity that follows from the law of the
persistence of force. In chapter two of this series, the scientific
conception of the persistence of force was identified with the
operations of the Holy Spirit, as taught by Joseph Smith. This Spirit
is behind all phenomena; by it as a medium, God works his will with
the things of the universe, and enables man to move on to eternal
salvation, to advance, and become a God; every law is of necessity a
result of the operation of this Spirit. Here, again, the "Mormon"
prophet anticipated the world of science; and his conceptions are
simplier and more direct than those invented by the truth-seekers, who
depended upon themselves and their own powers.

Marvelous is this view of the founder of "Mormonism." Where did he
learn in his short life, amidst sufferings and persecution such as few
men have known, the greatest mysteries of the universe!




Chapter XV.

THE PLAN OF SALVATION.


[Sidenote: Why am I on earth?]

In the preceding chapter the law of evolution was shown to be the
cementing law of nature, which explains the destiny of man. To live is
to change, and (if the change is right) to grow. Through all the ages
to come righteous man will increase in complexity and will grow
towards a condition of greater knowledge, greater power and greater
opportunity.

While the great law of evolution may be quite sufficient for the
general survey, it does not explain the special conditions amidst
which organized intelligences find themselves. Man asks, Why am I on
earth? Science is silent. Up to the present time, many scientific men
have not found it necessary to postulate an intelligent force behind
the phenomena of nature, which would explain our earthly existence.

The Mormon answer to this question lies in the Mormon doctrine of the
plan of salvation. There can be no attempt to harmonize the Mormon
plan with that of science, for science has none; but, that the Mormon
plan of salvation is strictly scientific, and rests upon the
irrevocable laws of the universe can certainly be demonstrated.

[Sidenote: Perfection comes only when matter, spirit and intelligence
are associated.]

Fundamental, in the doctrines of Joseph, is the statement that all
intelligence is eternal; and that God at the best is the organizer of
the spirits of men. The ether of science has been compared with the
Holy Spirit of Mormonism. The spirit body may be likened to an ether
body of man, and is the condition of his original existence. From the
original condition, at man's spiritual birth, under the law of
evolution he has steadily grown in complexity, which means in power.

In the universe are recognized ether or spirit, force or intelligence,
and matter. Matter may act upon the ether and the ether upon matter;
but ether acts most effectively upon ether, and matter upon matter.
The original man, in whom intelligence and other forces acted through
a purely spiritual or ether body, could impress matter and be
impressed by it only in part. The man was imperfect because he did not
touch directly the world of matter, and could know only in part the
phenomena of the material world, which forms an integral part of the
universe. In the words of Joseph Smith, "Spirit and element
inseparably connected, receiveth a fullness of joy, and when
separated, man can not receive a fullness of joy."[A]

[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 93:33, 34.]

For man's perfection, it then became necessary that his spiritual body
should be clothed with a material one, and that he should become as
familiar with the world of matter, as he had become with the world of
spirit. God, as the supreme intelligence, who desired all other
spirits to know and become mighty, led in the formulation of the plan,
whereby they should obtain knowledge of all the contents of the
universe.

[Sidenote: The fall of Adam necessary to perfect intelligence.]

For the purpose of perfecting the plan, a council of the Gods, or
perfected intelligences was called. It was decided to organize an
earth from available materials, and place the spirits on it, clothed
with bodies of the grosser elements. An essential function of
intelligence is free agency; and that the spirits might have the
fullest opportunity to exercise this agency in their earthly career,
they were made to forget the events of their spiritual existence. To
learn directly the nature of grossest matter, the earth bodies of
necessity were made subject to the process of the disintegration
called death.

To make possible the subjection of eternal, spiritual organized
intelligences to perishable, material structures, certain natural laws
would naturally be brought into operation. From the point of view of
the eternal spirit, it might mean the breaking of a law directed
towards eternal life; yet to secure the desired contact with matter,
the spirit was compelled to violate the law. Thus, in this earth life,
a man who desires to acquire a first hand acquaintance with magnetism
and electricity, may subject himself to all kinds of electric shocks,
that, perhaps, will affect his body injuriously; yet, for the sake of
securing the experience, he may be willing to do it. Adam, the first
man, so used natural laws that his eternal, spiritual body became
clothed upon with an earthly body, subject to death. Then in begetting
children, he was able to produce earthly bodies for the waiting
spirits.

According to this doctrine, the socalled Fall of Adam was
indispensable to the evolving of organized intelligences that should
have a complete acquaintance with all nature, and a full control over
their free agencies. If laws were broken, it was done because of the
heroism of the first parents, and not because of their sinfulness.

Mormon theology does not pretend to say in what precise manner Adam
was able to secure his corruptible body; neither is science able to
answer all the "whys" suggested by recorded experiences. The doctrines
of Joseph Smith maintain, however, that the events connected with the
introduction of organized intelligences on this earth, were in full
accord with the simple laws governing the universe. That the Mormon
view of this matter, so fundamental in every system of theology, is
rational, can not be denied.

[Sidenote: The atonement was in harmony with natural law.]

However, the bodies given to the spirits continued for only a few
years; then they were disorganized in death. Adam's work had been done
well. After the death of the mortal body, the spirit was still without
a permanent body of matter, that would complete his contact with the
elements of the universe. Therefore, it was necessary to bring other
laws into operation, that would reorganize these dead material bodies
in such a way that they would no longer be subject to the forces of
disorganization, death and decay. The eternal spiritual body, united
with this eternal material body, then constituted a suitable home for
eternal intelligence, whereby it might be able, under the law of
evolution to attain the greatest conceivable knowledge and power.

The personage who directed the laws that cancelled the necessary work
of Adam, and made the corruptible body incorruptible was the Savior,
Jesus Christ. As Adam, by his personal work, made the earth career
possible for all who succeeded him; so Jesus, by His personal work,
made it possible for the spirits to possess immortal material bodies.

Conditions that may be likened to the atonement are found in science.
Suppose an electrical current, supplying a whole city with power and
light, is passing through a wire. If for any reason the wire is cut
the city becomes dark and all machines driven by the current cease
their motion. To restore the current, the ends of the broken wire must
be reunited. If a person, in his anxiety to restore the city to its
normal conditions, seizes the ends of the wire with his bare hands,
and unites them, he probably will receive the full charge of the
current in his body. Yet, as a result, the light and power will return
to the city; and one man by his action, has succeeded in doing the
work for many.

The actual method by which Jesus was enabled to make mortal bodies
immortal, is not known to us. Neither can we understand just why the
shedding of the Savior's blood was necessary for the accomplishment of
this purpose. Like the work of Adam, the exact nature of the atonement
is unknown. Still, throughout this plan of Salvation, every incident
and accomplished fact are strictly rational. There is no talk of a
God, who because of his own will, and in opposition to natural laws,
placed man on earth.

[Sidenote: Earth life is a link in man's evolution.]

The presence of organized intelligences in earth is simply a link in
the evolution of man. The plan of salvation is the method whereby the
evolution of man is furthered. The intelligence who conforms to the
Plan, at last attains salvation, which means eternal life and endless
development, directed by the free agency of an organized intelligence
clothed with an incorruptible body of spirit and matter.

Can any other system of theology produce an explanation of the
presence of man on earth, which connects earthly life with the time
before and the time after, on the basis of the accepted laws of the
universe?

Flawless seems the structure reared by the Mormon Prophet. Had he been
an imposter, human imperfection would have revealed itself
somewhere.[A]

[Footnote A: It must not be assumed that in this chapter has been
given a full account of the Mormon doctrine of the Atonement. These
essays are not in any sense a full exposition of Mormon theology.]




THE REGION OF THE UNKNOWN.

Chapter XVI.

THE SIXTH SENSE.


[Sidenote: The six senses, need help to reorganize many phenomena of
nature.]

The five senses are the great gateways through which all the knowledge
why the natives fight shy of it; and they say there’s a lot of
treasure buried there.”

“I expect it’s being a ‘spooky’ place, as you say is one reason these
men selected it,” commented Mr. Pauling. “They probably knew they
would not be disturbed. But how do you account for the fact that they
found a few natives there whom they killed according to Smernoff’s
story?”

“Most likely smugglers or political refugees,” replied Rawlins, “Every
time there’s a row in Santo Domingo a bunch of the natives clear out
to save their skins and a place like this would suit ’em first rate.
And there’s always a crowd of smugglers knocking about. Or they may
have been fishermen or settlers from some of the others islands—from
over Porto Rico or St. Thomas way, who didn’t know the reputation of
the Cay.”

“Say,” said Tom, who had been listening attentively as Rawlins had
been speaking. “If there’s treasure there perhaps we can find it.
Wouldn’t that be great?”

His father laughed. “If there’s any treasure there it’s what the men
we are after have brought there,” he declared. “And if any was there
before they’ve probably found it. No, Son, every island and cay in the
West Indies has treasure on it, if we believe the natives.”

“Well, some of ’em really do have and some of it’s been found,” said
Rawlins. “First time I was down here I was diving for a crowd who were
searching for treasure.”

“Did they get it?” asked Frank.

“I’ll say they did!” replied the diver. “Got it out of an old
wreck—old galleon they said it was. I don’t know how much, but big
piles of old gold and silver coins all stuck together with coral and
old bronze bells and cannon. I’ve often wondered if they got it all. A
storm came up so we couldn’t work and we had to clear out. They said
they were coming back, but I don’t think they ever did, and I’ve been
meaning to have another look myself, but never got around to it. It’s
not far from here either. Over close to the Santo Domingo coast.”

“Jehoshaphat!” exclaimed Frank. “Let’s go over and try for it now!”

“This isn’t a treasure hunt, Frank,” Mr. Pauling reminded him. “We’ve
far more important matters on hand. Uncle Sam isn’t paying us to hunt
old galleons.”

“Oh, hang it!” ejaculated Tom in disappointed tones. “That’s what I
call rotten. Here we are with a submarine and a diver and suits and
all and right near a sunken galleon with millions and millions of
dollars on it for all we know, and we can’t even hunt for it. It makes
me sick.”

Mr. Pauling laughed. “You’ll never do for the Service if you’re so
easily sidetracked,” he declared. “Of course I understand how
fascinating such a story is to you boys, but business is business,
treasure or no treasure.”

“We’ll have to go up and take a squint now,” declared Rawlins a moment
later. “We don’t want to bump into the rocks.”

With the engines stopped the submarine was slowly raised until her
periscope broke through the surface and Rawlins announced that the Cay
was within half a mile.

“We can’t run into shoal water blind,” he said. “And if we go in with
our eye out they’ll spot us perhaps. I’d like to wait until night, but
then the old tramp wouldn’t be wallowing along to drown the sound of
our screw. What shall it be, Mr. Pauling?”

“I think we’d better risk running in with the periscope out,” he
replied. “Of course, as you say, there _is_ a risk of being seen,
but if we’re on the other side of the point and they don’t expect us
it’s a much smaller chance than we’d take by running in at night. It’s
highly probable that they maintain a pretty close watch and some one
is at the instruments constantly and they’d be certain to pick us up.
Yes, if you keep your periscope low and go slowly, so as not to make a
white wake, I think we can risk it.”

So, under half speed and with the slender periscope barely projecting
above the water, the submarine edged slowly in towards the Cay, until
in about five fathoms of water, when Rawlins brought her to a stop and
let her slowly sink until she rested on the sandy bottom.

“Well, we’re here,” he announced cheerfully, “About three hundred
yards from a nice smooth beach. Now, how about going ashore?”

“Better wait until dark,” suggested Mr. Henderson. “A diver coming out
of the sea is easily seen and would be helpless until he took off his
suit. I would advise laying that copper communication wire and getting
everything in readiness for a scouting party after dark.”

All agreed that this was the wisest plan and so, donning his suit,
Rawlins entered the air-lock and carrying a coil of copper wire
slipped into the sea, paying out the wire as he walked slowly towards
the shore. He was strongly tempted to sneak to land among the rocks of
a nearby point and have a look about on his own account, but knowing
that if anything went wrong he would be to blame for having disobeyed
orders, he regretfully refrained and having crawled as close to shore
as he dared without showing himself above the surface he weighted the
remainder of the coil with coral and returned to the submarine.

Before he had taken ten steps he halted in his tracks, listening half
incredulously, every nerve and sense alert, for in his ears he had
heard the rough, guttural voices he knew so well. For the time being
he had forgotten that he wore the receiving set and the sound of human
voices coming to him so unexpectedly and suddenly under water startled
him.

To be sure, the voices sounded faint and far away, but that they were
voices and voices of men speaking in Russian or some similar tongue
there could be no doubt.

“Confound it!” he muttered to himself. “Why the dickens didn’t I learn
Russian! Wonder if they’re hearing it on the sub!”

But he could not ask. He realized that if he could hear the others
they might hear him if he attempted to speak to his friends and with
this thought another flashed through his mind. Suppose the boys should
not hear the Russians and should speak to him! Or suppose, without
stopping to think, they too should hear the voices and ask him if he
did! In either case the enemy would be forewarned and on the alert.
The only thing was to make all haste to the submarine and warn those
upon it to listen and not to speak into the transmitters. Without
waiting to hear more, Rawlins hurried as rapidly as possible to the
submarine, climbed into the air-lock and soon reappeared among his
friends.

“Did you hear them?” he asked the moment he entered the door.

“No, hear who?” demanded Mr. Henderson.

“Those Bolsheviks,” replied Rawlins, “I heard ’em not five minutes
ago. I didn’t dare call you or say anything for fear they’d hear me
and I was nervous as a cat fearing you fellows might call into the
transmitter and they’d hear.”

“We’ve been right at the instruments and didn’t hear a thing,”
declared Tom. “Gosh, but it’s funny you got ’em and we didn’t.”

“They were pretty faint and far off,” said Rawlins. “Maybe they were
out of your range.”

“No, I guess it’s that same old effect of the sounds inside the
helmet,” said Tom. “Remember, up in New York, we could always hear
under water better than ashore.”

“Well, I don’t think it makes much difference,” declared Mr. Pauling,
“but it proves they’re here or near here. You’d better take some one
ashore with you to-night, Rawlins. Whom would you select?”

“Guess it’ll have to be Smernoff,” replied Rawlins. “I’ll need some
one who can savvy Russian more than anything else.”

“Do you think you can trust him?” asked Mr. Henderson. “You’re taking
a risk with him alone on that Cay in the dark and with his old-time
friends and comrades there.”

“Sure, I’m taking a risk,” agreed Rawlins with a grin, “but a diver’s
always taking risks—been taking them ever since I was knee high—and
a few more or less don’t cut any ice. Anyway, I don’t believe Smernoff
will turn traitor. You see, he looks upon me as a sort of hero—saving
his life and all, and besides, he’s as keen on evening up scores with
this bunch as any of us. He’s got everything to win and nothing to
lose by betting on us and my experience is that if it’s an even toss
up with a fellow he’ll chip in with the side that he’ll gain the most
with.”

“That’s sound philosophy,” chuckled Mr. Pauling. “I don’t think
there’s any danger with Smernoff and of course there’s the advantage
that he can use a diving suit.”

The time dragged slowly until sundown and as soon as darkness fell
Rawlins summoned the Russian and prepared to go ashore on his
dangerous mission.

“Just as soon as you get ashore, or even before, try this wired
wireless,” Tom admonished him. “Then we’ll know if it works. It’s too
bad you can’t keep it fastened to your set while you sneak over the
island, but that’s impossible.”

Then, showing Rawlins how to snap the wire onto his set, the boys bade
him good-by and the two men entered the air-lock. For a long time
after they had left, those upon the submarine sat silent, the boys
listening at their receivers, the men thinking deeply and in their
minds planning their moves should Rawlins locate the camp of the
“reds.” At last, after what seemed an interminable time, Tom heard
Rawlins’ voice rather thin and faint, coming in over the wire.

“Safe ashore,” he said, “and talking mighty low. Can you get me all
right?”

“Hear you finely,” replied Tom. “We’ll stick right here. Good luck!”

Minute after minute dragged by, the little clock upon the bulkhead
ticked off an hour and no sound or word came from shore. What had
happened? Had Rawlins found the camp? Had he been seen and captured?
Was he even now struggling for his life? Had Smernoff betrayed him?
The suspense was nerve-racking. It anything happened to Rawlins, if he
failed to return, their quest would come to an abrupt end. They
depended upon him for guidance, for advice, for diving. Never until
now did any of them realize to what an extent everything depended upon
him.

“If he’s not back soon I’ll take a landing party ashore,” declared Mr.
Pauling. “We’ve got arms and a dozen men and more. I can’t stand this
uncertainty much longer. They’ve been gone an hour and a half. I’m
sorry he took Smernoff. I——”

At that moment Frank heard the long-hoped-for voice. “Coming back!”
was all it said.

“Well, he’s safe at all events!” exclaimed Mr. Pauling fervently.




CHAPTER VII

THE FIGHT WITH THE OCTOPUS


A few moments later Rawlins appeared with Smernoff close behind him.

“Gone!” Rawlins announced before a question could be asked. “Cleared
out bag and baggage. We went over every inch of the Cay and there’s
not a living soul on it. Just too late.”

“Jove, that’s too bad!” exclaimed Mr. Henderson. “Looks as if they’re
bound to be a jump ahead of us. Lord alone knows where they’ve gone.”

“You’re dead wrong there!” declared Rawlins. “The Lord’s not the only
one knows. We know.”

The others leaped to their feet. “Are you serious?” cried Mr. Pauling,
hardly able to believe Rawlins’ statements. “What do you mean by that,
Rawlins?”

“Where are they?” demanded Mr. Henderson. “_How_ do you know?”

“You bet I’m serious,” declared Rawlins. “Heard ’em talking. Last of
’em was just leaving and I had one devil of a time stopping old
Smernoff from running amuck and doing up the bunch single-handed.
They’ve gone over to Santo Domingo where the Grand Panjandrum stops.”

“Well, for Heaven’s sake, begin at the beginning and tell us what
happened,” cried Mr. Pauling. “First you announce they’ve all gone and
then you talk about hearing them and knowing their plans. Make a
sensible consecutive story of it, Rawlins.”

“All right,” grinned the diver, seating himself. “We got ashore all
right and I called the boys and heard them—say you must have been
shouting, Tom—and then we took off the suits, tucked ’em out of sight
among the brush and started overland, Smernoff leading. Found a nice
spot overlooking the beach and there was a bunch of men standing by a
pile of dunnage and jabbering away to beat the band. Old Smernoff
wanted to butt right in and clean up the crowd, but I managed to stop
him. Thought he’d spoil the game by yelling or something. Well, after
I’d got him quieted down we sneaked in close—they were so blamed busy
gassing away they wouldn’t have seen us if we’d walked in and said
‘how-de-do.’ Got close enough so Smernoff could understand them and
told him not to try to translate, but just to take it all in and tell
me later. I thought at first of coming back and reporting, but I could
see they were just ready to clear out and knew they’d be gone before
we could get over here and back and decided the talk was more
important so hung on. Pretty soon up bobs their sub—I could tell her
by that smashed conning tower—and a boat comes ashore and takes off
the bunch. Then the sub clears out and we are alone.”

“Well, what did Smernoff tell you?” demanded Mr. Henderson as Rawlins
concluded.

“I was coming to that,” went on the diver. “There were so many talking
at once he didn’t get it all, but he got enough. He says they had word
this morning or this afternoon—he isn’t sure which—that their sub
had been attacked and was being followed by a destroyer, and a sub,
but that the sub—meaning us—had been done for. And they were talking
a lot about him—I expect he was so busy listening to that part he
couldn’t get all the rest—swearing vengeance on him for betraying
them. They knew about his getting away and doing up a few ‘reds’ in
New York—though how the dickens they got the news beats me, and one
of the men from the sub—he’d come ashore in a diving suit to see if
the coast was clear—was telling them how Smernoff and his mate had
betrayed the sub in the East River and the narrow escape they’d had.
Funny how they got the idea old Smernoff did that when really they
deserted him. Anyhow they were mad as hornets when their nest’s been
poked by a kid and at the same time they didn’t dare wait for the
destroyer to come up, so all hands decided to pack up and go over to
Santo Domingo. It seems they’ve a place all ready over there close to
the big chief’s and had been planning to move for some time. Now, just
where that is I don’t know, but Smernoff says they talked about a cave
and I heard one of ’em say something about Caña Honda. Over Caña Honda
way there are lots of caves so I’ve got a hunch the whole shooting
match are beating it for over that way.”

“You’ve done a good night’s work, Rawlins!” cried Mr. Pauling. “You
did quite right in listening rather than notifying us. All we wanted
of this crowd was information—it’s the head of the gang we’re
after—and we’ve got what we want, or nearly what we want—without
capturing or alarming them, which is a big point. Always keep the
other fellow guessing in this game is a good thing to remember—let
him think he’s safe and he’ll be less careful. I imagine you are right
about the locality, your hunches have proved very accurate so far, so
let us get under way for Caña Honda.”

“No hurry,” declared Rawlins. “Those chaps won’t be over there until
morning and I don’t want to take any chances of bumping into them or a
reef at night. We can get started and loaf along a little later, but
we want to be dead careful or they’ll hear us. They think we’re at the
bottom of the Caribbean so we’ll let ’em keep on thinking so. If they
are at Caña Honda we won’t have much trouble finding them. We can
either pick them up by radio or spot them by smoke. They can’t cook
without fire and where there’s fire there’s smoke. My plan would be to
wait until nearly daylight and then start and take it easy and
submerge before we get in sight of Caña Honda. Then slip in, find a
good hiding place and do our hunting in small boats or afoot after
dark. A sub’s a mighty poor sort of thing to go moseying around with.
If we locate them we can slip off, notify Disbrow and corral the whole
bunch.”

For a few moments Mr. Pauling was silent, thinking deeply.

“Yes,” he assented at last. “That will be the best plan. No use in
rushing matters to such an extent that we overdo it. And I quite agree
with you in regard to tracing them. As you say, a submarine is too
clumsy and large a craft for scouting—it’s too easily seen or heard.”

Everything being thus arranged, the submarine was raised to the
surface, anchored securely and the occupants retired. The boys,
however, got little sleep, for they were nervous and excited and
filled with expectation of thrilling adventures to come.

As soon as the first faint streaks of dawn showed upon the horizon,
the anchor was hauled in and, swinging her bow towards the dim, black
bulk that marked the mountains of Santo Domingo to the westward, the
submarine slipped silently from Trade Wind Cay.

Hour after hour they moved steadily across the calm blue sea and as
they drew ever nearer to the big island the boys gazed upon it with
wonder. They had never dreamed that an island could be so large. They
had imagined, from the tiny dot that represented Santo Domingo in
their geographies, that it would be a low, flat spot somewhat like the
Bahamas, but a little larger, and now before them, they saw what
appeared to be a continent. As far as eye could see on either hand the
forest-covered hills stretched away. Inland and up from the shores
rose tier after tier of mountains, the farthest nearly two miles in
height and half-hidden in clouds, and between them were immense
valleys, deep ravines and wide plateaus. And everywhere, from sea to
topmost mountain peaks, the vivid green of forest and jungle, broken
only by a few isolated patches of light-green sugar cane upon the
lower hill slopes or in the valleys.

“Jiminy!” exclaimed Tom. “That _is_ an island!”

“I’ll say ’tis!” agreed Rawlins. “Mighty fine one too.”

“It’s beautiful—but awfully wild-looking,” declared Frank. “Is it
full of Indians and wild animals?”

Rawlins laughed heartily. “Wildest animals are the natives,” he
assured them, “and the old Spaniards killed off the last poor Indian
over two hundred years ago.” Then, a moment later, he continued: “By
the way, speaking of Spaniards, that old galleon I told you about is
right over yonder. See that line of reefs? Well, she’s just on the
outer edge of those in about 20 to 25 fathoms.”

“Oh, Gosh! why won’t Dad let us stop and go down to it?” cried Tom.

“Say, perhaps he will!” exclaimed Frank jubilantly. “He wouldn’t
before, but now he’s in no hurry—they can’t go in shore until
dark—and I’ll bet he’d just as lief wait out here as anywhere else.
Let’s ask him.”

At first Mr. Pauling refused to listen to the boys’ pleading, but when
Rawlins pointed out that they had time to kill and added that he
personally would like to have a look at the old wreck, Tom’s father
yielded.

“Very well then,” he agreed, “but don’t waste any time. We’ll expect
you to bring up a fortune, Rawlins. Let us know when you go down so we
can see the fun.”

“And for heaven’s sake take care of yourself,” added Mr. Henderson.
“If anything happens to you where will we be?”

“Oh, I’ll be safe enough,” laughed Rawlins. “I’m safer under water
than on top any day.”

“Come on then!” cried Tom, “let’s get our suits ready.”

“No, boys, you’re not going down here,” declared Rawlins. “Too deep.”

“Oh, confound it all!” cried Frank. “Everything has to be spoiled.
What’s the use if we can’t go down to the old wreck?”

“You can look through the underseas ports and watch me,” Rawlins
reminded them. “Honest, I’m sorry you’re disappointed, but this is
real diving. I’ll have to use my regulation suit here too. Too deep
for those self-contained ones.”

For a time the disappointed boys sulked, but presently, realizing that
there were limits to what they could expect to do and also realizing
that they were more than fortunate to be able to watch Rawlins as he
investigated the old galleon, their high spirits returned and they
became as interested, excited and enthusiastic as ever.

The submarine was now close to the spot where Rawlins stated the wreck
had been before and he busied himself getting out his suit, oiling and
testing the air pump and making everything ready while the submarine
slowed down and came to a stop.

“It’s a heap easier now—with a submarine,” said Rawlins, as he slid
back the heavy metal cover to the thick glass port. “We can look about
a bit and locate the wreck before I go down. Last time it took us
nearly a month to find it. You see, it’s too deep to see bottom from
the surface and—look here, boys—ever see anything prettier than
that?”

The boys crowded to the small port and stared out It was like the
sea-gardens at Nassau multiplied and glorified a thousandfold. The
submarine was now submerged and floating at a slight angle a few
fathoms above the bottom and her powerful electric lights, such as
Rawlins used in his sub-sea photography, were casting a brilliant beam
of soft greenish light upon the ocean floor and the marvelous growths
which covered it. The boys, dry and safe within the submarine, could
scarcely believe they actually were gazing at the bottom of the sea.
It was more like some strange and marvelous painting or, as Tom said,
like the models on exhibition in the American Museum. It was all
unreal, weird, beautiful, unbelievable. On all sides was a dim, green
void, with half-revealed forms, shadowy outlines and indistinct
objects showing through it as through a heavy green curtain, while the
beam of light, stabbing through the water gave the effect of the
curtain being drawn aside to disclose the beauties and wonders behind
it. Back and forth in this light clear space flitted gaudy fishes;
fishes of grotesque form; fishes with long, trailing opalescent-hued
fins; fishes large and fishes small; and once the boys cried out in
momentary alarm and drew quickly back from the glass as an ugly
hammer-headed shark, six feet or more in length, bumped his
clumsy-looking head against the port.

“Gosh! Mr. Rawlins, aren’t you afraid to go down among those fellows?”
cried Tom.

“Not in the least,” Rawlins assured him. “They won’t touch a man in a
diving suit—come up and rub their backs against him or stare at him,
but never anything else. They’re a blamed nuisance at times—get in a
man’s way, but we can drive ’em off by hitting them. Look, there’s a
moray!”

As he spoke, an immense greenish, snake-like eel wriggled past so
closely the boys could see his throbbing gills.

“They’re worse than sharks,” Rawlins told them. “Bite anything and
savage as tigers. Good to eat though.”

But the boys found the other wonders and beauties even more
interesting than the fishes. Gigantic cup-shaped sponges grew upwards
for six or seven feet. Immense sea-fans and sea-plumes formed a forest
that might have been of futuristic palms. Huge orange, green and
chocolate domes of brain corals were piled like titanic many-colored
fruits. There were great toadstool-like mushroom corals of lavender,
pink and yellow and everywhere, above all, the wide-branching,
tree-like madrepores or stag-horn corals of dull fawn-brown. Back and
forth among this forest under the sea darted schools of tiny
jewel-like fishes; great pink conchs crawled slowly about; a little
flock of butterfly squids shot past, gleaming like bits of burnished
metal in the light; ugly long-legged giant spider crabs scuttled into
their shelters among the corals and everywhere the ocean’s floor was
dotted with huge starfishes, brilliant sponges, big black,
sea-cucumbers and crabs and shells by hundreds.

“Jove, it’s the most wonderful sight I’ve ever seen!” declared Mr.
Henderson who, with Mr. Pauling, was also gazing at this wonderland
beneath the sea.

“Yes, simply marvelous!” agreed the other. “Boys, I’m mighty glad I
gave in. I wouldn’t have missed this for anything. No wonder you’re
fascinated by a diver’s life, Rawlins!”

“But I want to see that wreck!” cried Tom. “Do you suppose it’s gone?”

“Ought to be pretty close to it by now,” said Rawlins. “Yes, there
’tis! See it, boys? Look, over beyond that big bunch of sea-fans!”

The boys strained their eyes in the direction Rawlins pointed, but
could see nothing that even remotely resembled a wreck.

“No, I can’t see it,” admitted Tom, at last.

“Neither can I,” said Frank.

“Why it’s plain as can be,” declared Rawlins. “Can’t miss it.” Then,
an idea occurring to him, he burst into a hearty laugh. “Why, I
suppose you’re looking for a ship!” he cried. “Masts and stern and
rails and all! Nothing like that, boys. This old hooker’s been down
here a couple of hundred years and more. She’s just a mass of coral
now. See that sort of mound there—that one with that lop-sided
stag-horn coral growing out of one side?”

“Oh, yes, I see that,” declared Tom. “Is that the wreck?”

“I’ll say ’tis,” Rawlins assured him. “Well, we’re near enough. Too
bad we can’t let the old sub down to the bottom, but it’s too rough. I
guess she’ll be pretty steady here though—isn’t any current or those
sea-rods would be waving.”

“But I don’t understand how you can go down with life-lines and things
when the submarine is under water,” said Frank. “I thought we’d have
to be on the surface.”

“And I don’t see why it makes any difference about the suits, no
matter how deep it is,” added Tom.

“I don’t use life-lines and ‘things’ when I’m diving from a sub,”
explained Rawlins. “In the first place they’re no use. When a fellow
goes down from the surface he can’t be seen and so he has to have a
signal line and a rope for hauling him up. But down here I can come
back to the sub whenever I please and just climb into the air-lock on
the ladder, and if I want to signal I can do it without any line—just
wave my hands—as you can see me all the time. The airhose runs from a
connection in the air-lock and I carry a light line along just as a
safeguard and have a man in the air-lock holding it. Of course I
_could_ go down in one of the self-contained suits, but the
pressure’s pretty big down here and it’s no fun working in one of them
when the pressure outside is just about the limit of what I can get
with the oxygen generators. It’s different with the air—I don’t have
to bother with that—the pump looks after it.”

“Oh, I understand,” declared Frank, “but who’s going to tend the line
for you?”

“Sam,” replied Rawlins. “He’s worked with me before and he’s a
wonderful diver and swimmer. You see the pressure in the air-lock is
the same or even a little more than outside and it takes a chap who’s
used to deep-sea diving to stand that. Sam could go down here without
a suit—but not for long of course—pressure’s too great. Well, so
long. Keep your eyes on the wreck and you’ll see me out there among
the fishes in a minute.”

Rawlins entered the air-lock with Sam and presently the boys saw
him—a grotesque, clumsy figure in the baggy diving suit and big round
helmet—laboriously making his way along the bottom almost below them.
Turning, he waved his hand reassuringly and then resumed his way
towards the coral-encrusted wreck.

“Doesn’t he look funny!” cried Tom, “leaning way forwards and half
swimming along, and aren’t those bubbles coming up from his
escape-valve pretty? Say, it must be fun to be way down there. Gosh, I
wish we could have gone!”

“It takes years of practice to enable a man to stand that pressure,”
his father informed him, “and even expert professional divers cannot
keep it up long. If you boys should go down here you’d probably be
terribly injured—your ear drums burst and perhaps your eyes ruptured.
A diver begins in shoal water and gradually goes deeper and deeper and
Rawlins has been at it since he was a youngster.”

“Yes,” commented Mr. Henderson, “and some men never can dive. Divers
are born not made.”

“Well it’s the next best thing to be able to watch him,” said Frank
philosophically. “Oh, look, Tom, he’s nearly at the wreck!”

Rawlins was, as Frank said, close to the mound of coral and sea-growth
that he had told the boys was the wreck of the old galleon and a
moment later they saw him stoop and begin working with the heavy
crowbar he carried.

Breathessly the boys watched, thrilled with the idea of thus seeing a
deep-sea diver at work and speculating on whether he would find
treasure. Then they saw Rawlins suddenly start back, almost losing his
balance and in recovering himself the crowbar dropped to the ocean’s
floor. The next instant Tom uttered a frightened, horrified cry. From
among the mass of corals a long, snake-like object had shot forth and
had whipped itself around Rawlins’ body like a living rope. They saw
Rawlins grasp it, strain at it, and then, before the white-faced,
terrified watchers in the submarine fully realized what was taking
place, another and another of the livid, serpent-like things were
writhing and coiling about the diver.

“It’s an octopus!” cried Mr. Pauling.

“Oh, oh! He’ll be killed!” screamed Frank. “Oh, isn’t it terrible?”

But they were helpless, powerless to aid. All they could do was to
gaze fascinated and terror-stricken at the awful tragedy, the fearful
struggle taking place there at the bottom of the sea before their very
eyes.

And now they could see the loathsome creature itself. Its great pulpy
body, now pink, now blue, now green; its huge, lusterless, unwinking
eyes—an enormous creature whose sucker-clad tentacles encircled
Rawlins in a grip of steel, binding his signal line and making it
useless, reaching about as if to grasp the air-hose, swaying like
serpents about to strike before his helmet. Madly the diver was
fighting for his life, bracing himself against the corals, grappling
with the slimy tentacles, wrenching his hands and arms free. Then the
terrified, breathless watchers gazing at the nightmare-like scene saw
Rawlins lift his arm and through the water they saw the blade of his
sheath knife flashing in the beam of light. Again and again he brought
it slashing down, hacking, stabbing at the clinging tentacles. Bits of
the writhing flesh dropped off at the blows and a cloud of inky water
that shot from the repulsive creature’s syphon for a moment obscured
the scene. But the savage blows, the slashing cuts, the lopped-off
tentacles seemed not to affect the giant devil fish in the least and
slowly, steadily, inexorably Rawlins was being drawn closer and closer
to the cruel eyes, the soft toad like body and the wicked, parrot-like
beak.

The boys screamed aloud, the men muttered under their breath. Members
of the crew, attracted by the frightened cries, rushed to the port and
peered horrified at the terrible scene being enacted under the sea.

Rawlins’ fate seemed sealed, he was now bound fast by the eight
tentacles, even the hand with the knife was wrapped around by the
relentless, sucker-armed things.

And then, from below the submarine, a strange shape darted through the
water—a dark form which, for an instant, the boys took for some huge
fish.

Straight towards the struggling diver it sped and as the light fell
upon it the boys shouted and yelled, the men cheered, for it was no
fish but a man! A man, naked and black, swimming at utmost speed—Sam
the negro hurrying to Rawlins’ aid!

Hardly had those at the ports realized it was Sam before he was at the
scene of battle. For a brief instant he poised motionless above the
diver and his antagonist and then, quickly and gracefully as a seal,
he plunged straight down at the octopus. There was a flash of steel in
the light, the water was blackened with the polyp’s ink. Through the
thick, murky, discolored water only confused, rapidly moving forms
were visible and scarcely breathing, those within the submarine gazed
and waited. Would Sam be able to kill the creature? Could he hold out
long enough to win the battle? Could he free Rawlins?

Then as the water cleared and the light once more penetrated the
depths, rousing cheers went up from the watchers, they laughed
hysterically, tears rolled down their cheeks, for slowly, painfully
but surely, Sam was coming back, while behind him, half dragging
himself along, but apparently uninjured, was Rawlins. Upon the bottom
where he had stood a shapeless squirming, pulpy mass was all that
remained of the octopus and about it, swarmed voracious fishes
snapping at the dying, flaccid tentacles. The battle was over. Rawlins
was safe. Sam had won. Naked, armed only with a knife, he had attacked
the monster of the sea, had literally hacked it to bits and had
returned unharmed.

“Gosh!” cried Tom. “Gosh!” and unable to say another word, utterly
overcome, he slumped down upon a cushioned seat faint from the strain
he had undergone.

Frank swayed unsteadily and sank down beside his chum while Mr.
Pauling and the others wiped their wet brows, licked their dry lips
and grasped one another’s hands in silent thanksgiving, too overcome
to speak.




CHAPTER VIII

LOST


Long before they had recovered from their fright, from the strain and
the reaction, Rawlins appeared, his face pale, but with its habitual
cheerful grin and half-carrying Sam.

“I’ll say that was a close call!” he exclaimed, as he placed the negro
on a seat. “Say, get some brandy or whisky quick! Sam’s all in.”

As the others crowded about, laughing, congratulating, expressing
their relief and joy at his escape and forcing liquor between Sam’s
blue lips, Rawlins was busily chafing and rubbing the man’s cold body
and limbs, slapping his chest and back and giving orders.

“Get some hot coffee,” he commanded, “and blankets. He’ll be all right
soon. Went to pieces in the air-lock—couldn’t help me off with the
suit and had a devil of a time with it. Bully boy, Sam! There, old
sport, how do you feel?”

A sickly smile spread over Sam’s haggard features.

“Ah’s all right, Chief,” he whispered. “Did Ah finish tha’ sea-cat,
Chief?”

“I’ll say you did!” cried Rawlins. “Cut him clean in two! Blamed lucky
for me too. Here, take this coffee!”

Sam gulped down the steaming coffee and was wrapped in the blankets
and slowly the color came back to his lips and he took deep, long
breaths.

“You’re all right now,” declared Rawlins. “Be fit as ever and ready
for another scrap with an octopus before dinner. Say, Sam, I
can’t——” Rawlins swayed, his face went white as a sheet and he
grasped wildly at a stanchion. Willing hands seized him and carried
him to a couch where, for five minutes, they worked feverishly over
him before he opened his eyes and regained consciousness.

“By Jove, but you’ve got grit!” exclaimed Mr. Henderson. “Nerviest
thing I ever saw! Imagine going through that horror and then bringing
Sam in and tending to him before you gave in! Rawlins, old man, you’re
a marvel!”

Rawlins grinned and rose to a sitting posture.

“Guess I was a bit knocked out and shaken,” he admitted. “I’ll say
it’s no sport fighting a darned octopus!” and then, with a whimsical
smile, “Say, I’ll be able to make a corking film of an octopus next
time. I thought that last one of mine was a peach, but it didn’t have
enough pep to it. Never thought when I invented that rubber beast I’d
ever get in a scrap with a real one.”

“Oh, it was terrible!” cried Tom. “How can you joke about it?”

“Easy to laugh as to cry,” replied Rawlins. “All’s well that ends
well, you know. I guess you’re glad you didn’t go down now.”

“You bet we are!” declared Frank. “Gee! I don’t believe I’ll ever go
down again. I’d imagine there were devil fish waiting for me
everywhere. Ugh!”

“Never had to tackle one before,” said Rawlins, “and I’ve been diving
for years. Well, I guess I’m O.K. I’ll get busy on that wreck again.”

“Not for one minute!” said Mr. Pauling decisively. “You’ll just forget
that wreck—at least as long as you are with me. If you feel all right
we’ll get out of here as quick as we can and get some fresh air—I’m
stifling and my heart’s still beating like a trip hammer.”

“Well, I suppose you’re the boss,” grinned Rawlins, “but it’s a shame
to clear out with that old galleon and a lot of loot so handy.”

“Bother the galleon and her loot!” burst out Mr. Henderson. “No more
nonsense on this trip. We’ve had enough of under-sea work to last a
lifetime.”

Ten minutes later, the submarine was floating on the surface and
standing in the bright warm sunshine on deck, with the placid blue sea
about and the rich green island beyond, the boys could scarcely
believe that they had really undergone such a frightful experience. It
seemed like some unreal, horrible nightmare, but the round raw spots
on Rawlins’ hands where the creature’s suckers had gripped him were
proof of the reality of the battle, and every time the boys thought of
it they shuddered and cold chills ran up and down their spines.

Rawlins made little of it, joking and laughing as if such matters were
of everyday occurrence, while Sam, fully recovered from the effects of
his daring rescue, refused to be considered a hero and was ill at ease
and embarrassed whenever a word of praise or commendation was
expressed.

Very soon Santo Domingo was so close that Rawlins advised running
submerged and, pointing out a low valley-like expanse extending far
into the hills, declared it to be the entrance to Caña Honda Bay. With
the periscope just visible above the sea, and hugging the shores as
closely as they dared, the submarine was run slowly into the narrow
opening while the boys, stationed at their instruments, listened for
the faintest hint of a whirring screw in their vicinity. But no sound
broke the silence under the sea and no sign of another craft was seen.

Well up the bay and behind a densely wooded point the sub-sea craft
was run into a smaller bay and then, emerging, Rawlins piloted her
through a crooked river-like channel until safely screened back of a
low sandy beach covered with a grove of coconut trees.

“We’re pretty safe here, I think,” he announced. “I came here once
with a party of scientists and we camped here when we were on that
trip looking for the wreck yonder. If the 'reds’ are hanging out near
here they’ll be over the other side of the bay, I think. Those hills
over there are full of caves and it’s a wild country. Just the place
for such a gang. We can keep an eye on the entrance and the channel
from here and go snooping around after dark and maybe pick up a radio
message or see a fire or smoke.”

“You’ve selected an ideal spot,” agreed Mr. Pauling. “Safe harbor,
fresh coconuts, a nice beach for bathing and safely hidden. I don’t
know how we could get on without you, Rawlins.”

“Well, if I hadn’t got the crazy idea of coming down here you wouldn’t
have been here,” the diver reminded him. “So you couldn’t have been
without me. But I’m mighty glad I’ve helped a little.”

“How about fresh water?” asked Mr. Henderson. “Ours is getting pretty
low, you know.”

“There’s a stream back on the mainland—just over by that point,”
replied Rawlins, “and there’s a sort of inner harbor here too—fine
place for fishing and hunting, though of course we can’t hunt—and
beyond that a big mangrove swamp that runs clean around to the
opposite side of the bay. By going through that we could sneak over
around the caves without being seen. Devil of a place to get through,
though—regular labyrinth. A man would get lost there in a jiffy
without a compass.”

It was now nearly sundown and preparations were at once made for the
night.

It was agreed that no time was to be lost. That as soon as darkness
came Rawlins and Mr. Pauling with one of the boys should go out in a
boat carrying a receiving instrument and the resonance coil while the
others remained in the submarine and listened for any sounds or
messages which might come to them.

“The trouble is we cannot communicate safely,” remarked Mr. Pauling.
“That’s the one great shortcoming of this radio. Any one within range
can hear. I don’t know much about the technical end as you know, but I
can see that the man who invents a method of communicating by wireless
secretly, or so others can’t hear him, will make his fortune and
revolutionize the science.”

“You’re quite right,” agreed Mr. Henderson. “That’s why it will never
take the place of wire telegraphy or telephone—that is, until such a
discovery as you suggest is made. However, the very fact that it’s not
possible to keep messages secret at present is to our advantage now.
It’s an ill wind that blows nobody good, you know.”

“We’ll hope we don’t need to communicate,” said Rawlins. “I don’t see
why we should. If we hear anything and locate the gang we can come
back here, slip away and call Disbrow. We’re in no shape to make an
attack by ourselves.”

“I’d like to know why not?” demanded Tom. “We could turn the gun on
’em and we’ve got rifles and pistols and everything.”

“Sure,” laughed Rawlins. “I suppose we’d pick up that two-inch gun and
lug it over in the small boat and dump it down in their front yard
while they looked on. No, Son, if they got wise to us being here
they’d either clean out by their sub or scatter in the bush or go for
us tooth and nail. A crowd that don’t hesitate to try to torpedo us
isn’t going to stop at a scrap and the Lord alone knows how many of
’em there are.”

“Rawlins is right,” declared Mr. Pauling. “If we locate them we must
plan to make a concerted raid, surrounding them on all sides and with
a large enough force to make resistance useless. The man we want may
or may not be there, but we must be absolutely sure to get him if he
is. If he gives us the slip our troubles will have just commenced.”

“Yes, I suppose that’s so,” admitted Tom. “Gosh, I hope we do find
them.”

Everything was now in readiness, the night was inky black, not a
glimmer of light showed upon the submarine and silently embarking in
the small boat, Rawlins, Mr. Pauling, Tom and two of the crew pushed
off and were instantly swallowed up in the darkness.

Sitting at his instruments and listening for any chance sound or
message was dull work for Frank and his mind was constantly on what
Tom and the others might be doing. Once, very faint and far away, he
thought he heard the whirring sound of a screw, but Bancroft, who
listened in at Frank’s request, declared he did not believe it was.

“At any rate,” he said, “if 't is, it’s a long way off. Maybe some
ship outside the bay.”

Then followed absolute silence. Bancroft, at the regular instruments,
picked up some dot and dash messages flying back and forth between
passing ships and the big station at Santo Domingo City, but there was
nothing suspicious, nothing that hinted of the proximity of the men
they sought. Slowly the time dragged on, hour after hour passed by.
Frank yawned and almost dozed while sitting at the instruments. Would
the boat never return? Had they heard or seen anything? How, Frank
wondered, could Rawlins find his way in such dense blackness? Would
they get lost in the swamp he had mentioned? Suppose they never
returned? Perhaps they might be captured or killed by the outlaws. The
thought startled him. It had not occurred to him before that there was
any danger. But once that current of thought was started it ran riot
in his brain. He grew nervous, excited, worried, and Bancroft could
not cheer him or disabuse him of the premonition that something
serious had happened.

“Oh, you’d hear ’em, if anything happened,” declared the operator.
“They’d call you or something. If they were discovered there’d be no
need of keeping quiet. Trouble is, your nerves aren’t over the
excitement of this afternoon yet. Cheer up. They’re all right. No news
is good news, you know.”

“Yes, I suppose you’re right,” admitted Frank, “but just the same I’m
worried.”

Then to his ears came a faint sound; before he could grasp its meaning
he heard footsteps overhead and a moment later Rawlins and Tom
descended the ladder with Mr. Pauling close behind them and Mr.
Henderson, who had been keeping watch on deck, bringing up the rear.

“Gee, I’m glad you’re back!” cried Frank. “I thought sure something
had happened to you! Did you find them?”

“Not a sign!” replied Rawlins. “Don’t believe they’ve got over here
yet.”

“Gosh, but it was black!” exclaimed Tom, “and weird. What did you
think could happen to us?”

Frank, rather ashamed of his unwarranted fears, tried to explain, but
Rawlins laughed.

“Don’t you worry over anything of that sort,” he told him. “We can
take care of ourselves.”

“And, as Bancroft said, if anything went wrong we’d let you know,”
said Mr. Pauling. “Remember, all of you, if you have trouble or are
attacked or anything goes wrong don’t hesitate to call for help or
give information. Safety first is the rule and it’s better to lose the
game by having the rascals hear us than to come to grief ourselves. I
should never forgive myself if anything serious happened to any of us
through lack of communicating with the means at hand, regardless of
the results as far as catching the criminals is concerned.”

“Didn’t you hear anything on the detector?” asked Tom.

“Nothing but the splash of your oars when you came and went and, yes,
I heard something once I thought was a screw, but is was too faint to
be sure and Mr. Bancroft didn’t think it was.”

“Funny,” commented Mr. Pauling. “Of course we didn’t go very far—it
was slow work getting about in the dark—and we had to turn back as
the moon began to rise. They are either not here or else were not
talking through their instruments. To-morrow night we’ll have an hour
longer and can go farther.”

“I think the very fact that they were not conversing by radio proves
one of two things,” declared Mr. Henderson. “Either the submarine has
not 'come within speaking distance or else all are ashore together
when there would be no need of talking by wireless. I imagine that, as
they know the destroyer is looking for them, and are aware that we or
those on the destroyer have some form of under-sea radio, they would
be very cautious about using it and would do so only when absolutely
necessary.”

“Yes, and they’ll lay low for a while too,” said Rawlins. “They know
about the raid in New York and about Smernoff’s escape and they wont
try any of their tricks for a time you can bet. They’ll just listen
and say nothing and wait until the excitement blows over. It’ll be
like stalking a deer to find ’em.”

“Yes, or like looking for a needle in a haystack,” agreed Mr. Pauling,
“although I should not be surprised if they are occupying one of those
caves you mention. Our best plan will be to make a thorough search and
trust to luck.”

The night passed uneventfully and the boys awoke the next morning
feeling as if the adventures of the previous days were all a dream.
Nothing could be done during the day and so, after breakfast, they
paddled to the beach, had a splendid swim, gathered coconuts to their
hearts’ content and came back to lunch with hearty appetites. In the
afternoon they went with the two boats to the stream for fresh water
and the boys thoroughly enjoyed themselves wandering about in the
jungle while the men filled the casks. They had never been in a
tropical forest before and they were filled with wonder at every turn.
The enormous trees, with their wide-spreading buttress-like roots and
the drapery of lianas; the great, broad-leaved air plants and gay
orchids; the innumerable palms and brilliant flowers were fascinating.
They exclaimed with delight at the gaudy butterflies, the tiny humming
birds and bright-plumaged tanagers and were tremendously interested in
the hosts of big busy ants carrying bits of leaves in their jaws and
moving across the forest floor in an endless procession. Rawlins told
them these were “drougher ants” and stated that the scientists with
whom he had visited the spot before said they used the bits of leaves
for propagating a species of fungus in their nests—“sort of ants’
mushrooms” as he put it—on which they fed.

Once the boys were puzzled by a shrill, rather pretty song which
seemed to issue from the sky and in vain they searched for the singer
until Frank’s sharp eyes spied a tiny atom perched on the topmost leaf
of a tall palm—a very midget of a bird—a diminutive humming bird no
larger than a bumblebee, whose fluttering wings and trembling throat
proved him to be the singer. Again, they were startled by harsh,
discordant cries and were just in time to see a flock of green and red
parrots winging swiftly away from a tree where they had been feeding.
It was all very novel and strange and to the boys, who for so long had
been confined to the submarine. It was a most delightful change, and
even after the casks had been filled and the boats were ready to
depart they insisted on remaining, telling the men to come back just
before sundown.

With nightfall, the small boat again started forth on its search,
Frank this time going with the party while Tom remained on board, but
once again they returned unsuccessful.

The following day Rawlins suggested going for a fishing trip and with
the two boys rowed up through the narrow, winding channel to the inner
harbor and for several hours caught fish as fast as they could bait
their hooks and drop them into the dark water.

Then, with enough fish and to spare, Rawlins rowed them into the
dismal mangrove swamp among the maze of trunks, aerial roots and
winding channels. This was another new and wonderful experience to the
boys. It was low tide and between the densely growing mangroves the
mud was exposed and with countless brilliant scarlet and yellow crabs
scuttling about everywhere, across the mud, up and down the tree
trunks, over the roots, even on the overhanging branches. Many of the
trees with their sprawling roots were overgrown with oysters and the
boys gathered half a boatload of the bivalves. Rawlins too showed them
how the mangroves spread and grew by means of the roots descending
from the branches, how the slender but tough cable like roots
supported the trees and bound all together into a compact mass and how
the trees, ever growing out into the water and accumulating mud and
drift about them, formed land.

“Some day,” he declared, “this whole swamp will be dry land. After the
mangroves come black-jacks and sea-grapes, then palms and other trees,
and at last it will be all forest. I’ve seen lots of places like
that.”

There was bird life in plenty in the swamp too. Green and blue herons,
white egrets and scarlet-faced white ibis that flapped up at the
boat’s approach and stared curiously at the intruders, uttering
half-frightened, hoarse croaks like giant frogs.

“Say, it would be fine hunting here,” declared Frank when, a little
later, a flock of tree ducks whirred up and perched upon the trees
within easy gunshot. “It’s too bad we can’t shoot. Roast duck would go
fine for a change.”

“I’ll say it would,” agreed Rawlins, “but a fellow could hear a
gunshot miles off here and it would give us away in a minute.”

Night after night the boat left the submarine, ever going farther and
farther in its search, but without results, and each day the boys
amused themselves by exploring the adjoining woods and swamps,
sometimes with Rawlins, and sometimes by themselves.

At first Mr. Pauling had objected to the two youngsters going off
alone, but after they had promised always to carry a compass and to be
very careful he consented, on the condition that they did not go far
and always took along their radio set.

“Not only that you may use it in case of real need,” he explained,
“but also as it is always possible that you may hear messages.
Remember and don’t use the set unless absolutely compelled to, but
don’t hesitate if in danger or lost.”

On their first two excursions they enjoyed themselves hugely. They had
caught plenty of fish, explored a small island in the swamp and found
a colony of egrets and herons and had even seen a few of the
wonderful, pink, roseate spoonbills. Also, they had been terribly
startled when a big broad snout broke through the water a few yards
from the boat and with a terrific bellow plunged out of sight.

Rawlins laughed heartily when they told of this. “Just a manatee or
seacow,” he said. “Perfectly harmless creatures and usually very shy.
I’ll bet he was more frightened than you two boys.”

On the third day, hoping to again catch sight of a manatee, and intent
on exploring another small island they had seen, the boys set forth in
high spirits, taking along a lunch and planning to be away until
afternoon. Rawlins had planned to go with them, promising to show them
an alligator’s nest, but at the last minute changed his mind and
decided to tramp inland and ascend a high hill with the hopes of
sighting smoke which might divulge the presence of the men they
sought.

For a time all went well with the boys. They paddled to the portion of
the swamp they had already visited, took compass bearings and
continued on their way. They found the island they had sighted and
spent several hours exploring it and, finding a pleasant sandy beach
on the farther side, decided to eat lunch there. Returning to their
boat they rowed around to the beach and, seated in the shade of the
trees, ate their midday meal while laughing and joking over the clumsy
pelicans diving and fishing in an open area of water a short distance
away. Suddenly, from beyond a thick grove of mangroves, came the
startling bull-like bellow of a manatee.

“Come on!” cried Tom. “Let’s go and find him. He’s just back of that
point. If we sneak up on him carefully we’ll see him!”

Hurrying to the boat they tumbled in and rowed as silently as possible
to the point and peered beyond. There was no sign of a manatee, but
ever-widening ripples on the calm water showed where some creature had
been a few moments before and presently, from up a narrow lane of
water, they heard a snort and a short bellow again.

“He’s gone up that channel,” declared Frank in a whisper. “Come along!
He’s bound to come up. Gee! I _would_ like to see one. Mr.
Rawlins says they’re eight or ten feet long and with skin like an
elephant.”

Paying little heed to where they were going the two interested and
excited boys, keen on their chase of the elusive manatee, paddled up
the winding channel among the mangroves while ever just beyond, they
could hear the snorts or the rumbling bellow of the creature they were
following.

Presently they swung around a bunch of the trees and found themselves
upon a small lake-like lagoon several hundred acres in extent and
surrounded by the mangrove swamp.

“I’ll bet he’s in here,” declared Tom. “Let’s sit still and watch.”

Taking in their oars the boys sat motionless, gazing about the
tranquil surface of the lagoon and watching for the expected
appearance of the sea-cow.

Suddenly Frank gripped Tom’s arm. “Look!” he whispered. “There he is.
See, crawling up on that mud bank!”

“Gosh! that’s so,” agreed Tom and fascinated, the two boys watched as
a big, bulky, black creature emerged from the dark still water and
slowly and with great effort drew himself onto the wet mud flat among
the trees.

“Jimmy, isn’t he a queer beast!” exclaimed Frank in an undertone.
“Looks like a seal; and what a funny head!”

“I wish we were closer,” whispered Tom. “Don’t you suppose we could
sneak nearer?”

“Well, we can try,” agreed Frank. “We’ve seen all we can from here and
if we do scare him we can see the way he dives. Come on.”

Very cautiously, the boys slipped their oars into the water and
silently edged the boat closer and closer to the unsuspecting
creature.

They had reached a point within a few rods of the manatee when the
clumsy beast suddenly lifted his head, peered at them with his tiny
eyes in a way which Tom afterwards said reminded him of Smernoff, and
so quickly the boys could hardly follow his movements plunged into the
water.

“Gosh!” exclaimed Tom, “I didn’t suppose he could move so quickly. Oh,
say, here he comes! Look!”

The water where the manatee had drawn himself ashore was shallow and
as he strove to reach deep water, frightened out of his few wits by
the unexpected sight of the human beings, his broad back broke through
the surface like the bottom of a capsized boat and to the boys’
excited minds he seemed headed directly for them.

Although Rawlins had assured them that manatees were gentle harmless
creatures, yet here, alone in the big, silent, mysterious swamp, the
huge beast seemed fraught with danger to the excited boys and they
were fully convinced that he was attacking them. Grabbing the oars
they strove frantically to get out of his way, but the boat was heavy
and clumsy, the boys were frightened and in their mad efforts to avoid
the oncoming sea-cow Frank’s oar slipped from the rowlocks, he lurched
backwards and before he could recover himself or cry out he plunged
overboard. Had Tom not been so terribly frightened he would have
roared with laughter at the sight, for as Frank fell he pushed the
boat aside and was now floundering about in water up to his waist,
struggling madly to regain the boat while the manatee, absolutely
crazy with fright at the splash and the appearance of the boy, tried
to turn and escape in another direction and in his blind rush bumped
into Frank’s legs and knocked him yelling and screaming head over
heels.

But at the time there was nothing humorous in the situation to either
boy. To Frank, startled by the manatee in the first place and shocked
and frightened at his unexpected plunge, the poor bewildered creature
was a terrifying monster bent on destroying him, while to Tom, equally
scared, the manatee’s sudden turn and collision with Frank appeared as
a deliberate attack. But it was all over in an instant. The manatee
gained deep water and disappeared and Frank, covered with mud and
dripping with the water, wallowed to the boat and pulled himself in.

“Whew!” he exclaimed as he caught his breath. “That _was_ a
narrow escape!”

Then for the first time Tom became sensible. “Say, I don’t believe he
was after us at all!” he declared. “He was just frightened half to
death. Golly, but you look scared!”

“So would you if you’d been overboard with that big beast in the water
alongside of you knocking you down,” responded Frank. “Come on, I’ve
had enough of this, let’s go back.”

“All right,” agreed Tom, “Hello, where did we come in?”

As he glanced about he realized for the first time that he was not
sure of his bearings. A dozen and more openings showed among the
mangroves and try as he might he could not tell which was the one by
which they had entered the lagoon.

For an instant Frank looked about. “Over there,” he declared
positively. “I remember that funny-shaped tree.”

“All right then,” replied Tom, “I thought for a minute we were lost.”

Feeling sure they were right the boys pulled into the narrow channel,
chatting and laughing over their adventure until suddenly Tom stopped
rowing and glanced about.

“Say, this isn’t the place we came in,” he declared. “We never passed
here. Look ahead—those stumps are right in the middle of the channel
and we’d have seen them sure.”

“Golly, I believe you’re right!” agreed Frank, “Say, we’ll have to go
by compass.”

Dropping his oars he reached into his pocket and slowly a strange
expression of wonder, amazement, surprise and fright overspread his
face.

“It’s gone!” he said in an awe-struck tone. “It’s lost! Gosh, Tom, it
must have dropped out of my pocket when I went overboard!”

“Jiminy, that’s too bad!” exclaimed Tom. “But you needn’t be so
frightened, we can go back and start over again.”

“Yes, but suppose we can’t find the right lead?” objected Frank. “Then
we will be in a pretty fix!”

“Oh, we can find it,” declared Tom reassuringly. “If necessary we can
try every one until we get the right one.”

Turning their boat the boys pulled rapidly back to the lagoon and
after a careful survey decided on another channel.

“Hurrah, this _is_ right!” cried Frank after they had rowed some
distance, “I remember that clump of reeds. We’re all right.”

But after they had rowed steadily for an hour the two boys began to
have doubts.

“We ought to be out by that island by now,” declared Tom. “I’m
beginning to think we’re wrong again.”

“I was just getting that same way myself,” admitted Frank. “Say, if we
don’t look out it’ll be dark before we get out of here.”

“Well we can use the radio,” suggested Tom.

“Not unless we have to,” replied Frank. “We still have time to go back
and—hello, there’s the island now!”

Glancing over his shoulder Tom saw that they had reached a bend in the
waterway and beyond it loomed a wooded island. For a moment he gazed
at it.

“That’s not the island,” he announced. “Look, it’s got palms on it.”

“Jehoshaphat, so it has!” exclaimed Frank. “Say, Tom, we’re lost.
We’ll have to use the radio.”

“Yes, I guess we will,” agreed Tom, “if we go back to that lagoon now
we’ll never get out until after dark and Dad’ll be worried to death.”

As he spoke, he uncovered the radio apparatus while Frank got out the
small portable aerial and erected it over the boat, dropping the
ground wire over the side into the water.

Tom picked up the instruments, turned on the rheostat and was about to
call into the microphone when his jaw dropped, his eyes seemed about
to pop from his head and his hand shook.

“What on earth’s the matter?” cried Frank, alarmed at the strange
expression which had come over Tom’s face. “You look as if you’d seen
a ghost.”

“Hssh!” whispered Tom in a shaky voice. “I near them! I heard those
Russians! Gosh, Frank! they must be close by!”




CHAPTER IX

PRISONERS


At Tom’s astounding announcement Frank sank limply onto a thwart. But
the next instant he was up, and seizing the resonance coil, hastily
connected it to the set in place of the aerial.

“Now signal or tell me when you get them,” he said, as, holding the
coil horizontally, he commenced moving it in a wide circle. For a time
Tom was silent, motionless, listening with every sense and nerve taut;
then, as the coil pointed to the right, he raised his hand.

“There!” he whispered.

Presently he took off his phones. “It’s no use listening,” he declared
“we can’t tell what they’re saying. Oh, thunder, why isn’t Smernoff
here?”

“Well, we can call to the folks and tell them and they can let
Smernoff listen,” said Frank.

“Silly!” cried Tom petulantly. “If we called them, these Russians
would hear and either clear out or shut up. And, besides, I don’t
believe they could hear them on the submarine. I’ll bet that’s been
the trouble all along. They’ve been too far off.”

“Well, what can we do then?” demanded Frank. “If we call for help to
get back, these fellows will hear us too. We’re in a nice fix just
from chasing that confounded old manatee. First we get lost and then
we hear this talking and can’t even tell about it.”

“We might row along until we lose these fellows and then call the
sub,” suggested Tom, “if we get so far away we can’t hear them the
chances are they can’t hear us. Come on.”

There seemed nothing else to do and so, choosing a channel that led
away from the direction whence the sounds had come, the boys rowed
steadily for some time. Then they ceased rowing and picking up the
coil Frank held it while Tom listened at the set.

For a space no sounds came to his ears and then he started so
violently that Frank was almost upset.

“Gosh all crickety, Frank!” he exclaimed. “Something’s wrong. They
sound nearer than ever.”

Puzzled and not knowing what to do, the boys sat motionless and
speechless. They seemed to be surrounded by the voices coming from
both directions.

“Hello,” ejaculated Frank presently, “We’re moving. Look at those
trees!”

Tom glanced up. It was perfectly true, the trees were slowly but
steadily slipping past them. They were drifting with the current.

“It must be the tide,” declared Tom. “If ’tis we’ll be out of here
soon and if we reach the bay——”

“Hurrah, there’s the bay now!” cried Frank.

A few hundred yards ahead they saw the sheet of open water through the
trees and with light hearts grasped the oars and started to row
forwards, but before they had taken a stroke Tom uttered a smothered
cry, grasped Frank’s arm and pointed a trembling finger at the open
water visible through a space between the mangroves.

“Look, Frank! Look!” he whispered

Less than two hundred yards distant, plainly visible and moored close
to the edge of the swamp was a big submarine! No second glance was
needed to verify Tom’s first suspicions; the shattered conning tower
left no doubt as to the craft’s identity.

Frank was too surprised and dumbfounded to speak and stood gazing with
unbelieving eyes at the submarine so near to them and so totally
unexpected.

“Quick!” whispered Tom. “If we don’t watch out we’ll be drifting in
sight on that open water. Grab a root or a branch while I push the
boat in.”

Seizing his oars, Tom pushed and pulled, forcing the boat close to the
trees until Frank could grasp one of the swaying, descending roots and
made the boat’s painter fast to it.

“No wonder we heard ’em,” remarked Tom when the boat was secured.
“That creek must turn around a corner and we didn’t notice it. Say,
what are we going to do now? We can’t wait here all night and we don’t
know where to go and we can’t call our folks without those fellows on
this sub hearing us.”

“And if we could call your father or Mr. Rawlins we couldn’t tell them
where this submarine is because we don’t know ourselves,” replied
Frank.

“It’s awful funny we should find it by getting lost after they’ve been
hunting for it night after night,” said Tom, “and now what good does
it do? I don’t see but what we’ll have to go back the way we came and
trust to luck.”

“Huh!” snorted Frank, “and get lost worse than ever. If this sub came
in here there must be deep water leading to sea and if we could sneak
out we’d be sure to find the entrance to the bay and then we could
call our people or hunt along the shore till we found that beach with
the coconut grove.”

“Yes, and a swell chance we have of sneaking out!” Tom reminded him.
“Just as soon as we went out of here they’d spot us, sure.”

“Well we’ll have to wait until dark, that’s all,” said Frank
resignedly. “Of course they’ll worry, but like as not they’ll call for
us and we may hear ’em. Then if these chaps hear, it wont be our
fault. I know your father said not to hesitate to use radio if we had
to, but he didn’t think we’d be alongside this submarine when we
needed to. It’s not going to hurt us to wait here a while and we may
see something.”

Tom’s sharp “Hisst!” caused Frank to wheel about. A small boat was now
beside the submarine and several men were climbing into it. Presently
they pushed off, the men took to the oars and to the boys’ horror and
amazement the boat headed directly toward their hiding place.

“Gosh now it’s all up!” whispered Tom in terrified tones, “if they
spot us or our boat it’ll be good night for us!”

Breathlessly the boys crouched in their craft, shaking with fright,
while nearer and nearer came the boat from the submarine. Then, when
the two trembling boys felt that their hour had come, that in another
instant they must be seen, the other boat swung to one side and
disappeared in a narrow channel among the mangroves not fifty feet
from where the boys were concealed. In a few moments the sound of the
oars and the voices of the men grew faint in the distance and the boys
raised themselves and with relieved, fast-beating hearts exchanged
glances.

“Did you see them?” exclaimed Tom. “My, weren’t they a tough looking
lot!”

“Regular pirates!” agreed Frank. “Did you see that big fellow with the
red beard?”

“You bet, and that thin one with the upturned blonde mustache! Gosh,
he looked like the Crown Prince of Germany!”

“That dark man was the worst,” declared Frank. “That Indian or nigger
or whatever he was—the one with the earrings. Gee, I’d hate to have
them get us.”

“I never knew Russians were such ugly looking people,” said Tom, “and
I thought they were all light. That fellow with the earrings was
almost as black as Sam.”

“They’re not all Russians,” Frank reminded him. “Don’t you remember
Mr. Henderson and your father saying they were ‘reds’ from every point
of the world and that the big chief of the lot isn’t even a German
although he worked for Germany. And there was that man that died in
New York, he was Irish.”

“Yes, that’s so,” agreed Tom, “but say, let’s get out of here now.
They’re gone and maybe we can sneak away. I don’t believe any one’s
aboard the sub.”

“Well, I do,” replied Frank, “I vote we turn back and see if we can’t
find another channel that leads out below here. We can tell the right
way to go by the tide flowing.”

“Golly, that’s so,” assented Tom. “All right, but we’ve got to be
careful.”

Unfastening the boat, the two boys pulled slowly up the creek against
the current, searching the mangroves on either side for an opening
through which the tide was flowing. At last they sighted one and with
elated minds turned into it. As they pulled along, Tom noticed that
the mangroves were giving place to other trees, that the soft mud
banks had changed to sand and that the shores were getting higher.

“We must be getting out of the swamp,” declared Tom. “See! the banks
are high and there are trees. We’ll soon be out.”

The stream they were following was now running with quite a swift
current and the boys noticed several side branches or smaller creeks
flowing into it. They had just passed one of these and were about to
turn a bend when with one accord they stopped rowing, their eyes grew
wide with fright and they sat listening breathlessly. From ahead had
come the sounds of human voices! Just around the bend were men!

To go on meant certain discovery. What should they do? For a brief
instant they had thought it might be some of their own party, but the
next second they knew better, for the words that came to them were in
a harsh guttural tongue—the same tongue they had so often heard
through their receivers.

Then, a sudden desire, an overwhelming curiosity to see the speakers,
to learn where they were and what they were doing swept over Tom. With
signs he motioned to Frank and an instant later they had run their
boat into the side creek, had beached it noiselessly upon a narrow
strip of soft earth and like snakes were wiggling silently up the bank
among the trees. For some strange psychological reason they were no
longer afraid; no longer did thoughts of the risk they ran enter their
heads. Their entire thoughts were centered on seeing these men, on
learning what they could, for they realized instinctively that they
had stumbled upon the secret of the gang’s hiding place, that they had
found what their friends had been searching for night after night and
that, did they ever regain their own submarine, their knowledge would
be invaluable.

But they were cautious. They had no intention of being either seen or
heard and before they reached the summit of the bank they carefully
raised their heads and peered between the bases of the trees beyond.
They had no means of knowing what lay beyond that bank. It might be
open land, it might be brush or woods or it might be water. They knew,
however, that the men must be close at hand and yet, when they peered
through, they could scarcely repress surprised exclamations at what
they saw.

Within a dozen yards, a boat was lying beside the bank of the stream
and just beyond, beneath a wide-spreading tree, two men stood talking.

One was the big, red-bearded fellow the boys had seen in the boat as
it left the submarine. The other, who half leaned upon a repeating
rifle and who wore an immense automatic pistol at his belt, was tall,
well-built and most striking in appearance. He was dressed in light,
neat clothes and leather puttees; a broad-brimmed Panama hat was on
his head, his face was tanned but clean shaven, except for a small,
sharply upturned, iron-gray mustache, and in one eye he wore a
monocle.

So totally unlike his companions was he that the boys almost gasped in
astonishment. There was nothing about him, nothing in his appearance,
that spoke of lawlessness, of a thug or a criminal. Indeed, he was a
most distinguished-looking gentleman, such a figure as one might
expect to see at a meeting of scientists, at some state function, at a
directors’ meeting in some bank or business house.

But when he spoke the disillusionment was complete. His voice had the
strangest sound the boys had ever heard. It was cold, grating,
inexpressibly cruel and sent shivers down the boys’ backs as they
listened. What he was saying they could not grasp, but that he was
angry, that he was reprimanding the giant before him, the boys could
tell by his tones, the hard reptilian glitter of his light gray eyes
and by the expression of the red-bearded fellow.

The latter, with hat in hand, fairly cowered before the other. His
head was bent, his eyes downcast, his face and neck were flushed
scarlet and his replies came in a low, humble, apologetic tone.

Those in the waiting boat were silent, only the two uttered a single
word. For a space the boys watched, fascinated, and then it occurred
to Tom that they must get away, that somehow they had taken the wrong
channel and that if they were to escape unseen they must leave at
once, retrace their way to where they had seen the submarine and from
there try to reach the entrance to the bay.

Touching Frank’s arm, Tom signaled for him to withdraw and as silently
as they had come the two boys slipped down the bank, shoved their boat
noiselessly into the water and crept into it.

With fast beating hearts they paddled towards the larger stream and
had almost reached it, when, without warning, a flock of white ibis
flapped up before them and with harsh croaks of alarm perched upon the
topmost branches of the trees.

The boys’ blood seemed to freeze in their veins and their hearts to
cease beating. Would the men suspect something or somebody was near?
Would they sweep down on the boys?

Instantly, at the hoarse cries of the birds, the voices beyond the
point had ceased and the boys knew the men were listening, straining
their ears for a suspicious sound. To go on would be to court
disaster. The least rattle of oars or squeal of rowlocks would be
heard and even if no sound issued from the boat the slightest movement
would again arouse the ibis overhead. There was nothing to do but
wait, wait with panting, throbbing lungs and heart-racking fears for
what might happen next.

But the boys did not have long to wait. From beyond the intervening
bank came the rattle of an oar, a sharp, gruff order, the splash of
water. The men were coming! To remain where they were meant capture!
There was but one thing to be done and that was to turn and pull as
fast as they were able into the small creek in the one faint hope that
the others might pass it by and look for the cause of the birds’
fright upon the main stream. Quickly the boat was swung round and with
deadly terror lending strength to their arms, the boys pulled
frantically into the trees that formed an archway over the tiny
waterway. But their ruse was in vain. The noise of the splashing oars
had been heard. The disturbed water of the stream told the story of
their flight to their enemies. Scarcely a score of yards had been
covered when the boys heard the other boat following, heard the rough
Slavic voices, and the frightened cries of the ibis. Madly they pulled
and then, so close that the boys could not avoid it had they wished,
the creek came to an abrupt end in a mass of foliage.

Before the boys knew it was there they had bumped into it. Frank’s hat
was swept off by a branch, sharp twigs and thorns tore their flesh,
the boat rocked and grated, and realizing they were trapped the boys
screamed in terror. Then, ere they grasped what had happened, their
boat had shot through the screen of branches, they were in open water
and looking back they saw the fallen trees which had spanned the
creek. Before them the stream turned sharply to one side. Only a dozen
strokes of the oars would bring them to the bend. They had almost
reached it when shouts and curses came from beyond the fallen trees,
they heard a crashing of the branches, the sharp reports of revolvers
rang out and bullets whistled past the boys’ heads.

The next moment the boat shot around the point and, driven to
desperation, thinking only of outdistancing their pursuers, the boys
rowed like mad, giving no heed to direction, no attention to their
surroundings. Then they suddenly realized that the sounds of their
pursuers had ceased, that there were no shouts, no splashing of oars,
no rattle of wood on wood. What had happened? Why had the others
abandoned the chase?

And then it dawned upon Frank.

“Gee Christopher!” he exclaimed under his breath, “that fallen tree
saved us, Tom! Their big boat couldn’t get through. We’re safe!”

“Gosh, I guess you’re right!” whispered Tom while the two still
continued to row. “But I’m not sure we’re safe. There may be another
way in here and perhaps they’ve gone around to cut us off. Say, we’ve
got to row like the dickens and try to get so far they won’t find us!”

“Yes, but we’re lost!” declared Frank. “We haven’t any idea where we
are!”

“I know it,” admitted Tom, “but we can’t help that now. After we’ve
gone farther we’ll stop and call our folks. Those chaps back there
can’t hear us and if their sub does, it won’t make any difference now.
They know we’re here and we’ve got to get out.”

For fully half an hour they toiled on. Their breath came in gasps,
their arms ached, their hands were blistered and raw, but they dared
not stop. Then, when they felt they could go no farther, their boat
shot out from the mangroves and they found themselves floating on a
broad lagoon.

“Hurrah!” cried Frank, “we’re back where we saw the manatee!”

“Golly, so we are!” agreed Tom. “Well, I’m going to use the radio now
and see if we can get our people.”

But all attempts to get their submarine proved fruitless. Over and
over again they called. Hopefully and patiently Tom listened while
Frank moved the resonance coil about, but not a sound came through the
receivers.

“It’s no use,” declared Tom at last. “We can’t get them. What on earth
will we do?”

“All we can do is to go on,” replied Frank in dejected tones. “It’s
almost dark, we may find our way by luck.”

“I can’t row another stroke,” declared Tom. “I’m all in. We might just
as well lie here and rest, at least until the moon comes up. We can’t
go on in the dark through these creeks.”

“Yes, I suppose so,” agreed Frank who, now the excitement was over,
felt utterly exhausted. “We’re as safe here as anywhere.”

Drawing in their oars the two lonely, tired and hungry boys threw
themselves in the bottom of the boat and too weary even to talk lay
gazing up at the stars. The boat rocked gently to the tiny ripples on
the lagoon; from the swamps came the droning chant of frogs and
insects; fireflies flitted by like tiny meteors; the water lapped
soothingly against the boat’s planks and lulled by the sounds and the
soft night air the boys slept.

Tom was the first to awake. For an instant he lay still, dazed, not
remembering where he was and dimly aware of a strange, monotonous,
resonant sound that somehow seemed to vibrate and throb through his
brain, the boat and the night air.

He nudged Frank. “Wake up!” he half whispered, “wake up! The moon’s
out and we’ve got to be going on.”

Then, as Frank sleepily opened his eyes and yawned, Tom spoke again.

“Hear that noise?” he asked. “What is it?”

Frank, now wide awake, sat up. He too heard the sound, a noise so
unlike anything else he had ever heard that he felt cold shivers
chasing up and down his spine.

“I—I don’t know!” he stammered. “It’s uncanny—perhaps it’s a frog or
a night bird or something. Say, where are we?”

Then, for the first time, Tom noticed their surroundings. No longer
were they on the lagoon. On either side, rose tall trees looming black
and gigantic against the moonlit sky and by the glint of the light
upon the ripples the boys could see that the narrow waterway ran
swiftly.

“Crickey, we’ve drifted while we were asleep!” cried Frank. “Now we
_are_ lost.”

“Well, we’re drifting with the tide anyway,” said Tom, trying bravely
to be cheerful. “And it’s bound to take us out somewhere to open
water.”

“Yes, only it may be coming in and not going out,” said Frank. “What
time is it? My watch stopped when I fell overboard.”

Tom pulled out his watch and examined it’s luminous dial. “Gosh, it’s
after eleven!” he exclaimed. “Say, we must have slept four or five
hours.”

“There’s that noise again!” cried Frank. “What on earth is it? It
seems to come from all around and say—— Gee, look there, Tom! What’s
that?”

Startled, Tom glanced about. Far ahead between the trees he could see
a ruddy glow.

“Golly, it’s a fire!” he exclaimed in frightened tones. “Let’s get
out. It may be those Russians again. Perhaps it’s their camp.”

“And the noise comes from there!” stammered Frank. “It’s dreadful!”

Hurriedly grasping their oars the boys pulled, trying their utmost to
swing the boat’s bow around, but it was of no use. The current was
running like a millrace and despite their utmost endeavors they were
being swept irresistibly towards the fire and that weird, uncanny,
hair-raising sound.

Nearer and nearer they swept. Now they could see the ruddy light upon
the water ahead. They could even see the flames dancing among the
trees and the resonant, throbbing boom rose and fell in terrifying
cadence through the night. Then, between the throbbing beats, the boys
heard voices; but not the harsh guttural voices of the “reds.” It was
even worse, for the sounds borne to the boys—frightened,
terror-stricken and helpless in their drifting boat—savored of
savages. They were high-pitched, yet musical, rising and falling; one
moment dying to a low murmur, the next rising to a blood-curdling
wail.

Absolutely paralyzed, the boys sat and stared at the light and the
fire they were approaching. What was it? Through their minds flashed
stories of cannibals, visions of savage Indians, and yet Rawlins had
assured them there were no Indians upon the island. But surely these
could be nothing else. Those sounds—dimly, to Tom’s mind came
memories of a similar sound he had once heard—yes—that was it—an
Indian tom-tom at a Wild West show. They _must_ be savages! Yes,
now he could see them, wild, naked, dancing, leaping figures;
whirling, gyrating about the fire now less than two hundred yards
ahead and within fifty feet of the Lank. Frank had seen them also. He
too knew they must be savages. Would they be seen? Would the dancing,
prancing fiends detect them as they swept through that circle of light
upon the water or were they too busy with their dancing to notice
them? Now the drum roared in deafening, booming notes, filling the
surrounding forest with its echoes and the savage chant of the
prancing figures sent chills over the cowering boys. Just ahead was
the expanse of water illuminated by the red glare. In a moment they
would be in it. Close to the bank the boys saw canoes drawn ashore,
big dug-outs, crude primitive craft. Yes, there _were_ Indians in
Santo Domingo, Rawlins must have been mistaken. Now they were in the
firelight. They held their breaths and then a moaning hopeless groan
issued from the boys’ lips. Their boat slowed down; before they
realized what had happened they were caught in an eddy and the next
instant their craft bumped with a resounding thud against one of the
canoes.

The boys’ senses reeled. They were wedged fast between the dugouts in
the brilliant light from the fire and before a cry could escape them,
before they could move, two half-naked, awful creatures, hideously
painted and with threatening, waving clubs came dashing down the bank.

The boys knew their last minute had come. The savages had seen them.
Resistance would be hopeless. They were too frightened, too frozen
with mortal terror to move or even scream.

The next second the naked fiends were upon them. Powerful hands seized
legs and feet and unresisting, limp, almost unconscious with dread
thoughts of their fate, they were borne triumphantly towards the fire
and the ring of terrifying figures.




CHAPTER X

RADIO TO THE RESCUE


As the sun dipped towards, the mountains to the west and the boys did
not return, Mr. Pauling became worried.

“I was a fool to permit them to go off alone,” he declared to Mr.
Henderson. “Even with a compass they might go astray in the swamp.
Boys are always careless and they do not realize the danger of getting
lost.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t worry yet,” replied the other. “They have their radio
sets along and would call us if they had any difficulties. Bancroft
has been listening for the past hour and nothing’s come in.”

“Yes, I know,” rejoined Tom’s father, “but if they don’t turn up soon
I shall start after them.”

Rawlins, who had returned from his scouting trip and had reported that
he had been unsuccessful in seeing a sign of smoke across the bay, now
approached.

“I hardly think they’re in trouble,” he said, “I I’d suggest calling
them before starting a search, provided they don’t arrive. They can
hear much farther than they can send and I don’t believe our messages
could be heard by the gang in the sub. We’ve been several miles around
the bay and know those rascals are not near.”

“Yes, we can do that,” agreed Mr. Pauling. “Even if they should hear,
it is of little consequence in comparison with getting word to the
boys. I’m about ready to abandon the attempt to locate the men anyway.
Our information is too indefinite to rely upon.”

As time slipped by and still there was no sign of the missing boys and
no word came by radio, Mr. Pauling became terribly worried and even
Rawlins’ optimism became shaken.

Finally, as the afternoon shadows lengthened, Tom’s father could stand
it no longer and he told Bancroft to call their names and see if he
could get in touch with them. But when, after fifteen minutes, the
operator reported that no response had been received Mr. Pauling grew
frantic.

“Something’s happened,” he declared. “They’ve either gone too far to
hear or to reply or they’ve been drowned or have met with some
accident. We must set out on a search at once.”

Accordingly, the boat was manned, a radio set was placed in it and Mr.
Pauling, Rawlins and Bancroft embarked, leaving Mr. Henderson, who was
the only remaining member of the party who understood radio, in charge
of the submarine. Sam also went along, for, as Rawlins explained, he
had eyes like a cat and at Mr. Henderson’s suggestion Smernoff was
included.

“You may hear those rascals talking,” he said, “and if you do you’ll
need him.”

Rawlins remembered hearing the boys speak of the island they wished to
explore and knew more or less the direction they had gone. It was no
easy matter to find an island in the swamp largely by guesswork, but
luck favored and just before dark they sighted the higher trees and
firm land of the island where the boys had lunched. Calling
frequently, both by voice and by radio, the searching party pulled
around the island and came to the beach. Something white upon the sand
attracted Rawlins’ attention and landing they found the paper
wrappings of the boys’ lunch.

“They stopped here to eat,” announced the diver. “Now the question is
in which direction they went. They might have gone up any one of these
creeks or they might have started for the mainland. It’s all
guesswork.”

It was now dusk and the swamp was black with impenetrable shadows, but
as they circled around the swamp in vague hopes of finding some clue
or of hearing the boys by the radio instruments, Sam’s sharp eyes
caught sight of a bunch of water plants.

“Tha’ boat parsed by here, Chief,” he announced, pointing to the
bruised and bent stems. “Ah’m sure of that, Chief.”

Rawlins examined the plants carefully. “Yes, either their boat or some
other,” he agreed. “We’ll follow up this channel.”

By the time they reached the open lagoon it was pitch dark and their
only hope lay in getting in touch with the boys by radio.

“If we don’t look out we’ll get lost ourselves,” announced Rawlins.
“You watch the compass, Quartermaster, and keep track of our course
and the bearings.”

“Aye, aye, Sir,” replied the old sailor, and once more the boat
proceeded through the black swamp, Rawlins peering ahead and
occasionally shouting, Bancroft constantly speaking into the
instruments and listening at the receivers and Mr. Pauling, nearly mad
with worry, fears and regrets.

For hour after hour they continued, following waterway after waterway,
traversing lagoon after lagoon, forcing their way through the dense
swamps to the mainland of the island and even emerging on the broad
calm bay.

“If they’re lost and unable to get back they’ll probably camp,” said
Rawlins. “They have matches and can make a fire. In fact they’ve sense
enough to think of making a fire for a signal. I believe it will be a
good plan to go ashore; I’ll ascend a hill, and Sam can climb a tree
and look about. If there’s a fire anywhere in sight we should see it.”

All agreed this was a good plan and accordingly the boat was headed
towards the nearest point and at last grated upon the rocks. With Sam,
Rawlins pushed into the brush, stumbling over roots, bumping into
trees in the darkness, barking shins and tearing clothes, but
steadfastly clambering up the steep slope until they reached the
summit. Selecting a tall palm, Sam proceeded to “walk” up the trunk in
the native Indian fashion and soon reached the huge leafy top.

Straddling the base of an immense frond, he slowly and carefully swept
the horizon with his eyes. From his lofty perch, nearly one hundred
feet above the earth and fully two hundred feet above the water, the
entire swamp, the numerous lagoons and even the broad bay lay spread
before him like a map. Although the moon would not rise until
midnight, yet the sky was bright with myriads of stars which cast a
faint glow upon the water and served to distinguish; it from the
darker masses of mangroves and land. At first he could see nothing
that resembled the glow of a fire, but after several minutes his eyes
detected a faint light among the trees several miles away and
apparently on the mainland across the bay.

As he watched, the spot grew brighter, it took on a pinkish tint and
seemed to spread, until at last, it was a distinct ruddy light which
he knew beyond the shadow of a doubt was a fire. Carefully taking
bearings by the stars and the dark masses of the swamp, he slid to the
ground.

“Tha’s a fire yonder, Chief,” he announced. “Ah’ seed it plain an’
clear, an’ it’s just started, Chief. Ah seed it fla’in’ up an’
a-makin’ brighter all the time. Ah reckon tha’ young gentlemens ’s
a-makin’ it fo’ a signal, Chief.”

“That’s blamed good news!” exclaimed Rawlins. “You say it’s over on
the other side of the bay and you’ve got its bearings. All right,
we’ll get over there, but how the deuce those kids got across the bay
without knowing it, stumps me.”

Reaching the boat, Rawlins reported their success and with all
possible speed the boat was pulled through the winding channels of the
swamp in the direction Sam indicated. But it is one thing to take a
sight and bearings from a tree top on a hillside and quite another
matter to follow those bearings and directions through a mangrove
swamp filled with twisting, devious channels. How Sam could manage to
keep the general course at all was little short of marvelous, but as
the boat turned bend after bend, doubled on its track, found its way
blocked and made detours, the Bahaman never missed his general sense
of direction, and at last the searching party emerged from the swamp
and on the broad expanse of the bay.

Sam glanced about, squinted at the stars and indicated the course to
follow. As they rowed swiftly across the bay towards the opposite
shores, Rawlins spoke.

“Say!” he exclaimed. “It may not be the boys after all. I’ve been
puzzling all along how they could get over there and I’m beginning to
think it’s those chaps we’re after and not the boys.”

“Jove! you’re right,” cried Mr. Pauling, “and, good Lord! perhaps
they’ve found the boys and taken them prisoners! If the boys used
their radio to call us the others may have heard it and located them.
What an addle-headed fool I’ve been to take such risks! No wonder we
haven’t heard them or got them. Probably they’re helpless—bound and
gagged and those devils are chuckling to themselves as they hear our
calls and are luring us into a trap.”

“Well, if they’ve touched those kids I’ll say there’ll be some
rough-house work when we step into that trap,” declared Rawlins, “and
they’ll find they’ve bitten off a darned sight bigger hunk than they
can swallow without choking. We’ve got arms, I slipped ’em in the
boat, and we’re no crew of tenderfeet. Sam’s some little scrapper and
the quartermaster was champion middle-weight of the Atlantic squadron,
old Smernoff’s itching for a fight with those whiskered friends of
his, and I guess you and Bancroft can take care of yourselves and I’m
no quitter myself.”

“Yes, yes, Rawlins,” replied Mr. Pauling, “but you forget that if they
have the boys they can protect themselves by threatening harm to Tom
and Frank. They can make their own terms and they are ruthless
beasts.”

“Well, Mr. Pauling, don’t let’s cross our rivers till we get to ’em,”
said the diver. “We don’t know if the boys are prisoners yet. We’ll go
easy and find out how the land lays first. Remember we can see their
fire and what’s going on a long time before they can spot us. That’s
the worst of a fire. The other fellow can see you, but you can’t see
the other fellow.”

“Yes, but the great trouble is, if we call for the boys by radio we’ll
warn our enemies instead,” Mr. Pauling reminded him.

“If they _are_ prisoners it won’t be any use hollering for them,”
replied Rawlins sagely. “I guess the best plan is just to lie low,
keep quiet and sneak in. If the boys are alone and it’s their fire
we’ll find them just as well without calling and if it’s the ‘reds’
fire and the boys are not there we’ll spring a surprise.”

A few minutes later the boat had gained the shelter of the trees
beyond the bay and, still guided by Sam’s almost uncanny instinct or
skill, they pushed into the nearest channel among the mangroves. On
this side of the bay, however, there was much more open water; the
trees were more scattered, and, instead of being made up of
innumerable creeks flowing through dense masses of mangroves, the
swamp consisted of large lake-like expanses dotted and interrupted by
narrow belts and isolated clumps of trees.

They had proceeded for an hour or more and felt that they must be
approaching the spot where Sam had seen the fire when they noticed
that the darkness was less dense, that there was a subdued light upon
the water, and that the clumps of trees were sharper and clearer.

“Hanged if the moon isn’t rising!” exclaimed Rawlins. “Crickey, it
must be near midnight.”

Mr. Pauling looked at his watch. “It’s after eleven,” he announced.
“We’ve been searching for five hours.”

“I’ll say those kids are some little travelers!” declared Rawlins.
“They must have thought they were rowing for a bet to get clean over
here.”

“Ah 'spec’ tha’ tide made to help them, Chief,” remarked Sam. “It
makes right strong an’ po’ful up these creeks.”

“Yep, that must have been it,” agreed Rawlins. “Hadn’t thought of it
before, I’ll bet they got caught in a strong current and couldn’t pull
against it. Hello! What the——”

Instantly the men stopped rowing. From far away, as if from the air
itself, came a low throbbing vibration, a sound felt rather than
heard, and those in the boat stared at one another questioningly.

“Thunder!” suggested Mr. Pauling, in a low tone.

Rawlins shook his head. “Nix,” he replied crisply. “Thunder doesn’t
keep up like that and it doesn’t throb that way. Sounds to me more
like a ship’s screw half out of water.”

“Some bird then,” suggested Mr. Pauling. “Bittern or owl, perhaps.”

“I’ll say it’s _some_ bird—if ’tis a bird!” exclaimed Rawlins.
“What is it, Sam?”

The quartermaster spat into the water and before the Bahaman could
reply he remarked: “’Course 'taint possible, Sir; but if I was
a-hearin’ o’ that 'ere soun’ an’ was in the South Seas 'stead o’ here
in the West Injies—I’d say as how ’twas a tom-tom, Sir—you knows
what I means, Sir—savage drum such as they uses for a-havin’ of a
cannibal feast, Sir.”

“Well we’re not in the South Seas,” returned Rawlins, “and there
aren’t any cannibals here. Say, what the devil’s the matter with you,
Sam?”

It was no wonder Rawlins asked. The Bahaman was staring open-mouthed
across the water, his eyes rolling, his face drawn and awful fear
depicted upon his black features.

“Here, wake up! Seen a ghost?” cried Rawlins, shaking the negro
roughly. Sam’s jaws came together, he licked his dry lips and in
terror-striken, shaking tones murmured, “Voodoo!”

Something in his tones, in the way he pronounced the one word, sent
shivers down his hearers’ backs.

“Voodoo?” repeated Rawlins, recovering himself. “What in thunder are
you talking about?”

“Ah knows it!” replied the negro, in a hoarse whisper. “Tha’s the
devil dance! Yaas, Sir, tha’s Voodoo goin’ on!”

“Well, I’ll be sunk!” ejaculated the diver. “A Voodoo dance! By glory!
I didn’t think they had ’em over here. I’ve heard of 'em in Martinique
and Haiti, but I never took much stock in the yarns. Are you sure,
Sam?”

The cowering negro had sunk to his knees in the boat. All the
long-dormant superstition of his race, the soul-racking fear of the
occult and supernatural which was the heritage of his African
ancestors had been stirred into being by the throbbing pulsations
borne through the night, and he was an abject, terror-stricken
creature.

Rawlins jerked him to athwart. “Brace up, you fool nigger!” he
commanded. “No one’s hurting you yet! You’re a blamed coward, Sam!
What if ’tis Voodoo? What in thunder are you scared of?”

Slowly the negro came back to his senses; shaking like a leaf, sickly
ashen with fright, he steadied himself. “Ah aint 'fraid,” he
stuttered, his tones belying his words. “Ah was jus’ flustrated,
Chief. But Ah don’t mek to meddle with Voodoo, Chief. Better go back,
Chief.”

“You bet your boots we’ll go back—not!” declared Rawlins. “I’d like
right well to see a Voodoo as you call it. And if there’s any folks
around here—black or white, tame or savage, we’re out to find ’em and
have a pow-wow with ’em. Maybe the boys saw their fire and made for
it, and maybe the fire’s nothing to do with the tom-tom, and more
likely than all it’s not a devil dance at all but just those blamed
Bolsheviks having a vodka spree all on their own—celebrating the
boys’ capture or something. Come on, men, let’s get a move on.”

“Perhaps we’d better try to call the boys,” suggested Mr. Pauling.
“Your hint that they may have seen the fire, or that they may have
heard the drum is reasonable, but they are cautious and might be near,
hesitating to approach the fire or the sound. The noise of that
drum—supposing it should be the ‘reds’ and not from a negro
dance—would prevent others from hearing us.”

“Sure, that’s a good idea,” agreed Rawlins. “Maybe they’re near, right
now.”

As Rawlins spoke, Bancroft was adjusting his instruments and the next
instant gave an exultant cry.

“I hear ’em!” he announced.

Then: “Tom! Frank!” he called into the microphone. “Can you hear me?
It’s Bancroft! We’re near! We can hear a drum and are making for a
fire! Where are you? Can you see the fire or hear the noise?”

Faint and thin, but clearly distinguishable, now the throbbing rumble
of the drum had ceased, Bancroft heard Tom’s voice.

“We hear!” it said. “Come quick! We don’t know where we are, but we’re
here by the fire—we’re prisoners—a lot of savages have us!”

Bancroft, in a strained voice, repeated the words.

“Good Lord!” cried Mr. Pauling, “they’re captives of those crazy
devil-worshipers.”

“Attaboy!” yelled Rawlins. “Lift her, boys! Pull for your lives!”




CHAPTER XI

THE DEVIL DANCERS


Perhaps the two terrified boys swooned, perhaps they were literally
frightened out of their wits. Neither could ever be sure, but
whichever it was, everything was a blank from the moment when they
felt the hands of the savage figures grasp them until they found
themselves surrounded on every side by a ring of half-naked men and
women in the full glare of a huge fire under immense trees.

But they were unharmed, not even bound, and as they realized this
their courage in a measure returned and they glanced about, still
terribly frightened, shaking as if with ague, and marveling that they
were still alive.

Then for the first time they realized that their captors were not
Indians. They were hideously daubed with paint to be sure, they were
nearly nude, but they were not bedecked with feathers and their black
skins and wooly heads left no doubt as to their identity. They were
negroes, mostly coal black, but a few were brown or even yellow and
the dazed, scared boys looked upon them with uncomprehending
amazement. To them, negroes were civilized, harmless, good-natured
people and why these blacks should be acting in this savage manner was
past all understanding.

And still more puzzling was the fact that they were talking together
in a strange, unintelligible jargon. To the boys’ minds, all colored
people spoke English—either with the broad soft accent of the
American negro or the slurring, drawling dialect of the West Indians,
and yet here were blacks chattering shrilly in some totally different
tongue.

The boys felt as if they had been bereft of their senses, as if, by
some magic, they had been transported to the middle of darkest Africa
and they wondered vaguely if their fears and worries had driven them
mad and the whole thing was a hallucination.

But at this moment four more blacks arrived and to the boys’ further
amazement deposited their radio sets upon the smooth, hard-beaten
earth beside them. These were real; they seemed somehow to link the
boys with the outside world, with civilization, and at sight of them
the boys knew they were not dreaming, were not mad.

And the little cases with their black fiber panels and shining
nickel-plated knobs and connections had a strange effect upon the
circle of negroes also. With low murmurs and sharp ejaculations they
drew a step farther from the boys and looked furtively at the
instruments, while the men who had brought them from the boat leaped
nimbly away the instant they had set them down as if afraid the
harmless things might bite them.

“Gosh!” murmured Tom, finding his voice at last. “They’re afraid of
us!”

“I believe they are,” responded Frank, who, finding that the
savage-looking crowd seemed of no mind to harm them, had regained
confidence.

Scarcely knowing why he did so, Tom reached forward, connected the
batteries and turned the rheostat. The result was astounding. As the
tiny filament in the bulb glowed at his touch an awed “Wahii!” arose
from the negroes, and with one accord they retreated several yards.

“Say, we’ve got ’em going!” exclaimed Tom jubilantly. “They’re as much
afraid of us as we are of them. It all gets me, Frank. I wonder——”

What Tom wondered Frank never knew, for at this moment the surrounding
blacks uttered a weird wailing cry and flung themselves upon the
ground.

“Gee!” ejaculated Frank, “look there.”

Over the prostrated blacks, approaching through a lane between their
bodies, came an amazing, fantastic, awful figure. Naked, save for a
loin cloth, painted to resemble a skeleton, with great horns bound to
his head and with a cow’s tail dragging behind him, he came prancing
and leaping towards the fire and the boys, shaking a rattle in one
hand and waving a horse-tail in the other.

Speechless with wonder, the boys gazed at him. They realized that he
was the leader of the crowd, a chief probably, and in his fantastic
garb they recognized a faint resemblance to pictures they had seen of
wild African tribesmen, but that such a being should be here—here in
an island in the West Indies and only a few miles from railways,
cities, great sugar mills, wireless stations and even their own
submarine, seemed incredible, monstrous, absolutely unbelievable—as
dream-like and amazing as the savage-looking figures who had captured
them.

But they had little time to think. Suddenly the tom-tom burst forth in
thunderous sounds, deep, sonorous, blood-curdling, savage, wild, and
to the deafening “turn—turn, turn, turn—turn—turn, turn, turn,” the
huge horned figure pranced and danced about the two boys, chanting a
wailing song, keeping time to his steps with his gourd-rattle and
shaking and waving his horse-tail.

Nearer and nearer he circled, stooping low, leaping high, working
himself into a frenzy; twisting, swaying, contorting, while,
fascinated, almost hypnotized, the two boys watched speechless and
rooted to the spot. Then, so abruptly that the boys jumped, the drum
ceased, the dancing figure halted as if arrested in mid-air, with one
foot still raised, and then, with a wild yell, he darted towards the
boys.

With a startled cry they cowered away. Surely, they thought, he was
about to seize them, to kill them. But the next instant the man
stooped, and grasping the shining copper resonance coil whirled it
about, facing the ring of negroes and waving the coil about his head,
while, upon the copper wire, the firelight gleamed and scintillated as
though living flames were darting from it.

And then a marvelous, a miraculous thing happened. As the gigantic
negro slowly swung the coil, a great hush fell upon the others and
clear and distinct in the silence a voice seemed to issue from the
black box upon the ground.

“Tom! Frank!” came the words.

At the sounds, pandemonium broke loose. With a wild, terrified scream
the horned man flung down the coil and with a tremendous bound burst
through the circle of onlookers who, screaming and yelling, turned and
fled in every direction. In a breath, the boys were alone. Alone by
the fire and their instruments while, crouching behind trees, flat on
the ground, wailing like lost souls, the negroes watched from a
distance with wildly rolling eyes and terror-stricken faces.

But the boys at the time gave little heed to this. At the sound of
their names from the receiver they had been galvanized to life and
action. Their friends were near, they were calling them! They were
saved! Leaping to the coil, Frank grabbed it up and moved it slowly,
until again to Tom’s anxious ears came the sound of a human voice.
“It’s Bancroft!” came the words. “We’re near! We can hear a drum and
are making for a fire. Where are you? Can you see the fire or hear the
noise?”

“Can we?” muttered Tom, his sense of humor coming to him even in his
excitement. “I’ll say we can, as Rawlins says.”

Then, scarcely daring to hope that he could send his voice through
space by the coil, he adjusted the sending instruments and called into
the transmitter.

“We hear!” he cried. “Come quick! We don’t know where we are, but
we’re here by the fire—we’re prisoners—a lot of savages have us!”

Breathlessly Tom listened. Had they heard? Would the resonance
coil—that marvelous instrument which had worked the miracle—act as a
sending antenna? Tom wondered why they had never tried it, why they
had been so stupid, why it had never occurred to them. Had Bancroft
heard? Would they come? All this flashed through his mind with the
speed of light. And then came another thought. Of course they’d come.
Even if they had not heard they would come. Bancroft had said they
were making for the fire. They would be there anyway and as Tom
realized this a tremendous load lifted from his mind. Whether or not
their coil had served to send the waves speeding through the ether,
they were sure of being rescued. But the next instant a still greater
joy thrilled him. Again from the receiver came Bancroft’s voice. “Hold
fast!” it said, “we’re coming! We hear you!” Even Frank had heard.

The boys’ tensed strained nerves gave way. The coil dropped from
Frank’s hand, he staggered to Tom’s side and, throwing their arms
around each other, the two burst into wild hysterical laughter.
Suddenly they were aware of some one speaking near them. In their wild
delight, the terrific reaction, they had forgotten their captors, had
forgotten the weird dancer whose act had saved them. But at the low
moaning voice close to them they came back to earth with a start and
wheeled about. Within a few paces, his head bobbing up and down
against the ground, flat on his stomach, was the giant negro, and from
his lips, muffled by their contact with the earth, came the pleading
wail which had roused the boys.

“What on earth does he want?” asked Tom, who could make nothing of the
words.

“I don’t know, but he’s scared to death like all the others,” replied
Frank, “and I don’t wonder. That voice from the phones was enough to
scare any savage. I think he’s begging forgiveness or something.”

“Gosh! I wish he understood English,” said Tom, and then, in a louder
voice, “Here, get up!” he ordered. “Can you speak English?”

Slowly and hesitatingly the man raised his wooly head and with wildly
rolling eyes gazed fearfully at the boys. His lips moved, his tongue
strove to form words, but no sound came from him. So abject, so
thoroughly terror-stricken was his appearance that the boys really
pitied him, but now, at last, he had found his voice again.

“Messieu’s!” he pleaded. “Messieu’s! Moi pas save. Moi ami, Beke. Ah!
Ai! Beke no un’stan’. Moi spik Eenglees liddle. Moi mo’ sorry! Moi
fren’ yes! Moi no mek harm Messieu’s! Ai, Ai! Moi mek dance, moi
people mek fo’ Voodoo! No mek fo’ harm Beke! Pa’donez Moi, Messieu’s!”

“Gosh, I can’t get it!” exclaimed Tom. “He’s asking us to forgive him
and wants to be friends, but what he means by ‘Beke’ and ‘Voodoo’ and
those other words I don’t know. But I’m willing to be friends.” Then,
addressing the still groveling negro, “All right!” he said. “Get up.
You’re forgiven. We’ll be friends. But stop bumping your head on the
ground and take off those horns. You give me the shivers.”

Whether the devil-dancer understood more than half of Tom’s words is
doubtful, but he grasped the meaning and with unutterable relief upon
his black face he grinned and tearing off his fantastic headdress cast
it into the flames and rose slowly to his feet.

As he did so, his watching companions also rose and edged cautiously
from their hiding places, but still keeping a respectful distance and
eyeing the black radio sets with furtive, frightened glances. Very
evidently, to their minds, these white boys were powerful Obeah men,
they possessed magic of a sort not to be despised or molested, and
with the primitive man’s simple reasoning they felt that to propitiate
such powerful witch doctors was the only way to insure their own
safety. Although, to the boys, they had appeared savages yet, had Tom
and Frank happened upon them at any other time, they would have found
nothing at all savage about them. Indeed, they would never have had
reason to think them other than happy-go-lucky, good-natured colored
folk, harmless and as civilized as any of the West Indian peasantry,
for they were merely French West Indian negroes, and aside from the
fact that they spoke only their native Creole patois were
indistinguishable from others of their race. But like the majority of
the French negroes they were at heart firm believers in Voodoo and
Obeah and when worked into a fanatical frenzy at one of these African
serpent-worshiping orgies they became temporarily transformed to
fiendish savages, reverting to all the wild customs and ways of their
ancestors and drawing the line only at actual cannibalism.

But of all this the boys knew nothing. They did not dream that such
people or such customs existed, and they could not fathom the reasons
or understand what to them were the mysterious and almost incredible
sights they had witnessed.

And of a far more important matter the boys were equally ignorant. Had
they but known, they would have thanked their lucky stars that they
had stumbled upon the Voodoo dancers and, had they been able to
understand and speak Creole and thus been able to converse with the
negroes, they would have made a discovery which, would have amazed
them even more than the savage dance and the remarkable results
brought about by their radio instruments.

But being unable to carry on any but the most limited conversation,
the boys sat there by the fire waiting for the sound of the expected
boat and surrounded by the colored folk who now had discarded their
paint and fantastic garb and were clothed in calico and dungaree. Even
the chief, or rather the Obeah man, was now so altered in appearance
that the boys could scarcely believe he was the same being who had
pranced and danced with waving horse-tail and rattlebox before them
and when, timidly and half apologetically, he brought them a tray
loaded with fruit and crisp fried fish with tiny rolls of bread
wrapped in banana leaves, they decided that it must all have been some
sort of a masquerade and that their imaginations had filled them with
unwarranted and ridiculous fears.

They were terribly hungry and never had food been more welcome; both
boys ate ravenously.

“He’s a good old skate after all!” declared Tom, nodding towards the
big negro who sat near. “I guess they were just trying to scare us.”

“Well, they succeeded all right,” replied Frank. “Say, I thought we
were going to be roasted and eaten when they grabbed us.”

“Yes, but our radio scared them a lot worse,” said Tom. “Gosh! that
_was_ wonderful, the way the old boy grabbed up the coil and
those words came in just right. I’ll bet Dad’s worried though. We
ought to call them and tell them we’re all right.”

“Golly, that’s so!” agreed Frank. “I’d forgotten we hadn’t.”

Still munching a mouthful of food, Frank rose to pick up the coil, but
at that instant several of the negroes jumped up, their voices rose in
excited tones and they turned wondering faces toward the waterside. At
the same instant the boys distinctly heard the splash of oars.

“They’re here!” yelled Tom, and with one accord the two rushed towards
the landing place.

Before they had reached it a boat shot from the shadows, its keel
grated on the beach and Mr. Pauling and Rawlins leaped out, each with
a rifle in his hands, while behind them, armed and ready for battle,
came Sam, Bancroft, the quartermaster and Smernoff.

But as the shouting, laughing boys dashed toward them, free and
unharmed, the gun dropped from Mr. Pauling’s hand and clattered on the
pebbles and the next instant he was clasping the boys in an embrace
like a bear’s.

Behind the boys, gathered in little knots and chattering excitedly
like a flock of parrots, the surprised negroes had gathered at the
edge of the forest and as Rawlins stared at them and then at the boys
a puzzled expression was on his face.

“Say, what’s the big idea?” he demanded, as the boys capered and
danced about, talking and laughing. “You said you were the prisoners
of savages and here you are free as birds and no sign of a savage.
Just a bunch of ordinary niggers. It gets me!”

“But we thought they were savages,” Tom tried to explain. “And we
_were_ prisoners.”

Then in hurried, disjointed sentences the two boys related the gist of
their story while the others listened in amazement.

“Hello!” cried Rawlins. “Is this the old Bally-hoo coming?”

As Rawlins spoke, the big negro was approaching and with a rather
sickly grin on his face he spoke to the new arrivals in his odd jargon
of Creole and broken English.

“Yep, I guess so!” grinned Rawlins. “Here you, Sam. You’ve lived in
the French Islands. Can you understand this bird?”

Sam, still suspicious and with the memory of Voodoo and devil dancers’
tom-toms in his mind, stepped forward.

“Yas, sir, Chief,” he replied, “Ah can talk Creole, Chief.”

“Well, get busy and spiel then,” Rawlins ordered him. “Ask him what he
says first and then we’ll give him the third degree for a time.”

Rapidly Sam spoke to the other in Martinique patois and at the sounds
of his native tongue the other’s face brightened.

“He says he’s sorry,” Sam informed the waiting men and boys. “He says
he’s a mos’ good friend an’ tha’ young gentlemen were safe from
molestation, Chief. He says he an’ his people were makin’ to have a
spree, Chief, an’ thought as how the young gentlemen were enemies, at
the first, Sir. He mos’ humbly arsks yo’ pardon an’ forgiveness,
Chief.”

“All right,” said Rawlins. “He’s forgiven. Ask him if we can stop here
for the night and if he has anything to eat. I’m famished and I’ll bet
the others are. It’s nearly morning.”

In reply to Sam’s queries the negro, who Sam now informed them was
named Jules, assured them that everything was at their disposal and
with quick orders in patois he sent a number of the women scurrying
off to prepare food. Leading the way, he guided the party to a cluster
of neat, wattled huts in a small clearing and told them to make
themselves at home.

Then, the first excitement of their meeting over, the boys began to
give an intelligible and sane account of their adventures.

As they told of the submarine and their spying on the men Mr. Pauling
uttered a sharp exclamation and Rawlins made his characteristic
comment.

“I’ll say you had nerve!” he cried. “Too bad they saw you though. Now
they know we’re here.”

“Not necessarily,” declared Mr. Pauling. “They may have seen that the
boat contained merely two boys and they may have thought them natives
or from some vessel. They probably know where the destroyer is and
they imagine our submarine is lying at the bottom of the Caribbean. In
that case they would hardly connect Tom and Frank with members of the
Service. Unless they have heard our calls tonight I doubt if the boys’
presence alarmed them.”

“That may be so,” admitted Rawlins, “and by the same token if they
heard us to-night it wouldn’t scare ’em. They’d think ’twas some of
the boys’ friends searching for ’em, same as ’twas. We didn’t say
anything that would give them a hint and radio’s too common nowadays
to mean much—as long as it’s not under-sea stuff. By glory! Perhaps
we can get ’em yet. Can you find that place again, boys?”

“I don’t see how we can,” replied Tom. “We were too scared to notice
where we went and we haven’t any idea where we drifted with the tide
while we slept.”

“That’s dead rotten luck,” commented Rawlins. “But by the Great Horn
Spoon we can find ’em if they’re here! This swamp’s not so
everlastingly big and a sub can’t hide in a mud puddle. I’ll bet my
hat to a hole in a doughnut we find ’em!”

“But who do you suppose that man on the bank was?” asked Tom. “He
didn’t look like a ‘red’ or a Russian or a crook. He looked like a
real gentleman.”

Mr. Pauling hesitated a moment. “Boys,” he said, lowering his voice,
“that was the man that of all men we want. That was the head, the
brains, the power of the whole vast organization. The man who has
schemed to overturn nations and carry a rave of fire and blood around
the world! He is the arch fiend, the greatest criminal, the most
coldly cruel and unscrupulous being alive! He is the incarnation of
Satan himself!”

The boys’ eyes were round with wonder. “Gosh!” exclaimed Tom. “Gosh!”

“Jehoshaphat!” cried Frank.




CHAPTER XII

SMERNOFF PAYS HIS DEBT


While the boys had been relating the story of their astonishing
experience, Sam had been talking with Jules and other members of the
village. Now, as some of the women approached bearing trays of food
for the strangers, he rose and, accompanied by Jules, walked over to
the hut where the boys and the others were seated.

“Ah been havin’ a extended conversationin’ with Mr. Jules,” the
Bahaman announced, in his odd stilted manner which invariably amused
the boys, “an’ Ah’s fo’med the opinion that th’ info’mation he’s
imparted is mos’ highly important an’ wo’thy o’ consideration, Chief.”

“Yes, well, what is it, Sam?” inquired Mr. Pauling as he helped
himself to the smoking viands.

But at Sam’s first words Mr. Pauling, and even the famished Rawlins,
forgot all about their hunger and the appetizing food before them, for
the Bahaman’s story was to the effect that Jules and his fellow French
West Indians were just as keen on getting the “reds” as were Mr.
Pauling and his party. According to Jules’ tale, a number of their
friends and members of their families had settled on Trade Wind Cay
and had been living a peaceful happy life, raising goats, fishing and
cultivating tiny garden plots, when a party of white men had arrived
and without warning or reason had butchered the West Indians and
burned their homes, exactly as Smernoff had described when questioned
in New York.

It was not this story of cold-blooded massacre which was of such
intense interest to the Americans, but the Fact that Jules calmly
informed them that he not only knew where the “devil boat” was hidden,
but that he could actually lead them to the cave where the murderers
lived.

“Phew!” whistled Rawlins. “I’ll say you tumbled into the right camp,
boys! So old Frenchy here’s into their hangout! If that isn’t the
all-firedest piece of luck! Lead us to ’em, old sport, lead us to
’em!”

“By Jove! if it’s true everything is coming our way,” declared Mr.
Pauling, “but let’s be absolutely sure first. Ask him how he knows his
friends were killed, Sam. And why he has not complained to the
authorities and demanded justice. Ask him why, if it is true and he
knows where these men live, he has not tried to avenge his friends’
death. Ask him what they look like, tell him to describe some of them
and the ‘devil boat’ as he calls it.”

Sam turned and began talking to Jules and the others in patois.

“Well, true or not I’m going to have grub,” declared Rawlins. “I don’t
eat with my ears, though; I’m almost sorry I can’t, I’m that hungry.”

For several minutes the negroes chattered and gesticulated, their
voices often rising excitedly and vehemently. Then, at last, Sam
seemed to be satisfied and addressing Mr. Pauling explained that Jules
said that two men had escaped from the Cay. They had been fishing and
when returning, saw the massacre and realizing resistance was hopeless
got away from the place in their boats unseen. He then went on to
state that Jules had complained to the Dominican authorities, but had
been laughed at; strange negro squatters—in the minds of the
Dominicans—were of too little consequence to bother with and had no
legal standing; and moreover, Trade Wind Cay did not belong to Santo
Domingo. In fact, it was a port of No Man’s Land claimed by Haiti,
Santo Domingo, the Dutch and a British corporation and its real
ownership had never been settled. Jules and his followers had never
avenged their friends merely because they feared to injure any white
man knowing that summary arrest, a farcical trial and death would
follow and so, as the next best thing, they had worked spells, had
placed Obeah and had danced Voodoo in the vain hope of bringing
disaster on their enemies. Indeed, Jules declared that their dance of
that night had been for this purpose and that when the boys had first
arrived the negroes had felt sure that their heathen gods had
delivered their enemies into their hands, but that the “devil box” had
spoken in English and they knew their enemies used another tongue.

Jules’ description of the submarine was too accurate to leave room for
doubt that he had seen it and the boys, at least, were convinced that
he had seen the “reds” when Sam repeated Jules’ description of the
red-bearded giant, the dark man with the earrings, the thin fellow
with the Kaiser-like mustache, and several others.

“I’ll say he’s got a line on ’em, all right!” declared Rawlins, as Sam
finished his translation of Jules’ description and statements, “and by
glory! I’d hate to be in their shoes if these buckos ever get their
hands on ’em. Say, did you notice that one of the bunch he described
would be Smernoff to a ‘T.’ Wonder if any of ’em recognized him?”

“By Jove!” ejaculated Mr. Pauling. “I hope not, I’d forgotten he was
one of the murderers. If they see him and recognize him we’ll be
looked upon as spies and enemies. Better run down and warn him,
Rawlins. He’s in the boat, asleep probably. Tell him to keep his face
hidden or to daub it with mud; or anything and tell the quartermaster
to see that he does it.”

Rising slowly and stretching himself as if nothing unusual had
occurred, Rawlins strolled off towards; the landing place while Mr.
Pauling kept Jules and his friends busy with questions and suggesting
plans by which they could aid the Americans.

When the negroes discovered that Mr. Pauling and his friends were
looking for the murderers and would make them prisoners if found, they
were highly delighted, and Jules assented instantly to guiding the
Americans to the cave and the submarine and offered to bring a number
of his men along to help.

They were still discussing these plans and Rawlins had almost reached
the edge of the clearing when a shot rang out, there was a savage
yell, and the next moment Smernoff appeared at the edge of the trees,
waving a pistol in his hand and backing away as if from an unseen
assailant.

The next instant, he leveled his pistol, there was a flash, another
report and then, before the wondering onlookers could move, before
they could utter a cry, a figure hurled itself from behind a tree.
There was a flash of descending steel, a dull thud, and the Russian
plunged forward on the ground. Standing over him, whirling his
bloodstained machete about his head and yelling in fiendish glee was a
huge gaunt negro.

With two bounds Rawlins was upon the man from behind; before another
blow could fall he had pinioned his arms in a vise-like grip and as
the others raced towards the scene of the tragedy Rawlins struggled
and strained to wrest the deadly machete from the negro’s grasp.

Mr. Pauling was the first to reach Smernoff’s side. That the fellow
was mortally wounded was evident at a glance. Across neck and shoulder
extended a deep, gaping gash that had almost severed the head, but the
man was still breathing and Mr. Pauling bent over him.

Suddenly the Russian’s piglike eyes opened and into them flashed a
look of such malignant, unspeakable hatred that Mr. Pauling drew back.
As he did so, the gasping, dying man hissed a curse between his
blood-covered lips, and with a last superhuman effort drew up his arm,
aimed the pistol at Mr. Pauling’s head and pulling the trigger dropped
back dead. So close to Mr. Pauling’s face was the weapon that the
blast of blazing powder singed his hair and filled his eyes with
acrid, smarting smoke and burnt powder and with a hoarse, choking cry
he reeled backward. But before the horror-stricken boys could cry out
he was upon his feet, wiping his eyes, coughing, shaken, but unhurt.
Death had missed him by the fraction of an inch, by a split second.
Smernoff had waited a thousandth of a second too long to wreak his
treachery; death had robbed him of his vengeance; life had flown from
him at the very instant he had pressed the trigger and he had paid his
debt without adding another to his long list of crimes.

It had all happened in the twinkling of an eye. From the moment when
Smernoff’s first shot had startled them until he had breathed his
last, not half a minute had elapsed and now all was over. The negro
who had settled his score with the murderer of his family no longer
resisted Rawlins, but stood regarding the mutilated body of the
Russian with much the same expression that a hunter might wear when he
has brought down a tiger or a lion. Sam was trying to convince Jules
that Smernoff was a prisoner who had escaped; Bancroft and the boys
were hovering about Mr. Pauling striving to make sure that he was not
even scratched; and Rawlins was explaining matters to the
quartermaster who had come from the boat on the run at sound of the
shots.

“I’ll say he was a dirty skunk!” declared Rawlins, “And I thought he
was straight and reformed. Guess once a ‘red’ always a ‘red.’ Blamed
if I ain’t sorry I didn’t let him drift. By glory! for all we know
he’s been tipping his friends off by radio or something. Well, that’s
that for him.”

Then, turning towards the negro executioner, he gave that individual
the surprise of his life by slapping him heartily on the back.

“Guess you saved us the trouble!” he cried to the amazed man who had
expected nothing short of being summarily killed for taking a white
man’s life. “Here, shake!”

Although the negro understood not a single word, yet Rawlins’ tones
and gestures were unmistakable and with a surprised grin he seized the
diver’s outstretched hand and pressed it firmly.

“I guess he’ll be a good boy to have along with us,” Rawlins
commented, as he picked up Smernoff’s pistol and pocketed it.

“Rum lot, them Russians,” remarked the quartermaster as he spat
contemptuously into the bushes and regarded Smernoff’s body
impartially. “I never trusted of him, Sir, and I kept me weather eye
on him. I’m thinkin’ he no more than got his reward, Sir.”

The boys, now that they were convinced that Mr. Pauling was unharmed,
glanced at the dead Russian and turned away with a shudder.

“Just the same I’m rather sorry for him,” declared Frank. “Of course
he was a beast and tried to kill you, Mr. Pauling, but somehow it
seems terrible to see a man cut down that way!”

“Death’s a terrible thing in any form,” said Mr. Pauling as he led the
boys away. “But don’t waste pity on him, Frank. He was a murderer many
times over and would have ended on the gallows or in the electric
chair if he had not met death here. He richly deserved his fate and
you cannot blame the negro for killing him. I thank God that his dying
effort to murder me was frustrated by his own violence.”

Sleep was out of the question after the exciting events and the final
tragedy of the night, and now the first faint light of dawn was
showing in the east.

“We’ll start as soon as it’s light enough,” announced Mr. Pauling.
“Jules and a few of his men will go along. He’d like to send a crowd,
but they’re of no use. They have no arms and I have no intention of
taking any chances or undue risks. I wish to locate the submarine and
the hiding place of these men. There is a remote possibility that we
may take them unawares or find but a few there, but I trust mainly to
locating them, then sending for Disbrow and his bluejackets and
attacking the rascals’ lair with an overwhelming force.”

“Well, of course you know best,” assented Rawlins. “But personally,
I’d like to take along this bunch of wild men and sail into those
‘reds.’ I’d back these bush niggers with machetes against any
sneaking, bomb-throwing Bolsheviks that ever grew whiskers.”

“Undoubtedly,” smiled Mr. Pauling, “but I’m not leading any party into
peril with the boys along.”

“Yes, you’re dead right there,” agreed Rawlins earnestly. “Some one
would most likely get hurt and we can’t risk the boys. Well, any time
you say the word, I’m ready.”

Half an hour later, the party set forth. Jules with four men—among
them the powerful negro who had cut down Smernoff—led the way in a
narrow dugout and Rawlins chuckled as he noticed that every man
carried a naked, razor-edged machete beside him and that two were
armed with old muzzle-loading guns. Unknown to Mr. Pauling, he had
slipped Jules the Russian’s pistol and he felt confident that, should
occasion arise, the Martinicans would, as he put it, “give the ‘reds’
some jolt.”

Silently as ghosts, the West Indians paddled through the waterways of
the vast swamp, following, with unerring instinct, the channels and
leads they knew, but leaving the white men hopelessly confused as to
the direction in which they were traveling.

They had proceeded steadily for more than two hours, the sun was high
in the heavens and the boys were wondering how on earth they could
have drifted so far while they slept, when Jules’ canoe swung sharply
to the left, his men ceased paddling and an instant later it grated
upon a low clay bank with the boat close behind it.

With a signal for silence and caution, Jules stepped ashore, gave a
few whispered orders to his men, and led the way up a narrow, almost
invisible trail.

Close at his heels followed Rawlins, Mr. Pauling, the two boys and
Sam, while the quartermaster and Bancroft remained in the boat beside
the canoe in which Jules had left two of his men.

“Guess there won’t be any fighting just yet,” Rawlins remarked to
himself. “Just a bit of scouting likely.”

Noiselessly as shadows the negroes slipped along the trail with the
leather-shod white men striving to make as little sound as possible
and ever climbing higher and higher up the steep hillside. Finally,
after ten minutes’ steady walking, Jules halted, crouched down and
crawled forward on all fours, signaling for the others to do the same.

As they reached his side they found themselves at the summit of a high
hill with a precipitous side facing the swamp and thus leaving an
unobstructed view of all below and before them, while they were
effectually hidden among the dense growth of ferns and broad-leaved
plants.

Jules pointed and in a low whisper muttered “devil boat!” Hemmed in by
the labyrinth of mangroves and winding channels, and apparently
completely surrounded by the swamps, was a large lagoon and towards
the side nearest them a large dark object loomed above the placid
water.

All this they took in at a single glance. Before them, there upon this
hidden lagoon within the fastnesses of the mangrove swamps, was the
long-sought submarine.

“Well, I’ll be jiggered!” exclaimed Rawlins under his breath. “Blamed
if the darned sub isn’t sunk!”

“Sunk?” repeated Mr. Pauling inquiringly. “What do you mean?”

“Don’t you see?” muttered the diver. “She’s wrecked, sunk, on the
bottom. Look how she’s keeled over. Must be full of water! Look at
that smashed conning tower; the hatch is open and the water’s half
over it. Say, I’ll bet that shot of mine bumped ’em more than I
thought. Must have ripped things loose. How the dickens they got in’s
a puzzle to me. Must have had emergency hatches or bulkheads or
something. Whatever ’twas the old sub’s done for now. Say, they’re
trapped! They can’t get away! I’ll say that’s luck! By glory, we’ve
got ’em right by the neck!”

“You’re right,” affirmed Mr. Pauling, after carefully scrutinizing the
submarine. “She’s evidently deserted and useless. Yes, they’re
certainly trapped—that is, unless they clear out overland. As soon as
we locate them we can summon Disbrow and make the raid. They certainly
cannot escape by water.”

Elated at the thought that luck was with them, that the “reds” were
marooned, and that within a short time they would be on their way home
with their prisoners, the party followed Jules down the hill to the
boats.

“Now for the big secret!” remarked Rawlins as they embarked. “If old
Uncle Tom here’s got the right dope we’ll be there in time to look in
on ’em at breakfast. Hope they’ll be at home.”

Jules grinned, chuckled, and significantly patted his keen-edged
machete. Only now and then could he grasp the meaning of an English
word, but he knew, with the African’s primitive instinct, what the
diver was talking about. He had proved the accuracy of his statements
by showing them the “devil boat” and he rejoiced to think that he
would soon see the murderers of his friends led away as captives to
meet their just punishment.

“You bet!” nodded Rawlins as he noted Jules’ gesture, “I’ll say you’d
like to use that pig-sticker, old boy; but hold your horses. Don’t go
losing your head and rushing in where angels fear to tread and
spilling the beans before they’re ready to serve. Just make him savvy
that, Sam!”

“He say he understand, Chief,” replied the Bahaman when he had, after
some difficulty, translated Rawlins’ speech into the limited
vocabulary of Martinique Creole. “He say he mos’ careful an’
circum-spec’, Chief. He quite assimilate the importance of carry in’
out yo’ comman’s mos’ precisely, Chief. Ah’ve impressed it upon he an’
he nex’ fr’ens. Yaas, Sir, Ah’ni sure he quite comprehen’s, Chief.”
Tom chuckled. “You _are_ funny, Sam!” he exclaimed. “If you use
as big words in patois as you do in English I’ll bet he didn’t
comprehen’ a bit.”

But whether or not Jules understood the importance of being
cool-headed and obeying orders, it was certain that he had assimilated
the necessity of proceeding with caution and in silence and his
upraised hand and low “Psst!” warned the boys that even whispers must
cease. Very slowly and carefully, avoiding the least splashing of
paddles, bending low as they passed beneath overhanging branches, the
negroes crept along the narrow channel—a slender ribbon of water
scarcely wide enough to accommodate the boats—until, when it seemed
as if they could go no farther, the canoe slipped into a mass of lily
pads and reeds and Jules, stepping into the shallow water, drew it
silently upon a shelving bank. When all had disembarked, he turned,
crouched low, squirmed through the fringe of underbrush and with the
others at his heels came out into fairly open forest. Once more he led
them along a game trail, but this time the way led up a gently sloping
ridge and in a few moments he came to a halt.

Creeping forward, he beckoned to the Americans, while his negro
companions melted into the shadows. Before them was a narrow valley
with a small stream flowing through the center and directly across
from where they lay among the bushes was a conical hill, its farther
side lapped by the waters of a small semicircular bay or estuary that
cut deeply into the land. Along the banks of the stream were
cultivated lands; plots of banner-leaved plantains and bananas, small
gardens of cassava, beans, yams and corn; numerous fruit trees and the
dark foliage of coffee; while upon the sides of the hill were groves
of coppery-tinted cacao trees with here and there lofty coconut palms
towering over all. Half-hidden in the greenery, the roofs fallen in
and evidently deserted, were the remains of once large buildings; a
stone bridge spanned the stream, and at the edge of the bay were the
tumble-down remnants of a dock.

Evidently, at some former time, the place had been a well-kept and
prosperous plantation, but now everything appeared abandoned and
deserted, although the gardens were carefully cultivated and attended
to.

“Humph!” muttered Rawlins. “Don’t look as if our friends lived there.”

Jules whispered a few words to Sam.

“He says as how tha’ men mek they abidin’ place in the hill yonder,
Chief,” interpreted the Bahaman.

“In the hill?” murmured Mr. Pauling. “Ah, of course, in a cave! But
where _is_ the cave?”

Sam put the question to Jules.

“Tha’s the entrance, Chief, tha’ dark spot beyon’ tha’ clump of
cabbage pa’m, Chief,” announced Sam in whispers.

“Well, I’d like to have a closer squint at it,” declared Rawlins. “I
vote we go over and say ‘howdy’ to ’em.”

“Odd that there’s no sign of life or smoke,” commented Mr. Pauling. “I
don’t see a soul. Surely they must have a boat.”

“He says as how tha’ boat goes out an’ in tha’ cave by water, Chief,”
explained Sam. “Tha’s a’ openin’ on tha’ water side also, Sir.”

“Foxy old guys, eh?” muttered the diver. “Don’t intend to be caught in
there like rats in a trap. Well, I won’t rest easy till I know they’re
there. I’ve a hunch our birds have flown.”

“You’ll never get there without being seen—that is, if there are any
men about,” declared Mr. Pauling.

“Not down this way, I admit,” replied Rawlins. “But we can sneak down
around the head of the valley, keep back of those thick rose-apple
trees that make that hedge above the yam field and work around the
base of the hill until—— Thunderation! What’s that?”

From just beyond the brow of the hill, cutting through the clear
water, leaving a tiny trail of bubbles behind it, a small object was
moving swiftly from the land across the bay. The next instant it was
gone.

“Shark!” declared Mr. Pauling.

“Shark nothing!” cried Rawlins leaping up. “It’s another sub! I’ll be
jiggered if they haven’t cleared out! Given us the slip! Come on,
who’s afraid! Atta boy! I’m going to that cave!”

Before any one could stop him, the diver had burst through the foliage
and was tearing down the hillside and so contagious is excitement
that, without stopping to think, Mr. Pauling dashed after him with the
boys close behind, while Jules and his men, thinking apparently that
the signal for an attack had been given, sprang from their hiding
places, and with waving, flashing machetes and blood-curdling shouts
bounded down the slope with the quartermaster, blowing like a porpoise
and crashing through the brush like a herd of elephants, bringing up
the rear.

The sudden appearance of the company, the flashing blades, the savage
yells, the glint of sun on rifle and pistol would have proved most
disconcerting to any one lurking in the valley or the caves, while the
noise made by the two-hundred-pound sailor lumbering through the dense
undergrowth must have sounded like the onslaught of a score of men. In
fact, it was the sudden rush, the surprise, the reckless charge which
Rawlins had counted on to win the day, for he had seen the value of
such tactics on the Flanders battle front and on one occasion, with
but two companions, had captured a German machine gun and crew without
a scratch, by just such methods.

To reach the bottom of the hill, dash across the valley, cross the
bridge and rush up the short slope to the mouth of the cave took less
time than to tell of it, but before the bridge was gained Jules and
his men were beside Rawlins, Mr. Pauling was at his heels, and the
boys were but a few paces in the rear. Heedless of shots that might
come from the cave at any instant, Rawlins and the half-crazed negroes
tore up the slope, dodged back of the palms, and with a yell leaped
into the cavern with upraised blades and cocked weapons. But not a
shot echoed through the rocky chamber, not a blow was struck, not a
voice answered Rawlins’ demand for surrender. The cave was empty,
deserted, silent as the tomb!

For an instant Rawlins stood gaping about, while the negroes lowered
their weapons, drew back a step as though afraid, and jabbered
excitedly among themselves. Then the diver grabbed off his hat, hurled
it on the floor of the cave and swore volubly and vehemently.

“Of all the rotten luck!” he cried as Mr. Pauling and the others
reached the cave panting and out of breath. “They’ve gone! Vamoosed!
Cleared out! Given us the slip! That _was_ a sub we saw. Another
one. They were wise to us.”

As he spoke, he strode into the cave and the next instant gave a
shout. “Look here!” he yelled. “Regular hang-out! Electric lights,
beds, billiard tables, and by Jiminy! even a phonograph and a piano!”

It was perfectly true. Just within the entrance of the cavern, a heavy
curtain was hung across and beyond this the great, vaulted,
subterranean chamber was furnished with every luxury and convenience.
There were no partitions—merely draperies and curtains of rich
tapestry, satin and plush, but no palace on earth could boast such a
ceiling with its vast arches, its thousands of gleaming, snow-white
and cream-tinted stalactites and no millionaire’s mansion ever had
such walls of scintillating, multicolored dripstone that gleamed and
sparkled like myriads of jewels in the light of the clusters of
incandescent lamps.

The floor, covered with upjutting stalagmites, had been chiseled and
chipped smooth, leaving the shorter columns as supports for tables,
stands for rare vases and beautiful statuary, while the great columns
where stalactites and stalagmites joined were surrounded by luxurious
cushioned seats and hung with pictures. At one side was a grand piano,
in a corner was a Victrola, and in two smaller chambers were brass
beds and luxurious bedroom furnishings. At every step the boys and
their elders exclaimed in wonder and admiration at the luxury and
richness of the furnishings of the great cavern. Beyond the first hall
was a smaller, narrower chamber, equipped with a huge range and the
latest cooking and kitchen devices; beyond this was a small connecting
cave where a dynamo and gasoline motor were installed, while far
overhead, in the most remote corner, was a tiny aperture in the roof.
Presently Rawlins, who had been nervously and hurriedly searching
everywhere in the hopes of routing out at least one member of the
gang, gave a ringing cry which instantly brought the others to his
side.

“There’s the secret to the place!” he announced triumphantly, pointing
down from a ledge of rock whereon he stood. “There’s their get-away.
I’ll say, they’re clever!”

At this spot, the floor of the cabin came to an abrupt end, dropping
in a sheer precipice some fifty feet to a huge pool of dark blue
water. But from the verge of the wall a slender ladder led down, its
foot resting on a narrow ledge of rock in which several large
ringbolts were set. Scattered upon the ledge were coils of rope,
tackle blocks, a broken oar, some wire cables and other boat-gear,
while beyond, and so perfectly reflected in the glass-like pool that
it appeared like a complete circle, was an arched opening with a
sunlit strip of water visible through it.

“Get the idea?” asked Rawlins, as the others gazed about. “There’s
their dock and there’s where they came in and went out with their sub.
But not with that big one that’s knocked galley west out in the
lagoon. No, this old boy lived in some style I’ll say—didn’t practice
all the socialist Bolshevist stuff he preached, I guess—and had his
own private sub, instead of a limousine, tied up handy at his back
door. Hello! There’s a paper down there! By crickey! perhaps they
dropped something!”

Hurrying nimbly down the ladder, Rawlins stooped, picked up the bit of
paper which had caught his eyes and a mystified, puzzled look spread
over his face. Slowly and with an odd expression he climbed the
ladder.

“Hanged if that don’t beat all!” he declared, as he gained the top and
extended the paper towards Mr. Pauling. “It’s a letter, and I’ll be
swizzled if it isn’t addressed to you!”

“What?” exclaimed Mr. Pauling as he took the envelope. “By Jove! This
_is_ amazing!”

Ripping open the envelope Mr. Pauling drew forth a single sheet of
paper. One glance sufficed to read all that was upon it, for there was
but a single line.

    “Good luck in your search. Sorry not home to receive you.
    Remember Mercedes.”

There was no signature, but none was needed. The words were
typewritten and the machine which had printed them was the one which
had typed the inflammatory, revolutionary Bolshevist propaganda which
had flooded the States.

Once more the arch criminal had slipped through their fingers. But it
had been a close shave.




CHAPTER XIII

THE TRAMP


“Looks as if the game’s up,” commented Rawlins, when he too had read
the brief message. “Guess they held the last trump. Well, I suppose we
might as well be getting back to our folks—they’ll begin to think
we’re lost as well as the boys.”

“Yes,” agreed Mr. Pauling. “There’s nothing more we can do until we
get some hint or clue to where they’ve flown. But we’ll have to
destroy this lair before we leave. It seems a terrible waste and a
shame to do it, but I don’t intend having them come back after we go.
We can bring some explosives from the submarine and blow the place
up.”

“No need to do that,” declared Rawlins. “Just tell Jules and his gang
here to help themselves and there won’t be much left for the
Bolsheviks, if they do come back. When they get through looting they
can build a rattling big fire in here and that’ll finish it. It’s
limestone and after it’s heated it’ll crumble to bits.”

“Good idea!” replied the other. “Sam, tell Jules that he and his men
are welcome to anything they want in the cave. But make him promise to
build a huge fire inside after they’ve taken what they want.”

As Sam interpreted this to Jules, the latter’s eyes fairly bulged with
wonder and a wide grin spread across his countenance as it gradually
dawned upon him that the white man had made him a present of all these
treasures. Already, in his mind’s eye, he could picture the dusky
belles of his village strutting about in gowns of silk and satin
brocades, he could see their earthen jars and battered iron pots
giving way to those shiny cooking utensils, he could imagine how
dressed up his huts would be with those deeply cushioned chairs, the
pictures and the statues.

“I’ll say he’ll’ be heap big chief now,” chuckled Rawlins, as he saw
Jules’ eyes roaming greedily over the furnishings as if at a loss what
to seize first. “And say, won’t it be a scream when some chap comes
along and finds a bunch of French West Indian niggers all dolled out
with billiard tables, grand pianos and marble Venuses!”

Then, a sudden whimsical idea seized him, and grasping Jules’ arm, he
exclaimed, “Here, old sport, come along and see what you think about
this for a devil box.”

As he spoke, he led the negro towards the Victrola, but at the words
“devil box” the black’s eyes took on a frightened look and he drew
back.

“Oh, it’s all right!” Rawlins assured him, “it won’t bite.”

Still hesitating, but somewhat reassured by the diver’s tones, and
putting on a brave front, Jules accompanied Rawlins and stood silently
watching as the latter wound up the machine, placed a record under the
needle and set it in motion. But as the first sounds of a singer’s
voice burst from the horn, Jules uttered a frightened yell and leaped
away.

Every one burst into a hearty roar of laughter and the negro, with a
hasty terrified glance about, halted in his precipitate retreat,
ashamed to exhibit his fear before the white men. Then, with the odd,
quizzical, half-puzzled, half-frightened and wholly wondering
expression of an ape, he leaned forward, turning his head first to one
side and then the other as he listened to the song, peering at the
mahogany cabinet as if expecting to see the hidden singer step out at
any moment. But finding that nothing happened and that the others
seemed in no dread of the affair, he drew nearer and nearer,
absolutely fascinated by this new form of witchcraft. Never in his
life had he beheld a phonograph, and while he realized that the
“Bekes,” as he called the whites, were capable of performing almost
any miracle or of making most marvelous and incomprehensible things,
yet this, he was sure, was something quite beyond their power and must
be some most powerful form of Obeah. But evidently the “devil” or
whatever it contained was most securely imprisoned and compelled to
serve the white men, and when he saw that Sam was not in the least
afraid, and even picked up and examined the flat, round objects that
Rawlins drew from the cabinet, he decided that this particular devil
was even harmless to men of his own color. Here indeed was a treasure.
With this he would be truly a king and he could imagine what a
sensation he would create when, in the light of the Voodoo fire, he
ordered the devil in the box to sing and talk and produce music.

His fears had now completely vanished and, drawing close to the
instrument, he stood absolutely fascinated as Rawlins placed record
after record in the machine.

“Tell him to try it himself, Sam,” said Rawlins, and very reluctantly
and gingerly Jules obeyed Sam’s instructions, wound the crank, placed
a record, and uttered a yell of mingled triumph and delight as he
found the imprisoned devil obeyed him as readily as it did the
American.

“Well, he’s all set up for life,” laughed Rawlins. “All the rest of
the whole shooting match can go to blazes as far as he’s concerned.
He’ll wear the blamed thing out making it work overtime. But let’s be
going. Sam, tell Jules he and his bunch’ll have to show us the way out
of here. I’m all twisted and couldn’t find the bay in a month of
Sundays.”

But Jules absolutely refused to leave. He had no intention of giving
his new acquisition any opportunity of getting away and, as the
Americans departed, following the other negroes whom Jules had ordered
to guide them to the bay, the old fellow was squatting on his haunches
at the mouth of the cavern, a broad grin on his wrinkled black face
while, from within, came the strains of the overture from Faust.

“Pretty good ringer for old Mephisto himself!” chuckled Rawlins, as
they scrambled down the hill towards the boats.

Pushing through the water plants and into the narrow channel, the
canoe, followed by the boat, moved rapidly among the mangroves. Soon a
wider waterway was reached, and for a time this was followed, then
they slipped into a small lagoon completely encircled by an apparently
impenetrable barrier of trees, but, without hesitation, the negroes
headed their craft across the little lake. With swinging strokes of
their paddles they urged their craft forwards with redoubled speed and
then, with a sharp cry of warning to the white men behind them, they
crouched low in their dug-out. Straight for the dense foliage shot the
canoe, there was a swaying of low-growing branches, the negroes’ craft
disappeared from sight and the next instant the boat had slipped
through the screen of leaves and was floating on open water in a dark,
tunnel-like passage through the trees. Just ahead was the canoe, with
the negroes again paddling forward.

“Well I’ll be hanged!” cried Rawlins, “so this is their front gate,
eh? Wonder how the dickens they ever found it!”

Straight as a canal, the channel led and five minutes later a second
wall of foliage blocked the way. But, as before, the canoe was urged
ahead and crashed through the barrier followed by the boat. As the
last branches swayed back into place behind them, the boys and their
companions glanced about in surprise. They were floating upon the
broad waters of the bay; an unbroken line of close-growing trees
without a trace of opening stretched in their rear and far ahead they
could see the row of palms upon the bar which marked the hiding place
of their submarine.

“Well, I’ll be shot!” cried Rawlins, as he swept his eyes about.
“We’ve passed this place a dozen times and never knew it. No wonder we
couldn’t find their hang-out. Why, I thought that was all solid land!”

A moment later they were pulling, across the open bay. The Martinicans
had vanished as if by magic in the dark green foliage and two miles
away were their waiting friends.

Half an hour afterwards they were clambering aboard their sub-sea
craft and regaling the amazed and wondering Henderson with the story
of their adventures, their discoveries and the escape of the men,
while below, the quartermaster, surrounded by his mates, was relating
a yarn which put the Arabian Nights to shame.

“All gold an’ jools b’ cripes!” he declared. “With a gran’ pianner an’
a funnygraf an’ electric lights. Aw, I ain’t yarnin’, ye can ask Mr.
Rawlins—an’ statooary like them youse sees up to the art muse’ms, an’
velvet curtains. Soak me if 'twan’t a reg’lar joint! Fit fer a king
that’s what ’twas, an’ I’ll be blowed if Mr. Pauling didn’t up an’
give the whole bloomin’ outfit to a bunch o’ wild Frenchy niggers!
Struck me fair 'tween wind and water to hear him a-doin’ of it! Blow
me if it didn’t, an’ then up an’ tol’ ’em to burn the blessed place
after they was done lootin’ of it! But say! You’d ’a’ bust your-sel’s
laffin to a-seen that old gazooks of a nigger a-squattin’ on his black
hams in his ragged dungarees a-grinnin’ like a bloomin gorilla an’
a-listenin’ to gran’ opery!”

“Aw, stow it, Bill!” yawned one of the engineers. “Tell that gaff to
the marines. Why didn’t ye cop some o’ them things if they was there?”

The quartermaster snorted. “I aint no bloody thief o’ a greasy wiper!”
he replied contemptuously. “Think I’d a-got myself in Dutch by
a-swipin’ stuff under Mr. Pauling’s nose? But jes’ the same I did
bring along a bit o’ a sooveeneer. Look a-here, you sons o’ sea
cooks!” Fumbling in his blouse, the quartermaster drew forth a
glittering object and placed it on the mess table triumphantly.

“Holy mackerel! Stow me if 'taint a ring!” exclaimed one of the men.
“An’ a reg’lar shiner in it! What youse goin’ to do with it, mate?
Give it to your best girl?”

“None o’ your business,” retorted the quartermaster pocketing the
ring. “An’ mind youse don’ go blowin’ the gaff neither. I picked her
up ’longside o’ one o’ the beds an’ none the wiser. Might as well be a
havin’ it as one o’ them black monkeys.”

While Bill was thus entertaining the crew, the boys and their friends
on deck were still talking, retelling their stories, putting and
answering innumerable questions and gradually imparting a coherent
account of all that had transpired to Mr. Henderson.

Presently Rawlins grasped Tom’s arm and pointed towards the hills
across the bay.

“Look there!” he exclaimed. “There goes the last of the Panjandrum’s
palace!”

The others turned at the diver’s words and saw a thick column of smoke
rising in curling blue clouds against the green jungle.

“Guess old Jules made quick work of looting it.” continued Rawlins.
“Say, I can just see the old boy and his mates dancing and prancing
around to the music of that phonograph and watching the place go up in
smoke. Must do their hearts good! Wonder if they’ll learn to play
billiards or hammer jazz music out of that piano!”

“Well, let’s get down to business,” suggested Mr. Pauling, when the
laughter over Rawlins’ quaint conceit had subsided. “I suppose we’d
better notify Disbrow and leave here. No use of delaying longer. The
trail is blind now.”

“I vote we all turn in early and light out to-morrow morning,”
suggested the diver. “I’m dead tired myself and the boys must be all
in. They haven’t slept since night before last, you know, and it’s
pretty near sundown now. How about grub, too?”

This seemed the wisest plan, and as Bancroft sat at his instruments
rapidly sending a cipher message to the destroyer the steward served a
belated but hearty meal.

“He’s received the message, Sir,” announced the operator as he joined
the others. “Here’s his reply.”

“H-m-m!” said Mr. Pauling, as he glanced over the apparently
meaningless figures and letters. “He’ll stand in and wait for us in
the morning. Hasn’t seen any signs of a sub, or anything suspicious.”

Now that their appetites were satisfied and the excitement was over
all realized how tired, exhausted and sleepy they were and gladly
sought their bunks at an early hour.

It seemed to Rawlins that he had scarcely closed his eyes when he
awoke with a start, the sound of a shout still ringing in his ears.
For a brief instant he thought he had been dreaming and then, as the
cry again echoed through the night, he realized it was no dream, that
something was amiss, and wide awake leaped to the floor.

The next instant he uttered a yell of shock and surprise. Instead of
landing on the rubber mat his feet had plunged into cold water!

“Get up! Wake! Hustle!” he screamed at Bancroft who occupied the other
bunk. “The boat’s full of water!”

Without waiting, he dashed from the room, shouting and yelling,
switching on lights and starting the alarm gong as he plunged,
splashing, through the water that covered the steel plates of the
floors.

Instantly all was in an uproar. Hoarse shouts and cries came from the
crews’ quarters. The boys, with frightened faces and still rubbing
dazed and sleep-filled eyes, rushed from their cabin with Mr. Pauling
and Mr. Henderson at their heels and through the din of the clanging
gong, the excited questions and warning shouts, Rawlins, with the
quartermaster by his side, hustled the men and boys up the ladder to
the deck, checking them off one by one as they passed.

“All up?” demanded Rawlins as a drowsy oiler stumbled through the
fast-rising water to the foot of the ladder.

“Aye, aye, Sir!” responded the old sailor. “Better be gettin’ aloft,
Sir.”

The water was now up to the men’s hips and as they reached the outer
air Rawlins and the quartermaster found the waves lapping the edges of
the deck. But perfect order prevailed. The two boats were manned and
ready and as Rawlins and the sailor sprang into them the men bent to
the oars and a few moments later the boats’ keels grated on the sand
beach under the ghostly palms.

“I’ll say we’re lucky!” were Rawlins first words. “Wonder what in
blazes burst loose!”

But no one could offer an explanation. The man who had been on watch
and whose cry had roused Rawlins declared that the first thing he had
noticed had been that the submarine was settling. The engineers
insisted that no sea-cock or valve had been left open. There had been
no blow, shock or explosion and, huddled together on the beach,
shivering and shaken, the men and the boys waited for the dawn.
Presently a fire was started and the survivors, glad of its warmth in
the chill night air, gathered close about it, discussing the disaster,
surmising as to its cause and thanking their stars that they had all
escaped and that help was not far away.

“If we don’t turn up, Disbrow will suspect something is wrong and send
a boat in,” declared Mr. Pauling. “We won’t have to wait here many
hours.”

“Perhaps we could call him,” suggested Mr. Henderson. “Are those radio
instruments still in the boats?”

“One is.” replied Rawlins. “I noticed it as we came ashore.”

“But we haven’t any aerial,” said Tom. “The resonance coil was on
board the submarine.”

“I don’t think it matters,” his father assured him. “Disbrow’s sure to
investigate.”

“For that matter, we can row out and meet them,” suggested Rawlins.
“We’ve got perfectly good boats.”

“Of course,” agreed Mr. Henderson, “although it would be more risky
than waiting here. Disbrow might not sight us and then we’d be worse
off.”

“Yes, we’ll wait here a reasonable time at any rate,” declared Mr.
Pauling, “Ah, I believe it’s getting lighter.”

Very soon the eastern sky grew bright and presently there was enough
light to distinguish surrounding objects clearly.

“There she is!” exclaimed Rawlins, pointing towards the spot where
their submarine had been moored. “Didn’t go clear under. Too shallow
for her.”

Above the water, the top of the submarine’s conning tower was visible
with the slender aerial wires faintly discernible in the soft morning
light.

“We’re all right!” declared the diver. “We can get that aerial off the
sub, rig it up between a couple of these palms and get the destroyer
here in double quick time. But I _would_ like to know what sunk
the old tub.”

Acting on Rawlins’ suggestion, the boats rowed over to the wreck and
the men busied themselves stripping the aerial from the submarine. By
the time this was accomplished it was broad daylight and the warm sun
was shining brightly upon the water and beach.

“Sam,” said Rawlins, turning to the Bahaman who, up to his waist in
water on the submarine’s deck, was unfastening a wire. “What do you
think of diving down and having a look around. I’m blamed anxious to
know how the old sub got full of water.”

“All right, Chief,” grinned the negro, dropping the wire and stripping
off his scanty garments. “Ah’ll mos’ surely ascertain, Chief.”

The next instant he had plunged off the deck and all waited
expectantly for his reappearance. After what seemed a tremendously
long interval his wooly head bobbed up close to the stern and shaking
the water from his eyes he swam easily to the submerged deck and
pulled himself up.

“Tha’s nothin’ wrong this side, Chief,” he announced as he recovered
his breath. “Ah’ll go down tha’ other side an’ have a look.”

Presently he rose, felt his way along the deck with the water to his
armpits and reaching a point near the bow again dove.

Again he reappeared near the stern and the satisfied grin upon his
face assured Rawlins that he had news.

“Yaas, Sir!” he announced as he drew himself onto the boat. “Ah foun’
it, Chief. Tha’ a big hole aft, Chief. Looks like it been bored in
tha’ plates, Chief.”

“Well, what in thunder!” cried Rawlins. “Come on, Sam, I’m going to
have a look. Show me where ’tis. I’m no fish like you, but I can stay
down long enough for that.”

Poising himself on the boat’s thwart with Sam beside him, Rawlins
waited for the word and together the two figures, one white, one
black, plunged into the sea.

Presently the two heads bobbed up side by side and breathing hard
Rawlins scrambled into the boat.

“I’ll say it’s bored!” he exclaimed. “Burned! Cut clean through with
an acetylene torch!”

The others fairly gasped with amazement.

“But how _could_ any one burn a hole through steel,—under
water?” cried Tom.

“Easy!” retorted Rawlins. “A good torch’ll burn as well under water as
in air. Used right along by divers. It’s those blasted, dumbfoozled
‘reds’! I can see it all now. They sneaked down here in that little
sub of theirs, laid on the bottom, sent a diver out with a torch and
burned the hole. Thought they’d drown us like rats in a trap—blame
their dirty hides!”

“By jove! it doesn’t seem possible,” declared Mr. Pauling. “I’m
surprised, they——”

His words were cut short by a shout from Rawlins. “Look there!” he
fairly screamed, leaping up, and pointing towards the bay. “Look at
’em! The low down, sneaking swine!”

All turned instantly towards the bay and at the sight which greeted
them jaws gaped, eyes grew round with wonder and hoarse exclamations
of anger, amazement and chagrin arose from a dozen throats.

Traveling swiftly seaward through the calm water was a small
submarine, her deck just awash, and standing upon her superstructure
and waving their hands in derisive farewell were two men. One was
heavily built with a huge red beard, the other slender, immaculate in
white flannels and with a stiffly upturned, iron-gray mustache.

The next moment they disappeared in the hatch. An instant later only
the conning tower showed above the water and ere the amazed onlookers
could recover from their astonishment the placid bay stretched
unbroken even by a ripple to the distant shores.

Mr. Pauling and Mr. Henderson exchanged rapid glances.

“It was!” muttered Mr. Pauling in a low voice.

The other nodded. “Absolutely!” he rejoined.

Rawlins, who for once had been rendered absolutely speechless with
surprise, anger and chagrin now found his voice.

“Lively, men!” he shouted. “Get that aerial up quick! We’ll nab those
devils yet! Get a message to Disbrow to go for ’em! Drop depth bombs
or anything else! He can’t be far off.”

At his bidding, thoroughly aroused to the necessity for action, the
men fell to work. Hastily the antennae from the submarine was rushed
ashore. Up the palms scrambled Sam and a sailor and in an incredibly
short space of time the slender wires were stretched between the
lopped-off tops of the lofty trees and the boys adjusted their
instruments. Excitedly they called the destroyer and presently sharp,
and clear, came back the answering call.

“Tell him to watch for a sub,” ordered Mr. Pauling. “Don’t bother over
cipher. Give it to them in English. Tell him she’s just slipped out.
If he sights her sink her, disable her, anything! Drop depth bombs if
necessary!”

Then, as the boys hurriedly and excitedly flashed these orders to the
destroyer and the “dee dee dee dah dee” (“we understand”) came back,
Mr. Pauling continued. “Now tell him our sub has sunk. Have him send a
cutter for us and tell him to hustle.”

Slowly the minutes slipped by. Breathlessly, filled with excitement,
those upon the beach beneath the palms listened, expecting each moment
to hear the distant boom of a gun, the low rumbling roar of an
exploding depth bomb. But no sound broke the low swish of the palm
fronds and the soft lapping of the waves upon the sand.

An hour went by and then, from the direction of the bay, came the
faint staccato beat of a motor’s exhaust and a moment later a trim
navy cutter came into view. Shouting and waving their hands, those
upon the beach attracted the cutter’s attention, it spun around, came
swiftly towards them and ten minutes later was headed seaward leaving
the sunken submarine deserted and alone.

A mile or two offshore, steaming in great circles, was the lean, gray
destroyer and as those in the cutter ran up the gangway and gained the
decks Disbrow met them.

“Seen anything of that sub!” demanded Mr. Pauling, ignoring the
officer’s cheery greeting.

“Not a sign,” declared the commander. “Had men aloft and been swinging
in circles ever since we got your message. Haven’t sighted a craft of
any sort since daylight. Only thing we’ve seen was an old Dutch tramp
over by Trade Wind Cay.”

Rawlins, who had just reached the deck, sprang forward.

“Dutch tramp!” he cried. “What did she look like? Did you board her?”

“Of course not!” replied Disbrow icily. “Why should we? Ordinary tramp
painted pea-soup color with bands two blue and one yellow, on her
funnel.”

“I’ll say she’s not an ordinary tramp!” exclaimed the diver. “If she
is, what the blazes is she hangin’ around there for? She was there a
week ago—we saw her—and Dutch tramps or any other tramps don’t hang
around Trade Wind Cay for a week! Rotten luck you didn’t board her!”

“Humph!” snorted Disbrow. “I’d get myself in a pretty mess if I
boarded every steamer I saw. It’s none of my business if a Dutchman
wants to kill time cruising about here. The sea’s free.”

“Yes, and I’m beginning to think some naval men are blamed idiots!”
cried Rawlins, overcome with excitement. “I know one that boarded a
square-head fishing smack and didn’t think ’twas any of his business
because she was a Bahaman schooner. Darned near finished us on account
of it, too!”

The commander flushed scarlet. “If you’re going to insult me!” he
began; but Mr. Pauling interposed.

“Here, here, boys!” he exclaimed. “Don’t get excited. We all make
mistakes and we’re dealing with most elusive and resourceful
scoundrels. Rawlins has a hunch of some sort, Disbrow, and his hunches
are usually, right. Now what it is, Rawlins? The sooner we get to an
understanding the quicker we can act.”

“Sorry, old man!” apologized the diver, extending his hand to Disbrow
who instantly grasped it. “Was a bit jumpy, I guess. But that tramp’s
got to be overhauled. I’ve an all-fired hunch she’s part of the game.
They deserted a sub once and took to a schooner and I’ll bet my last
dollar to a plugged cent that that tramp’s just waiting for ’em now.”

Disbrow wheeled and gave a crisp order and the next moment the
destroyer, throbbing and shaking like a leaf, a huge wave rising high
above her sharp bows, was tearing like an express train towards Trade
Wind Cay.

As they neared the little islet and rounded its jutting point, Rawlins
gave a cheer. Wallowing slowly along, her rust-streaked sides rising
and falling to the ocean swell, was the tramp, with the flag of the
Netherlands fluttering at her stern and the blue and yellow stripes
plainly visible on her funnels.

Up to the destroyer’s mast fluttered a string of bunting, but the
Dutchman paid not the slightest heed, continuing placidly on his
course.

“Confound him!” exploded Rawlins. “Doesn’t mean to stop, eh?”

“Run alongside and hail him,” quietly ordered Mr. Pauling. “I’ll take
all responsibility if there’s any trouble. But we’ll board that chap
if we have to fire on him.”

There was no need of any such drastic measures, however. As the
destroyer came near and Disbrow’s hail through the megaphone reached
those upon the tramp, a huge, burly figure appeared upon the bridge,
waved an arm in assent and a moment later the ill-kept vessel lay
motionless, as the cutter from the destroyer bobbed alongside. Over
the tramp’s wall-like sides dangled a rope ladder and followed by
Rawlins and Mr. Pauling a white clad ensign ran nimbly up and leaped
over the battered iron rails.

At the break of the bridge-deck the ponderous man lounged upon the
rail awaiting them, a big pipe projecting from an enormous yellow
mustache, a weather-beaten cap upon his tow-colored hair and greasy,
faded blue garments hanging loosely on his immensely fat figure.
Placidly, with pale, expressionless blue eyes, he watched the officer
and the civilians approach and as they drew near slowly withdrew the
pipe from his mouth.

“Vat you vellers vant?” he demanded in thick greasy tones. “Vat vor
you sthob mine shib?”

The boyish ensign touched his cap. “Compliments of Commander Disbrow,
Sir,” he announced. “His orders are to have a look at your papers and
search the ship if we think necessary. Are you the captain?”

The Dutchman drew himself up in what was a ludicrous attempt at
dignity. “Yah, me der gapdain!” he rumbled. “But vat de deffil you
vellers link? Dondt you know dot der var vas over? Vat vor you vant to
see mine babers, eh?”

“Just as a matter of form, Captain,” replied the ensign crisply.
“Won’t take a minute.”

For a space, the fat skipper eyed the other suspiciously. “Ach! All
right,” he exclaimed at last. “Gum on! Dis vay an’ pe tarn qvick apout
id!”

Rolling like a barge in a gale, the Dutchman led the way across the
deck and into his disorderly cabin under the bridge. Then, rummaging
among papers and letters, he drew out a package snapped together with
rubber bands and handed it to the ensign.

“Seem to be all right,” commented Mr. Pauling, as he glanced over the
officer’s shoulder with Rawlins beside him. “‘Steamship _Van
Doerck_, 11,345 tons, general cargo, Rotterdam for St. Thomas,
Hirschfelt, master and owner.’ Don’t see anything suspicious there,
Rawlins. Last cleared from Curacao. Health and port papers O. K. Guess
your hunch was wrong this time.”

Rawlins scratched his head and looked sheepish, but there was still a
questioning, puzzled expression in his eyes. “Maybe,” he admitted,
“but I’d like to have a look at his crew. Just ask him to line ’em up
on deck, Ensign.”

At first, the Dutchman vehemently objected, but finally, with a
muttered curse in his native tongue at the pigheadedness of the
Yankees, he ordered his second officer to summon all hands on deck.

Carefully Rawlins, Mr. Pauling and the ensign went along the line of
dirty faces, checking them off by name in accordance with the ship’s
papers, but they were all there, no more, no less.

“No use looking under hatches,” declared the ensign who began to feel
that he had made a fool of himself. “They haven’t been up for a week,
I’ll swear.” Then, as an afterthought, he added sarcastically, “Don’t
suppose you’d care to search the engine room and bunkers?”

“I’ll say I will!” exclaimed Rawlins, and without another word hurried
aft.

A few minutes later he reappeared, grimy, perspiring and greasy.

“Nothing doing there!” he announced. “Say, ask the old boy what he’s
been hanging around here a week for.”

Reluctantly the ensign put the question.

“None of your tamt pizness!” replied the skipper. “Put id’s no segret.
Ve drobt a sbar offerboard in der night an ve been hunding vor id. Ve
vasn’t here vor a veek—id vas night before ladst ve gum pack.”

Rawlins raised his eyebrows. “All right, Ensign,” he said. “Guess it’s
a false alarm. Might as well be going.”

“Sorry to have troubled you, Captain,” said the ensign, touching his
cap. “Expect you’re not the ship we were looking for.”

The skipper’s only reply was a low, rumbling bellow from his chest and
stumping up the ladder to the bridge he jerked the bell for “stand
by.”

No sooner were the boarding party again on the destroyer than Rawlins
beckoned Mr. Pauling aside.

“You may think I’m an ass, Mr. Pauling,” remarked the diver. “But
there’s something crooked about that Dutchman. He’s a blamed liar in
the first place, because you know as well as I do he was here six days
ago. In the second place, can you imagine wasting even two days
steaming along and hunting for a lost spar, and how the blazes could
he lose a spar? The sea’s been like glass.”

Mr. Pauling smiled. “You’re unduly suspicious, Rawlins,” he declared.
“I admit the tramp was here a week ago and we saw her, but he may have
gone on and then come back two days ago searching for a spar or he may
have lied just because he wouldn’t give us the satisfaction of telling
us his business. No, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with him. If
you suspect every ship we see we’ll have our hands full and every
nation in the world will be after our scalps.”

“Well, Mr. Pauling,” replied Rawlins, “I hope you won’t be insulted if
I say so and I don’t mean it that way; but you’re no seaman and you
may be a mighty good detective on land, but you’re not when aboard
ship. That old whale of a Dutchy has been anchored there and hasn’t
been hunting for a blamed thing! And what’s more, he hasn’t been in
Curacao for a year!”

“What?” exclaimed Mr. Pauling. “How do you know? Explain yourself,
Rawlins.”

“If that cockey little ensign hadn’t been so stuck on himself, he’d
have noticed it,” declared the diver. “Why, the anchor chains were
thick with wet mud, the steam winch was still hot, there was mud and
water on deck and some of the crew had fresh mud on their jumpers.
What’s more, the fires in her furnaces hadn’t been going an hour.
They’d been banked and the ashes were still on the plates where they’d
been raked out. That old hooker hadn’t been under way half an hour
when we came up. And now how do I know she hadn’t been at Curacao?
I’ll tell you. The papers looked all right, I’ll admit—Curacao stamps
and signatures and everything O. K. But they were dead crooked, I’ll
say! They were a whole year old!”

“Jove!” ejaculated Mr. Pauling, beginning to be convinced that Rawlins
had grounds for his suspicions. “How do you know? I saw nothing
wrong.”

Rawlins chuckled. “No, and the old guy didn’t expect you would. He or
his friends are darned clever birds, but they slipped up on those
papers. They’d changed the date under the signatures, but they forgot
about the stamps—they were canceled with a rubber stamp and the date
was ’21 not ’22!”

“Rawlins!” cried Mr. Pauling. “I’ll take it all back! You’re a
wonder—told you you should be in the Service. What’s your idea?”

“Well, I don’t know just where the Dutchy comes in with those reds,”
admitted Rawlins, “but I’ll bet they’re cahoots somehow. I think we’d
better follow the boys’ motto—hear everything, see everything and say
nothing and keep the other fellow guessing—I’d suggest we trail the
old porpoise and see if he _does_ go to St. Thomas. If he does,
we’ll bob up there too. I’m ready to follow along his wake if he
wallows round the world, but St. Thomas is an American port and we can
do pretty near anything we like there. If we hang around we may get a
line on something. We’ve had pretty good luck all together and I’ve
got a hunch we’re ‘hot’, as they used to say when we played hunt the
thimble.”

A few moments later Mr. Pauling was speaking to the commander in the
privacy of the latter’s cabin.

“You’ll make for St. Thomas, Disbrow,” he said. “Keep that tramp
within sight, but don’t let her think we’re following her. No, don’t
ask questions, I don’t really know myself. Rawlins has a hunch, and so
far his hunches have come mighty near being right. I’m backing them to
the limit.”

THE END




By A. HYATT VERRILL

  THE RADIO DETECTIVES
  THE RADIO DETECTIVES UNDER THE SEA
  THE RADIO DETECTIVES SOUTHWARD BOUND
  THE RADIO DETECTIVES IN THE JUNGLE
  THE DEEP SEA HUNTERS
  THE BOOK OF THE MOTOR BOAT
  ISLES OF SPICE AND PALM












    MASTERPIECES
    IN COLOUR
    EDITED BY - -
    T. LEMAN HARE

    INGRES

    (1778-1867)


    “MASTERPIECES IN COLOUR” SERIES

        ARTIST.                        AUTHOR.
    VELAZQUEZ.                     S. L. BENSUSAN.
    REYNOLDS.                      S. L. BENSUSAN.
    TURNER.                        C. LEWIS HIND.
    ROMNEY.                        C. LEWIS HIND.
    GREUZE.                        ALYS EVRE MACKLIN.
    BOTTICELLI.                    HENRY B. BINNS.
    ROSSETTI.                      LUCIEN PISSARRO.
    BELLINI.                       GEORGE HAY.
    FRA ANGELICO.                  JAMES MASON.
    REMBRANDT.                     JOSEF ISRAELS.
    LEIGHTON.                      A. LYS BALDRY.
    RAPHAEL.                       PAUL G. KONODY.
    HOLMAN HUNT.                   MARY E. COLERIDGE.
    TITIAN.                        S. L. BENSUSAN.
    MILLAIS.                       A. LYS BALDRY.
    CARLO DOLCI.                   GEORGE HAY.
    GAINSBOROUGH.                  MAX ROTHSCHILD.
    TINTORETTO.                    S. L. BENSUSAN.
    LUINI.                         JAMES MASON.
    FRANZ HALS.                    EDGCUMBE STALEY.
    VAN DYCK.                      PERCY M. TURNER.
    LEONARDO DA VINCI.             M. W. BROCKWELL.
    RUBENS.                        S. L. BENSUSAN.
    WHISTLER.                      T. MARTIN WOOD.
    HOLBEIN.                       S. L. BENSUSAN.
    BURNE-JONES.                   A. LYS BALDRY.
    VIGÉE LE BRUN.                 C. HALDANE MACFALL.
    CHARDIN.                       PAUL G. KONODY.
    FRAGONARD.                     C. HALDANE MACFALL.
    MEMLINC.                       W. H. J. & J. C. WEALE.
    CONSTABLE.                     C. LEWIS HIND.
    RAEBURN.                       JAMES L. CAW.
    JOHN S.                        SARGENT. T. MARTIN WOOD.
    LAWRENCE.                      S. L. BENSUSAN.
    DÜRER.                         H. E. A. FURST.
    MILLET.                        PERCY M. TURNER.
    WATTEAU.                       C. LEWIS HIND.
    HOGARTH.                       C. LEWIS HIND.
    MURILLO.                       S. L. BENSUSAN.
    WATTS.                         W. LOFTUS HARE.
    INGRES.                        A. J. FINBERG.
           _Others in Preparation._


    [Illustration: PLATE I.--LA VIERGE À L’HOSTIE

    (In the Louvre)

    This picture of “La Vierge à l’Hostie” is a repetition, with
    variations, of another painted by Ingres in 1840 for the Czar
    Nicholas, in which he had represented on either side of the
    Virgin the two patron saints of Russia, St. Nicholas and St.
    Alexander. In the Louvre picture, which is signed “J. Ingres,
    1854,” the two saints have been replaced by two angels. Probably
    in no other picture from his hand is the artist’s passionate
    admiration for Raphael so clearly displayed.]




    INGRES

    BY A. J. FINBERG


    ILLUSTRATED WITH EIGHT
    REPRODUCTIONS IN COLOUR

    [Illustration: IN SEMPITERNUM.]

    LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACK
    NEW YORK: FREDERICK A. STOKES CO.




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS


    Plate

       I. La Vierge à l’Hostie      Frontispiece
             In the Louvre

                                            Page
      II. Madame Rivière                      14
             In the Louvre

     III. Mademoiselle Rivière                24
             In the Louvre

      IV. L’Apotheose d’Homere                34
             In the Louvre

       V. M. Bertin                           40
             In the Louvre

      VI. Chérubini                           50
             In the Louvre

     VII. Le Duc d’Orléans                    60
             Musée de Versailles

    VIII. Jeanne d’Arc                        70
             In the Louvre




Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres was born on the 29th August 1778, at
Montauban. A stranger birthplace for a great artist could hardly be
found. All the passion not absorbed in the material cares of life
there turns to fanaticism. Religious hatred runs high. The municipal
elections are fought out on religious grounds. Protestant and Roman
Catholic hate but do not know one another. Each family lives for
itself and by itself. A visit is said to be considered as an
indiscretion. And nature there does nothing to soften the heart or the
manners of man. The soil is dusty on the surface and hard to dig. The
local colour is sombre, the general aspect of things sad. In the cold,
dull light the forms detach themselves without grace or sympathy. The
people have squat, thick-set figures, with round heads and heavy jaws.
Their souls are as sombre and hard as their faces. They have ardour,
but it is all concentrated and suppressed, burning within them like a
brazier without flames. They show an extreme eagerness for work and
gain; a silent obstinacy is the leading trait of their character.
Ingres’ mother belonged to these parts and to this race, and from her
he seems to have derived a part of his stormy and inflexible, his
unquiet and haughty genius.

Ingres’ father came from Toulouse. Little more than three miles
separate Toulouse from Montauban, but the chain of little hills which
throws off, to the left, the river Garonne, and to the right the Tarn
and the Aveyron, serves as the dividing line of two profoundly
different regions and races. In contrast with the sterile and rocky
regions of the North, the plains of Languedoc, with their great river
and verdant meadows, seem a land of joy and enchantment. It was at
Toulouse, with its courts of love, its floral fêtes, its contests of
song and poetry, that Ingres’ father was born. If we may judge from
the portrait which Ingres painted of him (it is preserved at the
Museum of Montauban), his father must have been an uncommon man. As we
see him in this portrait he has a fine forehead, with big black eyes,
and a look full of frankness and penetration. The evidence of this
portrait is confirmed by the following letter, written by Ingres
towards the end of his life, to a gentleman who had asked him for
information about his father:--

    “Sir,--Jean-Marie-Joseph Ingres was born at Toulouse (in 1734):
    his father, whom I saw in my childhood, was a master tailor; he
    lived to a great age. My father when he was very young entered
    the Academy of Toulouse. He had as master, I believe, M. Lucas,
    a celebrated sculptor, a professor of the said Academy. Later he
    went to Marseille, then settled at Montauban and married my
    mother, Anne Moulet, on 12th August 1777. He was very much loved
    and appreciated by the leading families of the city and by Mgr.
    de Breteuil, the Bishop of Montauban, of whom he made a large
    medallion in profile. This bishop employed my father a great
    deal at his palace and in his country house, situated near
    the city.

    “My father was born with a rare genius for the fine arts. I say
    the fine arts because he executed painting, sculpture, and even
    architecture with success. I saw him construct an important
    building in our principal street.

    “If M. Ingres had had the same advantages which he gave his
    son, of going to Paris to study under the greatest of our
    masters, he would have been the first artist of his time. My
    father, who drew perfectly, painted also in miniature. He also
    painted views of the country from nature....

    “Nothing came amiss to him. In sculpture his work ranged from
    the sphinxes and figures of abbés reading, which were placed in
    gardens, to the colossal statues of Liberty which he was forced
    to improvise in our temples for the Republican fêtes. He made
    with the greatest facility ornaments of all kinds, with which
    he decorated most tastefully the buildings of his time....
    Finally, he attracted everybody by his lovable character, his
    goodness, his eminently artistic tastes. Every one was anxious
    to enjoy his society.

    “He often went to Toulouse, his native place, to renew his
    strength, so to speak, in that large and beautiful city, almost
    as rich then in monuments of art as Rome, which it greatly
    resembles. He loved to find himself again with the friends of
    his youth, all distinguished artists. He took me often with him
    in these short journeys.

    “Without being a musician, my father adored music, and sang
    very well with a tenor voice. He gave me his taste for music
    and made me learn to play the violin. I succeeded well enough
    with it to be admitted into the orchestra of the Grand Theatre
    of Toulouse, where I played a concerto of Viotti with
    success....”

    [Illustration: PLATE II.--MADAME RIVIÈRE

    (In the Louvre)

    This portrait of “Madame Rivière” is one of the most characteristic
    works of Ingres’ first period--the period (1800-1806) of that six
    years’ weary wait to depart for Rome which the bankruptcy of the
    public exchequer compelled the young artist to submit to. In a list of
    his works executed immediately before his first portrait of
    “Bartolini,” painted in 1805, Ingres mentions the portraits of “M.
    Rivière, Madame Rivière, and their ravishing daughter.” This fixes the
    date of these three portraits as about 1804. These are often spoken of
    by French critics as typical specimens of the artist’s “Pre-Raphaelite
    manner.” All three portraits are now in the Louvre.]

In this glowing eulogy of his father there is doubtless a certain
amount of pious exaggeration. The man was a true Toulousian, a fine
singer, an occasional performer on the violin, an improviser in
everything, with a natural gift for drawing and a plastic sense common
among his compatriots. That he would have been “one of the first
artists of his time” if he had had the advantage of studying in Paris
is manifestly absurd. His work shows a want of vigour, of
originality, of invention. He had a certain correctness of eye and
skill of hand, with some taste for arrangement and effect. That was
sufficient for the plaster decorations with which he was mainly
occupied, and even for the little portraits in miniature or red chalk
which he undertook. But he could not go beyond this, and the only
attempt to paint an important picture which he made marks clearly the
limits of his talent. His private life was somewhat irregular. He was
a great lover of the fair sex, and towards the end of his life his
wife was compelled to leave his home.

From the father, then, we may say, Ingres inherited the penetrating
vivacity of his sight, the agile suppleness and surety of his fingers,
and a certain voluptuous tendency which is particularly noticeable in
his nudes; while his immense powers of work, his obstinacy and
pugnacity, came from his mother.

At a very early age his father began to teach him drawing and music.
He first achieved success as a violinist in the salon of the bishop,
but he was at least equally precocious with his pencil. Towards the
age of twelve he was taken to Toulouse. He was at first placed with
the painter Vigan, and worked under his direction at the Académie
Royale. Then he went to the atelier of Roques, where he made rapid
progress. It was in Roques’s studio that Ingres was converted to what
he called “the religion of Raphael.” Roques had brought back with him
from Rome a number of copies of the works of the great painters of the
Renaissance, among them one of Raphael’s “Vierge à la Chaise.” Ingres
was so impressed by the beauty of this work that he is said to have
burst into tears before it. The instruction at the Toulouse Academy,
with its insistence on minute accuracy of drawing, also had a great
influence on his future career. At the end of his life Ingres, when
talking of his early studies at Toulouse, was fond of affirming that
he was still “what the little Ingres of twelve years had been.”

At the age of eighteen he was sent to Paris, and had the good
fortune--it was his own expression--to be admitted to the studio of
Louis David. He quickly gained the esteem of his master, and is said
to have been employed to paint the accessories in David’s famous
portrait of Madame Récamier. But their good understanding did not last
long. Ingres competed for the Grand Prix de Rome in 1799, and David
awarded the prize to Granger, an older pupil of his, while Ingres, to
his great indignation, was only awarded the second prize. His picture
was burnt during the Commune. The following year Ingres carried off
the prize. The subject was “Achilles receiving in his Tent the Envoys
of Agamemnon.” Flaxman, the English sculptor and illustrator of Homer,
spoke so flatteringly of Ingres’ picture that, according to M.
Delaborde, his master’s hostility was still further increased. This
painting, which is still preserved at the École des Beaux-Arts, shows
the young man’s power of vivid and accurate drawing and his respect
for the teachings of his master. But under its external conformity to
David’s principles it is possible to trace the germs of an originality
which was soon to separate the pupil, almost in spite of himself, from
the school of his master. For while David admitted the direct
imitation of nature only in his portraits and studies of the nude, he
insisted on giving the first place to the search for the grand style
in his historical compositions.

Already in this picture we see that Ingres was constitutionally
incapable of sacrificing on any grounds his unconscious desire to
imitate closely, of copying nature. In vain he tries to force himself
to attain “style” in the group he has imagined. His group is not
harmoniously arranged. It has no vital unity. Each of the figures
appeared detached from the others; but they are drawn individually
with so much realistic exactitude that the whole has the bizarre
aspect of a photograph of an assembly of artists’ models trying
different poses in a studio.

As M. de Wyzewa has well said, the young painter had received from
heaven at his birth a defect and a quality which remained intimately
connected with each other. The defect was a total absence of
imagination, invention, or aptitude to raise himself above the reality
directly offered to the painter by the sight present to his eyes; and
the quality--the very excess of which was the inevitable cause of the
defect I have just denoted--the quality was a marvellous, an
absolutely exceptional power of seeing, of understanding, and of
reproducing that reality. No painter has ever had a more exact vision
of the human figure, nor hands more skilful to fix in its entirety on
the paper or the canvas what his eyes saw. A Holbein even, with all
the fidelity of his realism, was still troubled in his observation of
the model by a shade of æsthetic idealism, by the preoccupation of
an example to be followed, or by a new process to employ: between
Dominique Ingres and his model, so long as he had this model in front
of his eyes, no consideration of any kind could interpose itself. The
painter was as possessed by his vision, as hypnotised by it, and he
was forced to copy it without changing anything. He carried away,
indeed, as the result of his stay in David’s studio, a body of
doctrines to which he remained on the whole faithful all his life, but
nature had given him gifts which were entirely different from those
which were needed to put these doctrines into practice. And this
explains why this great man, in the ignorance he always remained in of
the real source of his originality and greatness, presents to us
to-day the paradox of having been the most naturalistic of French
painters, while obstinately attempting to make himself the most
idealistic.

    [Illustration: PLATE III.--MADEMOISELLE RIVIÈRE

    (In the Louvre)

    This is the portrait of the “ravishing daughter” of Monsieur and
    Madame Rivière already referred to.]

Having gained the much-coveted Prix de Rome, Ingres ought to have
started at once for Italy. But the state of the public treasury was so
miserable at this period of wars and internal crises that the young
painter had to remain in Paris for five years before the funds for his
journey were forthcoming. He was allotted apartments, together with
other artists, in a deserted Capuchin convent in Paris, where he
resumed his studies and undertook any work that was offered to him.
The only official encouragement he received was an order to paint two
portraits of Napoleon. The first of these portraits was finished in
1805--the “Bonaparte, First Consul,” for the town of Lille; the
second, of “Napoleon, Emperor,” for the Hôtel des Invalides, was
finished in the following year. To those years of anxious suspense
belong the first ideas of many of the works which were afterwards to
make him famous. The dominant influences noticeable in his designs are
said to be the works of Flaxman and the paintings on antique Greek
vases. The neighbouring studio at the convent was occupied by de Gros,
who was engaged upon a series of immense canvases consecrated to the
glory of Napoleon’s campaign in Egypt. It was filled with Oriental
bric-à-brac, damascened arms, costumes, Persian rugs, Turkish pipes,
and hangings of gold and silk--everything, in short, which would help
the artist to paint the accessories of his pictures. It was in this
studio that Ingres probably painted the studies of Eastern carpets,
mosaics, &c., which are still preserved at the Museum of Montauban,
and which he used afterwards in the “Odalisques.” But the real
strength of his personality is best seen in the series of portraits
Ingres painted at this time. The first was a portrait of his father,
who came to visit him in Paris in 1801. As was his custom, he worked
on this in the following years, which explains the date, 1804,
inscribed upon the painting. It was exhibited at the Salon in 1806,
and is now at Montauban. Then he painted the portrait of himself which
is now at the Museum of Chantilly. These were followed by the three
portraits of the Rivière family, now in the Louvre. Two of these,
those of the mother and daughter, have been reproduced in the present
volume.

Towards the end of 1806 Ingres was at length supplied with the
necessary funds to proceed to Rome. Once established in the Villa
Medici fortune began to smile on him. He received several important
official commissions. His talent also found private appreciators. The
General Miollis, a fanatical admirer of Virgil; M. de Norvins, M.
Marcotte; ladies like Madame de Lavalette, Madame Forgeot, and Madame
Devauçay, gave him orders for portraits and pictures. Joachim Murat,
then King of Naples, also took an interest in the young painter who
had been born in the same province as himself. He commissioned the
“Dormeuse de Naples” and the “Grande Odalisque,” and invited him to
his Court to paint portraits of the members of his family.

So flourishing did the young artist’s affairs look that he resolved to
face the responsibilities of marriage. He authorised a friend, a M.
Loréal, an employé of the French Government in Rome, to find him a
wife. M. Loréal’s choice fell upon a Mlle. Magdaleine Chapelle, a
young Frenchwoman of about the same age as the artist, who was then
acting as cashier in a café at Guéret. M. Boyer d’Agen has recently
published a letter from the young fiancée to her sister announcing the
approaching marriage. It is dated 30th August 1813. She starts by
saying that just as she was beginning to despair of ever finding a
suitable husband “they had written to her from Rome saying they had
found exactly what she wanted.” “You can judge of the pleasure the
news gave me,” she exclaims quite frankly, “and it made me feel ten
years younger, so that I now look only twenty years of age.” She
promises to send her sister a portrait of her future husband on
another occasion, but says that for the present she must be satisfied
with a verbal description. “He is a good-looking young man. I always
said my husband must be handsome.” “He is a painter--not a
house-painter, but a great painter of history, a great talent. He
earns from ten to twelve thousand livres a year. You see that with
that we shall not die of hunger. He has a good character, and is very
gentle. He is neither a drinker, a gambler, nor a rake. He has no
faults. He promises to make me very happy, and I love to believe he
will.”

The writer of this charming letter was married to the artist about
three months after it was written. The marriage was arranged entirely
by the friends of the young couple. They had not set eyes on each
other before Ingres went to the city gates to meet his affianced
bride. They met near the Tomb of Nero. It was there that Ingres first
took the hand of the partner who was to caress and console him during
the next thirty-five years. This charming and laughing “fille à Madame
Angot” turned out to be the admirable companion which every artist
dreams of but so rarely possesses: one who will share all his hopes,
but never his doubts; who believes and admires, smiles and is patient,
and accepts all sacrifices for the glory of the one she loves.

Almost immediately after his marriage Ingres’ luck changed. Murat was
overthrown in 1814. His successor refused all the pictures that had
been commissioned from Ingres, and those which had been finished were
sold although the artist had not been paid for them. In a letter to
his friend Gelibert, dated 7th July 1818, Ingres complains that he has
been able to put nothing aside, that he has to live, as it were,
from day to day. He admits he has several orders on hand for pictures,
but “as I paint only to paint well, I take a long time over them, and
consequently earn little.” His chief resource was the making of chalk
or pencil portraits, for which his usual price was twenty-five francs.
But after each portrait, as his wife told a friend in after years,
Ingres declared that he would not do any more, that he was a painter
of history, not a draughtsman of the faces of the middle classes.
“Nevertheless,” she added, “it was necessary to live, and M. Ingres
took up his pencil again.” But as even this slender resource began to
fail him at Rome, he resolved to leave that city and take up his
residence at Florence, where his friend Bartolini, the sculptor, was
already settled.

    [Illustration: PLATE IV.--L’APOTHEOSE D’HOMERE

    (In the Louvre)

    This large and famous picture was commissioned to fill the
    ceiling of one of the galleries of the Louvre. It is signed
    “Ingres pingbat, anno 1827.” It cost the master more research
    and trouble than any of his other works. This is proved by the
    number of painted studies, some of them superior to the finished
    picture itself, and the repeated references to it in his letters
    and note-books. Homer is being crowned by Victory, and the two
    beautiful female figures seated at his feet represent the
    _Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_. Around Homer are the painters,
    sculptors, and musicians whom the artist wished to glorify. “To
    his great regret,” he said he felt compelled to exclude Goethe,
    because he found too many “faults” in his writings. But
    Shakespeare and Pope were admitted. In his last version of this
    subject, made in 1865, Shakespeare was also finally expelled.]

To this period of Ingres’ first sojourn in Rome (from the end of 1806
to 1820) belong some of the artist’s finest and most personal works.
We must give the first place to his portraits. The delicious portrait
of Madame Aymon, known as “La Belle Zélie” (now in the Museum of
Rouen), was immediately followed by what is on all hands regarded as
his most beautiful work of this kind. This is the “Madame Devauçay,”
of the Museum of Chantilly. It is an admirable example of Ingres’
wonderful power of concentration and absorption in the thing seen.
Disdaining the help of accessories, he draws all his inspiration from
the face and figure of his model. He seizes the personality of his
sitter with so much completeness and such perfect sympathy and
understanding, and places it on the canvas with so much authority and
power, that the portrait of the individual takes on all the scope of a
permanent and absolute type. The portrait of “Madame de Sénonnes” (now
in the Museum of Nantes), which was painted about 1810, has the same
intensity of spirit as the “Madame Devauçay,” and the same exquisite
perfection of modelling and design. It is also marked by greater ease
and freedom of handling, a sign of the young master’s growing
confidence in his own genius. It is generally regarded as Ingres’
masterpiece of feminine portraiture.

The well-known “Œdipus and the Sphinx” was painted in 1808, while
the artist was still a pensioner of the School of Rome. It is hard for
us to understand the horror and dislike which this picture provoked
among the leading spirits of the school of David. What seems to us a
typical example of classic art struck the official representatives of
Classicism as the work of a revolutionary. In his report on this
picture, M. Lethière, the director of the School of Rome, regrets that
M. Ingres, in spite of his talent, has failed to grasp the secret of
the “grand and noble style of the great masters of the Roman school.”
To appreciate the originality and daring of this work, we must compare
the figure of Œdipus with that of the Roman heroes in David’s “Rape
of the Sabines.” David’s figures are all cast in the same mould. All
the particularities of the individual model are ruthlessly eliminated.
When we turn from the vague and empty generalisations of David,
Regnault, Gérard and Girodet, and look at the narrow forehead, the
pugnacious upper lip, the prominent cheek-bones, the deep-sunk eye and
the bushy eyebrows of Ingres’ figure, we may begin to understand
that the gulf which yawns between the two kinds of Idealism--the
abstract idealism of the Davidian school and the concrete idealism of
Ingres--is quite as wide and impassable as that which separates them
both from Romanticism and Naturalism.

    [Illustration: PLATE V.--M. BERTIN

    (In the Louvre)

    This portrait represents the famous “Bertin ainé, the director
    of the _Journal des Débats_.” It is signed “J. Ingres, pinxit
    1832,” and was exhibited at the Salon of 1833.]

The “Œdipus” was followed, in 1808, by the “Seated Bather” (now in
the Louvre); in 1811, by “Jupiter and Thétis” (now at the Museum of
Aix), a curiously Flaxman-like design; in 1812, by the “Dream of
Ossian” (now at Montauban); and in 1814, by a scene of real life, “The
Pope officiating among the Cardinals in the Sistine Chapel” (now in
the Louvre). In this marvellous picture the artist has for once
avoided the painful task of invention which he habitually imposed upon
himself. He abandoned himself completely to the imperious suggestion
of what was actually before his eyes. The truth, life, and richness of
colour and tone of this little picture have led some of his recent
admirers to speak of it as the most complete and perfectly balanced of
all the artist’s works.

The “Grande Odalisque,” exhibited at the Salon of 1819, but painted in
1814, brought to a close for the time the admirable series of nude
female figures which the artist had begun during his first years in
Rome. His wonderful sketches of the “Venus Anadyomene” and the
“Source” had already been painted, but the canvases remained
unfinished in his studio, the first till 1848, the second till 1858.

His love of female beauty reveals itself again in the principal figure
of the picture he sent to the Salon in 1819. This was the “Roger
delivering Angelica,” a scene borrowed from the tenth song of
Ariosto’s “Roland Furieux.” The picture is now in the Louvre. The
young knight, mounted on a hippogriff, pierces with his lance a marine
monster who was about to devour the beautiful young woman who is
chained to the rocks. The figure of the young knight, his curious
steed, and the strange monster which is being killed, provoked the
anger and ridicule of the Academic party. In its quaint details the
influence of Perugino and of the earlier Florentine and Tuscan
painters was clearly noticeable. This was one of the first signs in
nineteenth-century art of the Gothic revival and of that stream of
tendency which came afterwards to be described as pre-Raphaelitism.
The epithet “Gothic” was freely used as a term of reproach against
Ingres’ picture. But the lovely figure of Angelica was a distinct
creation of the painter’s own genius.

In the “Francesca da Rimini” of the same year (now in the Museum of
Angers) the same pre-Raphaelite tendencies are even more strongly
pronounced. The figures of the two lovers might easily have been
designed by Rossetti or Madox Brown.

       *       *       *       *       *

All these works in which the master’s genius had approved itself with
so much originality and fire had left their author to vegetate in
poverty and obscurity, while the mediocrities around him had risen
rapidly towards fortune and celebrity. Ingres was now anxious to
return to Paris, but his meagre resources would not allow it. Then,
tired of his hardships, and feeling that the social atmosphere of Rome
was not favourable to him, he rejoined his friend Bartolini at
Florence, hoping thus, among new surroundings, to re-establish his
compromised career. His hopes were falsified. The four years passed in
Florence (1820-1824) brought him only a fresh supply of hardships and
mortifications. Less hospitable than Rome, Florence brought him only
two commissions for portraits, those of M. and Mme. Leblanc
(1823-1824); but it was here that he met M. de Pastoret, who was
instrumental in getting him the commission which brought the artist
his first striking and definitive success. M. de Pastoret was so
pleased with Ingres’ “Entry of Charles V. into Paris” (painted in
1821) that he obtained for him a commission from the Minister of the
Interior for a large picture of “The Vow of Louis XIII.” for the
Cathedral of Montauban. This was begun in Florence in 1821 and
finished in 1824, in which year it figured in the Salon of Paris. It
was one of his pictures with which Ingres was most satisfied. It is
also one of the first in which the influence of Raphael, which was to
play such a large part in all his future work, is conspicuous. In a
letter written in 1821, Ingres said that he was sparing no pains to
make the picture “Raphaelesque and his own.” There is really more of
Raphael in it than Ingres. The general arrangement of the design
reminds one at once of Raphael’s “Transfiguration,” “The Sistine
Madonna,” and the “Mass of Bolsena.” The figure of the Madonna is a
sort of amalgam of Raphael’s various Madonnas. There is also an
evident want of faith and religious enthusiasm in the picture. It
marked the subjection of the artist to the Academical party which he
had fought till then with so much violence and bitterness. The public
which had frowned upon his vigorously personal and original works
hailed this able imitation with enthusiasm. The master’s period of
probation was at an end, and he returned in triumph to Paris to become
the leader of the Academic party against the rising tide of
Romanticism.

Ingres’ life was henceforward free from the material cares which had
hampered his early career. The Parisians declared that such a picture
as the “Vow of Louis XIII.” was too good to be buried in the
provinces. The State wanted to retain it for Notre Dame or
Val-de-Grace, and offered the artist a much larger sum of money for it
than had been agreed upon. But Ingres refused these flattering offers.
He was determined that Montauban should have it as an offering of his
filial affection. The picture was taken there from Paris. The artist
was entertained at a banquet given by the Municipality. Flattering
speeches were made, and the artist departed with the cheers of his
admirers ringing in his ears. And then the Archbishop, objecting to
the nakedness of the infant Jesus and the two amorini holding the
tablet, refused to permit the picture to be brought into the
Cathedral. The artist’s friends were indignant; Ingres himself was
furious. But prayers and threats could not move the Archbishop. It was
only when large gilt fig-leaves had been placed to cover up the
innocent nakedness of the charming little figures that he would allow
the canvas to be hung in his church.

In 1824 Ingres was nominated Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. In
1825 he was elected to the Institute. Charles X. commissioned him
to paint his portrait in the royal robes, and to decorate one of the
ceilings of the Louvre. At the end of 1829 he was made professor at
the École des Beaux-arts.

    [Illustration: PLATE VI.--CHÉRUBINI

    (In the Louvre)

    This “portrait picture” was begun in Rome in 1839, but was only
    finished in Paris in 1842. The painter’s first intention was to
    represent only the figure of Chérubini, but afterwards he had
    the canvas enlarged to make room behind the musician for the
    figure of the “Muse of lyrical poetry, mother of the sacred
    hymns.” It is doubtful whether this addition is an improvement.]

“The Apotheosis of Homer,” the subject chosen for the Louvre ceiling,
was begun and finished within the short space of a single year. The
amount of work involved in making the preparatory studies and carrying
through a work of such importance was enormous, and Ingres had never
before displayed so much energy and decision. The conception of the
picture was a noble one. It was to represent the spiritual ties which
bind one generation of human beings to the other; to insist on the
debt which each worker in the field of art and thought owes to his
predecessors; to celebrate the real immortality of genius by showing
the incessant action which it exerts on all the individuals who are
successively born and developed by its influence. We must confess that
Ingres has found a worthy plastic formula to express his highly
abstract conception. He shows us the poets, painters, sculptors,
philosophers, and great patrons of the arts grouped round the seat of
the old blind poet. Each individual face, each gesture and pose, has
been studied and thought out patiently, and executed with masterly
skill. The terrible problem of grouping together so many different
personalities and so many costumes of widely differing periods has
been faced and overcome. The whole produces an effect of incomparable
simplicity and grandeur.

In no part of the pictures are Ingres’ marvellous powers of
realisation more clearly displayed than in the three purely
symbolical figures of the Winged Victory who places the crown of gold
upon the forehead of the poet, and those representing the _Odyssey_
and the _Iliad_ who sit at his feet. What a distance separates these
figures, full of feminine charm and of exuberant life, from the cold
allegories of the other painters of his time! Look at the queenly
grace of the Victory; the disdainful lips, the contracted nostrils of
the proud woman, with hands nervously crossed upon her knee, who sits
on the poet’s right; and the dreamer who sits on his left, with her
mantle wrapped round her, her hand upon her chin, her half-closed eyes
dreaming of the far-away adventures of Ulysses.

This picture remained in the place for which it was destined for about
twenty years. Then it was replaced by an excellent copy made by three
of the master’s pupils, Dumas and the brothers Baize, and the
original was hung in the Louvre, where it could be better seen and
admired by the public and more carefully studied by the painters.

Such a display of his powers disarmed even the many enemies which
Ingres had made. But the artist was never satisfied. He thought he had
not attained the supreme and definitive expression of his genius. He
thought he could do better, that he could express himself with more
force, more persuasive energy and warmth, in his next work. This was a
religious scene commissioned for the Cathedral of Autun--the
“Martyrdom of St. Symphorian.”

Before this work was finished he painted yet another of those superb
portraits which he himself professed to regard as a waste of time, but
which posterity values more highly than the allegorical and religious
subjects to which he devoted himself with such fierce energy and
consuming ardour. This was the portrait of “Bertin ainé,” which was
exhibited at the Salon of 1833, and is now in the Louvre. The old man,
with turbulent grey hair, with keen penetrating eyes, with wary mouth,
seated so squarely in his chair with his hands on his knees--the whole
bodily and spiritual presence of the man is placed so vividly upon the
canvas that we seem to know him more intimately than we know our
friends.

After being repainted several times, the “Martyrdom of St Symphorian”
was exhibited at the Salon the year after the portrait of M. Bertin
had appeared there. Instead of bringing Ingres a more complete victory
than his “Homer,” it brought him an unexpected check. To us, living as
we do in a perfect anarchy of taste, it is rather difficult to
understand why this picture should have scandalised and alarmed the
artists and public of the time. The artist was accused of
exaggeration, of an abuse of power. Since Michael Angelo they had
never seen in painting such muscles as those of the arms and legs of
the lictors who are taking the saint to his place of torture. The
whole effect, Ingres’ critics said, was forced and improbable. They
did not understand that the artist had deliberately intended to force
the contrast between the bestiality of the murderers and the moral
superiority of their victim.

In spite of its want of atmosphere and other shortcomings, the picture
is a moving and impressive one. There is nothing vulgar in those too
robust figures. The face of the young martyr, illuminated with faith,
and the fanatical exaltation of the mother, form the two moral centres
of the drama. Between them the curiosity and emotion of the crowd are
divided. Some gaze in stupor at this woman who sends her son to
torture. They do not understand that she sees him already in glory,
crowned with celestial beatitudes. Others are indignant with her, like
the young man who picks up a stone to throw at her, or like the
soldier behind the centurion who turns towards her a face full of
astonishment and irritation. A young woman presses her child in her
arms in shuddering protestation. Others look at the man who is about
to die for his faith. Their sentiments oscillate between hostility,
compassion, indifference, and horror. The women are grieved. An old
man takes his head in his hands, confounded by such inconceivable
folly. And, dominating them all, the centurion on horseback gives the
order to march to the place of execution.

The learned construction of such a crowded scene, the nobility and
expressiveness of the figures, the fine treatment of drapery, the
virile energy of the drawing, the sober and restrained colouring, and,
above all, that indefinable beauty which genius stamps on all its
creations, might well have silenced the adverse criticisms with which
the artists and the public assailed this picture.

Ingres suffered from these criticisms to a quite unreasonable extent.
“I do not belong to this apostate century,” he exclaimed. He could not
understand people’s objections, nothing could console him, and he
cursed his epoch and the injustice of the public. He swore he would
never exhibit at the Salon again. He wished to flee from Paris. He
accepted as a deliverance the appointment of Director of the Academy
of France in Rome, shut his studio, dismissed his pupils, and with an
indignant and bitter spirit he quitted Paris again for the Eternal
City.

    [Illustration: PLATE VII.--LE DUC D’ORLÉANS

    (Musée de Versailles)

    This grave and dignified portrait of the Duke of Orleans was
    ordered by the King in 1842. It is remarkable for the minuteness
    and care with which all the details of the uniform and the
    accessories are rendered.]

But if Ingres doubted of human justice, he never doubted about his
art. He devoted himself to it with renewed passion and enthusiasm.
“The day I quitted Paris,” he wrote to one of his friends, “I broke
for ever with everything that has to do with the public. Henceforth I
will paint entirely for myself. I belong at last to myself, and I will
belong only to myself.”

But, as a fact, neither Ingres’ influence nor prestige suffered from
the want of success of his “St. Symphorian.” As director of the French
Academy at Rome he remained the guide, counsellor, and example of all
the young talents of his time. His proud ideal could not fail to
attract the enthusiasm of his younger contemporaries. His teaching and
example were helpful to others besides the painters. What was
essential in his doctrines was applicable to all the arts: to music,
which moved him so profoundly; and to sculpture--for did he not use
his pencil and brush like a chisel?

Official favour also followed him in his angry retreat. The Duke of
Orleans ordered a small historical picture from him, which gave him an
immense deal of trouble but was at the same time a source of glorious
compensation. He produced “Stratonice,” one of the most successful of
his works.

The tragedy of which Stratonice was the heroine had haunted his
imagination for years. He had meditated long on the subject, but had
always conceived the picture on a large scale. Unfortunately, the
picture had to be the same size as Paul Delaroche’s “Death of the Duke
of Guise,” to which it was to serve as pendant, and Ingres was
constrained to transform his grandiose conception into a miniature.
Ingres took six years to paint what he called his “grand historical
miniature.” And it is to be somewhat regretted that in his anxiety for
archæological exactitude he invited the collaboration of the architect
Hittorf. Hittorf was full of his rather excessive theories about the
polychromatic architecture of the ancients. He imposed his ideas so
completely on the unfortunate artist that he was permitted to paint
the background of the picture. Hence the debauch of local colour, of
coloured mosaics and bronzes, which threatens almost to swamp the
figures. And what is worse, later archæologists have not failed to
discover flaws in the pedantic architect’s too insistent
details--strange anachronisms like that of placing well-known
Pompeiian frescoes on the walls of the palace of Antiochus, together
with motives borrowed from Greek vases at least four hundred years
earlier in date. The example of this picture has had an important
effect on the French school.

But in spite of these defects, the picture imposes itself on the
imagination. The hopeless tragedy of the situation is admirably
expressed without a trace of theatrical exaggeration. We see a young
man, suffering from a grave and mysterious malady, extended upon his
bed of suffering. The physician called in by his despairing father
stands beside him and examines him. The father himself, overcome with
grief, bows his head over his son’s couch. At this moment in the
chamber of death a young woman enters. She is young, charming, and
melancholy. She is the second wife of the heart-broken father, the
mother-in-law of the dying son. And as she walks through the room with
languishing steps the physician guesses the horrible truth. The man on
the bed is dying of love. By signs which cannot deceive him, the man
of science has divined the dreadful passion of the son for his
father’s wife. Such was, in fact, the history of Stratonice. The
second wife of Seleucus Nicanor was loved by Antiochus, the king’s son
by his first marriage. The doctor, Erasistratus, having surprised this
secret, declared that the young man would certainly die if Stratonice
was not given to him, and his father’s love was great enough to
enable him to make this sacrifice.

No other artist than Ingres could have placed this poignant drama on
canvas without exciting ridicule. “Stratonice” was exhibited by the
Duke of Orleans in one of the galleries of the Pavilion of Marsan, and
the public were freely admitted to see it. All the visitors were
enchanted with it. The dramatic character of the subject was not
displeasing to the Parisian public, and the artists admired the
delicate taste, the pathetic grace, and the impeccable style of the
workmanship. Above all, the charm of the _svelte_ and supple figure of
the heroine, her head bowed under the weight of her culpable beauty,
touched all hearts.

Another small picture, known indifferently as “The Odalisque with the
Slave” or the “Small Odalisque,” was finished about the same time as
the “Stratonice.” This was painted for the artist’s friend M.
Marcotte, but is now in the Louvre. In the “Odalisque” as in the
“Stratonice” we find a profusion of the details dear to Hittorf, but
the figure of the beautiful Circassian curled up on the rich carpet of
the harem is a masterpiece of plastic form. In this lovely body the
artist has symbolised something of that perverse melancholy, that
dangerous voluptuousness, which has found such moving expression in
some of Baudelaire’s poems.

       *       *       *       *       *

In the spring of 1841 Ingres returned to Paris. He found his
reputation increased by the success of the “Stratonice.” His brother
artists hailed him as their leader. A banquet was offered to him by
all the artists present in the capital, painters, sculptors, and
architects, the only prominent absentee being Eugène Delacroix, the
leader of the Romantics. Delacroix did not wish to participate in the
triumph of his rival, and this triumph, so unanimously accorded, only
served to widen the breach between the two masters. Henceforth the
struggle between them became more bitter. Each party pursued the other
without mercy, neither disdaining to use any kind of weapon that came
to hand.

Fortified by the homage offered to him, Ingres returned to his work
with renewed ardour. The King asked him to paint a portrait of the
Duke of Orleans, and Ingres, grateful for the Duke’s kindness with
regard to the “Stratonice,” took much more pains over this portrait
than he usually took with commissions of this kind. This was the last
male portrait that Ingres painted, with the exception of a small
monochrome medallion of the Prince Jéròme Napoléon, which he executed
in 1855. But, on the other hand, he became the favourite painter of
the exalted dames of the Monarchy of July and of the Second Empire,
though very much against his will, for he regarded portrait-painting
as a waste of time, and wished to devote himself entirely to his grand
historical and religious compositions. Nevertheless, he painted some
fine portraits of beautiful women--Madame d’Haussonville in 1845,
Madame Frédéric Reisat in 1846, Madame James de Rothschild in 1848,
Madame Gonse and Madame Moitessier in 1852, the Princess de Broglie in
1853, a second half-length portrait (the first was a full-length) of
Madame Moitessier in 1856, and finally, in 1859, that of his second
wife.

    [Illustration: PLATE VIII.--JEANNE D’ARC

    (In the Louvre)

    The picture of “Joan of Arc assisting at the Consecration of
    Charles VII. in the Cathedral of Reims” was painted for the
    gallery of Versailles, but is now in the Louvre. It is signed
    “J. Ingres, 1854.” The figure, the maid’s squire, standing
    immediately behind the kneeling priest, is said to be a portrait
    of the artist himself.]

Soon after the portrait of the Duke of Orleans was finished he
received another royal commission, the “Jesus among the Doctors,”
which the Queen Marie-Amélie wished to present to the Château de Bizy.
The work, badly conceived at the beginning, was still unfinished when
the Revolution drove from France the patroness who had commissioned
it. It remained almost forgotten in a corner of the artist’s studio
till 1862, when Ingres decided to finish it and present it to the
museum of his natal city. Of all Ingres’ productions, it is perhaps
the only one where the inspiration and execution both seem feeble.

While he had been still in Rome, in 1839, Ingres had received from the
Duc de Luynes a commission to decorate the great room at the Château
of Dampierre with two large mural paintings representing “The Age of
Gold” and “The Age of Iron.” He was delighted with the commission, as
he was always dreaming of reviving the great traditions of decorative
painting. He made numberless studies for these subjects, many of them
among the most beautiful of his drawings. But as the painting had to
be done actually on the walls at Dampierre, the work progressed very
slowly. Years flew by, and the artist’s enthusiasm cooled. The noble
Duke and the sensitive and proud painter could not get along well
under the same roof. Ingres thought himself slighted on one occasion
(in 1850) and brusquely threw up the commission, leaving his work
unfinished. There exists of this gigantic work only a sketch at
Dampierre, an infinite number of drawings at the Museum of Montauban,
and a little painting executed from these drawings in 1862, a very
feeble representation of what the definitive work would have been. As
for “The Age of Iron,” we have only the preliminary studies.

       *       *       *       *       *

As if to revenge himself for the loss of his promised masterpiece,
Ingres now took up again a number of the works he had sketched in his
youth and set himself to finish them or repaint them. He also busied
himself painting replicas of others which had passed out of his hands
but with which he was not entirely satisfied. He painted thus a
repetition of the “Apotheosis of Homer,” adding a number of fresh
figures and substituting others for some of the poets and artists of
his first choice. After much anxious reflection and discussion with
his pupils, he decided to banish Shakespeare, as he had already
banished Goethe, from the group of the immortals. He also painted
replicas of his “Sistine Chapel,” of “Roger delivering Angelica,” and
variations of his “Œdipus” and “Stratonice.” He also painted four
or five slightly different versions of the figure of the Virgin in his
early picture of the “Vow of Louis XIII.” One of these developed into
a picture of “The Virgin between St. Nicholas and St. Alexander”--a
subject the Emperor of Russia had asked him to treat. We find another
version of the same type in “The Virgin with the Host,” which forms
one of our illustrations. In no other work of Ingres is his passionate
admiration of Raphael more clearly displayed.

One of the new works which caused the liveliest sensation was “The
Birth of Venus” or “Venus Anadyomene.” This had been begun forty years
before, at the time of the early “Bathers” and “Odalisque.” The
beautiful white body of the goddess detaches itself from the
harmonious blue of the sea and sky, and groups of amorini flutter
round and caress her youthful form. One of these delicious attendants
offers her a mirror, another kisses the feet of the young goddess,
while a third embraces her knees. It would be difficult to imagine
anything more graciously tender or more natural than the infantile
figures.

The “Venus Anadyomene” was finished in 1848; in 1851 Ingres painted
his “Jupiter and Antiope,” and two years later he painted his
“Apotheosis of Napoleon I.,” a large subject for the decoration of one
of the ceilings of the Hôtel de Ville, at Paris. This was
unfortunately destroyed by fire in the troubled days of the Commune in
1871. In 1854 his “Joan of Arc assisting at the Consecration of
Charles VII.” was painted for the gallery of Versailles.

We have now reached the last years of the artist’s laborious life.
They were as busy as his earlier years, but they were crowned with
honour and glory. In 1855 all Europe flocked to Paris to see the
Universal Exhibition. The life-work of Ingres was gathered together in
a special gallery. It produced an immense impression. All criticisms
of detail fell before the magnificent affirmation of the artist’s
individual ideal. One of the grand medals was given to him by the
unanimous votes of the artists, and the Emperor made him an officer of
the Legion of Honour.

Then, in the following year, as if to crown his career by the
evocation of a supreme masterpiece, Ingres finished the “Source,” a
subject which had been begun at the same time as the “Venus
Anadyomene.” This beautiful figure was not a passing vision which had
animated the brush of the aged painter; it was indeed the daughter of
his dreams, an emanation of his own soul, the slow growth of long
meditations, and which, at last, incarnated itself in an immortal
form. This calm and adorable figure seems a souvenir of our long-lost
innocence. That is perhaps why we love it so, and why we bless the
artist to whom we owe this divine dream.

Ingres died in 1867. He had finished his task, had spoken the last
word of his austere but profoundly human genius.

       *       *       *       *       *

Ingres has been spoken of as an ancient Greek lost and bewildered in
our modern times. Such a view of his character is misleading. Like all
the great creators, he expressed the aspirations of his race and his
times. He was not only the child of his century and his country, but
he represented them both in their classic reaction and in their
impulse towards Romanticism. But the two tendencies were so nicely
balanced in his temperament that he offended the extremists of both
parties. He paid in his lifetime for his detachment from parties, for
his exalted aims and sublime courage, but he reaps his reward from
posterity. The creator of the immortal figures of Œdipus, the
Odalisque, Angelica, Stratonice, and the Source to-day takes
unquestioned rank among the great masters not only of French but of
European art.




BIBLIOGRAPHY


The authoritative French accounts of Ingres’ life and work (from which
the foregoing sketch has been compiled) are:--

    _Comte Henri Delaborde._--Ingres, sa vie, ses travaux, sa
    doctrine (1870).

    _Charles Blanc._--Ingres (1870).

    _Henry Lapauze._--L’Œuvre de Ingres (in “Melanges sur l’Art
    Français,” 1905).

    _Jules Momméja._--Ingres (“Les Grands Artistes” series).

    _T. de Wyzewa._--L’Œuvre peint de Jean-Dominique Ingres
    (1907).

    _Boyer d’Agen._--Ingres d’apres une Correspondence inédite
    (1909).


      The plates are printed by BEMROSE & SONS, LTD., Derby and London
               The text at the BALLANTYNE PRESS, Edinburgh













     UNCLE WIGGILY IN WONDERLAND

     [Illustration]

     UNCLE WIGGILY SERIES

     by Howard R. Garis

[Illustration]




     _UNCLE WIGGILY BEDTIME STORIES_

     Uncle Wiggily in Wonderland

     By HOWARD R. GARIS

     Author of "SAMMIE AND SUSIE LITTLETAIL," "DICKIE AND NELLIE
     FLIPTAIL," "UNCLE WIGGILY'S AIRSHIP," THE DADDY SERIES, ETC.

     ILLUSTRATED BY EDWARD BLOOMFIELD

     A. L. Burt Company
     Publishers
     New York




THE FAMOUS BED TIME STORIES

Books intended for reading aloud to the Little Folks at night. Each
volume contains colored illustrations, and a story for every night in
the month. The animal tales send the children to bed with happy dreams.


BEDTIME ANIMAL STORIES By HOWARD R. GARIS

     SAMMIE AND SUSIE LITTLETAIL
     JOHNNIE AND BILLIE BUSHYTAIL
     LULU, ALICE AND JIMMIE WIBBLEWOBBLE
     JACKIES AND PEETIE BOW-WOW
     BUDDY AND BRIGHTEYES PIGG
     JOIE, TOMMIE AND KITTIE KAT
     CHARLIE AND ARABELLA CHICK
     NEDDIE AND BECKIE STUBTAIL
     BULLY AND BAWLY NO-TAIL
     NANNIE AND BILLIE WAGTAIL
     JOLLIE AND JILLIE LONGTAIL
     JACKO AND JUMPO KINKYTAIL
     CURLY AND FLOPPY TWISTYTAIL
     TOODLE AND NOODLE FLAT-TAIL
     DOTTIE AND WILLIE FLUFFTAIL
     DICKIE AND NELLIE FLIPTAIL


UNCLE WIGGILY BEDTIME STORIES By HOWARD R. GARIS

     UNCLE WIGGILY'S ADVENTURES
     UNCLE WIGGILY'S TRAVELS
     UNCLE WIGGILY'S FORTUNE
     UNCLE WIGGILY'S AUTOMOBILE
     UNCLE WIGGILY AT THE SEASHORE
     UNCLE WIGGILY'S AIRSHIP
     UNCLE WIGGILY IN THE COUNTRY
     UNCLE WIGGILY IN THE WOODS
     UNCLE WIGGILY ON THE FARM
     UNCLE WIGGILY'S JOURNEY
     UNCLE WIGGILY'S RHEUMATISM
     UNCLE WIGGILY AND BABY BUNTY
     UNCLE WIGGILY IN WONDERLAND
     UNCLE WIGGILY IN FAIRYLAND

For sale at all bookstores or sent prepaid on receipt of price, 75 cents
per volume, by the publishers

A. L. BURT COMPANY, 114-120 East 23rd Street New York City

_Copyright, 1921, by R. F. Fenno & Company_

UNCLE WIGGILY IN WONDERLAND




CONTENTS


Chapter                                          Page

        I Uncle Wiggily and Wonderland Alice        9

       II Uncle Wiggily and the March Hare         16

      III Uncle Wiggily and the Cheshire Cat       23

       IV Uncle Wiggily and the Dormouse           30

        V Uncle Wiggily and the Gryphon            37

       VI Uncle Wiggily and the Caterpillar        44

      VII Uncle Wiggily and the Hatter             50

     VIII Uncle Wiggily and the Duchess            56

       IX Uncle Wiggily and the Cook               63

        X Uncle Wiggily and the Baby               69

       XI Uncle Wiggily and the Mock Turtle        76

      XII Uncle Wiggily and the Lobster            83

     XIII Uncle Wiggily and Father William         89

      XIV Uncle Wiggily and the Magic Bottles      96

       XV Uncle Wiggily and the Croquet Ball      102

      XVI Uncle Wiggily and the Do-Do             108

     XVII Uncle Wiggily and the Lory              115

    XVIII Uncle Wiggily and the Puppy             122

      XIX Uncle Wiggily and the Unicorn           129

       XX Uncle Wiggily and Humpty Dumpty         136

      XXI Uncle Wiggily and the Looking Glass     143

     XXII Uncle Wiggily and the White Queen       150

    XXIII Uncle Wiggily and the Red Queen         157

     XXIV Uncle Wiggily and Tweedledum            164

      XXV Uncle Wiggily and Tweedledee            171

     XXVI Uncle Wiggily and the Tear Pool         178




CHAPTER I

UNCLE WIGGILY AND WONDERLAND ALICE


Once upon a time, after Uncle Wiggily Longears, the nice bunny rabbit
gentleman, had some funny adventures with Baby Bunty, and when he found
that his rheumatism did not hurt him so much as he hopped on his red,
white and blue striped barber pole crutch, the bunny uncle wished he
might have some strange and wonderful adventures.

"I think I'll just hop along and look for a few," said Uncle Wiggily to
himself one morning. He twinkled his pink nose, and then he was all
ready to start.

"Good-bye, Nurse Jane! Good-bye!" he called to his muskrat lady
housekeeper, with whom he lived in a hollow stump bungalow. "I'm going
to look for some wonderful adventures!" He hopped down the front steps,
with his red, white and blue striped crutch under one paw, and his tall,
silk hat on his head. "Good-bye, Miss Fuzzy Wuzzy!"

"Good-bye!" answered Nurse Jane. "I hope you have some nice
adventures!"

"Thanks, I wish you the same," answered Uncle Wiggily, and away he went
over the fields and through the woods. He had not hopped very far,
looking this way and that, before, all of a sudden, he came to a queer
little place, near an old rail fence. Down in one corner was a hole,
partly underground.

"Ha! That's queer," said Uncle Wiggily to himself. "That looks just like
the kind of an underground house, or burrow, where I used to live. I
wonder if this can be where I made my home before I moved to the hollow
stump bungalow? I must take a look. Nurse Jane would like to hear all
about it."

So Uncle Wiggily, folding back his ears in order that they would not get
bent over and broken, began crawling down the rabbit hole, for that is
what it really was.

It was dark inside, but the bunny uncle did not mind that, being able to
see in the dark. Besides, he could make his pink nose twinkle when he
wanted to, and this gave almost as much light as a firefly.

"No, this isn't the burrow where I used to live," said Uncle Wiggily to
himself, when he had hopped quite a distance into the hole. "But it's
very nice. Perhaps I may have an adventure here. Who knows?"

And just as he said that to himself, Uncle Wiggily saw, lying under a
little table, in what seemed to be a room of the underground house, a
small glass box.

"Ha! My adventure begins!" cried Uncle Wiggily. "I'll open that glass
box and see what is in it."

So the bunny uncle raised the cover, and in the glass box was a little
cake, made of carrots and cabbage, and on top, spelled out in pink
raisins, were the words:

                             "EAT ME!"

"Ha! That's just what I'll do!" cried jolly Uncle Wiggily, and, never
stopping to think anything might be wrong, the bunny gentleman ate the
cake. And then, all of a sudden, he began to feel very funny.

"Oh, my!" exclaimed Uncle Wiggily. "I hope that cake didn't belong to my
nephew, Sammie Littletail, or Johnnie or Billie Bushytail, the squirrel
brothers. One of them may have lost it out of his lunch basket on his
way to school. I hope it wasn't any of their cake. But there is surely
something funny about it, for I feel so very queer!"

And no wonder! For Uncle Wiggily had suddenly begun to grow very large.
His ears grew taller, so that they lifted his tall silk hat right off
his head. His legs seemed as long as bean poles, and as for his whiskers
and pink, twinkling nose, they seemed so far away from his eyes that he
wondered if he would ever get them near enough to see to comb the one,
or scratch the other when it felt ticklish.

"This is certainly remarkable!" cried Uncle Wiggily. "I wonder what made
me grow so large all of a sudden? Could it have been the cake which gave
me the indyspepsia?"

"It was the cake!" cried a sudden and buzzing voice, and, looking around
the hole Uncle Wiggily saw a big mosquito. "It was the cake that made
you grow big," went on the bad biting bug, "and I put it here for you to
eat."

"What for?" asked the bunny uncle, puzzled like.

"So you would grow so big that you couldn't get out of this hole," was
the answer. "And now you can't! This is how I have caught you! Ha! Ha!"
and the mosquito buzzed a most unpleasant laugh.

"Oh, dear!" thought Uncle Wiggily. "I wonder if I am caught? Can't I get
out as I got in?"

Quickly he hopped to the front of the hole. But alas! Likewise
sorrowfulness! He had grown so big from eating the magical cake that he
could not possibly squeeze out of the hole through which he had crawled
into the underground burrow.

"Now I have caught you!" cried the mosquito. "Since we could not catch
you at your soldier tent or in the trenches near your hollow stump
with rivets for a wooden handle, and copper fish-hooks and net-weights.

[Illustration: OUTER FACE OF A FOUNDATION-WALL AT TELLO, BUILT BY
UR-BAU, PATESI OF SHIRPURLA.--Déc. en Chald., pl. 51.]

The ornaments were very numerous, the wealthy wearing bead-necklaces
of agate and lapis-lazuli, the poorer contenting themselves with paste
or shell, while silver finger-rings and copper arm-rings were not
uncommon. A very typical class of grave-furniture consisted of palettes
or colour-dishes, made of alabaster, often of graceful shape, and
sometimes standing on four feet. There is no doubt as to their use, for
colour still remains in many of them, generally black and yellow, but
sometimes a light rose and a light green. Since all other objects in
the graves were placed there for the personal use of the dead man, we
may infer that colour was employed at that period for painting the body.

No difference in age appears to have separated the two classes of
burial, for the offerings are alike in each, and the arrangement
of the bodies is the same. Why there should have been a difference
in custom it is difficult to say. It might be inferred that the
sarcophagus was a mark of wealth, were it not that the offerings they
contain are generally more scanty than in the mat-burials. Whatever
may be the explanation there is little doubt that they belong to the
same race and period. Moreover, we may definitely connect the graves
with the buildings under which they are found, for in some of them
were seal-cylinders precisely similar to others found in the _débris_
covering the houses, and the designs upon them resemble those on
sealings from the strata of ashes in the upper surface of the mounds.
The seals are generally of shell or limestone, rarely of harder
stone, and the designs represent heroes and mythological beings in
conflict with animals. The presence of the sealings and seal-cylinders,
resembling in form and design those of the early period at Tello, in
itself suggests that Fâra marks the site of an early Sumerian town.
This was put beyond a doubt by the discovery of clay tablets in six
of the houses,[19] where they lay on the clay floor beneath masses
of charred _débris_ which had fallen from the roof; beside them were
objects of household use, and in one room the remains of a charred
reed-mat were under them. The tablets were of unbaked clay, similar in
shape to early contracts from Tello, and the texts upon them, written
in extremely archaic characters, referred to deeds of sale.

There is thus no doubt as to the racial character of the inhabitants of
this early settlement. The discovery of a brick inscribed with the name
of Khaladda, patesi of Shuruppak, proved that Fâra was the site of the
ancient city which later tradition regarded as the scene of the Deluge.
Khaladda's inscription is not written in very archaic characters, and
he probably lived in the time of the kings of Sumer and Akkad. We may
thus infer that Shuruppak continued to exist as a city at that period,
but the greater part of the site was never again inhabited after the
destruction of the early town by fire. We have described its remains
in some detail as they are our most valuable source of information
concerning the earliest Sumerians in Babylonia. Until the objects
that were found have been published it is difficult to determine
accurately its relation in date to the earlier remains at Tello. A few
fragments of sculpture in relief were discovered in the course of the
excavations, and these, taken in conjunction with the cylinder-seals,
the inscribed tablets, and the pottery, suggest that no long interval
separated its period from that of the earliest Sumerians of history.

[Illustration: ABÛ HATAB after Andrae and Noeldeke]

A less exhaustive examination of the neighbouring mounds of Abû Hatab
was also undertaken by Drs. Andrae and Noeldeke. This site lies to
the north of Fâra, and, like it, is close to the Shatt el-Kâr.[20]
The southern part of the tell could not be examined because of the
modern Arab graves which here lie thick around the tomb of the Imâm
Sa'îd Muhammad. But the trenches cut in the higher parts of the mound,
to the north and along its eastern edge, sufficed to indicate its
general character.[21] Earlier remains, such as were found at Fâra,
are here completely wanting, and it would appear to be not earlier
than the period of the kings of Sumer and Akkad. This is indicated by
bricks of Bûr-Sin I., King of Ur, which were discovered scattered in
_débris_ in the north-west part of the mound, and by the finding of
case-tablets in the houses belonging to the period of the dynasties of
Ur and Isin.[22] The graves also differed from those at Fâra, generally
consisting of pot-burials. Here, in place of a shallow trough with
a lid, the sarcophagus was formed of two great pots, deeply ribbed
on the outside; these were set, one over the other, with their edges
meeting, and after burial they were fixed together by means of pitch
or bitumen. The skeleton is usually found within lying on its back or
side in a crouching position with bent legs. The general arrangement
of drinking-cups, offerings, and ornaments resembles that in the Fâra
burials, so that the difference in the form of the sarcophagus is
merely due to a later custom and not to any racial change. Very similar
burials were found by Taylor at Mukayyar, and others have also been
unearthed in the earlier strata of the mounds at Babylon.

The majority of the houses at Abû Hatab appear to have been destroyed
by fire, and, in view of the complete absence of later remains, the
tablets scattered on their floors indicate the period of its latest
settlement. It thus represents a well-defined epoch, later than that
of the mounds at Fâra, and most valuable for comparison with them. At
neither Fâra nor Abû Hatab were the remains of any important building
or temple disclosed, but the graves and houses of the common people
have furnished information of even greater value for the archaeologist
and historian. Another mound which should provide further material for
the study of this earliest period is Bismâya, the site of the city
at Adab, at which excavations were begun on December 25, 1903 by the
University of Chicago and continued during the following year.[23] The
mound of Hêtime to the west of Fâra, may, to judge from the square
bricks and fragments of pot-burials that are found there, date from
about the same period as Abû Hatab. But it is of small extent and
height, the greater part being merely six or seven feet above the
plain, while its two central mounds rise to a height of less than
fourteen feet.

Such are the principal early Sumerian mounds in the region of the Shatt
el-Kâr and the Shatt el-Hai. Other mounds in the same neighbourhood may
well prove to be of equally early dates; but it should be noted that
some of these do not cover Sumerian cities, but represent far later
periods of occupation. The character of the extensive mound of Jidr to
the east of Fâra and Abû Hatab is doubtful; but the use of lime-mortar
in such remains as are visible upon the surface indicates a late epoch.
A number of smaller tells may be definitely regarded as representing a
settlement in this district during Sassanian times. Such are Dubâ'i,
which, with two others, lies to the south of Fâra, and Bint el-Mderre
to the east; to the same period may be assigned Menêdir, which lies
to the north-east, beyond Deke, the nearest village to Fâra. This
last mound, little more than a hundred yards long, covers the site of
a burial-place; it has been completely burrowed through by the Arabs
in their search for antiquities, and is now covered with fragments of
sarcophagi. The mounds of Mjelli and Abû Khuwâsîj to the west of Fâra
are probably still later, and belong to the Arab period.

It will have been noted that all the Sumerian mounds described or
referred to in the preceding paragraphs cover cities which, after being
burned down and destroyed in a comparatively early period, were never
reoccupied, but were left deserted. Lagash, Umma, Shuruppak, Kisurra,
and Adab play no part in the subsequent history of Babylonia. We may
infer that they perished during the fierce struggle which took place
between the Babylonian kings of the First Dynasty and the Elamite
kings of Larsa. At this time city after city in Sumer was captured and
retaken many times, and on Samsu-iluna's final victory over Rîm-Sin, it
is probable that he decided to destroy many of the cities and make the
region a desert, so as to put an end to trouble for the future. As a
matter of fact, he only succeeded in shifting the area of disturbance
southwards, for the Sumerian inhabitants fled to the Sea-country on
the shores of the Persian Gulf; and to their influence, and to the
reinforcements they brought with them, may be traced the troubles of
Samsu-iluna and his son at the hands of Iluma-ilu, who had already
established his independence in this region. Thus Samsu-iluna's policy
of repression was scarcely a success; but the archaeologist has reason
to be grateful to it. The undisturbed condition of these early cities
renders their excavation a comparatively simple matter, and lends a
certainty to conclusions drawn from a study of their remains, which is
necessarily lacking in the case of more complicated sites.

Another class of Sumerian cities consists of those which were not
finally destroyed by the Western Semites, but continued to be important
centres of political and social life during the later periods of
Babylonian history. Niffer, Warka, Senkera, Mukayyar, and Abû Shahrain
all doubtless contain in their lower strata remains of the early
Sumerian cities which stood upon their sites; but the greater part of
the mounds are made up of ruins dating from a period not earlier than
that of the great builders of the Dynasty of Ur. In Nippur, during the
American excavations on this site, the history of Ekur, the temple of
the god Enlil, was traced back to the period of Shar-Gani-Sharri and
Narâm-Sin;[24] and fragments of early vases found scattered in the
_débris_ beneath the chambers on the south-east side of the Ziggurat,
have thrown valuable light upon an early period of Sumerian history.
But the excavation of the pre-Sargonic strata, so far as it has yet
been carried, has given negative rather than positive results. The
excavations carried out on the other sites referred to were of a
purely tentative character, and, although they were made in the early
fifties of last century, they still remain the principal source of our
knowledge concerning them.

[Illustration: WARKA after Loftus]

Some idea of the extent of the mounds of Warka may be gathered from
Loftus's plan. The irregular circle of the mounds, marking the later
walls of the city, covers an area nearly six miles in circumference,
and in view of this fact and of the short time and limited means at
his disposal, it is surprising that he should have achieved such good
results. His work at Buwârîya, the principal mound of the group (marked
A on the plan), resulted in its identification with E-anna, the great
temple of the goddess Ninni, or Ishtar, which was enormously added to
in the reign of Ur-Engur. Loftus's careful notes and drawings of the
facade of another important building, covered by the mound known as
Wuswas (B), have been of great value from the architectural point of
view, while no less interesting is his description of the "Cone Wall"
(at E on the plan), consisting in great part of terra-cotta cones,
dipped in red or black colour, and arranged to form various patterns on
the surface of a wall composed of mud and chopped straw.[25] But the
date of both these constructions is uncertain. The sarcophagus-graves
and pot-burials which he came across when cutting his tunnels and
trenches are clearly contemporaneous with those at Abû Hatab, and
the mound may well contain still earlier remains. The finds made in
the neighbouring mounds of Senkera (Larsa), and Tell Sifr, were also
promising,[26] and, in spite of his want of success at Tell Medîna, it
is possible that a longer examination would have yielded better results.

[Illustration: MUKAYYAR after Taylor]

The mounds of Mukayyar, which mark the site of Ur, the centre of the
Moon-god's cult in Sumer, were partly excavated by Taylor in 1854 and
1855.[27] In the northern portion of the group he examined the great
temple of the Moon-god (marked A on the plan), the earliest portions
of its structure which he came across dating from the reigns of Dungi
and Ur-Engur. Beneath a building in the neighbourhood of the temple (at
B on the plan) he found a pavement consisting of plano-convex bricks,
a sure indication that at this point, at least, were buildings of
the earliest Sumerian period, while the sarcophagus-burials in other
parts of the mound were of the early type. Taylor came across similar
evidence of early building at Abû Shahrain,[28] the comparatively small
mound which marks the site of the sacred city of Eridu, for at a point
in the south-east side of the group he uncovered a building constructed
of bricks of the same early character.

At Abû Shahrain indeed we should expect to find traces of one of the
earliest and most sacred shrines of the Sumerians, for here dwelt
Enki, the mysterious god of the deep. The remains of his later temple
now dominates the group, the great temple-tower still rising in two
stages (A and B) at the northern end of the mound. Unlike the other
cities of Sumer, Eridu was not built on the alluvium. Its situation
is in a valley on the edge of the Arabian desert, cut off from Ur and
the Euphrates by a low pebbly and sandstone ridge. In fact, its ruins
appear to rise abruptly from the bed of an inland sea, which no doubt
at one time was connected directly with the Persian Gulf; hence the
description of Eridu in cuneiform literature as standing "on the shore
of the sea." Another characteristic which distinguishes Eridu from
other cities in Babylonia is the extensive use of stone as a building
material. The raised platform, on which the city and its temple stood,
was faced with a massive retaining wall of sandstone, no doubt
obtained from quarries in the neighbourhood, while the stairway (marked
D on the plan) leading to the first stage of the temple-tower had been
formed of polished marble slabs which were now scattered on the surface
of the mound. The marble stairs and the numerous fragments of gold-leaf
and gold-headed and copper nails, which Taylor found at the base of
the second stage of the temple-tower, attest its magnificence during
the latest stage of its history. The name and period of the city now
covered by the neighbouring mound of Tell Lahm, which was also examined
by Taylor, have not yet been ascertained.

[Illustration: ABÛ SHAHRAIN after Taylor]

It will thus be seen that excavations conducted on the sites of the
more famous cities of Sumer have not, with the single exception of
Nippur, yielded much information concerning the earlier periods of
history, while the position of one of them, the city of Isin, is still
unknown. Our knowledge of similar sites in Akkad is still more scanty.
Up to the present time systematic excavations have been carried out
at only two sites in the north, Babylon and Sippar, and these have
thrown little light upon the more remote periods of their occupation.
The existing ruins of Babylon date from the period of Nebuchadnezzar
II., and so thorough was Sennacherib's destruction of the city in 689
B.C., that, after several years of work, Dr. Koldewey concluded that
all traces of earlier buildings had been destroyed on that occasion.
More recently some remains of earlier strata have been recognized, and
contract-tablets have been found which date from the period of the
First Dynasty. Moreover, a number of earlier pot-burials have been
unearthed, but a careful examination of the greater part of the ruins
has added little to our knowledge of this most famous city before the
Neo-Babylonian era. The same negative results were obtained, so far
as early remains are concerned, from the less exhaustive work on the
site of Borsippa. Abû Habba is a far more promising site, and has been
the scene of excavations begun by Mr. Rassam in 1881 and 1882, and
renewed by Père Scheil for some months in 1894, while excavations were
undertaken in the neighbouring mounds of Deir by Dr. Wallis Budge in
1891. These two sites have yielded thousands of tablets of the period
of the earliest kings of Babylon, and the site of the famous temple of
the Sun-god at Sippar, which Narâm-Sin rebuilt, has been identified,
but little is yet accurately known concerning the early city and its
suburbs. The great extent of the mounds, and the fact that for nearly
thirty years they have been the happy hunting-ground of Arab diggers,
would add to the difficulty of any final and exhaustive examination. It
is probably in the neighbourhood of Sippar that the site of the city of
Agade, or Akkad, will eventually be identified.

Concerning the sites of other cities in Northern Babylonia,
considerable uncertainty still exists. The extensive mounds of Tell
Ibrâhîm, situated about four hours to the north-east of Hilla, are
probably to be identified with Cutha, the centre of the cult of Nergal,
but the mound of 'Akarkûf, which may be seen from so great a distance
on the road between Baghdad and Falûja, probably covers a temple and
city of the Kassite period. Both the cities of Kish and Opis, which
figure so prominently in the early history of the relations between
Sumer and Akkad, were, until quite recently, thought to be situated
close to one another on the Tigris. That Opis lay on that river and not
on the Euphrates is clear from the account which Nebuchadnezzar II. has
left us of his famous fortifications of Babylon,[29] which are referred
to by Greek writers as "the Median Wall" and "the Fortification of
Semiramis."

The outermost ring of Nebuchadnezzar's triple line of defence consisted
of an earthen rampart and a ditch, which he tells us extended from
the bank of the Tigris above Opis to a point on the Euphrates within
the city of Sippar, proving that Opis is to be sought upon the former
river. His second line of defence was a similar ditch and rampart which
stretched from the causeway on the bank of the Euphrates up to the city
of Kish. It was assumed that this rampart also extended to the Tigris,
although this is not stated in the text, and, since the ideogram for
Opis is once rendered as Kesh in a bilingual incantation,[30] it seemed
probable that Kish and Opis were twin cities, both situated on the
Tigris at no great distance from each other. This view appeared to find
corroboration in the close association of the two places during the
wars of Eannatum, and in the fact that at the time of Enbi-Ishtar they
seem to have formed a single state. But it has recently been shown that
Kish lay upon the Euphrates,[31] and we may thus accept its former
identification with the mound of El-Ohêmir where bricks were found
by Ker Porter recording the building of E-meteursagga, the temple of
Zamama, the patron deity of Kish.[32] Whether Opis is to be identified
with the extensive mounds of Tell Manjûr, situated on the right bank
of the Tigris in the great bend made by the river between Samarra and
Baghdad, or whether, as appears more probable, it is to be sought
further down stream in the neighbourhood of Seleucia, are questions
which future excavation may decide.[33]

The brief outline that has been given of our knowledge concerning the
early cities of Sumer and Akkad, and of the results obtained by the
partial excavation of their sites, will have served to show how much
still remains to be done in this field of archaeological research. Not
only do the majority of the sites still await systematic excavation,
but a large part of the material already obtained has not yet been
published. Up to the present time, for instance, only the briefest
notes have been given of the important finds at Fâra and Abû Hatab.
In contrast to this rather leisurely method of publication, the plan
followed by M. de Morgan in making available without delay the results
of his work in Persia is strongly to be commended. In this connection
mention should in any case be made of the excavations at Susa, since
they have brought to light some of the most remarkable monuments of
the early Semitic kings of Akkad. It is true the majority of these had
been carried as spoil from Babylonia to Elam, but they are none the
less precious as examples of early Semitic art. Such monuments as the
recently discovered stele of Sharru-Gi, the statues of Manishtusu,
and Narâm-Sin's stele of victory afford valuable evidence concerning
the racial characteristics of the early inhabitants of Northern
Babylonia, and enable us to trace some of the stages in their artistic
development. But in Akkad itself the excavations have not thrown much
light upon these subjects, nor have they contributed to the solution
of the problems as to the period at which Sumerians and Semites first
came in contact, or which race was first in possession of the land. For
the study of these questions our material is mainly furnished from the
Sumerian side, more particularly by the sculptures and inscriptions
discovered during the French excavations at Tello.

It is now generally recognized that the two races which inhabited Sumer
and Akkad during the early historical periods were sharply divided
from one another not only by their speech but also in their physical
characteristics.[34] One of the principal traits by which they may
be distinguished consists in the treatment of the hair. While the
Sumerians invariably shaved the head and face, the Semites retained the
hair of the head and wore long beards. A slight modification in the
dressing of the hair was introduced by the Western Semites of the First
Babylonian Dynasty, who brought with them from Syria the Canaanite
Bedouin custom of shaving the lips and allowing the beard to fall
only from the chin; while they also appear to have cut the hair short
in the manner of the Arabs or Nabateans of the Sinai peninsula.[35]
The Semites who were settled in Babylonia during the earlier period,
retained the moustache as well as the beard, and wore their hair long.
While recognizing the slight change of custom, introduced for a time
during the West Semitic domination, the practice of wearing hair and
beard was a Semitic characteristic during all periods of history. The
phrase "the black-headed ones," which is of frequent occurrence in the
later texts, clearly originated as a description of the Semites, in
contradistinction to the Sumerians with their shaven heads.

[Illustration: LIMESTONE FIGURE OF AN EARLY SUMERIAN PATESI, OR HIGH
OFFICIAL.--Brit. Mus., No. 90929; photo. by Messrs. Mansell & Co.]

Another distinctive characteristic, almost equally striking, may
be seen in the features of the face as represented in the outline
engraving and in the sculpture of the earlier periods. It is true
that the Sumerian had a prominent nose, which forms, indeed, his most
striking feature, but both nose and lips are never full and fleshy
as with the Semites. It is sometimes claimed that such primitive
representations as occur upon Ur-Ninâ's bas-reliefs, or in Fig. 1 in
the accompanying block, are too rude to be regarded as representing
accurately an ethnological type. But it will be noted that the same
general characteristics are also found in the later and more finished
sculptures of Gudea's period. This fact is illustrated by the two
black diorite heads of statuettes figured on the following page. In
both examples certain archaic conventions are retained, such as the
exaggerated line of the eyebrows, and the unfinished ear; but nose and
lips are obviously not Semitic, and they accurately reproduce the same
racial type which is found upon the earlier reliefs.

[Illustration: Fig. 1.--Fig. 2. Figures of early Sumerians,
engraved upon fragments of shell, which were probably employed for
inlaying boxes, or for ornamenting furniture. Earliest period: from
Tello.--Déc., pl. 46, Nos. 2 and 1.]

A third characteristic consists of the different forms of dress
worn by Sumerians and Semites, as represented on the monuments. The
earliest Sumerians wore only a thick woollen garment, in the form of a
petticoat, fastened round the waist by a band or girdle. The garment is
sometimes represented as quite plain, in other cases it has a scolloped
fringe or border, while in its most elaborate form it consists of
three, four, or five horizontal flounces, each lined vertically and
scolloped at the edge to represent thick locks of wool.[36] With the
later Sumerian patesis this rough garment has been given up in favour
of a great shawl or mantle, decorated with a border, which was worn
over the left shoulder, and, falling in straight folds, draped the body
with its opening in front.[37] Both these Sumerian forms of garment
are of quite different types from the Semitic loin-cloth worn by
Narâm-Sin on his stele of victory, and the Semitic plaid in which he is
represented on his stele from Pir Hussein.[38] The latter garment is a
long, narrow plaid which is wrapped round the body in parallel bands,
with the end thrown over the left shoulder. It has no slit, or opening,
in front like the later Sumerian mantle, and, on the other hand, was
not a shaped garment like the earlier Sumerian flounced petticoat,
though both were doubtless made of wool and were probably dyed in
bright colours.

[Illustration: Fig. 3--Fig. 4--Fig. 5--Later types of Sumerians, as
exhibited by heads of male statuettes from Tello. Figs. 4 and 5 are
different views of the same head, which probably dates from the age of
Gudea; Fig. 3 may possibly be assigned to a rather later period.--In
the Louvre; Cat. Nos. 95 and 93.]

Two distinct racial types are thus represented on the monuments,
differentiated not only by physical features but also by the method
of treating the hair and by dress. Moreover, the one type is
characteristic of those rulers whose language was Sumerian, the other
represents those whose inscriptions are in the Semitic tongue. Two
apparent inconsistencies should here be noted. On the Stele of the
Vultures, Eannatum and his soldiers are sculptured with thick hair
flowing from beneath their helmets and falling on their shoulders.
But they have shaven faces, and, in view of the fact that on the same
monument all the dead upon the field of battle and in the burial mounds
have shaven heads, like those of the Sumerians assisting at the burial
and the sacrificial rites, we may regard the hair of Eannatum and his
warriors as wigs, worn like the wigs of the Egyptians, on special
occasions and particularly in battle. The other inconsistency arises
from the dress worn by Hammurabi on his monuments. This is not the
Semitic plaid, but the Sumerian fringed mantle, and we may conjecture
that, as he wrote his votive inscriptions in the Sumerian as well as in
the Semitic language, so, too, he may have symbolized his rule in Sumer
by the adoption of the Sumerian form of dress.

It is natural that upon monuments of the later period from Tello
both racial types should be represented. The fragments of sculpture
illustrated in Figs. 6 and 7 may possibly belong to the same monument,
and, if so, we must assign it to a Semitic king.[39] That on the left
represents a file of nude captives with shaven heads and faces, bound
neck to neck with the same cord, and their arms tied behind them.
On the other fragment both captive and conqueror are bearded. The
latter's nose is anything but Semitic, though in figures of such small
proportions carved in relief it would perhaps be rash to regard its
shape as significant. The treatment of the hair, however, in itself
constitutes a sufficiently marked difference in racial custom. Fig.
8 represents a circular support of steatite, around which are seated
seven little figures holding tablets on their knees; it is here
reproduced on a far smaller scale than the other fragments. The little
figure that is best preserved is of unmistakably Semitic type, and
wears a curled beard trimmed to a point, and hair that falls on the
shoulders in two great twisted tresses; the face of the figure on his
left is broken, but the head is clearly shaved. A similar mixture of
types upon a single monument occurs on a large fragment of sculpture
representing scenes of worship,[40] and also on Sharru-Gi's monument
which has been found at Susa.[41]

[Illustration: Fig. 6.--Fig. 7.--Fig. 8.--Examples of sculpture of the
later period, from Tello, representing different racial types--_Déc.,_
pl. 26, Figs. 10_b_ and 10_a_; pl. 21, Fig. 5.]

At the period from which these sculptures date it is not questioned
that the Semites were in occupation of Akkad, and that during certain
periods they had already extended their authority over Sumer. It is not
surprising, therefore, that at this time both Sumerians and Semites
should be represented side by side upon the monuments. When, however,
we examine what is undoubtedly one of the earliest sculptured reliefs
from Tello the same mixture of racial types is met with.

[Illustration: Fig. 9--Fig. 10--Fig 11--Fragments of a circular
bas-relief of the earliest period, from Tello, sculptured with a scene
representing the meeting of two chieftains and their followers. The
different methods of treating the hair are noteworthy.--In the Louvre;
Cat. No. 5.]

The object is unfortunately broken into fragments, but enough of them
have been recovered to indicate its character. Originally, it consisted
of two circular blocks, placed one upon the other and sculptured on
their outer edge with reliefs. They were perforated vertically with
two holes which were intended to support maces, or other votive
objects, in an upright position. The figures in the relief form two
separate rows which advance towards one another, and at their head
are two chiefs, who are represented meeting face to face (Fig. 9). It
will be noticed that the chief on the left, who carries a bent club,
has long hair falling on the shoulders and is bearded. Four of his
followers on another fragment (Fig. 10) also have long hair and beards.
The other chief, on the contrary, wears no hair on his face, only on
his head, and, since his followers have shaven heads and faces,[42] we
may conjecture that, like Eannatum on the Stele of the Vultures, he
wears a wig. All the figures are nude to the waist, and the followers
clasp their hands in token of subordination to their chiefs.

The extremely rude character of the sculpture is a sufficient
indication of its early date, apart from the fact that the fragments
were found scattered in the lowest strata at Tello. The fashion of
indicating the hair is very archaic, and is also met with in a class
of copper foundation-figures of extremely early date.[43] The monument
belongs to a period when writing was already employed, for there are
slight traces of an inscription on its upper surface, which probably
recorded the occasion of the meeting of the chiefs. Moreover, from a
fifth fragment that has been discovered it is seen that the names and
titles of the various personages were engraved upon their garments.
The monument thus belongs to the earliest Sumerian period, and, if we
may apply the rule as to the treatment of the hair which we have seen
holds good for the later periods, it would follow that at this time the
Semite was already in the land. The scene, in fact, would represent
the meeting of two early chieftains of the Sumerians and Semites,
sculptured to commemorate an agreement or treaty which they had drawn
up.

[Illustration: Fig. 12.--Limestone panel sculptured in relief, with
a scene representing Gudea being led by Ningishzida and another god
into the presence of a deity who is seated on a throne.--In the Berlin
Museum; _cf. Sum. und Sem._, Taf. VII.]

By a similar examination of the gods of the Sumerians, as they are
represented on the monuments, Professor Meyer has sought to show that
the Semites were not only in Babylonia at the date of the earliest
Sumerian sculptures that have been recovered, but also that they were
in occupation of the country before the Sumerians. The type of the
Sumerian gods at the later period is well illustrated by a limestone
panel of Gudea, which is preserved in the Berlin Museum. The sculptured
scene is one that is often met with on cylinder-seals of the period,
representing a suppliant being led by lesser deities into the presence
of a greater god. In this instance Gudea is being led by his patron
deity Ningishzida and another god into the presence of a deity who was
seated on a throne and held a vase from which two streams of water
flow. The right half of the panel is broken, but the figure of the
seated god may be in part restored from the similar scene upon Gudea's
cylinder-seal. There, however, the symbol of the spouting vase is
multiplied, for not only does the god hold one in each hand, but three
others are below his feet, and into them the water falls and spouts
again. Professor Meyer would identify the god of the waters with Anu,
though there is more to be said for M. Heuzey's view that he is Enki,
the god of the deep. We are not here concerned, however, with the
identity of the deities, but with the racial type they represent. It
will be seen that they all have hair and beards and wear the Semitic
plaid, and form a striking contrast to Gudea with his shaven head and
face, and his fringed Sumerian mantle.[44]

[Illustration: Fig. 13. Figure of the seated god on the cylinder-seal
of Gudea.--_Déc.,_ p 293.]

A very similar contrast is represented by the Sumerian and his gods
in the earlier historical periods. Upon the Stele of the Vultures,
for instance, the god Ningirsu is represented with abundant hair, and
although his lips and cheeks are shaved a long beard falls from below
his chin.[45] He is girt around the waist with a plain garment, which
is not of the later Semitic type, but the treatment of the hair and
beard is obviously not Sumerian. The same bearded type of god is found
upon early votive tablets from Nippur,[46] and also on a fragment of
an archaic Sumerian relief from Tello, which, from the rudimentary
character of the work and the style of the composition, has been
regarded as the most ancient example of Sumerian sculpture known. The
contours of the figures are vaguely indicated in low relief upon a
flat plaque, and the interior details are indicated only by the point.
The scene is evidently of a mythological character, for the seated
figure may be recognized as a goddess by the horned crown she wears.
Beside her stands a god who turns to smite a bound captive with a heavy
club or mace. While the captive has the shaven head and face of a
Sumerian, the god has abundant hair and a long beard.[47]

[Illustration: Fig. 14.--Fig. 15. Votive tablets from Nippur, engraved
with scenes of worship.--Cf. Hilprecht, _Explorations_, p. 475, and
_Old Bab. Inscr._, II., pl. xvi.]

Man forms his god in his own image, and it is surprising that the gods
of the Sumerians should not be of the Sumerian type. If the Sumerian
shaved his own head and face, why should he have figured his gods with
long beards and abundant hair and have clothed them with the garments
of another race? Professor Meyer's answer to the question is that
the Semites and their gods were already in occupation of Sumer and
Akkad before the Sumerians came upon the scene. He would regard the
Semites at this early period as settled throughout the whole country,
a primitive and uncultured people with only sufficient knowledge of
art to embody the figures of their gods in rude images of stone or
clay. There is no doubt that the Sumerians were a warrior folk, and
he would picture them as invading the country at a later date, and
overwhelming Semitic opposition by their superior weapons and method
of attack. The Sumerian method of fighting he would compare to that
of the Dorians with their closed phalanx of lance-bearing warriors,
though the comparison is not quite complete, since no knowledge of
iron is postulated on the part of the Sumerians. He would regard the
invaders as settling mainly in the south, driving many of the Semites
northward, and taking over from them the ancient centres of Semitic
cult. They would naturally have brought their own gods with them, and
these they would identify with the deities they found in possession of
the shrines, combining their attributes, but retaining the cult-images,
whose sacred character would ensure the permanent retention of their
outward form. The Sumerians in turn would have influenced their Semitic
subjects and neighbours, who would gradually have acquired from them
their higher culture, including a knowledge of writing and the arts.

[Illustration: Fig. 16--Sumerian deities on an archaic relief from
Tello.--_Déc._, pl. 1, Fig. 1.]

It may be admitted that the theory is attractive, and it certainly
furnishes an explanation of the apparently foreign character of the
Sumerian gods. But even from the archaeological side it is not so
complete nor so convincing as at first sight it would appear. Since the
later Sumerian gods were represented with full moustache and beard,
like the earliest figures of Semitic kings which we possess, it would
naturally be supposed that they would have this form in the still
earlier periods of Sumerian history. But, as we have seen, their lips
and cheeks are shaved. Are we then to postulate a still earlier Semitic
settlement, of a rather different racial type to that which founded
the kingdom of Kish and the empire of Akkad? Again, the garments of
the gods in the earliest period have little in common with the Semitic
plaid, and are nearer akin to the plainer form of garment worn by
contemporary Sumerians. The divine headdress, too, is different to the
later form, the single horns which encircle what may be a symbol of the
date-palm,[48] giving place to a plain conical headdress decorated with
several pairs of horns.

[Illustration: Fig. 17--Fig. 18--Fig. 19--Earlier and later forms of
divine headdresses. Figs. 17 and 18 are from the obverse of the Stele
of the Vultures, fragments C and B; Fig. 19, the later form of horned
headdress, is from a sculpture of Gudea.--_Déc._, pl. 4, and pl. 26,
No. 9.]

Thus, important differences are observable in the form of the earlier
Sumerian gods and their dress and insignia, which it is difficult to
reconcile with Professor Meyer's theory of their origin. Moreover,
the principal example which he selected to illustrate his thesis,
the god of the central shrine of Nippur, has since been proved never
to have borne the Semitic name of Bêl, but to have been known under
his Sumerian title of Enlil from the beginning.[49] It is true that
Professor Meyer claims that this point does not affect his main
argument;[50] but at least it proves that Nippur was always a Sumerian
religious centre, and its recognition as the central and most important
shrine in the country by Semites and Sumerians alike, tells against any
theory requiring a comparatively late date for its foundation.

Such evidence as we possess from the linguistic side is also not in
favour of the view which would regard the Semites as in occupation
of the whole of Babylonia before the Sumerian immigration. If that
had been the case we should naturally expect to find abundant traces
of Semitic influence in the earliest Sumerian texts that have been
recovered. But, as a matter of fact, no Semitism occurs in any text
from Ur-Ninâ's period to that of Lugal-zaggisi with the single
exception of a Semitic loan-word on the Cone of Entemena.[51] In spite
of the scanty nature of our material, this fact distinctly militates
against the assumption that Semites and Sumerians were living side
by side in Sumer at the time.[52] But the occurrence of the Semitic
word in Entemena's inscription proves that external contact with some
Semitic people had already taken place. Moreover, it is possible
to press the argument from the purely linguistic side too far. A
date-formula of Samsu-iluna's reign has proved that the Semitic speech
of Babylonia was known as "Akkadian,"[53] and it has therefore been
argued that the first appearance of Semitic speech in the country
must date from the establishment of Shar-Gani-sharri's empire with
its capital at Akkad.[54] But there is little doubt that the Semitic
kingdom of Kish, represented by the reigns of Sharru-Gi, Manishtusu
and Urumush, was anterior to Sargon's empire,[55] and, long before the
rise of Kish, the town of Akkad may well have been the first important
centre of Semitic settlement in the north.

[Illustration: FRAGMENT OF SUMERIAN SCULPTURE REPRESENTING SCENES OF
WORSHIP BEFORE THE GODS.--_In the Louvre; Déc. en Chald., pl._ 23.]

It would thus appear that at the earliest period of which remains or
records have been recovered, Semites and Sumerians were both settled in
Babylonia, the one race in the north, the other southwards nearer the
Persian Gulf. Living at first in comparative isolation, trade and war
would gradually bring them into closer contact. Whether we may regard
the earliest rulers of Kish as Semites like their later successors,
is still in doubt. The character of Enbi-Ishtar's name points to his
being a Semite; but the still earlier king of Kish, who is referred
to on the Stele of the Vultures, is represented on that monument as a
Sumerian with shaven head and face.[56] But this may have been due to a
convention in the sculpture of the time, and it is quite possible that
Mesilim and his successors were Semites, and that their relations with
the contemporary rulers of Lagash represent the earlier stages in a
racial conflict which dominates the history of the later periods.

Of the original home of the Sumerians, from which they came to the
fertile plains of Southern Babylonia, it is impossible to speak with
confidence. The fact that they settled at the mouths of the great
rivers has led to the suggestion that they arrived by sea, and this
has been connected with the story in Berossus of Oannes and the other
fish-men, who came up from the Erythraean Sea and brought religion and
culture with them. But the legend need not bear this interpretation;
it merely points to the Sea-country on the shores of the Gulf as the
earliest centre of Sumerian culture in the land. Others have argued
that they came from a mountain-home, and have cited in support of their
view the institution of the ziggurat or temple-tower, built "like
a mountain," and the employment of the same ideogram for "mountain"
and for "land." But the massive temple-tower appears to date from the
period of Gudea and the earlier kings of Ur, and, with the single
exception of Nippur, was probably not a characteristic feature of the
earlier temples; and it is now known that the ideogram for "land" and
"mountain" was employed in the earlier periods for foreign lands, in
contradistinction to that of the Sumerians themselves.[57] But, in
spite of the unsoundness of these arguments, it is most probable that
the Sumerians did descend on Babylonia from the mountains on the east.
Their entrance into the country would thus have been the first of
several immigrations from that quarter, due to climatic and physical
changes in Central Asia.[58]

Still more obscure is the problem of their racial affinity. The
obliquely set eyes of the figures in the earlier reliefs, due mainly
to an ignorance of perspective characteristic of all primitive art,
first suggested the theory that the Sumerians were of Mongol type; and
the further developments of this view, according to which a Chinese
origin is to be sought both for Sumerian roots and for the cuneiform
character, are too improbable to need detailed refutation. A more
recent suggestion, that their language is of Indo-European origin
and structure,[59] is scarcely less improbable, while resemblances
which have been pointed out between isolated words in Sumerian and in
Armenian, Turkish, and other languages of Western Asia, may well be
fortuitous. With the Elamites upon their eastern border the Sumerians
had close relations from the first, but the two races do not appear
to be related either in language or by physical characteristics.
The scientific study of the Sumerian tongue, inaugurated by
Professors Zimmern and Jensen, and more especially by the work of M.
Thureau-Dangin on the early texts, will doubtless lead in time to more
accurate knowledge on this subject; but, until the phonetic elements of
the language are firmly established, all theories based upon linguistic
comparisons are necessarily insecure.

In view of the absence of Semitic influence in Sumer during the
earlier periods, it may be conjectured that the Semitic immigrants
did not reach Babylonia from the south, but from the north-west,
after traversing the Syrian coast-lands. This first great influx of
Semitic nomad tribes left colonists behind them in that region, who
afterwards as the Amurru, or Western Semites, pressed on in their turn
into Babylonia and established the earliest independent dynasty in
Babylon. The original movement continued into Northern Babylonia, and
its representatives in history were the early Semitic kings of Kish and
Akkad. But the movement did not stop there; it passed on to the foot of
the Zagros hills, and left its traces in the independent principalities
of Lulubu and Gutiu. Such in outline appears to have been the course
of this early migratory movement, which, after colonizing the areas
through which it passed, eventually expended itself in the western
mountains of Persia. It was mainly through contact with the higher
culture of the Sumerians that the tribes which settled in Akkad were
enabled later on to play so important a part in the history of Western
Asia.


[1] In point of time, the work of Loftus and Taylor (see below, pp.
32 ff.) preceded that of De Sarzec, but the results obtained were
necessarily less complete. It would be out of place in the present
volume to give any account of excavations in Assyria, as they have only
an indirect bearing on the period here treated. For a chronological
sketch of the early travellers and excavators, see Rogers, "History of
Babylonia and Assyria," vol. i. pp. 100 ff., who also gives a detailed
account of the decipherment of the cuneiform inscriptions; cf. also
Fossey, "Manuel," I., pp. 6 ff. For a similar chronological treatment,
but from the archaeological side, see the sections with which Hilprecht
prefaces his account of the Nippur excavations in "Explorations in
Bible Lands," pp. 7 ff.

[2] See above, p. 11.

[3] Cf. "Cun. Texts in the Brit. Mus.," Pt. XVI., pl. 36, l. 4 f.;
as written here the name might also be read Lagarum or Lagadil. That
Lagash is the correct reading is proved by the fragment of a duplicate
text published in Reisner, "Sum.-Bab. Hymnen," pl. 126, No. 81, where
the final character of the name is unmistakably written as _ash_; cf.
Meissner, "Orient. Lit.-Zeit.," 1907, col. 385.

[4] Separate mounds in the group were referred to by De Sarzec under
the letters A-P, P', and V. For the account of the diggings and their
results, see E. de Sarzec and Léon Heuzey, "Découvertes en Chaldée"
("Description des fouilles" by De Sarzec; "Description des monuments"
by Heuzey; "Partie épigraphique" by Amiaud and Thureau-Dangin), Paris,
1884-1906; see also Heuzey, "Une Villa royale chaldéenne," and "Revue
d'Assyriologie," _passim_.

[5] The plate opposite p. 20 illustrates the way in which Gudea's
gateway has been worked into the structure of the Parthian Palace. The
slight difference in the ground-level of the two buildings is also
clearly shown.

[6] See the plate opposite p. 26.**

[7] From the nature of this building Amiaud christened the mound the
"Tell de la Maison des Fruits."

[8] A description of these buildings is given in Chap. IV., pp. 90 ff.**

[9] Cf. "Zeits. für Assyr." II., pp. 406 ff.

[10] Cf. Messerschmidt, "Vorderasiatische Schriftdenkmäler," p. v. f.,
pl. 1 ff.

[11] The name is still often transcribed as Gishkhu or Gishukh; for
the reading Umma, supplied by a Neo-Babylonian vocabulary, see "Cun.
Texts," XII., pl. 28, Obv., l. 7, and cf. Hrozný, "Zeits. für Assyr."
XX. (1907), pp. 421 ff. For its identification with Jôkha, see Scheil,
"Rec. de trav.," XIX., p. 63; cf. also XXI., p. 125.

[12] Cf. "Mitteil. der Deutsch. Orient-Gesellschaft," No. 16, p. 20 f.
Dr. Andrae adds valuable notes on other mounds he visited during this
journey.

[13] See below, p. 33 f.

[14] See "Mitteil. der Deutsch. Orient-Gesellschaft," No. 15, p. 9 ff.

[15] _Op. cit._, No. 17, p. 4 ff.

[16] Each section of a trench is also given a letter, so that such a
symbol as IV. _b_ or XII. _x_ indicates within very precise limits the
_provenance_ of any object discovered. The letter A on the plan marks
the site of the house built by the expedition.

[17] This form of brick is characteristic of the Pre-Sargonic period;
cf. p. 91.

[18] The positions of some of the larger ones, which were excavated in
the northern part of the mounds, are indicated by black dots in the
plan.

[19] The houses with the clay tablets were found in trenches VII., IX.,
XIII., and XV.

[20] In the folding map Fâra has been set on the right bank of the
Shatt el-Kâr, in accordance with Loftus's map published in "Travels and
Researches in Chaldaea and Susiana." From Andrae's notes it would seem
that Abû Hatab, and probably Fâra also, lie on the east or left bank.
But the ancient bed of the stream has disappeared in many places, and
is difficult to follow, and elsewhere there are traces of two or three
parallel channels at considerable distances apart, so that the exact
position of the original bed of the Euphrates is not certain at this
point.

[21] In the plan the trenches and excavated sites are lettered from A
to K. The figures, preceded by a cross, give in metres and centimetres
the height of the mound at that point above the level of the plain.

[22] Itûr-Shamash, whose brick-inscription furnished the information
that Abû Hatab is the site of the city Kisurra, is to be set towards
the end of this period; see below, Chap. XI., and cf. p. 283 f., n. 1.

[23] See the extracts from the "Reports of the Expedition of the
Oriental Exploration Fund (Babylonian Section) of the University of
Chicago," which were issued to the subscribers.

[24] See below, Chap. IV., pp. 85 ff.

[25] See "Chaldaea and Susiana," pp. 174 ff. and 188 f.

[26] Op. cit., pp. 244 ff., 266 ff.

[27] See his "Notes on the ruins of Mugeyer" in the _Journal of the
Royal Asiatic Society_, 1855, pp. 260 ff., 414 f.

[28] See his "Notes on Abû Shahrein and Tel el-Lahm," _op. cit._, p.
409. The trench which disclosed this structure, built of uninscribed
plano-convex bricks laid in bitumen, was cut near the south-eastern
side of the ruins, between the mounds F and G (see plan), and to the
north-east of the gulley.

[29] See Weissbach, "Wâdī Brîssā," Col. VI., ll. 46 ff., and cf. pp. 39
ff.

[30] The incantation is the one which has furnished us with authority
for reading the name of Shirpurla as Lagash (see above, p. 17, n. 3).
It is directed against the machinations of evil demons, and in one
passage the powers for good inherent in the ancient cities of Babylonia
are invoked on behalf of the possessed man. Here, along with the names
of Eridu, Lagash, and Shuruppak, occurs the ideogram for Opis, which
is rendered in the Assyrian translation as _Ki-e-shi_, _i.e._ Kesh, or
Kish (cf. Thompson, "Devils and Evil Spirits," vol. i., p. 162 f.)

[31] See above, p. 9.

[32] See George Smith, "Trans. Soc. Bibl. Arch.," III., p. 364, and cf.
Thureau-Dangin, "Orient. Lit.-Zeit.," 1909, col. 205 f.

[33] The fact that in an early Babylonian geographical list ("Cun.
Inscr. West. Asia," Vol. IV., pl. 36, No. 1) the name of Opis is
mentioned after a number of Sumerian cities, is no indication that the
city itself, or another city of the same name, was regarded as situated
in Sumer, as suggested by Jensen (cf. "Zeits. für Assyr.," XV., pp. 210
ff.); the next two names in the list are those of Magan and Melukhkha.

[34] For the fullest treatment of this subject, see Meyer, "Sumerier
und Semiten in Babylonien" (Abh. der Königl. Preuss. Akad. der
Wissenschaft., 1906).

[35] Cf. Herodotus, III., 8.

[36] The women of the earlier period appear to have worn a modified
form of this garment, made of the same rough wool, but worn over
the left shoulder (see below, p. 112, Fig. 43). On the Stele of the
Vultures, Eannatum, like his soldiers, wears the petticoat, but this
is supplemented by what is obviously a separate garment of different
texture thrown over the left shoulder so as to leave the right arm
free; this may have been the skin of an animal worn with the natural
hair outside (see the plate opposite p. 124).

[37] A very similar fringed mantle was usually worn by the Sumerian
women of the later period, but it was draped differently upon the body.
Pressed at first over the breasts and under each arm, it is crossed at
the back and its ends, thrown over the shoulders, fall in front in two
symmetrical points; for a good example of the garment as seen from the
front, see below, p. 71.

[38] See below, p. 245, Fig. 59.

[39] Remains of an inscription upon Fig. 6 treat of the dedication
of a temple to the god Ningirsu, and to judge from the characters it
probably does not date from a period earlier than that of Gudea.

[40] See the plate facing p. 52, and cf. p. 68 f.

[41] See below, Chap. VIII., pp. 220 ff.

[42] According to the traces on the stone the figure immediately behind
the beardless chief has a shaven head and face, like his other two
followers in Fig. 3. The figure on the right of this fragment wears
hair and beard, and probably represents a member of the opposite party
conducting them into the presence of his master.

[43] See "Déc. en Chaldée," pl. 1 _bis_, Figs. 3-7.

[44] The fact that on seals of this later period the Moon-god is
represented in the Sumerian mantle and headdress may well have been a
result of the Sumerian reaction, which took place under the kings of Ur
(see below, p. 283 f.).

[45] See below, p. 131, Fig. 46.

[46] See p. 49. In Fig. 14 the hair and beard of the god who leads the
worshipper into the presence of the goddess is clearer on the original
stone. In Fig. 15 the locks of hair and long beards of the seated gods
are more sharply outlined; they form a striking contrast to the figures
of Sumerians, who are represented as pouring out libations and bringing
offerings to the shrine.

[47] See p. 50, Fig. 16.

[48] Cf. Langdon, "Babyloniaca," II., p. 142; this explanation is
preferable to treating the crowns as a feathered form of headdress.
The changes in the dress of the Sumerian gods, and in the treatment
of their beards, appear to have taken place in the age of the later
Semitic kings of Kish and the kings of Akkad, and may well have been
due to their influence. The use of sandals was certainly introduced by
the Semites of this period.

[49] See Clay, "The Amer. Journ. of Semit. Lang, and Lit.," XXIII., pp.
269 ff. In later periods the name was pronounced as Ellil.

[50] Cf. "Nachträge zur aegyptischen Chronologie," p. 44 f., and
"Geschichte des Altertums," Bd. I., Hft. II., p. 407.

[51] See Thureau-Dangin, "Sum. und Akkad. Königsinschriften," p. 38,
Col. I., l. 26; the word is _dam-kha-ra_, which he rightly takes as
the equivalent of the Semitic _tamkhara_, "battle" (cf. also Ungnad,
"Orient. Lit.-Zeit.," 1908, col. 63 f.).

[52] In this respect the early Sumerian texts are in striking contrast
to those of the later periods; the evidence of strong Semitic influence
in the latter formed the main argument on which M. Halévy and his
followers relied to disprove the existence of the Sumerians.

[53] See Messerschmidt, "Orient. Lit.-Zeit.," 1905, col. 268 ff.; and
cf. King, "Chronicles," I., p. 180, n. 3.

[54] See Ungnad, op. cit., 1908, col. 62 ff.

[55] See below, Chap. VII. f.

[56] See below, p. 141, Fig. 48.

[57] See above, p. 14, n. 1.

[58] See further, Appendix I.

[59] Cf. Langdon, "Babyloniaca," I., pp. 225 f., 230, 284 ff., II.,
p. 99 f. The grounds, upon which the suggestion has been put forward,
consist of a comparison between the verb "to go" in Sumerian, Greek,
and Latin, an apparent resemblance in a few other roots, the existence
of compound verbs in Sumerian, and the like; but quite apart from
questions of general probability, the "parallelisms" noted are scarcely
numerous enough, or sufficiently close, to justify the inference drawn
from them.




CHAPTER III


THE AGE AND PRINCIPAL ACHIEVEMENTS OF SUMERIAN CIVILIZATION


Considerable changes have recently taken place in our estimate of
the age of Sumerian civilization, and the length of time which
elapsed between the earliest remains that have been recovered and the
foundation of the Babylonian monarchy. It was formerly the custom to
assign very remote dates to the earlier rulers of Sumer and Akkad,
and although the chronological systems in vogue necessitated enormous
gaps in our knowledge of history, it was confidently assumed that
these would be filled as a result of future excavation. Blank periods
of a thousand years or more were treated as of little account by many
writers. The hoary antiquity ascribed to the earliest rulers had in
itself an attraction which outweighed the inconvenience of spreading
the historical material to cover so immense a space in time. But
excavation, so far from filling the gaps, has tended distinctly to
reduce them, and the chronological systems of the later Assyrian
and Babylonian scribes, which were formerly regarded as of primary
importance, have been brought into discredit by the scribes themselves.
From their own discrepancies it has been shown that the native
chronologists could make mistakes in their reckoning, and a possible
source of error has been disclosed in the fact that some of the early
dynasties, which were formerly regarded as consecutive, were, actually,
contemporaneous. Recent research on this subject has thus resulted in
a considerable reduction of the early dates, and the different epochs
in the history of Sumer and Akkad, which were at one time treated as
isolated phenomena, have been articulated to form a consistent whole.
But the tendency now is to carry the reaction rather too far, and to
compress certain periods beyond the limits of the evidence. It will be
well to summarize the problems at issue, and to indicate the point at
which evidence gives place to conjecture.

In attempting to set limits to the earlier periods of Sumerian history,
it is still impossible to do more than form a rough and approximate
estimate of their duration. For in dealing with the chronology of
the remoter ages, we are, to a great extent, groping in the dark.
The material that has been employed for settling the order of the
early kings, and for determining their periods, falls naturally into
three main classes. The most important of our sources of information
consists of the contemporary inscriptions of the early kings
themselves, which have been recovered upon the sites of the ancient
cities in Babylonia.[1] The inscriptions frequently give genealogies
of the rulers whose achievements they record, and they thus enable
us to ascertain the sequence of the kings and the relative dates at
which they reigned. This class of evidence also makes it possible to
fix certain points of contact between the separate lines of rulers
who maintained an independent authority within the borders of their
city-states.

A second class of material, which is of even greater importance for
settling the chronology of the later Sumerian epoch, comprises the
chronological documents drawn up by early scribes, who incorporated in
the form of lists and tables the history of their own time and that of
their predecessors. The system of dating documents which was in vogue
was not a very convenient one from the point of view of those who used
it, but it has furnished us with an invaluable summary of the principal
events which took place for long periods at a time. The early dwellers
in Babylonia did not reckon dates by the years of the reigning king,
as did the later Babylonians, but they cited each year by the event
of greatest importance which took place in it. Such events consisted
in the main of the building of temples, the performance of religious
ceremonies, and the conquest of neighbouring cities and states. Thus
the dates upon private and official documents often furnish us with
historical information of considerable importance.

But the disadvantages of the system are obvious, for an event might
appear of great importance in one city and might be of no interest
to another situated at some distance from it. Thus it happened that
the same event was not employed throughout the whole country for
designating a particular year, and we have evidence that different
systems of dating were employed in different cities. Moreover, it would
have required an unusually good memory to fix the exact period of a
document by a single reference to an event which took place in the year
when it was drawn up, more especially after the system had been in use
for a considerable time. Thus, in order to fix the relative dates of
documents without delay, the scribes compiled lists of the titles of
the years, arranged in order under the reigns of the successive kings,
and these were doubtless stored in some archive-chamber, where they
were easily accessible in the case of any dispute arising with regard
to the date of a particular year. It is fortunate that some of these
early Sumerian date-lists have been recovered, and we are furnished
by them with an outline of Sumerian history, which has the value of
a contemporary record.[2] They have thrown light upon a period of
which at one time we knew little, and they have served to remove more
than one erroneous supposition. Thus the so-called Second Dynasty of
Ur was proved by them to have been non-existent, and the consequent
reduplication of kings bearing the names of Ur-Engur and Dungi was
shown to have had no foundation in fact.

From the compilation of lists of the separate years it was but a step
to the classification of the reigns of the kings themselves and their
arrangement in the form of dynasties. Among the mass of tablets
recovered from Niffer has been found a fragment of one of these early
dynastic tablets,[3] which supplements the date-lists and is of the
greatest value for settling the chronology of the later period. The
reverse of the tablet gives complete lists of the names of the kings
who formed the Dynasties of Ur and Isin, together with notes as to
the length of their respective reigns, and it further states that the
Dynasty of Isin directly succeeded that of Ur. This document fixes
once for all the length of the period to which it refers, and it is
much to be regretted that so little of the text has been recovered.
Our information is at present confined to what is legible on part of
one column of the tablet. But the text in its complete form must have
contained no less than six columns of writing, and it probably gave
a list of various dynasties which ruled in Babylonia from the very
earliest times down to the date of its compilation, though many of the
dynasties enumerated were doubtless contemporaneous. It was on the
base of such documents as this dynastic list that the famous dynastic
tablet was compiled for the library of Ashurbani-pal at Nineveh, and
the existence of such lengthy dynastic records must have contributed to
the exaggerated estimate for the beginnings of Babylonian history which
have come down to us from the work of Berossus.

A third class of material for settling the chronology has been found
in the external evidence afforded by the early historical and votive
inscriptions to which reference has already been made, and by tablets
of accounts, deeds of sale, and numerous documents of a commercial
and agricultural character. From a study of their form and material,
the general style of the writing, and the nature of the characters
employed, a rough estimate may sometimes be made as to the time at
which a particular record was inscribed, or the length of a period
covered by documents of different reigns. Further, in the course of the
excavations undertaken at any site, careful note may be made of the
relative depths of the strata in which inscriptions have been found.
Thus, if texts of certain kings occur in a mound at a greater depth
than those of other rulers, and it appears from an examination of the
earth that the mound has not been disturbed by subsequent building
operations or by natural causes, it may be inferred that the deeper
the stratum in which a text is found the earlier must be the date to
be assigned to it. But this class of evidence, whether obtained from
palaeographical study or from systematic excavation, is sometimes
uncertain and liable to more than one interpretation. In such cases it
may only be safely employed when it agrees with other and independent
considerations, and where additional support is not forthcoming, it is
wiser to regard conclusions based upon it as provisional.

The three classes of evidence that have been referred to in the
preceding paragraphs enable us to settle the relative order of many
of the early rulers of Babylonia, but they do not supply us with
any definite date by means of which the chronology of these earlier
ages may be brought into relation with that of the later periods of
Babylonian history. In order to secure such a point of connection,
reliance has in the past been placed upon a notice of one of the early
rulers of Babylonia, which occurs in an inscription of the last king of
the Neo-Babylonian empire. On a clay cylinder of Nabonidus, which is
preserved in the British Museum, it is stated that 3200 years elapsed
between the burial of Narâm-Sin's foundation-memorial in the temple of
the Sun-god at Sippar, and the finding of the memorial by Nabonidus
himself when digging in the temple's foundations.[4] Now Narâm-Sin was
an early king of Akkad, and, according to later tradition, was the son
of the still more famous Sargon I. On the strength of the figure given
by Nabonidus, the approximate date of 3750 B.C. has been assigned to
Narâm-Sin, and that of 3800 B.C. to his father Sargon; and mainly on
the basis of these early dates the beginning of Sumerian history has
been set back as far as 5000 and even 6000 B.C.[5]

The improbably high estimate of Nabonidus for the date of Narâm-Sin
has long been the subject of criticism.[6] It is an entirely isolated
statement, unsupported by any other reference in early or late texts;
and the scribes who were responsible for it were clearly not anxious
to diminish the antiquity of the foundation-record, which had been
found at such a depth below the later temple's foundations, and
after so prolonged a search. To accept it as accurate entailed the
leaving of enormous gaps in the chronological schemes, even when
postulating the highest possible dates for the dynasties of Ur and
Babylon. An alternative device of partially filling the gaps by the
invention of kings and even dynasties[7] was not a success, as their
existence has since been definitely disproved. Moreover, the recent
reduction in the date of the First Dynasty of Babylon, necessitated
by the proof that the first three dynasties of the Kings' List were
partly contemporaneous, made its discrepancy with Nabonidus's figures
still more glaring, while at the same time it furnished a possible
explanation of so high a figure resulting from his calculations. For
his scribes in all good faith may have reckoned as consecutive a
number of early dynasties which had been contemporaneous.[8] The final
disproof of the figure is furnished by evidence of an archaeological
and epigraphic character. No such long interval as twelve or thirteen
hundred years can have separated the art of Gudea's period from that
of Narâm-Sin; and the clay tablets of the two epochs differ so little
in shape, and in the forms of the characters with which they are
inscribed, that we must regard the two ages as immediately following
one another without any considerable break.

By rejecting the figures of Nabonidus we cut away our only external
connection with the chronology of the later periods, and, in order to
evolve a scheme for earlier times we have to fall back on a process
of reckoning from below. Without discussing in detail the later
chronology, it will be well to indicate briefly the foundations on
which we can begin to build. By the aid of the Ptolemaic Canon, whose
accuracy is confirmed by the larger List of Kings and the principal
Babylonian Chronicle, the later chronology of Babylon is definitely
fixed back to the year 747 B.C.; by means of the eponym lists that for
Assyria is fixed back to the year 911 B.C. Each scheme controls and
confirms the other, and the solar eclipse of June 15th, 763 B.C., which
is recorded in the eponymy of Pûr-Sagale, places the dead reckoning for
these later periods upon an absolutely certain basis. For the earlier
periods of Babylonian history, as far back as the foundation of the
Babylonian monarchy, a chronological framework has been supplied by the
principal List of Kings.[9] In spite of gaps in the text which render
the lengths of Dynasties IV. and VIII. uncertain, it is possible,
mainly by the help of synchronisms between Assyrian and Babylonian
kings, to fix approximately the date of Dynasty III. Some difference
of opinion exists with regard to this date, but the beginning of the
dynasty may be placed at about the middle of the eighteenth century B.C.

With regard to Dynasty II. of the King's List it is now known that it
ruled in the Sea-country in the region of the Persian Gulf, its earlier
kings being contemporary with the close of Dynasty I. and its later
ones with the early part of Dynasty III.[10] Here we come to the first
of two points on which there is a considerable difference of opinion.
The available evidence suggests that the kings of the Sea-country never
ruled in Babylon, and that the Third, or Kassite, Dynasty followed
the First Dynasty of Babylon without any considerable break.[11] But
the date 2232 B.C., which probably represents the beginning of
the non-mythical dynasties of Berossus,[12] has hitherto played a
considerable part in modern schemes of chronology, and, in spite of the
fact that no amount of ingenuity can reconcile his dynasties with those
of history, there is still a strong temptation to retain the date for
the beginning of Dynasty I. of the Kings' List as affording a fixed
and certain point from which to start calculations. But this can only
be done by assuming that some of the kings of the Sea-country ruled
over the whole of Babylonia, an assumption that is negatived by such
historical and archaeological evidence as we possess.[13] It is safer
to treat the date 2232 B.C. as without significance, and to follow the
evidence in confining the kings of the Sea-country to their own land.
If we do this we obtain a date for the foundation of the Babylonian
monarchy about the middle of the twenty-first century B.C.

[Illustration: Brit. Mus., No. 86261.--Brit. Mus., No. 86260.--THE
BLAU MONUMENTS.]

The second important point on which opinion is not agreed, concerns
the relation of the First Dynasty of Babylon to that of Isin. From the
Nippur dynastic list we know the duration of the dynasties of Ur and
Isin, and if we could connect the latter with the First Dynasty of
Babylon, we should be able to carry a fixed chronology at least as far
back as the age of Gudea. Such a point of connection has been suggested
in the date-formula for the seventeenth year of Sin-muballit's reign,
which records a capture of Isin; and by identifying this event with
the fall of the dynasty, it is assumed that the kings of Isin and of
Babylon overlapped for a period of about ninety-nine years. In a later
chapter the evidence is discussed on which this theory rests, and it is
shown that the capture of Isin in Sin-muballit's seventeenth year had
nothing to do with the dynasty of that name, but was an episode in the
later struggle between Babylon and Larsa.[14] We thus have no means of
deciding what interval, if any, separated the two dynasties from one
another, and consequently all the earlier dates remain only approximate.

The contract-tablets dating from the period of the Dynasty of Isin,
which have been found at Nippur, are said to resemble closely those
of the First Babylonian Dynasty in form, material, writing, and
terminology.[15] It would thus appear that no long interval separated
the two dynasties from one another. We have seen that the foundation
of the Babylonian monarchy may be set in about the middle of the
twenty-first century B.C., and by placing the end of the Dynasty
of Isin within the first half of that same century we obtain the
approximate dates of 2300 B.C. for the Dynasty of Isin, and 2400 B.C.
for the Dynasty of Ur. It is true that we know that the Dynasty of
Ur lasted for exactly one hundred and seventeen years, and that of
Isin for two hundred and twenty-five years and a half, but until we
can definitely connect the Dynasty of Isin with that of Babylon, any
attempt to work out the dates in detail would be misleading. We must be
content to await the recovery of new material, and meanwhile to think
in periods.

There is evidence that Ur-Engur established his rule in Ur, and founded
his dynasty in the time of Ur-Ningirsu, the son of Gudea of Lagash. We
may therefore place Gudea's accession at about 2450 B.C. This date is
some thirteen hundred years later than that assigned to Narâm-Sin by
Nabonidus. But the latter, we have already seen, must be reduced, in
accordance with evidence furnished by Tello tablets, which are dated
in the reigns of the intermediate patesis of Lagash. If we set this
interval at one hundred and fifty years,[16] we obtain for Narâm-Sin
a date of 2600 B.C., and for Shar-Gani-Sharri one of 2650 B.C. For the
later Semitic kings of Kish, headed by Sharru-Gi, one hundred years is
not too much to allow;[17] we thus obtain for Sharru-Gi the approximate
date of 2750 B.C. It is possible that Manishtusu, King of Kish, was the
contemporary of Urukagina of Lagash, but the evidence in favour of the
synchronism is not sufficiently strong to justify its acceptance.[18]
By placing Urukagina at 2800 B.C., we obtain for Ur-Ninâ an approximate
date of 3000 B.C., and for still earlier rulers such as Mesilim, a date
rather earlier than this.[19] It is difficult to estimate the age of
the early graves, cylinder-seals and tablets found at Fâra, but they
cannot be placed at a much later period than 3400 B.C. Thus the age
of Sumerian civilization can be traced in Babylonia back to about the
middle of the fourth millennium B.C., but not beyond.

It must be confessed that this is a reduction in the date usually
assigned to the earliest relics that have been recovered of the
Sumerian civilization, but its achievements are by no means belittled
by the compression of its period of development. It is not suggested
that this date marks the beginning of Sumerian culture, for, as we
have noted, it is probable that the race was already possessed of
a high standard of civilization on their arrival in Babylonia. The
invention of cuneiform writing, which was one of their most noteworthy
achievements, had already taken place, for the characters in the
earliest inscriptions recovered have lost their pictorial form.
Assuming the genuineness of the "Blau Monuments," it must be admitted
that even on them the characters are in a comparatively advanced stage
of development.[20] We may thus put back into a more remote age the
origin and early growth of Sumerian culture, which took place at a time
when it was not Sumerian.

In the concluding chapter of this volume an estimate is given to
the extent to which Sumerian culture influenced, either directly or
indirectly, other races in Asia, Egypt, and the West. In such matters
the interest attaching to the Sumerian original is largely derived
from its effects, and its study may be undertaken mainly with the view
of elucidating a later development. But one department of Sumerian
activity forms a striking exception to this rule. The arts of sculpture
and engraving, as practised by the Sumerians, are well worthy of study
on their own account, for while their work in all periods is marked by
spirit and originality, that of the later time reaches a remarkable
standard of excellence. The improvement in technique observable in
the later period may largely be due to the influence of Semitic work,
which was derived from Sumer and reacted in its turn on the parent
stem. But the original impulse to artistic production was of purely
Sumerian origin, and it is possible to trace the gradual development
of its products from the rudest reliefs of the archaic period to the
finished sculpture of Gudea's reign.[21] The character of the Semitic
art of Akkad was secondary and derivative, though the Semites certainly
improved on what they borrowed; in that of the Sumerians the seeds
of its later excellence may be detected from the beginning. The most
ancient of the sculptured reliefs of the Sumerians are very rudely
cut, and their age is attested not only by their primitive character,
but also by the linear form of the writing which is found upon them.
These, owing to their smaller size, are the best preserved, for the
later reliefs, which belong to the period when Sumerian art reached its
fullest development, are unfortunately represented only by fragments.
But they suffice to show the spirit which animated these ancient
craftsmen, and enabled them successfully to overcome difficulties
of technique which were carefully avoided by the later sculptors of
Assyria. To take a single instance, we may note the manner in which
they represented the heads of the principal figures of a composition in
full-face, and did not seek to avoid the difficulty of foreshortening
the features by a monotonous arrangement in profile. A good example
of their bolder method of composition is afforded by the relief of a
god, generally identified with Ningirsu, which dates from the epoch
of Gudea; he is seated upon a throne, and while the torso and bearded
head are sculptured full-face, the legs are in profile.[22] On another
fragment of a relief of the same period, beautifully cut in alabaster
but much damaged by fire, a goddess is represented seated on the knees
of a god. The rendering of the group is very spirited, for while the
god gazes in profile at his wife, she looks out from the sculpture
curving her body from the hips.[23]

[Illustration: DIORITE STATUE OF GUDEA, PATESI OF SHIRPURLA,
REPRESENTED AS THE ARCHITECT OF THE TEMPLE OF GATUMDUG.--In the Louvre;
Déc. en Chald., pl. 14.]

In neither instance can it be said that the sculptor has completely
succeeded in portraying a natural attitude, for the head in each case
should be only in three-quarter profile, but such attempts at an
unconventional treatment afford striking evidence of the originality
which characterized the work of the Sumerians. Both the sculptures
referred to date from the later Sumerian period, and, if they were the
only instances recovered, it might be urged that the innovation should
be traced to the influence of North Babylonian art under the patronage
of the kings of Akkad. Fortunately, however, we possess an interesting
example of the same class of treatment, which undoubtedly dates from
a period anterior to the Semitic domination. This is afforded by a
perforated plaque, somewhat similar to the more primitive ones of
Ur-Ninâ,[24] engraved in shallow relief with a libation-scene. The
figure of a man, completely nude and with shaven head and face, raises
a libation-vase with a long spout, from which he is about to pour water
into a vase holding two palm leaves and a flowering branch.[25] The
goddess in whose honour the rite is being performed is seated in the
mountains, represented as in later times by a number of small lozenges
or half circles. While her feet and knees are in profile, the head is
represented full-face, and the sculptor's want of skill in this novel
treatment has led him to assign the head a size out of all proportion
to the rest of the body. The effect is almost grotesque, but the work
is of considerable interest as one of the earliest attempts on the
part of the Sumerian sculptors to break away from the stiff and formal
traditions of the archaic period. From the general style of the work
the relief may probably be dated about the period of Eannatum's reign.

[Illustration: Fig. 20. Perforated plaque engraved with a scene
representing the pouring out of a libation before a goddess.--In the
Louvre; Cat. No. 11.]

The Sumerians did not attain the decorative effect of the Assyrian
bas-reliefs with which the later kings lined the walls of their
palaces. In fact, the small size of the figures rendered them suitable
for the enrichment of stelæ, plaques, basins and stone vases, rather
than for elaborate wall sculptures, for which in any case they had not
the material. The largest fragment of an early bas-relief that has been
recovered appears to have formed the angle of a stone pedestal, and is
decorated with figures in several registers representing ceremonies of
Sumerian worship.[26] In the upper register on the side that is best
preserved is a priest leading worshippers into the presence of a god,
while below is a crouching figure, probably that of a woman who plays
on a great lyre or harp of eleven cords, furnished with two uprights
and decorated with a horned head and the figure of a bull. On the side
in the upper row is a heavily bearded figure on a larger scale than
the rest, and the mixture of Sumerian and Semitic types in the figures
preceding him suggests that the monument is to be assigned to the
period of Semitic domination, under the rule of the kings of Kish or
Akkad. But it is obviously Sumerian in character, resembling the work
of Gudea's period rather than that of Narâm-Sin.

[Illustration: Fig. 21.--Fragments of sculpture belonging to the best
period of Sumerian art.--_Déc._, pl. 25, Figs. 4 and 6.]

The perfection of detail which characterized the best work of the
Sumerian sculptors is well illustrated by two fragments of reliefs,
parts of which are drawn in outline in the accompanying blocks. The one
on the left is from a bas-relief representing a line of humped cattle
and horned sheep defiling past the spectator. It is badly broken,
but enough is preserved to show the surprising fidelity with which
the sculptor has reproduced the animal's form and attitude. Though
the subject recalls the lines of domestic animals upon the Assyrian
bas-reliefs, the Sumerian treatment is infinitely superior. The same
high qualities of design and workmanship are visible in the little
fragment on the right. Of the main sculpture only a human foot remains;
but it is beautifully modelled. The decorative border below the foot
represents the spouting vase with its two streams of water and two
fish swimming against the stream. A plant rises from the vase between
the streams, the symbol of vegetation nourished by the waters.[27] The
extreme delicacy of the original shows to what degree of perfection
Sumerian work attained during the best period.

The use of sculpture in relief was also most happily employed for
the decoration of basins or fountains. The most elaborate of those
recovered, unhappily represented by mutilated fragments only, was
decorated on the outside with a chain of female figures passing from
hand to hand vases of spouting water.[28] Better preserved are the
remains of another basin, which was set up by Gudea in Ningirsu's
temple at Lagash. Rectangular in shape, each corner was decorated with
a lion. The head, drawn in the accompanying block, is a fine piece
of sculpture, and almost stands out from the corner, while the body,
carved in profile on the side of the basin, is in low relief. In this
portrayal of a lion turning its head, the designer has formed a bold
but decorative combination of relief with sculpture in the round.

[Illustration: Fig. 22.--Limestone head of a lion which decorated
the corner of a basin set up by Gudea in Ningirsu's temple at Lagash
(Shirpurla).--Déc., pl. 24, Fig. 3.]

The most famous examples of Sumerian sculpture are the statues of
Gudea, and the rather earlier one of Ur-Bau, which, however, lose
much of their character by the absence of their heads. It is true
that a head has been fitted to a smaller and more recently found
figure of Gudea;[29] but this proves to be out of all proportion to
the body--a defect that was probably absent from the larger statues.
The traditional attitude of devotion, symbolized by the clasping of
the hands over the breast, gives them a certain monotony; but their
modelling is superior to anything achieved by the Babylonians and
Assyrians of a later time.[30] Thus there is a complete absence of
exaggeration in the rendering of the muscles; the sculptor has not
attempted by such crude and conventional methods to ascribe to his
model a supernatural strength and vigour, but has worked direct from
nature. They are carved in diorite, varying in colour from dark green
to black, and that so hard a material should have been worked in
the large masses required, is in itself an achievement of no small
importance, and argues great technical skill on the part of the
sculptors of the later period.

[Illustration: Fig. 23.--Upper part of a female statuette of diorite,
of the period of Gudea or a little later.--_Déc_., pl. 24 _bis_, Fig.
2.]

For smaller figures and statuettes a softer stone, such as white
limestone, alabaster, or onyx, was usually employed, but a few in
the harder stone have been recovered. The most remarkable of these
is a diorite statuette of a woman, the upper part of which has been
preserved. The head and the torso were found separately, but thanks to
their hard material they join without leaving a trace of any break.
Here, as usual, the hands are crossed upon the breast, and the folds of
the garment are only indicated under the arms by a few plain grooves
as in the statues of Gudea. But the woman's form is visible beneath the
stuff of her garment, and the curves of the back are wonderfully true.
Her hair, undulating on the temples, is bound in a head-cloth and falls
in the form of a chignon on the neck, the whole being secured by a
stiff band, or fillet, around which the cloth is folded with its fringe
tucked in.

The drawing in Fig. 23 scarcely does justice to the beauty of the face,
since it exaggerates the conventional representation of the eyebrows,
and reproduces the texture of the stone at the expense of the outline.
Moreover, the face is almost more striking in profile.[31] The nose,
though perfectly straight, is rather large, but this is clearly a
racial characteristic. Even so, the type of female beauty portrayed is
singularly striking, and the manner in which the Sumerian sculptor has
succeeded in reproducing it was not approached in the work of any later
period. Another head from a female statuette, with the hair dressed in
a similar fashion, is equally beautiful. The absence of part of the
nose tends to give it a rather less marked ethnographic character, and
probably increases the resemblance which has been claimed for it to
types of classical antiquity.[32]

[Illustration: Fig. 24.--Limestone head of a female statuette belonging
to the best period of Sumerian art.--_Déc._, pl. 25, Fig. 2.]

The art of casting in metal was also practised by the Sumerians, and
even in the earliest period, anterior to the reign of Ur-Ninâ, small
foundation-figures have been discovered, which were cast solid in
copper. In fact, copper was the metal most commonly employed by the
Sumerians, and their stage of culture throughout the long period of
their history may be described as a copper age, rather than an age of
bronze. It is true that the claim is sometimes put forward, based on
very unsatisfactory evidence, that the Sumerian metal-founders used not
only tin but also antimony in order to harden copper, and at the same
time render it more fusible;[33] and it is difficult to explain the
employment of two ideograms for the metal, even in the earlier periods,
unless one signified bronze and the other copper.[34] But a careful
analysis by M. Berthelot of the numerous metal objects found at Tello,
the dates of which can be definitely ascertained, has shown that, even
under the later rulers of Lagash and the kings of Ur, not only votive
figures, but also tools and weapons of copper, contain no trace of tin
employed as an alloy.[35] As at Tello, so at Tell Sifr, the vessels and
weapons found by Loftus are of copper, not bronze.[36] The presence of
an exceedingly small proportion of elements other than copper in the
objects submitted to analysis was probably not intentional, but was due
to the necessarily imperfect method of smelting that was employed.

[Illustration: CLAY RELIEF STAMPED WITH THE FIGURE OF THE BABYLONIAN
HERO GILGAMESH, HOLDING A VASE FROM WHICH TWO STREAMS OF WATER FLOW.
_Brit. Mus., No._ 21204.]

[Illustration: FRAGMENT OF LIMESTONE SCULPTURED IN RELIEF WITH VASES
FROM WHICH STREAMS OF WATER FLOW. _Brit. Mus., No._ 95477]

No trace has yet been found of any mould used by the Sumerians in the
process of casting metal, but we may assume that clay was employed both
for solid and hollow castings. While many figures of the same form have
been found, no two are exactly alike nor of quite the same proportions,
so that it may be inferred that a mould was never used a second time,
but that each was broken in order to remove the casting. The copper
foundation-figures usually take the form of nails, terminating with
the bust of a female figure, and they were set in a socket beneath
stone foundation-inscriptions which they support. Later, votive
objects, cast in copper, represent male figures, bearing on their heads
the builder's basket, in which is clay for the sacred bricks of the
temple's foundation; or they consist of great cones or nails supporting
a recumbent bull,[37] or clasped by the kneeling figure of a god.[38]
Large figures of wood were sometimes covered with thin plates of copper
joined by a series of small nails or rivets, as is proved by the horn
of a bull of natural size, which has been discovered at Tello.[39]
But hollow castings in copper of a considerable size have also been
found. A good example is the bull's head, figured in the accompanying
block, which probably dates from a period not later than the close
of Ur-Ninâ's dynasty. Its eyes are inlaid with mother-of-pearl and
lapis-lazuli, and a very similar method of inlaying is met with in the
copper head of a goat which was found at Fâra.[40]

[Illustration: Fig. 25--One of a series of copper female
foundation-figures with supporting rings, buried in a structure of
unburnt brick beneath stone foundation-records. From Tello; period of
Ur-Ninâ. _Déc._, pl. 2 _ter_, Fig. 3.]

A far simpler process of manufacture was employed for the making
of votive figures of terra-cotta, which, in order of development,
preceded the use of metal for this purpose, though they continued to
be manufactured in considerable quantities during the later periods.
Here the mould, in a single piece, was cut in stone or some other hard
material,[41] and the clay, after being impressed into it, was smoothed
down on the back by hand. The flat border of clay left by the upper
surface of the mould, was frequently not removed, so that the figures
are sometimes found standing out from a flat background in the manner
of a sculptured plaque, or bas-relief. In the period of Gudea, the
mould was definitely used as a stamp, thus returning to the original
use from which its later employment was developed. Interesting examples
of such later stamped figures include representations of a god wearing
a horned headdress, to which are added the ears of a bull, and of a
hero, often identified with Gilgamesh, who holds a vase from which two
streams of water flow.[42] The clay employed for the votive figures is
extremely fine in quality, and most of them are baked to a degree of
hardness resembling stone or metal.

[Illustration: Fig. 26-27.--Heads of a bull and a goat cast in copper
and inlaid with mother-of-pearl, lapis-lazuli, etc. The bull's head was
found at Tello, and that of the goat at Fâra.--_Déc._, pl. 5 _ter_,
Fig. 2; _Zeits. für Ethnol._, 1901, p. 163.]

[Illustration: Fig. 28. Stamped terra-cotta figure of a bearded god,
wearing the horned headdress, to which are attached the ears of a bull.
Period of Gudea.--_Déc._, pl. 39, Fig. 3.]

The art of inlaying was widely practised by the Sumerians, who not
only treated metal in this way, but frequently attempted to give more
expression or life to stone statues by inlaying the white of the eye
with mother-of-pearl or shell, and representing the pupil and iris by
lapis-lazuli or bitumen. A similar method was employed to enrich votive
stone figures of animals, and to give a varied and polychrome effect to
vases carved in stone. The finest example of this class of work is a
libation-vase of Gudea made of dark green steatite, which was dedicated
by him to his patron deity Ningishzida. The vase has a short projecting
spout running up from the base and grooved, so as to allow only a small
stream of liquid to escape during the pouring of a libation. Its scheme
of decoration is interesting as it affords an excellent example of the
more fantastic side of Sumerian art, inspired by a large and important
section of the religious belief. The two intertwined serpents, whose
tongues touch the point where the liquid would leave the vase, are
modelled from nature, but the winged monsters on each side well
illustrate the Sumerian origin of later Babylonian demonology.

[Illustration: Fig. 29. Scheme of decoration from a libation-vase of
Gudea, made of dark green steatite and originally inlaid with shell.
_Déc._, pl. 44, Fig. 2; cf. Cat., p. 281.]

It is probable that such composite monsters, with the bodies and
heads of serpents and the wings and talons of birds, were originally
malevolent in character, but here, like the serpents, they are
clearly represented as tamed, and in the service of the god to whom the
vase was dedicated. This is sufficiently proved by the ringed staffs
they carry,[43] their modified horned headdresses, and their carefully
twisted locks of hair. They were peculiarly sacred to Ningishzida and
in Fig. 12 they may be seen rising as emblems from his shoulders.
The rich effect of the dark green steatite was originally enhanced
by inlaying, for the bodies of the dragons are now pitted with deep
holes. These were no doubt originally inlaid with some other material,
probably shell, which has been found employed for this purpose in a
fragment of a vase of a very similar character.

[Illustration: IMPRESSION OF A CYLINDER-SEAL ENGRAVED WITH SCENES
REPRESENTING AN EARLY BABYLONIAN HERO, PROBABLY GILGAMESH, IN CONFLICT
WITH A LION.--_Brit. Mus., No._ 89147.]

[Illustration: IMPRESSION OF A CYLINDER-SEAL ENGRAVED WITH A SCENE
REPRESENTING GILGAMESH AND EA-BANI IN CONFLICT WITH BULLS IN A WOODED
AND MOUNTAINOUS COUNTRY.--_Brit. Mus., No._ 89308.]

[Illustration: IMPRESSION OF A CYLINDER-SEAL ENGRAVED WITH A SCENE
REPRESENTING MYTHOLOGICAL BEINGS, BULLS, AND LIONS IN CONFLICT.--_Brit.
Mus., No._ 89538.]

In the same category with the monsters on the vase we may class the
human-headed bulls, of which small sculptured figures, in a recumbent
attitude, have been found at Tello; these were afterwards adopted by
the Assyrian kings, and employed as the colossal guardians of their
palace door-ways. The extent to which this particular form of composite
monster was employed for religious and decorative purposes may be seen
on the cylinder-seals, upon which in the earlier period it represents
the favourite device. Examples are frequently found in decorative
combinations, together with figures of early bearded heroes, possibly
to be identified with Gilgamesh, and with a strange creature, half-man
and half-bull, resembling the later descriptions of Ea-bani, who strive
with lions and other animals.[44] Gudea's catalogue of the temple
furniture and votive objects, with which he enriched E-ninnû, throws
light upon the manner in which Sumerian art reflected this aspect of
the Sumerian religion. Some of the legends and beliefs may well have
been derived from Semitic sources, but the imagery, which exerted so
strong an influence upon the development of their art, may probably be
traced to the Sumerians themselves.

The engraving upon cylinder-seals during the Sumerian period appears
to have been done generally by hand, without the help of a drill
or a revolving tool.[45] Outline engraving with the point was also
practised, that on stone having probably preceded the use of the
bas-relief,[46] but it continued to be employed in the later periods
for the decoration of metal and shell. The finest example of metal
engraving is the silver vase of Entemena, around which is incised in
outline a decorative band, consisting of variations of the emblem of
Lagash, arranged beneath a row of seven calves. But the largest number
of designs engraved in outline have been found, not upon stone or
metal, but upon shell. It is an interesting fact that among the smaller
objects found by M. de Sarzec at Tello, there is not a single fragment
of ivory, and it would seem that this material was not known to the
earliest inhabitants of Babylonia, a fact which has some bearing on
the disputed question of their relations to Egypt, and to the earlier
stages of Egyptian culture.[47]

From the earliest period at Lagash fragments of shell were employed
in place of ivory, and the effect produced by it is nearly the same.
Certain species of great univalves or conch-shells, which are found
in the Indian Ocean, have a thick core or centre, and these furnished
the material for a large number of the earliest cylinder-seals. Small
plaques or lozenges could also be obtained from the core by sectional
cutting, while the curved part of the shell was sometimes employed
for objects to which its convex form could be adapted. The numerous
flat lozenges that have been found are shaped for inlaying furniture,
caskets, and the like, and curved pieces were probably fitted to others
of a like shape in order to form small cups and vases. Each piece is
decorated with fine engraving, and in nearly every instance the outline
is accentuated by the employment of a very slight relief. The designs
are often spirited, and they prove that even in the earliest periods
the Sumerian draughtsman had attained to a high standard of proficiency.

One of the most interesting engraved fragments that have been recovered
consists of a slightly curved piece of shell, which probably formed
part of a small bowl or cup. The rest of the side seems to have been
built up of pieces of similar shape, held together by bitumen, or,
more probably, fitted to a metal lining by rivets through holes in the
shell. The scene engraved upon the fragment represents a lion seizing a
bull in a thicket of shrubs or high flowering plants. Though the group
upon the fragment is complete in itself, there are indications that it
formed only part of a more elaborate composition.

[Illustration: Fig. 30--Convex panel of shell from the side of a cup,
engraved with a scene representing a lion attacking a bull; early
Sumerian period. _Déc._, pl. 46, No. 3; cf. Cat. p. 189]

For in the space on the right of the fragment behind the lion's mane
are engraved two weapons. The upper one is a hilted dagger with its
point towards the lion; this may be compared with the short daggers
held by the mythological beings resembling Ea-bani upon one of
Lugal-anda's seals, with which they are represented as stabbing lions
in the neck.[48] Below is a hand holding a curved mace or throwing
stick, formed of three strands bound with leather thongs or bands of
metal, like that held by Eannatum upon the Stele of the Vultures.[49]
It is, therefore, clear that on the panel to the right of the lion and
bull a king, or patesi, was represented in the act of attacking the
lion, and we may infer that the whole of the cup was decorated with a
continuous band of engraving, though some of the groups in the design
may have been arranged symmetrically, with repetitions such as are
found upon the earlier cylinder-seals.

The position of the lion upon the fragment, represented with luxuriant
mane and with head facing the spectator, and the vigour of the design
as a whole combined with certain inequalities of treatment, have
suggested a comparison with the lions upon the sculptured mace-head
of Mesilim. The piece has, therefore, been assigned to the epoch of
the earlier kings of Kish, anterior to the period of Ur-Ninâ.[50] It
may perhaps belong to the rather later period of Ur-Ninâ's dynasty,
but, even so, it suffices to indicate the excellence in design and
draughtsmanship attained by the earlier Sumerians. In vigour and
originality their representations of animals were unequalled by those
of the later inhabitants of Babylonia and Assyria, until shortly
before the close of the Assyrian empire. But the Sumerian artists only
gradually acquired their skill, and on some of the engraved fragments
recovered it is possible to trace an advance on earlier work. The
designs in the accompanying blocks have been selected as illustrating,
to some extent, the change which gradually took place in the treatment
of animal forms by the Sumerians.

[Illustration: Fig. 31.--Fig. 32.--Fig. 33. Three fragments of
shell engraved with animal forms, which illustrate the growth of a
naturalistic treatment in Sumerian design.--_Déc._, pl. 46, Nos. 4, 5,
and 8.]

Of the three designs, that on the left is engraved upon a convex piece
of shell, thin as the shell of an egg; it represents a lion-headed
eagle which has swooped down upon the back of a human-headed bull and
is attacking him with mouth and claws. The subject resembles that
found upon the most primitive Sumerian cylinder-seals, and its rough
and angular treatment is sufficient indication of the very archaic
character of the work. The central panel resembles in shape that of
the lion and the bull.[51] The design represents a leaping ibex with
flowering plants in the background, and the drawing is freer and less
stiff than that of the animals on the silver vase of Entemena.[52]
Some archaic characteristics may still be noted, such as the springing
tufts of hair at the joints of the hind legs; but the general treatment
of the subject marks a distinct advance upon the archaic conventions
of the earlier fragment. The third design is that of a leaping kid,
engraved upon a flat piece of shell and cut out for inlaying. Here the
drawing is absolutely true to nature, and the artist has even noted the
slight swelling of the head caused by the growing horns.

The Sumerians do not appear to have used complete shells for engraving,
like those found on Assyrian and Aegean sites. A complete shell has
indeed been recovered, but it is in an unworked state and bears a
dedicatory formula of Ur-Ningirsu, the son and successor of Gudea.
Since it is not a fine specimen of its class, we may suppose that it
was selected for dedication merely as representing the finer shells
employed by the workmen in the decoration of the temple-furniture. The
Sumerians at a later period engraved designs upon mother-of-pearl.
When used in plain pieces for inlaying it certainly gave a more
brilliant effect than shell, but to the engraver it offered greater
difficulties in consequence of its brittle and scaly surface. Pieces
have been found, however, on which designs have been cut, and these
were most frequently employed for enriching the handles of knives
and daggers. The panels in the accompanying blocks will serve to
show that the same traditional motives are reproduced which meet us
in the earlier designs upon fragments of shell and cylinder-seals.
They include a bearded hero, the eagle attacking the bull, a hero
in conflict with a lion, the lion-headed eagle of Lagash, a winged
lion, a lion attacking an ibex, and a stag. Even when allowance is
made for the difficulties presented by the material, it will be seen
that the designs themselves rank far below those found upon shell.
The employment of mother-of-pearl for engraving may thus be assigned
to a period of decadence in Sumerian art when it had lost much of its
earlier freshness and vigour.

[Illustration: Fig. 34.--Fig. 35.--Fig. 36.--Fig. 37. Four panels of
mother-of pearl, engraved with Sumerian designs, which were employed
for inlaying the handles of daggers. They belong to a period of
decadence in Sumerian art.--In the Louvre; Cat. Nos. 232 ff.]

The above brief sketch of the principal forms and productions of
Sumerian art may serve to vindicate the claim of the Sumerians to a
place among the more artistic races of antiquity. Much oriental art is
merely quaint, or interesting from its history and peculiarities, but
that of the Sumerians is considerably more than this. Its sculpture
never acquired the dull monotony of the Assyrian bas-reliefs with their
over-elaboration of detail, intended doubtless to cloak the poverty
of the design. Certain conventions persisted through all periods, but
the Sumerian sculptor was never a slave to them. He relied largely on
his own taste and intelligence, and even the earliest work is bold and
spirited. After centuries of independent development fresh vigour was
introduced by the nomad Semitic races who settled in the north, but in
the hands of the later Semites the Sumerian ideals were not maintained.
For the finest period of Babylonian art we must go back to a time some
centuries before the founding of the Babylonian monarchy.


[1] These have been collected and translated by Thureau-Dangin
in "Les Inscriptions de Sumer et d'Akkad," the German edition of
which, published under the title "Die sumerischen und akkadischen
Königsinschriften" in the _Vorderasiatische Bibliothek_, includes the
author's corrections and an introduction; a glossary to subjects of
a religious character, compiled by Langdon, is added to the German
edition of the work.

[2] Cf. Thureau-Dangin, "Königsinschriften," pp. 228 ff., where the
lists are restored from dates on early tablets; for the earlier
date-formulæ from tablets, see pp. 224 ff.

[3] See Hilprecht, "Mathematical, Metrological, and Chronological
Tablets," p. 46 f., pl. 30, No. 47.

[4] Cf. "Cun. Inscr. West. Asia," V., pl. 64, Col. II., ll. 54-65.

[5] Hilprecht formerly placed the founding of Enlil's temple and the
first settlement at Nippur "somewhere between 6000 and 7000 B.C.,
possibly even earlier" (cf. "Old Babylonian Inscriptions chiefly from
Nippur," Pt. II., p. 24.)

[6] See Lehmann-Haupt, "Zwei Hauptprobleme," pp. 172 ff., and Winckler,
"Forschungen," I., p. 549; "Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament"
(3rd ed.), I., p. 17 f., and "Mitteil. der Vorderas. Gesellschaft,"
1906, I., p. 12, n. 1; cf. also Thureau-Dangin, "Rev. d'Assyr.," IV.,
p. 72, and "Rec. de tabl.," p. ix.

[7] Cf. Radau, "Early Babylonian History," pp. 30 ff., 215 ff.

[8] Cf. King, "Chronicles," I., p. 16. This explanation is preferable
to Lehmann-Haupfs emendation of the figures, by which he suggests that
a thousand years were added to it by a scribal error. The principle of
emending the figures in these later chronological references is totally
unscientific. For the emenders, while postulating mechanical errors in
the writing of the figures, still regard the calculations of the native
scribes as above reproach; whereas many of their figures, which are
incapable of emendation, are inconsistent with each other.

[9] For references, see King, "Chronicles," I., p. 77. n. 1.

[10] _Op. cit._, pp. 93 ff.

[11] _Op. cit._, Chap. IV. f. Meyer also adopts this view ("Geschichte
des Altertums," Bd. I., Hft. II., p. 340 f.).

[12] Cf. "Chronicles," I., pp. 90 ff.

[13] The purely arbitrary character of the assumption is well
illustrated by the different results obtained by those who make it.
By clinging to Berossus's date of 2232 B.C., Thureau-Dangin assigns
to the second dynasty of the Kings' List a period of 168 years of
independent rule in Babylon (cf. "Zeits. für Assyr.," XXI., pp. 176
ff., and "Journal des savants," 1908, pp. 190 ff.), and Ungnad 177
years ("Orient. Lit.-Zeit.," 1907, col. 638, 1908, col. 63 ff.).
Lehmann-Haupt, in his suggested reconciliation of the new data with
his former emendation of the Bavian date, makes the period 80 years
("Klio," 1908, pp. 227 E). Poebel, ignoring Berossus and attempting
to reconcile the native chronological notices to early kings, makes
it 160 years (cf. "Zeits. für Assyr.," XXI., pp. 162 ff.). The latest
combination is that proposed by Schnabel, who accepts the date of 2232
B.C. for both the system of Berossus and that represented by the Kings'
List, but places the historical beginning of the First Dynasty in 2172
B.C.; this necessitates a gap of 120 years between Dynasties I. and
III. ("Mitteil. der Vorderas. Gesellschaft," 1908, pp. 241 ff.). But
all these systems are mainly based on a manipulation of the figures,
and completely ignore the archaeological evidence.

[14] See below, Chap. XI., pp. 313 ff.

[15] Cf. Hilprecht, "Math., Met., and Chron. Tabl.," p. 55, n. 1.

[16] Thureau-Dangin would assign only one hundred years to this period
(cf. "Journal des savants," 1908, p. 201).

[17] The period may well have been longer, especially if Manishtusu
should prove to have been the contemporary of Urukagina.

[18] See below, pp. 176, n. 2, 209 f.

[19] For a list of the kings and rulers of Sumer and Akkad with their
approximate dates, see the List of Rulers at the end of the volume.

[20] See the plate opposite p. 62. The objects have been previously
published by Hayes Ward in "Proc. Amer. Orient. Soc.," Oct., 1885, and
"Amer. Journ. Arch.," vol. iv. (1888), pp. 39 ff. They subsequently
found their way into a London sale-room, where they were bought as
forgeries and presented as such to the British Museum.

[21] Our knowledge of Sumerian art is mainly derived from the finds at
Tello, since the objects from other early sites are not yet published.
For its best and fullest discussion, see Heuzey's descriptions in
"Découvertes en Chaldée," his "Catalogue des antiquités chaldéennes,"
"Une Villa royale chaldéenne," and the "Revue d'Assyriologie"; cf. also
Perrot and Chipiez, "Histoire de l'art," vol. ii. The finest examples
of Semitic art have been found at Susa (see De Morgan, "Mémoires de la
Délégation en Perse," _passim_). A scientific treatment of the subject
is adopted by Meyer in "Sumerier und Semiten," but he is inclined to
assign too much credit to the Semite, and to overestimate his share in
the artistic development of the two races.

[22] See below, p. 267, Fig. 66.

[23] See the photographic reproduction in "Déc. en Chaldée," pl. 22,
Fig. 5.

[24] For the use of these perforated sculptures, see below, p. 110 f.

[25] The rite is represented upon other Sumerian monuments such as the
Stele of the Vultures (see below, p. 140). Heuzey suggests that the
liturgy may have forbidden the loss of the libation-water, the rite
symbolizing its use for the profit of vegetation; cf. "Catalogue des
antiquités chaldéennes," p. 118.

[26] See the plate opposite p. 52.

[27] Cf. Heuzey, "Déc. en Chaldée," p. 218; "Catalogue," p. 149.

[28] See "Déc. en Chaldée," pl. 24, Fig. 4, pp. 216 ff.

[29] See the plate opposite p. 268.

[30] For the seated statue of Gudea as the architect of Gatumdug's
temple, see the plate opposite p. 66; and for descriptions of the
statues, see Chap. IX., p. 269 f.

[31] See the very beautiful drawing in outline which Heuzey prints on
the title-page of his Catalogue.

[32] Cf. Heuzey, "Déc. en Chaldée," p. 158.

[33] It should be noted that of the seven objects from Nippur and
other south-Babylonian sites which were submitted to analysis by Herr
Otto Helm in Danzig, only two contained a percentage of tin (cf.
"Zeitschrift für Ethnologie," 1901, pp. 157 ff.). Of these a nail (_op.
cit._, p. 161) is from a stratum in Nippur, dated by Prof. Hilprecht
himself after 300 A.D. The "stilusartige Instrument," which, like the
nail, contained over five per cent, of tin, was not found at Nippur,
but is said to have come from a mound about thirty miles to the south
of it. Nothing is therefore known with accuracy as to its date. The
percentage of antimony in the other objects is comparatively small, and
the dates assigned to them are not clearly substantiated. These facts
do not justify Hilprecht's confident statement in "Explorations," p.
252. Meyer also credits the earliest Sumerians with using bronze beside
copper, and he describes the axe-heads and arm-rings found in the early
graves as of bronze (cf. "Geschichte des Altertums," Bd. I., Hft. II.,
p. 416 f.); but he also describes the little foundation-figures from
the oldest stratum at Tello as of bronze, whereas analysis has proved
them to be copper.

[34] This point is made by Sayce (cf. "The Archaeology of the Cuneiform
Inscriptions," p. 59 f.), who, however, holds the definite opinion that
nothing of bronze has been discovered on the earlier sites (_op. cit._,
p. 55 f.).

[35] Cf. Berthelot, "La chimie au moyen âge," tome I., Appendix IX., p.
391 f.; "Introduction à l'étude de la chimie," p. 227 f., and Heuzey
in "Déc. en Chaldée," p. 238; antimony is said to have been known and
used by itself, though not as an alloy (Berthelot, "Introd.," p. 223),
but there is no proof of the date of the fragment from Tello, which was
analysed. It may be added that the votive figures of Gudea's reign,
which are preserved in the British Museum and are usually regarded as
of bronze (cf. the plate opposite p. 272), should, since they came from
Tello, be more accurately described as of copper.

[36] See Loftus, "Chaldaea and Susiana," p. 268 f., who describes
all the objects as of copper. One of the knives excavated by Loftus
was subsequently analysed and found to be copper (see "Report of the
British Assoc.," Nottingham, 1893, p. 715); this analysis was confirmed
by that of Dr. J. H. Gladstone (published in the "Proc. Soc. Bibl.
Arch.," vol. xvi., p. 98 f.). A careful analysis of the metal objects
found by members of the Deutsche Orient-Gesellschaft at Fâra in 1902
and 1903, and styled by them as bronze (see "Mitteilungen," No. 17, p.
6), would probably result in proving the absence of any alloy.

[37] See the blocks on p. 256.

[38] See the plate opposite p. 272.

[39] See "Déc. en Chaldée," pl. 45, Fig. 1.

[40] See Fig. 27, and cf. Hilprecht, "Explorations," p. 539 f.

[41] Like the brick-stamps, they may sometimes have been made of clay
burnt to an extreme hardness.

[42] See the stamped figure published on the plate opposite p. 72 from
a terra-cotta in the British Museum.

[43] The ringed staff occurs as a sacred emblem upon cylinder-seals,
and is sometimes carried by heroes (cf. p. 82, Fig. 34). A colossal
example of one, made of wood and sheathed in copper, was found at Tello
by De Sarzec (see Heuzey, "Rev. d'Assyr.," IV., p. 112, and "Déc. en
Chaldée," pl. 57, Fig. 1), but the precise use and significance of the
object has not been determined.

[44] See the plate opposite p. 76, and see below, p. 174 f.

[45] It should be noted that a few of the early cylinder-seals found
at Fâra Andrae considers to have been engraved with the help of the
wheel (see "Mitteil. der Deutsch. Orient-Gesellschaft," No. 17, p. 5).
The suggestion has also been made that, on the introduction of harder
stones, the cutting tool may have been tipped with a flake of corundum;
cf. Hayes Ward, "Cylinders and other Oriental Seals," p. 13.

[46] For early examples, see above, p. 49.

[47] See further, Chap. XII.

[48] See below, p. 175.

[49] See the plate opposite p. 124.

[50] See Heuzey, "Catalogue," p. 387.

[51] See above, p. 79, Fig. 30.

[52] See above, p. 78, and below, p. 167 f.




CHAPTER IV


THE EARLIEST SETTLEMENTS IN SUMER; THE DAWN OF HISTORY AND THE RISE OF
LAGASH


In their origin the great cities of Babylonia were little more
than collections of rude huts constructed at first of reeds cut in
the marshes, and gradually giving place to rather more substantial
buildings of clay and sun-dried brick. From the very beginning it would
appear that the shrine of the local god played an important part in the
foundation and subsequent development of each centre of population.
Of the prehistoric period in Babylonia we know little, but it may be
assumed that, already at the time of the Sumerian immigration, rude
settlements had been formed around the cult-centres of local gods.
This, at any rate, was the character of each town or city of the
Sumerians themselves during the earliest periods to which we can trace
back their history. At Fâra, the most primitive Sumerian site that has
yet been examined, we find the god Shuruppak giving his own name to the
city around his shrine, and Ningirsu of Lagash dominates and directs
his people from the first. Other city-gods, who afterwards became
powerful deities in the Babylonian pantheon, are already in existence,
and have acquired in varying degrees their later characters. Enki of
Eridu is already the god of the deep, the shrine of Enzu or Nannar in
the city of Ur is a centre of the moon-cult, Babbar of Larsa appears
already as a sun-god and the dispenser of law and justice, while the
most powerful Sumerian goddess, Ninni or Nanâ of Erech, already has her
shrine and worshippers in the city of her choice.

By what steps the city-gods acquired their later characters it is
impossible now to say, but we may assume that the process was a
gradual one. In the earlier stages of its history the character of
the local god, like that of his city, must have been far more simple
and primitive than it appears to us as seen in the light of its later
development. The authority of each god did not extend beyond the limits
of his own people's territory. Each city was content to do battle on
his behalf, and the defeat of one was synonymous with the downfall of
the other. With the gradual amalgamation of the cities into larger
states, the god of the predominant city would naturally take precedence
over those of the conquered or dependent towns, and to the subsequent
process of adjustment we may probably trace the relationships between
the different deities and the growth of a pantheon. That Enki should
have been the god of the deep from the beginning is natural enough
in view of Eridu's position on an expanse of water connected with
the Persian Gulf. But how it came about that Ur was the centre of a
moon-cult, or that Sippar in the north and Larsa in the south were
peculiarly associated with the worship of the sun, are questions
which cannot as yet be answered, though it is probable that future
excavations on their sites may throw some light upon the subject.

In the case of one city excavation has already enabled us to trace the
gradual growth of its temple and the surrounding habitations during a
considerable portion of their history. The city of Nippur stands in a
peculiar relation to others in Sumer and Akkad, as being the central
shrine in the two countries and the seat of Enlil, the chief of the
gods. Niffer, or Nuffar, is the name by which the mounds marking its
site are still known. They have been long deserted, and, like the sites
of many other ancient cities in Babylonia and Assyria, no modern town
or village is built upon them or in their immediate neighbourhood. The
nearest small town is Sûk el-'Afej, about four miles to the south,
lying on the eastern edge of the Afej marshes, which begin to the
south of Niffer and stretch away to the west. The nearest large town
is Dîwânîya, on the left bank of the Euphrates twenty miles to the
south-west. In the summer the marshes in the neighbourhood of the
mounds consist of pools of water connected by channels through the
reed-beds, but in the spring, when the snows have melted in the Taurus
and the mountains of Kurdistan, the flood-water converts the marshes
into a vast lagoon, and all that meets the eye are isolated date-palms
and a few small hamlets built on rising knolls above the water-level.

Although, during the floods, Niffer is at times nearly isolated, the
water never approaches within a considerable distance of the actual
mounds. This is not due to any natural configuration of the soil, but
to the fact that around the inner city, the site of which is marked by
the mounds, there was built an outer ring of habitations at a time when
the enclosed town of the earlier periods became too small to contain
the growing population. The American excavations, which have been
conducted on the site between the years 1889 and 1900, have shown that
the earliest area of habitation was far more restricted than the mounds
which cover the inner city.[1] In the plan on p. 88 it will be seen
that this portion of the site is divided into two parts by the ancient
bed of the Shatt en-Nîl. The contours of the mounds are indicated by
dotted lines, and each of them bears a number in Roman figures. Mound
III. is that which covered E-kur, the temple of Enlil, and it was
around the shrine, in the shaded area upon the plan, that the original
village or settlement was probably built. Here in the lowest stratum
of the mound were found large beds of wood-ashes and animal bones, the
remains of the earliest period of occupation.

[Illustration: Early Babylonian plan of the temple of Enlil at Nippur
and its enclosure, drawn upon a clay tablet dating from the first half
of the second millennium B.C. The labels on the plan are translated
from notes on the original.--Cf. Fisher, "Excavations at Nippur," I.,
pl. 1.]

It is difficult to trace through all its stages the early growth of
the city, but it would seem that the shrine in the centre of the town
was soon raised upon an artificial mound to protect it during periods
of inundation. Moreover, as at Fâra, the original settlement must
have expanded quickly, for even below the mounds to the south-west
of the Shatt en-Nîl, strata have been found similar in character to
those under the temple-mound, as well as bricks and wells of the
pre-Sargonic period. In reconstructing the plan of the later areas
occupied by the temple and its enclosure, considerable assistance has
been obtained from an ancient plan of the temple, drawn upon a clay
tablet that was found at Nippur. From the form of the characters
inscribed upon it, it does not appear to date from an earlier period
than the first half of the second millennium B.C., but it may well
be a copy of an older original since the form of its temple-enclose
appears to agree with that in the time of Narâm-Sin as revealed by
the excavations. In it the position of E-kur is marked at one end
of a great enclosure surrounded by an irregular wall. The enclosure
is cut by a canal or sluice, on the other side of which stood
temple-storehouses.

[Illustration: NIPPUR: The inner city after Fischer]

The position of gates in the wall are marked, and it will be noted that
a large stream, labelled the Euphrates, washes its upper side, while on
its other sides are terraces and moats. These details are incorporated
in the accompanying plan, but their suggested relation to the remains
uncovered in the course of the excavations is largely conjectural.
Moreover the period in the temple's history represented by the tablet
is not certainly established, and some of the details such as the
ground-plan of the temple itself may reproduce its later form.

The most striking feature in the temple-area, which was uncovered in
the course of the excavations, is the great temple-tower, or ziggurat,
erected by Ur-Engur, and faced by him with kiln-baked bricks bearing
his name and inscription.[2] The ziggurat in its later and imposing
form was built by him, though within its structure were found the
cores of earlier and smaller towers, erected by Narâm-Sin and during
the pre-Sargonic period. In fact, Ur-Engur considerably altered the
appearance of the temple. In addition to building the ziggurat, he
raised the level of the inner court above Narâm-Sin's pavement, and he
straightened the course of the outer wall, using that of Narâm-Sin as
a foundation where it crossed his line. His wall also included mounds
XII. and V., in the latter of which many of the temple-archives have
been found. During the Kassite period these were stored in buildings in
mound X., across the Shatt en-Nîl in the area included within the inner
city during the later periods. An alteration in the course of the river
from the north-east to the south-west side of the temple area probably
dates from the period of Samsu-iluna, who upon a cone found in _débris_
in the temple-court records that he erected a dam and dug out a new
channel for the Euphrates. His object in doing so was probably to bring
a supply of water within reach of the later extension of the city on
the south-west side.

The excavations on the site of Nippur and its temple have illustrated
the gradual increase in the size of a Sumerian city, and the manner in
which the temple of the city-god retained its position as the central
and most important building. The diggings, however, have thrown little
light upon the form the temple assumed during periods anterior to the
Dynasty of Ur. In fact, we do not yet know the form or arrangement of
an early Sumerian temple; for on early sites such as Fâra, Surghul,
and Bismâya, the remains of no important building were uncovered,
while the scanty remains of Ningirsu's temple at Tello date from the
comparatively late period of Ur-Bau and Gudea. On the latter site,
however, a number of earlier constructions have been discovered, and,
although they are not of a purely religious character, they may well
have been employed in connection with the temple service. Apart from
private dwellings, they are the only buildings of the early Sumerians
that have as yet been recovered, and they forcibly illustrate the
primitive character of the cities of this time.

The group of oldest constructions at Tello was discovered in the
mound known as K, which rises to a height of seventeen metres above
the plain. It is the largest and highest after the Palace Tell, to
the south-east of which it lies at a distance of about two hundred
metres.[3] Here, during his later excavations on the site, M. de
Sarzec came upon the remains of a regular agricultural establishment,
which throw an interesting light upon certain passages in the early
foundation-inscriptions referring to constructions of a practical
rather than of a purely religious character. It is true the titles of
these buildings are often difficult to explain, but the mention of
different classes of plantations in connection with them proves that
they were mainly intended for agricultural purposes. Their titles are
most frequently met with in Entemena's records, but Ur-Ninâ refers
by name to the principal storehouse, and the excavations have shown
that before his time this portion of the city had already acquired its
later character. Here was situated the administrative centre of the
sacred properties attached to the temples, and possibly also those
of the patesi himself. It is true that the name of Ningirsu's great
storehouse does not occur upon bricks or records found in the ancient
structures upon Tell K, but it is quite possible that this was not
a name for a single edifice, but was a general title for the whole
complex of buildings, courts and outhouses employed in connection
with the preparation and storage of produce from the city's lands and
plantations.

[Illustration: SOUTH-EASTERN FACADE OF A BUILDING AT TELLO, ERECTED BY
UR-NINA, KING OF SHIRPURLA.--_Déc. en Chald._, pl. 54.]

At a depth of only two and a half metres from the surface of the tell
M. de Sarzec came upon a building of the period of Gudea, of which
only the angle of a wall remained. But, unlike the great Palace Tell,
where the lowest diggings revealed nothing earlier than the reign of
Ur-Bau, a deepening of his trenches here resulted in the recovery
of buildings dating from the earliest periods in the history of the
city. In accordance with the practice of the country, as each new
building had been erected on the site, the foundations of the one it
had displaced were left intact and carefully preserved within the new
platform, in order to raise the building still higher above the plain
and form a solid substructure for its support. To this practice we owe
the preservation, in a comparatively complete form, of the foundations
of earlier structures in the mound. At no great depth beneath
Gudea's building were unearthed the remains of Ur-Ninâ's storehouse.
Comparatively small in size, it is oriented by its angles, the two
shorter sides facing north-west and south-east, and the two longer
ones south-west and north-east, in accordance with the normal Sumerian
system.[4] It was built of kiln-baked bricks, not square and flat like
those of Gudea or of Sargon and Narâm-Sin, but oblong and plano-convex,
and each bore the mark of a right thumb imprinted in the middle of its
convex side. A few of the bricks that were found bear Ur-Ninâ's name in
linear characters, and record his construction of the "House of Girsu,"
while one of them refers to the temple of Ningirsu. These may not
have been in their original positions, but there is little doubt that
the storehouse dates from Ur-Ninâ's reign, and it may well have been
employed in connection with the temple of the city-god.

Built upon a platform composed of three layers of bricks set in
bitumen, the walls of the building were still preserved to the height
of a few feet. It is to be noted that on none of the sides is there a
trace of any doorway or entrance, and it is probable that access was
obtained from the outside by ladders of wood, or stairways of unburnt
brick, reaching to the upper story. At D and E on the plan are traces
of what may have been either steps or buttresses, but these do not
belong to the original building and were added at a later time. The
absence of any entrance certainly proves that the building was employed
as a storehouse.[5] Within the building are two chambers, the one
square (A), the other of a more oblong shape (B). They were separated
by a transverse passage or corridor (C), which also ran round inside
the outer walls, thus giving the interior chamber additional security.
The double walls were well calculated to protect the interior from damp
or heat, and would render it more difficult for pillagers to effect an
entrance. Both in the chambers and the passages a coating of bitumen
was spread upon the floor and walls. Here grain, oil, and fermented
drink could have been stored in quantity, and the building may also
have served as a magazine for arms and tools, and for the more precious
kinds of building material.

[Illustration: TELLO: Store-House of Ur-Ninâ.]

Around the outside of the building, at a distance of about four metres
from it, are a series of eight brick bases, two on each side, in a
direct line with the walls.[6] On these stood pillars of cedar-wood, of
which the charred remains were still visible. They probably supported
a great wooden portico or gallery, which ran round the walls of the
building and was doubtless used for the temporary storage of goods and
agricultural implements. On the north-east side of the building a brick
pavement (F) extended for some distance beyond the gallery, and at the
southern angle, within the row of pillars and beneath the roof of the
portico, was a small double basin (G) carefully lined with bitumen.
At a greater distance from the house were two larger basins or tanks
(I and K), with platforms built beside them of brick and bitumen (J
and L); with one of them was connected a channel or water-course (M).
At a later time Eannatum sunk a well not far to the west of Ur-Ninâ's
storehouse, and from it a similar water-course ran to a circular basin;
a large oval basin and others of rectangular shape were found rather
more to the north. These, like Ur-Ninâ's tanks, were probably employed
for the washing of vessels and for the cleansing processes which
accompanied the preparation and storage of date-wine, the pressing
of oil, and the numerous other occupations of a large agricultural
community.

A still earlier building was discovered at a depth of five metres below
that of Ur-Ninâ, but it is more difficult to determine the purpose to
which it was put. It was built upon a solid platform (C), which has the
same orientation as Ur-Ninâ's storehouse and rises above the ground
level marked by the remains of a brick pavement (D). It is strange that
the building itself is not in the centre of the platform and for some
unknown reason was set at a slight angle to it. It consists of two
chambers, each with a doorway, the smaller chamber (A) on a level with
the platform, the larger one (B) considerably below it, from which it
must have been reached by a ladder. At intervals along the surface of
the walls were cavities lined with bitumen, which may have supported
the wooden columns of a superstructure, or possibly the supports of
an arched roof of reeds. It is possible that we here have a form of
religious edifice, but the depth of the larger chamber suggests that,
like Ur-Ninâ's building, it was employed as a sort of store-house or
treasure-chamber.

[Illustration: TELLO: Building anterior to Ur-Ninâ after De Sarzec]

The bricks of the building were small and plano-convex, with
thumb-impressions and without inscriptions, so that it is impossible
to recover the name of its builder. But the objects found at the same
deep level indicate a high antiquity, and present us with a picture of
some of the inhabitants of the country at a time when this building,
which was one of the oldest constructions at Lagash, stood upon the
surface of the mound. The circular relief, sculptured with the meeting
of the chieftains,[7] was found in fragments near the building.
Another archaic piece of sculpture of the same remote period, which
was also found in the neighbourhood, represents a figure, crowned
with palm-branches; one hand is raised in an attitude of speech or
adoration, and on the right are two standards supporting what appear
to be colossal mace-heads. The sex of the figure is uncertain, but it
may well be that of a woman; the lines below the chin which come from
behind the ear, are not necessarily a beard, but may be intended for a
thick lock of hair falling over the right shoulder. The scene probably
represents an act of worship, and an archaic inscription on the field
of the plaque appears to record a list of offerings, probably in honour
of Ningirsu, whose name is mentioned together with that of his temple
E-ninnû. It is interesting to note that in this very early age the
temple of the city-god of Lagash already bore its later name.

[Illustration: Fig. 38.--Archaic plaque from Tello, engraved in low
relief with a scene of adoration. In an inscription on the stone, which
appears to enumerate a list of offerings, reference is made to Ningirsu
and his temple E-ninnû.--_Déc._, pl. 1 _bis_, Fig. 1.]

The earliest written records of the Sumerians which we possess, apart
from those engraved upon stone and of a purely votive character,
concern the sale and donation of land, and they prove that certain
customs were already in vogue with regard to the transfer of property,
which we meet with again in later historical periods. A few such
tablets of rounded form and fashioned of unburnt clay were found
at Lagash on Tell K, and slightly below the level of Ur-Ninâ's
building;[8] they may thus be assigned to a period anterior to his
reign. Others of the same rounded form, but of baked clay, have been
found at Shuruppak. It is a significant fact that several of these
documents, after describing the amount of land sold and recording
the principal price that was paid for it, enumerate a number of
supplementary presents made by the buyer to the seller and his
associates.[9] The presents consist of oxen, oil, wool and cloth, and
precisely similar gifts are recorded on the Obelisk of Manishtusu.[10]
It would thus appear that even in this early period the system of land
tenure was already firmly established, which prevailed in both Sumer
and Akkad under the earlier historical rulers.

From the Shuruppak tablets we also learn the names of a number of early
rulers or officials of that city, in whose reigns or periods of office
the documents were drawn up. Among the names recovered are those of
Ur-Ninpa, Kanizi and Mash-Shuruppak, but they are given no titles on
the tablets, and it is impossible to say whether their office preceded
that of the patesi, or whether they were magistrates of the city who
were subordinate to a ruler of higher rank. Another of these early
deeds of sale is inscribed, not upon a tablet, but on the body of a
black stone statuette that has been found at Tello.[11] From the text
we learn that the buyer of the property was a certain Lupad, and the
figure is evidently intended to represent him. Although it was found
on the site of Lagash, and the text records a purchase of land in that
city, it is remarkable that Lupad is described as a high official
of the neighbouring city of Umma, which was the principal rival of
Lagash during the greater part of its history. The archaic character
of the sculpture, and the early form of writing upon it, suggest a
date not much later than that of Ur-Ninâ, so that we must suppose the
transaction took place at a period when one of the two rival cities
acknowledged the suzerainty of the other. Unlike other Sumerian figures
that have been recovered, Lupad's head has a slight ridge over the
brow and below the cheek-bones. This has been explained by Heuzey as
representing short hair and beard, but it more probably indicates the
limits of those portions of the head and face that were shaved.[12]
Thus Lupad presents no exception to the general Sumerian method of
treating the hair.

[Illustration: Fig. 39.--Figure of Lupad, a high official of the city
of Umma, inscribed with a text recording a purchase of land in Lagash
(Shirpurla); from Tello.--In the Louvre; cf. Comptes rendus, 1907, p.
518.]

[Illustration: Fig 40.--Statue of Essar, King of Adab, preserved in the
Imperial Ottoman Museum at Constantinople; from Bismâya.]

In order to assign a date to such figures as that of Lupad, it is
necessary, in the absence of other evidence, to be guided entirely by
the style of the sculpture and the character of the writing. Several
such figures of archaic Sumerian type have been recovered, and three
of them represent kings who ruled in different cities at this early
period. The finest of these is a standing figure of Esar, King of Adab,
which was found in the course of the American excavations at Bismâya,
and is now preserved in the Imperial Ottoman Museum at Constantinople.
Its discoverers claimed that it was the earliest example of Sumerian
sculpture known,[13] but it may be roughly placed at about the time of
Ur-Ninâ's dynasty. A second king is represented by two fragments of a
statuette from Tello, inscribed in archaic characters with a dedicatory
text of E-abzu, King of Umma,[14] while the third is a seated figure
of a king of the northern city or district of Ma'er, or Mari, and is
preserved in the British Museum.[15] The same uncertainty applies to
the date of Ur-Enlil, a patesi of Nippur, whose name is mentioned on
one of the fragments of votive vases from that city which were found
together on the south-east side of the temple-tower.[16] As in the case
of Esar, King of Adab, we can only assign these rulers approximately to
the period of the earlier rulers of Lagash.

It is in the city of Lagash that our knowledge of Sumerian history may
be said to begin. The excavation of the site has yielded an abundance
of material from which it is possible to arrange her rulers for long
periods in chronological order, and to reconstruct the part they played
in conflicts between the early city-states. It is true that some of her
earlier kings and patesis remain little more than names to us, but with
the accession of Ur-Ninâ we enter a period in which our knowledge of
events is continuous, so far at least as the fortunes of the city were
concerned. With the growth of her power it is also possible to trace in
some detail the relations she maintained with other great cities in the
land.

[Illustration: Emblems of the city of Lagash (Shirpurla) and of the god
Ningirsu. The upper drawing represents a perforated plaque dedicated
to Ningirsu by Ur-Ninâ. Below is a brick stamped with the figure of
Imgig, the lion-headed eagle of Ningirsu.--In the Louvre; Cat. No. 7
and _Déc._, pl. 31 _bis_, No. 1.]

At the earliest period of which we have any historical records it
would appear that the city of Kish exercised a suzerainty over Sumer.
Here there ruled at this time a king named Mesilim, to whom Lagash,
and probably other great cities in the south, owed allegiance. During
his reign a certain Lugal-shag-engur was patesi of Lagash, and we
have definite record that he acknowledged Mesilim's supremacy. For a
votive mace-head of colossal size has been found at Tello, which bears
an inscription stating that it was dedicated to Ningirsu by Mesilim,
who had restored his great temple at Lagash during the time that
Lugal-shag-engur was patesi of that city.[17] The text, the brevity of
which is characteristic of these early votive inscriptions, consists
of but a few words, and reads: "Mesilim, King of Kish, the builder of
the temple of Ningirsu, deposited this mace-head (for) Ningirsu (at the
time when) Lugal-shag-engur (was) patesi of Lagash." In spite of its
brevity the importance of the inscription is considerable, since it
furnishes a synchronism between two early rulers of Sumer and the North.

[Illustration: Fig. 42.--Mace-head, dedicated to Ningirsu, the god
of Lagash (Shirpula), by Mesilim, King of Kish, at the time of
Lugal-shag-engur, patesi of Lagash.--_Déc._, pl 1 _ter_, No. 2; Cat. No
4.]

The weapon itself, upon which it is engraved, IS also noteworthy. As
may be inferred from its colossal size the mace was never intended
for actual use in battle, but was sculptured by Mesilim's orders with
the special object of being dedicated in the temple of the god. It
is decorated with rudely-carved figures of lions, which run around
it and form a single composition in relief. The lions are six in
number, and are represented as pursuing and attacking one another.
Each has seized the hind-leg and the back of the one which precedes
it; they thus form an endless chain around the object, and are a most
effective form of decoration. Unlike the majority of mace-heads, that
of Mesilim is not perforated from top to bottom. The hole for receiving
the handle of the weapon, though deep, is not continued to the top of
the stone, which is carved in low relief with a representation of a
lion-headed eagle with wings outspread and claws extended. Looked at
from above, this fantastic animal appears as an isolated figure, but
it is not to be separated from the lions running round the side of the
mace-head. In fact, we may see in the whole composition a development
of the symbol which formed the arms of the city of Lagash, and was
the peculiar emblem of the city-god Ningirsu.[18] In the latter, the
lion-headed eagle grasps two lions by the back, and in Mesilim's sacred
mace we have the same motive of a lion-headed eagle above lions. It
was, indeed, a peculiarly appropriate votive offering for an overlord
of Lagash to make. As suzerain of Lagash, Mesilim had repaired the
temple of Ningirsu, the city-god; the colossal mace-head, wrought
with a design taken from the emblem of the city and its god, was thus
a fitting object for his inscription. By depositing it in Ningirsu's
temple, he not only sought to secure the favour of the local god by his
piety, but he left in his city a permanent record of his own dominion.

Of Lugal-shag-engur we know as yet nothing beyond his name, and the
fact that he was patesi of Lagash at the time of Mesilim, but the
latter ruler has left a more enduring mark upon history. For a later
patesi of Lagash, Entemena, when giving a historical summary of the
relations which existed between his own city and the neighbouring city
of Umma, begins his account with the period of Mesilim, and furnishes
additional testimony to the part which this early king of Kish played
in the local affairs of southern Babylonia.[19] From Mesilim's own
inscription on the mace-head, we have already seen that he interested
himself in the repair of temples and in fostering the local cults
of cities in the south; from Entemena's record we learn that his
activities also extended to adjusting the political relations between
the separate states. The proximity of Umma to Lagash brought the two
cities into constant rivalry, and, although they were separated by the
Shatt el-Hai,[20] their respective territories were not always confined
to their own sides of the stream. During the reign of Mesilim the
antagonism between the cities came to a head, and, in order to prevent
the outbreak of hostilities, Mesilim stepped in as arbitrator, possibly
at the invitation of the two disputants. The point at issue concerned
the boundary-line between the territories of Lagash and Umma, and
Mesilim, as arbitrator, drew up a treaty of delimitation.

The form in which the record of the treaty is cast is of peculiar
interest, for it forcibly illustrates the theocratic feeling of these
early peoples. It is in accordance with their point of view that the
actual patesis of Lagash and Umma are not named, and the dispute is
regarded as having been adjusted by the gods. The deity who presided
over the conference, and at whose invitation the treaty is stated
to have been made, was Enlil, "the king of the lands." Owing to his
unique position among the local gods of Babylonia, his divine authority
was recognized by the lesser city-gods. Thus it was at his command
that Ningirsu, the god of Lagash, and the city-god of Umma fixed the
boundary. It is true that Mesilim, the King of Kish, is referred to by
name, but he only acted at the word of his own goddess Kadi, and his
duties were confined to making a record of the treaty which the gods
themselves had drawn up. We could not have a more striking instance
of the manner in which the early inhabitants of Babylonia regarded
the city-gods as the actual kings and rulers of their cities. The
human kings and patesis were nothing more than ministers, or agents,
appointed to carry out their will. Thus, when one city made war upon
another, it was because their gods were at feud; the territory of
the city was the property of the city-god, and, when a treaty of
delimitation was proposed, it was naturally the gods themselves who
arranged it and drew up its provisions.

We are enabled to fix approximately the period of Mesilim by this
reference to him upon the cone of Entemena, but we have no such means
of determining the date of another early ruler of the city of Kish,
whose name has been recovered during the American excavations on the
site of Nippur. Three fragments of a vase of dark brown sandstone have
been found there, engraved with an inscription of Utug, an early patesi
of Kish. They are said to have been found in the strata beneath the
chambers of the great temple of Enlil on the south-east side of the
ziggurat, or temple-tower.[21] It would be rash to form any theory as
to the date of the vase solely from the position in which the fragments
are said to have been discovered, but the extremely archaic forms
of the characters of the inscription suggest that it dates from the
earliest period of Babylonian history. Moreover, Utug is termed upon
it patesi, not king, of Kish, suggesting that he ruled at a time when
Kish had not the power and influence it enjoyed under Mesilim. The
hegemony in Sumer and Akkad constantly passed from one city to another,
so that it is possible that Utug should be set after Mesilim, when
the power of Kish had temporarily declined. But as the characters of
Utug's inscription are far more archaic than those of Mesilim, we may
provisionally set him in the period before Kish attained the rank of a
kingdom in place of its patesiate. But how long an interval separated
Utug from Mesilim there is no means of telling.

[Illustration: LIMESTONE FIGURES OF EARLY SUMERIAN RULERS.--_Brit.
Mus., Nos._ 22470 _and_ 90828.]

On the assumption that Utug ruled in this early period, we may see in
the fragments of his vase from Nippur, evidence of the struggles by
which the city of Kish attained the position of supremacy it enjoyed
under Mesilim. For Utug's vase was not carried to Nippur as spoil from
Kish, but was deposited by Utug himself in the temple of Enlil, in
commemoration of a victory he had achieved over the land of Khamazi. We
here learn the name of one of the enemies with whom Kish had to fight
in the early stages of its existence as an independent city-state, and
we may conjecture that many more such battles had to be fought and won
before its influence was felt beyond the boundaries of Akkad by the
Sumerian cities in the south. The fact that after his victory Utug
deposited the vase at Nippur as a thank-offering proves that in his
time the shrine of Enlil was already regarded as the central sanctuary
of Babylonia. Zamama, the god of Kish, had achieved the victory over
Khamazi, but Enlil, as the supreme lord of the world, was entitled
to some recognition and gratitude, and also probably to a share of
the spoil. From one line of the inscription upon Utug's vase we may
perhaps infer that his father's name was Bazuzu, but, as no title
follows the name, he is not to be reckoned as a patesi of Kish. We may
thus conclude that Utug did not succeed his father upon the throne.
Whether he was a usurper or succeeded some other relative, and whether
he followed up his military successes by founding at Kish a powerful
dynasty to which Mesilim may have belonged, are among the questions
which may perhaps be answered as the result of future excavation in
Northern Babylonia.

It is probable that the early supremacy which Kish enjoyed during the
reign of Mesilim continued for some time after his death. At any rate,
the names of two other early rulers of that city are known, and, as
they both bear the title of king, and not patesi, we may conclude that
they lived during a period of the city's prosperity or expansion. The
name of one of these kings, Urzage, occurs upon a broken vase of white
calcite stalagmite, which was found at Nippur, approximately in the
same place as the vase of the patesi Utug.[22] The inscription upon
the vase records the fact that it was dedicated by Urzage to Enlil,
"king of the lands." and his consort Ninlil, "the lady of heaven and
earth." The end of the text is wanting, but we may conjecture that,
like his earlier predecessor Utug, the king dedicated the vase in the
temple of Enlil, at Nippur, in gratitude for some victory over his
enemies. We may thus see in the dedication of the vase further evidence
of the continued prosperity of Kish, though it is clear that it only
maintained its position among the other great cities of the land by
force of arms. The name of the other early king of Kish, Lugal-tarsi,
is known to us from a short inscription upon a small tablet of
lapis-lazuli preserved in the British Museum.[23] The text records the
building of the wall of the enclosure, or outer court, of a temple
dedicated to Anu and the goddess Ninni, but, as its provenance is
unknown, it is impossible to base any argument upon it with reference
to the extent of the influence exerted by Kish during the reign of
Lugal-tarsi.[24] Such are the few facts which have come down to us
with regard to the earliest period of the supremacy of Kish. But the
fortunes of the city were destined to undergo a complete change, in
consequence of the increase in the power of Lagash which took place
during the reign of Eannatum. Before we describe the transfer of power
from the north to Sumer, it will be necessary to retrace our steps to
the point where we left the history of that city, during the time that
Mesilim was ruling in the north.

The names of the successors of Lugal-shag-engur, Mesilim's
contemporary, upon the throne of Lagash have not yet been recovered,
and we do not know how long an interval separated his reign from
that of Ur-Ninâ, the early king of Lagash, from whose time so many
inscriptions and archaeological remains have been recovered at
Tello.[25] It is possible that within this period we should set
another ruler of Lagash, named Badu, to whom reference appears to be
made by Eannatum upon the famous Stele of the Vultures. The passage
occurs in the small fragment that has been preserved of the first
column of the text engraved upon the stele,[26] the following line
containing the title "King of Lagash." The context of the passage is
not preserved, but it is possible that the signs which precede the
title are to be taken as a proper name, and in that case they would
give the name of an early ruler of the city. In favour of this view we
may note that in the text upon an archaic clay tablet found below the
level of Ur-Ninâ s building at Tello[27] the name Badu occurs, and,
although it is not there employed as that of a king or patesi, the
passage may be taken as evidence of the use of Badu as a proper name in
this early age.

Assuming that Badu represents a royal name, it may be inferred from
internal evidence furnished by Eannatum's inscription that he lived
and reigned at some period before Ur-Ninâ. The introductory columns of
Eannatum's text appear to give a brief historical summary concerning
the relations which were maintained between Lagash and the neighbouring
city of Umma in the period anterior to Eannatum's own reign. Now the
second column of the text describes the attitude of Umma to Lagash
in the reign of Akurgal, Ur-Ninâ's son and successor; it is thus a
natural inference that Badu was a still earlier ruler who reigned at
any rate before Ur-Ninâ. Whether he reigned before Lugal-shag-engur
also, there are no data for deciding. It will be noted that Eannatum
calls him "king" of Lagash, not "patesi," but the use of these titles
by Eannatum, as applied to his predecessors, is not consistent, and,
that he should describe Badu as "king," is no proof that Badu himself
claimed that title. But he may have done so, and we may provisionally
place him in the interval between the patesi Lugal-shag-engur and
Ur-Ninâ, who in his numerous texts that have been recovered always
claims the title of "king" in place of "patesi," a fact that suggests
an increase in the power and importance of Lagash.[28] To the same
period we may probably assign Enkhegal, another early king of Lagash,
whose name has been recovered on an archaic tablet of limestone.[29]

It is possible that Ur-Ninâ himself, though not a great soldier, did
something to secure, or at least to maintain, the independence of his
city. In any case, we know that he was the founder of his dynasty, for
to neither his father Gunidu, nor to his grandfather Gursar, does he
ascribe any titular rank. We may assume that he belonged to a powerful
Sumerian family in Lagash, but, whether he obtained the throne by
inheritance from some collateral branch, or secured it as the result
of a revolt within the city, is not recorded. It is strange that in
none of his numerous inscriptions does he lay claim to any conquest
or achievement in the field. Most of his texts, it is true, are of
a dedicatory character, but, to judge from those of other Sumerian
rulers, this fact should not have prevented him from referring to
them, had he any such successes to chronicle. The nearest approach to
a record of a military nature is that he rebuilt the wall of Lagash.
It is therefore clear that, though he may not have embarked on an
aggressive policy, he did not neglect the defence of his own city.
But that appears to have been the extent of his ambition: so long as
the fortifications of the city were intact, and the armed men at her
disposal sufficient for the defence of Lagash herself and her outlying
territory, he did not seek to add to his own renown or to the city's
wealth by foreign conquest. The silence of Entemena with regard to
the relations of Lagash to Umma at this period is not conclusive
evidence that Mesilim's treaty was still in force, or that the peace he
inaugurated had remained unbroken. But Entemena's silence fully accords
with that of Ur-Ninâ himself, and we may infer that, in spite of his
claims to the royal title, he succeeded in avoiding any quarrel with
his city's hereditary foe. Ur-Ninâ's attitude towards the city-state
upon his own immediate borders may be regarded as typical of his policy
as a whole. The onyx bowl which he dedicated to the goddess Bau may
possibly have been part of certain booty won in battle,[30] but his
aim appears to have been to devote his energies to the improvement of
his land and the adornment of his city. It is therefore natural that
his inscriptions[31] should consist of mere catalogues of the names of
temples and other buildings erected during his reign, together with
lists of the statues he dedicated to his gods, and of the canals he cut
in order to increase the material wealth of his people.

But, while Ur-Ninâ's policy appears to have been mainly of a domestic
character, he did not fail to maintain relations with other cities
in the sphere of religious observance. That he should have continued
in active communication with Nippur, as the religious centre of the
whole of Babylonia, is what we might infer from the practice of the
period, and we may probably trace to this fact his dedication to Enlil
of one of the canals which was cut during his reign. A more striking
instance of the deference paid by Ur-Ninâ to the god of another city
may be seen in his relations to Enki, the Sumerian prototype of the
god Ea. When Ur-Ninâ planned the rebuilding of the temple E-ninnû, he
appears to have taken precautions to ensure the success of his scheme
by making a direct appeal to Enki, the city-god of Eridu. On a diorite
plaque that has been found at Tello[32] he records the delivery of his
prayer to Enki, that in his character of Chief Diviner he should use
his pure reed, the wand of his divination, to render the work good and
should pronounce a favourable oracle. The temple of Enki in the city
of Eridu, near the shore of the Persian Gulf, was one of the earliest
and most sacred of Sumerian shrines, and we may perhaps picture Ur-Ninâ
as journeying thither from Lagash, in order to carry his petition in
person into the presence of its mysterious god.

Of the deities of Lagash to whose service Ur-Ninâ appears especially
to have devoted himself, the goddess Ninâ, whose name he bore within
his own, was one of the most favoured. For one of the chief claims to
distinction that he puts forward is that he built her temple at Lagash;
and although, unlike the later great builder Gudea, he gives in his
inscriptions few details of his work, we may conclude that he lavished
his resources upon it. He also boasts that he made a statue of Ninâ,
which he no doubt set up within her temple, and one of his canals he
dedicated to her. Her daughter Ninmar was not neglected, for he records
that he built her temple also, and he erected a temple for Gatumdug,
Ninâ's intercessor, and fashioned a statue of her. Another group of
Ur-Ninâ's buildings was connected with the worship of Ningirsu, the
city-god of Lagash, whose claims a ruler, so devoted to the interests
of his own city as Ur-Ninâ, would naturally not have ignored.

A glance at his texts will show that Ur-Ninâ more than once describes
himself as the builder of "the House of Girsu," a title by which he
refers to E-ninnû, the great temple dedicated to Ningirsu, since it
stood in that quarter of the city which was named Girsu and was by
far its most important building.[33] He also built E-pa, a sanctuary
closely connected with E-ninnû and the worship of Ningirsu. This temple
was added to at a later date by Gudea, who installed therein his
patron god, Ningishzida, and set the nuptial gifts of Bau, Ningirsu's
consort, within its shrine; it is possible that Ur-Ninâ's onyx bowl,
which was dedicated to Bau, and the fragments of other bowls found
with it,[34] were deposited by Ur-Ninâ in the same temple. Of other
deities in Ningirsu's entourage, whom Ur-Ninâ singled out for special
veneration, may be mentioned Dunshagga, Ningirsu's son, and Uri-zi, the
god whose duty it was to look after Ningirsu's _harîm_. Among lesser
temples, or portions of temples, which were built or restored by him
was the Tirash, where on the day of the New Moon's appearance it was
the custom to hold a festival in honour of Ningirsu; while another act
of piety which Ur-Ninâ records was the making of a statue of Lugal-uru,
the god from whose festival one of the Sumerian months took its name.
In this connection, mention may also be made of the god Dun-...,[35]
whom Ur-Ninâ describes as the "God-king," since he stood in a peculiar
relation to Ur-Ninâ and his family. He became the patron deity of the
dynasty which Ur-Ninâ founded, and, down to the reign of Enannatum II.,
was the personal protector of the reigning king or patesi of Lagash.[36]

For the construction of his temples Ur-Ninâ states that he fetched
wood from the mountains, but unlike Gudea in a later age, he is not
recorded to have brought in his craftsmen from abroad. In addition
to the building of temples, Ur-Ninâ's other main activity appears
to have centred in the cutting of canals; among these was the canal
named Asukhur, on the banks of which his grandson Eannatum won a
battle. That the changes he introduced into the canalization of the
country were entirely successful may be inferred from the numerous
storehouses and magazines, which he records he built in connection
with the various temples,[37] and by his statement that when he added
to the temple of Ningirsu he stored up large quantities of grain
within the temple-granaries. In fact, from the inscriptions he has
left us, Ur-Ninâ appears as a pacific monarch devoted to the worship
of his city-gods and to the welfare of his own people. His ambitions
lay within his own borders, and, when he had secured his frontier, he
was content to practise the arts of peace. It was doubtless due to
this wise and far-seeing policy that the resources of the city were
husbanded, so that under his more famous grandson she was enabled
to repel the attack of enemies and embark upon a career of foreign
conquest. Ur-Ninâ's posthumous fame is evidence that his reign was a
period of peace and prosperity for Lagash. His great-grandson Entemena
boasts of being his descendant, and ascribes to him the title of King
of Lagash which he did not claim either for himself or for his father
Enannatum I., while even in the reign of Lugal-anda offerings continued
to be made in connection with his statue in Lagash.[38]

We are not dependent solely on what we can gather from the inscriptions
themselves for a knowledge of Ur-Ninâ. For he has left us sculptured
representations, not only of himself, but also of his sons and
principal officers, from which we may form a very clear picture of the
primitive conditions of life obtaining in Sumer at the time of this
early ruler. The sculptures take the form of limestone plaques, roughly
carved in low relief with figures of Ur-Ninâ surrounded by his family
and his court.[39] The plaques are oblong in shape, with the corners
slightly rounded, and in the centre of each is bored a circular hole.
Though they are obviously of a votive character, the exact object for
which they are intended is not clear at first sight. It has been, and
indeed is still, conjectured that the plaques were fixed vertically to
the walls of shrines,[40] but this explanation has been discredited by
the discovery of the plaque, or rather block, of Dudu, the priest of
Ningirsu during the reign of Entemena. From the shape of the latter,
the reverse of which is not flat but pyramidal, and also from the
inscription upon it, we gather that the object of these perforated
bas-reliefs was to form horizontal supports for ceremonial mace-heads
or sacred emblems, which were dedicated as votive offerings in the
temples of the gods.[41] The great value of those of Ur-Ninâ consists
in the vivid pictures they give us of royal personages and high
officials at this early period.

[Illustration: PLAQUE OF UR-NINA, KING OF SHIRPURLA, ENGRAVED WITH
REPRESENTATIONS OF THE KING AND HIS FAMILY--_In the Louvre; Déc. en
Chald., pl._ 2 (_bis_).]

[Illustration: PLAQUE OF DUDU, PRIEST OF NINGIRSU DURING THE REIGN OF
ENTEMENA, PATESI OF SHIRPURLA.--_In the Louvre; Déc. en Chald., pl._ 5
(_bis_).]

The largest of the plaques[42] is sculptured with two separate scenes,
in each of which Ur-Ninâ is represented in a different attitude and
with a different occupation, while around him stand his sons and
ministers. In the upper scene the king is standing; he is nude down
to the waist and his feet are bare, while around his loins he wears
the rough woollen garment of the period,[43] and upon his shaven head
he supports a basket which he steadies with his right hand. The text
engraved beside the king, in addition to giving his name and genealogy,
records that he has built the temple of Ningirsu, the abzu-banda which
was probably a great laver or basin intended for the temple-service,
and the temple of Ninâ; and it has been suggested that the king is
here portrayed bearing a basket of offerings to lay before his god or
goddess. But the basket he carries is exactly similar to those borne by
labourers for heaping earth upon the dead as represented upon the Stele
of the Vultures,[44] and baskets have always been used in the east by
labourers and builders for carrying earth and other building-materials.
It is therefore more probable that the king is here revealed in the
character of a labourer bearing materials for the construction of the
temples referred to in the text. The same explanation applies to the
copper votive figures of a later period which are represented bearing
baskets on their heads. In a similar spirit Gudea has left us statues
of himself as an architect, holding tablet and rule; Ur-Ninâ represents
himself in the still more humble rôle of a labourer engaged in the
actual work of building the temple for his god.

Behind the king is a little figure intended for the royal cup-bearer,
Anita, and facing him are five of his children. It is usually held
that the first of these figures, who bears the name of Lidda and is
clothed in a more elaborate dress than the other four, is intended for
the king's eldest son.[45] But in addition to the distinctive dress,
this figure is further differentiated from the others by wearing long
hair in place of having the head shaved. In this respect it bears
some resemblance to an archaic statuette, which appears to be that
of a woman;[46] and the sign attached to Lidda's name, engraved upon
the stone, is possibly that for "daughter," not "son." It is thus
not unlikely that we should identify the figure with a daughter of
Ur-Ninâ. The other figures in the row are four of the king's sons,
named Akurgal, Lugal-ezen, Anikurra and Muninnikurta. A curious point
that may be noted is that the height of these figures increases as
they recede from the king. Thus the first of the small figures, that
of Akurgal, who succeeded Ur-Ninâ upon the throne, is represented as
smaller than his brothers, and it has been suggested in consequence
that he was not the king's eldest son,[47] a point to which we will
return later. In the scene sculptured upon the lower half of the plaque
the king is represented as seated upon a throne and raising in his
right hand a cup from which he appears to be pouring a libation. We may
probably see in this group a picture of the king dedicating the temple
after the task of building was finished. The inscription records the
fact that he had brought wood from the mountains, doubtless employed
in the construction of the temples, a detail which emphasises the
difficulties he had overcome. The cup-bearer who stands behind the
throne is in this scene, not Anita, but Sagantug, while the figure
facing the king is a high official named Dudu, and to the left of Dudu
are three more of the king's sons named Anunpad, Menudgid, and Addatur.

[Illustration: Fig 43.--Early Sumerian figure of a women, showing the
Sumerian dress and the method of doing the hair.--_Déc., pl_ 1 _ter_,
No 3.]

A smaller plaque, rather more oval in shape than the large one
figured on the plate facing p. 110, but like it in a perfect state of
preservation, gives a similar scene, though with less elaboration of
detail. According to its inscription this tablet also commemorates
the building of Ningirsu's temple. Here the king carries no basket,
but is represented as standing with hands clasped upon the breast,
an attitude of humility and submission in the presence of his god.
In other respects both the king and the smaller figures of his sons
and ministers are conceived as on the larger plaque. A small figure
immediately behind the king is Anita, the cup-bearer, and to the
left of Anita are the king's son Akurgal and a personage bearing
the name Barsagannudu. In the upper row are two other small figures
named Lugal-ezen and Gula. Now from the largest plaque we know
that Lugal-ezen was a son of Ur-Ninâ; thus the absence of such a
description from Gula and Barsagannudu is not significant, and it is
a fair assumption that both these, like Lugal-ezen, were sons of the
king. But it is noteworthy that of the four figures the only one that
is specifically described as a "son" of Ur-Ninâ is Akurgal.

[Illustration: Plaque of Ur-Ninâ, King of Lagash (Shirpurla),
sculptured with representations of himself, his cup-bearer, Anita, and
four of his sons.--_Déc., pl._ 2 _bis_, No. 2; Cat. No. 9.]

Another of Ur-Ninâ's plaques is not completely preserved, for the right
half is wanting upon which was the figure, or possibly two figures, of
the king. On the portion that has been recovered are sculptured two
rows of figures, both facing the right. The first in the lower row is
Anita, the cup-bearer; then comes a high official named Banar; then
Akurgal, distinguished by the title of "son," and on the extreme left
Namazua, the scribe. Of the four figures preserved in the upper row,
the two central ones are Lugal-ezen and Muninnikurta, both of whom bear
the title of "son," as on the largest of the three plaques. The reading
of the names upon the figures on the right and left is uncertain, but
they are probably intended for officials of the court. The one on the
left of the line is of some interest, for he carries a staff upon his
left shoulder from which hangs a bag. We may perhaps regard him as the
royal chamberlain, who controlled the supplies of the palace; or his
duty may have been to look after the provisions and accommodation for
the court, should the king ever undertake a journey from one city to
another.[48]

[Illustration: Fig 45.--Portion of a plaque of Ur-Ninâ, King of Lagash
(Shirpurla), sculptured with representations of his sons and the high
officials of his court.--_Déc., pl._ 2 _ter_, No. 1; in the Imperial
Ottoman Museum.]

While Ur-Ninâ's sons upon the smaller plaques are all roughly of the
same size, we have noted that the similar figures upon the largest
plaque vary slightly in height. It has been suggested that the
intention of the sculptor was to indicate the difference in age between
the brothers, and in consequence it has been argued that Akurgal,
who succeeded Ur-Ninâ upon the throne of Lagash, was his fifth, and
not his eldest, son. This inference has further been employed to
suggest that after Ur-Ninâ's death there may have followed a period of
weakness within the state of Lagash, due to disunion among his sons;
and during the supposed struggle for the succession it is conjectured
that the city may have been distracted by internal conflicts, and, in
consequence, was unable to maintain her independence as a city-state,
which she only succeeded in recovering in the reign of Eannatum, the
son and successor of Akurgal.[49] But a brief examination of the theory
will show that there is little to be said for it, and it is probable
that the slight difference in the height of the figures is fortuitous
and unconnected with their respective ages. It may be admitted that a
good deal depends upon the sex of Lidda, who, on the largest plaque,
faces the standing figure of Ur-Ninâ. If this is intended for a son of
the king, his richer clothing marks him out as the crown-prince; but,
even so, we may suppose that Akurgal was Ur-Ninâ's second son, and that
he succeeded to the throne in consequence of Lidda having predeceased
his father. But reasons have already been adduced for believing that
Lidda was a daughter, not a son, of Ur-Ninâ. In that case Akurgal
occupies the place of honour among his brothers in standing nearest
the king. He is further differentiated from them by the cup which he
carries; in fact, he here appears as cup-bearer to Lidda, the office
performed by Anita and Saguntug for the king.

That the crown-prince should be here represented as attending his
sister may appear strange, but, in view of our imperfect knowledge
of this early period, the suggestion should not be dismissed solely
on that account. Indeed, the class of temple votaries, who enjoyed
a high social position under the Semitic kings of the First Dynasty
of Babylon, probably had its counterpart at the centres of Sumerian
worship in still earlier times; and there is evidence that at the time
of the First Dynasty, the order included members of the royal house.
Moreover, tablets dating from the close of Ur-Ninâ's dynasty show the
important part which women played in the social and official life of
the early Sumerians.[50] Thus it is possible that Ur-Ninâ's daughter
held high rank or office in the temple hierarchy, and her presence
on the plaque may have reference to some special ceremony, or act of
dedication, in which it was her privilege to take the leading part
after the king, or to be his chief assistant. In such circumstances it
would not be unnatural for her eldest brother to attend her. In both
the other compositions Lidda is absent, and Akurgal occupies the place
of honour. In the one he stands on a line with the king immediately
behind the royal cup-bearer, and he is the only royal son who is
specifically labelled as such; in the other he is again on a line with
the king, separated from Anita, the cup-bearer, by a high officer of
state, and followed by the royal scribe. In these scenes he is clearly
set in the most favoured position, and, if Lidda was not his sister but
the crown-prince, it would be hard to explain the latter's absence,
except on the supposition that his death had occurred before the
smaller plaques were made. But the texts upon all three plaques record
the building of Ningirsu's temple, and they thus appear to have been
prepared for the same occasion, which gives additional weight to the
suggestion that Lidda was a daughter of Ur-Ninâ, and that Akurgal was
his eldest son.

But, whether Akurgal was Ur-Ninâ's eldest son or not, the evidence of
at least the smaller of the two complete plaques would seem to show
that he was recognized as crown-prince during the lifetime of his
father, and we may infer that he was Ur-Ninâ's immediate successor.
For an estimate of his reign we must depend on references made to him
by his two sons. It has already been mentioned that the early part of
the text engraved upon the Stele of the Vultures appears to have given
an account of the relations between Lagash and Umma during the reigns
preceding that of Eannatum,[51] and in a badly preserved passage in
the second column we find a reference to Akurgal, the son of Ur-Ninâ.
The context is broken, but "the men of Umma" and "the city of Lagash"
are mentioned almost immediately before the name of Akurgal,[52] and
it would appear that Eannatum here refers to a conflict which took
place between the two cities during the former's reign. It should be
noted that upon his Cone[53] Entemena makes no mention of any war at
this period, and, as in the case of Ur-Ninâ's reign, his silence might
be interpreted as an indication of unbroken peace. But the narratives
may be reconciled on the supposition either that the conflict in
the reign of Akurgal was of no great importance, or that it did not
concern the fertile plain of Gu-edin. It must be remembered that the
text upon the Cone of Entemena was composed after the stirring times
of Eannatum, Entemena's uncle, and the successes won by that monarch
against Umma were naturally of far greater importance in his eyes than
the lesser conflicts of his predecessors. It is true that he describes
the still earlier intervention of Mesilim in the affairs of Lagash
and Umma, but this is because the actual stele or boundary-stone set
up by Mesilim was removed by the men of Umma in Eannatum's reign, an
act which provoked the war. The story of Mesilim's intervention, which
resulted in the setting up of the boundary-stone, thus forms a natural
introduction to the record of Eannatum's campaign; and the fact that
these two events closely follow one another in Entemena's text is not
inconsistent with a less important conflict being recorded by the Stele
of the Vultures as having taken place in the reign of Akurgal.

The only other evidence with regard to the achievements of Akurgal
is furnished by the titles ascribed to him by his two sons. Upon
the Stele of the Vultures,[54] Eannatum describes him as "king" of
Lagash, and from this passage alone it might be inferred that he was
as successful as his father Ur-Ninâ in maintaining the independence
of his city. But in other texts upon foundation-stones, bricks, and a
small column, Eannatum describes him only as "patesi," as also does
his other son Enannatum I. It should be noted that in the majority
of his inscriptions Eannatum claims for himself the title of patesi,
and at the end of one of them, in which he has enumerated a long list
of his own conquests, he exclaims, "He (_i.e._ Eannatum) is the son
of Akurgal, the patesi of Lagash, and his grandfather is Ur-Ninâ,
the patesi of Lagash."[55] That he should term Ur-Ninâ "patesi" does
not accord with that ruler's own texts, but, if Eannatum himself had
been merely a patesi at the beginning of his reign, and his father
had also been one before him, he may well have overlooked the more
ambitious title to which his grandfather had laid claim, especially
as this omission would enhance the splendour of his own achievements.
It is also possible that at this time the distinction between the two
titles was not so strictly drawn as in the later periods, and that
an alteration in them did not always mark a corresponding political
change.[56] However this may be, the subsequent conflicts of Eannatum
suggest that Lagash had failed to maintain her freedom. We may assume
that the North had once more interfered in the affairs of Sumer, and
that Kish had put an end to the comparative independence which the city
had enjoyed during Ur-Ninâ's reign.


[1] For an account of the excavations at Nippur and their results, see
Hilprecht, "Explorations in Bible Lands," pp. 289 ff., and Fisher,
"Excavations at Nippur," Pt. I. (1905), Pt. II. (1900).

[2] At a later period this was converted into a Parthian fortress.

[3] See the plan of Tello on p. 19.

[4] For example, compare the orientation of Enlil's temple on p. 88.

[5] It has been compared to the granaries of Egypt as depicted in
wall-paintings or represented by models placed in the tombs; cf.
Heuzey, "Une Villa royale chaldéenne,"--p. 9 f.

[6] See H, H on plan.

[7] See above, p. 45 f.

[8] Cf. Heuzey, "Une Villa royale," p. 24.

[9] Cf. Thureau-Dangin, "Recueil de tablettes chaldéennes," p. i. f.,
Nos. 1 ff., 9 ff., and "Rev. d'Assyr.," VI., pp. 11 ff.

[10] See below, Chap. VII., p. 206 f.

[11] Cf. Heuzey and Thureau-Dangin, "Comptes rendus de l'Acad. des
Inscriptions," 1907, pp. 516 ff. The head of the figure had been found
many years before by M. de Sarzec, and was published in "Déc. en
Chald.," p. 6 _ter_, Figs. 1 _a_ and _b_.

[12] Cf. Meyer, "Sum. und Sem.," p. 81, n. 2.

[13] Cf. Banks, "Scientific American," Aug. 19, 1905, p. 137, and
"Amer. Journ. Semit. Lang.," XXI., p. 59.

[14] "Déc. en Chald.," pl. 5, No. 3.

[15] See the plate opposite p. 102. The king of Ma'er's figure is the
one on the right.

[16] Cf. Hilprecht, "Old Bab. Inscr.," II., pl. 44, No. 96, and
Thureau-Dangin, "Königsinschriften," p. 158 f.

[17] See Heuzey, "Revue d'Assyr.," IV., p. 109; cf.
"Königsinschriften," p>. 160 f.

[18] See the blocks on p. 98. A variant form of the emblem occurs on
the perforated block of Dudu (see the plate facing p. 110). There the
lions turn to bite the spread wings of the eagle, indicating that the
emblem is symbolical of strife ending in the victory of Lagash (cf.
Heuzey, "Cat.," p. 121).

[19] See the Cone of Entemena, "Déc. en Chald.," p. xlvii.;
and cf. Thureau-Dangin, "Rev. d'Assyr.," IV., pp. 37 ff., and
"Königsinschriften," pp. 36 ff. Entemena's sketch of the early
relations of Lagash and Umma precedes his account of his own conquest
of the latter city; see below, p. 164 f.

[20] See above, pp. 11, 21 f.

[21] See Hilprecht, "Old Babylonian Inscriptions," Pt. II., p. 62, pl.
46, No. 108 f., and Pt. I., p. 47.

[22] See Hilprecht, _op. cit._, Pt. II., p. 51, pl. 43, No. 93;
cf. Winckler, "Altorientalische Forschungen," I., p. 372 f., and
Thureau-Dangin, "Königsinschriften," p. 160 f.

[23] See "Cuneiform Texts in the British Museum," Pt. III., pl.
1, and cf. Thureau-Dangin, "Rev. d'Assyr.," IV., p. 74, and
"Königsinschriften," p. 160 f. For a photographic reproduction of the
tablet, see the plate facing p. 218.

[24] Since the central cult of Ninni and of Anu was at Erech, it is
possible that Lugal-tarsi's dedication implies the subjection of Erech
to Kish at this period.

[25] See above, pp. 91 ff.

[26] "Déc. en Chaldée," p. xl.; cf. Thureau-Dangin,
"Königsinschriften," p. 10 f.

[27] See Thureau-Dangin, "Recueil de tablettes chaldéennes," p. 1, pl.
1, No. 1.

[28] It has been suggested that the title lugal, "king," did
not acquire its later significance until the age of Sargon
(Shar-Gani-sharri), but that it was used by earlier rulers as
the equivalent of the Semitic belu, "lord" (cf. Ungnad, "Orient.
Lit.-Zeit.," 1908, col. 64, n. 5). But, in view of the fact that
Mesilim bore the title, it would seem that in his time it already
conveyed a claim to greater authority than that inherent in the word
patesi. The latter title was of a purely religious origin; when borne
by a ruler it designated him as the representative of his city-god, but
the title "king" was of a more secular character, and connoted a wider
dominion. But it must be admitted that some inconsistencies in the use
of the titles by members of Ur-Ninâ's dynasty seem to suggest that
the distinction between them was not quite so marked as in the later
periods.

[29] See Hilprecht, "Zeits. für Assyr.," XI., p. 330 f.; and
Thureau-Dangin, _op. cit._, XV., p. 403.

[30] See Heuzey, "Rev. d'Assyr.," IV., p. 106. A fragment of a similar
bowl, probably of the same early period, is definitely stated in the
inscription upon it to have been set aside for Bau as a part of certain
spoil.

[31] They are collected and translated by Thureau-Dangin,
"Königsinschriften," pp. 2 ff.

[32] "Découvertes en Chaldée," p. xxxvii., No. 10.

[33] See above, p. 90 f. Other divisions of Lagash were Ninâ,
Uru-azagga and Uru.

[34] See above, p. 107.

[35] The reading of the second half of the name is uncertain. The two
signs which form the name were provisionally read by Amiaud as Dun-sir
("Records of the Past," N.S., I., p. 59), and by Jensen as Shul-gur
(cf. Schrader's "Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek," Bd. III., Hft. 1, p.
18 f.); see also Thureau-Dangin, "Rev. d'Assyr." III., p. 119, n. 5,
and Radau, "Early Bab. Hist.," p. 92, n. 18.

[36] See below, pp. 168 f., 177.

[37] For a description of his principal storehouse or magazine, the
remains of which have been found at Tello, see above, pp. 91 ff.

[38] See below, p. 169.

[39] See the opposite plate and the illustrations on p. 113 f.

[40] Cf. Meyer, "Sumerier und Semiten," p. 77.

[41] Dudu's block was probably let into solid masonry or brickwork,
while the plaques of Ur-Ninâ would have rested on the surface of altars
built of brick; cf. Heuzey, "Découvertes en Chaldée," p. 204.

[42] See the plate opposite p. 110.

[43] See above, p. 41 f.

[44] See the plate opposite p. 138.

[45] So, for instance, Radau, "Early Bab. History," p. 70.

[46] The figure, which is in the Louvre, was not found at Tello, but
was purchased at Shatra, so that its provenance is not certain.

[47] See Radau, _op. cit._, p. 70, and cp. Genouillac, "Tablettes
sumériennes archaïques," p. xi.

[48] See the similar figure on a fragment of shell, illustrated on p.
41.

[49] Cf. Radau, "Early Bab. History," p. 71.

[50] Cf. Genouillac, "Tablettes sumériennes archaïques," pp. xxii. ff.

[51] See above, p. 105.

[52] "Déc. en Chaldée," p. xl., Col. II.

[53] _Op. cit._, p. xlvii.

[54] Col. II., l. 9.

[55] "Déc. en Chaldée," p. xliii., Col. VIII.

[56] See above, p. 106, n. 1.




CHAPTER V


WARS OF THE CITY-STATES; EANNATUM AND THE STELE OF THE VULTURES


When the patesiate of Lagash passed from Akurgal to his son Eannatum
we may picture the city-state as owing a general allegiance to Akkad
in the north. Nearer home, the relations of Lagash to Umma appear to
have been of an amicable character. Whatever minor conflicts may have
taken place between the two cities in the interval, the treaty of
Mesilim was still regarded as binding, and its terms were treated with
respect by both parties. The question whether Eannatum, like Akurgal,
had had some minor cause of disagreement with the men of Umma at the
beginning of his reign depends upon our interpretation of some broken
passages in the early part of the text engraved upon the Stele of the
Vultures.[1] The second column deals with the relations of Umma and
Lagash during the reign of Akurgal, and the fourth column concerns the
reign of Eannatum. The name of neither of these rulers is mentioned
in the intermediate portion of the text, which, however, refers to
Umma and Lagash in connection with a shrine or chapel dedicated to the
god Ningirsu. It is possible that we have here a continuation of the
narrative of the preceding column, and in that case we should assign
this portion of the text to the reign of Akurgal, rather than to the
early part of the reign of his successor. But it may equally well refer
to Eannatum's own reign, and may either record a minor cause of dispute
between the cities which was settled before the outbreak of the great
war, or may perhaps be taken in connection with the following columns
of the text.

These two columns definitely refer to Eannatum's reign and describe
certain acts of piety which he performed in the service of his gods.
They record work carried out in E-ninnû, by which the heart of
Ningirsu was rejoiced; the naming and dedication of some portion of
E-anna, the temple of the goddess Ninni; and certain additions made
to the sacred flocks of the goddess Ninkharsag. The repetition of the
phrase referring to Ninni's temple[2] suggests a disconnected list
of Eannatum's achievements in the service of his gods, rather than a
connected narrative. The text in the fifth column continues the record
of the benefits bestowed by him upon Ningirsu, and here we may perhaps
trace a possible cause of the renewal of the war with Umma. For the
text states that Eannatum bestowed certain territory upon Ningirsu and
rejoiced his heart; and, unless this refers to land occupied after
the defeat of Umma, its acquisition may have been resented by the
neighbouring city. Such an incident would have formed ample excuse for
the invasion of the territory of Lagash by the injured party, though,
according to the records of Eannatum himself and of Entemena, it would
appear that the raid of the men of Umma was unprovoked. But, whatever
may have been the immediate cause of the outbreak of hostilities, we
shall see reason for believing that the war was ultimately due to the
influence of Kish.

The outbreak of the war between Umma and Lagash is recorded concisely
in the sixth column of the inscription upon the Stele of the Vultures,
which states that the patesi of Umma, by the command of his god,
plundered[3] Gu-edin, the territory beloved of Ningirsu. In this
record, brief as it is, it is interesting to note that the patesi of
Umma is regarded as no more than the instrument of his city-god, or
the minister who carries out his commands. As the gods in a former
generation had drawn up the treaty between Lagash and Umma, which
Mesilim, their suzerain, had at the command of his own goddess engraved
upon the stele of delimitation, so now it was the god, and not the
patesi, of Umma, who repudiated the terms of that treaty by sending
his army across the border. Gu-edin, too, is described, not in its
relation to the patesi of Lagash, but as the special property of
Ningirsu, the opposing city-god. We shall see presently that Eannatum's
first act, on hearing news of the invasion, was quite in harmony with
the theocratic feeling of the time.

The patesi who led the forces of Umma is not named by Eannatum upon the
Stele of the Vultures, but from the Cone of Entemena[4] we learn that
his name was Ush. In the summary of events which is given upon that
document it is stated that Ush, patesi of Umma, acted with ambitious
designs, and that, having removed the stele of delimitation which had
been set up in an earlier age by Mesilim between the territories of the
respective states, he invaded the plain of Lagash. The pitched battle
between the forces of Umma and Lagash, which followed the raid into the
latter's territory, is recorded by Entemena in equally brief terms. The
battle is said to have taken place at the word of Ningirsu, the warrior
of Enlil, and the destruction of the men of Umma is ascribed not only
to the command, but also to the actual agency, of Enlil himself. Here,
again, we find Enlil, the god of the central cult of Nippur, recognized
as the supreme arbiter of human and divine affairs. The various
city-gods might make war on one another, but it was Enlil who decreed
to which side victory should incline.

In the record of the war which Eannatum himself has left us, we are
furnished with details of a more striking character than those given
in Entemena's brief summary. In the latter it is recorded that the
battle was waged at the word of Ningirsu, and the Stele of the Vultures
amplifies this bald statement by describing the circumstances which
attended the notification of the divine will. On learning of the
violation of his border by the men of Umma and the plundering of his
territory which had ensued, Eannatum did not at once summon his troops
and lead them in pursuit of the enemy. There was indeed little danger
in delay, and no advantage to be gained by immediate action. For Umma,
from its proximity to Lagash, afforded a haven for the plunderers
which they could reach in safety before the forces of Lagash could be
called to arms. Thus Eannatum had no object in hurrying out his army,
when there was little chance of overtaking the enemy weighed down with
spoil. Moreover, all the damage that could be done to Gu-edin had no
doubt been done thoroughly by the men of Umma. In addition to carrying
off Mesilim's stele, they had probably denuded the pastures of all
flocks and cattle, had trampled the crops, and had sacked and burnt
the villages and hamlets through which they had passed. When once
they and their plunder were safe within their own border, they were
not likely to repeat the raid at once. They might be expected to take
action to protect their own territory, but the next move obviously lay
with Lagash. In these circumstances Eannatum had no object in attacking
before his army was ready for the field, and his preparations for war
had been completed; and while the streets of Lagash were doubtless
re-echoing with the blows of the armourers and the tramp of armed men,
the city-gates must have been thronged with eager groups of citizens,
awaiting impatiently the return of scouts sent out after the retreating
foe. Meanwhile, we may picture Eannatum repairing to the temple of
Ningirsu, where, having laid his complaint before him, he awaited the
god's decision as to the course his patesi and his people should follow
under the provocation to which they had been subjected.

It is not directly stated in the text as preserved upon the stele
that it was within E-ninnû Eannatum sought Ningirsu's counsel and
instructions; but we may assume that such was the case, since the god
dwelt within his temple, and it was there the patesi would naturally
seek him out. The answer of the god to Eannatum's prayer was conveyed
to him in a vision; Ningirsu himself appeared to the patesi, as he
appeared in a later age to Gudea, when he gave the latter ruler
detailed instructions for the rebuilding of E-ninnû, and granted him
a sign by which he should know that he was chosen for the work. Like
Gudea, Eannatum made his supplication lying flat upon his face; and,
while he was stretched out upon the ground, he had a dream. In his
dream he beheld the god Ningirsu, who appeared to him in visible form
and came near him and stood by his head. And the god encouraged his
patesi and promised him victory over his enemies. He was to go forth to
battle and Babbar, the Sun-god who makes the city bright, would advance
at his right hand to assist him. Thus encouraged by Ningirsu, and with
the knowledge that he was carrying out the orders of his city-god,
Eannatum marshalled his army and set out from Lagash to attack the men
of Umma within their own territory.

The account of the battle is very broken upon the Stele of the
Vultures,[5] but sufficient details are preserved to enable us to
gather that it was a fierce one, and that victory was wholly upon the
side of Lagash. We may conjecture that the men of Umma did not await
Eannatum's attack behind their city-walls, but went out to meet him
with the object of preventing their own fields and pastures from being
laid waste. Every man capable of bearing arms, who was not required for
the defence of two cities, was probably engaged in the battle, and the
two opposing armies were doubtless led in person by Eannatum himself
and by Ush, the patesi of Umma, who had provoked the war. The army of
Lagash totally defeated the men of Umma and pursued them with great
slaughter. Eannatum puts the number of the slain at three thousand six
hundred men, or, according to a possible reading, thirty-six thousand
men. Even the smaller of these figures is probably exaggerated, but
there is no doubt that Umma suffered heavily. According to his own
account, Eannatum took an active part in the fight, and he states that
he raged in the battle. After defeating the army in the open plain,
the troops of Lagash pressed on to Umma itself. The fortifications had
probably been denuded of their full garrisons, and were doubtless held
by a mere handful of defenders. Flushed with victory the men of Lagash
swept on to the attack, and, carrying the walls by assault, had the
city itself at their mercy. Here another slaughter took place, and
Eannatum states that within the city he swept all before him "like an
evil storm."

[Illustration: PORTION OF THE "STELE OF VULTURES," SCULPTURED WITH
SCENES REPRESENTING EANNATUM, PATESI OF SHIRPURLA, LEADING HIS TROOPS
IN BATTLE AND ON THE MARCH.--_In the Louvre; Déc. en Chald., pl._ 3
(_bis_).]

The record of his victory which Eannatum has left us is couched in
metaphor, and is doubtless coloured by Oriental exaggeration; and the
scribes who drew it up would naturally be inclined to represent the
defeat of Umma as even more crushing than it was. Thus the number of
burial-mounds suggests that the forces of Lagash suffered heavily
themselves, and it is quite possible the remnant of Umma's army rallied
and made a good fight within the city. But we have the independent
testimony of Entemena's record, written not many years after the fight,
to show that there is considerable truth under Eannatum's phrases; and
a clear proof that Umma was rendered incapable of further resistance
for the time may be seen in the terms of peace which Lagash imposed.
Eannatum's first act, after he had received the submission of the city,
was to collect for burial the bodies of his own dead which strewed
the field of battle. Those of the enemy he would probably leave where
they fell, except such as blocked the streets of Umma, and these he
would remove and cast out in the plain beyond the city-walls. For we
may conclude that, like Entemena, Eannatum left the bones of his foes
to be picked clean by the birds and beasts of prey. The monument on
which we have his record of the fight is known as the Stele of the
Vultures from the vultures sculptured upon the upper portion of it.
These birds of prey are represented as swooping off with the heads and
limbs of the slain, which they hold firmly in their beaks and talons.
That the sculptor should have included this striking incident in his
portrayal of the battle is further testimony to the magnitude of the
slaughter which had taken place. That Eannatum duly buried his own dead
is certain, for both he and Entemena state that the burial-mounds which
he heaped up were twenty in number; and two other sculptured portions
of the Stele of the Vultures, to which we shall presently refer, give
vivid representations of the piling of the mounds above the dead.

The fate of Ush, the patesi of Umma, who had brought such misfortune
on his own city by the rash challenge he had given Lagash, is not
recorded; but it is clear he did not remain the ruler of Umma. He
may have been slain in the battle, but, even if he survived, he was
certainly deprived of his throne, possibly at the instance of Eannatum.
For Entemena records the fact that it was not with Ush, but with a
certain Enakalli, patesi of Umma, that Eannatum concluded a treaty of
peace.[6] The latter ruler may have been appointed patesi by Eannatum
himself, as, at a later day, Ili owed his nomination to Entemena on
the defeat of the patesi Urlumma. But, whether this was so or not,
Enakalli was certainly prepared to make great concessions, and was
ready to accept whatever terms Eannatum demanded, in order to secure
the removal of the troops of Lagash from his city, which they doubtless
continued to invest during the negotiations. As might be expected, the
various terms of the treaty are chiefly concerned with the fertile
plain of Gu-edin, which had been the original cause of the war. This
was unreservedly restored to Lagash, or, in the words of the treaty, to
Ningirsu, whose "beloved territory" it is stated to have been. In order
that there should be no cause for future dispute with regard to the
boundary-line separating the territory of Lagash and Umma, a deep ditch
was dug as a permanent line of demarcation. The ditch is described as
extending "from the great stream" up to Gu-edin, and with the great
stream we may probably identify an eastern branch of the Euphrates,
through which at this period it emptied a portion of its waters into
the Persian Gulf. The ditch, or canal, received its water from the
river, and, by surrounding the unprotected sides of Gu-edin, it formed
not only a line of demarcation but to some extent a barrier to any
hostile advance on the part of Umma.

On the bank of the frontier-ditch the stele of Mesilim, which had been
taken away, was erected once more, and another stele was prepared by
the orders of Eannatum, and was set up beside it. The second monument
was inscribed with the text of the treaty drawn up between Eannatum and
Enakalli, and its text was probably identical with the greater part of
that found upon the fragments of the Stele of the Vultures, which have
been recovered; for the contents of that text mark it out as admirably
suited to serve as a permanent memorial of the boundary. After the
historical narrative describing the events which led up to the new
treaty, the text of the Stele of the Vultures enumerates in detail the
divisions of the territory of which Gu-edin was composed. Thus the
stele which was set up on the frontier formed in itself an additional
security against the violation of the territory of Lagash. The course
of a boundary-ditch might possibly be altered, but while the stele
remained in place, it would serve as a final authority to which appeal
could be made in the case of any dispute arising. It is probably in
this way that we may explain the separate fields which are enumerated
by name upon the fragment of the Stele of the Vultures which is
preserved in the British Museum,[7] and upon a small foundation-stone
which also refers to the treaty.[8] The fields there enumerated either
made up the territory known by the general name of Gu-edin, or perhaps
formed an addition to that territory, the cession of which Eannatum may
have exacted from Umma as part of the terms of peace. While consenting
to the restoration of the disputed territory, and the rectification
of the frontier, Umma was also obliged to pay as tribute to Lagash a
considerable quantity of grain, and this Eannatum brought back with him
to his own city.

In connection with the formal ratification of the treaty it would
appear that certain shrines or chapels were erected in honour of
Enlil, Ninkharsag, Ningirsu and Babbar. We may conjecture that this
was done in order that the help of these deities might be secured for
the preservation of the treaty. According to Entemena's narrative,[9]
chapels or shrines were erected to these four deities only, but the
Stele of the Vultures contains a series of invocations addressed not
only to Enlil, Ninkharsag, and Babbar, but also to Enki, Enzu, and
Ninki,[10] and it is probable that shrines were also erected in their
honour. These were built upon the frontier beside the two stelæ of
delimitation, and it was doubtless at the altar of each one of them
in turn that Eannatum and Enakalli took a solemn oath to abide by the
terms of the treaty and to respect the frontier. The oaths by which
the treaty was thus ratified are referred to upon the Stele of the
Vultures[11] by Eannatum, who invokes each of the deities by whom he
and Enakalli swore, and in a series of striking formulæ calls down
destruction upon the men of Umma should they violate the terms of the
compact. "On the men of Umma," he exclaims, "have I, Eannatum, cast the
great net of Enlil! I have sworn the oath, and the men of Umma have
sworn the oath to Eannatum. In the name of Enlil, the king of heaven
and earth, in the field of Ningirsu there has been..., and a ditch has
been dug down to the water level.... Who from among the men of Umma
by his word or by his ... will go back upon the word (that has been
given), and will dispute it in days to come? If at some future time
they shall alter this word, may the great net of Enlil, by whom they
have sworn the oath, strike Umma down!"

Eannatum then turns to Ninkharsag, the goddess of the Sumerian city of
Kesh, and in similar phrases invokes her wrath upon the men of Umma
should they violate their oath. He states that in his wisdom he has
presented two doves as offerings before Ninkharsag, and has performed
other rites in her honour at Kesh, and turning again to the goddess, he
exclaims, "As concerns my mother, Ninkharsag, who from among the men
of Umma by his word or by his ... will go back upon the word (that has
been given), and will dispute it in days to come? If at some future
time they shall alter this word, may the great net of Ninkharsag, by
whom they have sworn the oath, strike Umma down!" Enki, the god of the
abyss of waters beneath the earth, is the next deity to be invoked,
and before him Eannatum records that he presented certain fish as
offerings; his net Eannatum has cast over the men of Umma, and should
they cross the ditch, he prays that destruction may come upon Umma by
its means. Enzu, the Moon-god of Ur, whom Eannatum describes as "the
strong bull-calf of Enlil," is then addressed; four doves were set as
offerings before him, and he is invoked to destroy Umma with his net,
should the men of that city ever cross Ningirsu's boundary, or alter
the course of the ditch, or carry away the stele of delimitation.
Before Babbar, the Sun-god, in his city of Larsa, Eannatum states that
he has offered bulls as offerings, and his great net, which he has cast
over the men of Umma, is invoked in similar terms. Finally, Eannatum
prays to Ninki, by whom the oath has also been taken, to punish any
violation of the treaty by wiping the might of Umma from off the face
of the earth.

The great stele of Eannatum, from the text upon which we have taken
much of the description of his war with Umma, is the most striking
example of early Sumerian art that has come down to us, and the
sculptures upon it throw considerable light upon the customs and
beliefs of this primitive race. The metaphor of the net, for example,
which is employed by Eannatum throughout the curses he calls down
upon Umma, in the event of any violation of the treaty, is strikingly
illustrated by a scene sculptured upon two of the fragments of the
stele which have been recovered. When complete, the stele consisted of
a large slab of stone, curved at the top, and it was sculptured and
inscribed upon both sides and also upon its edges. Up to the present
time seven fragments of it have been recovered during the course of
the excavations at Tello, of which six are in the Louvre and one is
in the British Museum; these are usually distinguished by the symbols
A to G.[12] Although the fragments thus recovered represent but a
small proportion of the original monument, it is possible from a
careful study of them to form a fairly complete idea of the scenes
that were sculptured upon it. As we have already noted, the monument
was a stele of victory set up by Eannatum, and the two faces of
the slab are sculptured in low relief with scenes illustrating the
victory, but differing considerably in character. On the face the
representations are mythological and religious, while on the back they
are historical. It might very naturally be supposed that the face of
the stele would have been occupied by representations of Eannatum
himself triumphing over his enemies, and, until the text upon the
stele was thoroughly deciphered and explained, this was indeed the
accepted opinion. But it is now clear that Eannatum devoted the front
of the stele to representations of his gods, while the reverse of the
monument was considered the appropriate place for the scenes depicting
the patesi and his army carrying out the divine will. The arrangement
of the reliefs upon the stone thus forcibly illustrates the belief of
this early period that the god of the city was its real ruler, whose
minister and servant the patesi was, not merely in metaphor, but in
actual fact.

Upon the largest portion of the stele that has been recovered,
formed of two fragments joined together,[13] we have the scene which
illustrates Eannatum's metaphor of the net. Almost the whole of this
portion of the monument is occupied with the figure of a god, which
appears of colossal size if it is compared with those of the patesi and
his soldiers upon the reverse of the stele. The god has flowing hair,
bound with a double fillet, and, while cheeks and lips are shaved,
a long beard falls in five undulating curls from the chin upon the
breast. He is nude to the waist, around which he wears a close-fitting
garment with two folds in front indicated by double lines. It was at
first suggested that we should see in this figure a representation
of some early hero, such as Gilgamesh, but there is no doubt that we
should identify him with Ningirsu, the city-god of Lagash. For in his
right hand the god holds the emblem of Lagash, the eagle with outspread
wings, clawing the heads of two lions; and the stele itself, while
indirectly perpetuating Eannatum's fame, was essentially intended to
commemorate victories achieved by Ningirsu over his city's enemies.
This fact will also explain the rest of the scene sculptured upon the
lower fragment. For the god grasps in his right hand a heavy mace,
which he lets fall upon a net in front of him containing captive
foes, whose bodies may be seen between its broad meshes struggling
and writhing within it. On the relief the cords of the net are
symmetrically arranged, and it apparently rises as a solid structure
to the level of the god's waist. It thus has the appearance of a cage
with cross-bars and supports of wood or metal. But the rounded corners
at the top indicate that we may regard it as a net formed of ropes and
cordage. That it should rise stiffly before the god may be partly due
to the imperfect knowledge of perspective characteristic of all early
art, partly perhaps to the desire of the sculptor to allow the emblem
of Lagash, grasped in the god's left hand, to rest upon it; unless
indeed the emblem itself is a part of the net, by means of which the
god is holding it up. In any case the proximity of the emblem to the
net is not fortuitous. Within the net are the foes of Lagash, and with
the mace in his right hand Ningirsu is represented as clubbing the head
of one of them which projects from between the meshes.

[Illustration: Fig. 46.--Part of the Stele of the Vultures, sculptured
with a scene representing Ningirsu clubbing the enemies of Lagash
(Shirpurla), whom he has caught in his net.--Fragments D and E,
Obverse; _Déc._, pl. 4 _bis_.]


The metaphor of the net, both of the fisherman and the fowler,
is familiar in the poetical literature of the Hebrews, and it is
interesting to note this very early example of its occurrence among the
primitive Sumerian inhabitants of Babylonia.[14] In the text engraved
upon the Stele of the Vultures Eannatum, as we have already seen, seeks
to guard the terms of his treaty by placing it under the protection of
the nets of Enlil and of other deities. He states that he has cast upon
the men of Umma the nets of the deities by whom he and they have sworn,
and, in the event of any violation of their oath, he prays that the
nets may destroy them and their city.[15] Thus the meshes of each net
may in a sense be regarded as the words of the oath, by the utterance
of which they have placed themselves within the power of the god whose
name they have invoked. But the scene on the front of the stele is not
to be regarded as directly referring to this portion of the text, nor
is the colossal figure that of Enlil, the chief god of Babylonia. For
his destruction of the men of Umma is merely invoked as a possible
occurrence in the future, while the god on the stele is already engaged
in clubbing captives he has caught; and, whether the net of Ningirsu
was referred to in a missing portion of the text or not, the fact that
the figure on the stele grasps the emblem of Lagash is sufficient
indication that Ningirsu and not Enlil, nor any other deity, is
intended. Thus the face of the stele illustrates the text of Eannatum
as a whole, not merely the imprecatory formulæ attached to the treaty
with Umma. It refers to the past victories of Ningirsu in his character
as the city-god of Lagash.

The representation of Ningirsu clubbing his enemies forms only a
portion of a larger scheme which occupied the whole of the upper part
of the Stele of the Vultures. Though his is the principal figure of
the composition, it is not set in the centre of the field but on the
extreme right, the right-hand edge of the fragments illustrated on
p. 131 representing the actual edge of the stele. On the left behind
the god and standing in attendance upon him was a goddess, parts of
whose head and headdress have been recovered upon a fragment from the
left edge of the stele.[16] She wears a horned crown, and behind her
is a standard surmounted by an emblem in the form of an eagle with
outspread wings. She is sculptured on a smaller scale than the figure
of Ningirsu, and thus serves to indicate his colossal proportions; and
she stood on a fillet or lintel, which cuts off the upper register
from a second scene which was sculptured below it. The fragment of the
stele in the British Museum[17] preserves one of Ningirsu's feet and a
corner of the net with the prisoners in it, and both are represented
as resting on the same fillet or lintel. This fragment is a piece of
some importance, for, by joining two other pieces of the stele in the
Louvre,[18] it enables us to form some idea of the scene in the lower
register. Here, too, we have representations of deities, but they are
arranged on a slightly different plan. We find upon the fragment from
the right of the stele (C) part of the head and headdress of a goddess
very like that in the register above. Here she faces to the left, and
on another fragment (F), which joins the British Museum fragment upon
the left, is a portion of a very complicated piece of sculpture. This
has given rise to many conjectures, but there appears to be little
doubt that it represents the forepart of a chariot. We have the same
curved front which is seen in the chariot of Eannatum upon the reverse
of the stele, and the same arrangement of the reins which pass through
a double ring fixed in the front of the chariot and are hitched over
a high support. Here the support and the front of the chariot are
decorated with a form of the emblem of Lagash, the spread eagle and
the lions, and we may therefore conclude that the chariot is that of
Ningirsu; indeed, on the left of the fragment a part of the god's plain
garment may be detected, similar to that which he wears in the upper
register. He is evidently standing in the chariot, and we may picture
him riding in triumph after the destruction of his foes.

A close analogy may thus be traced between the two scenes upon the
front of the stele and the two upper registers upon the back. In the
latter we have representations of Eannatum on foot leading his warriors
to battle, and also riding victoriously in a chariot at their head.
On the front of the stele are scenes of a similar character in the
religious sphere, representing Ningirsu slaying the enemies of Lagash,
and afterwards riding in his chariot in triumph. It may also be noted
that the composition of the scenes in the two registers upon the face
of the stone is admirably planned. In the upper register the colossal
figure of Ningirsu with his net, upon the right, is balanced below on
the left by his figure in the chariot; and, similarly, the smaller
figure or figures above were balanced by the ass that drew Ningirsu's
chariot, and the small figure of a goddess who faces him.

There are few indications to enable us to identify the goddesses who
accompany Ningirsu. If the figures in both registers represent the same
divine personage the names of several goddesses suggest themselves. We
might, perhaps, see in her Ningirsu's wife Bau, the daughter of Anu, or
his sister Ninâ, the goddess of the oracle, to whose service Eannatum
was specially devoted, or Gatumdug, the mother of Lagash. But the
military standard which accompanies the goddess in the upper scene, and
the ends of two darts or javelins which appear in the same fragment
to rise from, or be bound upon, her shoulders, seem to show that the
upper goddess, at any rate, is of a warlike character. Moreover, in
another inscription, Eannatum ascribes a success he has achieved in war
to the direct intervention of the goddess Ninni,[19] proving that she,
like the later Babylonian and Assyrian goddess Ishtar, was essentially
the goddess of battle. It is permissible, therefore, to see in the
upper goddess, sculptured upon the face of the Stele of the Vultures,
a representation of Ninni, the goddess of battle, who attends the
city-god Ningirsu while he is engaged in the slaughter of his foes. In
the lower register it is possible we have a second representation of
Ninni, where she appears to welcome Ningirsu after the slaughter is at
an end. But though the headdresses of the two goddesses are identical,
the accompanying emblems appear to differ, and we are thus justified in
suggesting for the lower figure some goddess other than Ninni, whose
work was finished when Ningirsu had secured the victory. The deity most
fitted to gladden Ningirsu's sight on his return would have been his
faithful wife Bau, who was wont to recline beside her lord upon his
couch within the temple E-ninnû. We may thus provisionally identify the
goddess of the lower register with Bau, who is there portrayed going
out to meet the chariot of her lord and master upon his return from
battle.

Perhaps the scenes which are sculptured upon the back of the Stele of
the Vultures are of even greater interest than those upon its face,
since they afford us a picture of these early Sumerian peoples as they
appeared when engaged in the continual wars which were waged between
the various city-states. Like the scenes upon the face of the stele,
those upon the back are arranged in separate registers, divided one
from the other by raised bands, or fillets, stretching across the face
of the monument and representing the soil on which the scenes portrayed
above them took place. The registers upon the back are smaller than
those on the face, being at least four in number, in place of the
two scenes which are devoted to Ningirsu and his attendant deities.
As might be expected, the scenes upon the back of the stele are on a
smaller scale than those upon the face, and the number and variety of
the figures composing them are far greater. Little space has been left
on the reverse of the stone for the inscription, the greater part of
which is engraved on the front of the monument, in the broad spaces
of the field between the divine figures. Of the highest of the four
registers upon the reverse four fragments have been recovered,[20] one
of which (A) proves that the curved head of the stele on this side
was filled with the representations of vultures, to which reference
has already been made.[21] The intention of the sculptor was clearly
to represent them as flying thick in the air overhead, bearing off
from the field of battle the severed heads and limbs of the slain.
The birds thus formed a very decorative and striking feature of the
monument, and the popular name of the stele, which is derived from
them, is fully justified. In the same register on the left is a scene
representing Eannatum leading his troops in battle.[22] and we there
see them advancing over the bodies of the slain; while from the extreme
right of the same register we have a fragment representing men engaged
in collecting the dead and piling them in heaps for burial.[23] We may
conjecture that the central portion of the register, which is missing,
portrayed the enemies of Eannatum falling before his lance. In the
register immediately below we find another representation of Eannatum
at the head of his troops. Here, however, they are not in battle array
but on the march, and Eannatum, instead of advancing on foot, is riding
before them in his chariot.[24]

The sculptured representations of Eannatum and his soldiers, which
are preserved upon these fragments, are of the greatest importance,
for they give a vivid picture of the Sumerian method of fighting,
and supply detailed information with regard to the arms and armour
in use at this early period. We note that the Sumerians advanced to
the attack in a solid phalanx, the leading rank being protected by
huge shields or bucklers that covered the whole body from the neck to
the feet, and were so broad that, when lined up in battle array, only
enough space was left for a lance to be levelled between each; the
lance-bearers carried as an additional weapon an axe, resembling an
adze with a flat head. From the second register, in which we see the
army on the march, it is clear that no shield was carried by the rank
and file for individual protection; the huge bucklers were only borne
by men in the front rank, and they thus served to protect the whole
front of an attacking force as it advanced in solid formation. In the
scene in the upper register two soldiers are sculptured behind each
shield, and in each gap between the shields six lances are levelled
which are grasped firmly in both hands by the soldiers wielding them.
The massing of the lances in this fashion is obviously a device of the
sculptor to suggest six rows of soldiers advancing one behind the other
to the attack. But the fact that each lance is represented as grasped
in both hands by its owner proves that the shields were not carried by
the lance-bearers themselves, but by soldiers stationed in the front,
armed only with an axe. The sole duty of a shield-bearer during an
attack in phalanx was clearly to keep his shield in position, which was
broad enough to protect his own body and that of the lance-bearer on
his right. Thus the representation of two soldiers behind each buckler
on the Stele of the Vultures is a perfectly accurate detail. As soon
as an attack had been successfully delivered, and the enemy was in
flight, the shield-bearers could discard the heavy shields they carried
and join in the pursuit. The light axe with which they were armed was
admirably suited for hand-to-hand conflicts, and it is probable that
the lance-bearers themselves abandoned their heavy weapons and had
recourse to the axe when they broke their close formation.

Both Eannatum and his soldiers wear a conical helmet, covering the
brow and carried down low at the back so as to protect the neck, the
royal helmet being distinguished by the addition at the sides of
moulded pieces to protect the ears. Both the shields and the helmets
were probably of leather, though the nine circular bosses on the face
of each of the former may possibly have been of metal. Their use was
clearly to strengthen the shields, and they were probably attached to
a wooden framework on the other side. They would also tend to protect
the surface of the shields by deflecting blows aimed at them. The royal
weapons consisted of a long lance or spear, wielded in the left hand,
and a curved mace or throwing-stick, formed of three strands bound
together at intervals with thongs of leather or bands of metal. When
in his chariot on the march, the king was furnished with additional
weapons, consisting of a flat-headed axe like those of his soldiers,
and a number of light darts, some fitted with double points. These last
he carried in a huge quiver attached to the fore part of his chariot,
and with them we may note a double-thonged whip, doubtless intended for
driving the ass or asses that drew the vehicle. It is probable that the
soldiers following Eannatum in both scenes were picked men, who formed
the royal body-guard, for those in the battle-scene are distinguished
by the long hair or, rather, wig, that falls upon their shoulders
from beneath their helmets,[25] and those on the march are seen to be
clothed from the waist downwards in the rough woollen garment similar
to that worn by the king. They may well have been recruited among
the members of the royal house and the chief families of Lagash. The
king's apparel is distinguished from theirs by the addition of a cloak,
possibly of skin,[26] worn over the left shoulder in such a way that it
leaves the right arm and shoulder entirely free.

Considerable light is thrown upon the burial customs of the Sumerians
by the scene sculptured in the third register, or section, on the
reverse of the stele of Eannatum. Portions of the scene are preserved
upon the fragments C and F, which we have already noted may be
connected with each other by means of the fragment G, preserved in
the British Museum. In this register we have a representation of the
scenes following the victory of Eannatum, when the king and his army
had time to collect their dead and bury them with solemn rites and
sacrifices beneath huge tells or burial-mounds. It will be remembered
that a fragment of the top register portrays the collection of the
dead upon the battlefield; here, on the left, we see the mounds in
course of construction, under which the dead were buried.[27] The dead
are quite nude, and are seen to be piled up in rows, head to head and
feet to feet alternately. The two corpses at the base are sculptured
lying flat upon the ground, and, as the tell rises, they appear to
be arranged like the sticks of a fan. This arrangement was doubtless
due to the sculptor's necessity of filling the semi-circular head of
the tell, and does not represent the manner in which the corpses were
actually arranged for burial. We may conclude that they were set out
symmetrically in double rows, and that the position of every one was
horizontal, additional rows being added until sufficient height had
been attained.

[Illustration: PORTION OF THE "STELE OF VULTURES," SCULPTURED WITH A
SCENE REPRESENTING THE BURIAL OF THE DEAD AFTER A BATTLE.--_In the
Louvre; photo, by Messrs. Mansell & Co._]

Two living figures are sculptured on the fragment, engaged in the work
of completing the burial. They are represented as climbing the pile
of corpses, and they seem to be helping themselves up by means of a
rope which they grasp in their right hands. On their heads they carry
baskets piled up with earth, which they are about to throw upon the top
of the mound. In the relief they appear to be climbing upon the limbs
of the dead, but it is probable that they began piling earth from below
and climbed the sides of the mound as it was raised. The sculptor has
not seen how to represent the sides of the tell without hiding his
corpses, so he has omitted the piled earth altogether, unless, indeed,
what appears to be a rope which the carriers hold is really intended
for the side of the mound in section. It has been suggested that the
carriers are bearing offerings for the dead, but the baskets appear to
be heaped with earth, not offerings, and the record in the text upon
the stele, that Eannatum piled up twenty burial-mounds after his battle
with the men of Umma, is sufficient justification for the view that the
scene represents one of these mounds in course of construction.

[Illustration: Part of the Stele of the Vultures, sculptured with a
sacrificial scene which took place at the burial of the dead after
battle. The fragments represents the head of a bull, which is staked
to the ground and prepared for sacrifice. The foot and robe probably
belonged to a figure of Eannatum, who presided at the funeral
rites.--Fragment F, Reverse; _Déc.,_ pl. 4 _ter_.]

The continuation of the scene upon the other two fragments,[28] proves
that the burial of the dead was attended with elaborate funeral rites,
and the offering of sacrifices. To the right of the workers engaged
in piling up the burial-mound may be seen a bull lying on his back
upon the ground, and bound securely with ropes to two stout stakes
driven into the soil close to its head and tail. He is evidently the
victim, duly prepared for sacrifice, that will be offered when the
burial-mound has been completed. In the field above the bull are
sculptured other victims and offerings, which were set out beside the
bull. We see a row of six lambs or kids, decapitated, and arranged
symmetrically, neck to tail, and tail to neck. Two large water-pots,
with wide mouths, and tapering towards the base, stand on the right
of the bull; palm-branches, placed in them, droop down over their
rims, and a youth, completely nude, is pouring water into one of them
from a smaller vessel. He is evidently pouring out a libation, as we
may infer from a similar scene on another early Sumerian relief that
has been recovered.[29] Beyond the large vessels there appear to be
bundles of faggots, and in the field above them are sculptured a row
of growing plants. These probably do not rise from the large vessels,
as they appear to do in the sculpture, but form a separate row beyond
the faggots and the vessels. At the head of the bull may be seen the
foot and part of the robe of a man who directs the sacrifice. As in all
the other registers upon the reverse of the stele Eannatum occupies a
prominent position, we may conclude that this is part of the figure of
Eannatum himself. He occupies the centre of the field in this register,
and presides at the funeral rites of the warriors who have fallen in
his service.

[Illustration: Fig. 48.--Part of the Stele of the Vultures, which was
sculptured with a scene representing Eannatum deciding the fate of
prisoners taken in battle. The point of the spear, which he grasped in
his left hand, touches the head of the captive king of Kish.--Fragments
C and F, Reverse; _Déc.,_ pl. 3 and 4 _ter_.]

Of the last scene that is preserved upon the Stele of the Vultures very
little remains upon the fragments recovered, but this is sufficient
to indicate its character. Eannatum was here portrayed deciding the
fate of prisoners taken in battle. Of his figure only the left hand
is preserved; it is grasping a heavy spear or lance by the end of the
shaft as in the second register. The spear passes over the shaven heads
of a row of captives, and at the end of the row its point touches the
head of a prisoner of more exalted rank, who faces the king and raises
one hand in token of submission. A fragment of inscription behind the
head of this captive gives the name "Al-[...], King of Kish," and it
may be concluded with considerable probability that these words form
a label attached to the figure of the chief prisoner, like the labels
engraved near the head of Eannatum in the two upper registers, which
describe him as "Eannatum, champion of the god Ningirsu." There is
much more to be said for this explanation than for the possibility
that the words formed part of an account of a war waged by Eannatum
against Kish, which has been added to the record of his war with Umma.
According to such a view the stele must have been larger than we have
supposed, since it would have included additional registers at the
base of the reverse for recording the subsequent campaigns and their
illustration by means of reliefs. The monument would thus have been
erected to commemorate all the wars of Eannatum. But that against
Umma would be the most important, and its record, copied directly
from the text of the treaty, would still occupy three quarters of the
stone. Moreover, we should have to suppose that the scribe slavishly
copied the text of the stele of delimitation even down to its title,
and made no attempt to assimilate with it the later records, which
we must assume he added in the form of additional paragraphs. Such a
supposition is extremely unlikely, and it is preferable to regard the
words behind the prisoner's head as a label, and to conclude that the
connected text of the stele ended, as it appears to do, with the name
and description of the stone, which is engraved as a sort of colophon
upon the upper part of the field in the fourth register.

According to this alternative we need assume the existence of no
registers other than those of which we already possess fragments, and
the conception and arrangement of the reliefs gains immensely in unity
and coherence. On the obverse we have only two registers, the upper one
rather larger than the one below, and both devoted, as we have seen, to
representations of Ningirsu and his attendant goddesses. The reverse
of the stone, divided into four registers, is assigned entirely to
Eannatum, who is seen leading his troops to the attack, returning in
his chariot from the field of battle, performing funeral rites for his
dead soldiers, and deciding the fate of captives he has taken. Thus the
reliefs admirably illustrate the description of the war with Umma, and
we may conclude that the Stele of the Vultures was either the actual
stele of delimitation set up by Eannatum upon the frontier, or, as is
more probable, an exact copy of its text, embellished with sculptures,
upon a stone which Eannatum caused to be carved and set up within
his own city as a memorial of his conquest. Indeed, we may perhaps
make the further assumption that the stele was erected within the
temple of Ningirsu, since it commemorates the recovery of Gu-edin, the
territory that was peculiarly his own. The Stele of the Vultures, with
its elaborate and delicate relief, would have been out of place upon
the frontier of Gu-edin, where, we may conjecture, the memorial stone
would have been made as strong and plain as possible, so as to offer
little scope for mutilation. But, if destined to be set up within the
shelter of Ningirsu's temple in Lagash, the sculptor would have had no
restriction placed upon his efforts; and the prominent place assigned
to Ningirsu in the reliefs, upon the face of the memorial, is fully in
keeping with the suggestion that the Stele of the Vultures at one time
stood within his shrine.

In favour of the view that the monument was not the actual stele of
delimitation we may note that towards the close of its text some
four columns were taken up with lists of other conquests achieved
by Eannatum. But in all "kudurru-inscriptions," or boundary-stones,
which were intended to safeguard the property or claims of private
individuals, the texts close with a series of imprecations calling
down the anger of the gods upon any one infringing the owner's rights
in any way. Now in general character the text upon the Stele of the
Vultures closely resembles the "kudurru-inscriptions," only differing
from them in that it sets out to delimit, not the fields and estates
of individuals, but the respective territories of two city-states.
We should therefore expect that, like them, it would close with
invocations to the gods. Moreover, the Cone of Entemena, the text of
which was undoubtedly copied from a similar stele of delimitation, ends
with curses, and not with a list of Entemena's own achievements. But if
the short list of Eannatum's titles and conquests be omitted, the text
upon the Stele of the Vultures would end with the series of invocations
to Enlil and other deities, to which reference has already been made.
We may therefore conclude that the original text, as engraved upon the
stele of delimitation, did end at this point, and that the list of
other conquests was only added upon the memorial erected in Ningirsu's
temple.

Apart from the interest attaching to the memorial itself, this point
has a bearing upon the date of the conquest of Umma in relation to the
other successful wars conducted by Eannatum in the course of his reign.
It might reasonably be urged that the subjugation of the neighbouring
city of Umma would have preceded the conquest of more distant lands and
cities, over which Eannatum succeeded in imposing his sway. In that
case we must assume that the list of conquests upon the Stele of the
Vultures was added at a later date. On the other hand, it is equally
possible that the war with Umma took place well on in Eannatum's
reign, and that, while the patesi and his army were away on distant
expeditions, their ancient rival Umma refrained from taking advantage
of their absence to gain control of the coveted territory of Gu-edin.
Both cities may for years have respected the terms of Mesilim's treaty,
and Lagash, while finding scope elsewhere for her ambition, may have
been content to acquiesce in the claims of independence put forward
by her nearest neighbour. Thus the list of Eannatum's conquests may
well have been engraved upon the Stele of the Vultures at the time
the treaty with Umma was drawn up. In accordance with this view we
shall see there are reasons for believing that several of Eannatum's
conquests did take place before his war with Umma, and it is quite
possible to assign to this earlier period the others that are mentioned
in the list.

The conquest of Kish stands in close relation to that of Umma, for,
apart from the portrayal of the king of Kish as a captive upon the
Stele of the Vultures, there is a passage in the main body of the
inscription which would seem to connect the outbreak of war between
Umma and Lagash with the influence of that city. In the broken passage
recording the encouragement given to Eannatum by Ningirsu after the
raid of Gu-edin, the names of Umma and Kish occur together, and the
context of the passage suggests that Ningirsu here promises his patesi
victory over both these cities.[30] We may, therefore, conjecture that
the ambitious designs described by Entemena as actuating Ush, the
patesi of Umma, in raiding the territory of Lagash, were fostered by
the city of Kish. It is probable that Eannatum had already given proof
of his qualities as a military leader, and had caused the king of Kish
to see in Lagash a possible rival for the hegemony which the North had
long enjoyed. To sow dissension between her and her neighbour Umma,
would have appeared a most effective method of crippling her growing
power, and it is possible that the king of Kish not only promised his
support, but furnished a contingent of his own soldiers to assist in
the attack. The representation of the captive king of Kish upon the
Stele of the Vultures may possibly be interpreted as proving that he
led his troops in person, and was captured during the battle. But the
relief is, perhaps, not to be taken too literally, and may merely
symbolize the defeat of his forces along with those of Umma, and his
failure to render them any effective aid. On the other hand, in a text
engraved upon one of his foundation-stones,[31] Eannatum boasts that
he added the kingdom of Kish to his dominions: "Eannatum, patesi of
Lagash, by the goddess Ninni who loves him, along with the patesiate of
Lagash was presented with the kingdom of Kish." It would seem that in
this passage Eannatum lays claim, not only to have defeated Kish, but
also to exercising suzeranity over the northern kingdom.

With Eannatum's victory over Kish we must probably connect the success
which he achieved over another northern city, Opis. For towards the
end of the text upon the foundation-stone referred to above, these
achievements appear to be described as a single event, or, at least,
as two events of which the second closely follows and supplements the
first. In the course of the formulæ celebrating the principal conquests
of his reign, Eannatum exclaims: "By Eannatum was Elam broken in the
head, Elam was driven back to his own land; Kish was broken in the
head, and the king of Opis was driven back to his own land."[32] When
referring to the victory over Opis in an earlier passage of the same
inscription, Eannatum names the king who attacked him, and, although he
does not give many details of the war, it may be inferred that Opis was
defeated only after a severe struggle. "When the king of Opis rose up,"
the text runs, "Eannatum, whose name was spoken by Ningirsu, pursued
Zuzu, king of Opis, from the Antasurra of Ningirsu up to the city of
Opis, and there he smote him and destroyed him."[33] We have already
seen reasons for believing that the king of Kish took an active part in
Umma's war with Lagash, and shared her defeat; and we may conjecture
that it was to help and avenge his ally that Zuzu, king of Opis,
marched south and attacked Eannatum. That he met with some success at
first is perhaps indicated by the point from which Eannatum records
that he drove him back to his own land. For the Antasurra was a shrine
or temple dedicated to Ningirsu, and stood within the territory of
Lagash, though possibly upon or near the frontier. Here Eannatum met
the invaders in force, and not only dislodged them, but followed up his
victory by pursuing them back to their own city, where he claims that
he administered a still more crushing defeat. It is possible that the
conquest of Ma'er, or Mari, took place at this time, and in connection
with the war with Opis and Kish, for in one passage Eannatum refers to
the defeat of these three states at the Antasurra of Ningirsu. Ma'er
may well have been allied with Kish and Opis, and may have contributed
a contingent to the army led by Zuzu in his attack on Lagash.

[Illustration: PORTION OF A BLACK BASALT MORTAR BEARING AN INSCRIPTION
OF EANNATUM, PATESI OF SHIRPURLA.--_Brit. Mus., No._ 90832_; photo, by
Messrs. Mansell & Co._]

It is interesting to note that Kish and the king of Kish represented
the most dreaded enemies of Lagash, at least during a portion of the
reign of Eannatum. For on a mortar of black basalt which is preserved
in the British Museum,[34] Eannatum, after recording that he has
dedicated it to Ninâ, "the Lady of the Holy Mountain," prays that
no man may damage it or carry it away; and he then adds the petition,
"May the King of Kish not seize it!" This ejaculation is eloquent of
the dread which the northern kingdom inspired in the cities of the
south, and we may see in it evidence of many a raid during which the
temples of Lagash had been despoiled of their treasures. We may well
ascribe the dedication of the altar and the cutting of the inscription
to the early part of Eannatum's reign; at any rate, to a period before
the power of Kish was broken in the south; and, if we are right in
this supposition, the mortar may perhaps serve to date another group
of Eannatum's campaigns. For in a passage on the second side of this
monument it appears to be recorded that he had conquered the cities
of Erech and Ur. The passage follows the invocations set forth by
Eannatum upon the other side, in the course of which he prays that no
one shall remove the mortar, or cast it into the fire, or damage it in
any way; and it might be argued that the lines were an addition made
to the original text of dedication at a considerably later period.
In that case the passage would afford no proof that the conquest of
Ur and Erech preceded that of Kish. But both sides of the monument
have the appearance of having been engraved by the same hand, and we
are probably justified in assuming that the whole of the inscription
was placed upon the vessel at the time it was made. We may thus
provisionally place the conquest of Ur and Erech before that of Kish.
Further, in his foundation-inscriptions, Eannatum groups his conquest
of Ur and Erech with that of Ki-babbar, "the place of the Sun-god," a
term which may with considerable probability be identified with Larsa,
the centre of the cult of the Sun-god in Southern Babylonia. It would
thus appear that Eannatum conquered these cities, all situated in the
extreme south of Babylonia at about the same period, and probably in
the early part of his reign.

An indication that we are right in placing the southern conquests
of Eannatum before the war with Umma may, perhaps, be seen in the
invocations to deities engraved upon the Stele of the Vultures with
which Eannatum sought to protect his treaty. In the course of the
invocations Eannatum states that he has made offerings to the goddess
Ninkharsag in the city of Kesh, to Enzu, the Moon-god, in Ur, and to
Babbar, the Sun-god, in Larsa. These passages we may assume refer to
offerings made by Eannatum in his character of suzerain, and, if this
view is correct, we must conclude that the conquest of these cities
had already taken place. The invocation to Enki perhaps presupposes
that Eridu also was in the hands of Eannatum at this time, a corollary
that would almost necessarily follow, if the three neighbouring cities
of Ur, Erech, and Larsa had fallen before his arms. Accordingly, the
list of gods by whom Eannatum and the men of Umma swore to preserve
the treaty becomes peculiarly significant. They were selected on
political as much as on purely religious grounds, and in their combined
jurisdiction represented the extent of Eannatum's dominion in Sumer
at the time. That a ruler should be in a position to exact an oath by
such powerful city-gods was obviously calculated to inspire respect
for his own authority, while the names of the gods themselves formed
a sufficient guarantee that divine punishment would surely follow any
violation of the treaty. The early successes gained by Eannatum, by
which he was enabled to exercise suzerainty over the principal cities
of Southern Babylonia, may well have been the cause of his arousing the
active hostility of Kish and Opis. When he had emerged victorious from
his subsequent struggle with the northern cities, we may assume that he
claimed the title of king, which he employs in place of his more usual
title of patesi in certain passages in the text of his treaty with Umma.

The other conquests recorded in the inscriptions of Eannatum fall into
two groups. In all the lists of his victories that have come down
to us--on the Stele of the Vultures, the foundation-stones, and the
brick-inscriptions--the defeat of Elam is given the first place. This
is probably not to be taken as implying that it was the first in order
of time. It is true that the order in which the conquered districts
and cities are arranged is generally the same in the different lists,
but this is not invariably the case. Apart from differences caused by
the omission or insertion of names, the order is sometimes altered;
thus the conquest of Arua is recorded before that of Ur on the Stele
of the Vultures, whereas on the foundation-stones this arrangement
is reversed. It would, therefore, be rash to assume that they were
enumerated in the order of their occurrence; it is more probable that
the conquered states and districts are grouped on a rough geographical
basis, and that these groups are arranged according to the importance
attaching to them. That Elam should always be mentioned first in the
lists is probably due to the fact that she was the hereditary enemy
of the cities of Sumer and Akkad, whose rulers could never be sure of
immunity from her attacks. The agricultural wealth of Babylonia offered
a tempting prey to the hardy tribes who dwelt among the hills upon the
western border of Elam, and the dread of the raider and mountaineer,
experienced by the dweller in the plain, is expressed by Eannatum in
his description of Elam as "the mountain that strikes terror."[35]

That in their conflict with Eannatum the Elamites were, as usual, the
aggressors, is clear from the words of the record upon his longer
foundation-inscription--"by Eannatum was Elam broken in the head, Elam
was driven back to his own land."[36] In other passages referring to
the discomfiture of the Elamites, Eannatum adds the formula that "he
heaped up burial-mounds," a phrase which would seem to imply that the
enemy were only defeated with considerable loss.[37] It is not unlikely
that we may fix the field of battle, upon which the forces of Elam were
defeated, on the banks of the Asukhur Canal, which had been cut two
generations before by Ur-Ninâ, Eannatum's grandfather; at least, the
canal gives its name to a battlefield which is mentioned immediately
before the name of Elam in one of the lists of conquests. It would thus
seem that the Elamites were engaged in raiding the territory of Lagash
when Eannatum fell upon them with his army and drove them northwards
and across the Tigris.

Closely associated with Eannatum's success against the Elamites were
his conquest of Shakh, of a city the reading of the name for which is
unknown, and probably also of a land or district which bore the name of
Sunanam. The conquest of this last place is only mentioned in a broken
passage upon the Stele of the Vultures,[38] between the names of Elam
and Shakh, and that of the unknown city, so that little can be inferred
with regard to it. Shakh, on the other hand, whenever it is referred
to in the inscriptions of Eannatum, follows immediately after the name
of Elam, and it was not improbably a district on the Elamite frontier
which Eannatum ravaged during his pursuit of the invaders. The city
with the unknown name[39] was evidently a place of some importance,
for not only was it governed by a patesi, but when its conquest is
mentioned in the lists details are usually given. The interpretation
of a phrase recording its patesi's action with regard to the emblem of
the city is not quite certain, but it would appear that on the approach
of Eannatum he planted it before the city-gate. The context would
seem to imply that this was intended as an act of defiance, not of
submission, for Eannatum states that he conquered the city and heaped
up burial-mounds. The site of the city, like its name, is unknown, but
since the records referring to it always follow those concerning Elam,
we may provisionally regard it as having lain in the direction of the
Elamite frontier.

The remaining group of Eannatum's conquests comprise the victories he
achieved over Az, Mishime, and Arua. The first of these places was
a city ruled by a patesi, whom Eannatum slew when he captured and
destroyed it. It was formerly regarded as situated in the neighbourhood
of the Persian Gulf, but the grounds on which this view was held have
proved inadequate.[40] Moreover, Eannatum's references to Mishime and
Arua do not assist us much in determining their positions, for he
merely states that he destroyed and annihilated them. In a passage
upon the Stele of the Vultures, however, a reference to the land of
Sumer follows closely upon a record of the conquest of Arua,[41]
which perhaps is an indication that all three places should be
sought in Southern Babylonia. We are thus without data for settling
definitely the region in which this group of cities lay, and we are
equally without information as to the period of his reign in which
Eannatum captured or destroyed them. The fact that they are mentioned
last in the lists is no proof that they were among his most recent
conquests; it may merely be due to their relatively small importance.
In support of this suggestion we may note that in the longest of his
foundation-inscriptions Eannatum refers to them once only, while his
successes against Elam and the northern cities are celebrated in two or
three separate passages.

From the preceding discussion of the campaigns of Eannatum it will have
been seen that during his reign a considerable expansion took place
in the power and influence of Lagash. From being a city-state with
her influence restricted to her own territory, she became head of a
confederation of the great Sumerian cities, she successfully disputed
with the northern cities the hegemony in Babylonia, and she put a check
upon the encroachments of Elam, the hereditary foe of Sumer and Akkad
alike. According to the view of Eannatum's conquests which has been
put forward, the first expansion of the city's influence took place
southwards. The cities of Ur, Erech, Larsa, Kesh, and probably Eridu,
had already become her vassal states, before Kish and Opis attempted to
curtail her growing power; and in the war which followed it is probable
that we may see a struggle between the combined forces of Sumer on the
one hand, and those of Akkad on the other. One of the most important
episodes in this conflict was the war with Umma, since the raid by the
men of that city into the territory of Lagash furnished the occasion
for the outbreak of hostilities. The issue of the conflict placed
Lagash in the position of the leading city in Babylonia. The fact that
from this time forward Eannatum did not permanently adopt the title of
"king" in his inscriptions, may perhaps be traced to his preference for
the religious title of "patesi," which emphasized his dependence upon
his own city-god Ningirsu.

The military character of Eannatum is reflected in his inscriptions,
which in this respect form a striking contrast to those of his
grandfather, Ur-Ninâ. While the earlier king's records are confined
entirely to lists of temples and other buildings, which he erected or
restored in Lagash and its neighbourhood, the texts of Eannatum are
devoted almost exclusively to his wars. From a few scattered passages,
however, we gather that he did not entirely neglect the task of adding
to and beautifying the temples in his capital. Thus he built a temple
for the goddess Gatumdug, and added to other buildings which were
already standing in Ur-Ninâ's time. But his energies in this direction
were mainly devoted to repairing the fortifications of Lagash, and to
putting the city in a complete state of defence. Thus he boasts that
he built the wall of Lagash and made it strong. Since Ur-Ninâ's time,
when the city-wall had been thoroughly repaired, it is probable that
the defences of the city had been weakened, for Eannatum also records
that he restored Girsu, one of the quarters of the city, which we
may suppose had suffered on the same occasion, and had been allowed
to remain since then in a partly ruined condition. In honour of the
goddess Ninâ he also records that he rebuilt, or perhaps largely
increased, the quarter of the city which was named after her, and he
constructed a wall for the special protection of Uru-azagga, another
quarter of Lagash. In fact, the political expansion, which took place
at this period in the power of Lagash, was accompanied by an equally
striking increase in the size and defences of the city itself.

During the reign of Eannatum it is clear that the people of Lagash
enjoyed a considerable measure of prosperity, for, although they were
obliged to furnish men for their patesi's army, the state acquired
considerable wealth from the sack of conquered cities, and from the
tribute of grain and other supplies which was levied upon them as a
mark of their permanent subjection. Moreover, the campaigns could not
have been of very long duration, and, after the return of the army
on the completion of a war, it is probable that the greater part of
it would be disbanded, and the men would go back to their ordinary
occupations. Thus the successful prosecution of his foreign policy by
Eannatum did not result in any impoverishment of the material resources
of his people, and the fertile plains around the city were not left
untilled for lack of labour. Indeed, it would appear that in the
latter part of his reign he largely increased the area of land under
cultivation. For in his longer foundation-inscriptions, after recording
his principal conquests, he states: "In that day Eannatum did (as
follows). Eannatum, ... when his might had borne fruit, dug a new canal
for Ningirsu, and he named it Lummadimdug." By the expression "when his
might had borne fruit," it is clear that Eannatum refers to the latter
part of his reign, when he was no longer obliged to place his army
incessantly in the field, and he and his people were enabled to devote
themselves to the peaceful task of developing the material resources of
their own district in Sumer.

Another canal, which we know was cut by Eannatum, was that
separating the plain of Gu-edin from the territory of Umma, but this
was undertaken, not for purposes of irrigation, but rather as a
frontier-ditch to mark the limits of the territory of Lagash in that
direction. There is little doubt, however, that at least a part of its
stream was used for supplying water to those portions of Gu-edin which
lay along its banks. Like the canal Lummadimdug, this frontier-ditch
was also dedicated to Ningirsu, and in the inscription upon a small
column which records this fact, the name of the canal is given as
Lummagirnuntashagazaggipadda. But this exceedingly long title was only
employed upon state occasions, such as the ceremony of dedication; in
common parlance the name was abbreviated to Lummagirnunta, as we learn
from the reference to it upon Entemena's Cone. It is of interest to
note that in the title of the stone of delimitation, which occurs upon
the Stele of the Vultures, reference is made to a canal named Ug-edin,
the title of the stone being given as "O Ningirsu, lord of the crown
..., give life unto the canal Ug-edin!" In the following lines the
monument itself is described as "the Stele of Gu-edin, the territory
beloved of Ningirsu, which I, Eannatum, have restored to Ningirsu"; so
that it is clear that the canal, whose name is incorporated in that
of the stele, must have had some connection with the frontier-ditch.
Perhaps the canal Ug-edin is to be identified with Lummagirnunta,
unless one of the two was a subsidiary canal.

For the supply of his principal irrigation-canal with water after the
period of the spring-floods, Eannatum did not depend solely upon such
water as might find its way in from the river, before the surface
of the latter sank below the level of the canal-bed; nor did he
confine himself to the laborious method of raising it from the river
to his canal by means of irrigation-machines. Both these methods of
obtaining water he doubtless employed, but he supplemented them by the
construction of a reservoir, which should retain at least a portion of
the surplus water during the early spring, and store it up for gradual
use in the fields after the water-level in the river and canals had
fallen. In the passage in his foundation-inscription, which records
this fact, he says: "For Ningirsu he founded the canal Lummadimdug
and dedicated it to him; Eannatum, endowed with strength by Ningirsu,
constructed the reservoir of Lummadimdug, with a capacity of three
thousand six hundred _gur_ of water."[42] It is true that his reservoir
was not of very imposing dimensions, but its construction proves that
Eannatum or his engineers had studied the problem of irrigation in a
scientific spirit, and had already evolved the method of obtaining
a constant water-supply which is still regarded as giving the best
results.

[Illustration: BRICK OF EANNATUM, PATESI OF SHIRPURLA, RECORDING HIS
GENEALOGY AND CONQUESTS, AND COMMEMORATING THE SINKING OF WELLS IN
SHIRPURLA.--_Brit. Mus., No._ 85977; _photo, by Messrs. Mansell & Co._]

Smaller canals were possibly dug during Eannatum's reign for supplying
water to those quarters of Lagash which he improved or added to; and
we also know that, where canalization was impracticable, he obtained
water by sinking wells. Within the enclosure of Ningirsu's temple, for
instance, he constructed a well for supplying the temple with water,
and some of the bricks have been recovered which lined the well on the
inside.[43] On these he inscribed his name beside those of the gods
by whom he had been favoured; and, after giving a list of his more
important conquests, he recorded that he had built the well in the
spacious forecourt of the temple, and had named it Sigbirra, and had
dedicated it to Ningirsu. From the reference to his conquests in the
inscription upon the bricks, it is clear that the sinking of the well,
like the cutting of the irrigation-canal Lummadimdug, took place in the
later years of Eannatum's reign.

The phrase with which the well-inscription of Eannatum ends may be
taken as indicating the measure of prosperity to which the state of
Lagash attained under his rule. "In those days," it says, "did Ningirsu
love Eannatum." But Eannatum's claim to remembrance rests, as we have
seen, in a greater degree upon his military successes, by means of
which he was enabled to extend the authority of Lagash over the whole
of Sumer and a great part of Akkad. He proved himself strong enough at
the same time to defend his empire from the attack of external foes,
and it is probable that, after his signal defeat of the Elamites, he
was not troubled by further raids from that quarter. Three times in
the course of his inscriptions he states that "by Eannatum, whose name
was uttered by Ningirsu, were the countries broken in the head," and
it would appear that his boast was justified. The metaphor he here
employs is taken from the heavy battle-mace, which formed an effective
weapon in the warfare of the period. It may be seen in use in the scene
sculptured upon the principal monument of Eannatum's reign, where
Ningirsu himself is portrayed as breaking the heads of his foes. This
representation of the city-god of Lagash, one of the finest examples of
early Sumerian sculpture, in itself admirably symbolizes the ambition
and achievements of the ruler in whose reign and by whose order it was
made.


[1] "Déc. en Chaldée," p. xl.; cf. Thureau-Dangin, "Königsinschriften,"
pp. 10 ff.

[2] With the lower part of Col. IV. (pl. xl.), ll. 5-8, cf. Col. V.,
ll. 23-29.

[3] Literally, "devoured.".

[4] Col. I., ll. 10 ff. ("Déc. en Chaldée," p. xlvii.).

[5] Obv., Col. VII. (lower part) and Col. VIII. ff.

[6] Cone-Inscription, Col. I., ll. 32 ff.

[7] "Cuneiform Texts in the British Museum," Pt. VII., pl. 1 f., No.
23580.

[8] "Déc. en Chaldée," p. xliv., Galet E.

[9] Cone-Inscription, Col. II., ll. 11-18.

[10] Cf. Obv., Col. XIX.-XXII., and Rev., Col. III.-V.

[11] Obv., Col. XVI.--Rev., Col. V.

[12] The fragments A-F have been published in "Déc. en Chaldée" on the
following plates: Plate 4, A, B, and C, Obverse (it should be noted
that on the plate the letters B and C should be interchanged); Plate 3,
A, B, and C, Reverse (the letters B and C are here placed correctly);
Plate 4 (bis), D and E, Obverse; Plate 3 (bis), D and E, Reverse; Plate
4 (ter), F, Obverse and Reverse. The fragment G, which connects C with
F, is published in "Cun. Texts in the Brit. Mus.," Pt. VII., pl. 1.

[13] These are known by the symbols D and E; see p. 131, Fig. 46. In
the course of its transport from Tello to Constantinople the upper part
of fragment D was unfortunately damaged, so that the god's brow, and
his eye, and the greater part of his nose are now wanting (see "Déc.
en Chaldée," pl. 4 bis). In the block the missing portions have been
restored from a squeeze of the fragment taken at Tello by M. de Sarzec
(cf. "Déc.," p. 194 f.).

[14] Cf. Heuzey, "Rev. d'Assyr.," III., p. 10. Its first adoption by
the Semites is seen on the recently discovered monument of Sharru-Gi,
an early king of Kish; see below, Chap. VIII., p. 220 f.

[15] See above, p. 128 f.

[16] The fragment is known as B; "Déc. en Chaldée," pl. 4 (see above,
p. 129, n. 1). For her headdress, see above, p. 51, Fig. 18.

[17] Fragment G; see above, p. 129, n 1.

[18] Fragments C and F; see above, p. 129, n. 1.

[19] "Déc. en Chaldée," p. xliii., Galet A, Col. V. f.

[20] These are numbered A, D (which is joined to E), and B; see above,
p 129, n. 1.

[21] See above, p. 125.

[22] See the plate facing p. 124.

[23] Fragment B, Reverse (see above, p. 129, n. 1).

[24] See the plate facing p. 124.

[25] See above, p. 43.

[26] See above, p. 42, n. 1.

[27] Fragment C, Reverse; see the plate facing p. 138.

[28] The remains of this scene upon fragment F are figured in the text;
for the fragment G, see "Cun. Texts in the Brit. Mus.," Pt. VII., pl. 1.

[29] See above, p. 68, Fig. 20.

[30] See Obv., Col. VI., ll. 25 ff., Col. VII., ll. 1 ff.

[31] Foundation-stone A, Col. V., l. 23--Col. VI., l. 5; "Déc.," p.
xliii.

[32] See Col, VI., ll. 6 ff.

[33] See Col. IV., ll. 25 ff.

[34] See the opposite plate.

[35] Foundation-stone A, Col. III., l. 13.

[36] Col. VI., ll. 6 ff.

[37] The phrase is not to be taken to mean that Eannatum buried the
bodies of the slain Elamites, though it may be a conventional formula
employed to describe any important battle. It may be noted that
Entemena definitely states that he left the bones of his enemies to
bleach in the open plain, and this was probably the practice of the
period. Each side would bury its own dead to ensure their entrance into
the Underworld.

[38] Rev., Col. VI., l. 10--Col. VII., l. 3.

[39] The name is expressed by the conflate sign, formed of the signs
URU and A, the phonetic reading of which is unknown.

[40] The name of the place was formerly read in a short inscription
engraved upon a mace-head of Gudea, and it was supposed to be described
in that passage as lying near the Persian Gulf; cf. Heuzey, "Rev.
Arch.," vol. xvii. (1891), p. 153; Radau, "Early Bab. Hist.," pp. 81,
191. But the syllable as occurs in that text without the determinative
for "place," and it is rather to be interpreted as part of the name of
the mountain from which Gudea obtained the breccia for his mace-head;
and the mountain itself is described as situated on "the Upper Sea,"
i.e. the Mediterranean, see below, p. 270 f.

[41] See "Rev.," Col. VIII.

[42] Foundation-stone A, Col. VII., ll. 3 ff.

[43] For one of the inscribed bricks from the well, see the plate
opposite p. 154.




CHAPTER VI


THE CLOSE OF UR-NINÂ'S DYNASTY, THE REFORMS OF URUKAGINA, AND THE FALL
OF LAGASH


Eannatum was the most famous and powerful member of Ur-Ninâ's dynasty,
and it is probable that his reign marks the zenith of the power of
Lagash as a city-state. We do not know the cause which led to his
being succeeded upon the throne by his brother Enannatum I., instead
of by a son of his own. That the break in the succession was due to
no palace-revolution is certain from a reference Enannatum makes to
his brother in an inscription found by Koldewey at El-Hibba,[1] where,
after naming Akurgal as his father, he describes himself as "the
beloved brother of Eannatum, patesi of Lagash." It is possible that
Eannatum had no male issue, or, since his reign appears to have been
long, he may have survived his sons. We may indeed conjecture that his
victories were not won without considerable loss among his younger
warriors, and many cadets of the royal house, including the king's
own sons, may have given their lives in the service of their city and
its god. Such may well have been the cause of the succession passing
from the direct line of descent to a younger branch of the family.
That Enannatum followed, and did not precede his brother upon the
throne is proved by the reference to him in the El-Hibba text already
referred to; moreover, he himself was succeeded by his own immediate
descendants, and a reference to his reign upon the Cone of Entemena
follows in order of time the same ruler's record concerning Eannatum.
The few inscriptions of his reign, that have been recovered at Tello
and El-Hibba, are of a votive rather than of an historical character,
and, were it not for the historical summaries upon Entemena's Cone and
an inscribed plaque of Urukagina, we should be without data for tracing
the history of Sumer at this period. As it is, our information is in
the main confined to the continued rivalry between Lagash and her near
neighbour Umma, which now led to a renewal of active hostilities.

We have already seen that, in spite of the increase in the power of
Lagash during the reign of Eannatum, the city of Umma had not been
incorporated in its dominion, but had succeeded in maintaining an
attitude of semi-independence. This is apparent from the terms of the
treaty, by which the men of Umma undertook not to invade the territory
of Lagash; and, although they paid a heavy tribute in corn to Eannatum,
we may assume that they were ready to seize any opportunity that
might present itself of repudiating the suzerainty of Lagash. Such
an opportunity they may have seen in the death of their conqueror
Eannatum, for after the accession of his brother we find them repeating
the same tactics they had employed during the preceding reign under
the leadership of their patesi, Ush. Enakalli, with whom Eannatum had
drawn up his treaty, had been succeeded on the throne by Urlumma. In
his cone-inscription Entemena gives no indication as to whether there
was any interval between the reign of Enakalli and that of Urlumma.
But from a small tablet of lapis-lazuli in the "Collection de Clercq,"
we gather that the latter was Enakalli's son, and, therefore, probably
his direct successor upon the throne.[2] The little tablet was employed
as a foundation-memorial, and a short inscription upon it records the
building of a temple to the god Enkigal by Urlumma, who describes
himself as the son of Enakalli. Each ruler bears the title of "king" in
the inscription, and, although the reading of the sign following the
title is uncertain, there is little doubt that we should identify the
Urlumma and Enakalli of the tablet with the two patesis of Umma who are
known to have borne these names.

Urlumma did not maintain his father's policy, but, following Ush's
example, marshalled his army and made a sudden descent upon the
territory of Lagash. His raid appears to have been attended with even
greater violence than that of his predecessor. Ush had contented
himself with merely removing the stele of delimitation set up by
Mesilim, but Urlumma broke that of Eannatum in pieces by casting it
into the fire, and we may assume that he treated Mesilim's stele in the
same way.[3] The shrines, or chapels, which Eannatum had built upon the
frontier and had dedicated to the gods whom he had invoked to guard the
treaty, were now levelled to the ground. By such acts Urlumma sought
to blot out all trace of the humiliating conditions imposed in earlier
years upon his city, and, crossing the frontier-ditch of Ningirsu,
he raided and plundered the rich plains which it had always been the
ambition of Umma to possess.

It is probable that Urlumma's object in breaking the treaty was not
merely to collect spoil from the fields and villages he overran, but to
gain complete possession of the coveted plain. At least, both Entemena
and Urukagina record that the subsequent battle between the forces
of Umma and Lagash took place within the latter's territory, which
would seem to imply that Urlumma and his army did not retreat with
their plunder to their own city, but attempted to retain possession of
the land itself. Enannatum met the men of Umma in Ugigga, a district
within the temple-lands of Ningirsu, where a battle was fought, which,
in Urukagina's brief account, is recorded to have resulted in Umma's
defeat. Entemena, on the other hand, does not say whether Lagash was
victorious, and his silence is possibly significant, for, had his
father achieved a decided victory, he would doubtless have recorded
it. Moreover, Urlumma continued to give trouble, and it was only in
the reign of Entemena himself that he was finally defeated and slain.
We may, therefore, conclude that Enannatum did no more than check
Urlumma's encroachments, and it is not improbable that the latter
retained for the time a considerable portion of the territory which
Lagash had enjoyed for several generations.

Few other facts are known of the reign of Enannatum I. We gather that
he sent men to the mountains, probably of Elam, and caused them to fell
cedars there and bring the trunks to Lagash; and from the cedar-wood
thus obtained he constructed the roof of a temple, which appears to
have been dedicated to Ningirsu. The temple we may probably identify
with Ningirsu's famous temple E-ninnû, whence we have recovered a
mortar, which Enannatum prepared and presented that it might be used
for pounding onions in connection with the temple-ritual. Another
object dedicated to Ningirsu, which dates from this period, is
preserved in the British Museum, and furnishes us with the name of a
minister in the service of Enannatum. This is a limestone mace-head,[4]
carved with the emblem of Lagash, and bearing an inscription from which
we learn that it was deposited in the temple E-ninnû by Barkiba,[5]
the minister, to ensure the preservation of the life of Enannatum,
"his king." It would appear from this record that, although Enannatum
himself adopted the title of "patesi," which he ascribes also to his
father Akurgal, it was permissible for his subordinates to refer to
him under the title of "king." That "patesi" was, however, his usual
designation may be inferred not only from his own inscriptions, but
from the occurrence of the title after his name upon a deed of sale
drawn up on a tablet of black stone,[6] which probably dates from his
reign. From this document, as well as from a text inscribed upon clay
cones found by Koldewey at El-Hibba,[7] we also learn that Enannatum
had a son named Lummadur,[8] in addition to Entemena. It should be
noted that neither on the clay cones nor on the tablet of black stone
is the name of Enannatum's father recorded, so that the suggestion has
been made that they should be referred to Enannatum II., rather than to
Enannatum I. But the adornment of the temple E-anna, recorded on the
cones, is referred to in the clay-inscription of Enannatum I., which,
like the cones, was found at El-Hibba.[9] It is reasonable therefore to
assign the cone-inscription also to Enannatum I., and to conclude that
Lummadur was his son, rather than the son and possible successor of
Enannatum II. The cone-inscription records the installation of Lummadur
by his father as priest in E-anna, when that temple had been adorned
and embellished in honour of the goddess Ninni. Since Enannatum was
succeeded upon the throne of Lagash by Entemena, we may assume that
Lummadur was the latter's younger brother.

One of the first duties Entemena was called upon to perform, after
ascending the throne, was the defence of his territory against further
encroachments by Urlumma. It is evident that this ruler closely
watched the progress of events in Lagash, and such an occasion as the
death of the reigning patesi in that city might well have appeared
to him a suitable time for the renewal of hostilities. The death of
the great conqueror Eannatum had already encouraged him to raid and
occupy a portion of the territory held up to that time by Lagash,
and, although Eannatum had succeeded in holding him to some extent in
check, he only awaited a favourable opportunity to extend the area of
territory under his control. Such an opportunity he would naturally
see in the disappearance of his old rival, for there was always the
chance that the new ruler would prove a still less successful leader
than his father, or his accession might give rise to dissension among
the members of the royal house, which would materially weaken the
city's power of resistance. His attack appears to have been carefully
organized, for there is evidence that he strengthened his own resources
by seeking assistance from at least one other neighbouring state. His
anticipation of securing a decided victory by this means was, however,
far from being realized. Entemena lost no time in summoning his forces,
and, having led them out into the plain of Lagash, he met the army
of Urlumma at the frontier-ditch of Lummagirnunta, which his uncle
Eannatum had constructed for the defence and irrigation of Gu-edin,
the fertile territory of Ningirsu. Here he inflicted a signal defeat
upon the men of Umma, who, when routed and put to flight, left sixty
of their fellows lying dead upon the banks of the canal.[10] Urlumma
himself fled from the battle, and sought safety in his own city.
But Entemena did not rest content with the defeat he had inflicted
upon the enemy in the field. He pursued the men of Umma into their
own territory, and succeeded in capturing the city itself before its
demoralized inhabitants had had time to organize or strengthen its
defence. Urlumma he captured and slew, and he thus put an end to an
ambitious ruler, who for years had undoubtedly caused much trouble
and annoyance to Lagash. Entemena's victory was complete, but it was
not won without some loss among his own forces, for he heaped up
burial-mounds in five separate places, which no doubt covered the
bodies of his own slain. The bones of the enemy, he records, were left
to bleach in the open plain.

[Illustration: MARBLE GATE-SOCKET BEARING AN INSCRIPTION OF ENTEMENA,
PATESI OF SHIRPURLA.--_Brit. Mus., No._ 90932_; photo, by Messrs.
Mansell & Co._]

Entemena now proceeded to annex Umma, and he incorporated it within
the state of Lagash and reorganized its administration under officers
appointed by himself. As the new patesi of Umma he did not appoint
any native of that city, but transferred thither an official of his
own, who held a post of considerable importance in another town
under the suzerainty of Lagash. The name of the official was Ili,
and at the time of the annexation of Umma he was acting as sangu, or
priest, of the town, the name of which has been provisionally read as
Ninab or Ninni-esh. Though the reading of the name of the place is
still uncertain, it would appear to have been situated in Southern
Babylonia, and to have been a place of some importance. A small tablet
in the Louvre mentions together certain men of Erech, of Adab and of
Ninni-esh,[11] and, when Lugal-zaggisi enumerates the benefits he had
conferred on the cities of Southern Babylonia over which he ruled, he
mentions Umma and Ninni-esh together, after referring to Erech, Ur, and
Larsa.[12] We may, therefore, conclude with some probability that the
city in which Ili was at this time acting as priest was situated not
far from Umma. It was under the control of Lagash, and doubtless formed
part of the empire which Eannatum had bequeathed to his successors upon
the throne. Ili is described as the priest, not the patesi, of the
city, and it is possible that his office included the control of its
secular administration. But in view of the importance of the place, it
is unlikely that it was without a patesi.

The installation of Ili in the patesiate of Umma was accompanied by
some degree of ceremonial. It would appear that his appointment did not
take place immediately after the capture of the town, but that a short
interval elapsed between the close of the war and the inauguration
of the new government. Meanwhile, Entemena himself had returned to
Lagash, and it was to that city that he summoned Ili into his presence.
He then set out with Ili from Girsu, and, when Umma was reached, he
formally installed him at the head of the government, and conferred on
him the title of patesi. At the same time he dictated his own terms to
the people of Umma, and commissioned Ili to see that they were duly
carried out. In the first place he restored to Lagash the territory
to which she had always laid claim, and the ancient frontier-ditches,
which had been filled up or had fallen in, he caused to be repaired. In
addition to reasserting the traditional rights of Lagash, he annexed
new land in the district of Karkar, since its inhabitants had taken
part in the recent rebellion, and had probably furnished an important
contingent for the army of Urlumma. He gave directions to Ili to
extend the two principal frontier-ditches, dedicated to Ningirsu and
Ninâ respectively, within the territory of Karkar; and, with the
large supply of forced labour which he exacted from his newly annexed
subjects, he strengthened the defences of his own territory, and
restored and extended the system of canals between the Euphrates and
the Tigris. But Entemena did not content himself with exacting land
and labour only from the conquered city. He imposed a heavy tribute in
corn, and it was probably one of Ili's most important duties as patesi
to superintend its collection and ensure its punctual transfer into the
granaries of Lagash.

In order to commemorate the conquest and annexation of Umma, Entemena
caused a record of his victory to be drawn up, which he doubtless
had engraved upon a stone stele similar to those prepared in earlier
times by Mesilim and Eannatum. This stele, like the earlier ones,
was probably set up upon the frontier to serve as a memorial of his
achievements. Fortunately for us, he did not confine the records to
his own victories, but prefaced them with an epitomized account of
the relations which had existed between Lagash and Umma from the time
of Mesilim until his own day. Other copies of the inscription were
probably engraved upon stone and set up in the cities of Umma and
Lagash, and, in order to increase still further the chances in favour
of the preservation of his record, he had copies inscribed upon small
cones of clay. These last were of the nature of foundation-memorials,
and we may conclude that he had them buried beneath the buildings he
erected or repaired upon the frontier-canals, and also perhaps in the
foundations of temples within the city of Lagash itself. Entemena's
foresight in multiplying the number of his texts, and in burying them
in the structure of his buildings, was in accordance with the practice
of the period; and in his case the custom has been fully justified.
So far as we know, his great stone stelæ have perished; but one of
the small clay cones [13] has been recovered, and is among the most
valuable of the records we possess of the early history of Sumer.

It is possible that the concluding paragraphs of the text were given
in a fuller form upon the stone stelæ than we find them upon the cone;
but, so far as the historical portion of the record is concerned,
we have doubtless recovered the greater part, if not the whole, of
Entemena's record. The stelæ may have been engraved with elaborate
curses, intended to preserve the frontier-ditch from violation, and,
though these have been omitted in the shorter version of the text,
their place is taken by the brief invocation and prayer with which the
record concludes. Entemena here prays that if ever in time to come
the men of Umma should break across the boundary-ditch of Ningirsu or
the boundary-ditch of Ninâ, in order to lay violent hands upon the
territory of Lagash, whether they be men of the city of Umma itself or
people from the lands round about, then may Enlil destroy them, and may
Ningirsu cast over them his net, and set his hand and foot upon them.
And, should the warriors of his own city be called upon to defend it,
he prays that their hearts may be full of ardour and courage. It was
not many years before Lagash was in sore need of the help which is here
invoked for her by Entemena.

Apart from the cone recording the conquest of Umma, the inscriptions
of Entemena do not throw much light upon the military achievements
of his reign. Three fragments of a limestone vase have been found at
Nippur in the strata beneath the temple of Enlil on the south-east side
of the ziggurat, or temple-tower, bearing on their outer surface a
votive inscription of Entemena.[14] From these we gather that the vase
was dedicated to Enlil as a thank-offering after some victory. The
fragmentary character of the inscription prevents us from identifying
the enemy who was subdued on this occasion; but we shall probably be
right in taking the passage as referring, not to the conquest of Umma,
but to the subjugation of some other district. In fact, we may regard
the vase as evidence that Entemena attempted to retain his hold upon
the empire which Eannatum had founded, and did not shrink from the
necessity of undertaking military expeditions to attain this object. In
further support of this view we may perhaps cite a reference to one of
the cities conquered by Eannatum, which occurs upon a votive text drawn
up in Entemena's reign, though not by the patesi himself. The text in
question is stamped upon the perforated relief of Dudu, chief priest
of Ningirsu,[15] which at one time formed the support of a colossal
ceremonial mace-head dedicated in the temple of Ningirsu at Lagash.

The material of which the block is composed is dark in colour,
comparatively light in weight, and liable to crack; it consists of
a mixture of clay and bitumen, and may have been formed by nature
or produced artificially.[16] While this substance was still in a
pliant state the block was formed from it, and the designs with the
inscription were impressed by means of a stamp. According to the
inscription, this bituminous substance was brought by Dudu to Lagash
from one of the cities which had been conquered by Eannatum and
incorporated within his empire. The fact that Dudu should have caused
the substance to be procured from the city in question suggests that
friendly relations existed between it and Lagash at the time; it is
quite possible that it had not, meanwhile, secured its independence,
but still continued to acknowledge the suzerainty of the latter city.
The only other references to a foreign city in the texts of Entemena
occur upon his two principal building inscriptions,[17] which include
among the list of his buildings the erection of a great laver for the
god Enki, described as "King of Eridu." We may perhaps see in this
record a further indication that at least the southern portion of
Eannatum's empire still remained in his nephew's possession.

[Illustration: Fig. 49.--Fig 50.--Fig 51.--Details from the engravings
upon Entemena's silver vase. The upper group represents the emblem of
Lagash; in the lower groups ibexes and stags are substituted for the
lions.--_Déc._, pl 43 _bis_; Cat. No. 218.]

The high-priest, Dudu, whose portrait is included in the designs upon
the plaque already referred to, appears to have been an important
personage during the reign of Entemena, and two inscriptions that have
been recovered are dated by reference to his period of office. One
of these occurs upon the famous silver vase of Entemena, the finest
example of Sumerian metal work that has yet been recovered. The vase,
engraved in outline with variant forms of the emblem of Lagash,[18]
bears an inscription around the neck, stating that Entemena, patesi
of Lagash, "the great patesi of Ningirsu," had fashioned it of
pure silver and had dedicated it to Ningirsu in E-ninnû to ensure
the preservation of his life. It was deposited as a votive object
in Ningirsu's temple, and a note is added to the dedication to the
effect that "at this time Dudu was priest of Ningirsu." A similar
reference to Dudu's priesthood occurs upon a foundation-inscription
of Entemena recording the construction of a reservoir for the supply
of the Lummadimdug Canal, its capacity being little more than half
that of the earlier reservoir constructed by Eannatum. Since the
canal was dedicated to Ningirsu, the reference to Dudu was also here
appropriate. But such a method of indicating the date of any object
or construction, even though closely connected with the worship or
property of the city-god, was somewhat unusual, and its occurrence
in these texts may perhaps be taken as an indication of the powerful
position which Dudu enjoyed.[19] Indeed, Enlitarzi, another priest of
Ningirsu during Entemena's reign, subsequently secured the throne of
Lagash. Entemena's building-inscriptions afford further evidence of
his devotion to Ningirsu, whose temple and storehouses he rebuilt and
added to. Next in order of importance were his constructions in honour
of the goddess Ninâ, while he also erected or repaired temples and
other buildings dedicated to Lugal-uru, and the goddesses Ninkharsag,
Gatumdug, and Ninmakh. Such records suggest that Entemena's reign, like
that of Eannatum, was a period of some prosperity for Lagash, although
it is probable that her influence was felt within a more restricted
area.[20] By his conquest and annexation of Umma, he more than made up
for any want of success on the part of his father, Enannatum I., and,
through this victory alone, he may well have freed Lagash from her most
persistent enemy throughout the reign of his immediate successors.

[Illustration: SILVER VASE DEDICATED TO THE GOD NINGIRSU BY ENTEMENA,
PATESI OF SHIRPURLA.--_In the Louvre; Déc. en Chald., pl._ 43 (_bis_).]

With Enannatum II., the son of Entemena, who succeeded his father upon
the throne, the dynasty founded by Ur-Ninâ, so far as we know, came
to an end.[21] The reign of Entemena's son is attested by a single
inscription engraved upon a door-socket from the great store-house of
Ningirsu at Lagash, his restoration of which is recorded in the text.
There then occurs a gap in our sequence of royal inscriptions found at
Tello, the next ruler who has left us any records of his own, being
Urukagina, the ill-fated reformer and king of Lagash, under whom the
city was destined to suffer what was undoubtedly the greatest reverse
she encountered in the long course of her history. Although we have
no royal texts relating to the period between the reigns of Enannatum
II. and Urukagina, we are fortunately not without means for estimating
approximately its length and recovering the names of some, if not all,
of the patesis who occupied the throne of Lagash in the interval. Our
information is derived from a number of clay tablets, the majority of
which were found in the course of native diggings at Tello after M.
de Sarzec's death.[22] They formed part of the private archive of the
patesis of Lagash at this time, and are concerned with the household
expenses of the court and particularly of the harîm. Frequently these
tablets of accounts make mention of the reigning patesi or his wife,
and from them we have recovered the names of three patesis--Enetarzi,
Enlitarzi, and Lugal-anda[23]--who are to be set in the interval
between Enannatum II. and Urukagina. Moreover, it has been pointed out
that the inscriptions upon most of the tablets end with a peculiar form
of figure, consisting of one or more diagonal strokes cutting a single
horizontal one; and a plausible explanation has been given of these
figures, to the effect that they were intended to indicate the date
of the tablet, the number of diagonal strokes showing at a glance the
year of the patesi's reign in which the text was written, and to which
the accounts refer. A considerable number of such tablets have been
examined, and by counting the strokes upon them it has been concluded
that Enetarzi reigned for at least four years, Enlitarzi for at least
five years, and Lugal-anda for at least seven years.[24]

The relative order of these three patesis may now be regarded as
definitely fixed, and, though it is possible that the names of others
are missing which should be set within the period, the tablets
themselves furnish indications that in any case the interval between
Enannatum II. and Urukagina was not a long one. It had for some
time been suspected that Enlitarzi and Lugal-anda lived at about
the same period, for a steward named Shakh was employed by the wife
of Enlitarzi as well as by Barnamtarra, the wife of Lugal-anda.[25]
This inference has now been confirmed by the discovery of a document
proving that Lugal-anda was Enlitarzi's son; for a clay cone has been
found, inscribed with a contract concerning the sale of a house, the
contracting parties being the family of Lugal-anda, described as
"the son of Enlitarzi, the priest," and the family of Barnamtarra,
Lugal-anda's future wife.[26] Moreover, we have grounds for believing
that Lugal-anda was not only the last of the three patesis whose names
have been recovered, but was Urukagina's immediate predecessor. An
indication that this was the case may be seen in the fact that the
steward Eniggal, who is frequently mentioned in tablets of his reign,
was also employed by Urukagina and his wife Shagshag. Confirmation
of this view has been found in the text upon a tablet, dated in the
first year of Urukagina's reign as king, in which mention is made of
Barnamtarra, Lugal-anda's wife.[27] This only leaves an interval before
the reign of Enlitarzi, in which Enetarzi, the remaining patesi, is to
be set.

That this was not a long period is clear from the fact that Enlitarzi
himself occupied the throne soon after Enannatum II., an inference
we may draw from a double date upon a sale-contract, dated in the
patesiate of Entemena, patesi of Lagash, and in the priesthood of
Enlitarzi, chief priest of Ningirsu.[28] There can be no doubt of the
identity of Enlitarzi, the priest here referred to, with Enlitarzi, the
patesi, for the wife of the priest, who is mentioned in the contract,
bears the same name as the wife of the patesi.[29] Since, therefore,
Enlitarzi already occupied the high position of chief priest of
Ningirsu during the reign of Entemena, it is reasonable to conclude
that his reign as patesi was not separated by any long interval
from that of Entemena's son and successor. The internal evidence
furnished by the texts thus supports the conclusion suggested by an
examination of the tablets themselves, all of which are distinguished
by a remarkable uniformity of type, consisting, as they do, of baked
clay tablets of a rounded form and written in a style which closely
resembles that of Urukagina's royal inscriptions. The interval between
the death of Entemena and Urukagina's accession was thus a short one,
and the fact that during it no less than four patesis followed one
another in quick succession suggests that the period was one of unrest
in Lagash.

Like Enlitarzi, Enetarzi also appears to have been chief priest of
Ningirsu before he secured the throne; at least we know that a priest
of that name held office at about this period. The inscription from
which this fact may be inferred is an extremely interesting one,[30]
for it consists of the earliest example of a letter or despatch that
has yet been found on any Babylonian site. It was discovered at Tello
during the recent excavations of Commandant Cros, and, alike in the
character of its writing and in its general appearance, it closely
resembles the tablets of accounts from the patesis' private archive, to
which reference has already been made. The despatch was written by a
certain Lu-enna, chief priest of the goddess Ninmar, and is addressed
to Enetarzi, chief priest of the god Ningirsu. At first sight its
contents are scarcely those which we should expect to find in a letter
addressed by one chief priest to another. For the writer informs his
correspondent that a band of Elamites had pillaged the territory of
Lagash, but that he had fought with the enemy, and had succeeded in
putting them to flight. He then refers to five hundred and forty of
them, whom he probably captured or slew. The reverse of the tablet
enumerates various amounts of silver and wool, and certain royal
garments, which may have formed part of the booty taken, or recaptured,
from the Elamites; and the text ends with what appears to be a
reference to the division of this spoil between the patesi of Lagash
and another high official, and with directions that certain offerings
should be deducted for presentation to the goddess Ninmar, in whose
temple the writer was chief priest.

That a chief priest of Ninmar should lead an army against the enemies
of Lagash and should send a report of his success to the chief priest
of Ningirsu, in which he refers to the share of the spoil to be
assigned to the patesi, may be regarded as an indication that the
central government of Lagash was not so stable as it once had been
under the more powerful members of Ur-Ninâ's dynasty. The reference
to Enetarzi suggests that the incursion of the Elamites took place
during the reign of Enannatum II. We may thus conclude that the last
member of Ur-Ninâ's dynasty did not possess his father's ability to
direct the affairs of Lagash and allowed the priests of the great
temples in the city to usurp many of the privileges which had hitherto
been held by the patesi. It is probably to this fact that the close
of Ur-Ninâ's dynasty may be traced. The subsequent struggle for the
patesiate appears to have taken place among the more important members
of the priesthood. Of those who secured the throne, Enlitarzi, at
any rate, was succeeded by his son, by whom, however, he may have
been deposed,[31] and no strong administration appears to have been
established, until Urukagina, abandoning the traditions of both the
priesthood and the patesiate, based his government on the support he
secured from the people themselves. Such appears to have been the
course of events at this time, although the paucity of our historical
materials renders it impossible to do more than hazard a conjecture.

[Illustration: Fig. 52. Fig 53.--Impression of a seal of Lugal-anda,
patesi of Lagash (Shirpurla), engraved with the emblem of Lagash, and
with figures of animals, heroes, and mythological creatures. Below is a
reconstruction of the cylinder-seal, indicating its size.--See Allotte
de la Fu e, _Rev. d'Assyr._, Vol. VI., No. 4, pl. i.]

In addition to the tablets of accounts concerning the household
expenditure of the patesis, and the letter to Enetarzi from Lu-enna,
the principal relics of this period that have come down to us are
numbers of clay sealings, some of which bear impressions of the
seals of the patesi Lugal-anda, his wife Barnamtarra, and his
steward Eniggal. They afford us no new historical information, but
are extremely valuable for the study of the artistic achievements
and religious beliefs of the Sumerians.[32] From the traces upon
their lower sides, it is clear that they were employed for sealing
reed-baskets or bundles tied up in sacking formed of palm-leaves and
secured with cords. In consequence of the rough character of the
lumps of clay, no single one presents a perfect impression, but, as
several examples of each have been found, it is possible in some cases
to reconstruct the complete design and to estimate the size of the
original seal. In the accompanying blocks reproductions are given of
the designs upon the cylinder-seals of Lugal-anda which can be most
completely restored. The principal group of figures in the larger of
the two consists of two rampant lions in conflict with a human-headed
bull and a mythical and composite being, half-bull and half-man, whose
form recalls the description of Ea-bani in the legend of Gilgamesh. To
the left of the inscription is the emblem of Lagash, and below is a row
of smaller figures consisting of two human-headed bulls, two heroes and
a stag. The figures on the smaller cylinder represent the same types,
but here the emblem of Lagash is reduced to the eagle without the
lions, which was peculiarly the emblem of Ningirsu. The mythological
being who resembles Ea-bani is repeated heraldically on each side of
the text in conflict with a lion.

The occurrence of this figure and those of the

[Illustration: Fig. 54. Fig. 55.--Impression of a seal of Lugal-anda,
sandy for half a mile out; there was just light enough to distinguish
where the paler green commenced. The darkness grew rapidly as they
walked; the last faint reflection of sunset faded on the gray sea. An
unusual silence possessed them after the exuberance of the evening. They
stopped now and again to shake the little pebbles out of their shoes.
All was black when they reached the village. The beach was full of
wickerwork crab-pots, and the headless divided forms of skate and
dog-fish loomed uncannily from the poles on which they hung. They were
the crab-fishers’ bait. Only a stray mongrel represented the village,
which already slept. The sea was mournful and gloomy; its pitchy
blackness, over which the sky hinged like a half-raised gray lid, was
relieved only by its own broken lines of foam, which sometimes rolled
in six deep, looking exactly like streaks of phosphorescence on a dark
wall, and adding weirdness to the forlorn desolation of the scene. There
was no other line of light either on sea or land; the lonesome sea
tossed sleeplessly in its agony, howling and crying.

They turned back, interchanging companions. During the walk Mrs.
Wyndwood suddenly asked Matthew if his wife knew where he was: he said,
“No”; sometimes his brother Billy did; Billy lived with her: his man
forwarded all letters from his studio. After a long pause he added that
practically he had been separated from his wife for years. Eleanor
murmured again, “Poor woman,” and he was too shame-stricken to look her
in the face, and to read that the sympathy was for him. They relapsed
into silence, and indeed conversation was difficult.

The night had grown wilder, the wind blew more fiercely, drenching their
faces with salt spray, whirling them round and round and almost lifting
them off their feet. But the clouds were driven off and the
star-sprinkled heaven was revealed, majestic.

Near the house Mrs. Wyndwood and Matthew Strang stopped to admire the
sublime spectacle, sheltering themselves from the gale in a niche in the
cliff; the other two had already gone round the craggy projection which
hid the house.

They watched the mad cavalry charge of creaming billows; watched them
break, thundering and throwing their spray heavenwards like a continuous
play of white fountains all along the line of march. To the right,
beyond the village whence they had come, where the cliff jutted out at
its lowest level, a ghostly fountain leaped again and again sheer over
the top of the cliff with a crashing and splashing that was succeeded by
the long-receding moan of the back-drawn wave soughing through the
rattling pebbles.

Her face, flushed with the passion of the storm, showed divinely in the
dim starlight; beneath her wrap her bosom, panting from the walk in the
teeth of the wind, heaved with excitement; the gale had dishevelled her
hair. They scarcely spoke; the organ-roll of the sea crashed
majestically like the bass in some savage symphony of the winds.

Now at last the moon leaped out, framed in a weird cloud-rack; the
moonlight played on her loveliness and made it wonderful.

She moved slightly forward. “The cliff is too damp to lean upon,” she
murmured.

Audaciously he slipped a trembling arm against the rock and let her form
rest against that. She scarcely seemed conscious of him; she was
watching the rampant, seething waters, volleying their white jets
skyward with a crash of cannon that outroared the wind; her scarlet lips
were parted eagerly; the dreamy light had gone from her eyes; they
flashed fire.

“Oh, I could dare to-night!” she cried.

The wind blew her tresses into his face; the perfume of them stung his
blood. Her loveliness was maddening him. So close! so close! Oh, to
shower mad kisses upon her lips, her eyes, her hair! What did it matter,
there on that wild beach alone with the elements! He had been so near
death; who would have recked if he had been dead now, tossed in that
welter of waters?

The waves broke with a thousand thunders, the white fountains flew at
the stars; they seemed alive, exultant, frenzied with the ecstasy of
glorious living. Oh, for life--simple, sublime--the keen, tingling,
savage life of Vikings and sea-robbers in the days before civilization,
in the full-blooded days when men loved and hated fiercely, strenuously,
wrenching through rapine and slaughter the women they coveted. Ah,
surely he had some of their blood; it ran in his veins like fire; he was
of their race, despite his dreamings. He was his father’s son, loving
the storm and the battle.

The wind wailed; it was like the cry of his tortured heart, his yearning
for happiness. It rose higher and higher. A bat flew between them and
the moon. Eleanor nestled to him involuntarily; her face was very near
to his. It gleamed seductively; there was no abashment, only alluring
loveliness; the fire in her eyes kindled him now not to the secondary
life of Art, but to the primary life of realities. Could she not hear
his heart beat? Yes, surely the storm of the elements had passed into
her blood, too. Her face was ardent, ecstatic. His arm held her tight.
Oh, to stake the world on a kiss!

The moon was hidden again; they were alone in the mad, dim night; the
complexities of Society were far away. They looked at each other, and
through her eyes he seemed to see heaven.

A star fell overhead. It drew her eyes away a moment to watch its fiery
curve. He felt the spell was broken. The wind shrieked with an eldritch
cry, like the mocking threnody of his thwarted hope. He had a shuddering
remembrance of Mad Peggy. And straightway he saw her weird figure
dashing round the crag in the darkness--a shawl over her head, and a
lovely face, at once radiant and frenzied, gleaming from between its
dusky folds. His heart almost stopped, a superstitious thrill froze his
hot blood. Never to be happy! Ah, God! never! never! To thirst and
thirst, and nothing ever to quench his thirst!

Mrs. Wyndwood started forward. “Oh, there you are, Olive!”

The figure threw passionate arms round her. “Comfort me, darling; I am
engaged.”

       *       *       *       *       *

For the happier Herbert had spoken. And Olive had listened shyly,
humbly, with tears, full of an exquisite uplifting emotion, akin to the
exaltation of righteousness, at the thought of giving herself to this
man, of living her life with and for the one true soul in the world.

They stood close to the hoary rim of the black welter; dusky figures,
wind-rocked and spray-drenched, a little apart from each other, the
shining house in the background.

“And when did you begin to think of me--in that way?” she faltered.

“I never thought of you in any other. But that night when Matthew
arrived, when you sat nid-nodding in the grandfather’s chair, you
maddened me; you were adorable! the contrast was exquisite. To think of
you--a wilful little misanthrope--to think of that glorious, wayward
creature fading away till she suited the chair. Oh, it was too--”

He broke off. Passion robbed him of words. He moved nearer--she drew
back.

“Oh, but will you still”--she hesitated, shy of the word--”love me when
I do suit the chair?”

“I shall always see you as you were then.”

She laughed with a half-sob.

“And just then,” she confessed deliciously, fluttering even now like a
bird in the net, “I was beginning to get frightened of you. I felt you
growing upon me, shadowing the horizon like the roc in the _Arabian
Nights_. And the pain of the world was outside--in the great black
night--calling to me in my slough of luxury.”

“You witch! Veil those eyes or I shall kiss them.”

She retreated.

“And why were you frightened of me?” he asked, tenderly.

She said, humbly, in little shy jerks: “I felt like in the sea this
morning--one little atom, and the whole world against me, and my own
weakness most of all.... I had prided myself on my swimming, and here
was I being dragged under ... just like other girls ... a victim to the
same ridiculous passion.”

“You delightful, candid creature! With me as the object?”

“Don’t be flippant now, Herbert.” How delicious his name sounded; it
made amends for the rebuke! “You do understand me. Marriage is a second
birth--voluntary, this time. It means accepting the universe, which was
thrust upon one unasked.”

“It means making the best of it.”

“Oh, surely it means more. It means passing it on to others. But I
surrender. I cannot live without you.”

“Olive!”

He sprang to take her, but she eluded him. “Look! the moon is covered up
again.”

“I only want to see your face.”

“Don’t talk like other men, though I have fallen like other girls.”

“No, you are always yourself, Olive--I have dreamed of this moment. I
would not have it otherwise--except perhaps with you in the
grandfather’s chair and a poke bonnet.”

“Now you are _your_self. This is such a conventional ending to a
holiday, we must preserve what originality we can.” She was recovering
her spirits.

“A conventional ending! Why, it’s a most romantic incongruous match. It
beats the comedy. I shall burn it.”

“No, let’s produce it--it wouldn’t cost much.”

“I am not worthy of you, Olive,” he said, with a quiver in his voice. “I
have nothing.”

“Oh! When you have my heart!”

“My queen of girls! But what of your relatives?”

A gleam of fun passed across her wet face. She had her droll look of
mischief.

“You are all of them. I was of age long ago--I am awfully old, you
know--you take me with your eyes open--”

“I can’t; yours dazzle me.”

“That’ll do for the comedy,” she laughed, gleefully. “Still, if you do
want me, there are only you and I to consider.”

“Only we two,” he murmured.

“We two,” she repeated, and her eyes were suffused with tender moisture.

There was a delicious silence. He tried to take her hand. This time she
abandoned it to him; a wave of moral emotion lifted her to the stars.

The wind wailed, the black sea crashed white at their feet, its whirling
brine blinded their eyes as with salt tears.

“Isn’t it curious?” she said, as they moved back a little, hand in hand.

“What, dearest?”

“That you and I should be made happier by our common perception of the
unhappiness of life?”

“Queer girl!” he thought. But he only squeezed her hand.

“The Catechism is right,” she went on, thoughtfully, proceeding to
misquote it. “The waves are too strong. It’s no use fighting against
your sex or your station. Do your duty in that state of life in which it
has pleased God to call you. But I would have that text taught to the
rich exclusively, not to the poor. The poor should be encouraged to
ascend; the rich should be taught contentment. Else their strength for
good is wasted fruitlessly.” And the electric current of love generated
by those close-pressed palms flashed to her soul the mission of a life
of noble work hand in hand.

Herbert scarcely heard her. The glow of her lovely face, the flashes of
feeling that passed over it, the tears that glistened on her
eyelashes--these absorbed his senses. Her generalizations were only a
vague, exquisite music. He lifted her hand and held it passionately to
his lips. She murmured, beseechingly:

“You will never disappoint me, Herbert?”

“My darling!” And he strove to draw her nearer and press his first kiss
upon those bewitching lips.

“Oh! there’s a star falling,” she cried, and slipped from his hold, a
beautiful Diana, virgin as the white spray and tameless as the night.

She had disappointed Herbert. He was puzzled. But as she disappeared
round the cliff in quest of the others, a smile of triumphant content
curled round his boyish lips.

“That’s the last touch of piquancy,” he murmured, as he chased her round
the crag.




CHAPTER VIII

ELEANOR WYNDWOOD


Two days after Herbert’s engagement, Matthew Strang left Devonshire on
the plea of a death in the family.

A letter from Billy had indeed brought the news that Rosina’s father was
no more. Matthew had never thought untenderly of old Coble; the mountain
of a man had acted generously after his lights, and now that his genial
roar had passed into the eternal silence, the pathos of death softened
his son-in-law towards his memory and towards the bereaved daughter.
Nevertheless, Matthew’s plea was only a pretext. He had no intention of
intruding upon Rosina. After her recent reception of him he had no
reason to suppose a visit would be welcome. The letter from Billy had
included no message from her, except a request, superfluously and
irritatingly formal, that she should be allowed to give house-room to
her aunt Clara, who had gone to live with old Coble when his daughter
married. His reply to Billy contained warmly sympathetic reference to
the loss of old Coble, and expressed his joy at the prospect of
receiving Miss Coble.

His real reason for fleeing from Devonshire was his discovery of his
real feeling towards Mrs. Wyndwood. When the frenzy of the stormy night
had merged in the sober reflections of the mild morning, he shuddered to
think how near he had gone to forfeiting her respect, to insulting her
by the revelation of a dishonorable passion. To continue in her daily
society would have been too great a torment, aggravated, as it must have
been, by the sight of Herbert’s happiness. Perhaps the rude reminder of
his domestic shackles contained in Billy’s letter strengthened his
resolve to tear himself away. Courtesy compelled him to leave behind him
an invitation to the ladies to take tea one day at his studio, which
neither had ever seen. How could he snap abruptly the links he had
forged with this delightful twain?

He threw himself with ardor into work, trying to soothe his pain by
expressing it in Art, as a woman sheds it away in tears. He toiled at a
symbolic picture to illustrate Rossetti’s sonnet, “Love’s Fatality.”

    “Love shackled with Vain-longing, hand to hand.”

He put the figures in a vague landscape, but did not study his models in
the open, for he now had a desire to produce that fatness of effect
suggested by a concentrated studio light instead of the dry flatness
which the open air always diffused. He no longer pinned himself to
technical theories, finding by experience that he only invented them
afterwards to justify the procedure his instinct dictated for any
particular picture. But his progress with “Love’s Fatality” was slow and
unsatisfactory. He was feeling about, as it were, for a new manner
worthy of her who inspired it. He wrote her once telling her that it was
on the easel, and reminding her and Miss Regan of their promise to visit
him on their return from Devonshire, and he had from her an
answer--elegantly indited on dainty, crested paper, delicately
scented--which he held often to his lips with a rankling, gnawing pain
of unsatisfied and unspoken desire. She wrote that she was very anxious
to see the picture, and also to be back in town, for she was weary of
the country with its monotony, its lack of the complex thrill of
civilization. Not that the town held much to enthral her. Fortunately
Olive had consented to the Paris project; the girl did not want to marry
before next summer, and rather hailed the idea of a farewell
quasi-bachelor Bohemian period of art and liberty. What she, Eleanor,
would do when she lost Olive Heaven only knew. And then came the wail of
world-weariness which his ear had caught already in the first stages of
their acquaintanceship. He interpreted it in the light of his own blank
unrest, but to imagine her hungering for him as he hungered for her was
impossible to his reverent passion. That she admired and liked him he
could not doubt; and in one or two instants of mutual electricity he had
dared to think that Herbert was right, and that she loved him. But his
diffidence could never cherish the hope for more than a few seconds; and
even if she indeed loved him, he felt that her delicacy, her finer, more
ethereal ethical sense would preserve her from the wistful images that
tortured him. It was the memory of her unhappy marriage to which her
sadness must be due; no doubt, too, her life lacked love, though she
might not be consciously aware of it.

When she at last came to see the picture, he was startled to find her
alone, and the bearer of a message of apology from Miss Regan. His
studio being, so to speak, a place of business, he was not unused to
receive ladies in connection with commissions, but his poor, agonized
heart--that had so ached to see her again--pulsed furiously with mad
hope as her stately figure, clad in widow-like black that set off her
beauty in novel lights, moved slowly about the great studio, admiring
pictures which he would have hidden from her in the days when he thought
of her more as a spiritual critic than a woman. Now, even though she
stood before him making remarks, he was too distraught to catch the
purport of her criticisms. He followed her about in a haze, a dream,
speaking, replying, and feeling all the while as if it was all part of a
game of make-believe, and in a moment the thin pretence would be thrown
off and she would be in his arms. But the moments passed, the haze
cleared, and he realized that he was entertaining a fashionable,
self-possessed lady, wrapped up in artistic interest, with no apparent
relation to the woman who had flushed with the passion of the sea and
the winds on that night of stress and storm.

His mind flew back from her bodily presence to picture her leaning
against his arm, and the memoried vision seemed incredible. She was
unapproachably demure in her black-silk gown. Over the shoulders she
wore a short black-velvet cape embroidered in jet, with a beaded fringe,
finished off with a filmy black lace reaching just below the waist. When
she threw it back, Matt saw the great puff sleeves of her gown and a
turned-down collar that combined with them to give an old-world feeling.
At her throat was a soft ruche of black chiffon. And from this monotone
of black the blond skin of the throat and face rose dazzling, crowned by
a small pink bonnet, of shamrock shape, entirely composed of roses, with
a lace-and-jet butterfly fluttering over it. Now and then she pointed
out something with a long black-gloved forefinger. Her left hand held a
dainty little book, that looked--like herself--poetry. How far away she
seemed, standing thus at his side! He was in a fever of chills and
heats.

She stopped longest before his unfinished picture of “Love’s Fatality.”
He heard her approving his conception of

    “Love shackled with Vain-longing, hand to hand,”

but, even as her ravishing lips spoke golden words of praise, his vain
longing to kiss them admonished him how feebly his symbols expressed the
heart-sickness he was feeling. The longer he heard the music of her
lauding voice, the more those gray eyes kindled below the pink bonnet in
adoration of his genius, the more his disgust with the picture grew; and
when a chance word of hers reminded him that the subject had already
been treated in the last Academy, he determined to destroy his work the
moment she was gone, though he had always been aware of the little skied
picture which had drawn Miss Regan’s eccentric attention. The last
vestiges of his hope of her love died as she discussed “Love’s
Fatality,” with apparent unconsciousness that to him, at least, the
picture stood for something personal; her aloofness was exacerbating.
The heats of his fever died; only the chill was left.

He gave her some tea, and became gradually aware that she was abnormally
loquacious and vivacious. He remembered to ask after Miss Regan’s
health, and was told that Olive was bright and gay, with only rare
reactions of pessimism. Mrs. Wyndwood wondered dolefully again what she
would do when Olive was married. His heart, bolder than his lips, beat
“Come to me. Come to me.” But she did not seem to catch its appeal,
though his eyes spoke, too. In his embarrassment he turned over the
pages of the dainty little book she had laid down on the table. He
started at finding it a new volume of Harold Lavender’s poems, and when
on the fly-leaf he read “To Eleanor” his face twitched noticeably.

“Ah, that was the book Mr. Lavender wrote about in the letter that
Primitiva lost,” she said, quickly. “It’s just out to-day.”

“I see he calls you Eleanor,” he observed, tonelessly.

“Yes,” she responded, smiling, “that is a poetic license. Besides, it is
a screen. There are so many Eleanors.”

That sounded true to his bitter mood. There were indeed so many
Eleanors, all in contradiction. He kept turning over the leaves in
silent jealousy.

“Ah, that is a very pretty one you have there,” she said, lightly. “It
might suggest a subject to you. Read it aloud, it’s only ten lines.”

Fuming inwardly at the suggestion that the dapper poet of sugar-plums
and the hero of the nougat, whom he mentally classed with Roy as an
interloper, could afford him any inspiration, and further incensed by
the command to read the fellow’s verses, he gabbled through the little
poem, which extended over two deckle-edged, rough, creamy pages.

“ROSALIND READING AN OLD ROMANCE

    “I watch her dainty rose-bud mouth,
     That trembles with the exquisite
     And wondrous tide that steals from it
     Of song, redolent of the South;
     While o’er her April countenance,
     The music of the quaint romance,
     The sweeter for a sense of pain,
     Sends sun and shade; and lost in dream,
     Her sweet eyes softly flash and gleam
     With golden smiles and diamond rain.”

“I hope she read it better than that,” laughed Mrs. Wyndwood,
mirthfully.

“Well, she couldn’t make the fourth line scan anyhow,” he said.

“Oh, you mean ‘redolent.’ That’s another poetic license.”

“And Rosalind seems to be another,” he said, surlily.

“Oh no, I’m not Rosalind. I haven’t a dainty rose-bud mouth. Mine is a
full-grown rose at least.” And her laugh showed the white teeth gleaming
against the red lips.

Her arch laughing face so close to his across the little tea-table
tantalized him intolerably.

“It is a red, red rose,” he whispered, hoarsely, half rising and bending
over as if to survey it.

“Beware of the thorn!” she laughed, nervously, drawing back
involuntarily. “And to think that but for the coast-guard who found
Primitiva’s letter,” she rattled on hastily, “some other fair lady would
have had the honor of the dedication.”

“One of the other Eleanors, perhaps,” he said, sulkily, sinking back
into his chair.

“Poor Primitiva!” she cried, in unabated hilariousness and intensified
volubility. “Oh, she’s been such fun. You know Olive has brought her to
London. She begged her away from her father, to the excessive joy of
Primitiva, who has become her devoted slave. The other night Olive took
her to the theatre with us and would have her in the box. She had been
wrought up to a wild excitement, and when she got inside the theatre and
looked round at the festive company she drew a deep breath of rapture.
She said she liked it very much. Long before the orchestra struck up,
Olive discovered that Primitiva imagined she was already in complete
enjoyment of the play, and that to sit in the theatre was all in all.
Only one thing marred Primitiva’s pleasure. She was looking round
furtively for your cousin, and at last asked where Mr. Herbert sat;
not, it transpired, because of his position as Olive’s _fiancé_, but
because she had heard us talk of Herbert as writing a play, and imagined
he was an inseparable adjunct of the theatre. Of course, she doesn’t
know even now that there are more theatres than one. When the overture
struck up she was surprised and delighted by this unexpected addition to
the pleasures of the evening. The rising of the curtain was the climax
of her astonishment and her transport. The action of the piece--a
melodrama, purposely chosen for her behoof by our sportive friend,
experimenting upon her freshness--seized her from the start, and kept
her riveted. The fall of the first curtain, and the arrest of the
innocent man for the murder, left her weeping bitterly. ‘It isn’t real,
you little goose!’ Olive said, to pacify her. ‘Isn’t it?’ Primitiva
replied, opening her brimming trustful eyes to their widest. She gave a
little sobbing laugh. ‘And I thought they was all alive!’ Then she rose
to go, and was astonished to hear that there was more. Alas! it would
have been better had she gone. When the hero’s wife, visiting the hero
in prison, kissed him, Primitiva inquired if the actor and actress were
really married, and learning that they were not, was too disgusted to
sympathize any further with their misfortunes. It revolted her,”
concluded Mrs. Wyndwood, taking up her teacup with an air of preparing
for the resumption of sips, “that a man who was not a woman’s husband
should kiss her.” And her face gleamed more tantalizing than ever under
the roses of her bonnet.

His fingers dented the teaspoon they fidgeted with; it seemed
intolerable that his life should be spoiled by acceptance of the moral
stand-point of this simple creature. He with his artistic agonies and
his complex sorrows and his high imaginings to be squeezed into the same
moral moulds as Primitiva! He refused to see the humor of her. The girl
had no more interest for him than that irritating Roy. It was maddening
to have Eleanor sitting there in cold blood, the Honorable Mrs.
Wyndwood, an irreproachable widow in black, talking abstractly of
kisses. Then the tense string of expectation snapped; the apathy that he
felt in the presence of Rosina invaded him--he stirred his tea
listlessly, awaiting the moment of her departure. As she talked on,
loquacious to the end, prattling of Erle-Smith and Beethoven, and
Swinburne, his apathy quickened into impatience; he longed for her to be
gone. His hidden fingers played a tattoo on the side of his chair. She
bade him good-bye at last; she would not see him again for many months,
unless he came to Paris.

“I always run over to do the Salon,” he answered, indifferently.

When he had seen her, stately and stiff, to her carriage, and his
studio-door had shut him in again, he ripped up the canvas with his old
sailor’s knife in a paroxysm of fury. His eye caught the silver regatta
cup standing proudly upon the piano. He felt like dashing it down; then
it occurred to him how fine and bitter a revenge it would be upon her
and humanity at large to fill it with poison and drain it to the dregs.
But he only threw himself upon a couch in a passion of sobs, such as had
not shaken him since childhood. The great picturesque room, which the
autumn twilight had draped in dusk, was ineffably dreary without her;
his heart seemed full of dust, and tears were a blessed relief in the
drought. They probably saved him from ending his empty life there and
then.

He rallied, and began other pictures, but he could do nothing with them.
He refused commissions for portraits, hating the imposition of subject,
and fearful of exposing his restlessness to a stranger’s gaze. The
return of the world to town renewed social solicitations, but he felt he
was wearing his heart on his sleeve, and declined to parade it through
drawing-rooms. Despite this gain of time, the weeks passed without any
definite product. He was searching, but he could not find. One day he
would sit down and fix in charcoal some rough suggestions for a greater
symbolic picture than that which he had destroyed; but the next day he
would be working up his recollections of Devonshire night-scenery,
trying by a series of tentative touches on a toned canvas to evolve the
romantic mystery of those illumined villages niched in the cliffs, or of
the moon making a lovely rippling path across the dark lonely sea, as
Eleanor had made across his life; while a day or so after he would
discard these thinly painted shadowy night-pieces, and, painting
straight from the shoulder, “impasto” his canvas with brutal blobs of
paint that at a distance merged into the living flow of red sunlit
water.

And always this rankling, gnawing pain of unsatisfied and unspoken
desire. No man could work with that at his breast. And her rare letters
did not allay it, though they spoke no word of love, but were full of
enthusiasm for the free student life in Paris, the glorious
_camaraderie_, the fun of dining occasionally for a few centimes in tiny
_crémeries_, and going to the People’s Theatre off the Boulevard
Montparnasse, where they gave a bonus of _cerises à l’eau de vie_
between the pieces. Oh, if she had only been younger, less staled by
life! If she could only begin over again. If she only had the energy of
Olive, who started work at the Academy at the preternatural hour of
eight A.M. But she had lost the faculty of beginnings, she feared, and
she made but poor progress in sculpture. That was the undercurrent of
these gay letters, the characteristic note of despondency.

Rosina held out no hand of reconciliation. His only contact with her was
through Billy, who paid him one visit to escort “Aunt Clara” over the
studio. His wife had, it transpired, held forth so copiously and
continuously upon its glories that the poor creature had plucked up
courage to ask to see it, and Rosina, who had evidently concealed the
breach with her famous husband, had besought Billy to convoy her. And so
one day these two routed out the sick lion from the recesses of his den.

The appearance of Miss Clara Coble was as much a shock as a surprise to
Matthew Strang. In the nine years or so since she had assisted at his
wedding--an unimportant but not disagreeable personage, tall and
full-blooded as her brother, she had decayed lamentably. She was now an
ungainly old maid, stooping and hollow-eyed, with crows’ feet and
sharpened features. She had a nervous twitch of the eyelids, her head
drooped oddly, and her conversation was at times inconsecutive to the
verge of fatuity. From the day of her birth to the day of his death
Coble had thought of her as his little sister, and he never realized
the tragedy of her spinsterhood, of her starved nature, though under his
very eye she had peaked and pined in body and soul.

But it leaped to the painter’s eye at the first sight of her, and her
image remained in his brain, infinitely pathetic.

The ugliness that in earlier days would have averted his eyes in
artistic disgust, drew him now in human pity. He grew tenderer to Rosina
at the thought that she was harboring this wreck of femininity. It
rejoiced him to think how much “Aunt Clara” was enjoying this visit to
his grandeurs; he listened with pleased tolerance to her artless
babble--in her best days she had always had something of her brother’s
big simplicity--as she told tale after tale out of school, repeating the
colossal things her poor brother had said about his son-in-law’s genius
and wealth, recounting how Coble had thus become the indirect hero of
the Temperance Bar, and unconsciously revealing--what was more
surprising to the painter--the pride with which Rosina had always
written home (and still spoke to her aunt) about her husband and his
fashionable friends and successes. And poor Miss Coble expanded in the
atmosphere of the great man, which she had never hoped to breathe. Her
cadaverous cheek took a flush, she held her head straighter on her
shoulders. He felt that, after all, it was worth while being famous if
he could give such pleasure to simple souls by his mere proximity. The
fame he had sold his body and soul for was a joyless possession; happy
for him if it could yet give joy to others.

Billy told him that Ruth Hailey was in Paris at the Hotel Windsor with
Mrs. Verder, preparatory to the long Antipodean tour, and suggested that
he might call upon her when he went over to see the Salon if she was
still there. Matthew wrote down the address, but said he didn’t think he
should go over that year. Billy looked disappointed; he had been about
to suggest accompanying his brother. Life at Camden Town, he intimated
fretfully, had resumed its dead-alive routine, and he glanced towards
Miss Coble as if to imply that her advent had not brightened the
domestic table.

When the visitors left, Matthew put them into a cab and drove with them
a little way to purchase presents for the children. There was a doll
for Clara and a box of animals for Davie. To Rosina he did not venture
to send even a message. At a word from her he would have gone to her,
but he had no stomach to cope with her tantrums.

This new reminder of home left him more depressed than before. It was
impossible to concentrate himself upon his work, even in the presence of
models. They were an unprofitable expense, and he dismissed them and
brooded over the ruins of his life. Without Eleanor Art was impossible,
he felt. True Art he could not produce without her inspiration, and
false Art was falseness to her and a vile slavery.

Insomnia dogged his nights, and when he slept it was but to suffer under
harassing dreams fantastically compounded of his early struggles. These
dreams never touched his later life; many of them dealt oppressively
with the bird-shop, and he had often to clean endless shades with
chamois leather, smashing one after the other under the rebuking but
agonizingly unintelligible “Pop! Pop! Pop!” of “Ole Hey,” though he felt
sure Tommy, the young Micmac errand-boy, had cracked them beforehand.
And what added to the sleeper’s agony was that these breakages would
have to be made good to the Deacon from his scanty wage, or, worse, he
would be discharged and unable to send the monthly subsidy to Cobequid
Village. The anguish and anxiety were quite as harassing as though the
troubles were real.

He made one desperate excursion into Society--it was the delightful
dinner-party of a gifted fellow-artist whose cultured and beautiful wife
had always seemed to him the ideal hostess. And a pretty and guileless
girl, full of enthusiasm for Art and Nature and the life that was
opening out before her, fell to his escorting arm; she was visibly
overpowered by her luck and charmingly deferential; at first his
responsive smile was bitter, but his mood lightened under her engaging
freshness and the champagne he imbibed recklessly.

But the next morning’s reaction, aggravated by the headache of
indigestion, plunged him into more tenebrous glooms. But for the
unkindly fates he might have sat with such a wife, host and hostess of
such a gathering. He pictured Eleanor receiving his guests, and in his
factitious happiness he gathered the poor and the despised to his
hearth. The images of suicide resurged. He saw it on the
bills:--“Suicide of a Popular Painter.” Why not? The position was
hopeless; were it not best to throw it up? How the world would stare! No
one would understand the reason. Rosina would still remain unknown,
irrelevant to the situation. And his eyes filled with tears, in the
bitter luxury of woe.

But he did not commit suicide, and all that the world, or that minute
portion of it which talks Art, wondered at, was why Matthew Strang was
unrepresented when the Academy opened in May. It leaked out that he had
been ill, and there were sympathetic paragraphs which were not
altogether misinformed, for these sleepless or dream-tortured nights had
brought on nervous prostration and acute headaches. That ancient
blood-poisoning, too, had left its traces in his system, and when he was
worried and overwrought his body had to pay again the penalty of
unforgiven physical error.

Again, as in those far-off days, he thought of a sea-voyage to his
native village; it dwindled down to crossing the Channel. As the opening
of the Salon drew nearer and nearer, he felt more and more strongly that
he must not miss the Exhibition. It was part of a painter’s education.
There was no need to see Eleanor Wyndwood; by remaining on the
fashionable side of the river the chances were he would not even come
across her casually in the few days of his stay. No, there was nothing
to apprehend. And besides, it began to be increasingly borne in upon him
that it was his duty to look up Ruth Hailey; she had called upon him at
Camden Town, and etiquette demanded that he should return the call. What
had she and Rosina talked about? he wondered dully. If he did not go
soon, she might be off to Australia, and the opportunity of seeing his
ancient playmate would probably recur nevermore.

And so a bright May morning saw him arrive in the capital of Art,
breakfast hastily at the Grand Hotel, and--drive straight to the Latin
Quarter. Other climes, other thoughts, and the gayety of the Boulevards,
with their green trees and many-colored kiosks, had begun to steal into
his spirit, and his gloomy apprehension of danger to dissipate in the
crisp sunny air. Why should he not see Eleanor Wyndwood?

And then he discovered that he did not know her address, that she wrote
from the English Ladies’ Art Club; he hunted out the place, but the
concierge told him she was not there, and gave him the address of the
Academy most of the ladies attended, but this was the hour of
_déjeuner_, and monsieur would probably not find them there till the
afternoon. He grew downcast again, and, dismissing the cab, he sauntered
on foot towards the Academy, trying to kill time. He dropped into a tiny
restaurant close by to get a cup of coffee; it was decorated by studies
from the nude, evidently accepted in payment for dinners; and the
ceiling had a central decoration that reminded him of his own crude
workmanship in the sitting-room of that hotel in New Brunswick. He sat
down at a little table facing the only lady customer, a dashing
Frenchwoman, the warm coloring of whose handsome model’s face showed
between a great black-plumed hat and a light-blue bow, and who paused
between her spoonfuls of apple-stew to chant joyously, “Coucou, coucou,
fal la, la, la, la.” A decadent poet with a leonine name sipped
absinthe, a spectacled Dane held forth intermittently on the bad faith
of England towards Denmark at the commencement of the century, a Scotch
painter discoursed on fly-fishing, and exhibited a box of trout-flies,
and one or another paused from time to time to hum, “Coucou, coucou, fal
la, la, la, la,” in sympathy with the gay refrain. Hens fluttered and
clucked about the two sunlit tables, and a goat wandered around, willing
to eat.

Matthew Strang fed the hens and was taken by the humors of the quarter,
into which he had scarcely penetrated before, knowing mainly the other
side of the water. Perceiving him looking at her pictures, the stout
smiling proprietress, whose homely face, minus her characteristic smile,
flared in paint on a wall, protruding from a scarlet-striped bodice,
asked him in very loud tones if he would like to see her collection, and
straightway haled him up-stairs to her salon, which was hung thickly
with meritorious pictures, upon whose beauties she held a running
comment, astonishing Matthew by the intelligence of her criticisms.
“This represents a hawthorn, monsieur, which blossoms in the spring.
This was done by a Dane who is dead. The King of Denmark offered him a
commission, but he would not work for him, because he was a
revolutionary--in painting only, you understand, an Impressionist. That
is a copy of the one in the Luxembourg. I paid two hundred francs to
have it made, because I love the original so. Oh yes, it is a very good
copy. My landlord offered me four hundred for it, but I prefer to live
in a little apartment, surrounded by my pictures. As you say, I am an
amateur of pictures. There are more here in my bedroom,” and she ushered
him in, apologizing for the bed not being made. Then she told him her
history. She was a widow with an only son, who was _beau garçon_. Ah,
she was beautiful herself when she had twenty years. Her son was to be
an artist. Matthew Strang feelingly hoped the boy would become a great
artist; inwardly he wondered wistfully why he himself had not been
blessed with an art-loving mother. And then in a curious flash of
retrospective insight he recognized for the first time the essential
artistic elements in his mother’s character, stifled by a narrow
creed--her craving for the life of gay cities, her Pagan anger at Abner
Preep’s bow-legs! What a pity she had not been born in this freer
artistic atmosphere, which indeed her ancestors must have breathed,
though their blood had been crossed with German and Scotch, as if to
produce his own contradictory temperament. In London, he thought,
artistic connoisseurship was the last thing one would look for in small
shopkeepers. In a softer mood he repaired to the Academy, which was
entered through a pair of large folding doors that gave upon a stone
corridor. He passed through this passage and came out under a sloping
porch, with broken trellis-work at one side and an untidy tree. At the
top of a flight of stone steps that descended thence, he was stopped by
a block of young American fellows in soft felt hats, who motioned him to
stand still, and, to his astonishment and somewhat melancholy amusement,
he found himself part of a group about to be photographed by a pretty
young lady student in the sunny, dusty court-yard below.

The group she had posed stretched all down the steps, and consisted
mainly of models--male and female. There were Italian women, dusky and
smiling, some bareheaded, some hooded, and a few pressing
infants--literal olive-branches--to their bosoms. There was an Italian
girl of fourteen with a mustache, who was a flare of color in her green
velvet apron and gorgeous trailing head-dress. There were Frenchwomen
with coquettish straw hats, and a child in a Tam o’ Shanter; there was a
Corsican in a slouch-hat, with coal-black hair and a velvet jacket to
match, and a little Spanish boy in a white hat. Thrown in as by way of
artistic contrast with all this efflorescence of youth was a doddering,
pathetic old man with a spreading gray beard and flowing gray locks; and
there were young lady students of divers nationalities--Polish, Greek,
Dutch, and American--curiously interspersed in the motley group which
stretched right down the stone steps between the stone balustrades that
terminated in stone urns spouting disorderly twigs. Behind the pretty
photographer were the terra-cotta walls of the sculpture atelier, which,
high beyond her head, were replaced by long, green-glazed windows, into
which a pink lilac-bush, tiptoeing, tried to peep; around her were
stools, dumb-bells, damaged busts, a headless terra-cotta angel with
gaping trunk and iron stump, nursing a squash-faced cherub, and
dismantled packing-cases swarming with sportive black kittens; and
facing her a great blackened stone head of Medusa stared from a
red-brick pedestal, awful with spiders’ webs across the mouth and
athwart the hollow orbits and in the snaky hair covered with green moss;
and towering over her head and dominating the court-yard stood a
colossal classical statue, tarnished and mutilated, representing a huge
helmeted hero, broken-nosed and bleared, sustaining a heroine, as
armless but not so beautiful as the Venus de Milo, doing a backward
fall. But the sun shone on the dusty litter and the mess and the lumber,
and the lilac-bush blossomed beautifully, and over all was the joy of
youth and Art and the gayety of the spring. Matthew Strang felt an
ancient thrill pass through his sluggish veins. To be young and to
paint--what happiness! His eyes moistened in sympathy with the scene.
The models were redolent of Art--the very children breathed Art, the
babes sucked it in. Art was a republic, and everybody was equal in
it--the doughtiest professor and the meanest model, the richest amateur
and the penurious youth starving himself to be there. There was nothing
in the world but Art--it was the essence of existence. There were people
who lived for other things, but they did not count. Oh, the free brave
life! He was glad to be photographed as part and parcel of all this
fresh aspiration; it revivified him; he had a superstitious sense that
it was symbolic.

The group scattered, dismissed by the “Merci” of the pretty
photographer; and Matthew, descending the steps, asked her if Mrs.
Wyndwood worked in her atelier. She did not know, but she guessed from
his description it must be the aristocratic-looking lady who had dropped
in once or twice in Miss Regan’s company. Miss Regan came regularly
every morning at eight o’clock, but not at all in the afternoon, when
she worked at home. Miss Regan’s own studio was in an Impasse about ten
minutes away; probably her friend lived with her. Heartily thanking his
informant, he betook himself thither. He found the Impasse in a prosaic,
grimy street, amid which the charming, if battered bass-relief of Venus
with Cupids over its entrance, struck an unexpected note of poetry,
which was intensified by the little Ionic portico with classic bronze
figures between its pillars that faced him as he passed through the
corridor. Leafy trees and trellised plants added rusticity to the poetry
of the sunny, silent, deserted court-yard, so curiously sequestered amid
the surrounding squalor. The windows of many studios gave upon it, and
the backs of canvases showed from the glass annexes for _plein air_
study. But as he passed under the pretty, natural porch of embowering
foliage that led to the door of the studio he sought, his heart beat as
nervously at the thought of again facing the Hon. Mrs. Wyndwood as when,
in his young days, he had first saluted the magnificent uncle whose name
he bore. He had an inward shrinking: was it wise to expose himself to
the perturbation of another interview with this cold, stately creature,
the image of whom, passing graciously to her carriage, was still vivid
to him? But he could not go back now. He knocked at the door.

Eleanor opened the door--a radiant, adorable apparition in a big white
clay-smeared blouse with a huge serviceable pocket. He had never
imagined her thus; he was as taken aback by her appearance as she by his
presence. He stared at her in silence, as she stood there under the
overarching greenery, with gold flecks of sunlight on her hair. But both
recovered themselves in a moment; the sight of her in this homely
artistic costume knocked her off the pedestal of fashion and propriety
on which his mental vision had posed her; she became part of that brave
young democracy of Art he had just left; and there was a charming
_camaraderie_ in the gay laugh with which, withdrawing her long white
hands beyond reach of his proffered glove, and exhibiting them piquantly
clay-covered, she cried, “Can’t shake.”

The seriousness of the imagined meeting vanished in a twinkling. He
looked at her dancing eyes, the sweet, red mouth smiling with a gleam of
lustrous teeth: he had an audacious inspiration.

“Well, then there’s nothing for it but--” he said, smiling back, and
finished the sentence by kissing her. Instantly her eyelids drooped,
half-closing; her lips responded passionately to his.

They were withdrawn in a moment before he could realize what he had
done, or the wonderful transformation in their relations.

“In the open air!” she cried, horrified, and ran within. He followed
her, closing the door; his heart beat tumultuously now. Nothing could
undo that moment. A wilderness of talk could not have advanced matters
so far.

Through the tall glass roof of the airy studio the sun streamed in rays
of dusty gold, dappling the imaginative clay models in their wet
wrappings, the busts, fountains, serpents, rock-work, witches, that
variegated the shelves, and lent an air of fantasy and poetry, extruding
the tedious commonplace of plebeian existence, and harmonizing with the
joyous aloofness of the scene in the court-yard its sense of existence
in and for itself, by souls attuned to Art and dedicate to loveliness.

Mrs. Wyndwood stood, saucily beautiful, leaning against a shelf, with
one hand in the pocket of her blouse, and rubbing the clay of the other
against the sides of what looked like a tin baking-dish filled with
plaster-pie. How harmonious was that tilt to her nose! He had never
noticed before how delightfully it turned up. She smiled roguishly.

“Imprudent creature! Suppose Olive had been in!”

The great moment was taken in a livelier key than he had ever dreamed.

“But _you_ were out,” he said, trying to respond to her lightness,
though he trembled in every limb. He made a movement towards her. She
shrank back against the shelf.

“Don’t!” she cried, gayly, “you’ll spoil your gloves.”

He dabbled them magnificently in a heap of plaster of Paris and advanced
nearer.

“Now you’ll spoil my blouse,” she cried, moving hastily away to dip her
hands in a bowl of water.

He tore off the gloves and threw them on the floor.

“Is that a challenge?” she laughed, drying her hands, but the laughter
died in a gurgle. He had stopped her breath. She did not struggle, but
lay in his arms silent like a tired, lovely child--at rest, at last, her
happy face pressed to his. “Oh, my dear,” she murmured, cooingly. “And
all those months you never kissed me once!”

“I did not dare,” he answered, with a pang of remorse. “You gave me no
hint that you--that you cared for me.”

A beautiful blush blossomed and faded on her face. “But you should have
understood. I needed the touch.” And her face nestled closer against
his.

Even now it seemed dream-like that this marvellous happiness should be
his; that this fastidious complex creature of fashionable London whom he
had dared to love should be pillowing her perfumed head on the shoulder
of the man who in his laborious and wretched youth had wheeled a
bird-stuffer’s barrow through Whitechapel. His life lay behind him like
a steep, arduous hill rising to this celestial cloudland.

“If I had only known,” he said, brokenly. “Oh, how I loved you that
night of the storm!”

“And how I adored you,” she confessed deliciously. “You were so brave,
so manly that day. You saved Olive’s life, you saved her for me and for
Herbert. Oh, how noble! We none of us thanked you, it was all laughter
and badinage, but you were my hero, my true, great, strong, simple man.”

And her lips sought his humbly, her eyes swimming in tears.

“Let me kiss you now for your brave deed. Ah, how I was afraid when
Herbert, looking through his glass, cried out that something had
happened to Olive, that you had swum back for her. I felt my life
growing dark. Suppose I had lost you both.”

And her mobile face grew tragic at the thought. He held her tighter.

“Eleanor! It is so good to be with you!” he articulated in a hoarse
whisper that was half a sob.

Her tragic features lightened to a winsome, reproachful smile.

“And when I came to your studio, Matthew, you gave me ... tea!”

“If I had only known, if I had only dared!”

“You must dare with a woman.”

Her arms had been resting on his shoulders--she threw them around his
neck.

“Oh, my Master--now and ever.”

Conscience slipped into paradise. He unwound her arms.

“You forget my--secret.”

She moved her chin bewitchingly upward.

“You have sealed my lips.”

He kissed them again. “And you can love me despite that? I am not worthy
of such a sacrifice.”

Her bosom heaved beneath the blouse, her eyes kindled with the old
spiritual fire, her voice rang passionately.

“You _are_ worthy! Life has been too cruel to you--you need a woman’s
heart to cherish you, you shall not be starved of the sunshine, you
shall work in happiness. Ah! that is what I have learned here in this
happy, liberal air. Art is the child of joyful labor--it is the sunshine
of life. You are sad, miserable, and it harrows my heart. Oh, if I can
bring joy and peace to the soul of a man like you, if I can indeed
inspire your Art, my wretched life will not have been wasted. You have
told me that I could, tell it me again.”

“You, and you only, can bring me joy and peace.”

She caressed his hair with a tender, protective hand. “My Matthew!” she
murmured.

“And you, Eleanor,” he faltered, tremulously; “I shall not make you
unhappy?”

“I shall be happier than I have ever been,” and her arms stole round him
again in simple trust.

“Ah, I was forgetting. Life owes _you_ happiness, too. If I dared to
think I could bring you forgetfulness of the past!”

She shuddered. Her arms unlaced themselves of their own accord. She
dropped into a chair before the table and laid them across the
moulding-dish, and buried her head in her hands. He stood by helpless,
torn by emotions, waiting till the flood of bitter memories should have
spent itself, watching her shoulders quivering, and the sunlight lying
on her hair like a consecration.

“Oh, Douglas!” she was moaning. “Did I do you wrong? Did I do you wrong?
But I meant the best; I always meant the best, God knows. And you cannot
chide me now you are dead and cold, and it is all so long ago.”

He shivered nervously. Truly women were incomprehensible, he thought. No
man could follow the leaps and turns of their emotions. They were a
higher, more ethereal order of being. But he reverenced her for her
loyalty to the unworthy dead, her punctilious self-torture, even while
he envied the man who had been privileged to call her “wife.”

He touched her hair reverently--there where the sunshine rested.

“Don’t cry, dear Eleanor.”

A great burst of sobbing shook her. “Oh, life is so difficult!” He bent
down beside her, ineffably pitiful.

“We are going to make it easier for one another,” he said, gently. His
hair touched hers. She turned her tear-flecked face, and their lips met.
“We are going to begin over again,” he murmured. She stifled her sobs
like a soothed child, and sprang up with a smile struggling through
rain-clouds.

“Yes, with you I can begin over again, Master,” and she looked into his
face with her naïve, beseeching trustfulness.

“This is a new life already,” he said, touching her blouse. She gave a
laugh of childish joy.

“Yes! yes! This is a new life--the past is dead--this is my neophyte’s
robe. Ah, it changes one, this Paris, does it not? I am an artist, and
you are my Master. It is you who have awakened me to Art! Oh, I knew
this would happen. That wonderful old woman! She’s a fortune-teller in
Bethnal Green--the Duchess of Portsdown gave me her address--and after
you were so cold to me when I came to your studio in London, I went to
see her. Such a queer, wrinkled hag, and such a dingy, wretched room, up
such a dirty flight of stairs--oh, I was afraid! But she was marvellous!
She knew I was a widow--that I had been married unhappily--that I was a
fashionable lady--though I went in my oldest clothes, and hid my rings
in my purse for fear of their being stolen. Oh! by-the-way, where have I
put them?” He found them and she slipped them on. “And she said I should
love again and be loved. You should have seen her wicked old eyes as she
spoke of love--they were like live coals. And then she predicted that I
should marry again and lead a long and happy life with a dark man,
distinguished and rich, who should inspire me to a new faith. Isn’t it
marvellous?” She took his hand and smoothed the wrist caressingly.

“It is you who have inspired me to a new faith,” he answered,
tremulously. “It is you who have awakened me to Art. Do you know what
happened to me this morning when I went to seek you out? I, too, was
reborn.”

He told her the auspicious incident--how he had been photographed as
part of the fresh young art-life.

She clapped her jewelled hands.

“It is providential--foreordained. We are to be happy.”

“Happy!” He shivered with sudden foreboding. “Another prophetess
declared I was never to be happy,” he said, sadly. “To thirst, and to
thirst, and never to quench my thirst!”

“Oh, that is all superstitious nonsense!” she cried, vehemently. “You
_must_ be happy; you _shall_ be happy; the world must not lose your Art;
_I_ will save it.”

Her face was glorified.

“But the cost to yourself,” he faltered.

“I will pay the price. You love me. For me to ruin your life--_that_
would be sin.”

She drew his head to her bosom and smoothed back the curly hair from his
forehead.

“My dear, my dear,” she murmured.

He gulped back the lump in his throat. “No, this is not sin. You have
redeemed me; I never felt so at peace with all things,” he said, in low,
religious tones. “Oh, we will shame the world--we will live high and
true. Our happiness shall radiate to all that sorrows and suffers. Our
home shall be the home of Art. It shall stand open to all the young
artists striving faithfully in poverty--it shall be a centre of
blessing. Suffering has made me morose, now I feel at one with my kind,
longing to do my truest work. Oh, God bless you, my dear.”

A startled look of alarm had come into her face. She loosed her embrace
of him.

“But, Matt! We cannot have a home.”

He had a chill of apprehension, which even the sweetness of that first
clipping of his name could not counteract.

“But we love each other!”

She waved her hands agitatedly. “The world would spurn me--”

“We will spurn the world.”

“Oh, but you are not thinking! Who would come to the house? How is it to
be a centre of blessing?”

“We will win the world’s respect. What! You and I! Are we not strong
enough? You, with your noble past--I, who come from nothing and have won
_you_.”

“You talk like a dreamer, a poet, and I love you for it. But you do not
know the world--how it ignores the realities of things.”

“Oh, I know the canting hypocrisy that puts its faith in shows, and
honors loveless marriage. I will teach it to respect a home of love, and
the work that is its fruit. You are right, happiness is the mother of
Art. Oh, how I shall work now, my dear!”

“You may overtop Raphael; you will never be a Royal Academician.”

“What has my private life to do with Art?”

“Nothing with Art, but everything with English Art. You will lose your
R.A.”

“I shall gain you.”

She shook her head.

“Why not gain both?”

“Ah, but you say it is impossible!”

“I do not say so. What need is there to wear our hearts upon our
sleeves?” She touched his sleeve now, insinuating caressing fingers.
“Darling, don’t you see how hard it would be for me to bear--I am not a
man. The worst of the scorn would be for me. Society is very hard upon
those who will not be unconventional in secret. I have not your courage
and strength. You will not shame me.”

He weakened.

“Oh, I am thoughtless,” he said, and stood miserable, unconscious of the
caressing fingers.

Then his brow lightened.

“Nobody knows I’m married. If we came back and set up house together,
people would think we had been married abroad.”

She put her hands to her face with a desperate gesture. “Oh, but I could
not bear Olive to know.”

His heart leaped. “Has Herbert told her I’m married?”

“No, she doesn’t know.”

“He is a fine fellow.”

“But she would be sure to learn it one day--it would leak out.”

“Then she would keep the secret.”

She shook her head. “You don’t know Olive,” she said from between her
palms. “She is hard on women. I would have sat to you ages ago, only I
was afraid of her sneers. I wouldn’t have her know for worlds. I used to
think her sexless.”

“But now that she is to be married--”

“She will be more conventional than ever.”

He tossed back his hair, impatiently. “Then we must dispense with
Olive.”

For a long time she did not reply. He thought his harshness towards her
friend had set her crying again. He gently forced her hands from her
face. It was flushed and pain-stricken.

“Forgive me. I have hurt you,” he said, in contrition.

“No, you do not understand. And Olive has been so good to me. She takes
charge of all my affairs--” She hesitated. “I don’t even know what my
income is, or”--with a pathetic engaging smile--”whether I have an
income at all. And I’m afraid I spend a great deal.”

He straightened his shoulders. “I am very glad of that. I will work for
you. I can wring gold from the world.” Rapid calculations flashed
through his mind--already he regretted his last year’s inactivity, the
destruction of his picture.

She was blushing adorably. “No, I could not take anything from you ...
if we lived apart. No, no.”

“Not from me? Oh, Eleanor. Then we must make our home together.”

“But don’t I tell you that is impossible?” she said, almost pettishly,
on the brink of tears. “The world would get to know the truth. There is
that Ruth Hailey you spoke of, who knows your brother, and who through
her connection with Linda Verder gets brought into contact with all
sorts of people. And your wife would hear of it, too. Unscrupulous
persons would egg her on to move. There would be blackmailing,
everything sordid and horrible.” She shuddered violently.... “Oh, you do
not know the world--you have lived with your eyes shut, fixed on inward
visions.”

He opened them now, startled to find himself lectured for want of
worldliness by this ethereal creature. She dissipated his uneasy
bewilderment by a swift transition, her face dimpled itself with
reassuring smiles. She pulled the little curly lock at his forehead with
a fascinating tug.

“Don’t be such a hot-headed Quixote, dear. There is time enough to plan
out the future. Circumstances may change--” Her face saddened. “The poor
creature may be taken ... and your idea may seem more plausible when I
have got used to it--you come with a rush and a crash--like those waves
that night.” She smiled wistfully. “And I am only a woman, and timid.
Can’t you see I have been frightened to death all this last half-hour?”

“Frightened of me?”

“No,” with a pathetic smile. “Frightened of Olive. Twenty times I
thought I caught her footsteps.”

“What if she does come! She won’t be surprised to see me here.”

“No, but I have a plan. It will be safest if she doesn’t know you’re in
Paris at all. You must leave me at once.”

His heart sank. “But when do I see you?”

“Next Sunday evening.”

“A whole week?” The sunlight seemed gone.

“On Sunday morning Olive goes to Brussels for a few days--she’s only
waiting to finish that statuette of Fate, isn’t it weird? All those
things there are Olive’s handiwork; how clever she is! I only do the
menial work of pouring in the plaster. It saves money, because--”

“Yes, yes,” he interrupted, impatiently. “And on Sunday evening?”

“You will call for me here--say about seven--you will take me to dinner,
somewhere quiet in this great free Paris.” She made a great circle with
her arms, as if enjoying the elbow-room. “And then--” she smiled
intoxicatingly, “then we can talk over the future.” Her eyes looked
heavenly promise. He caught her in his arms. This time she struggled
away.

“No, no! She may be back at any moment. I hear footsteps. You must go.”

She pushed him towards the door.

“Mayn’t I write?”

“No, Olive would see the letter.”

The footsteps passed by.

He looked back in reluctant farewell, as he fumbled at the door-handle.
She was close behind him.

She opened her arms, and his head was on her breast again. “Oh, my dear,
my dear,” she murmured, “it is hard to wait.”

Then she pushed him outside, her face grown spiritual again in its
anxiety, and she slammed the door, and he reeled like a drunken man.

Her last look haunted him--soulful, alluring, intoxicating. He was
almost sobbing with happiness. Heaven had been kind to him at last. The
balmy air of the court-yard fanned his brow. He walked on aimlessly, in
a beatific dream, past the beautiful Ionic portico, through the
corridor, into the street, no longer grimy, and so on to the Boulevards.

How happy the world was! How the sunshine streamed with its dancing
motes! How gay the kiosks with their dainty posters and the piquant
designs of great caricaturists laughing from the front pages of the
illustrated journals! How light-hearted those bourgeois drinking red
wine at the _al fresco_ tables! What a jolly, bulbous-nosed old cabman
that was who hailed him, not knowing he had quicksilver in his veins,
and must needs give his limbs to lively motion. He sauntered on at
random, buoyant, treading on sunbeams, a song at his heart, breathing in
the sense of the spacious, airy city that sparkled in the spring
sunshine, mother of nimble spirits; he crossed the river, glittering in
a long sweep, with Notre Dame rising on its island in picturesque
antiquity; the book-stalls on the quays thrilled him with a remembrance
of the joys of reading; he strode on humming a merry tune, the bustle of
traffic was a musical accompaniment to it; he stopped at a great leafy
square, alive with pedestrians, to watch the limpid water leaping from a
beautiful fountain; around him were the seductive programmes of
theatres, eloquent of artistic acting, of fine comedy, of poetic
tragedy. He strolled along, absorbing noble buildings, and churches, and
splendid public monuments. How fair life was, how marvellously
compacted! Gladness was at the heart of all things.

The city passed into his soul as never before; its radiant message of
elegance, proportion, style, sanity, unity, lucidity, exquisite
sensibility to the material, balanced by an æsthetic delight in ideas,
and the spirit of gayety all over; henceforth, thanks to Eleanor, he
would be of it, following Art for the joy of Art, out of the happiness
of the soul, sun-clear, without stagnant vapors of discontent, those
fits of spleen bred of foggy, uncouth London; he would be fixed at last,
swinging steadily on a pivot of happiness, a lover of life and a
praiser thereof. All its sweetness had been diverted from him--it had
passed to others. Now at last he would be self-centred. He rambled on,
he crossed the Pont Passy, and saw the old city rising quaint and steep
in wooded terraces. Oh, love and life! Oh, life and love! Why had people
besmirched the Creation with soilures of cynicism, plaguing the air with
pessimistic laments, graceless grunts of swine nosing garbage?

What good times he had had himself, he who had won fame and gold while
still young! And how ungraciously he had accepted these gifts of the
gods, mewling and whining like a sulky child. Surely he deserved that
hell allotted in Dante for those who had wilfully lived in sadness. The
gracious romance of life--that was what his Art should henceforth
interpret. He began to dream beautiful masterpieces, and they reminded
him that he had come to see the Salon. He retraced his steps towards the
Champs Elysées, watching the endless procession of elegant equipages
rolling steadily to and from the Bois, with their panorama of luxurious
women. He entered the Salon; the pictures delighted him, the crowd
enraptured him, a young girl’s face stirred him to a mood of paternal
benediction; he met Edward Cornpepper, A.R.A., there, and felt the
little man was his dearest friend. Cornpepper introduced him to his
newly-acquired wife, who said the Exhibition was indecent.

“You are right, my dear, there isn’t a decent picture here,” Cornpepper
chuckled, grimacing to adjust his monocle, and feeling his round beard.
“Ichabod! The glory is departed from Paris. The only chaps who can paint
nowadays are the Neo-Teutonic school. The Frenchmen are played out--they
have even lost their taste. They bought a picture of mine last year, you
remember. I palmed off the rottenest thing I’d ever done on ’em. It’s in
the Luxembourg--you go and see it, old man, and you tell me if I’m not
right. Now, mind you do! Ta, ta, old fellow. Sorry you’re not in the
Academy this year--but it’s a good advertisement for you. I think I
shall be ill myself next year. But we mustn’t talk shop. Good-bye, old
man. Oh, by-the-way, I hear your cousin’s engaged to an heiress. It’s
true, is it? Lucky beggar, that Herbert! Better than painting, eh? Ha!
ha! ha! But I knew he’d never do anything. Didn’t he win the Gold Medal,
eh? Ho! ho! ho! Well, au revoir. Don’t forget the Luxembourg. You don’t
want to wait till I’m dead and in the Louvre, what? Thanks for a
pleasant chat, and wish you better.”

Matthew shook his hand for the third time with unabated affection. What
a clever fellow Cornpepper was, and what a pretty wife he had got!

He went to his hotel to dine. The court-yard was gay with lounging,
lolling visitors, the fountain in the centre leaped and sparkled with
changing colors, like an effervescence of the city. Far into the night
he sat out on the balcony of his gilt-skied, many-mirrored bedroom,
gazing at the beautiful Boulevards stretching serenely away in the
moonlight between their gigantic edifices.




CHAPTER IX

RUTH HAILEY


How he lived through the rest of the week he never definitely
remembered. He would have willingly given the days away, but, as they
had to be filled up somehow, they left confused recollections of
theatres and ballets, of rencontres with random acquaintances, of riding
on tiny tram-cars to see the Zoological Garden in the Bois de Boulogne,
of wandering in a rag-fair, of reading modern French poetry, of visiting
the ateliers of French painters whom he knew, and sympathizing with
their grumbles against the Institute and the distribution of
decorations, while wondering inwardly why these overgrown school-boys
languished and died for lack of a bit of ribbon. What could a man want
in life but to paint and to love? State recognition? Bah! The artist was
always an Anarchist. He stood alone, self-centred.

He hobnobbed with students, too, in his new sympathy with youth and art,
and--a distinguished visitor--was taken through the great ateliers with
their rainbow-colored dados of palette-scrapings and the announcements
in every European language that new-comers must pay for drinks. He
gladly accepted a ticket for a students’ ball on the Saturday night; it
had been postponed for a few weeks through the death of a beloved
professor. He had heard much of these balls, but had never seen one, and
he counted upon it to while away that last intolerable night between him
and his happiness.

Several times during the week he had thought of going to see Ruth Hailey
in accordance with the duty that on the other side of the Channel had
seemed so pressing, but he shrank instinctively from the raking up of
memories of the old unhappy days at this joyous crisis; he was not in
the mood for extraneous emotion. Nevertheless on the Saturday afternoon,
partly for want of anything better to do, partly to keep up to himself
the pretence that she was at least one of the motives that brought him
to Paris, and partly to ascertain if she had spoken to people in England
about his wife, he set out to pay the long-projected visit. He would
feel how the ground lay, discover if she had innocently betrayed him to
anybody who might touch Mrs. Wyndwood’s circle--which might be awkward
if in a possible compromise Eleanor should ever decide to live with him
in ostensible marriage.

He had a dim, unformed idea of appealing to Ruth for silence, but he did
not really meditate invoking her sympathies; she was on the eve of
departing for the Antipodes--was perhaps already gone.

He found her hotel--it was in the Rue de Rivoli. A waiter took up his
name and forthwith brought back word that Mademoiselle would see
Monsieur Strang.

His heart was throbbing curiously as he mounted the stairs and stood
outside her door. The quick, irregular clack, clack of a type-writer
responded like an echo. He was ushered into a large plainly-furnished
sitting-room. His first vision was of a tall comely lady in a grayish
gown, writing at a table opposite the door; but this was effaced by the
slimmer figure of a younger woman approaching from the right, with a
smile of welcome and an extended hand. A moment later her smile had
faded, and her hand was on her heart, soothing its flutter. He was
shaken to his depths; behind all the bodily changes he saw the little
girl-friend of his childhood; and, indeed, the purity of her limpid,
truthful gaze was undimmed.

“Ruth!” he cried in alarm, moving forward as if to sustain her.

She drew herself up, rigid and frozen; then her face relaxed, suffused
by a wan smile and a returning flood of carmine. She held out her hand
with a nervous laugh.

“How are you, Mr. Strang? I thought it was Billy, and to see you instead
startled me.”

As he took the little hand and looked into her face, maturer than its
years, though it had not lost its olden charm, especially in the
complexion, which was marvellously pure and soft, registering every
slightest change of thought and feeling in dainty flickers of rose
across its delicate fairness, his soul was invaded by a rush of tender
memories, incongruously jostling in his brain: the thrills and raptures
of boyhood, the joys of coasting down the slopes, and snaring rabbits
and shooting partridges; the glow of skating; the delicious taste of the
home-made cakes; the songs and hymns of childhood, the firelight casting
shadows on the dusky walls, while his mother read the Bible; the drone
of the fusty-coated preacher in the little wooden meeting-house; the
thwacking of the dancers’ feet in the barn, the odors of hay and the
lowing of cattle; the gleam of the yellow-tipped mullein by the wayside
and the smell of the wild flowers in the woods; the note of the
whippoorwill in the forest at twilight; the long cranes floating over
the summer marshes; the buzz of fresh young voices in McTavit’s
school-room. All these came back--dear and desirable, steeped in tears,
softened by distance to a pensive beauty, like bawling choruses heard
from afar across still water, inextricably interwoven with all the
pieties of childhood, the simple sense of God and truth and honor and
righteousness.

He stood holding her hand, oblivious of the present, in a whirling chaos
of ancient images that melted his soul to childish tenderness, and
brought back to it the child’s clear, unquestioning perception of
spiritual ideas which had grown shadowy in the atmosphere of salons and
studios and fashionable churches, that stereoscopic vision of the saint
and the child which sees the spiritual solid. But Ruth disengaged her
fingers at last, blushing under the kindly smile of the comely lady.

“This is Mr. Matthew Strang, Linda,” she said. “Mr. Strang, let me
introduce you to Mrs. Verder.”

He bowed: “Oh, I have heard of Linda Verder,” he said, smiling.

“And I have heard more of Matthew Strang,” she replied, beamingly.

“That is scarcely possible,” he murmured.

She laughed with a bird-like trill. “Oh, I wasn’t alluding merely to
your public career, though our sweet Ruth has gotten a whole album full
of newspaper-cuttings about that. But it is of you yourself and your
childhood that I have heard so much. So you see I _have_ the advantage
of you. But you will excuse me, I know; I have to go out. You needn’t
bother about those letters, dear. We’re nearly through with them.” And
with an affectionate nod to Ruth and a beneficent smile to Matthew, she
left the room. He was reddening: he was beginning to feel uncomfortable
under Mrs. Verder’s smiles, which in their insinuation of old
sweetheartship made it certain that Ruth had never mentioned his
marriage to her friend even; to hear that the forgotten Ruth had been
following his career all those years gave him an odd pathetic shiver.
She and Billy--and Heaven knew what others--were sunning themselves in
the mere reflected rays of that fame which had left him cold.

She stood away from him, shy and equally embarrassed, the blood ebbing
and flowing in the pure, soft cheek.

“Won’t you sit down?” she said at last.

“Oh, thank you!” he replied, and took a distant chair.

She sat down behind her type-writer, facing him. There was a silence.
She was the first to break it.

“I was so sorry to read you were ill.”

“Oh, it was nothing,” he murmured.

“I am so pleased we hadn’t left--we are sailing next Tuesday. It is so
good of you to come and see me, with the many claims that you must have
on your time.”

“It is a pleasure to be reminded of old times. I was sorry I missed you
the time you called at my house,” he said, awkwardly.

“I was very sorry, too.”

“But you know I work at my studio,” he explained, trying not to flush.
“There is no room at home.”

“Yes, I know. But I didn’t care to call there and interrupt your work.
Billy showed me the little room where you used to work in the olden
days. I thought it real nice of you to turn it into a study for him, and
to take care of him as you are doing. He sent me a story of his. No; it
wasn’t very good, poor fellow!” she added, seeing the question in his
face. “Rather too full of passionate love-making.”

“Not published?”

“No--in manuscript. I returned it to him type-written. He was
enraptured. He said it was like seeing himself in print.”

“Ah! we are not so used to the type-writer as you Americans.”

“It is coming in fast, though; even into your slow, old country, if you
consider it yours,” she added, slyly. “I am delighted to see how many
offices the new-fangled machine has crept into; in two years it will be
in every business office.”

“Why delighted? Have you or Mrs. Verder shares in the patent?”

“No, no,” she said, gently. “Don’t you see it is a new occupation for
women?”

He smiled.

“Ah, I remember. That’s your hobby.”

“Oh, not hobby, Mr. Strang, not hobby. It is my life-work. But I can’t
expect you to sympathize with these sordid, practical things,” she said,
smiling. “Your life is devoted to the gospel of the Beautiful.”

“Oh, but I do sympathize,” he cried, remorsefully. “I think it is very
fine of you.”

She shook her head, her smile fading.

“You don’t--you can’t. You are outside the circle of the material
worries of the poor; or, what is worse, the genteel. And nobody but a
woman can know the tragic pettiness of the life-struggle for single
girls--the stifled aspirations, the abortive longings, the tears in the
night. Christ would have understood. But He was not a man.”

He saw the blur of emotion veil her eyes ere she turned her head hastily
away. He felt his own sight growing dim; an understratum of his
consciousness admired the flow of her language, and divined platform
experiences. He had never before thought of her as clever.

She recovered herself in a moment, and resumed, playfully:

“No, if you were a black-and-white artist you would have sketched Mrs.
Verder with corkscrew ringlets and crying for trousers. We do want the
Franchise and the right to dress as we please, but these are only
incidental aspects of the movement for the independence of women, though
they lend themselves most readily to caricature. The woman of the future
is simply the working woman. All we really want is to make girls
economically independent of marriage; able to choose their mates from
love instead of selling themselves for a home.”

He could not meet her frank eyes; he was suddenly reminded of his own
marriage. What would this stainless soul think of him if she knew he had
sold himself, or--worse--if she knew why he had come to her this
afternoon? He murmured, surveying the carpet, that he knew life was hard
for girls, but that he hoped she at least had not been unhappy.

“I? Oh! I’ve been as happy as the next girl, though I’ve had my trials,”
she said, cheerily, between smiles and tears. “But I am grateful to God
for them, else I should never have learned to sympathize as I do, and I
should not have served the Master. My life might have been wasted in
mere happiness.”

Mere happiness! The phrase went through him like a sword.

“But _you_ had no need to work for a living,” he said, dubiously.

“Indeed I had! I had nothing.”

“You had a father.”

“Of a kind. But I quarrelled with him. You heard that, of course.”

He had heard of it, of course, but her affairs had made trivial dints
upon his consciousness.

“Why did you quarrel with him?” he asked.

Her face became a crimson mask. She lowered her head.

“Oh--I beg your pardon,” he stammered in distress. “Of course I had no
right to ask.”

She was silent, her fingers nervously picking out letters on the
type-writer. Then her eyes met his unflinchingly again.

“No, in a way you have a right to ask,” she said, uneasily. “I don’t see
why I shouldn’t tell you--it’s so long ago. You know I became the
Deacon’s book-keeper?”

He nodded, wondering.

“He made me keep all his accounts. I learned all about his affairs.
Well, one day, looking over the books, I made a discovery.”

“Yes?”

She hesitated. Her face was still fiery. The image of the mumbling,
quid-chewing Deacon, with the roundabout methods of arriving at his
point, rose vivid to his memory. He remembered his childish strain to
understand “Ole Hey’s” good advice. Pop! Pop! Pop! It was like the
clack, clack, clack of the type-writer under Ruth’s nervous, unconscious
fingers. But what was this she was saying to the accompaniment of the
erratic automatic music?

“I discovered that he was cheating you, or rather your sister and Abner
Preep, that he had always bamboozled your father, that the mortgage was
more than paid off long before, aside from the work he had gotten out of
your brothers and sisters.” She paused, then hastened on with a lighter
tone. “So, of course, being a foolish, hot-headed girl, I wouldn’t stay
any longer in his house unless he repaid you, and equally of course he
refused, knowing I wouldn’t make a scandal, and so I went off to the
only relative I had in the world--my mother’s sister in Portland, Maine.
She was too poor to give me more than food and shelter. But my knowledge
of book-keeping soon got me a place in a store. And ever since I have
earned my own bread, Heaven be thanked.”

She was not looking at him now; her fingers were still lightly tapping
the letters into combinations that spelled only embarrassment. “Perhaps
I oughtn’t to have told you--but you won’t take action now, will you?”

“No, seeing that the money has been paid!” he cried, hoarsely, with a
sudden intuition. He sprang up agitatedly. “You sent us all that money
anonymously--from Maine!”

Her head drooped lower. “Oh, I felt I oughtn’t to say anything,” she
cried in vexation.

“But you did, didn’t you?”

“It was such a trifle, anyhow,” she said, deprecatingly.

“It was a fortune then--five hundred dollars!”

“I could do no less. There was no other call for the money I earned in
those first few years, while my aunt still lived. And I thought that
perhaps--” He came towards her. “That perhaps--that perhaps it might
help you in your career--my aunt corresponded with my poor mother’s
friends in Cobequid Village--I knew how you were slaving and sending
money to your folks.”

“God bless you, Ruth.”

“I hope it was a little help to you, Matt.” He thrilled under the name,
spoken for the first time. “I have often liked to think it was--that I
had a wee finger in the making of a great artist.”

Her words cut him to the heart. How could he tell her that her money had
come too late? He was about to murmur something, but she stopped him.

“No, don’t answer me for fear you should dispel my illusion. It has been
such a joy to me when I read about your rapid rise to say to myself:
‘Ah, perhaps _we_ know something.’ But half the joy was in the secrecy;
now you have found me out, don’t take away the relics of my pleasure.”

“But why should you bother to read things about me?” he murmured, only
half sincerely, for another and more agitating suspicion was fast
germinating in his breast.

She flashed a quick glance up at him as he stood over her, then looked
down again indifferently, her sweet mouth quivering. “Oh, why should I
not be proud of knowing, if only in boyhood, the only great man our
township ever produced?”

But he had now been trained in woman’s looks. Rosina and Eleanor had
taught him much, and the thought that was borne in upon him now--the
conviction that Ruth, too, loved him, that she had always cherished her
childish affection, though his own had been swamped by his craving for
Art--was not the complacent conviction of a coxcomb. It was a chilling
agony. It pierced his breast like a jagged icicle. He had an appalling
sense as of responsibility for a ruined life. The image of “Aunt Clara”
flashed suddenly before him--careworn, faded, broken-down, unlovely. Was
that to be the end of Ruth--the sweet playmate, the great soul?

“And you, too, have done something in life,” he said, as if to reassure
himself, trying to curve his trembling lips to a smile.

She looked up frankly at him. “In so far as I have been able to help
Linda to help other girls.”

“And do you meditate--helping Linda all your life?”

“With God’s help.”

“Even,” he essayed to smile again, “even if you marry?”

“Oh, but I won’t marry,” she said, quickly, and kept her face bravely
raised to his, though the tell-tale rose was coming and going on her
transparent skin.

“Not even”--his smile was a ghastly caricature--”to spite the
caricaturists?”

She smiled a faint response. “Not even for that. Has not Linda
sacrificed herself on that altar? It’s true she’s a widow, but still--”

He could not help asking the question: “But why won’t you marry?”

“Because I don’t want to. Is that a woman’s reason?” And she smiled
again.

“Ruth!” he cried, frenziedly, in a strange mixture of emotions. “I am
not worthy to kneel to you!”

She opened her eyes, wondering: “Because I prefer celibacy? Because my
life is happy enough as it is; because, thanks to Mrs. Verder, it is
sufficiently filled with activity and movement?”

“Oh, if it is, if it is!” he cried, almost hysterically.

“Certainly it is. You men are all so mistaken about women. Marriage may
be a necessity for some women, but not for all--oh, thank God! not for
all. It may be harder for Linda, who has known a husband’s love--but for
me? Oh, I am perfectly happy.” She rose and moved away from him, and
began to walk restlessly up and down, talking rapidly. “It is perfectly
absurd, this making marriage and happiness synonyms. Novels end with
marriage, and that is called a happy ending. Good heavens! It is quite
as often an unhappy beginning! If you had seen the things I have seen,
heard the tales women have told me! Even the women you would imagine the
most enviable are full of worries. Why, look at your own wife, Mr.
Strang, who has everything to make her happy.” And her lips parted in a
faint smile.

He turned his face away. “Did she also tell you tales of woe?” he said,
with a forced laugh.

“Well, not precisely woe, but plenty of anxiety about the children, and
about the dishonesty of her helps, and she seemed rather poorly, too. I
hope you left her strong and well.”

“Thank you,” he murmured, flushing.

“How proud she is of you,” Ruth went on. “I was so glad to find that she
really appreciated you. I had often wondered. And it isn’t only on
account of your importance, Matthew Strang! She told me you were
goodness itself, which, of course, I knew, and that you had long wished
her to move to a better neighborhood, only she was afraid to put you to
expense. What a good woman she must be! And so pretty too!”

“Do you think so?” he muttered. His face was still averted.

“Yes, and I seem to remember her in your earliest pictures. She’s the
woman in ‘Motherhood,’ isn’t she?”

“I think she sat for the figure,” he said, hesitatingly. “I couldn’t
afford models then. I wish you weren’t going so soon. I should so like
to do a sketch of you--something to remember you by.”

She shook her head. “We have so much to do this week. I shouldn’t have
time.”

“I am sorry. Perhaps we shall never meet again,” he said in low tones.
“I never even had a photograph of you--I could do a sketch from that.”

“I don’t think I have any. You did a sketch of me once,” she reminded
him, “but I’m not going to give you that. That’s precious--an example
of your first manner.” The gay note in her voice sounded rather
strained. “Don’t you remember? You sent it me when you first went to
Halifax, please don’t remember how many years ago.”

But he did remember. And he remembered, too, how he had sent it her as a
slight return for the _Arabian Nights_. He had lost her gift (through
the carelessness of Jack Floss) very soon after, but she cherished his
still.

He moved to her side, watching her rummage among heaps of papers. He saw
the backs of two photographs, and picked them up. One was a portrait of
Linda Verder, the other of himself.

“Both public celebrities,” she said, with a little confused laugh. “I’ve
never attained to the shop-windows, so naturally I am scarcer.” She
continued her search, and at last turned up something. “Ah, there’s an
old one--or rather a young one. Me at sixteen! Goodness, to think I’ve
still got that!”

His flaccid nerves sent fresh moisture to his eyes as he gazed at the
simple picture of the sweet, delicate, girlish face, with large eyes
luminous with dreams, looking out shyly upon life in a sort of wistful
wonder and expectation, unconscious, unprophetic of the blank years when
eyes grow dim with sudden unsought tears.

His voice was broken as he said: “Thank you. This is the picture I would
most have wished to have. Henceforward I shall think of you, earnest,
truthful, aspiring ... as you have thought of me all these years. And
now I suppose I must not keep you any longer from your duties.”

“Oh, they are nothing. It is your time that is precious, I know. I am
rejoiced to have had this glimpse of you in your fame and happiness. I
shall always remember this afternoon. Good-bye, Mr. Strang.” She held
out her hand.

He put his, with the portrait, behind his back. “No, I won’t,” he said,
petulantly. “Not if you call me that.”

She dropped her hand with a sad smile.

“You see I belong to the rejected, Matt.”

He quivered as at a thrust.

“No, you are of the elect, of the saints of this earth.”

Her smile took on the wistfulness of her early portrait. They stood
looking at each other in a tender embarrassment.

“Oh, by-the-way, Matt, you will not mind my speaking of her ... she
belongs to me a little as well as to you, you know ... I went to see
your poor mother before I left for Europe.”

He shuddered.

“Did she recognize you?” he said, in a half-whisper.

She shook her head. Her face was drawn with the pain of the memory. “But
she is quite gentle, except when she quotes texts. They give her simple
housework to do--it provides a vent for her activity ... marriages are
not always happy, you see.” A wan smile flitted across her features. “I
shall go to see her again. Poor creature! I forgot her when I called you
happy. The thought of her must always sadden you.”

He would not trust his voice to reply. He transferred the photograph to
his left hand, and held out the right in silence. She put her hand into
his.

“Good-bye, Matt; perhaps forever.”

He struggled to speak.

“Good-bye, Ruth.” He bent nearer. “May I not kiss you ... for auld lang
syne?”

She withdrew her hand. Her voice was tremulous and low. “We are not
playmates now, Matt.”

He held up the photograph.

“Then I will kiss the girl I used to know.”

He pressed his lips reverentially to it.

She smiled sadly.

“Good-bye again, dear Matt. God bless you.”

He hurried from the room, overwhelmed with emotion. The door closed upon
him, and he leaned against the balustrade for a moment to recover
himself.

Clack! clack! clack! clack! clack!

It was the steady, business-like clatter of determined work. She had
taken up the burden of Duty again.




CHAPTER X

THE MASTER


He half groped his way down the stairs. In this mist of tears all things
were obscured, even the image of Eleanor Wyndwood.

No, one thing was clear--the figure of the sweet Puritan woman with her
simple righteousness.

He emerged into the Rue de Rivoli with its pretentious architecture, its
glittering shop windows, its bustle of life; across the road the gardens
of the Tuileries stretched away in the sunshine; but the gentle figure
stood between him and Paris. He tried to shake her off, to think of the
transcendent raptures that awaited him on the morrow; he tried to see
Eleanor’s face steadily, but it was all wavering lines like a reflection
in storm-shaken water. He bethought himself of selecting the secluded
restaurant and hiring the private room for the dinner, but the figure of
Ruth resurged, blotting Eleanor’s out. He took out her photograph and
kissed it again. “She’s a little angel,” he cried, aloud. And then, from
that chaos of ancient memories, freshly stirred up, came like an echo
Mad Peggy’s cry, “She’s a little angel....” A girl passing him laughed
in his face, and he put away the portrait, flushing and chilled to the
marrow.

He told himself he must soak himself in Paris and forget her. He walked
towards the Grand Boulevards, trying vainly to absorb and assimilate the
gayety of the streets. He returned to his hotel and dressed, and dined
with dainty dishes and sparkling wines, such as Herbert himself would
have recommended. But the quivering roots of his being had been laid
bare; his soul vibrated with intangible memories, and the image of Ruth
still possessed his imagination--the candid eyes, the pure skin. As ever
his soul was touched through the concrete.

After dinner he wandered about the gay city, adding the red of his
cigar-tip to the feverish dusk athrob with a myriad stars above and a
myriad lights below; the soft spring air was charged with the
pleasurable hum of ceaseless pedestrians; the theatres and music-halls
and dancing places blazoned themselves upon the night; the great
restaurants flared within and without, their pavement tables thronged
with light-hearted men and pretty women, gossiping, laughing, clinking
glasses. Women, everywhere women. They looked out even from the
illustrated papers of the illumined kiosks. The shining city seemed to
waft an incense of pleasure up to the stars; to breathe out an aroma of
sinless voluptuousness that rose like a thank-offering for life. His
heart expanded to all this happiness; he felt himself being caught up by
the great joyous wave, and Eleanor Wyndwood’s face came back, radiant
and seductive. But Ruth Hailey was still at his side, and ever and anon
he saw her as in her later guise--stern, sorrowful, negativing; she
stood out against the whole city.

He seated himself before one of the innumerable little marble
_guéridons_. He was at the cross-roads of the great arteries dominated
by the fulgent façade of the Opera House, where he could watch the
perpetual currents of gladsome life. He observed the countless couples
with emotion, striving to concentrate himself on the thought of his
imminent happiness, when the love that sustained the world and made it
sustainable should be his at last; when he should become as other men,
living the natural life of the race and the sexes in sympathetic fusion.
But the figure of Ruth Hailey stood firm amid the swirling crowds, and
her pure eyes shamed his thought, and filled his breast with an aching
tenderness for the poor human atoms he had deserted--for Rosina, for
Billy, for “Aunt Clara”--for whom there was no happiness and no natural
life. He fought against this obsession of Ruth’s spirit, he struggled to
fix his vision on the glitter and the gayety, but he had to see her
standing like a rock or a tower, four-square against smiling,
treacherous seas.

But if he went back to Rosina in honorable acknowledged union, then
farewell to Society! To take her about with him was out of the
question; she would be more unhappy than he in those high glacial
latitudes of humanity. Well, what was Society to him? He could shake it
off as easily as the Micmac of his childhood shook off the clothes of
Christendom. To be shut out from Society were no privation for him. He
had the advantage of his fellow-artists, who sacrificed at its shrine
and were sacrificed to it. He could couch on fir boughs, he had lived on
bread and water. This constant concern with wines and cookery, with
couches and carriages; this gorging and gormandizing and
self-pampering--did it add dignity to life? Was it worth the hecatomb of
hearts and souls offered up for it--this low luxury of the higher
classes? Was not simplicity the note of greatness--in life as in Art?
And howsoever simple the complex comfort of their lives might seem to
those born to it, was it for artists to imitate this lowest side of the
upper classes, especially if it frittered away their Art? Was it for
Bohemia to ape Philistia, and for Art--the last of the rebels against
the platitudinization of life--to bow the knee and swear allegiance to
the vulgar ideals of fashion? They had drawn him even from boyhood,
these showy ideals; from the days when he had peered wistfully into the
cricket-ground at Halifax. But he was done with boyhood now.

Ah, but if he went back to Rosina--and the new thought struck a chill as
of graveyard damps--it was all over with his Art. That, just beginning
to revive under the inspiration of Eleanor Wyndwood, would be a sheer
impossibility under the daily oppression of Rosina with her kitchen
horizon. His imagination would be clogged with the vapors of cabbage.
And of the old bad work he had had enough. He would retire from Art as
from Society, and the Exhibitions should know him no more. He would go
out of the business; that was all it was, he told himself with a bitter
smile. His fame was a bauble, a bagatelle. For all it mattered to him it
might have been his dead uncle, Matthew Strang, whose name was on the
lips of strangers. There was still work in the world for an honest man
to do; he remembered again that his hands could wield more than the
brush; besides, he had a little capital now, Rosina had still her
income. Perhaps they would go back to Nova Scotia and buy a farm. They
would sow and reap, far from the glare of cities, and the sweet, simple
sun and rain would bless the work of their hands. His life would be
joyless, but perchance his soul would be at peace.

Yes, but to give up Art! Art, which was the meaning of his life!
Rosina’s life stood for nothing. It was out of all proportion to give up
his for hers. Had he not suffered enough? Had he not already expiated
his marriage, the hapless union he had entered into when distracted by
illness and disgrace and hunger, when perhaps his whole future had
hinged--such were the tragi-whimsical turns of life--on his reluctance
to change his last two dollars?

He rose and walked about restlessly through the glistening streets.
Everywhere restaurants, open-air tables, men, women. He wandered to
Montmartre. More restaurants, more couples, cafés, cabarets, queer
entertainments: _Le Chat Noir, Le Rat Mort_, the red sails of the famous
Mill turning tirelessly, lights, gayety, women, always women, of all
shades of prettiness and piquancy, with rosy cheeks and lips not always
painted, and eyes that could shine without bismuth. He walked back
through the Grand Boulevards--they were one flush of life.

But the reasoning was inexorable. He had sacrificed Rosina to his Art;
Art had slipped through his fingers, but Rosina remained none the less
sacrificed. Now his Art must be sacrificed to Rosina--the atonement was
logical. That was not a surrender, he told himself angrily, to Ruth
Hailey’s view of life--a view whose narrowness he and everybody around
him had outgrown. He refused to recognize, in the face of this radiant
Paris, that each human soul came into the world to sacrifice its
happiness to other human souls. That seemed to him a preposterous
paradox rather than a solution; a world of reciprocal whipping-boys was
an absurdity, and, at any rate, if such were the scheme of creation, it
did not work at all with the gross run of mankind, to say nothing of
animals. The only reason for going back to Rosina must be honestly to
fulfil his side of the bargain. She had done her part, he must do his.
That his return to her meant the ruin of his life and his life-work was
not her concern; these larger issues were too wide for her
comprehension; she loved her husband and she desired him. That was
enough. He owed himself to her, and to shirk his obligation was as
dishonorable as to disown a debt. He had paid off the Stasborough
store-keeper, although absolved by bankruptcy; he must be equally
honorable with Rosina, though his life had been bankrupted. Practically
his Art had always been sacrificed to her; it was her pettiness that had
driven him to produce in haste for the market, so as to escape
indebtedness to her; well, let the sacrifice be consummated.

He had come to the Place de la Concorde--it seemed a fairy-land of
romantic lights, a dance of fire-flies; it wooed him towards the calm
and solitude of the river. He leaned on the parapet and saw the sombre,
fire-shot water stretching away in marvellously solemn beauty, hushed
and lonely, its many-twinkling perspective of green and red and yellow
gleams palpitating in the air dim with a yearning poetry. He felt the
presence of Ruth Hailey at his side; she looked like the photograph now;
he held her little hand and gazed into her candid eyes. Good God! This
girl had loved him all those long years, and would be hopelessly
faithful even unto death.

But if he went back to Rosina, what of Eleanor Wyndwood? Would he spoil
her life, too? and more culpably than he had spoiled Ruth Hailey’s? He
sighed wearily; it was impossible to do wrong and have the result
simple. Life was so intercomplicated. But he had been honest with
Eleanor, thank heaven; she knew the truth about his life; he would be
honest with her to the end. He would tell her the truth now. The same
noble, uncalculating simplicity that had accorded him friendship, that
had been ready to give him love, would bear her triumphantly through the
new trial. He remembered her brave words: “If I did not suffer I should
think I had not grown.” Perhaps there would be consolation for both in
the thought that she remained unsullied before the world.

He crossed the river, and his mood changed. He got towards the Latin
Quarter, and wandered into the “Boule Miche” amid the students’
restaurants, where young humanity sat in its couples again, amorous and
gay; every place was full within and without, and there was the gurgle
of liquids with the sounds of singing and laughter; he was back again
amid the blithe, insouciant, easy-going life of the eternal
undergraduate, with the local variation of bocks; rakish young men
danced through the restaurants arm in arm in tipsy merriment; poets with
lack-lustre visages and tumbled hair imbibed vermouth, clinking glasses
with their mistresses; the smoky air vibrated with irresponsible gayety;
it was full of invitations to careless happiness, joyous levity,
forgetfulness of an austere view of life. Puritanism seemed a form of
dementia, asceticism a sunless folly. The atmosphere gained upon him. He
tossed off a bock, then walked recklessly past Mrs. Wyndwood’s studio.
The whole court-yard was in darkness, but he thought of to-morrow night,
and it glowed as with bonfires of joy. He resolved to sup famously. He
jumped into a victoria and drove to a fashionable restaurant. It was
near midnight; the theatres had emptied, but the streets were only the
fuller. He passed through rooms full of dazzling women in gorgeous
evening costumes, sipping champagne; women, always women: the city
blossomed with them like roses. He ordered some oysters and chablis, and
forgot to eat; opposite him a self-conscious celebrity of the
footlights, blazing with diamonds, held her court, surrounded by a bevy
of dandies; behind him a black-eyed _demi-mondaine_ in red playfully
rapped her cavalier’s knuckles; at the next table the exuberant
liveliness of a supper party diverted him; he drank, drank, listening
greedily to the gay repartees. Life should be joy, joy, joy, he thought.
That was what modern life lacked, gray with problems, wrinkled with
thought. These people lived--lived in splendid insolence under the
midnight sun. There was a touch of bigness that appealed to him in their
arrogant vitality. Society was an organized insipidity, afraid of life.

The figure of Ruth Hailey rose rebuking; he paid the bill and went out.

But his heart cried, ached for happiness. Ah, no! He could not give up
so young; go into a living grave. He roved the Boulevards again. The
beautiful city solicited him, rouged and perfumed, clad in shining
garments, with star-gemmed hair. But the virginal figure of Ruth Hailey,
with sweet shy eyes, stood against the city. Paris seemed garish beside
her.

He was fluctuating again. It seemed as if the simple girl would draw him
away from all the joys of life. Was there no means of ridding himself of
her haunting presence? A grotesque mask looked out of a cab. Ah! the
fancy ball! He had forgotten. That would lay the ghost of his disordered
imagination. He felt in his pocket and found the ticket; he hastened to
the scene of revelry. A clatter of cabs and a blaze of lights--he had
arrived.

The first glimpse within was exhilarating, provoking, dazzling,
overwhelming; he had a confused sense of a hall of a thousand lights and
mirrors, reeking with scent and heat, reverberant with music and shrieks
and laughter, white with the whirling gleam of semi-nude women, and
motley with the rainbow hues and multiplied reflections of male
masqueraders; a mad, joyous orgy, the diabolical medley of a glittering,
tinselled pantomime and an opium-eater’s nightmare. Ah, here was
oblivion of Ruth Hailey at last, and he eagerly took up a position on a
raised platform that ran along the side of the gigantic ball-room,
trying to catch the contagion of the scene, and ready to rush into the
heart of the devil-may-care jollity. The gleeful, palpitating pageant--a
twisted, tangled kaleidoscopic rally of riotous color and flesh
tones--tore past him, dancing, leaping, shrieking, wantoning, clowning,
kissing, uncouth as the gargoyles of Notre Dame and brilliant as the
midnight Boulevard: Japanese figures and demons, gladiators in cuirasses
and bathing drawers, Gallic warriors in skins, brawny barbarians in
blankets, Amazons with brass breasts, a savage in a girdle of
fig-leaves, a real Samoan girl with coal-black hair in the convoy of her
Russian lover in a tall white hat, a boy as a German girl, and an
elderly woman as a gendarme with orange blossoms in her hair; one man
with a helmet crowned by a black cat, and another with a mock broken
head, reddened bandages, and a hideous stream of blood on his
shirt-front. And women--always women; a few masked, but most bare-faced,
shining with flowers and flesh; models of all sorts and conditions, some
with artistic dresses designed by their favorite students, some with
tarnished gaudery; blondes, brunettes of every nationality--French,
English, Greek, Italian, Creoles, Negresses, diversely dowered; frail
anæmic women, fervid gypsy-like women, saucily splendid women, soft
sleepy women with languorous black eyes, sweet lily-like women, big
blowzy women, tall febrile women, little demoniac women, all content to
take life as a flash of leaping flame flickering out to an early
darkness. And as they danced and laughed and romped and shouted, the fun
rose to hysterical frenzy; four masked men bore the queen of the models,
sinuous in complete fleshings, niched in an outspread gigantic fan;
before it a Druid and a Bacchante danced backward; behind it seethed a
vast picturesque procession of women mounted on their cavaliers’
shoulders, smoking cigarettes and waving lighted red and green lanterns;
at its sides girls pirouetted frantically, foot in mouth; the brazen
orchestra clanged--the procession defiled, frolicking, round and round
the hall, roaring a students’ marching chorus; a wave of hysteria ran
through the assembly, mighty, magnetic, compulsive; and Matthew Strang
waved his arms and shouted and sang with the best. Joy, joy, joy, this
was your true artistic interpretation of life. Away with this modern
morbidity! He was one in soul with all the great artists, all the
Masters who had had their royal way in life. O royal Eleanor! O rare
Eleanor! fit mate for a mighty artist! Then supper came, and he fought
for some in the balconies, amid the roar of voices, and the rattle of
knives, and the shouts for the maddened waiters, and the indescribable
exhalations of food and wine and smoke and hot air and scented flesh.
The half-deserted dancing floor was littered with champagne capsules,
bits of lanterns, ends of cigarettes, fragments of dresses, spangles,
morsels of fur. After supper the frolic grew more intoxicating, the
gayety more reckless; sweet demure-looking girls gave themselves to
high-kicking and lascivious movement; they obliged with the _danse du
ventre_; in a corner a woman turned somersaults from sheer
light-heeledness, a bashi-bazouk trundled a hoop through the centre of
the room, a band of fifty dancers with joined hands ran amuck among the
yelling crowd. Matthew Strang’s senses ached with the riot of color and
the rollick of figures and the efflorescence of femininity, and the
tohu-bohu of this witches’ sabbath. And then a strange ancient thought
struck him afresh--the same grotesque thought that after his father’s
death had weighed upon his childhood: very soon all these scintillating,
whirling figures would lie still and cold, frozen in death. They
suddenly became nothing but marionettes in a clock-work mechanism
destined to run down. And then the girlish form that had hovered mistily
in his neighborhood throughout all the tumultuous hours grew clear
again, and against this pandemoniac background the inexorable figure of
Ruth Hailey rose, simple and virginal, with sweet shy eyes.

When he came back to consciousness of the revellers, they had formed a
human amphitheatre, an inner circle lying on the ground, and the next
squatting, and the next kneeling, and the next half standing, and the
last but one erect, and the last of all surmounted by shouldered girls,
and in the centre of this human amphitheatre a beautiful young nude
model with ruddy brown hair struck graceful attitudes. The cold blue
light of dawn fell through a semicircular window overhead and mingled
weirdly with the yellowish electric light, lending a strange, wan,
unearthly hue to all these painted, perspiring faces.

The atmosphere seemed unbearably mephitic. He sallied shamefacedly into
the street. It was Sunday morning, stainless and fresh and blue. The
sunrise brooded over the sleeping gray-etched city in sacred splendor.
The sun was like a gigantic bowl of pure gold with a refracted cover
separated from it by a rift of cloud. Around it the sky was dappled with
lines and splashes and a ring or two of pale sulphur, ending to the
south in a narrow gulf of green. And all this loveliness of color was
spread on two amorphous islands of amber-gray in an ocean of pale-blue
sky, across which a few fleecy clouds sailed swan-like.

He had a perception of the divine, speaking through the silence of
beauty. And the world was asleep or at riot.

Ah! this should have been the message of his Art. Each morn the sunrise
spoke its flaming word unheard; it was the artist’s function to stir the
world to the perception of the sublimity and poetry that lay all around
unheeded; to uplift its eyes to the loveliness of realities, realities
solid as rocks, yet beautiful as dreams; visionary and tangible; the
great verities of sun and sea and forest, of righteousness and high
thinking; beautiful and elemental.

Too late! Too late! Art was over now. Not to his hand had the mission
been given; once he had thought to feel the sacred fire in his bosom;
but he knew now that the mission was not for him. He had failed.

The great streets stretched under the blue dawn bathed in sacred
freshness. The stir of night was passing into the stir of morning. The
sleepy yawn of returning revellers was met by the sleepy yawn of
early-risen artisans. Two horrible hags of rag-pickers, first astir of
Parisians, were resting their baskets on a bench; he heard them
rapturously recalling the excellence of the soup they had made from the
bones, picked clean by dogs, that they had gathered from the citizens’
ash-pans.

Ah, not all the world was gay. He had been surveying only the sparkling
bubbles and froth of Paris. Below flowed the sober, orderly, industrious
civic life, with its bottom dregs of misery. All the great cities were
full of dolorous figures, every by-way and alley swarmed with sickly
faces, pale fruits of a congested civilization. He had always kept his
eye on those happier than he; now he was reminded of how much more than
the man in the street he had drawn in the lottery of the fates. He
remembered the saying of a street scavenger he had come across in his
days of destitution. “I’m neither hungry nor dry, so what have I to
grumble about, mate?” What, indeed, had he, Matthew Strang, to grumble
about? There did not seem to be enough happiness to go round. Who was
he, to be selected for a special helping? Who was he more than his mate
the scavenger, more than any other of the human souls he had met in his
diversified career, more than his fellow-lodgers in the slums of Holborn
or Halifax, or his fellow-passengers on board _The Enterprise_, or the
blind woman who caned chairs in the basement of the house of the
Rotherhithe bird-stuffer? Why should he be happy?

It was like a new thought, luminous and arrestive. And then it flashed
upon him that all this glitter of gayety that had dazzled his covetous
eyes, even if it were not half an illusion, was infinitely subdivided;
each person could only have a minute share in the overwhelming total,
and even this quantum of joy must be alloyed with the inevitable
miseries of the human lot. This was the fallacy that in London, too, had
added the sting of envy to his unhappiness; he had lumped together all
the pleasure and splendor and happiness of the capital, forgetting that
though it could all be lacked by one man, it could not be possessed by
one. And to look at life from the outside was childish--it was like
reading paragraphs about people in the newspapers. How happy he himself
loomed in biographical summaries! Poor Rosina! Poor Aunt Clara! Poor
Billy! What happiness for these?

They were foolish, fretful creatures, all of them; in the jargon of the
drawing-rooms, bourgeois, vulgar, impossible, too low even for the
stigma of “suburban”; but their lives were as important to them as his
life to him. Each soul was the centre of its own world. If he could
understand them, and they could not understand him, the gain was to him.
He was strong, therefore he must supplement their weakness; not because
of any ethics or theology, simply because he was stronger. For sheer
pity he must give up his life to theirs; sacrifice his Art to their
happiness. He must adapt himself to their points of view, since they
could not adapt themselves to his; if for Rosina the world turned on the
price of beef, he must teach himself to be interested in the price of
beef. He had found it easy enough on the day when they had gone
a-marketing together at Halifax. He saw her as then, buoyant, youthful,
gay, even pretty; was it not he who had made her shrewish, sorrowful,
unlovely? How nobly reticent she had been about his neglect of her!
Coble had died thinking her ideally happy, boastfully proud of his
son-in-law. And after all, there was an excellent side to her economical
instincts; she did not long for diamonds and dinner-parties like the
wives of other artists; nay, wiser, perhaps, than he, she had known how
to content herself with her own station. Even Tarmigan must have
approved of her as an artist’s wife. Yes, he must go back to her and
his children, not out of any deference to the marriage-tie, but as
individual to individuals.

He arrived at his hotel. To his astonishment it was in full
illumination; he heard the strains of dance-music from within. He peeped
into the magnificent dining-room; it was become a ball-room, and sober
couples were waltzing. Women, always women; irreproachable this time;
elegant in shimmering silks. The world of fashion was dancing
there--dancing on behalf of a charity.

He wavered again; this was the world he was leaving forever, the world
of soft things, the world of thought and pleasant speech, the world of
art and books and music, the caressing world that praised pictures, and
the makers thereof: the world of Eleanor Wyndwood. But the fight was
over; in every sense, he told himself, the fight was over. He must go to
Eleanor and tell her that happiness was not for either; she would be
strong and fine, she would strengthen him in his obedience to the higher
voice. But oh--and her face swam up vivid again--would not the very
sight of her weaken him, shatter his resolve? And perhaps, too, the
sight of him would weaken even her. No, they must never meet again; that
was the simplest, the least painful for both.

He gave instructions that he was to leave by the first morning train; he
mounted to his room and packed up; then he wrote to Eleanor.

     DEAREST ELEANOR,--Forgive me that I must cause you pain. I can only
     hope it will prove to have saved you greater pain in the future.
     But, my dear, I must not pretend it is from any unselfish desire to
     save you from sacrificing yourself to my happiness, as you in your
     generous nobility have been ready to do, that I have resolved never
     to see you again. I am leaving Paris at once. When I tell you the
     reason I know that it will ease your pain, and that your noble
     nature will approve and forgive. I am going back to my wife. I have
     thought it over and see that I have no option. I have been
     forgetting that in return for her helping me to Art, I vowed to
     love, cherish, and protect her. If I cannot love her--if I can only
     love you, if the thought of you will always be like music to me,
     though I must never see you again in the flesh--I must at least do
     my best to make her happy. This is not only a farewell to you, it
     is a farewell to Art. Without you to inspire it, my Art is dead. I
     retire from the long contest broken-hearted.

Yours so truly,

MATTHEW STRANG.

     P.S.--I dared not trust myself to come and tell you this. It would
     have been a useless trial for both of us. You will be happier
     without me and all the suffering my selfish passion must have
     brought upon you. Forget me. God bless you.

He descended to the court-yard and dropped the letter into the box. Then
he sat outside on his balcony and watched the great gleaming Boulevards
as they woke to the new day.

He was too early at the station, and the train tarried. The porters
leisurely wheeled in the luggage. Sleepy passengers straggled up, armed
with gayly illustrated papers broad with Gallic buffoonery.

Oh, the agony of that last quarter of an hour, when Paris beckoned him
with its finger of morning sunlight, when Art cried to him from a
thousand happy ateliers, calling him to come back and be happy in the
great work he felt he had been about to do at last; when Love shone like
a purple haze veiling the world in poetic dream, and sang to him like an
angel’s voice, and witched him back with the eyes and the hair and the
lips of Eleanor Wyndwood!

But the train was going at last, and he must take his seat in his
first-class compartment. It was his second defeat, his second farewell
to Art, bitterer, crueller by a thousand-fold than the first, when he
had sailed home again penniless, broken in soul and body. Then, at
least, home was a tender recollection. Now--! And he had been so near
the goal of happiness, the cup had been at his very lips. Never to be
happy--never, never! The sudden shriek of the engine sounded sardonic.
The train moved on, bearing Matthew Strang from all the sweetness and
savor of life. In the great ocean of existence wherein men struggle for
happiness he had gone down--like his father.

But, like his father, he had gone down wrapped in his flag.

       *       *       *       *       *

The stage of the world is not adapted for heroic attitudes, unless the
curtain be dropped on the instant.

To pass, after a tedious day-long journey, from the vivid boulevards to
the gray dreariness of a poor London suburb on a Sunday evening was
already a chill to the artistic mind; to find that the wife into whose
arms he had come to fall in dramatic contrition was not only out, but
gone to church with Aunt Clara and little Clara, was to be further
reminded of the essentially inartistic character of life in general, and
of its especial narrowness in church-going districts.

But he stooped down to kiss little Davie, who, by reason of the
servant’s “Sunday out,” had opened the door and explained these things
to him. He saw that the child had a little wooden mannikin in his hand,
and was sucking it.

“Don’t suck that, Davie,” he said.

“There ain’t no paint to spoil,” Davie urged, gravely. “It’s all gone.”

Matthew carried both the little men down-stairs on his shoulder. In the
kitchen he found Billy moping by the fire--profiting by the absence of
the servant to enjoy the only fire Rosina’s economy permitted at this
season of the year--but sunk so deep in a black reverie that he did not
raise his head at the unwonted footsteps.

A wave of protective love, almost paternal, flooded Matthew’s soul; he
laid his hand on poor Billy’s head as in benediction. Nevermore would
they be parted, nevermore.

“Billy,” he said, softly.

The young man started violently, and looked up.

“I’ve come back, Billy,” he said, tenderly.

“So I see,” replied Billy, ungraciously.

He was stung to the quick, but he controlled his pain; he saw this was
part of his atonement.

“I’ve come to make it up with Rosina. I’m not going away again,” he went
on gently, his hand on Billy’s shoulder.

“And what’s the use of that?” Billy snapped. “Even if she makes it up
with you, she’ll break out again in a few days. I know her.”

He set down the child with a sigh, and drew a chair to his brother’s
side. Davie climbed trustfully on his knee. The kettle was singing, and
a plump gray cat purred in the fender.

“Besides,” Billy went on, “you’ve always said you couldn’t live here--it
was necessary to live at your studio.”

“I know; but I am giving up the studio.”

Billy turned whiter than usual.

“What’s happened?” he cried in alarm.

“Nothing in particular.”

“Then I suppose you are going to turn me out of my workroom?”

“No, no, Billy. I am giving up painting altogether.”

Billy’s eyes dilated in horror, as on the night when his mother had
dragged him out of bed to trudge the frozen fields.

“Are you mad?” he gasped.

Something of his awe sent a shiver through his brother.

“Perhaps I am,” said Matthew.

He fell silent.

Billy regarded him furtively. The minutes dragged on. Matthew looked at
his watch--getting on for seven. Eleanor Wyndwood would have been
dressing for him--he saw her matchless loveliness. Another few minutes,
and his kisses would have been on her lips--those lips that had lain on
his in what was already an enchanted, hazy dream rather than a waking
memory.

“Perhaps I _am_ mad,” he muttered again, as he sat waiting for Rosina
instead. And then he caught sight of the little figure Davie was
sucking, and began to laugh boisterously.

Billy was terrified.

“You can have the studio back if you like,” he said, soothingly; the
cripple’s tones became protective in their turn. “I can write
anywhere--and, after all, what’s the use of my writing?--nobody will
take what I write.”

“I can write kisses,” interposed Davie, looking up proudly.

“What does he mean, Billy?” said Matthew.

“Oh, he used to put crosses at the end of the letter when Rosina wrote
to poor old Coble--kisses to his grandfather, you know.”

“He’s a angel now,” said Davie, gravely.

“What’s that you’re sucking?” Billy responded, sternly. “You know you
mustn’t.”

He took it away, and Davie set up a howl till pacified by a penny.

“It’s an image of a preacher, Matt,” Billy explained. “I forget his
name. He died last year--Rosina used to go and hear him. She said he
gave her great comfort. These images are sold in thousands. What a
ludicrous thing popular religion is!”

Matthew laughed, but there was a tear for Rosina in the laughter.

“By-the-way,” he said, suddenly, “did old Coble leave her any money?”

“Yes--but a few thousand dollars was all there was when his estate was
wound up. He couldn’t have expected to crack up, for he made no
provision whatever for Aunt Clara.”

“Then Rosina is keeping her?”

“Yes, I suppose so.”

“How does she reconcile that with her economy?” he thought, with an
added throb of tenderness. The kettle sang on; the cat purred; he had a
flash of hope--he might grow to love her yet. But he thought of Eleanor
Wyndwood, and the hope died. They would have been on their way now to
their restaurant--sitting close together, driving through the flashing
streets. Oh, was he not mad to be here?

“What are you doing all alone?” he thought. “My love, my first love and
my last, you who believed in me, who were ready to sacrifice yourself to
me?”

“Did you go to see Ruth Hailey?” asked Billy, suddenly.

Eleanor’s face vanished. He put his hand to his breast-pocket, and drew
out the portrait with the sweet, shy eyes.

“Yes,” he said, tremulously, “and she gave me this.”

Billy took the photograph and kissed it.

“God bless you!” he said.

Davie pricked up his ears.

“You’re not in love with her?” Matthew asked, lightly, with a sudden
apprehension.

“I?--I know better than to be in love with any woman,” said Billy,
sadly, as he returned the portrait. “Only in my stories can I love and
be loved.”

“It was she who sent us that mysterious money,” said Matthew, and told
him the story. Billy listened in surprise and emotion.

“God bless you, Ruth!” he said again.

“What is that God?” interrupted Davie.

The brothers looked at each other, embarrassed.

“Ask mummy; she’ll tell you,” said Matthew, at last.

“Mummy did tell me, but I can’t ’derstand.” He sat there wondering.
“When does God sleep?”

The sudden blare and boom of a Salvationist procession saved reply. The
blatant clangor passed, died. They waited for Rosina.

Presently they heard the returning church party descending into the
area, so as not to soil the white upper-steps. He had kissed her before
she was aware of his presence, as she stepped across the kitchen
threshold, red-edged prayer-book in hand. After that her sullenness was
only half-hearted. He said he had come to supper. By the time they had
sat down to it a reconciliation had been patched up. Warned by Billy’s
reception of his determination, he did not even break it to her yet.
Thus tamely passed off the great renunciation scene--the crisis of his
life--like everything else in his life, unlike what he had imagined
beforehand. Rosina did not even understand what this home-coming meant
to him. He pleaded that Davie, who did not want to go to sleep, should
be allowed to stay up to supper, but this request was not granted.

“Mummy, when does God go to sleep?” the persistent Davie remembered to
ask as she was leading him from the room.

“God never sleeps,” replied Rosina, sternly, and haled him to bed.

Matthew pondered the immense saying, so glibly spoken, as he waited for
her to return. “Aunt Clara,” pouch-eyed and wan, her head nodding
queerly with excitement at the great man’s presence, was laying the
supper in the warm kitchen, where the servant would not resume
possession till ten; little Clara was at her task of Bible reading.
Billy drowsed on his chair, exhausted. The fire glowed red; the cat was
still stretched in the warmth. Something in the scene thrilled him with
a sense of restful kinship with it, half sweet, half sad; a sense of
being more really at home than in delicate drawing-rooms; the old homely
kitchen far away on the borders of the forest sent out subtle links,
binding his childhood to the manhood that had come at last.

       *       *       *       *       *

This half-and-half-ness was typical of the new life which began that
night, and which on the morrow was sealed and consecrated by the
characteristically self-deceptive message from Eleanor: “You are right.
We have chosen the highest.” It was a life full of petty pricks and
every-day worries. But if it was not so grandiosely heroic as he had
intended, neither was the consequence to his Art as he had foreseen.

He has not given up Art. Neither Rosina nor Billy would permit that
folly, and Eleanor’s brief letter had a postscript of inspiring protest.
He had meant to sacrifice Art and Happiness, but only the latter
sacrifice was accepted. For unhappiness drove him back to his
studio--where the “Angelus” hung now like an inspiration. From the
glooms and trials of the daily routine in this prosaic home, with its
faithful but narrow-souled mistress, who knew not what was passing in
her husband’s mind, nor at what cost he had made her happy, and who
would not even agree to live in some beautiful country spot which would
have softened life for him--from this depressing household, with its
unsprightly children, its cheerless pensioner, its querulous cripple
resenting the very hand that fed him, he escaped to the little
whitewashed studio to find in his Art oblivion of the burden of life.

And now, at last, his true life--work was begun. Removed from the
sapping cynicism of the Club conscience, from the drought of
drawing-room disbelief, from the miasma of fashionable conversation,
from the confusing cackle of critics; saved from the intrigue with Mrs.
Wyndwood, that would have distracted his soul and imposed an extra need
for money-making; withdrawn from the feverish rush of fashion and the
enervating consumption of superfluous food and drink; exempted from
keeping up a luxurious position purchased by scamped, soulless pictures;
able to work without the whims of sitters or patrons, without regard to
prices--for Rosina’s income, augmented by her very considerable
hoardings and by his balance, supplemented by the proceeds of the sale
of his studio effects and

[Illustration: “SOMETHING IN THE SCENE THRILLED HIM WITH A SENSE OF
RESTFUL KINSHIP”]

ancient pictures, the whole doubled by Rosina’s economic administration,
was amply sufficient for every rational need--Matthew Strang began at
last, without underthought of anything but Art, in this homely
environment to which his soul was native, to express his own inmost
individuality, to produce faithfully and finely the work it was in him
to do.

Solitary, silent, sorrowful, strong; not chattering about his ideas and
his aims, indifferent to fame or the voice of posterity, striving for
self-approbation and rarely obtaining it, touching and retouching,
breaking the rules of the schools in obedience to his own genius, he
toiled on in his humble studio, seeking the highest, with no man and no
woman to inspire, encourage, or praise. He had been saved from Love and
Happiness, and sent back into sympathy with all that works and suffers.
And thus the note that had trembled faintly and then died out in his
work was struck strong and sure at last--the note of soul. To his
accurate science and his genius for the decorative, which are two of the
factors of great Art, was now added the spiritual poetry which is the
last and rarest. For he was master of his soul at last.

He had absorbed life sufficiently--he had toiled and hungered; he had
feasted and made merry; he had sorrowed and endured; he had sinned and
suffered; he had known the lust of life and the pride of the eye; he had
known Love--the love of the soul and the love of the senses; he had
known the heartache of baffled ambition and the dust and ashes of
achievement. What he had wanted he had not got; by the time he had got
it he had not wanted it; whatever he had set out to do he had not done,
and whatever he had done he had not foreseen. And out of all this
travail of the soul was born his Art--strong, austere, simple.

In the five or six years since he died to the world he has finished as
many big pictures, and has made studies for others, besides a host of
minor things. He has not exhibited any of the larger pictures in the
Academy; three have been presented quietly to provincial and suburban
galleries where the People comes. Only one with some of the smaller
things has been sold for money, and this but to appease Rosina; it was
one more sacrifice of his individuality to hers. It is true there are
expenses for models and materials, and he has now two more children, but
it jars upon him to ask money for work that expresses and conceals the
tragic secrets of his inmost being. Nor does he care to have his
pictures shut away amid the other furniture of luxurious mansions.
Still, he has learned enough to know that life cannot be lived ideally.
And, moreover, the event has taught him again the contrariety of life;
for his eccentricity, leaking out slowly, has enhanced the fame to which
he is indifferent, and, aided by a legend of mysterious saturnine
seclusion, has raised his market value to such a point that he need only
sell an occasional picture. One dealer in particular is anxious to give
him his own price for a picture. Matthew Strang will probably part with
one to him some day, but he does not know that the dealer is acting for
Lady Thornton, the wealthy and celebrated society leader and convert,
though he knows and is glad that Eleanor Wyndwood found both happiness
and spiritual peace when, a few months after her friend Olive Regan’s
marriage to Herbert Strang, that ever-charming and impressionable lady
was led to the altar by the handsome and brilliant Sir Gilbert Thornton,
and went over with him to Roman Catholicism. With the same earnestness
with which she had passed from her native orthodoxy to the Socialism of
Gerard Brode, and thence to the spirituality of Dolkovitch, she had slid
by a natural transition from the sensuous art atmosphere of Matthew
Strang’s world into the sensuous spirituality of Catholicism as soon as
his influence had been replaced by the ascendency of another male mind.
He was not asked to the wedding, and the invitation to Olive’s, reaching
him in the days when the first darkness of isolation was upon him, he
had left unanswered.

And just as he has given his Art freely to the world, so, under the
inspiration of Tarmigan’s memory, he gives his services freely at
Grainger’s and other humble art-schools as encourager of every talent
that aspires under discouragement; teaching it to be itself and nothing
else, for the artist gives to the world and is not asked for, creating
the taste he satisfies, and Art is not Truth nor Beauty, but a
revelation of beautiful truth through the individual vision. It is the
artist’s reaction to the stimulus of his universe, whether his universe
be our common world seen for itself or through antecedent art, or a
private world of inward vision: for while the philosophers are
quarrelling about abstract truth, the artist answers Pilate’s question
through his own personality. The beauty which Matthew Strang’s art
reveals, though he experiments in many styles, with unequal results, is
mainly tragic. For others the gay, the flippant, the bright--let those
from whose temperament these things flow interpret the joyousness and
buoyancy and airy grace of existence. For others the empty
experimentation in line and color. It is all Art--in the house of Art
are many mansions. He has come to the last of the three stages of so
many artists, who pass from the fever to do everything, through a period
of intolerance for all they cannot do, into a genial acceptance of the
good in all schools. But, unassuming as he has always been, he is yet
sometimes shaken by righteous indignation when he sees tawdry art--art
that is the response to the stimulus of no universe but the artificial
studio-universe of models and posings and stage-properties--enthroned
and fêted at the banquet of life; and sometimes an unguarded word
flashes out before his pupils, but he always repents of his railings,
feeling it is his to work, not to judge; to do the one simple thing that
his hand findeth to do.

One of his pictures is of a woman looking out to sea with hopeless eyes;
there is a mocking glory of sunset in the sky. This is called “The Pain
of the World.” The title was due to Olive’s exclamation that night in
Devonshire. The figure is his mother’s, come back to him in his own
solitude--the image of her standing thus in the asylum at Halifax could
not be effaced from his soul; it had to find expression in his Art.

As he worked at it, with the brutal aloofness of the artist, studying
lights and shadows, values and effects, gradations and tones, he
wondered whether the artist were a cold-blooded monster, or a divinely
appointed alchemist sent to transmute the dross of the world’s pain to
the gold of Art for the world’s pleasure; a magician to cover up the
rawness of life, as kindly Nature covers up the naked earth with grass,
or throws the purple light of dream over all that is dead--over the
centuries that are past or our youth that is gone; a Redeemer, whose
beautiful perception of pathos and tragedy robs the grave of its
victory, and plucks Death of its sting, so that no man suffereth or
travaileth without contributing to the raw stuff of life of which Art is
woven by the souls dowered with the pangs and privileges of
Over-Consciousness. Each man, it sometimes seemed to him, dimly, had to
pay so much in sorrow and pain; and in return for that he drew from the
common human fund the comprehension of life and the consolation of Art,
new sympathies and new delights, music and books and pictures, that only
lived through the rich variety of human destinies; mystic atmospheres
and minor scales, meaningless to souls that had not suffered or
inherited the capacity to suffer. Some--generally the stupid--paid
little in pain and sorrow; and some--as in his own case--much. But so
long as the account showed a balance to the general good, it was not for
the soul that was sacrificed to complain. It was, perhaps, even a
privilege to subserve the common good. Life was so arranged that virtue
could not be sure of personal reward, and this uncertainty was just what
made virtue possible. Under no other scheme of things could the soul
enjoy the privilege of virtue. To have suffered, as he himself had done,
by the institution of marriage, both as child and husband; to have been
a victim to the general laws which safeguard human society; to have been
cut in two by the flaming swords of the cherubim, which turn every way
to keep the way of the Tree of Life--all this did not, he thought, give
him the right to blaspheme existence. And the artist at least extracted
a soul of good from all things evil.

Some such reflections--not clear, but all confused and blurred, for he
was no syllogism-building philosopher, but an artist whose profoundest
thought sprang always from the concrete image before him--came to him
again when he was working at his famous picture “The Persecutors,”
inspired by an episode in Billy’s life, though Billy does not know. It
is simply children tormenting an old man. The old man is one of the
world’s wrecks; the children know not what they do. But the pathos of
the picture is overwhelming; it purifies by pity and terror. This is the
profit to the world of Billy’s life.

Matthew Strang knows, with the same secret assurance that sent him out
to fight, and strengthened him in the long struggle, that this picture
will live, that the gods have answered his boyish prayer for
immortality. But at moments when Billy is moping or in pain, or when the
artist foresees the gabble of magazines and drawing-rooms about his
work, the chatter of fashionable parrots, and the analysis of his
“second manner” by glib, comfortable critics, he wonders whether the
picture or the immortality is worth the price.

But, stronger than those driven by their Over-Consciousness to express
in artistic shapes the futility of life, he does not dwell eternally on
the tears of things; and his picture simply entitled “A Woman” is
perhaps his masterpiece. For when he painted it that sunrise in Paris
was still vivid to him, and the light in Ruth Hailey’s eyes, and that
fire of love in Eleanor Wyndwood’s; these things were in the eternal
order, too, as truly as the ugliness and the sordid realities. The
simplest human life was packed with marvels of sensation and emotion,
haloed with dreams and divine illusions. To have been a child, to have
sung and danced, to have eaten and played, to have seen woods and
waters, to have grown to youth and to manhood, to have dreamed and
aspired, to have labored and hoped--all this happiness had been his
while he was looking for happiness, just as Art had been his in Nova
Scotia, while he had been struggling to get to it in England.

And so to-day he yearns to paint the poetry of the Real--not with the
false romantic glamour which had witched his youth, though even his
youth had had a hankering after the Real, just as his maturity retains a
love for the mystic. That gilded unreality to which his Art would have
gravitated, had he found happiness with the sentimental Eleanor in her
atmosphere of fashion, will be replaced by the beauty that even when
mystic is based on Truth. He needed no woman’s inspiration, nor the
stimulus of cultured cliques. Alone he faces the realities of life and
death without intervening veils of charming illusion, no longer craving
to filter the honest sunlight through stained cathedral windows or to
tarnish the simplicity of the grave with monumental angels. Aspiring now
to paint London, he wanders through the gray streets, as in his days of
hunger, but now the grotesque figures no longer seem outside the realm
of serious Art, or mere picturesque arrangements of line and color. To
his purged vision, that still lacks humor, they touch the mysteries and
the infinities, passing and disappearing like ghosts on a planet of
dream: solitude has brought him a sense of the universal life from which
they flow, and he fancies the function of Art should be to show the
whole in every part, the universal through the particular. And so he
longs to paint the beauty that lies unseen of grosser eyes, the poetry
of mean streets and every-day figures, to enrich and hallow life by
revealing some sweep of a great principle that purifies and atones.

In “The Old Maid” he has painted the portrait of “Aunt Clara” with Davie
on her knee, revealing the wistful, imprisoned, maternal instinct he
detected one day in her sunken eyes as she fondled his little Davie.
What makes this presentation of ugliness Art is not merely the breathing
brush-work, but the beauty of his own pity which the artist has added to
the Nature he copied. With the falsely aristocratic in Art or life he
has lost sympathy: to him to be honest and faithful is to belong to the
only aristocracy in the world--and the smallest. Sometimes he dreams of
some great Common Art--for all men, like the sky and the air, which
should somehow soften life for all. And dreaming thus he somewhat frets
against the many limitations of his own Art--as once in his callow
boyhood when he set out to write that dime novel--and against its lapsed
influence in modern life, wishing rather he had been a great poet or a
great musician. Only music and poetry, he feared while toiling at the
“Old Maid,” could express and inspire modern life; the impulse that had
raised the cathedral had been transformed into the impulse that built
the grand hotel, fitted throughout with electrical conveniences; in the
visible arts landscape and portraiture alone seemed to find response
from the modern mind, the one by its revelation of the beauty of the
world, the other by its increasing subtlety of psychological insight.
Painting had begun with religion, religion had led to technique, then
religion had drifted away from painting, and then technique had become a
religion. But technique ought not to be thought of separately except by
the student; to the artist the spiritual and the material came as one
conception, as metre comes with the poet’s thought. The spirit must be
brought back to painting--this modern accuracy of tones and forms was
but the channel for it. But it could no longer be conveyed through the
simple images of a popular creed to which all men vibrated: to-day there
was no such common chord for the artist to touch. Even this picture of
“The Old Maid” might be unintelligible without its title, and risked
denunciation as literary. And the greatest picture could be seen by but
few.

But repining is useless; there is only one thing he can do, and he must
do it--a small thing in the span of the cosmos and the sweep of the
ages, but to be done ere he goes down to the kindred dust. But before
death comes he has doubtless other things to suffer--all these spiritual
agonies have seared the body in which early privations and sickness had
already left the seeds of premature infirmity. His children are growing
up, too, bringing new fears and problems.

And yet his life is not all unhappy--work is his anodyne, and there is
an inner peace in the daily pain, because it is the pain that his soul
has chosen, in willing slavery to its own yoke.

But life is too long for ideals; the unending procession of the days
depresses the finest enthusiasm. Sometimes when the domestic horizon is
dark, or when his body is racked with pain, he rebels against the rôle
thrust upon him in the world’s workshop, and against the fate that
mocked at his free-will, and made of him a voluntary instrument for the
happiness of Rosina and Herbert, turning his every action to
undreamed-of issues; and then he longs for the life that he had found so
hollow, the life of gay talk, and rustling dresses, and wine, and woman,
and song. And in such moments as these--when the natural human instinct
for happiness, yearning sunward, breaks through all the strata of
laborious philosophy and experience--he remembers that men call him “The
Master,” and then he seems to hear the sardonic laughter of Mad Peggy,
as he asks himself what Master he has followed in his sacrifice, or what
Master, working imperturbably, moulds human life at his ironic,
inscrutable will.

       *       *       *       *       *

Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:

Miss O’Reilly’s hair chamelon-colored=> Miss O’Reilly’s hair
chameleon-colored {pg}

painter always trod giugerly=> painter always trod gingerly {pg 400}













BLACKY THE CROW

By Thornton W. Burgess



CHAPTER I: Blacky The Crow Makes A Discovery

Blacky the Crow is always watching for things not intended for his sharp
eyes. The result is that he gets into no end of trouble which he could
avoid. In this respect he is just like his cousin, Sammy Jay. Between
them they see a great deal with which they have no business and which it
would be better for them not to see.

Now Blacky the Crow finds it no easy matter to pick up a living when
snow covers the Green Meadows and the Green Forest, and ice binds the
Big River and the Smiling Pool. He has to use his sharp eyes for all
they are worth in order to find enough to fill his stomach, and he will
eat anything in the way of food that he can swallow. Often he travels
long distances looking for food, but at night he always comes back to
the same place in the Green Forest, to sleep in company with others of
his family.

Blacky dearly loves company, particularly at night, and about the time
jolly, round, red Mr. Sun is beginning to think about his bed behind
the Purple Hills, you will find Blacky heading for a certain part of
the Green Forest where he knows he will have neighbors of his own kind.
Peter Rabbit says that it is because Blacky's conscience troubles him
so that he doesn't dare sleep alone, but Happy Jack Squirrel says that
Blacky hasn't any conscience. You can believe just which you please,
though I suspect that neither of them really knows.

As I have said, Blacky is quite a traveler at this time of year, and
sometimes his search for food takes him to out-of-the-way places. One
day toward the very last of winter, the notion entered his black head
that he would have a look in a certain lonesome corner of the Green
Forest where once upon a time Redtail the Hawk had lived. Blacky knew
well enough that Redtail wasn't there now; he had gone south in the fell
and wouldn't be back until he was sure that Mistress Spring had arrived
on the Green Meadows and in the Green Forest.

Like the black imp he is, Blacky flew over the tree-tops, his sharp eyes
watching for something interesting below. Presently he saw ahead of him
the old nest of Red-tail. He knew all about that nest. He had visited
it before when Red-tail was away. Still it might be worth another visit.
You never can tell what you may find in old houses. Now, of course,
Blacky knew perfectly well that Redtail was miles and miles, hundreds
of miles away, and so there was nothing to fear from him. But Blacky
learned ever so long ago that there is nothing like making sure that
there is no danger. So, instead of flying straight to that old nest, he
first flew over the tree so that he could look down into it.

Right away he saw something that made him gasp and blink his eyes. It
was quite large and white, and it looked--it looked very much indeed
like an egg! Do you wonder that Blacky gasped and blinked? Here was snow
on the ground, and Rough Brother North Wind and Jack Frost had given no
hint that they were even thinking of going back to the Far North. The
idea of any one laying an egg at this time of year! Blacky flew over to
a tall pine-tree to think it over.

“Must be it was a little lump of snow,” thought he. “Yet if ever I saw
an egg, that looked like one. Jumping grasshoppers, how good an egg
would taste right now!” You know Blacky has a weakness for eggs. The
more he thought about it, the hungrier he grew. Several times he almost
made up his mind to fly straight over there and make sure, but he didn't
quite dare. If it were an egg, it must belong to somebody, and perhaps
it would be best to find out who. Suddenly Blacky shook himself. “I must
be dreaming,” said he. “There couldn't, there just couldn't be an egg at
this time of year, or in that old tumble-down nest! I'll just fly away
and forget it.”

So he flew away, but he couldn't forget it. He kept thinking of it all
day, and when he went to sleep that night he made up his mind to have
another look at that old nest.



CHAPTER II: Blacky Makes Sure

   “As true as ever I've cawed a caw
    That was a new-laid egg I saw.”

“What are you talking about?” demanded Sammy Jay, coming up just in time
to hear the last part of what Blacky the Crow was mumbling to himself.

“Oh nothing, Cousin, nothing at all,” replied Blacky. “I was just
talking foolishness to myself.” Sammy looked at him sharply. “You aren't
feeling sick, are you, Cousin Blacky?” he asked. “Must be something
the matter with you when you begin talking about new-laid eggs, when
everything's covered with snow and ice. Foolishness is no name for it.
Whoever heard of such a thing as a new-laid egg this time of year.”

“Nobody, I guess,” replied Blacky. “I told you I was just talking
foolishness. You see, I'm so hungry that I just got to thinking what I'd
have if I could have anything I wanted. That made me think of eggs, and
I tried to think just how I would feel if I should suddenly see a great
big egg right in front of me. I guess I must have said something about
it.”

“I guess you must have. It isn't egg time yet, and it won't be for a
long time. Take my advice and just forget about impossible things. I'm
going over to Farmer Brown's corncrib. Corn may not be as good as eggs,
but it is very good and very filling. Better come along,” said Sammy.

“Not this morning, thank you. Some other time, perhaps,” replied
Blacky.

He watched Sammy disappear through the trees. Then he flew to the top
of the tallest pine-tree to make sure that no one was about. When he was
quite sure that no one was watching him, he spread his wings and headed
for the most lonesome corner of the Green Forest.

“I'm foolish. I know I'm foolish,” he muttered. “But I've just got to
have another look in that old nest of Redtail the Hawk. I just can't get
it out of my head that that was an egg, a great, big, white egg, that I
saw there yesterday. It won't do any harm to have another look, anyway.”

Straight toward the tree in which was the great tumble-down nest of
Redtail the Hawk he flew, and as he drew near, he flew high, for Blacky
is too shrewd and smart to take any chances. Not that he thought that
there could be any danger there; but you never can tell, and it is
always the part of wisdom to be on the safe side. As he passed over the
top of the tree, he looked down eagerly. Just imagine how he felt when
instead of one, he saw two white things in the old nest--two white
things that looked for all the world like eggs! The day before there had
been but one; now there were two. That settled it in Blacky's mind; they
were eggs! They couldn't be anything else.

Blacky kept right on flying. Somehow he didn't dare stop just then. He
was too much excited by what he had discovered to think clearly. He had
got to have time to get his wits together. Whoever had laid those eggs
was big and strong. He felt sure of that. It must be some one a great
deal bigger than himself, and he was of no mind to get into trouble,
even for a dinner of fresh eggs. He must first find out whose they were;
then he would know better what to do. He felt sure that no one else knew
about them, and he knew that they couldn't run away. So he kept right on
flying until he reached a certain tall pine-tree where he could sit and
think without being disturbed.

“Eggs!” he muttered. “Real eggs! Now who under the sun can have moved
into Redtail's old house? And what can they mean by laying eggs before
Mistress Spring has even sent word that she has started? It's too much
for me. It certainly is too much for me.”



CHAPTER III: Blacky Finds Out Who Owns The Eggs

Two big white eggs in a tumbledown nest, and snow and ice everywhere!
Did ever anybody hear of such a thing before?

“Wouldn't believe it, if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes,” muttered
Blacky the Crow. “Have to believe them. If I can't believe them, it's of
no use to try to believe anything in this world. As sure as I sit here,
that old nest has two eggs in it. Whoever laid them must be crazy to
start housekeeping at this time of year. I must find out whose eggs they
are and then--”

Blacky didn't finish, but there was a hungry look in his eyes that would
have told any who saw it, had there been any to see it, that he had
a use for those eggs. But there was none to see it, and he took the
greatest care that there should be none to see him when he once again
started for a certain lonesome corner of the Green Forest.

“First I'll make sure that the eggs are still there,” thought he, and
flew high above the tree tops, so that as he passed over the tree in
which was the old nest of Red-tail the Hawk, he might look down into it.
To have seen him, you would never have guessed that he was looking for
anything in particular. He seemed to be just flying over on his way to
some distant place. If the eggs were still there, he meant to come back
and hide in the top of a near-by pine-tree to watch until he was sure
that he might safely steal those eggs, or to find out whose they were.

Blacky's heart beat fast with excitement as he drew near that old
tumble-down nest. Would those two big white eggs be there? Perhaps
there would be three! The very thought made him flap his wings a little
faster. A few more wing strokes and he would be right over the tree. How
he did hope to see those eggs! He could almost see into the nest now.
One stroke! Two strokes! Three strokes! Blacky bit his tongue to keep
from giving a sharp caw of disappointment and surprise.

There were no eggs to be seen. No, Sir, there wasn't a sign of eggs in
that old nest. There wasn't because--why, do you think? There wasn't
because Blacky looked straight down on a great mass of feathers which
quite covered them from sight, and he didn't have to look twice to know
that that great mass of feathers was really a great bird, the bird to
whom those eggs belonged.

Blacky didn't turn to come back as he had planned. He kept right on,
just as if he hadn't seen anything, and as he flew he shivered a little.
He shivered at the thought of what might have happened to him if he had
tried to steal those eggs the day before and had been caught doing it.

“I'm thankful I knew enough to leave them alone,” said he. “Funny I
never once guessed whose eggs they are. I might have known that no one
but Hooty the Horned Owl would think of nesting at this time of year.
And that was Mrs. Hooty I saw on the nest just now. My, but she's big!
She's bigger than Hooty himself! Yes, Sir, it's a lucky thing I didn't
try to get those eggs yesterday. Probably both Hooty and Mrs. Hooty were
sitting close by, only they were sitting so still that I thought they
were parts of the tree they were in. Blacky, Blacky, the sooner you
forget those eggs the better.”

Some things are best forgotten As soon as they are learned. Who never
plays with fire Will surely not get burned.



CHAPTER IV: The Cunning Of Blacky

Now when Blacky the Crow discovered that the eggs in the old tumble-down
nest of Redtail the Hawk in a lonesome corner of the Green Forest
belonged to Hooty the Owl, he straightway made the best of resolutions;
he would simply forget all about those eggs. He would forget that he
ever had seen them, and he would stay away from that corner of the Green
Forest. That was a very wise resolution. Of all the people who live in
the Green Forest, none is fiercer or more savage than Hooty the Owl,
unless it is Mrs. Hooty. She is bigger than Hooty and certainly quite as
much to be feared by the little people.

All this Blacky knows. No one knows it better. And Blacky is not one
to poke his head into trouble with his eyes open. So he very wisely
resolved to forget all about those eggs. Now it is one thing to make a
resolution and quite another thing to live up to it, as you all know.
It was easy enough to say that he would forget, but not at all easy
to forget. It would have been different if it had been spring or early
summer, when there were plenty of other eggs to be had by any one smart
enough to find them and steal them. But now, when it was still winter
(such an unheard-of time for any one to have eggs!), and it was hard
work to find enough to keep a hungry Crow's stomach filled, the thought
of those eggs would keep popping into his head. He just couldn't seem to
forget them. After a little, he didn't try.

Now Blacky the Crow is very, very cunning. He is one of the smartest
of all the little people who fly. No one can get into more mischief and
still keep out of trouble than can Blacky the Crow. That is because he
uses the wits in that black head of his. In fact, some people are unkind
enough to say that he spends all his spare time in planning mischief.
The more he thought of those eggs, the more he wanted them, and it
wasn't long before he began to try to plan some way to get them without
risking his own precious skin.

“I can't do it alone,” thought he, “and yet if I take any one into my
secret, I'll have to share those eggs. That won't do at all, because
I want them myself. I found them, and I ought to have them.” He quite
forgot or overlooked the fact that those eggs really belonged to Hooty
and Mrs. Hooty and to no one else. “Now let me see, what can I do?”

He thought and he thought and he thought and he thought, and little by
little a plan worked out in his little black head. Then he chuckled. He
chuckled right out loud, then hurriedly looked around to see if any one
had heard him. No one had, so he chuckled again. He cocked his head
on one side and half closed his eyes, as if that plan was something he
could see and he was looking at it very hard. Then he cocked his head on
the other side and did the same thing.

“It's all right,” said he at last. “It'll give my relatives a lot of
fun, and of course they will be very grateful to me for that. It won't
hurt Hooty or Mrs. Hooty a bit, but it will make them very angry. They
have very short tempers, and people with short tempers usually forget
everything else when they are angry. We'll pay them a visit while the
sun is bright, because then perhaps they cannot see well enough to catch
us, and we'll tease them until they lose their tempers and forget all
about keeping guard over those eggs. Then I'll slip in and get one and
perhaps both of them. Without knowing that they are doing anything of
the kind, my friends and relatives will help me to get a good meal. My,
how good those eggs will taste!”

It was a very clever and cunning plan, for Blacky is a very clever and
cunning rascal, but of course it didn't deserve success because nothing
that means needless worry and trouble for others deserves to succeed.



CHAPTER V: Blacky Calls His Friends

When Blacky cries “Caw, caw, caw, caw!” As if he'd dislocate his jaw,
His relatives all hasten where He waits them with a crafty air. They
know that there is mischief afoot, and the Crow family is always ready
for mischief. So on this particular morning when they heard Blacky
cawing at the top of his lungs from the tallest pine-tree in the Green
Forest, they hastened over there as fast as they could fly, calling to
each other excitedly and sure that they were going to have a good time
of some kind.

Blacky chuckled as he saw them coming. “Come on! Come on! Caw, caw, caw!
Hurry up and flap your wings faster. I know where Hooty the Owl is, and
we'll have no end of fun with him,” he cried.

“Caw, caw, caw, caw, caw, caw!” shouted all his relatives in great glee.
“Where is he? Lead us to him. We'll drive him out of the Green Forest!”

So Blacky led the way over to the most lonesome corner of the Green
Forest, straight to the tree in which Hooty the Owl was comfortably
sleeping. Blacky had taken pains to slip over early that morning and
make sure just where he was. He had discovered Hooty fast asleep, and
he knew that he would remain right where he was until dark. You know
Hooty's eyes are not meant for much use in bright light, and the
brighter the light, the more uncomfortable his eyes feel. Blacky knows
this, too, and he had chosen the very brightest part of the morning to
call his relatives over to torment poor Hooty. Jolly, round, bright Mr.
Sun was shining his very brightest, and the white snow on the ground
made it seem brighter still. Even Blacky had to blink, and he knew that
poor Hooty would find it harder still.

But one thing Blacky was very careful not to even hint of, and that was
that Mrs. Hooty was right close at hand. Mrs. Hooty is bigger and even
more fierce than Hooty, and Blacky didn't want to frighten any of the
more timid of his relatives. What he hoped down deep in his crafty heart
was that when they got to teasing and tormenting Hooty and making the
great racket which he knew they would, Mrs. Hooty would lose her temper
and fly over to join Hooty in trying to drive away the black tormentors.
Then Blacky would slip over to the nest which she had left unguarded and
steal one and perhaps both of the eggs he knew were there.

When they reached the tree where Hooty was, he was blinking his great
yellow eyes and had fluffed out all his feathers, which is a way he has
when he is angry, to make himself look twice as big as he really is. Of
course, he had heard the noisy crew coming, and he knew well enough what
to expect. As soon as they saw him, they began to scream as loud as
ever they could and to call him all manner of names. The boldest of them
would dart at him as if to pull out a mouthful of feathers, but took
the greatest care not to get too near. You see, the way Hooty hissed and
snapped his great bill was very threatening, and they knew that if once
he got hold of one of them with those big cruel claws of his, that would
be the end.

So they were content to simply scold and scream at him and fly around
him, just out of reach, and make him generally uncomfortable, and they
were so busy doing this that no one noticed that Blacky was not joining
in the fun, and no one paid any attention to the old tumble-down nest
of Redtail the Hawk only a few trees distant. So far Blacky's plans were
working out just as he had hoped.



CHAPTER VI: Hooty The Owl Doesn't Stay Still

   Now what's the good of being smart
   When others do not do their part?

If Blacky the Crow didn't say this to himself, he thought it. He knew
that he had made a very cunning plan to get the eggs of Hooty the Owl,
a plan so shrewd and cunning that no one else in the Green Forest or on
the Green Meadows would have thought of it. There was only one weakness
in it, and that was that it depended for success on having Hooty the
Owl do as he usually did when tormented by a crowd of noisy Crows,--stay
where he was until they got tired and flew away.

Now Blacky sometimes makes a mistake that smart people are very apt to
make; he thinks that because he is so smart, other people are stupid.
That is where he proves that smart as he is, he isn't as smart as he
thinks he is. He always thought of Hooty the Owl as stupid. That is, he
always thought of him that way in daytime. At night, when he was waked
out of a sound sleep by the fierce hunting cry of Hooty, he wasn't so
sure about Hooty being stupid, and he always took care to sit perfectly
still in the darkness, lest Hooty's great ears should hear him and
Hooty's great eyes, made for seeing in the dark, should find him. No,
in the night Blacky was not at all sure that Hooty was stupid.

But in the daytime he was sure. You see, he quite forgot the fact that
the brightness of day is to Hooty what the blackness of night is to him.
So, because Hooty would simply sit still and hiss and snap his bill,
instead of trying to catch his tormentors or flying away, Blacky called
him stupid. He felt sure that Hooty would stay right where he was now,
and he hoped that Mrs. Hooty would lose her temper and leave the nest
where she was sitting on those two eggs and join Hooty to help him try
to drive away that noisy crew.

But Hooty isn't stupid. Not a bit of it. The minute he found out that
Blacky and his friends had discovered him, he thought of Mrs. Hooty and
the two precious eggs in the old nest of Redtail the Hawk close by.

“Mrs. Hooty mustn't be disturbed,” thought he. “That will never do at
all. I must lead these black rascals away where they won't discover Mrs.
Hooty. I certainly must.”

So he spread his broad wings and blundered away among the trees a little
way. He didn't fly far because the instant he started to fly that whole
noisy crew with the exception of Blacky were after him. Because he
couldn't use his claws or bill while flying, they grew bold enough to
pull a few feathers out of his back. So he flew only a little way to a
thick hemlock-tree, where it wasn't easy for the Crows to get at him,
and where the light didn't hurt his eyes so much. There he rested a few
minutes and then did the same thing over again. He meant to lead
those bothersome Crows into the darkest part of the Green Forest and
there--well, he could see better there, and it might be that one of them
would be careless enough to come within reach. No, Hooty wasn't stupid.
Certainly not.

Blacky awoke to that fact as he sat in the top of a tall pine-tree
silently watching. He could see Mrs. Hooty on the nest, and as the noise
of Hooty's tormentors sounded from farther and farther away, she settled
herself more comfortably and closed her eyes. Blacky could imagine that
she was smiling to herself. It was clear that she had no intention of
going to help Hooty. His splendid plan had failed just because stupid
Hooty, who wasn't stupid at all, had flown away when he ought to have
sat still. It was very provoking.



CHAPTER VII: Blacky Tries Another Plan

   When one plan fails, just try another;
   Declare you'll win some way or other.

People who succeed are those who do not give up because they fail the
first time they try. They are the ones who, as soon as one plan fails,
get busy right away and think of another plan and try that. If the thing
they are trying to do is a good thing, sooner or later they succeed. If
they are trying to do a wrong thing, very likely all their plans fail,
as they should.

Now Blacky the Crow knows all about the value of trying and trying. He
isn't easily discouraged. Sometimes it is a pity that he isn't, because
he plans so much mischief. But the fact remains that he isn't, and he
tries and tries until he cannot think of another plan and just has to
give up. When he invited all his relatives to join him in tormenting
Hooty the Owl, he thought he had a plan that just couldn't fail. He felt
sure that Mrs. Hooty would leave her nest and help Hooty try to drive
away his tormentors. But Mrs. Hooty didn't do anything of the kind,
because Hooty was smart enough and thoughtful enough to lead his
tormentors away from the nest into the darkest part of the Green Forest
where their noise wouldn't bother Mrs. Hooty. So she just settled
herself more comfortably than ever on those eggs which Blacky had hoped
she would give him a chance to steal, and his fine plan was quite upset.

Not one of his relatives had noticed that nest. They had been too busy
teasing Hooty. This was just as Blacky had hoped. He didn't want them to
know about that nest because he was selfish and wanted to get those eggs
just for himself alone. But now he knew that the only way he could get
Mrs. Hooty off of them would be by teasing her so that she would lose
her temper and try to catch some of her tormentors. If she did that,
there would be a chance that he might slip in and get at least one of
those eggs.

He would try it.

For a few minutes he listened to the noise of his relatives growing
fainter and fainter, as Hooty led them farther and farther into the
Green Forest. Then he opened his mouth.

“Caw, caw, caw, caw!” he screamed. “Caw, caw, caw, caw! Come back,
everybody! Here is Mrs. Hooty on her nest! Caw, caw, caw, caw!”

Now as soon as they heard that, all Blacky's relatives stopped chasing
and tormenting Hooty and started back as fast as they could fly. They
didn't like the dark part of the Green Forest into which Hooty was
leading them. Besides, they wanted to see that nest. So back they came,
cawing at the top of their lungs, for they were very much excited. Some
of them never had seen a nest of Hooty's. And anyway, it would be just
as much fun to tease Mrs. Hooty as it was to tease Hooty.

“Where is the nest?” they screamed, as they came back to where Blacky
was cawing and pretending to be very much excited.

“Why,” exclaimed one, “that is the old nest of Redtail the Hawk. I know
all about that nest.” And he looked at Blacky as if he thought Blacky
was playing a joke on them.

“It was Redtail's, but it is Hooty's now. If you don't believe me, just
look in it,” retorted Blacky.

At once they all began to fly over the top of the tree where they could
look down into the nest and there, sure enough, was Mrs. Hooty, her
great, round, yellow eyes glaring up at them angrily. Such a racket!
Right away Hooty was forgotten, and the whole crowd at once began to
torment Mrs. Hooty. Only Blacky sat watchful and silent, waiting for
Mrs. Hooty to lose her temper and try to catch one of her tormentors. He
had hope, a great hope, that he would get one of those eggs.



CHAPTER VIII: Hooty Comes To Mrs. Hooty's Aid

No one can live just for self alone. A lot of people think they can,
but they are very much mistaken. They are making one of the greatest
mistakes in the world. Every teeny, weeny act, no matter what it is,
affects somebody else. That is one of Old Mother Nature's great laws.
And it is just as true among the little people of the Green Forest and
the Green Meadows as with boys and girls and grown people. It is Old
Mother Nature's way of making each of us responsible for the good of all
and of teaching us that always we should help each other.

As you know, when Blacky the Crow called all his relatives over to the
nest where Mrs. Hooty was sitting on her eggs, they at once stopped
tormenting Hooty and left him alone in a thick hemlock-tree in the
darkest part of the Green Forest. Of course Hooty was very, very glad
to be left in peace, and he might have spent the rest of the day there
sleeping in comfort. But he didn't. No, Sir, he didn't. At first he gave
a great sigh of relief and settled himself as if he meant to stay. He
listened to the voices of those noisy Crows growing fainter and fainter
and was glad. But it was only for a few minutes.

Presently those voices stopped growing fainter. They grew more
excited-sounding than ever, and they came right from one place. Hooty
knew then that his tormentors had found the nest where Mrs. Hooty was,
and that they were tormenting her just as they had tormented him. He
snapped his bill angrily and then more angrily.

“I guess Mrs. Hooty is quite able to take care of herself,” he
grumbled, “but she ought not to be disturbed while she is sitting on
those eggs. I hate to go back there in that bright sunshine. It hurts my
eyes, and I don't like it, but I guess I'll have to go back there. Mrs.
Hooty needs my help. I'd rather stay here, but--”

He didn't finish. Instead, he spread his broad wings and flew back
towards the nest and Mrs. Hooty. His great wings made no noise, for they
are made so that he can fly without making a sound. “If I once get hold
of one of those Crows!” he muttered to himself. “If I once get hold of
one of those Crows, I'll--” He didn't say what he would do, but if
you had been near enough to hear the snap of his bill, you could have
guessed the rest.

All this time the Crows were having what they called fun with Mrs.
Hooty. Nothing is true fun which makes others uncomfortable, but somehow
a great many people seem to forget this. So, while Blacky sat watching,
his relatives made a tremendous racket around Mrs. Hooty, and the more
angry she grew, the more they screamed and called her names and darted
down almost in her face, as they pretended that they were going to fight
her. They were so busy doing this, and Blacky was so busy watching them,
hoping that Mrs. Hooty would leave her nest and give him a chance to
steal the eggs he knew were under her, that no one gave Hooty a thought.

All of a sudden he was there, right in the tree close to the nest! No
one had heard a sound, but there he was, and in the claws of one foot he
held the tail feathers of one of Blacky's relatives. It was lucky, very
lucky indeed for that one that the sun was in Hooty's eyes and so he had
missed his aim. Otherwise there would have been one less Crow.

Now it is one thing to tease one lone Owl and quite another to tease two
together. Besides, there were those black tail feathers floating down
to the snow-covered ground. Quite suddenly those Crows decided that they
had had fun enough for one day, and in spite of all Blacky could do
to stop them, away they flew, cawing loudly and talking it all over
noisily. Blacky was the last to go, and his heart was sorrowful. However
could he get those eggs?



CHAPTER IX: Blacky Thinks Of Farmer Brown's Boy

“Such luck!” grumbled Blacky, as he flew over to his favorite tree to do
a little thinking. “Such luck! Now all my neighbors know about the nest
of Hooty the Owl, and sooner or later one of them will find out that
there are eggs in it. There is one thing about it, though, and that
is that if I can't get them, nobody can. That is to say, none of my
relatives can. I've tried every way I can think of, and those eggs are
still there. My, my, my, how I would like one of them right now!”

Then Blacky the Crow did a thing which disappointed scamps often
do,--began to blame the ones he was trying to wrong because his plans
had failed. To have heard him talking to himself, you would have
supposed that those eggs really belonged to him and that Hooty and Mrs.
Hooty had cheated him out of them. Yes, Sir, that is what you would have
thought if you could have heard him muttering to himself there in the
tree-top. In his disappointment over not getting those eggs, he was
so sorry for himself that he actually did feel that he was the one
wronged,--that Hooty and Mrs. Hooty should have let him have those eggs.

Of course, that was absolute foolishness, but he made himself believe
it just the same. At least, he pretended to believe it. And the more he
pretended, the angrier he grew. This is often the way with people who
try to wrong others. They grow angry with the ones they have tried to
wrong. When at last Blacky had to confess to himself that he could think
of no other way to get those eggs, he began to wonder if there was some
way to make trouble for Hooty and Mrs. Hooty. It was right then that he
thought of Farmer Brown's boy. Blacky's eyes snapped. He remembered how,
once upon a time, Farmer Brown's boy had delighted to rob nests. Blacky
had seen him take the eggs from the nests of Blacky's own relatives and
from many other feathered people. What he did with the eggs, Blacky had
no idea. Just now he didn't care. If Farmer Brown's boy would just
happen to find Hooty's nest, he would be sure to take those eggs, and
then he, Blacky, would feel better. He would feel that he was even with
Hooty.

Right away he began to try to think of some way to bring Farmer Brown's
boy over to the lonesome corner of the Green Forest where Hooty's nest
was. If he could once get him there, he felt sure that Farmer Brown's
boy would see the nest and climb up to it, and then of course he would
take the eggs. If he couldn't have those eggs himself, the next best
thing would be to see some one else get them.

Dear me, dear me, such dreadful thoughts! I am afraid that Blacky's
heart was as black as his coat. And the worst of it was, he seemed to
get a lot of pleasure in his wicked plans. Now right down in his heart
he knew that they were wicked plans, but he tried to make excuses to
himself.

“Hooty the Owl is a robber,” said he. “Everybody is afraid of him.
He lives on other people, and so far as I know he does no good in the
world. He is big and fierce, and no one loves him. The Green Forest
would be better off without him. If those eggs hatch, there will be
little Owls to be fed, and they will grow up into big fierce Owls, like
their father and mother. So if I show Farmer Brown's boy that nest and
he takes those eggs, I will be doing a kindness to my neighbors.”

So Blacky talked to himself and tried to hush the still, small voice
down inside that tried to tell him that what he was planning to do was
really a dreadful thing. And all the time he watched for Farmer Brown's
boy.



CHAPTER X: Farmer Brown's Boy And Hooty

Farmer Brown's boy had taken it into his head to visit the Green Forest.
It was partly because he hadn't anything else to do, and it was partly
because now that it was very near the end of winter he wanted to see how
things were there and if there were any signs of the coming of spring.
Blacky the Crow saw him coming, and Blacky chuckled to himself. He had
watched every day for a week for just this thing. Now he would tell
Farmer Brown's boy about that nest of Hooty the Owl.

He flew over to the lonesome corner of the Green Forest where Hooty and
Mrs. Hooty had made their home and at once began to caw at the top of
his voice and pretend that he was terribly excited over something.

“Caw, caw, caw, caw, caw!” shouted Blacky. At once all his relatives
within hearing hurried over to join him. They knew that he was
tormenting Hooty, and they wanted to join in the fun. It wasn't long
before there was a great racket going on over in that lonesome corner of
the Green Forest.

Of course Farmer Brown's boy heard it. He stopped and listened. “Now
I wonder what Blacky and his friends have found this time,” said he.
“Whenever they make a fuss like that, there is usually something to see
there. I believe I'll so over and have a look.”

So he turned in the direction of the lonesome corner of the Green
Forest, and as he drew near, he moved very carefully, so as to see all
that he could without frightening the Crows. He knew that as soon as
they saw him, they would fly away, and that might alarm the one they
were tormenting, for he knew enough of Crow ways to know that when they
were making such a noise as they were now making, they were plaguing
some one.

Blacky was the first to see him because he was watching for him. But
he didn't say anything until Farmer Brown's boy was so near that he
couldn't help but see that nest and Hooty himself, sitting up very
straight and snapping his bill angrily at his tormentors. Then Blacky
gave the alarm, and at once all the Crows rose in the air and headed for
the Green Meadows, cawing at the top of their lungs. Blacky went with
them a little way. The first chance he got he dropped out of the flock
and silently flew back to a place where he could see all that might
happen at the nest of Hooty the Owl.

When Farmer Brown's boy first caught sight of the nest and saw the Crows
darting down toward it and acting so excited, he was puzzled.

“That's an old nest of Red-tail the Hawk,” thought he. “I found that
last spring. Now what can there be there to excite those Crows so?”

Then he caught sight of Hooty the Owl. “Ha, so that's it!” he exclaimed.
“Those scamps have discovered Hooty and have been having no end of fun
tormenting him. I wonder what he's doing there.”

He no longer tried to keep out of sight, but walked right up to the
foot of the tree, all the time looking up. Hooty saw him, but instead of
flying away, he snapped his bill just as he had at the Crows and hissed.

“That's funny,” thought Farmer Brown's boy. “If I didn't know that
to be the old nest of Redtail the Hawk, and if it weren't still the
tail-end of winter, I would think that was Hooty's nest.”

He walked in a circle around the tree, looking up. Suddenly he gave a
little start. Was that a tail sticking over the edge of the nest? He
found a stick and threw it up. It struck the bottom of the nest, and out
flew a great bird. It was Mrs. Hooty! Blacky the Crow chuckled.



CHAPTER XI: Farmer Brown's Boy Is Tempted

   When you're tempted to do wrong
   Is the time to prove you're strong.
   Shut your eyes and clench each fist;
   It will help you to resist.

When a bird is found sitting on a nest, it is a pretty sure sign that
that nest holds something worth while. It is a sign that that bird has
set up housekeeping. So when Farmer Brown's boy discovered Mrs. Hooty
sitting so close on the old nest of Redtail the Hawk, in the most
lonesome corner of the Green Forest, he knew what it meant. Perhaps I
should say that he knew what it ought to mean.

It ought to mean that there were eggs in that nest.

But it was hard for Farmer Brown's boy to believe that. Why, spring
had not come yet! There was still snow, and the Smiling Pool was still
covered with ice. Who ever heard of birds nesting at this time of year?
Certainly not Farmer Brown's boy. And yet Hooty the Owl and Mrs. Hooty
were acting for all the world as feathered folks do act when they have
eggs and are afraid that something is going to happen to them. It was
very puzzling.

“That nest was built by Red-tail the Hawk, and it hasn't even been
repaired,” muttered Farmer Brown's boy, as he stared up at it. “If
Hooty and his wife have taken it for their home, they are mighty poor
housekeepers. And if Mrs. Hooty has laid eggs this time of year, she
must be crazy. I suppose the way to find out is to climb up there. It
seems foolish, but I'm going to do it. Those Owls certainly act as if
they are mighty anxious about something, and I'm going to find out what
it is.”

He looked at Hooty and Mrs. Hooty, at their hooked bills and great
claws, and decided that he would take a stout stick along with him. He
had no desire to feel these great claws. When he had found a stick to
suit him, he began to climb the tree. Hooty and Mrs. Hooty snapped their
bills and hissed fiercely. They drew nearer. Farmer Brown's boy kept a
watchful eye on them. They looked so big and fierce that he was almost
tempted to give up and leave them in peace. But he just had to find out
if there was anything in that nest, so he kept on. As he drew near it,
Mrs. Hooty swooped very near to him, and the snap of her bill made an
ugly sound. He held his stick ready to strike and kept on.

The nest was simply a great platform of sticks. When Farmer Brown's boy
reached it, he found that he could not get where he could look into it,
so he reached over and felt inside. Almost at once his fingers touched
something that made him tingle all over. It was an egg, a great big egg!
There was no doubt about it. It was just as hard for him to believe
as it had been for Blacky the Crow to believe, when he first saw those
eggs. Farmer Brown's boy's fingers closed over that egg and took it
out of the nest. Mrs. Hooty swooped very close, and Farmer Brown's boy
nearly dropped the egg as he struck at her with his stick. Then Mrs.
Hooty and Hooty seemed to lose courage and withdrew to a tree near by,
where they snapped their bills and hissed.

Then Farmer Brown's boy looked at the prize in his hand. It was a big,
dirty-white egg. His eyes shone. What a splendid prize to add to his
collection of birds' eggs! It was the first egg of the Great Horned Owl,
the largest of all Owls, that he ever had seen.

Once more he felt in the nest and found there was another egg there.
“I'll take both of them,” said he. “It's the first nest of Hooty's that
I've ever found, and perhaps I'll never find another. Gee, I'm glad
I came over here to find out what those Crows were making such a fuss
about. I wonder if I can get these down without breaking them.”

Just at that very minute he remembered something. He remembered that he
had stopped collecting eggs. He remembered that he had resolved never to
take another bird's egg.

“But this is different,” whispered the tempter. “This isn't like taking
the eggs of the little song birds.”



CHAPTER XII: A Tree-Top Battle

   As black is black and white is white,
   So wrong is wrong and right is right.

There isn't any half way about it. A thing is wrong or it is right, and
that is all there is to it. But most people have hard work to see this
when they want very much to do a thing that the still small voice
way down inside tells them isn't right. They try to compromise. To
compromise is to do neither one thing nor the other but a little of
both. But you can't do that with right and wrong. It is a queer thing,
but a half right never is as good as a whole right, while a half wrong
often, very often, is as bad as a whole wrong.

Farmer Brown's boy, up in the tree by the nest of Hooty the Owl in
the lonesome corner of the Green Forest, was fighting a battle. No, he
wasn't fighting with Hooty or Mrs. Hooty. He was fighting a battle right
inside himself. It was a battle between right and wrong. Once upon a
time he had taken great delight in collecting the eggs of birds, in
trying to see how many kinds he could get. Then as he had come to know
the little forest and meadow people better, he had seen that taking the
eggs of birds is very, very wrong, and he had stopped stealing them. He
bad declared that never again would he steal an egg from a bird.

But never before had he found a nest of Hooty the Owl. Those two big
eggs would add ever so much to his collection. “Take 'em,” said a
little voice inside. “Hooty is a robber. You will be doing a kindness to
the other birds by taking them.”

“Don't do it,” said another little voice. “Hooty may be a robber, but
he has a place in the Green Forest, or Old Mother Nature never would
have put him here. It is just as much stealing to take his eggs as to
take the eggs of any other bird. He has just as much right to them as
Jenny Wren has to hers.”

“Take one and leave one,” said the first voice.

“That will be just as much stealing as if you took both,” said the
second voice. “Besides, you will be breaking your own word. You said
that you never would take another egg.”

“I didn't promise anybody but myself,” declared Farmer Brown's boy
right out loud. At the sound of his voice, Hooty and Mrs. Hooty, sitting
in the next tree, snapped their bills and hissed louder than ever.

“A promise to yourself ought to be just as good as a promise to any one
else. I don't wonder Hooty hisses at you,” said the good little voice.

“Think how fine those eggs will look in your collection and how proud
you will be to show them to the other fellows who never have found a
nest of Hooty's,” said the first little voice.

“And think how mean and small and cheap you'll feel every time you look
at them,” added the good little voice. “You'll get a lot more fun if
you leave them to hatch out and then watch the little Owls grow up and
learn all about their ways. Just think what a stout, brave fellow Hooty
is to start housekeeping at this time of year, and how wonderful it is
that Mrs. Hooty can keep these eggs warm and when they have hatched
take care of the baby Owls before others have even begun to build their
nests. Besides, wrong is wrong and right is right, always.”

Slowly Farmer Brown's boy reached over the edge of the nest and put
back the egg. Then he began to climb down the tree. When he reached the
ground he went off a little way and watched. Almost at once Mrs. Hooty
flew to the nest and settled down on the eggs, while Hooty mounted guard
close by.

“I'm glad I didn't take 'em,” said Farmer Brown's boy. “Yes, Sir, I'm
glad I didn't take 'em.”

As he turned back toward home, he saw Blacky the Crow flying over the
Green Forest, and little did he guess how he had upset Blacky's plans.



CHAPTER XIII: Blacky Has A Change Of Heart

Blacky The Crow isn't all black. No, indeed. His coat is black, and
sometimes it seems as if his heart is all black, but this isn't so. It
certainly seemed as if his heart was all black when he tried so hard to
make trouble for Hooty the Owl. It would seem as if only a black heart
could have urged him to try so hard to steal the eggs of Hooty and Mrs.
Hooty, but this wasn't really so. You see, it didn't seem at all wrong
to try to get those eggs. Blacky was hungry, and those eggs would have
given him a good meal. He knew that Hooty wouldn't hesitate to catch
him and eat him if he had the chance, and so it seemed to him perfectly
right and fair to steal Hooty's eggs if he was smart enough to do so.
And most of the other little people of the Green Forest and the Green
Meadows would have felt the same way about it. You see, it is one of
the laws of Old Mother Nature that each one must learn to look out for
himself.

But when Blacky showed that nest of Hooty's to Farmer Brown's boy with
the hope that Farmer Brown's boy would steal those eggs, there was
blackness in his heart. He was doing something then which was pure
meanness. He was just trying to make trouble for Hooty, to get even
because Hooty had been too smart for him. He had sat in the top of a
tall pine-tree where he could see all that happened, and he had chuckled
wickedly as he had seen Farmer Brown's boy climb to Hooty's nest and
take out an egg. He felt sure that he would take both eggs. He hoped so,
anyway.

When he saw Farmer Brown's boy put the eggs back and climb down the tree
without any, he had to blink his eyes to make sure that he saw straight.
He just couldn't believe what he saw. At first he was dreadfully
disappointed and angry. It looked very much as if he weren't going to
get even with Hooty after all. He flew over to his favorite tree to
think things over. Now sometimes it is a good thing to sit by oneself
and think things over. It gives the little small voice deep down inside
a chance to be heard. It was just that way with Blacky now.

The longer he thought, the meaner his action in calling Farmer Brown's
boy looked. It was one thing to try to steal those eggs himself, but it
was quite another matter to try to have them stolen by some one against
whom Hooty had no protection whatever.

“If it had been any one but Hooty, you would have done your best to have
kept Farmer Brown's boy away,” said the little voice inside. Blacky
hung his head. He knew that it was true. More than once, in fact many
times, he had warned other feathered folks when Farmer Brown's boy had
been hunting for their nests, and had helped to lead him away.

At last Blacky threw up his head and chuckled, and this time his chuckle
was good to hear. “I'm glad that Farmer Brown's boy didn't take those
eggs,” said he right out loud. “Yes, sir, I'm glad. I'll never do such
a thing as that again. I'm ashamed of what I did; yet I'm glad I did
it. I'm glad because I've learned some things. I've learned that Farmer
Brown's boy isn't as much to be feared as he used to be. I've learned
that Hooty isn't as stupid as I thought he was. I've learned that while
it may be all right for us people of the Green Forest to try to outwit
each other we ought to protect each other against common dangers. And
I've learned something I didn't know before, and that is that Hooty the
Owl is the very first of us to set up housekeeping. Now I think I'll go
hunt for an honest meal.” And he did.



CHAPTER XIV: Blacky Makes A Call

  Judge no one by his style of dress;
  Your ignorance you thus confess.
   --Blacky the Crow.

“Caw, caw, caw, caw.” There was no need of looking to see who that was.
Peter Rabbit knew without looking. Mrs. Quack knew without looking. Just
the same, both looked up. Just alighting in the top of a tall tree was
Blacky the Crow. “Caw, caw, caw, caw,” he repeated, looking down at
Peter and Mrs. Quack and Mr. Quack and the six young Quacks. “I hope I
am not interrupting any secret gossip.”

“Not at all,” Peter hastened to say. “Mrs. Quack was just telling me
of the troubles and clangers in bringing up a young family in the Far
North. How did you know the Quacks had arrived?”

Blacky chuckled hoarsely. “I didn't,” said he. “I simply thought there
might be something going on I didn't know about over here in the pond
of Paddy the Beaver, so I came over to find out. Mr. Quack, you and Mrs.
Quack are looking very fine this fall. And those handsome young Quacks,
you don't mean to tell me that they are your children!”

Mrs. Quack nodded proudly. “They are,” said she.

“You don't say so!” exclaimed Blacky, as if he were very much surprised,
when all the time he wasn't surprised at all. “They are a credit to
their parents. Yes, indeed, they are a credit to their parents. Never
have I seen finer young Ducks in all my life. How glad the hunters with
terrible guns will be to see them.”

Mrs. Quack shivered at that, and Blacky saw it. He chuckled softly. You
know he dearly loves to make others uncomfortable. “I saw three hunters
over on the edge of the Big River early this very morning,” said he.

Mrs. Quack looked more anxious than ever. Blacky's sharp eyes noted
this.

“That is why I came over here,” he added kindly. “I wanted to give you
warning.”

“But you didn't know the Quacks were here!” spoke up Peter.

“True enough, Peter. True enough,” replied Blacky, his eyes twinkling.
“But I thought they might be. I had heard a rumor that those who go
south are traveling earlier than usual this fall, so I knew I might find
Mr. and Mrs. Quack over here any time now. Is it true, Mrs. Quack, that
we are going to have a long, hard, cold winter?”

“That is what they say up in the Far North,” replied Mrs. Quack. “And it
is true that Jack Frost had started down earlier than usual. That is
how it happens we are here now. But about those hunters over by the Big
River, do you suppose they will come over here?” There was an anxious
note in Mrs. Quack's voice.

“No,” replied Blacky promptly. “Farmer Brown's boy won't let them. I
know. I've been watching him and he has been watching those hunters. As
long as you stay here, you will be safe. What a great world this would
be if all those two-legged creatures were like Farmer Brown's boy.”

“Wouldn't it!” cried Peter. Then he added, “I wish they were.”

“You don't wish it half as much as I do,” declared Mrs. Quack.

“Yet I can remember when he used to hunt with a terrible gun and was as
bad as the worst of them,” said Blacky.

“What changed him?” asked Mrs. Quack, looking interested.

“Just getting really acquainted with some of the little people of the
Green Forest and the Green Meadows,” replied Blacky. “He found them
ready to meet him more than halfway in friendship and that some of them
really are his best friends.”

“And now he is their best friend,” spoke up Peter.

Blacky nodded. “Right, Peter,” said he. “That is why the Quacks are safe
here and will be as long as they stay.”



CHAPTER XV: Blacky Does A Little Looking About

   Do not take the word of others
   That things are or are not so
   When there is a chance that you may
   Find out for yourself and know.
    --Blacky the Crow.

Blacky the Crow is a shrewd fellow. He is one of the smartest and
shrewdest of all the little people in the Green Forest and on the Green
Meadows. Everybody knows it. And because of this, all his neighbors have
a great deal of respect for him, despite his mischievous ways.

Of course, Blacky had noticed that Johnny Chuck had dug his house deeper
than usual and had stuffed himself until he was fatter than ever before.
He had noticed that Jerry Muskrat was making the walls of his house
thicker than in other years, and that Paddy the Beaver was doing the
same thing to his house. You know there is very little that escapes the
sharp eyes of Blacky the Crow.

He had guessed what these things meant. “They think we are going to have
a long, hard, cold winter,” muttered Blacky to himself. “Perhaps they
know, but I want to see some signs of it for myself. They may be only
guessing. Anybody can do that, and one guess is as good as another.”

Then he found Mr. and Mrs. Quack, the Mallard Ducks, and their children
in the pond of Paddy the Beaver and remembered that they never had come
down from their home in the Far North as early in the fall as this. Mrs.
Quack explained that Jack Frost had already started south, and so they
had started earlier to keep well ahead of him.

“Looks as if there may be something in this idea of a long, hard, cold
winter,” thought Blacky, “but perhaps the Quacks are only guessing,
too. I wouldn't take their word for it any more than I would the word
of Johnny Chuck or Jerry Muskrat or Paddy the Beaver. I'll look about a
little.”

So after warning the Quacks to remain in the pond of Paddy the Beaver
if they would be safe, Blacky bade them good-by and flew away. He headed
straight for the Green Meadows and Farmer Brown's cornfield. A little of
that yellow corn would make a good breakfast.

When he reached the cornfield, Blacky perched on top of a shock of corn,
for it already had been cut and put in shocks in readiness to be carted
up to Farmer Brown's barn. For a few minutes he sat there silent and
motionless, but all the time his sharp eyes were making sure that no
enemy was hiding behind one of those brown shocks. When he was quite
certain that things were as safe as they seemed, he picked out a plump
ear of corn and began to tear open the husks, so as to get at the yellow
grains.

“Seems to me these husks are unusually thick,” muttered Blacky, as he
tore at them with his stout bill. “Don't remember ever having seen them
as thick as these. Wonder if it just happens to be so on this ear.”

Then, as a sudden thought popped into his black head, he left that ear
and went to another. The husks of this were as thick as those on the
first. He flew to another shock and found the husks there just the same.
He tried a third shock with the same result.

“Huh, they are all alike,” said he. Then he looked thoughtful and for a
few minutes sat perfectly still like a black statue. “They are right,”
 said he at last. “Yes, Sir, they are right.” Of course he meant Johnny
Chuck and Jerry Muskrat and Paddy the Beaver and the Quacks. “I don't
know how they know it, but they are right; we are going to have a long,
hard, cold winter. I know it myself now. I've found a sign. Old Mother
Nature has wrapped this corn in extra thick husks, and of course she has
done it to protect it. She doesn't do things without a reason. We are
going to have a cold winter, or my name isn't Blacky the Crow.”



CHAPTER XVI: Blacky Finds Other Signs

   A single fact may fail to prove you either right or wrong;
   Confirm it with another and your proof will then be strong.
   --Blacky the Crow.

After his discovery that Old Mother Nature had wrapped all the ears
of corn in extra thick husks, Blacky had no doubt in his own mind that
Johnny Chuck and Jerry Muskrat and Paddy the Beaver and the Quacks were
quite right in feeling that the coming winter would be long, hard and
cold. But Blacky long ago learned that it isn't wise or wholly safe to
depend altogether on one thing.

“Old Mother Nature never does things by halves,” thought Blacky, as he
sat on the fence post on the Green Meadows, thinking over his discovery
of the thick husks on the corn. “She wouldn't take care to protect the
corn that way and not do as much for other things. There must be other
signs, if I am smart enough to find them.”

He lifted one black wing and began to set in order the feathers beneath
it. Suddenly he made a funny little hop straight up.

“Well, I never!” he exclaimed, as he spread his wings to regain his
balance. “I never did!”

“Is that so?” piped a squeaky little voice. “If you say you never did, I
suppose you never did, though I want the word of some one else before I
will believe it. What is it you never did?”

Blacky looked down. Peeping up at him from the brown grass were two
bright little eyes.

“Hello, Danny Meadow Mouse!” exclaimed Blacky. “I haven't seen you for a
long time. I've looked for you several times lately.”

“I don't doubt it. I don't doubt it at all,” squeaked Danny. “You'll
never see me when you are looking for me. That is, you won't if I can
help it. You won't if I see you first.”

Blacky chuckled. He knew what Danny meant. When Blacky goes looking
for Danny Meadow Mouse, it usually is in hope of having a Meadow Mouse
dinner, and he knew that Danny knew this. “I've had my breakfast,” said
Blacky, “and it isn't dinner time yet.”

“What is it you never did?” persisted Danny, in his squeaky voice.

“That was just an exclamation,” explained Blacky. “I made a discovery
that surprised me so I exclaimed right out.”

“What was it?” demanded Danny.

“It was that the feathers of my coat are coming in thicker than I ever
knew them to before. I hadn't noticed it until I started to set them in
order a minute ago.” He buried his bill in the feathers of his breast.
“Yes, sir,” said he in a muffled voice, “they are coming in thicker than
I ever knew them to before. There is a lot of down around the roots of
them. I am going to have the warmest coat I've ever had.”

“Well, don't think you are the only one,” retorted Danny. “My fur never
was so thick at this time of year as it is now, and it is the same way
with Nanny Meadow Mouse and all our children. I suppose you know what it
means.”

“What does it mean?” asked Blacky, just as if he didn't have the least
idea, although he had guessed the instant he discovered those extra
feathers.

“It means we are going to have a long, hard, cold winter, and Old Mother
Nature is preparing us for it,” replied Danny, quite as if he knew all
about it. “You'll find that everybody who doesn't go south or sleep all
winter has a thicker coat than usual. Hello! There is old Roughleg the
Hawk! He has come extra early this year. I think I'll go back to warn
Nanny.” Without another word Danny disappeared in the brown grass. Again
Blacky chuckled. “More signs,” said he to himself. “More signs. There
isn't a doubt that we are going to have a hard winter. I wonder if I
can stand it or if I'd better go a little way south, where it will be
warmer.”



CHAPTER XVII: Blacky Watches A Queer Performance

   This much to me is very clear:
   A thing not understood is queer.
   --Blacky the Crow.

Blacky the Crow may be right. Again he may not be. If he is right, it
will account for a lot of the queer people in the world. They are not
understood, and so they are queer. At least, that is what other people
say, and never once think that perhaps they are the queer ones for not
understanding.

But Blacky isn't like those people who are satisfied not to understand
and to think other people and things queer. He does his best to
understand. He waits and watches and uses those sharp eyes of his and
those quick wits of his until at last usually he does understand.

The day of his discovery of Old Mother Nature's signs that the coming
winter would be long, hard and cold, Blacky paid a visit to the Big
River. Long ago he discovered that many things are to be seen on or
beside the Big River, things not to be seen elsewhere. So there are few
clays in which he does not get over there.

As he drew near the Big River, he was very watchful and careful, was
Blacky, for this was the season when hunters with terrible guns were
abroad, and he had discovered that they were likely to be hiding along
the Big River, hoping to shoot Mr. or Mrs. Quack or some of their
relatives. So he was very watchful as he drew near the Big River, for
he had learned that it was dangerous to pass too near a hunter with a
terrible gun. More than once he had been shot at. But he had learned by
these experiences. Oh, yes, Blacky had learned. For one thing, he had
learned to know a gun when he saw it. For another thing, he had learned
just how far away one of these dreadful guns could be and still hurt the
one it was pointed at, and to always keep just a little farther away.
Also he had learned that a man or boy without a terrible gun is quite
harmless, and he had learned that hunters with terrible guns are tricky
and sometimes hide from those they seek to kill, so that in the dreadful
hunting season it is best to look sharply before approaching any place.

On this afternoon, as he drew near the Big River, he saw a man who
seemed to be very busy on the shore of the Big River, at a place where
wild rice and rushes grew for some distance out in the water, for just
there it was shallow far out from the shore. Blacky looked sharply for a
terrible gun. But the man had none with him and therefore was not to be
feared. Blacky boldly drew near until he was able to see what the man
was doing.

Then Blacky's eyes stretched their widest and he almost cawed right out
with surprise. The man was taking yellow corn from a bag, a handful at
a time, and throwing it out in the water. Yes, Sir, that is what he was
doing, scattering nice yellow corn among the rushes and wild rice in the
water!

“That's a queer performance,” muttered Blacky, as he watched. “What is
he throwing perfectly good corn out in the water for? He isn't planting
it, for this isn't the planting season. Besides, it wouldn't grow in the
water, anyway. It is a shame to waste nice corn like that. What is he
doing it for?”

Blacky flew over to a tree some distance away and alighted in the top
of it to watch the queer performance. You know Blacky has very keen eyes
and he can see a long distance. For a while the man continued to scatter
corn and Blacky continued to wonder what he was doing it for. At last
the man went away in a boat. Blacky watched him until he was out of
sight. Then he spread his wings and slowly flew back and forth just
above the rushes and wild rice, at the place where the man had been
scattering the corn. He could see some of the yellow grains on the
bottom. Presently he saw something else. “Ha!” exclaimed Blacky.



CHAPTER XVIII: Blacky Becomes Very Suspicious

   Of things you do not understand,
      Beware!
   They may be wholly harmless but--
      Beware!
   You'll find the older that you grow
   That only things and folks you know
    Are fully to be trusted, so
      Beware!
     --Blacky the Crow.

That is one of Blacky's wise sayings, and he lives up to it. It is one
reason why he has come to be regarded by all his neighbors as one of the
smartest of all who live in the Green Forest and on the Green Meadow. He
seldom gets into any real trouble because he first makes sure there
is no trouble to get into. When he discovers something he does not
understand, he is at once distrustful of it.

As he watched a man scattering yellow corn in the water from the shore
of the Big River he at once became suspicious. He couldn't understand
why a man should throw good corn among the rushes and wild rice in the
water, and because he couldn't understand, he at once began to suspect
that it was for no good purpose. When the man left in a boat, Blacky
slowly flew over the rushes where the man had thrown the corn, and
presently his sharp eyes made a discovery that caused him to exclaim
right out.

What was it Blacky had discovered? Only a few feathers. No one with eyes
less sharp than Blacky's would have noticed them. And few would have
given them a thought if they had noticed them. But Blacky knew right
away that those were feathers from a Duck. He knew that a Duck, or
perhaps a flock of Ducks, had been resting or feeding in there among
those rushes, and that in moving about they had left those two or three
downy feathers.

“Ha!” exclaimed Blacky. “Mr. and Mrs. Quack or some of their relatives
have been here. It is just the kind of a place Ducks like. Also some
Ducks like corn. If they should come back here and find this corn, they
would have a feast, and they would be sure to come again. That man who
scattered the corn here didn't have a terrible gun, but that doesn't
mean that he isn't a hunter. He may come back again, and then he may
have a terrible gun. I'm suspicious of that man. I am so. I believe he
put that corn here for Ducks and I don't believe he did it out of the
kindness of his heart. If it was Farmer Brown's boy I would know that
all is well; that he was thinking of hungry Ducks, with few places where
they can feed in safety, as they make the long journey from the Far
North to the Sunny South. But it wasn't Farmer Brown's boy. I don't like
the looks of it. I don't indeed. I'll keep watch of this place and see
what happens.”

All the way to his favorite perch in a certain big hemlock-tree in the
Green Forest, Blacky kept thinking about that corn and the man who
had seemed to be generous with it, and the more he thought, the more
suspicious he became. He didn't like the looks of it at all.

“I'll warn the Quacks to keep away from there. I'll do it the very first
thing in the morning,” he muttered, as he prepared to go to sleep. “If
they have any sense at all, they will stay in the pond of Paddy the
Beaver. But if they should go over to the Big River, they would be
almost sure to find that corn, and if they should once find it, they
would keep going back for more. It may be all right, but I don't like
the looks of it.”

And still full of suspicions, Blacky went to sleep.



CHAPTER XIX: Blacky Makes More Discoveries

   Little things you fail to see
   May important prove to be.
   --Blacky the Crow.

One of the secrets of Blacky's success in life is the fact that he never
fails to take note of little things. Long ago he learned that little
things which in themselves seem harmless and not worth noticing may
together prove the most important things in life. So, no matter how
unimportant a thing may appear, Blacky examines it closely with those
sharp eyes of his and remembers it.

The very first thing Blacky did, as soon as he was awake the morning
after he discovered the man scattering corn in the rushes at a certain
place on the edge of the Big River, was to fly over to the pond of Paddy
the Beaver and again warn Mr. and Mrs. Quack to keep away from the Big
River, if they and their six children would remain safe. Then he got
some breakfast. He ate it in a hurry and flew straight over to the Big
River to the place where he had seen that yellow corn scattered.

Blacky wasn't wholly surprised to find Dusky the Black Duck, own cousin
to Mr. and Mrs. Quack the Mallard Ducks, with a number of his relatives
in among the rushes and wild rice at the very place where that corn had
been scattered. They seemed quite contented and in the best of spirits.
Blacky guessed why. Not a single grain of that yellow corn could Blacky
see. He knew the ways of Dusky and his relatives. He knew that they must
have come in there just at dusk the night before and at once had found
that corn. He knew that they would remain hiding there until frightened
out, and that then they would spend the day in some little pond where
they would not be likely to be disturbed or where at least no danger
could approach them without being seen in plenty of time. There they
would rest all day, and when the Black Shadows came creeping out from
the Purple Hills, they would return to that place on the Big River to
feed, for that is the time when they like best to hunt for their food.

Dusky looked up as Blacky flew over him, but Blacky said nothing, and
Dusky said nothing. But if Blacky didn't use his tongue, he did use his
eyes. He saw just on the edge of the shore what looked like a lot of
small bushes growing close together on the very edge of the water. Mixed
in with them were a lot of the brown rushes. They looked very harmless
and innocent. But Blacky knew every foot of that shore along the Big
River, and he knew that those bushes hadn't been there during the
summer. He knew that they hadn't grown there.

He flew directly over them. Just back of them were a couple of logs.
Those logs hadn't been there when he passed that way a few days before.
He was sure of it.

“Ha!” exclaimed Blacky under his breath. “Those look to me as if they
might be very handy, very handy indeed, for a hunter to sit on. Sitting
there behind those bushes, he would be hidden from any Duck who might
come in to look for nice yellow corn scattered out there among the
rushes. It doesn't look right to me. No, Sir, it doesn't look right to
me. I think I'll keep an eye on this place.”

So Blacky came back to the Big River several times that day. The second
time back he found that Dusky the Black Duck and his relatives had left.
When he returned in the afternoon, he saw the same man he had seen
there the afternoon before, and he was doing the same thing,--scattering
yellow corn out in the rushes. And as before, he went away in a boat.

“I don't like it,” muttered Blacky, shaking his black head. “I don't
like it.”



CHAPTER XX: Blacky Drops A Hint

   When you see another's danger
   Warn him though he be a stranger.
   --Blacky the Crow.

Every day for a week a man came in a boat to scatter corn in the rushes
at a certain point along the bank of the Big River, and every day Blacky
the Crow watched him and shook his black head and talked to himself and
told himself that he didn't like it, and that he was sure that it was
for no good purpose. Sometimes Blacky watched from a distance, and
sometimes he flew right over the man. But never once did the man have a
gun with him.

Every morning, very early, Blacky flew over there, and every morning he
found Dusky the Black Duck and his flock in the rushes and wild rice at
that particular place, and he knew that they had been there all night,
He knew that they had come in there just at dusk the night before, to
feast on the yellow corn the man had scattered there in the afternoon.

“It is no business of mine what those Ducks do,” muttered Blacky to
himself, “but as surely as my tail feathers are black, something is
going to happen to some of them one of these days. That man may be
fooling them, but he isn't fooling me. Not a bit of it. He hasn't had
a gun with him once when I have seen him, but just the same he is a
hunter. I feel it in my bones. He knows those silly Ducks come in here
every night for that corn he puts out. He knows that after they have
been here a few times and nothing has frightened them, they will be
so sure that it is a safe place that they will not be the least bit
suspicious. Then he will hide behind those bushes he has placed close to
the edge of the water and wait for them with his terrible gun. That is
what he will do, or my name isn't Blacky.”

Finally Blacky decided to drop a hint to Dusky the Black Duck. So the
next morning he stopped for a call. “Good morning,” said he, as Dusky
swam in just in front of him. “I hope you are feeling as fine as you
look.”

“Quack, quack,” replied Dusky. “When Blacky the Crow flatters, he hopes
to gain something. What is it this time?”

“Not a thing,” replied Blacky. “On my honor, not a thing. There is
nothing for me here, though there seems to be plenty for you and your
relatives, to judge by the fact that I find you in this same place every
morning. What is it?”

“Corn,” replied Dusky in a low voice, as if afraid some one might
overhear him. “Nice yellow corn.”

“Corn!” exclaimed Blacky, as if very much astonished. “How does corn
happen to be way over here in the water?”

Dusky shook his head. “Don't ask me, for I can't tell you,” said he. “I
haven't the least idea. All I know is that every evening when we arrive,
we find it here. How it gets here, I don't know, and furthermore I don't
care. It is enough for me that it is here.”

“I've seen a man over here every afternoon,” said Blacky. “I thought he
might be a hunter.”

“Did he have a terrible gun?” asked Dusky suspiciously.

“No-o,” replied Blacky.

“Then he isn't a hunter,” declared Dusky, looking much relieved.

“But perhaps one of these days he will have one and will wait for you to
come in for your dinner,” suggested Blacky. “He could hide behind these
bushes, you know.”

“Nonsense,” retorted Dusky, tossing his head. “There hasn't been a sign
of danger here since we have been here. I know you, Blacky; you are
jealous because we find plenty to eat here, and you find nothing. You
are trying to scare us. But I'll tell you right now, you can't scare us
away from such splendid eating as we have had here. So there!”



CHAPTER XXI: At Last Blacky Is Sure

   Who for another conquers fear
   Is truly brave, it is most clear.
   --Blacky the Crow.

It was late in the afternoon, and Blacky the Crow was on his way to the
Green Forest. As usual, he went around by the Big River to see if that
man was scattering corn for the Ducks. He wasn't there. No one was to be
seen along the bank of the Big River.

“He hasn't come to-day, or else he came early and has left,” thought
Blacky. And then his sharp eyes caught sight of something that made him
turn aside and make straight for a certain tree, from the top of which
he could see all that went on for a long distance. What was it Blacky
saw? It was a boat coming down the Big River.

Blacky sat still and watched. Presently the boat turned in among the
rushes, and a moment later a man stepped out on the shore. It was the
same man Blacky had watched scatter corn in the rushes every day for a
week. There wasn't the least doubt about it, it was the same man.

“Ha, ha!” exclaimed Blacky, and nearly lost his balance in his
excitement. “Ha, ha! It is just as I thought!” You see Blacky's sharp
eyes had seen that the man was carrying something, and that something
was a gun, a terrible gun. Blacky knows a terrible gun as far as he can
see it.

The hunter, for of course that is what he was, tramped along the shore
until he reached the bushes which Blacky had noticed close to the water
and which he knew had not grown there. The hunter looked out over the
Big River. Then he walked along where he had scattered corn the day
before. Not a grain was to be seen. This seemed to please him. Then he
went back to the bushes and sat down on a log behind them, his terrible
gun across his knees.

“I was sure of it,” muttered Blacky. “He is going to wait there for
those Ducks to come in, and then something dreadful will happen. What
terrible creatures these hunters are! They don't know what fairness is.
No, Sir, they don't know what fairness is. He has put food there day
after day, where Dusky the Black Duck and his flock would be sure to
find it, and has waited until they have become so sure there is no
danger that they are no longer suspicious. He knows they will feel so
sure that all is safe that they will come in without looking for danger.
Then he will fire that terrible gun and kill them without giving them
any chance at all.

“Reddy Fox is a sly, clever hunter, but he wouldn't do a thing like
that. Neither would Old Man Coyote or anybody else who wears fur or
feathers. They might hide and try to catch some one by surprise. That is
all right, because each of us is supposed to be on the watch for things
of that sort. Oh, dear, what's to be done? It is time I was getting home
to the Green Forest. The Black Shadows will soon come creeping out from
the Purple Hills, and I must be safe in my hemlock-tree by then. I would
be scared to death to be out after dark. Yet those Ducks ought to be
warned. Oh, dear, what shall I do?”

Blacky peered over at the Green Forest and then over toward the Purple
Hills, behind which jolly, round, red Mr. Sun would go to bed very
shortly. He shivered as he thought of the Black Shadows that soon would
come swiftly out from the Purple Hills across the Big River and over the
Green Meadows. With them might come Hooty the Owl, and Hooty wouldn't
object in the least to a Crow dinner. He wished he was in that
hemlock-tree that very minute. Then Blacky looked at the hunter with his
terrible gun and thought of what might happen, what would be almost sure
to happen, unless those Ducks were warned. “I'll wait a little while
longer,” muttered Blacky, and tried to feel brave. But instead he
shivered.



CHAPTER XXII: Blacky Goes Home Happy

   No greater happiness is won
   Than through a deed for others done.
   --Blacky the Crow.

Blacky sat in the top of a tree near the bank of the Big River and
couldn't make up his mind what to do. He wanted to get home to the big,
thick hemlock-tree in the Green Forest before dusk, for Blacky is afraid
of the dark. That is, he is afraid to be out after dark.

“Go along home,” said a voice inside him, “there is hardly time now for
you to get there before the Black Shadows arrive. Don't waste any more
time here. What may happen to those silly Ducks is no business of yours,
and there is nothing you can do, anyway. Go along home.”

“Wait a few minutes,” said another little voice down inside him. “Don't
be a coward. You ought to warn Dusky the Black Duck and his flock that a
hunter with a terrible gun is waiting for them. Is it true that it is
no business of yours what happens to those Ducks? Think again, Blacky;
think again. It is the duty of each one who sees a common danger to warn
his neighbors. If something dreadful should happen to Dusky because
you were afraid of the dark, you never would be comfortable in your own
mind. Stay a little while and keep watch.”

Not five minutes later Blacky saw something that made him, oh, so glad
he had kept watch. It was a swiftly moving black line just above the
water far down the Big River, and it was coming up. He knew what that
black line was. He looked over at the hunter hiding behind some bushes
close to the edge of the water. The hunter was crouching with his
terrible gun in his hands and was peeping over the bushes, watching that
black line. He, too, knew what it was. It was a flock of Ducks flying.

Blacky was all ashake again, but this time it wasn't with fear of being
caught away from home in the dark; it was with excitement. He knew that
those Ducks had become so eager for more of that corn, that delicious
yellow corn which every night for a week they had found scattered in the
rushes just in front of the place where that hunter was now hiding, that
they couldn't wait for the coming of the Black Shadows. They were so
sure there was no danger that they were coming in to eat without waiting
for the Black Shadows, as they usually did. And Blacky was glad. Perhaps
now he could give them warning.

Up the middle of the Big River, flying just above the water, swept the
flock with Dusky at its head. How swiftly they flew, those nine big
birds! Blacky envied them their swift wings. On past the hidden hunter
but far out over the Big River they swept. For just a minute Blacky
thought they were going on up the river and not coming in to eat, after
all. Then they turned toward the other shore, swept around in a circle
and headed straight in toward that hidden hunter. Blacky glanced at him
and saw that he was ready to shoot.

Almost without thinking, Blacky spread his wings and started out from
that tree. “Caw, caw, caw, caw, caw!” he shrieked at the top of his
lungs. “Caw, caw, caw, caw, caw!” It was his danger cry that everybody
on the Green Meadows and in the Green Forest knows.

Instantly Dusky turned and began to climb up, up, up, the other Ducks
following him until, as they passed over the hidden hunter, they were so
high it was useless for him to shoot. He did put up his gun and aim at
them, but he didn't shoot. You see, he didn't want to frighten them so
that they would not return. Then the flock turned and started off in
the direction from which they had come, and in a few minutes they were
merely a black line disappearing far down the Big River.

Blacky headed straight for the Green Forest, chuckling as he flew. He
knew that those Ducks would not return until after dark. He had saved
them this time, and he was so happy he didn't even notice the Black
Shadows. And the hunter stood up and shook his fist at Blacky the Crow.



CHAPTER XXIII: Blacky Calls Farmer Brown's Boy

Blacky awoke in the best of spirits. Late the afternoon before he had
saved Dusky the Black Duck and his flock from a hunter with a terrible
gun. He wasn't quite sure whether he was most happy in having saved
those Ducks by warning them just in time, or in having spoiled the plans
of that hunter. He hates a hunter with a terrible gun, does Blacky. For
that matter, so do all the little people of the Green Forest and the
Green Meadows.

So Blacky started out for his breakfast in high spirits. After
breakfast, he flew over to the Big River to see if Dusky the Black Duck
was feeding in the rushes along the shore. Dusky wasn't, and Blacky
guessed that he and his flock had been so frightened by that warning
that they had kept away from there the night before.

“But they'll come back after a night or so,” muttered Blacky, as he
alighted in the top of a tree, the same tree from which he had watched
the hunter the afternoon before. “They'll come back, and so will that
hunter. If he sees me around again, he'll try to shoot me. I've done all
I can do. Anyway, Dusky ought to have sense enough to be suspicious of
this place after that warning. Hello, who is that? I do believe it is
Farmer Brown's boy. I wish he would come over here. If he should find
out about that hunter, perhaps he would do something to drive him away.
I'll see if I can call him over here.”

Blacky began to call in the way he does when he has discovered something
and wants others to know about it. “Caw, caw, caaw, caaw, caw, caw,
caaw!” screamed Blacky, as if greatly excited.

Now Farmer Brown's boy, having no work to do that morning, had started
for a tramp over the Green Meadows, hoping to see some of his little
friends in feathers and fur. He heard the excited cawing of Blacky and
at once turned in that direction.

“That black rascal has found something over on the shore of the Big
River,” said Farmer Brown's boy to himself. “I'll go over there to
see what it is. There isn't much escapes the sharp eyes of that black
busybody. He has led me to a lot of interesting things, one time and
another. There he is on the top of that tree over by the Big River.”

As Farmer Brown's boy drew near, Blacky flew down and disappeared below
the bank. Fanner Brown's boy chuckled. “Whatever it is, it is right down
there,” he muttered.

He walked forward rapidly but quietly, and presently he reached the edge
of the bank. Up flew Blacky cawing wildly, and pretending to be scared
half to death. Again Farmer Brown's boy chuckled. “You're just making
believe,” he declared. “You're trying to make me believe that I have
surprised you, when all the time you knew I was coming and have been
waiting for me. Now, what have you found over here?”

He looked eagerly along the shore, and at once he saw a row of low
bushes close to the edge of the water. He knew what it was instantly.
“A Duck blind!” he exclaimed. “A hunter has built a blind over here from
which to shoot Ducks. I wonder if he has killed any yet. I hope not.” He
went down to the blind, for that is what a Duck hunter's hiding-place
is called, and looked about. A couple of grains of corn just inside
the blind caught his eyes, and his face darkened. “That fellow has been
baiting Ducks,” thought he. “He has been putting out corn to get them to
come here regularly. My, how I hate that sort of thing! It is bad enough
to hunt them fairly, but to feed them and then kill them--ugh! I wonder
if he has shot any yet.”

He looked all about keenly, and his face cleared. He knew that if that
hunter had killed any Ducks, there would be tell-tale feathers in the
blind, and there were none.



CHAPTER XXIV: Farmer Brown's Boy Does Some Thinking

Farmer Brown's boy sat on the bank of the Big River in a brown study.
That means that he was thinking very hard. Blacky the Crow sat in the
top of a tall tree a short distance away and watched him. Blacky was
silent now, and there was a knowing look in his shrewd little eyes. In
calling Farmer Brown's boy over there, he had done all he could, and he
was quite satisfied to leave the matter to Farmer Brown's boy.

“A hunter has made that blind to shoot Black Ducks from,” thought Farmer
Brown's boy, “and he has been baiting them in here by scattering corn
for them. Black Ducks are about the smartest Ducks that fly, but if they
have been coming in here every evening and finding corn and no sign of
danger, they probably think it perfectly safe here and come straight
in without being at all suspicious. To-night, or some night soon, that
hunter will be waiting for them.

“I guess the law that permits hunting Ducks is all right, but there
ought to be a law against baiting them in. That isn't hunting. No, Sir,
that isn't hunting. If this land were my father's, I would know what to
do. I would put up a sign saying that this was private property and no
shooting was allowed. But it isn't my father's land, and that hunter has
a perfect right to shoot here. He has just as much right here as I have.
I wish I could stop him, but I don't see how I can.”

A frown puckered the freckled face of Farmer Brown's boy. You see, he
was thinking very hard, and when he does that he is very apt to frown.

“I suppose,” he muttered, “I can tear down his blind. He wouldn't know
who did it. But that wouldn't do much good; he would build another.
Besides, it wouldn't be right. He has a perfect right to make a blind
here, and having made it, it is his and I haven't any right to touch
it. I won't do a thing I haven't a right to do. That wouldn't be honest.
I've got to think of some other way of saving those Ducks.”

The frown on his freckled face grew deeper, and for a long time he sat
without moving. Suddenly his face cleared, and he jumped to his feet. He
began to chuckle. “I have it!” he exclaimed. “I'll do a little shooting
myself!” Then he chuckled again and started for home. Presently he began
to whistle, a way he has when he is in good spirits.

Blacky the Crow watched him go, and Blacky was well satisfied. He didn't
know what Farmer Brown's boy was planning to do, but he had a feeling
that he was planning to do something, and that all would be well.
Perhaps Blacky wouldn't have felt so sure could he have understood what
Farmer Brown's boy had said about doing a little shooting himself.

As it was, Blacky flew off about his own business, quite satisfied that
now all would be well, and he need worry no more about those Ducks.
None of the little people of the Green Forest and the Green Meadows knew
Farmer Brown's boy better than did Blacky the Crow. None knew better
than he that Farmer Brown's boy was their best friend. “It is all right
now,” chuckled Blacky. “It is all right now.” And as the cheery whistle
of Farmer Brown's boy floated back to him on the Merry Little Breezes,
he repeated it: “It is all right now.”



CHAPTER XXV: Blacky Gets A Dreadful Shock

   When friends prove false, whom may we trust?
   The springs of faith are turned to dust.
   --Blacky the Crow.

Blacky the Crow was in the top of his favorite tree over near the Big
River early this afternoon. He didn't know what was going to happen, but
he felt in his bones that something was, and he meant to be on hand to
see. For a long time he sat there, seeing nothing unusual. At last he
spied a tiny figure far away across the Green Meadows. Even at that
distance he knew who it was; it was Farmer Brown's boy, and he was
coming toward the Big River.

“I thought as much,” chuckled Blacky. “He is coming over here to drive
that hunter away.”

The tiny figure grew larger. It was Farmer Brown's boy beyond a doubt.
Suddenly Blacky's eyes opened so wide that they looked as if they were
in danger of popping out of his head. He had discovered that Farmer
Brown's boy was carrying something and that that something was a gun!
Yes, Sir, Farmer Brown's boy was carrying a terrible gun! If Blacky
could have rubbed his eyes, he would have done so, just to make sure
that there was nothing the matter with them.

“A gun!” croaked Blacky. “Farmer Brown's boy with a terrible gun! What
does it mean?”

Nearer came Farmer Brown's boy, and Blacky could see that terrible gun
plainly now. Suddenly an idea popped into his head. “Perhaps he is going
to shoot that hunter!” thought Blacky, and somehow he felt better.

Farmer Brown's boy reached the Big River at a point some distance below
the blind built by the hunter. He laid his gun down on the bank and went
down to the edge of the water. The rushes grew very thick there, and
for a while Farmer Brown's boy was very busy among them. Blacky from
his high perch could watch him, and as he watched, he grew more and more
puzzled. It looked very much as if Farmer Brown's boy was building a
blind much like that of the hunter's. At last he carried an old log
down there, got his gun, and sat down just as the hunter had done in his
blind the afternoon before. He was quite hidden there, excepting from a
place high up like Blacky's perch.

“I--I--I do believe he is going to try to shoot those Ducks himself,”
 gasped Blacky. “I wouldn't have believed it if any one had told me. No,
Sir, I wouldn't have believed it. I--I--can't believe it now. Farmer
Brown's boy hunting with a terrible gun! Yet I've got to believe my own
eyes.”

A noise up river caught his attention. It was the noise of oars in a
boat. There was the hunter, rowing down the Big River. Just as he had
done the day before, he came ashore above his blind and walked down to
it.

“This is no place for me,” muttered Blacky. “He'll remember that I
scared those Ducks yesterday, and as likely as not he'll try to shoot
me.”

Blacky spread his black wings and hurriedly left the tree-top, heading
for another tree farther back on the Green Meadows where he would be
safe, but from which he could not see as well. There he sat until the
Black Shadows warned him that it was high time for him to be getting
back to the Green Forest.

He had to hurry, for it was later than usual, and he was afraid to be
out after dark. Just as he reached the Green Forest he heard a faint
“bang, bang” from over by the Big River, and he knew that it came from
the place where Farmer Brown's boy was hiding in the rushes.

“It is true,” croaked Blacky. “Farmer Brown's boy has turned hunter.”
 It was such a dreadful shock to Blacky that it was a long time before he
could go to sleep.



CHAPTER XXVI: Why The Hunter Got No Ducks

The hunter who had come down the Big River in a boat and landed near
the place where Dusky the Black Duck and his flock had found nice yellow
corn scattered in the rushes night after night saw Blacky the Crow leave
the top of a certain tree as he approached.

“It is well for you that you didn't wait for me to get nearer,” said the
hunter. “You are smart enough to know that you can't play the same trick
on me twice. You frightened those Ducks away last night, but if you try
it again, you'll be shot as surely as your coat is black.”

Then the hunter went to his blind which, you know, was the hiding-place
he had made of bushes and rushes, and behind this he sat down with his
terrible gun to wait and watch for Dusky the Black Duck and his flock.

Now you remember that farther along the shore of the Big River was
Farmer Brown's boy, hiding in a blind he had made that afternoon. The
hunter couldn't see him at all. He didn't have the least idea that any
one else was anywhere near. “With that Crow out of the way, I think I
will get some Ducks to-night,” thought the hunter and looked at his gun
to make sure that it was ready.

Over in the West, jolly, round, red Mr. Sun started to go to bed behind
the Purple Hills, and the Black Shadows came creeping out. Far down
the Big River the hunter saw a swiftly moving black line just above the
water. “Here they come,” he muttered, as he eagerly watched that black
line draw nearer.

Twice those big black birds circled around over the Big River opposite
where the hunter was crouching behind his blind. It was plain that
Dusky, their leader, remembered Blacky's warning the night before. But
this time there was no warning. Everything appeared safe. Once more the
flock circled and then headed straight for that place where they hoped
to find more corn. The hunter crouched lower. They were almost near
enough for him to shoot when “bang, bang” went a gun a short distance
away.

Instantly Dusky and his flock turned and on swift wings swung off and
up the river. If ever there was a disappointed hunter, it was the one
crouching in that blind. “Somebody else is hunting, and he spoiled
my shot that time,” he muttered. “He must have a blind farther down.
Probably some other Ducks I didn't see came in to him. I wonder if he
got them. Here's hoping that next time those Ducks come in here first.”

He once more made himself comfortable and settled down for a long wait.
The Black Shadows crept out from the farther bank of the Big River.
Jolly, round red Mr. Sun had gone to bed, and the first little star was
twinkling high overhead. It was very still and peaceful. From out in the
middle of the Big River sounded a low “quack”; Dusky and his flock were
swimming in this time. Presently the hunter could see a silver line on
the water, and then he made out nine black spots. In a few minutes those
Ducks would be where he could shoot them. “Bang, bang” went that gun
below him again. With a roar of wings, Dusky and his flock were in the
air and away. That hunter stood up and said things, and they were not
nice things. He knew that those Ducks would not come back again that
night, and that once more he must go home empty-handed. But first he
would find out who that other hunter was and what luck he had had, so he
tramped down the shore to where that gun had seemed to be. He found the
blind of Farmer Brown's boy, but there was no one there. You see, as
soon as he had fired his gun the last time, Farmer Brown's boy had
slipped out and away. And as he tramped across the Green Meadows toward
home with his gun, he chuckled. “He didn't get those Ducks this time,”
 said Farmer Brown's boy.



CHAPTER XXVII: The Hunter Gives Up

Blacky The Crow didn't know what to think. He couldn't make himself
believe that Farmer Brown's boy had really turned hunter, yet what else
could he believe? Hadn't he with his own eyes seen Farmer Brown's boy
with a terrible gun hide in rushes along the Big River and wait for
Dusky the Black Duck and his flock to come in? And hadn't he with his
own ears heard the “bang, bang” of that very gun?

The very first thing the next morning Blacky had hastened over to the
place where Farmer Brown's boy had hidden in the rushes. With sharp eyes
he looked for feathers, that would tell the tale of a Duck killed. But
there were no feathers. There wasn't a thing to show that anything so
dreadful had happened. Perhaps Farmer Brown's boy had missed when he
shot at those Ducks. Blacky shook his head and decided to say nothing to
anybody about Farmer Brown's boy and that terrible gun.

You may be sure that early in the afternoon he was perched in the top of
his favorite tree over by the Big River. His heart sank, just as on the
afternoon before, when he saw Farmer Brown's boy with his terrible gun
trudging across the Green Meadows to the Big River. Instead of going to
the same hiding place he made a new one farther down.

Then came the hunter a little earlier than usual. Instead of stopping at
his blind, he walked straight to the blind Farmer Brown's boy had first
made. Of course, there was no one there. The hunter looked both glad and
disappointed. He went back to his own blind and sat down, and while he
watched for the coming of the Ducks, he also watched that other blind to
see if the unknown hunter of the night before would appear. Of course
he didn't, and when at last the hunter saw the Ducks coming, he was sure
that this time he would get some of them.

But the same thing happened as on the night before. Just as those Ducks
were almost near enough, a gun went “bang, bang,” and away went the
Ducks. They didn't come back again, and once more a disappointed hunter
went home without any.

The next afternoon he was on hand very early. He was there before Farmer
Brown's boy arrived, and when he did come, of course the hunter saw him.
He walked down to where Farmer Brown's boy was hiding in the rushes.
“Hello!” said he. “Are you the one who was shooting here last night and
the night before?”

Farmer Brown's boy grinned. “Yes,” said he.

“What luck did you have?” asked the hunter.

“Fine,” replied Farmer Brown's boy.

“How many Ducks did you get?” asked the hunter.

Farmer Brown's boy grinned more broadly than before. “None,” said he. “I
guess I'm not a very good shot.”

“Then what did you mean by saying you had fine luck?” demanded the
hunter.

“Oh,” replied Farmer Brown's boy, “I had the luck to see those Ducks and
the fun of shooting,” and he grinned again.

The hunter lost patience. He tried to order Farmer Brown's boy away. But
the latter said he had as much right there as the hunter had, and the
hunter knew that this was so. Finally he gave up, and muttering
angrily, he went back to his blind. Again the gun of Farmer Brown's boy
frightened away the Ducks just as they were coming in.

The next afternoon there was no hunter nor the next, though Farmer
Brown's boy was there. The hunter had decided that it was a waste of
time to hunt there while Farmer Brown's boy was about.



CHAPTER XXVIII: Blacky Has A Talk With Dusky The Black Duck

   Doubt not a friend, but to the last
   Grip hard on faith and hold it fast.
   --Blacky the Crow.

Every morning Blacky the Crow visited the rushes along the shore of
the Big River, hoping to find Dusky the Black Duck. He was anxious, was
Blacky. He feared that Dusky or some of his flock had been killed, and
he wanted to know. You see, he knew that Farmer Brown's boy had been
shooting over there. At last, early one morning, he found Dusky and his
flock in the rushes and wild rice. Eagerly he counted them. There were
nine. Not one was missing. Blacky sighed with relief and dropped down on
the shore close to where Dusky was taking a nap.

“Hello!” said Blacky.

Dusky awoke with a start. “Hello, yourself,” said he.

“I've heard a terrible gun banging over here, and I was afraid you or
some of your flock had been shot,” said Blacky.

“We haven't lost a feather,” declared Dusky. “That gun wasn't fired at
us, anyway.”

“Then who was it fired at?” demanded Blacky.

“I haven't the least idea,” replied Dusky.

“Have you seen any other Ducks about here?” inquired Blacky.

“Not one,” was Dusky's prompt reply. “If there had been any, I guess we
would have known it.”

“Did you know that when that terrible gun was fired there was another
terrible gun right over behind those bushes?” asked Blacky.

Dusky shook his head. “No,” said he, “but I learned long ago that where
there is one terrible gun there is likely to be more, and so when I
heard that one bang, I led my flock away from here in a hurry. We didn't
want to take any chances.”

“It is a lucky thing you did,” replied Blacky. “There was a hunter
hiding behind those bushes all the time. I warned you of him once.”

“That reminds me that I haven't thanked you,” said Dusky. “I knew there
was something wrong over here, but I didn't know what. So it was a
hunter. I guess it is a good thing that I heeded your warn-ing.”

“I guess it is,” retorted Blacky dryly. “Do you come here in daytime
instead of night now?”

“No,” replied Dusky. “We come in after dark and spend the night here.
There is nothing to fear from hunters after dark. We've given up coming
here until late in the evening. And since we did that, we haven't heard
a gun.”

Blacky gossiped a while longer, then flew off to look for his breakfast;
and as he flew his heart was light. His shrewd little eyes twinkled.

“I ought to have known Farmer Brown's boy better than even to suspect
him,” thought he. “I know now why he had that terrible gun. It was to
frighten those Ducks away so that the hunter would not have a chance to
shoot them. He wasn't shooting at anything. He just fired in the air to
scare those Ducks away. I know it just as well as if I had seen him do
it. I'll never doubt Farmer Brown's boy again. And I'm glad I didn't say
a word to anybody about seeing him with a terrible gun.”

Blacky was right. Farmer Brown's boy had taken that way of making
sure that the hunter who had first baited those Ducks with yellow corn
scattered in the rushes in front of his hiding place should have no
chance to kill any of them. While appearing to be an enemy, he really
had been a friend of Dusky the Black Duck and his flock.



CHAPTER XXIX: Blacky Discovers An Egg

Blacky is fond of eggs, as you know. In this he is a great deal like
other people, Farmer Brown's boy for instance. But as Blacky cannot keep
hens, as Farmer Brown's boy does, he is obliged to steal eggs or else
go without. If you come right down to plain, everyday truth, I suppose
Blacky isn't so far wrong when he insists that he is no more of a thief
than Farmer Brown's boy. Blacky says that the eggs which the bens lay
belong to the hens, and that he, Blacky has just as much right to take
them as Farmer Brown's boy. He quite overlooks the fact that Farmer
Brown's boy feeds the biddies and takes the eggs as pay. Anyway, that
is what Farmer Brown's boy says, but I do not know whether or not the
biddies understand it that way.

So Blacky the Crow cannot see why he should not help himself to an egg
when he gets the chance. He doesn't get the chance very often to steal
eggs from the hens, because usually they lay their eggs in the henhouse,
and Blacky is too suspicious to venture inside. The eggs he does get are
mostly those of his neighbors in the Green Forest and the Old Orchard.
But once in a great while some foolish hen will make a nest outside the
henhouse somewhere, and if Blacky happens to find it the black scamp
watches every minute he can spare from other mischief for a chance to
steal an egg.

Now Blacky knows just what a rogue Farmer Brown's boy thinks he is, and
for this reason Blacky is very careful about approaching Farmer Brown or
any other man until he has made sure that he runs no risk of being shot.
Blacky knows quite as well as any one what a gun looks like. He also
knows that without a terrible gun, there is little Farmer Brown or any
one else can do to him. So when he sees Farmer Brown out in his fields,
Blacky often will fly right over him and shout “Caw, caw, caw, ca-a-w!”
 in the most provoking way, and Fanner Brown's boy insists that he has
seen Blacky wink when he was doing it.

But Blacky doesn't do anything of this kind around the buildings of
Farmer Brown. You see, he has learned that there are doors and windows
in buildings, and out of one of these a terrible gun may bang at any
time. Though he has suspected that Farmer Brown's boy would not now try
to harm him, Blacky is naturally cautious and takes no chances. So when
he comes spying around Farmer Brown's house and barn, he does it when
he is quite sure that no one is about, and he makes no noise about it.
First he sits in a tall tree from which he can watch Farmer Brown's
home. When he is quite sure that the way is clear, he flies over to the
Old Orchard, and from there he inspects the barnyard, never once making
a sound. If he is quite sure that no one is about, he sometimes drops
down into the henyard and helps himself to corn, if any happens to be
there. It was on one of these silent visits that Blacky spied something
which he couldn't forget. It was a box just inside the henhouse door.
In the box was some hay and in that hay he was sure that he had seen an
egg. In fact, he was sure that he saw two eggs there. He might not have
noticed them but for the fact that a hen had jumped down from that box,
making a terrible fuss. She didn't seem frightened, but very proud. What
under the sun she had to be proud about Blacky couldn't understand, but
he didn't stay to find out. The noise she was making made him nervous.
He was afraid that it would bring some one to find out what was going
on. So he spread his black wings and flew away as silently as he had
come.

As he was flying away he saw those eggs. You see, as he rose into the
air, he managed to pass that open door in such a way that he could
glance in. That one glance was enough. You know Blacky's eyes are very
sharp. He saw the hay in the box and the two eggs in the hay, and that
was enough for him. From that instant Blacky the Crow began to scheme
and plan to get one or both of those eggs. It seemed to him that he
never, never, had wanted anything quite so much, and he was sure that he
would not and could not be happy until he succeeded in getting one.



CHAPTER XXX: Blacky Screws Up His Courage

If out of sight, then out of mind. This is a saying which you often
hear. It may be true sometimes, but it is very far from true at other
times. Take the case of Blacky. He had had only a glance into that nest
just inside the door of Farmer Brown's henhouse, but that glance had
been enough to show him two eggs there. Then, as he flew away toward the
Green Forest, those eggs were out of sight, of course. But do you think
they were out of mind? Not much! No, indeed! In fact, those eggs were
very much in Blacky's mind. He couldn't think of anything else. He
flew straight to a certain tall pine-tree in a lonely part of the Green
Forest. Whenever Blacky wants to think or to plan mischief, he seeks
that particular tree, and in the shelter of its broad branches he keeps
out of sight of curious eyes, and there he sits as still as still can
be.

“I want one of those eggs,” muttered Blacky, as he settled himself in
comfort on a certain particular spot on a certain particular branch of
that tall pine-tree. Indeed, that particular branch might well be called
the “mischief branch,” for on it Blacky has thought out and planned most
of the mischief he is so famous for. “Yes, sir,” he continued, “I want
one of those eggs, and what is more, I am going to have one.”

He half closed his eyes and tipped his head back and swallowed a couple
of times, as if he already tasted one of those eggs.

“There is more in one of those eggs than in a whole nestful of Welcome
Robin's eggs. It is a very long time since I have been lucky enough
to taste a hen's egg, and now is my chance. I don't like having to go
inside that henhouse, even though it is barely inside the door. I'm
suspicious of doors. They have a way of closing most unexpectedly.
I might see if I cannot get Unc' Billy Possum to bring one of those eggs
out for me. But that plan won't do, come to think of it, because I can't
trust Unc' Billy. The old sinner is too fond of eggs himself. I would be
willing to divide with him, but he would be sure to eat his first, and
I fear that it would taste so good that he would eat the other. No. I've
got to get one of those eggs myself. It is the only way I can be sure of
it.

“The thing to do is to make sure that Farmer Brown's boy and Farmer
Brown himself are nowhere about. They ought to be down in the cornfield
pretty soon. With them down there, I have only to watch my chance and
slip in. It won't take but a second. Just a little courage, Blacky, just
a little courage! Nothing in this world worth having is gained without
some risk. The thing to do is to make sure that the risk is as small as
possible.”

Blacky shook out his feathers and then flew out of the tall pine-tree
as silently as he had flown into it. He headed straight toward Farmer
Brown's cornfield. When he was near enough to see all over the field, he
dropped down to the top of a fence post, and there he waited. He didn't
have long to wait. In fact, he had been there but a few minutes
when he spied two people coming down the Long Lane toward the cornfield.
He looked at them sharply, and then gave a little sigh of satisfaction.
They were Farmer Brown and Farmer Brown's boy. Presently they reached
the cornfield and turned into it. Then they went to work, and Blacky
knew that so far as they were concerned, the way was clear for him to
visit the henyard.

He didn't fly straight there. Oh, my, no! Blacky is too clever to do
anything like that. He flew toward the Green Forest. When he knew that
he was out of sight of those in the cornfield, he turned and flew over
to the Old Orchard, and from the top of one of the old apple-trees he
studied the henyard and the barnyard and Farmer Brown's house and the
barn, to make absolutely sure that there was no danger near. When he was
quite sure, he silently flew down into the henyard as he had done many
times before. He pretended to be looking for scattered grains of corn,
but all the time he was edging nearer and nearer to the open door of
the henhouse. At last he could see the box with the hay in it. He walked
right up to the open door and peered inside. There was nothing to be
afraid of that he could see. Still he hesitated. He did hate to go
inside that door, even for a minute, and that is all it would take to
fly up to that nest and get one of those eggs.

Blacky closed his eyes for just a second, and when he did that he seemed
to see himself eating one of those eggs. “What are you afraid of?” he
muttered to himself as he opened his eyes. Then with a hurried look in
all directions, he flew up to the edge of the box. There lay the two
eggs!



CHAPTER XXXI: An Egg That Wouldn't Behave

   If you had an egg and it wouldn't behave
    Just what would you do with that egg, may I ask?
   To make an egg do what it don't want to do
    Strikes me like a difficult sort of a task.

All of which is pure nonsense. Of course. Who ever heard of an egg
either behaving or misbehaving? Nobody. That is, nobody that I know,
unless it be Blacky. It is best not to mention eggs in Blacky's presence
these days. They are a forbidden topic when he is about. Blacky is apt
to be a little resentful at the mere mention of an egg. I don't know as
I wholly blame him. How would you feel if you knew you knew all there
was to know about a thing, and then found out that you didn't know
anything at all? Well, that is the way it is with Blacky the Crow.

If any one had told Blacky that he didn't know all there is to know
about eggs, he would have laughed at the idea. Wasn't he, Blacky,
hatched from an egg himself? And hadn't he, ever since he was big
enough, hunted eggs and stolen eggs and eaten eggs? If he didn't know
about eggs, who did? That is the way he would have talked before his
visit to Farmer Brown's henhouse. It is since then that it has been
unwise to mention eggs.

When Blacky saw the two eggs in the nest in Farmer Brown's henhouse how
Blacky did wish that he could take both. But he couldn't. One would be
all that he could manage. He must take his choice and go away while the
going was good. Which should he take?

It often happens in this life that things which seem to be unimportant,
mere trifles in themselves, prove to be just the opposite. Now, so far
as Blacky could see, it didn't make the least difference which egg he
took, excepting that one was a little bigger than the other. As a matter
of fact, it made all the difference in the world. One was brown and very
good to look at. The other, the larger of the two, was white and also
very good to look at. In fact, Blacky thought it the better of the
two to look at, for it was very smooth and shiny. So, partly on this
account, and partly because it was the largest, Blacky chose the white
egg. He seized it in his claws and started to fly with it, but somehow
he could not seem to get a good grip on it. He fluttered to the ground
just outside the door, and there he got a better grip. Just as old
attracted the attention of that nobleman, who took him from the gang
of convicted malefactors, with whom, under strict supervision, he hoed
and delved under the blazing sun, and befriended him. It did not pay
to befriend William Parsons. He stole one of the best horses belonging
to his benefactor, and, going upon those early colonial roads, soon
accumulated, as a highwayman, a sufficient sum to buy himself a
passage back to old England.

By fraud, backed up with consummate assurance, he obtained £70 at his
port of landing, and came at once to London. A scheme for plundering
his sister, who by this time had succeeded to her aunt's legacy
of £25,000, then engaged his attention. He hatched a plot with a
discharged footman, for that man to pose as a gentleman of fortune, and
to make advances to her, and even to forcibly carry her off and marry
her against her will, if needs were. Some women servants were also in
the plot, and were even given duly signed bonds in £500 and lesser
sums, to lend their aid. The footman and Parsons were, in the event of
this scheme proving successful, to share the £25,000 in equal parts.

[Illustration: WILLIAM PARSONS.]

By a mere accident, the plot was discovered in a milliner's shop in the
West End, where a lady friend of Miss Parsons had pointed out to her a
finely dressed gentleman, "who was going to marry Miss Parsons." This
led to enquiries, and an exposure of the whole affair.

The last resource of this thorough-paced scoundrel was the road. He
chiefly affected the western suburbs and Hounslow Heath, and it was
in a robbery on that widespreading waste that he was captured. He
had obtained information that a servant, with a valise containing a
large sum in notes and gold, was to leave town and meet his master at
Windsor; and so set out to lie in wait for him. But he had already
been so active on the Heath that his face was too well known, and he
was recognised at Brentford by a traveller who had suffered from him
before. Following him into Hounslow Town, this former victim suddenly
raised an alarm and caused him to be seized. Taken to the "Rose and
Crown" inn, Parsons was recognised by the landlord and others, as one
who had for some time scoured the Heath and committed robberies. His
pistols were taken from him, and he was committed to Newgate, and in
the fulness of time tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. The
efforts of his family connections were again used to save him from the
gallows, and themselves from the stigma of it; but his career was too
notorious for further leniency, and he was hanged at Tyburn on February
11th, 1751.




WILLIAM PAGE


"There is always room on top" has long been the conclusive reply to
complaints of overcrowding in the professions. However many duffers may
already be struggling for a bare livelihood in them, there yet remains
an excellent career for the recruit with energy and new methods. The
profession of highwayman aptly illustrates the truth of these remarks.
It was shockingly over-crowded in the middle of the eighteenth century,
even though the duffers were generally caught in their initial efforts
and hanged; and really it is wonderful where all the wealth came from,
to keep such an army of "money-changers" in funds.

William Page, who for twelve years carried on a flourishing practice
in the "Stand and Deliver!" profession, was one of those few who
lived very near the top of it. His name is not so familiar as those
of Du Vall, Hind, Maclean, or Turpin, but not always do the really
eminent come down to us with their eminence properly acknowledged.
He was born about 1730, the son of a bargeman to a coal merchant at
Hampton-on-Thames. The bargeman was unfortunately drowned at Putney
in 1740, and his widow was reduced to eking out a meagre livelihood
by the distilling of waters from medicinal herbs. She is described
as "a notable industrious woman," and certainly it was not from her
example that William learned the haughty and offensive ways that
would not permit him long to keep any of the numerous situations he
took, after leaving the Charity School at Hampton, where he acquired
what small education he had. He started life as tapster's boy at
the "Bell" alehouse, in his native town, and thence changed to
errand-boy in the employment of "Mr. Mackenzie," apothecary. Soon his
youthful ambition took him to London, where he obtained a situation
in the printing-office of Woodfall, in Little Britain, who became in
after-years notorious as printer of the "Letters of Junius"; but "that
business being too great a confinement for his rambling temper, he
left it, and went footboy to Mr. Dalrymple, Scots Holland warehouse in
London."

He rapidly filled the situations of footman to one Mr. Hodges, in
Lincoln's Inn Fields; porter to a gentleman in Cork Street, and footman
to Mr. Macartney in Argyle Buildings. He then entered the service
of the Earl of Glencairn, but left that situation to become valet
to a certain Captain Jasper. Frequently discharged for "his proud
and haughty spirit, which would not brook orders from his masters,"
and prevented him, on the other hand, being on good terms with his
fellow-servants, he at last found himself unable to obtain another
place. This was a sad time for William Page. In service he had learned
extravagant habits, the love of fine clothes and the fascination of
gambling; but his arrogant ways had brought him low indeed.

"Being by such means as these extremely reduced in his circumstances,
without money, without friends, and without character, he could think
of no better method of supplying his wants, and freeing himself from
a servile dependency, than by turning Collector on the Highway. This
he imagined would not only take off that badge of slavery, the livery
he had always worn with regret, but would set him on a level with
gentlemen, a figure he was ever ambitious of making."

His first steps were attended with some difficulty, for he laboured
under the disadvantage, at the moment of coming to this decision, of
having no money in his pockets; and to commence highwayman, as to begin
any other business or profession, it was necessary to have a small
capital, for preliminary expenses. But a little ingenuity showed him
the way. Pistols and a horse were the tools of his trade, and pistols,
of course, first. A servant of his acquaintance knew a person who had
a brace of pistols to sell, and Page took them, "to show a friend on
approval." He then hired a horse for deferred payment, and with the
pistols went out and immediately and successfully robbed the Highgate
coach. Thus, with the £4 he in this manner obtained, he paid for the
pistols and settled with the livery-stable keeper for his horse-hire.
In another day or two he had touched the wayfaring public for a sum
sufficient to purchase a horse of his own; and thus commenced his
twelve-years' spell of highway adventure, in which, although he had
many exciting experiences, he was arrested only once before the final
escapade that brought him to the gallows.

An early freak of his was the robbing of his former master, Captain
Jasper, on Hounslow Heath. The Captain was crossing the ill-omened
place with a lady in a post-chaise, when Page rode up, bade the
postilion stop, and ordered the Captain to deliver.

"That may be, sir," retorted the Captain angrily, "but not yet," and,
pulling out a pistol, fired at him. His aim was not good, but he hit
somebody: none other, indeed, than his own postilion, who was struck in
the back, "and wounded very much."

Then said Page, "Consider, sir, what a rash action you have been guilty
of. You have killed this poor fellow, which I would not have done for
the world. And now, sir, I repeat my orders, and if you refuse any
longer to comply, I will actually fire upon you."

[Illustration: WILLIAM PAGE.]

The Captain then snapped his second pistol at him, but it missed fire.
Page then swore he would shoot the lady; intending to do nothing of the
kind, but only to alarm the Captain the more. But in Captain Jasper
our highwayman had met sterner stuff than common, and the gallant
soldier, the better to protect her, forthwith sat himself in her lap.
On Page continuing to declare he would shoot him, the Captain leapt out
of the chaise at him, and at that moment Page fired, but with intention
to miss, and the shot passed harmlessly by. Again the Captain pulled
the trigger of his pistol, and again it missed fire.

Then Page declared his ultimatum: "You must now surrender, or I
absolutely will shoot you." Whereupon the Captain, having done all he
possibly could, delivered up his gold watch and ten or eleven guineas.
Page then demanded his sword, but he quite rightly, as a soldier,
demurred to such a humiliation.

"You may see by my cockade I am an officer, and I would sooner part
with my life and soul than with my sword," he bravely declared.

Page generously acknowledged his spirit. "I think myself," he said,
"thou art the bravest fellow that ever crossed these plains, but thou
art an obstinate fellow; and so, go about your business."

He introduced some interesting novelties into the well-worn business.
The chief of these was the distinctly bright idea of driving from
London in a phaeton with a pair of horses and at some lonely spot
disguising himself with a wig and another suit of clothes. Then,
saddling one of the horses and leaving the phaeton, he would carefully
emerge upon the high road and hold up coaches, post-chaises, or
solitary equestrians. This accomplished, he returned to his phaeton,
harnessed the horse again, resumed his former attire, and drove back to
town, like the gentleman of fashion and leisure he pretended to be. One
day, pursuing this highly successful programme, he was nearly undone by
the action of some countryfolk who, finding an abandoned phaeton and
one horse strangely left in a coppice, went off with it. The simple
people, making along the road with this singular treasure-trove, were
themselves followed by some unlucky travellers whom Page had just
robbed, and violently denounced as confederates. Page was fully equal
to the occasion. Nearly stripping himself, and casting his clothes down
a convenient well, he returned to London in that plight and declared
himself to have been treated like the man in the Scriptures, who
"fell among thieves"; although it does not appear that the traveller
in question had a carriage. His phaeton had been stolen, and himself
robbed and left almost naked.

This precious story was fully believed, and the country people
themselves stood in some considerable danger. They were flung into
prison and would no doubt have been convicted had Page appeared against
them. This he, for obvious reasons, refused to do, and they found
themselves at liberty once more, resolved to leave any other derelict
carriages they might chance to see severely alone.

Page, in course of time, married a girl of his native town. She could
not long remain ignorant of his means of livelihood, and earnestly
begged him to leave the road and take to honest work. Few, however,
quitted the highway except for the "three-legged mare" at Tyburn, and
the one- or two-legged mares of other places; and he held on his way.
Now and again he would disappear for a time, after some particularly
audacious exploit, to reappear when the excitement it had caused was
over. On one of these occasions he shipped to Barbados and Antigua,
stayed there for seven or eight months, and then returned to England,
desperately in want of money. The line of least resistance indicated
the road once more.

His first exploit after this reappearance was the robbing of one Mr.
Cuffe, north of Barnet. The traveller, being driven along the road
alone and unarmed in a post-chaise, had no choice but to surrender his
purse, and held it out from the window at arm's length. But Page's
horse, not being used to this kind of business, shied violently, and
Page thereupon ordered the postilion to dismount and hand it him, which
he did, and he then gracefully and at leisure retired.

On his return to town, leading this high-mettled horse down Highgate
Hill, Page was followed by three men on horseback, who, having heard
of this robbery down the road, suspected he might be the man. They
immediately planned how they were to take him, and then, one of them
riding quietly up, said, "Sir, I have often walked my horse up Highgate
Hill, but never down; but since you do, I will also, and bear you
company."

Page readily agreed, without the least suspicion of any design against
him, and so they entered into a very friendly conversation. After
walking in this manner some little distance, the gentleman finding a
fit opportunity, keeping a little behind, suddenly laid hold of his
arms and pinioned them so tightly behind him that he was not able to
stir; seeing which, the other two, then on the opposite side of the
road, crossed over and secured him beyond any possibility of escape.
They found in his pockets four loaded pistols, a powder-horn, and some
bullets, a crape mask, and a curious and ingenious map himself had
drawn, showing all the main roads and cross roads for twenty miles
round London.

They then took him before a Justice of the Peace at Highgate, who
put many searching questions, without gaining any information. He
was, however, committed to Clerkenwell Bridewell, and was afterwards
examined by none other than Henry Fielding, magistrate and novelist.
Sent from the Old Bailey to stand his trial at Hertford Assizes, he
was acquitted for lack of exact evidence, although every one was fully
satisfied of his guilt, for, however strange the times, they were not
so strange that honest gentlemen carried such a compromising collection
of things about with them on the roads.

His narrow escape did not disturb him, and he was soon again on his
lawless prowls. On Hounslow Heath he robbed a Captain of one of the
Guards regiments, and was pursued into Hounslow town by that officer,
shouting "Highwayman!" after him. No one took any notice. Page got
clear away, and afterwards boasted of having, the following night at a
theatre in London, sat next the officer, who did not recognise him.

An interlude followed in the activities of our high-spirited
highwayman. He and an old acquaintance struck up a more intimate
friendship over the tables of billiard-rooms in London, and there they
entered into an alliance, with the object of rooking frequenters of
those places. But their returns were small and precarious, and did not
even remotely compare with the rich harvest to be gathered on the road,
to which he accordingly returned.

It was Page's ill-fortune to meet with several plucky travellers, who,
like Captain Jasper, would not tamely submit to be robbed, and resisted
by force of arms. Among them was Lord Downe, whose post-chaise he,
with a companion, one day stopped at Barnet. Presenting his pistol, he
issued the customary orders, but, to his surprise, Lord Downe himself
drew a pistol, and discharged it with such excellent aim, that Page
was shot in the body, and bled very copiously. His companion's horse,
alarmed at the shot, grew restive, and thus his friend was for a while
unable to come to his aid. Page, however, again advanced to the attack;
but my lord was ready with another pistol, and so the highwaymen
thought it best to make off. They hurried to London, and Page sought
a doctor, who found the wound so dangerous, that he refused to treat
him without consultation. The other doctor, immediately on arriving,
recognised Page, and asked him how he came by the wound; to which Page
replied, that he had received it in a duel he had just fought.

"I will extract the ball," replied the doctor; "but," he added
significantly, "I do not wish to see your face again, for I believe you
fought that duel near Barnet."

Shortly after his recovery from this untoward incident, he and one
ally, Darwell, by name, an old schoolfellow, waiting upon chance
on Shooter's Hill, met two post-chaises, in one of which was a
"supercargo" belonging to the East India Company, and in the other a
person, who is simply described as a "gentleman."

Page's accomplice opened the encounter by firing a pistol, to which
the supercargo replied in like manner; but with a better aim, for the
bullet tore away a portion of his coat, under the armpit. A second
shot from the highwayman was also ineffective. Then Page rode up and
attacked the other chaise. A desperate fusillade followed; but the only
damage done was that Page's horse was slightly wounded. At last, the
post-chaise travellers having expended all their ammunition, the two
highwaymen compelled them to alight, and the postilions to dismount;
and then, having bound the hands of all of them with rope, they ordered
these unfortunate persons, on peril of their lives, to remain on
that spot for one hour. They then returned to the chaises, removed
the travelling trunks, and, carrying them off on horseback, hid them
securely.

Then they hastened back to London. The next morning, in two chaises,
they returned to the spot, and in security brought back the trunks,
which contained, not only a large amount of money, but a mass of
important documents belonging to the East India Company.

A reward of forty guineas was offered, by advertisement in the
newspapers of the time, for the return of the documents, "and no
questions asked." The advertisers themselves, by so doing, risked a
fine of £50 for compounding a felony; but, in any case, the reward was
never claimed, although Page carefully returned the papers anonymously.

The fact which at last cut the knot of William Page's existence was
the robbing of Captain Farrington in 1757, on Blackheath. Among other
things the Captain was compelled to render to this Cæsar of the roads
was a gold repeater watch. Hotly pursued, Page gave the hue-and-cry a
long chase for it, and finally, arriving at Richmond, had himself and
his exhausted horse ferried across to Twickenham.

Soon after, finding the south of England ringing uncomfortably with
the fame of his doings, he took ship for Scotland, but landed at
Scarborough, where, at the fashionable spa, he gambled heavily and
strutted awhile as a man of considerable fortune. But he must have
been at last really alarmed and prepared to consider turning over
a new leaf, for he went north to see his former master, the Earl
of Glencairn, who, he thought, would be able to recommend him to
employment in the plantations. The Earl, however, received him coldly,
and he came south again, to resume his chosen profession, in company
with Darwell, whom he had by constant alternate threats and persuasions
seduced from the reformed life he was leading and the respectable
situation he held, to take up again this hazardous calling.

Together they scoured the road to Tonbridge, Darwell forming, as it
were, a rearguard. Page was pursued beyond Sevenoaks by five mounted
men armed with pistols, and a blunderbuss, who dashed past Darwell,
and after a struggle seized his leader, who presently escaped again.
In their return, disappointed, they made a prisoner of Darwell, who,
suspecting something of the kind would happen, had already thrown
away his pistols. In spite of his indignant protestations that he was
a private gentleman, and would not endure such an outrage, he was
searched and a part of Captain Farrington's watch was found upon him,
with the maker's name and most of the distinguishing marks more or less
carefully obliterated. Questioned closely, he declared he had picked
it up upon the road. As for the highwayman they had just now nearly
captured, he knew nothing of him: had never set eyes on him before.

But, in spite of these denials, Darwell was taken off in custody and
examined before a magistrate, who so plied him with questions, threats
of what would happen to him if he continued obstinate, and promises of
clemency if he would make discovery of his companion, that he at last
turned King's evidence. During the interval, he was lodged in Maidstone
gaol.

A fortnight later, Page was arrested in one of their old haunts in
London, the "Golden Lion," near Grosvenor Square. He was at first taken
to Newgate, but afterwards remitted to Maidstone, and tried there for
the robbery of Captain Farrington. Convicted and sentenced to death, he
was hanged on Penenden Heath, April 6th, 1758.




ISAAC DARKIN, _ALIAS_ DUMAS


Isaac Darkin was the son of a cork-cutter in Eastcheap, and was born
about 1740; too late to appear in the stirring pages of Alexander
Smith or Charles Johnson, in which he would have made, we may be sure,
an admired figure. All those who knew him, on the road or in the
domestic circle, agreed that he was a handsome fellow; and travellers,
in particular, noticed his taking ways. These were first displayed
in 1758, when he robbed Captain Cockburn near Chelmsford. No less
taking, in their own especial way, were the police of the neighbourhood
in that time, for they speedily apprehended Isaac, and lodged him
in Springfield gaol. He was duly arraigned at the next assizes, and
no fewer than eight indictments were then preferred against him. He
pleaded guilty to the robbing of Captain Cockburn, but not guilty on
the other counts; and was, after a patient trial, found guilty on the
first and acquitted on the others. He was then sentenced to death, but
was eventually respited on account of his youth, and finally pardoned
on condition that he enlisted in the 48th Regiment of foot, then
serving in the West Indies, at Antigua. Drafted with others aboard a
ship lying in the lower reaches of the Thames, presently to set sail
for that distant shore, he effected his escape, almost at the moment
of up-anchor, by dint of bribing the captain of a merchant vessel
lying alongside, to whom he promised so much as a hundred pounds to
help him out. He was smuggled aboard the merchantman, and so cunningly
disguised that when a search-party, suspecting his whereabouts, boarded
the ship, and searched it, even to the hold, they did not recognise
him in a particularly rough and dirty sailor who was swearing nautical
oaths among the ship's company on deck. So the transport-vessel sailed
without him, and he, assuming the name of Dumas, rioted all through
the West of England, robbing wealthy travellers and gaily spending his
takings on what he loved best: fine clothes and fine ladies. He was so
attentive to business that he speedily made a name for himself, the
name of a daring votary of the high toby. This reputation rendered
it politic on his part to enlist in the Navy, so that in case of
being arrested for highway robbery, he could prove himself to have a
respectable occupation, that would help to discredit the charge of
being a highwayman.

He soon became a valued recruit, and was promoted to midshipman; and
it is quite likely that if he had been sent on active service he would
have distinguished himself in a more reputable career than that in
which he was so soon to die. But his duties kept him for considerable
periods in port, and he seems to have had ample leave from them; for
we find him hovering near Bath and gaily robbing the wealthy real or
imagined invalids going to, or returning from, the waters.

On the evening of June 22nd, 1760, he fell in with Lord Percival,
travelling by post-chaise over Clarken Down, near Bath, and robbed him
of twelve, thirteen, or fourteen guineas—my lord could not positively
swear to the exact amount. He then made off in the gathering twilight,
and galloped across country, to Salisbury Plain and the little village
of Upavon, where he was arrested in a rustic alehouse, and sent
thence to Salisbury gaol. At his trial he indignantly denied being a
highwayman, or that he was an Englishman. He declared his name was
Dumas, that he had lately come from Guadaloupe, where he had taken
a part in the late military operations; and said that the so-styled
"suspicious behaviour" and damaging admissions he was charged with,
when arrested at the inn, were merely the perplexities of a foreigner,
when suddenly confronted by hostile strangers.

This special pleading did not greatly deceive judge or jury, but
the prosecution broke down upon a technical detail, and Darkin was
acquitted; not, however, without an affecting address to the prisoner
from the judge, Mr. Justice Willmott, who urged him to amend his ways,
while there was yet time.

It is thus quite sufficiently evident that, although the Court was
bound to acquit the prisoner, no one had the least doubt of his
guilt. His narrow escape does not appear to have impressed Darkin,
or "Dumas"; but he was anxious enough to be off, as we learn from a
contemporary account of the proceedings, in which it is quaintly said:
"He discovered great Impatience 'till he had got off his Fetters and
was discharged, which was about five o'clock in the evening, when he
immediately set out for London in a post-chaise."

The fair ladies of Salisbury sorrowed when he was gone. They had
been constant in visiting him in prison, and had regarded him as a
hero, and Lord Percival as a disagreeable hunks. The hero-worship he
received is properly noted in the account of his life, trial, and
execution, issued in haste from an Oxford press in 1761, shortly after
the final scene had been enacted. In those pages we read: "During
Mr. Dumas' imprisonment at Salisbury, we find his sufferings made a
deep impression upon the tender Hearts of the Ladies, some of whom,
having visited him in his Confinement, his obliging Manner, genteel
Address, lively Disposition, and whole Deportment so struck them that
his Fame soon became the Discourse of the Tea Table; and at the happy
Termination of His Affair with my Lord Percival, produced between them
the following Copy of Verses:

    Joy to thee, lovely Thief! that thou
      Hast 'scaped the fatal string,
    Let Gallows groan with ugly Rogues,
      _Dumas_ must never swing.

    Dost thou seek Money?—To thy Wants
      Our Purses we'll resign;
    Could we our Hearts to guineas coin
      Those guineas all were thine.

    To Bath in safety let my lord
      His loaded Pockets carry;
    Thou ne'er again shall tempt the Road,
      Sweet youth! if thou wilt marry.

    No more shall niggard travellers
      Avoid thee—We'll ensure them:
    To us thou shalt consign thy Balls
      And Pistol; we'll secure 'em.

    Yet think not, when the Chains are off,
      Which now thy Legs bedeck,
    To fly: in Fetters softer far
      We'll chain thee by the Neck."

But in the short space of six weeks from his acquittal at Salisbury and
his triumphal exit in a post-chaise for London, he was again arrested
on a charge of highway robbery, this time for robbing a Mr. Gammon at
Nettlebed, on the road to Oxford. Committed to trial at Newgate, he was
transferred to Oxford gaol, and tried there on March 6th. He had up
to now been phenomenally fortunate, but things at this crisis looked
a great deal more serious. He acknowledged "he had experienced many
narrow scrapes, but never such a d—d one as this," and he was presently
found guilty and condemned to death, this time without any extenuating
circumstances being found.

Isaac Darkin was what in our times would be called a "superior person."
Slang he disdained to use, bad language was anathema to him; and if
he did, indeed, condescend to describe a person of mean understanding
as "a cake," or "a flat," that was the most he permitted himself. His
delicacy was so great that he never mentioned a "robbery," a "robber,"
or a "highwayman," but spoke instead of persons who had been "injured,"
or of "the injured parties." And as he was so nice in his language, so
he was particular in his dress and deportment. As an eulogist of him
said, not without a little criticism: "He was possessed of too great
a share of pride for his circumstances in life, and retained more of
it to the last than was becoming in a person in his unhappy situation.
He had a taste for elegance in every respect; was remarkably fond of
silk stockings, and neat in his linen; had his hair dressed in the most
fashionable manner every morning; his polished fetters were supported
round his waist by a sword-belt, and tied up at his knees with ribbon."

Although but the son of a cork-cutter, he had lived, in the estimation
of his contemporaries, like a gentleman. Like a gentleman he spent
his last days, and if he did indeed seem to boast a little when, a
few days before his execution, he declared he had been nine times in
gaol, and seven times tried on a capital charge, that was merely a
pardonable professional exaggeration. His claim to have gleaned over
six hundred guineas from the road has, on the other hand, the look of
an under-estimate. The rumbustious fellows of a hundred years earlier
would have thought that very bad business; they often took much more
in a single haul. But times were changing, and not for the better, from
the highwaymen's point of view.

Isaac Darkin died like a gentleman, without apparent fear, and without
bravado, at Oxford, on March 23rd, 1761, and was at that time, as
himself remarked, without apparent pathos or truckling to weak
sentiment, "not twenty-one."




JAMES MACLAINE, THE "GENTLEMAN" HIGHWAYMAN


The career of James Maclean, or Maclaine, shows that it was not really
difficult to become a "gentleman" highwayman. Born at Monaghan in 1724,
he was the second son of Lauchlin Maclaine, a Presbyterian minister,
who, although settled in Ireland, was a Scotsman of unmixed Scottish
blood, and of undoubted Scottish sympathies. There are plenty of
materials for a life of his son James, the highwayman, for the story
of his career had a remarkable attraction for all classes of people
at the time when he went to die at Tyburn, in 1750; and consequently
the "Lives" and "Memoirs" of him are numerous. There are also several
portraits of him, most of them showing a distinctly Scottish type of
countenance, but not one solving the mystery of his extraordinary
fascination for women. Indeed, the full-length portrait of him
engraved in Caulfield's _Remarkable Characters_, in which he is styled
"Macleane, the Ladies' Hero," shows a heavy-jowled person, with dull,
yet staring fish-like eyes; exactly the kind of person who might be
expected to create an unfavourable impression. Perhaps the artist
does him an injustice, but none of the several artists and engravers
who have handed down to us their respective versions of his features
have succeeded in imparting the slightest inkling of good looks to him,
and few of the portraits agree with one another. He was tall above
the average, as the various prints show; and he wore fine clothes. It
was these exceedingly fine feathers, and the fashionable resorts he
affected, that gave him the distinction of "gentleman" highwayman; and
it is to be feared that his exquisite dress, in larger measure than the
quality of his manners, influenced the ladies of 1750, who wept over
his fate just as the equally foolish women of 1670 had wept over the
hanging of Du Vall.

[Illustration: JAMES MACLAINE.

  _From a contemporary Portrait._]

The Ordinary of Newgate saw nothing remarkable in Maclaine. He speaks
of him as "in person of the middle-size, well-limbed, and a sandy
complexion, a broad, open countenance pitted with the small-pox, but
though he was called the _Gentleman Highwayman_, and in his dress and
equipage very much affected the fine gentleman, yet to a man acquainted
with good breeding, and that can distinguish it from impudence and
affectation, there was very little in his address or behaviour that
could entitle him to the character."

[Illustration: MACLAINE, THE LADIES' HERO.]

Archibald, the elder brother of this fashionable hero, was an entirely
respected and blameless person, who entered the Church, and was pastor
of the English community at The Hague for forty-nine years, from 1747
to 1796.

James, the future knight of the road, was intended by his father for
a merchant; but that pious father died when James was eighteen years
of age, and so the youthful "perfect master of writing and accompts,"
as he is styled, instead of proceeding, as intended, to a Scottish
merchant in Rotterdam, received a modest inheritance, with which he
immediately took himself off to Dublin, where he lost or expended it
all inside twelve months, in dissipation, after the example of the
Prodigal Son in the Scriptures.

Only, unfortunately for him, when the money was gone, and he would,
given the opportunity, perhaps have returned, like that illustrious
exemplar, from his husks and his harlots, to partake of the fatted
calf, there was no father, no home, and no fatted calf to which he
might return.

But he had still some relatives left in Monaghan, and he thought he
might be received by them. In this he was altogether mistaken when he
tried to put it to the proof, and was reduced almost to the point of
starvation there, when he attracted the attention of a gentleman, who
offered him a footman's place in his service. He did not keep this
situation long. He was too impudent to his master, and too patronising
towards the other servants. He was discharged, and for a time subsisted
upon a scanty allowance from his brother.

In this extremity he found a gentleman of Cork, a "Colonel F——n," who
was confiding enough to engage him as butler. But he apparently did not
make a good butler; and was, moreover, discovered making away with his
master's property, and discharged. We next find him in London, thinking
of joining the Irish Brigade in the French service; but abandoning
the idea from conscientious scruples against being employed in Popish
surroundings. Maclaine had a very tender conscience and a timid nature,
and what with his religious scruples and the fear of being shot (to
which he does not allude, but which was very vivid to him), he had to
abandon the notion of wearing a fine uniform, which we may suspect had
originally given him the impulse to a military life.

[Illustration: JAMES MACLAINE.]

Maclaine did not at this period keep very reputable society; but
was in 1746 again occupying a position with the forgiving "Colonel
F——n." The Colonel seems to have, on this second occasion, found
him an undesirable servant; whereupon, "being prepossessed with the
perfections of his person," he proposed to enlist in Lord Albemarle's
troop of horseguards. The Colonel, as an old soldier, thought this, no
doubt, the best thing, and, with an advance of ten pounds, bade him go
where glory waited him.

Maclaine accordingly enlisted. He had visions of being seated on a
prancing steed—"steed" being the superlative of "horse"—and, dressed in
something with plenty of blue or scarlet and gold in it, taking part
in ceremonial processions and escorts. Unhappily, soon after he had
enlisted, he heard that the troop was to proceed at once to Flanders
on active service, and hurriedly got, somehow, out of the dangerous
position.

He then made some attempt to settle down and live respectably, for he
married the daughter of a Mr. Maclagen, a horse-dealer in the Oxford
Road—the Oxford Street of to-day. His wife brought a small dowry of
£500, and with this they set up business in the grocery and chandlery
way in Welbeck Street. Unhappily for any views he may have entertained
of a settled life as a tradesman, his wife died in 1748. It appeared
then that the business had not prospered, or that their style of living
had been beyond their means, for the stock and furniture were then
found to be worth only £85.

Maclaine's first idea after this domestic catastrophe was one very
prevalent at that time: the notion of posing as a gentleman of fortune
and of fashion, with the object of ensnaring the affections of some
susceptible young lady of means and marrying her for her money. He
accordingly realised all his effects, and, placing his two infant
daughters in the care of his mother-in-law, burst upon the town as one
of the elegants of the day.

A needy neighbour, like himself a tradesman, Plunkett by name, who had
failed as a chemist, was induced by this hopeful widower to act a part
as his footman, and together they frequented places of fashionable
assemblage, both in London and at Tunbridge Wells, on the look-out for
heiresses. But the game was shy, and meanwhile the small capital of
£85 was fast melting away. Fine clothes were ten times more expensive
in that age than the finest clothes of to-day, and although it was
possible to obtain a good deal on credit, it was not at all workable to
visit Vauxhall and such expensive places, and to cut a dash there, for
any considerable time on so inconsiderable a capital.

It was Plunkett who at this stage of affairs, when their funds were
nearly exhausted, suggested the road as a place where money might
usually be had for the asking.

"A brave man," said Plunkett, "cannot want. He has a right to live, and
need not want the conveniences of life. While the dull, plodding, busy
knaves carry cash in their pockets, we must draw upon them to supply
our wants. Only impudence is necessary, and the getting better of a
few idle scruples. Courage is scarcely necessary, for all we have to
deal with are mere poltroons." But when poltroon meets poltroon, when
the timid traveller, ready to hand over his purse on demand, cannot do
so because the coward highwayman dare not reach out and take it, what
happens? It is an embarrassing moment, whose fortunes are (or were)
determined only by chance.

Plunkett did not know the manner of man he had to deal with until they
had taken the road together. He had always seemed a bold, swaggering
fellow, and big enough in all conscience; but when it came to highway
robbery he was a helpless companion.

Their first affair was with a grazier, going home from Smithfield with
the proceeds of his day's business in his pocket. Plunkett, suddenly
enlightened as to Maclaine's want of nerve, took the conduct of the
incident firmly in hand at once, or the results might have been
disastrous for both. He took £60 from the grazier, while Maclaine
looked on and spoke no word, inwardly in greater fear than he, and
ready, had there been any sign of resistance, to fly.

Their next attempt was to stop and rob a coach on the St. Albans road.

It was agreed that Maclaine should stop the coachman and present his
pistol on one side, while Plunkett did the same on the other. But
although he rode up several times, intending to challenge the Jehu with
the traditional cry of the bold and fearless fellows who did the like
every night, his heart failed him; so Plunkett had to carry it off
as best he could, while Maclaine sat shivering with cowardice in the
background, in spite of the "Venetian mask" that covered the upper part
of his face and concealed his identity sufficiently well.

But Plunkett, as may have been already gathered, was a man with
sufficient resolution for two, and although Maclaine was quaking with
terror on every occasion, he brought him in some fashion up to the
scratch in a long series of robberies. They frequently hired or stabled
horses at Hyde Park Corner, and thence rode out for a day and a night
upon Hounslow Heath, or elsewhere.

"In all this while," we learn, he scarcely ever thought of his
daughters, "and seldom visited his mother-in-law." O villain!

When in town, he had lodgings on the first floor over a shop in St.
James's Street, and presented a gorgeous figure to morning callers.
He was even more gorgeous in the evening, when he frequented places
of public entertainment, and obtained the freedom of some fashionable
houses. But the morning picture he presented will probably suffice. He
then wore a crimson damask banjan, a silk shag waistcoat turned with
lace, black velvet breeches, white silk stockings, and yellow morocco
slippers.

On one exceptional occasion, Plunkett and Maclaine went as far as
Chester, and did good business on the way; but their best haul was on
Shooter's Hill, where they stopped and robbed an official of the East
India Company of a large sum.

With his share of the plunder, Maclaine took a little holiday on the
Continent, and visited his brother at The Hague, probably astonishing
that worthy man by his sudden magnificence. He then returned and
rejoined Plunkett.

Horace Walpole wrote at different times several accounts of how he was
once stopped by these brothers-in-arms. It was a moonlight night, in
the beginning of November 1749, nearly a year before Maclaine's career
was brought to a close, that Horace was returning from Holland House,
Kensington, to London. The hour was ten o'clock, the place Hyde Park.
What trifles, or what amount of money Messrs. Maclaine and Plunkett
took on this occasion we are not told; for Walpole does not take his
correspondents so completely and voluminously into his confidence over
this affair as he generally did. He only tells them, and us, that the
pistol of "the accomplished Mr. Maclean," as he calls him, went off—by
accident, he is careful to say—and that the bullet passed so close as
to graze the skin beneath his eye and stun him. The bullet then went
through the roof of the carriage.

The incident that so nearly brought the life of Horace Walpole to
an untimely end, and might thus have left the world much poorer in
eighteenth-century gossip, was conducted, as he tells us, "with the
greatest good-breeding on both sides." He further adds that the reason
of Maclaine being out that night and taking a purse _that_ way was, he
had only that morning been disappointed of marrying a great fortune. It
does not seem at all an adequate reason; but that was the eighteenth
century and this is the twentieth, and perhaps we cannot see eye to eye
on all these matters.

But, at any rate, Maclaine afterwards behaved very nicely about the
articles he had taken; sending a note to Walpole as soon as ever he had
returned to his lodgings, in which he made his excuses, if not with
the witty grace of a Voiture, at least expressed in a manner ten times
more natural and easily polite. He declared that, had the bullet found
its billet in Walpole's head, he would certainly have put one through
his own. Then, in a postscript, which, like the postscripts in letters
written by feminine hands, contained the whole substance of and reason
for the letter, Maclaine added that he would be pleased to meet the
gentleman at Tyburn (O ominous tryst!) at twelve at night, where the
gentleman might purchase again any trifles he had lost.

There, if not particularly elsewhere, Maclaine seems to have indeed
proved himself, in one brief moment, a "gentleman" highwayman. You
see the argument passing in his mind. The trifles were indeed trifles
intrinsically, but they might have had some sentimental worth, of old
or new association, that would have made the loss of them a grievous
thing to their rightful owner. Well, then, if that owner liked to
ransom them for a trifling sum, here was his chance. A very considerate
offer.

But Horace Walpole did not accept the rendezvous. Possibly he doubted
the honour of a highwayman met at such a spot.

The "gentleman highwayman" resented criticism, as will be seen by
the following story: Maclaine frequented Button's Coffee House, in
Russell Street, Covent Garden, and paid particular attention to the
barmaid there, daughter of the proprietor. The attentions of such a
fine gentleman as he appeared to be were very flattering to the girl,
and very noticeable to other frequenters of the house, one of whom,
a certain Mr. Donaldson, knew Maclaine, and took the opportunity of
warning the girl's father of his real character. The father in his turn
cautioned his daughter, and foolishly let slip the name of the person
who had warned him; and she, of course, passed on the information to
the engaging Maclaine.

On the next occasion when Donaldson visited Button's, and while he was
sitting in one of the boxes, Maclaine entered, and in a loud voice, and
the pronounced Irish brogue that was ever on his tongue, said: "Mr.
Donaldson, I wish to spake to you in a private room."

Mr. Donaldson, being unarmed, and naturally afraid of being alone with
such a man as he knew Maclaine to be, said that as there could not
possibly be anything pass between them that the whole world was not
welcome to know, he begged leave to decline the invitation.

"Very well," rejoined Maclaine, "we shall meet again."

A day or so later, as Mr. Donaldson was walking near Richmond in the
evening, he saw Maclaine on horseback, approaching him; but fortunately
at that moment a gentleman's carriage appeared, and Maclaine rode
after it; Donaldson hastening into the protection that the streets
of Richmond town afforded. It is probable that, but for this timely
diversion, Maclaine would have shot the man who dared tell the truth
about him.

But the end of the alliance of Maclaine and Plunkett was now at hand.
On June 26th, 1750, at two o'clock in the morning, they stopped the
Salisbury stage on Turnham Green. The courage of the coach passengers
was at a low ebb at that unconscionable hour, and they suffered
themselves to be robbed, without making the least resistance. They
numbered five men and one woman. The men were bidden step out, and,
doing so, were searched and robbed at leisure. A Mr. Higden had an
exceptionally fine waistcoat, and had to part with even that to
Maclaine, who was a connoisseur in waistcoats. A Mr. Lockyer also was
constrained to give up a wig. From the lady was taken "only what she
chose to give." Here, at any rate, is a faint sweet relic of an older
courtesy.

As an afterthought, Maclaine went back for two or three of the
portmanteaux stored away in the hoot.

They then, riding off westward, met the Earl of Eglinton, travelling in
his post-chaise. He had an escort of two mounted servants, but as they
were over half a mile behind at the time, he might equally well have
been travelling alone.

[Illustration: MACLAINE AND PLUNKETT ROBBING THE EARL OF EGLINTON ON
HOUNSLOW HEATH.]

Maclaine, riding up to the postboy, threatened him with a pistol and
told him to stop instantly; but, at the same time, was sufficiently
cautious to so place himself that the occupant of the post-chaise would
be unable to fire at him without hitting the postboy. The highwaymen
were, as a rule, exceedingly well-informed persons; and Maclaine knew
perfectly well that Lord Eglinton carried a blunderbuss with him, and
had the reputation of always being ready and willing to use it.

But in the strategic position he had taken up, he was quite safe, and
meanwhile Plunkett had advanced from the rear and taken his lordship
completely by surprise. He threatened, indeed, instantly to shoot him,
if he did not throw the blunderbuss away; and my lord flung the weapon
from him at once, as though it had been red-hot. Plunkett then took
seven guineas from him.

Maclaine was not behindhand, and seized his lordship's overcoat and the
blunderbuss which was lying upon the heath. He was a frugal person,
and in that particular did credit to his Scots ancestry. A curious
old print shows this robbery, famous in its day, and in it Maclaine
and Plunkett do certainly look most awe-inspiring in their attitudes:
Maclaine, in particular, being apparently engaged in pushing his pistol
through the postboy's head. But that is doubtless artistic licence.

Maclaine did a very foolish thing when he returned to his St. James's
Street rooms, early that same day. He sent for a Jew dealer to come and
make an offer for some clothes he wished to sell; none other, in fact,
than those he had taken from the coach, and when they were shortly
advertised as having been stolen, the mischief was done. As if that
were not folly enough, Maclaine's frugality had led him also to remove
the gold lace from one of the stolen coats and to offer it for sale.
He chanced to take it to the very laceman who had recently sold it.
His arrest was then a matter of course. Equally of course, he strongly
protested against the indignity of a "gentleman" being arrested for
theft, and then he broke down and wept in "a most dastardly and
pusillanimous manner, whimpering and crying like a whipt schoolboy."

Maclaine declared that the absconded Plunkett had left the clothes with
him, in part satisfaction of a debt he owed, and that he, Maclaine, was
to have sold them for what they would fetch, as part liquidation of the
debt.

Any so-called confession he might have made, he now declared
impossible. What should a gentleman like himself know of highway
robbery? "It is true enough that when first apprehended, the surprise
confounded me and gave me a most extraordinary shock. It caused a
delirium and confusion in my brain which rendered me incapable of being
myself, or knowing what I said or did. I talked of robberies as another
man would do in talking of stories; but, my Lord, after my friends had
visited me in the Gate-house, and had given me some new spirits, and
when I came to be re-examined before Justice Lediard, and was asked
if I could make any discovery of the robbery, I then alleged I had
recovered my surprise, that what I had talked of before concerning
robberies was false and wrong, and was entirely owing to a confused
head and brain."

He called nine witnesses to character; among them Lady Caroline
Petersham, who is represented in a curious print of the trial at the
Old Bailey, under examination.

The elegant Maclaine stands prominently in the dock handsomely attired,
but, alas! heavily fettered, with his laced hat under his left arm.
One hand holds his lengthy written defence, the other is affectedly
spread over his breast, in gentlemanly protestation of his being an
injured person. His is a tall, upstanding figure; but he appears, by
the evidence of the print, to have had a face like a pudding: and the
majority of the counsel seated at a table in front of him are shown
regarding it with easily understood curiosity and astonishment.

One of the dignified persons on the bench is represented addressing
Lady Caroline: "What has your Ladyship to say in favour of the
Prisoner at y^e Bar?"

[Illustration: MACLAINE IN THE DOCK.]

With a dramatic gesture, she replies: "My Lord, I have had the Pleasure
to know him well: he has often been about my House, and I never lost
anything."

In spite of this cloud of witness, our gentleman was convicted, and
that with the utmost dispatch, for the jury returned their verdict of
"guilty" without leaving the box.

The time between his condemnation and execution was spent in an
affectation of repentance, that does not read very pleasantly. He
suddenly found himself a great sinner, and indeed revelled luxuriantly
in the discovery. But there was not the true note of abasement and
conviction in all this; for he went among his fellow-criminals like
a superior person, and offered them consolation from the rarefied
heights of his "gentility," that must have been excessively galling to
them. Their profanity and callousness shocked him profoundly. Probably
their behaviour was not less profane when he, condemned to die for
misdeeds similar to their own, presumed to lecture them on the error of
their ways. But preaching was in his blood, and would find expression
somehow, and he found excuse for his almost consistent lack of courage
on the road in the moral reflection that it was conscience made a
coward of him. But conscience did not prevent him sharing in the swag
when the enterprise was carried through.

He said it was true that, since he had entered upon the highway, he
had never enjoyed a calm and easy moment; that when he was among ladies
and gentlemen they observed his uneasiness, and would often ask him
what was the matter, that he seemed so dull. And his friends would tell
him that surely his affairs were under some embarrassment; "But they
little suspected," said he, "the wound I had within."

He protested in a good cause he believed there was not a man of greater
natural courage than himself, but that in every scheme of villainy
he put Plunkett on the most hazardous post. "There," said he, "I was
always a coward—my conscience"——always that sickly, unconvincing
iteration. But the insistence of conscience that Plunkett should always
be placed in the way of the bullets is at least amusing.

Walpole tells how Maclaine had rooms in St. James's Street, opposite
White's Club, and others at Chelsea. Plunkett, he says, had rooms in
Jermyn Street. Their faces were as well known in and about St. James's
as that of any of the gentlemen who lived in that quarter, who might
also be in the habit of going upon the road, if the truth were known
about everybody. Maclaine, he said, had quarrelled, very shortly
before his arrest, with an army officer at the Putney Bowling Green.
The officer had doubted his gentility, and Maclaine challenged him to
a duel, but the exasperating officer would not accept until Maclaine
should produce a certificate of the noble birth he claimed.

"After his arrest," says Walpole, "there was a wardrobe of clothes,
three-and-twenty purses, and the celebrated blunderbuss found at his
lodgings, besides a famous kept-mistress." Walpole concluded he would
suffer, and as he wished him no ill, he did not care to follow the
example of all fashionable London, and go to see him in his cell. He
was almost alone in his thus keeping away. Lord Mountfield, with half
White's Club at his heels, went to Newgate the very first day. There,
in the cell, was Maclaine's aunt, crying over her unhappy nephew. When
those great and fashionable frequenters of White's had gone, she asked,
well knowing who they were, but perhaps not fully informed of their
ways, beyond the fact that they gambled extravagantly: "My dear, what
did the Lords say to you? Have you ever been concerned with any of
them?"

"Was it not admirable?" asks Walpole; adding, "but the chief personages
who have been to comfort and weep over their fallen hero are Lady
Caroline Petersham and Miss Ashe: I call them 'Polly' and 'Lucy,' and
asked them if he did not sing: 'Thus I stand like the Turk with his
doxies around'?"

In that last passage, Walpole refers to Gay's _Beggar's Opera_, written
in 1716 and produced in 1728; a play written around an imaginary
highwayman, "Captain Macheath," who might very well have stood for
Maclaine himself. Polly and Lucy were two of Macheath's friends in the
opera.

We have Walpole's own authority for the otherwise almost incredible
statement that three thousand people went to see Maclaine in his cell,
the first Sunday after he was condemned. He fainted away twice with the
heat of the cell. "You can't conceive the going there is to Newgate,
and the prints that are published of the malefactors and the memoirs
of their lives and deaths, set forth with as much parade as Marshal
Turenne's."

The fatal October 3rd came at last, when he was to die. A curious
etched print published at the time, at the small price of threepence,
entitled "Newgate's Lamentation, or the Ladies' Last Farewell of
Maclaine," shows the parting, and bears the following verses:

    Farewell, my friends, let not your hearts be fill'd,
    My time is near, and I'll with calmness yield.
    Fair ladies now, your grief, I pray, forbear,
    Nor wound me with each tender-hearted tear.

    Mourn not my fate; your friendships have been kind,
    Which I in tears shall own, till breath's resign'd.
    Oh! may the indulgence of such friendly love,
    That's been bestowed on me, be doubled from above.

Thus fortified, and giving his blessing, for what it might be worth, he
went to Tyburn diligently conning his prayer-book all the way, and not
once glancing at the crowds.

[Illustration: NEWGATE'S LAMENTATION; OR, THE LADIES' FAREWELL TO
MACLAINE.]

To the constable who had arrested him, and who now came to beg his
forgiveness, he replied earnestly: "I forgive you, and may God bless
you, and your friends; may He forgive my enemies and receive my soul."
And then he was turned off, and died quite easily. There was a great
sale for the many more or less truthful lives of him hawked round the
gallows.




JOHN POULTER, _ALIAS_ BAXTER


The story of John Poulter is one of the saddest that here present
themselves to be recorded. He was born at Newmarket, of poor parents,
and was given a sufficient schooling for his station. At thirteen
years of age he was taken into service in the stables of the Duke of
Somerset, and remained there for six years, leaving with an excellent
character for smartness and industry. He then went into the employ of
Colonel Lumley, and was on three occasions sent to France, in charge
of racehorses; always giving complete satisfaction. But this slight
experience of foreign travel seems to have unsettled him, and he craved
for adventures under alien skies. We next find him, accordingly,
sailing on a Bristol merchant ship and voyaging to the West Indies, to
the American Colonies, and to Newfoundland; seeing life in a humble but
effective way.

Returning to England at last, and, sailor-like—or at any rate, like
sailors of those times—falling at once into abandoned company, he
met, at Lichfield on February 1749, a dissolute set of persons living
disreputably upon their wits; among them a certain John Brown, alias
Dawson, who, with an experience of the highway trade, easily persuaded
the adventurous Poulter to join him and his associates.

Brown, Poulter, and company, fully armed, then set out to prey upon
all and sundry; devoting themselves more particularly to thefts from
houses. At Lichfield, while one diverted the attention of the landlord
of the "George" inn, another rifled a chest and stole a sum of money
and many valuable articles. At Chester, Poulter distinguished himself
by stealing some black plush that he fancied might make him a fine
stylish waistcoat; and sent off at once to a tailor, to call at the
"Black Dog" inn, where he and the gang were lodging, that he might
be measured, and enabled to appear forthwith as a person of elegance
and distinction. We may here fitly pause a moment to admire, or to
be astonished at, the child-like vanity and delight in fine clothes
displayed by nearly all the highwaymen at that time. They could not
resist seizing every and any opportunity that offered, of dressing
themselves in the best that could be obtained.

Unfortunately, the manners of a highwayman were not exactly those of
a gentleman. There was something overdone in the affected elegance of
deportment, a certain exaggeration and a decided "loudness" that made
reflective people suspicious. Thus, the tailor to whom Poulter sent
for his stolen plush to be made up was not altogether satisfied with
his strange customer, and when a pistol that Poulter carried in his
pocket went off accidentally during the process of measurement, he was
convinced that a person who carried loaded firearms in this manner was
not only a dangerous, but also a suspicious, person. The bullet had
harmlessly sped into the ceiling, but the tailor was unnerved by the
incident, and Poulter, rather lamely apologetic, endeavoured to explain
away this concealed armoury by accusing Brown of putting crackers
in his pockets. As for the tailor, he hurried off to the Mayor with
the story that a dangerous person, evidently a highwayman, had taken
lodgings in the city, and was one of a queer gang, whose suspicious
movements had already attracted attention. The Mayor sent some trusty
emissaries to examine Poulter and his associates, but they had already
taken the alarm, and had embarked at Parkgate for Ireland.

Poulter had already had enough of this criminal life, and, tired of
adventure of all kinds, desired nothing better than to settle down to
some business. He accordingly, in the name of Baxter, took a small
alehouse in Dublin, and, entirely dissociating himself from his
companions for a time, did a comfortable and fairly prosperous trade,
averaging five barrels a week. Here he might have continued, and would
have been glad to do so, only for a most unfortunate circumstance.

There were at that time a number of Irish rogues in London, obtaining a
hazardous livelihood, chiefly by picking pockets, but not disdaining
any form of villainy that might promise to be profitable. General
Sinclair was robbed of a gold watch by one or other of this gang, as he
was leaving a party at Leicester House, and William Harper and Thomas
Tobin, two suspicious characters, were arrested for being concerned,
and taken to the Gatehouse at Westminster, whence they were presently
rescued by their gang, to the number of a couple of dozen; all of them
making off to Ireland.

This affair would not appear to concern Poulter in any way, engaged
as he was at Dublin in earning an honest livelihood; but it had a
very tragical result on his fortunes. Among the fugitives was one
James Field, who had known Poulter in London; and he, as ill-fortune
would have it, chanced one day to walk down that Dublin Street where
Poulter's inn was situated. By the accursed malevolence of fate,
Poulter himself happened at that moment to be standing at the door of
his house. Field immediately recognised him and stopped to enquire
what his old confederate was doing. He drank there and wished him good
day, but soon after brought all that escaped gang of scoundrels to the
spot; and there, much to Poulter's dismay, they established themselves,
day by day, making his inn, once so respectable and well-conducted, a
byword for riotous drinking, and the haunt of characters that it would
be flattery to describe as merely "suspicious." Field and others were
actually taken into custody there. Decent trade deserted the inn, and,
despairing of being rid of the scoundrels, whom he dared not forbid the
house, lest they should turn upon and denounce him, he absconded across
Ireland to Cork, where he at first contemplated taking another inn.
He at last, however, settled upon Waterford, and took an inn there,
remaining for six months, when he was induced to return to Dublin by
his former brewer, who, sorry to have lost a good customer by Poulter's
enforced flight, wanted him back.

He eventually settled two miles outside Dublin, at an inn called the
"Shades of Clontarf," looking upon the sea; and became part innkeeper,
part fisherman, and led a very happy, honest, and contented life,
making, moreover, an average profit of £3 a week.

But here he was found towards the close of 1751 by Tobin, who foisted
himself and a dissolute woman companion upon the unfortunate man.
Poulter generously received them, but earnestly implored Tobin not
to bring his evil associates into the neighbourhood. He wanted, he
declared, to live an honest life, and to be done with the past. Tobin
assured him he would not appear in the neighbourhood again; but in a
few days he was back at Clontarf, with a select company of rascals, and
from that time the unhappy Poulter knew no peace. His determination
to lead a respectable life they took as a direct challenge to, and
slur upon, themselves. There is nothing that so greatly enrages the
habitual criminal as the reclamation of one of his own kind, and it is
doubtless the influence of hardened evil-doers that prevents many a
criminal, really disgusted with crime, from reforming. These wretches
set themselves deliberately to ruin Poulter. They practically lived
at his house, and, as had been done before, they soon changed the
character of it from a decent alehouse to a thieves' boozing-ken, to
which the police-officers came at once when they wanted to find some
bad character, or to trace stolen property. Poulter was a mere cipher
under his own roof.

But they were not content with wrecking his trade: they must needs
blast that good character he had been so patiently acquiring. They did
it by making him out a smuggler. Six pounds of tea and twelve yards of
calico and muslin placed secretly in his boat, and information then
lodged with the Revenue officers, was sufficient. Poulter's boat was
seized and condemned, and Poulter himself, convinced that he would not
be able to establish his innocence, fled from the scene and hurried
aboard a vessel bound for Bristol, where he landed penniless. There, in
Bristol streets, he met two early criminal acquaintances, Dick Branning
and John Roberts, and as there seemed to be no likelihood of being
allowed to live within the law, he agreed to take part with them and a
number of confederates, whose headquarters were at Bath, in a campaign
of highway and other robberies.

Their operations were of the most roving description. By way of
Trowbridge, they made for Yorkshire, raiding the country as they went
with all manner of rogueries. Nothing came amiss. At Halifax they
netted twenty-five guineas from a clergyman by an eighteenth-century
ancestor of the thimble-rigging fraud, called "pricking in the
belt." At last they found themselves at Chester: place of evil omen
for Poulter. There, at the house of a confederate, they heard on
the evening of their arrival of a train of pack-horses laden with
Manchester goods, due to pass that night. Watch had been kept upon
them, said the confederate, and a man would point out to our friends
which, among all the animals of the pack-horse train, was best worth
robbing of his load. It would be best, he said, to do the work on the
country road, and to take the horse into a field.

As it happened, they pitched upon the wrong horse, and got only a
load of calamancoes, fabrics woven of wool with an admixture of silk,
popular in those times; but the pack contained over a thousand yards,
and they cut it off after some difficulty in the dark, and got away
safely with it; although greatly alarmed by the horse's loud neighing
when he found himself separated from his companions.

The robbers went off at once out of the neighbourhood, and that same
night reached a village near Whitchurch, eighteen or twenty miles
distant. There they obliterated all distinguishing marks on the goods,
and divided them.

At Grantham, which Poulter and Tobin next favoured with a visit, they
relieved a credulous farmer of fifteen guineas by the "pricking in the
belt" device. At Nottingham several of the accomplices met, but they
had bad luck, and Poulter went on the sneak and stole a silver tankard,
without a lid, from the "Blackamoor's Head" inn: and that was all the
scurvy town of Nottingham yielded them. They then made for Yorkshire,
where they remained for a considerable period, and then left, only
because their widespread thefts of all kinds made a continued stay
dangerous. York, Durham, and the north, including Newcastle, comprised
a tour then undertaken.

They then made their way to Bath, the general rendezvous of the
gang, and thence in what Poulter calls "three sets," or gangs, moved
independently and by easy stages into Devonshire: attending the
cattle-fair at Sampford Peverell, with marked success to themselves,
and grievous loss to the farmers and graziers there assembled. Thence
they moved on to Torrington and Exeter, and so back again to Bath,
where twelve of them met at Roberts's house.

Poulter and two confederates named Elgar and Allen then went into the
north of England again, attending fairs, horse-races and cock-fighting
matches on the sharping lay; winning about £30 or £40 at cards.
Returning to Bath, and being looked upon with suspicion, living as
they were with a number of riotous men in Roberts's house, they hit
upon the dodge of passing for smugglers, and thus at once explaining
their association and enlisting public sympathy. Every one, except the
Revenue officers, was in those times well-affected towards smugglers.

They were not only at considerable pains, but at great expense also, to
create this impression. "We used," says Poulter, in his confessions,
"to give seven shillings a pound for tea, and sell it again for four
shillings and sixpence, on purpose to make people believe we were
smugglers."

While they were thus staying at Bath, they would go now and then to a
fair, and try "the nob," or "pricking in the belt." If that did not
succeed, they would buy a horse or two, give IOU's for the money and
false addresses, and then sell the horses again. "This," says Poulter,
"is called 'masoning.'"

This was followed by a raid into Dorset. A visit of the gang to
Blandford races was highly successful. They attended numerously, and
while some robbed the booths, others devoted their attention to the
sportsmen, and yet others lightened the pockets of the crowds engrossed
in watching the cock-fighting. They wound up a glorious day by dining
in style at the "Rose and Crown," and there chanced upon the best luck
of all those gorgeous hours: finding a portmanteau from which they took
eighteen guineas, four broad pieces, and diamonds, jewels, and clothes
to a great amount. Many of these articles were taken to London by
Poulter, and sold there to Jews in Duke's Place, Aldgate, on behalf of
self and partners. The proceeds were duly divided at Roberts's house at
Bath.

The next activities of these busy rogues were at Corsham, near Bath.
They then appeared at Farringdon in Berkshire, and there robbed the
Coventry carrier. Newbury and Bristol then suffered from them. At last,
they grew so notorious in the West of England that they judged it only
prudent to alter their methods for a time, and to devote themselves
exclusively to horse-stealing: an art they had not hitherto practised
with any frequency.

An amusing incident was that in which Poulter robbed a man of £20. The
foolish fellow, an utter stranger, had been rash enough to display his
money to Roberts one night in a country alehouse. It had just been paid
to him, he said. "And it will presently be taken from you," Roberts
might truly have retorted. But he merely in a sly manner drew Poulter's
attention, who later followed the man and presenting a metal tinder-box
to his head, roared out, "Your money or your life." The tinder-box in
the darkness looked so like a pistol that the money was meekly handed
over.

Poulter then went off to Trowbridge, in company with a new recruit,
Burke by name, an Irishman, who had been confidential ostler to
Roberts, and was now advanced to full membership of this body of
raiders. Meeting a post-chaise near Clarken Down, Burke proposed to
attack it, but Poulter would agree only on condition that no violence
were used. Poulter then led the attack, but in the darkness put his
hand with accidental force through the window, and cut it severely.
In doing so, his pistol went off, and Burke thinking it was the
occupant of the chaise who had fired, replied with his own firearms.
Fortunately, no one was hit.

The chaise was occupied by Dr. Hancock and his little girl. Poulter
took up the child and kissed her, and then, setting her down, robbed
the Doctor of one guinea and a half in gold, six shillings, a gold
watch, and some clothes: a booty not worth all the trouble, and
certainly not by a long way worth the further trouble the affair was
presently to bring.

After seeing the post-chaise disappear in the darkness, Poulter and his
companion made their way to a neighbouring inn, and coolly displayed
their takings to the landlord and his wife, who appear to have been,
if not actual confederates, at least better disposed to self-revealed
robbers than honest innkeepers should be. The landlady gave the
highwaymen a bag for the clothes, and the landlord, when they lamented
the fact of all their powder and ball being fired off, obligingly
removed the charge from his loaded fowling-piece, and melted down two
pewter spoons for casting into bullets. The landlady, when Poulter and
Burke asked her if these preparations for arming did not alarm her,
said: "No, they are not the first pistols I have seen loaded by night
in this kitchen." Evidently an inn that the solitary and unarmed
traveller with money about him should avoid.

She added thoughtfully that, after this robbery, they had better travel
as far away as they could, that night from the spot. She would send
them any news.

They then left, and, taking a horse they chanced to see in an adjacent
meadow, proceeded to Exeter, where they sold the stolen articles to a
receiver.

It was not more than three weeks later when Poulter was arrested on
suspicion of being concerned in the robbery of Dr. Hancock. He was
thrown into Ilchester gaol, brought to trial, and condemned to death.
He made a full confession and disclosed the names of no fewer than
thirty-one of his associates, their places of meeting, and their
methods. He was not only anxious to save his life by thus turning
evidence against the gang, but he was genuinely wearied of the manner
of life into which he had been hounded.

Many members of the gang, he said, lived to all appearances
respectably. Their general meeting-place was Bath. He added that it was
on every account desirable that the messenger to the police at Bath,
entrusted with these disclosures, should keep all these things secret,
except to the Mayor; but some one had gossiped, for within one hour
of his arrival those revelations were the talk of the town, and the
names of those implicated in them were freely mentioned. The next day
they were even printed, in accounts of the disclosures hastily struck
off and sold in the streets. The very natural result was that most of
the persons named escaped before justice could lay hands upon them. A
list of nineteen not taken, and twelve in various gaols all over the
country, is printed in the _Discoveries_.

Dr. Hancock's property was found and returned to him. His conduct
was one of the most astonishing features in this amazing case, and
reflected considerable discredit upon him; for although he visited
Poulter in Ilchester gaol, before the trial, and assured the prisoner
that although he was obliged to be a prosecutor, he would bear lightly
upon the facts, and would in the event of a conviction use his best
efforts to obtain the Royal pardon, he treacherously used every effort
to secure his being hanged. There seems to have been no motive for this
double-dealing, except his own natural duplicity. His treachery was
thorough, for he even used his influence with the judge to obtain a
shortening of the period between sentence and execution.

The trial and the revelations made by Poulter excited keen and
widespread public interest, and the lengthy pamphlet account of
them, entitled "The Discoveries of John Poulter, otherwise Baxter,
apprehended for robbing Dr. Hancock on Clarken Down, near Bath," had a
large and long-continued sale. A copy of the fourteenth edition, issued
in 1769, fourteen years later, is in the British Museum library.

He was respited for six weeks, in consideration of the further
disclosures he was to make, or of any evidence he might be required
to give, and in this time, so moving was his tale, and so useful was
the information he had given, that the corporations of Bath, Bristol,
Exeter, and Taunton, together with numerous private gentlemen of
considerable influence, petitioned that he might be reprieved. It is
probable that these efforts would have been successful; but Poulter was
an unlucky man, and at this particular crisis in his affairs happened
in some way to rouse the ill-will of the gaoler, who was never tired,
in all those days of suspense, of assuring him that he would certainly
be hanged, and serve him right!

It is not surprising that, under these circumstances, the unhappy
Poulter endeavoured to escape. With, the aid of a fellow-prisoner,
committed to gaol for debt, he forced an iron bar out of a window, and
the two, squeezing through the opening, broke prison at nightfall of
Sunday, February 17th, 1755. They intended to make for Wales. All that
night they walked along the country roads, Poulter with irons on his
legs as far as Glastonbury, where he succeeded in getting them removed.
When day came, they hid in haystacks, resuming their flight when
darkness was come again. They next found themselves at Wookey, near
Wells, much to their dismay, having intended to bear more towards the
north-west. Poulter was by this time in a terribly exhausted condition,
and his legs and ankles were so sore and swollen from the effects of
being chafed with the irons he had walked with for ten miles, that it
was absolutely necessary he should rest. He did so at an alehouse until
two o'clock in the afternoon, and was about to leave when a mason at
work about the place entered, and recognised him. Calling his workmen
to help, he secured Poulter, who was then taken back to Ilchester.
Nine days of his respite were left, but a strong and murderous animus
was displayed against this most unfortunate of men, and it was decided
to hang him out of hand. The execution could not, however, take place
earlier without a warrant from London, and the trouble and expense of
sending an express messenger to the local Member of Parliament, then
in town, demanding his instant execution, were incurred, in order to
cut shorter his already numbered days. The messenger must have been
phenomenally speedy, for he is said to have returned with the warrant
within twenty-four hours; and Poulter was at once taken out of his cell
and hanged, February 25th, 1755.




PAUL LEWIS


Paul Lewis, who was, like Nicholas Horner, the son of a clergyman,
was born at Hurst-monceaux, in Sussex, and was originally put to the
profession of arms, and became an officer of artillery. The usual
career of gambling and debauchery, so productive of highwaymen, led
him first into difficulties with his creditors, and then caused him to
desert from the army. He left one service only to enter another, for
he joined the navy, and rose from the rank of midshipman to that of
lieutenant.

[Illustration: PAUL LEWIS.]

None doubted his courage, nor, on the other hand, was there any
mistaking his depravity. He robbed his brother officers of the small
sum of three guineas, and made off with that meagre amount to begin the
life of the road in the neighbourhood of Newington Butts. He levied
contributions from a gentleman travelling in a chaise on this spot,
but this, his initial effort, resulted in his capture. The plea of an
_alibi_ set up for him, however, secured his acquittal. Later he was
seized at night by a police-officer while in the act of robbing a Mr.
Brown, whose horse he had frightened by discharging a pistol. Mr.
Brown was flung violently to the ground, and Lewis was in the act of
going over his pockets when Pope, the police-officer, who had been on
the look-out for him, secured him, after a struggle.

Lewis was duly sentenced to death at the ensuing Sessions.

The Newgate Calendar, recounting all these things, says: "Such was the
baseness and unfeeling profligacy of this wretch that when his almost
heart-broken father visited him for the last time in Newgate, and put
twelve guineas into his hand to repay his expenses, he slipped one of
the pieces of gold into the cuff of his sleeve by a dexterous sleight,
and then, opening his hand, showed the venerable and reverend old man
that there were but eleven; upon which his father took another from his
pocket, and gave it him to make the number intended. Having then taken
a last farewell of his parents, Lewis turned to his fellow-prisoners,
and exultingly exclaimed: "I have flung the old fellow out of another
guinea!"

Lewis said he would die like a man of honour; no hangman should put a
halter round his neck. He would rather take his own life. But this he
had not, after all, sufficient courage to do. A knife he had secreted
in his pillow fell out one day, either by accident or design, and was
taken away from him. He was executed at Tyburn on May 4th, 1763, aged
twenty-three.




THE WESTONS


The careers of George and Joseph Weston read like the imaginings of a
romantic novelist, and, indeed, Thackeray adopted some of the stirring
incidents of their lives in his unfinished novel, _Denis Duval_.

George Weston was born in 1753, and his brother Joseph in 1759; sons
of George Weston, a farmer, of Stoke, in Staffordshire. Early in 1772,
George was sent to London, where a place in a merchant's office had
been secured for him, and there he was fortunate enough to be promoted
to the first position, over the heads of all the others, upon the death
of the chief clerk, eighteen months later. He was then in receipt of
£200 a year, and on that amount contrived to take part pretty freely
in the gaieties and dissipations of Vauxhall and similar resorts.
At this period he introduced his brother Joseph to town, and also
began a series of peculations in the office, in order to support the
extravagances into which a passion for gambling and "seeing life" had
led him. When he could no longer conceal his defalcations, he fled to
Holland, and Joseph, suspected of complicity, was obliged to leave
London.

Within three months George had returned to England in disguise. He made
his way to Durham and there entered the service of a devout elderly
lady of the Methodist persuasion. Pretending to have adopted the
religious convictions of George Whitefield's followers, he affected the
religious life, with the object of marrying the lady and securing her
ample fortune. But he was recognised on the very eve of the wedding,
and exposed. He then fled southward, with as much of the old lady's
money and valuables as he could manage to secure at the moment.

But he speedily lost nearly all his plunder in backing outsiders at
York and Doncaster races, and entered Nottingham with only one guinea.
There he fell in with a company of strolling players, managed by one
James Whiteley, who offered him the post of leading gentleman. He
accepted it, and under the name of Wilford, remained with them a little
while.

It was not a distinguished troupe, which perhaps accounts for his
having been so promptly given a leading part in it. It consisted of
two runagate apprentices, a drunken farrier, a stage-struck milliner,
two ladies whose characters it were well not to study too closely, the
manager's wife, a journeyman cobbler, a little girl seven years of age,
and a stage-keeper, who alternated his stage-keeping with acting and
barbering.

The theatre was a decrepit and almost roofless barn, and the stage
consisted of loose boards propped up on empty barrels; while the
scenery and the curtains were chiefly dilapidated blankets.
Barn-storming in such pitiful circumstances did not suit our
high-minded hero, who soon made his way to Manchester, where he became
a schoolmaster, and a leading member of a local club, where he read
the papers and conducted himself with such a show of authority that
the parson, the lawyer, and the apothecary, who had before his coming
disputed for pre-eminence over their fellow-members, yielded before his
masterful ways. He shortly became High Constable, and soon began to
abuse the position by blackmailing innkeepers and forging small drafts
upon them. The more timid and easy-going submitted for a while to
this, but others resented it in the very practical way of taking steps
to secure his arrest. George then obeyed the instinct of caution and
disappeared.

About the year 1774 the brothers met at a fair in Warwickshire, where
Joseph had been playing the game of "hiding the horse," and had hidden
three so effectively from their owners that he was presently able
to sell them, unsuspected, for over £70. They then had thoughts of
purchasing a farm, and travelled to King's Lynn, where, in the name of
Stone, they lodged some time with a farmer. Pretending to be riders
(_i.e._ travellers) to a London distiller, they wormed themselves into
the confidence of the farmer and appointed him local agent for the
non-existent firm, showing him tricks by which he would be able to
water down the spirits he was to receive, and so cheat the retailers.
On the strength of these confidences, they borrowed over a hundred
pounds, and then decamped, leaving only their "sample bottles" of
brandies and rums behind.

They thought it wise to travel far, and so made their way into
Scotland, and in the name of Gilbert took a small farm, where they
remained for only a few months, leaving secretly and at night with all
the movables, and with two geldings belonging to a neighbour.

Cumberland had next the honour of affording them shelter. In October
1776 they were apprehended on a charge of forgery at Bishop's Castle,
Shropshire, and must have received an altogether inadequate sentence,
or perhaps escaped, for they are next found in Ireland, in the
following summer, at Baltinglass, county Wicklow. They were shortly
afterwards at Dublin, frequenting the clubs under the name of Jones.
There they met a noted plunger of that time, one "Buck" English, and
fooled him in the highest degree; cheating at hazard, and obtaining
money from him in exchange for forged bills and drafts. At length,
after a fierce quarrel with English, who fought with George in the
Dublin streets and wounded him in the right hand, the Westons left for
Holyhead. Landing there with plenty of ready money, they toured Wales
at leisure; Joseph as "Mr. Watson," and George as his valet.

In May 1778 they were at Tenby. On leaving the inn, where they had
stayed and run up a bill of £30, they paid the landlord with a forged
cheque and departed grandly with the change, in a post-chaise and
four. They then visited Brecon and Bideford; George now posing as
master, in the name of Clark, and Joseph acting as Smith, his valet.
Next they are found at Sutton Coldfield, then on the Sussex and Kentish
coasts, where they purchased a vessel and became known to the fishermen
of Folkestone, Deal, and Dover as the "Gentlemen Smugglers," trading
between those parts and Dunkirk. They did very well, too, until an
interfering Revenue cutter chased them and forced them to run their
craft ashore.

After this exciting episode, they made their way to London, and led a
fashionable life, strongly flavoured with gambling and forgery. George
took a house in Queen Anne Street, and the two "commenced gentlemen,"
as we are told; George passing for a wealthy squire of sporting tastes.
Hounds and whippers-in were almost daily at the door in the morning,
and at night the rooms were filled with callow young men about town,
attracted by the brilliant card-parties given—at which, it is scarcely
necessary to add, they were thoroughly rooked.

The brothers lived here in great style, on the proceeds of forgery and
cheating at cards. They induced a lady next door to lend a sideboard
full of valuable silver plate, on the pretence that their own had not
arrived from the country, and sold it; and, advertising largely that
they were prepared to purchase plate, jewellery, and annuities, did, in
fact, make several such purchases, paying for them in worthless bills.
A good deal of the property thus obtained was stored at a residence
they had hired at Beckenham, in the name of Green.

At length warrants were issued against them, and they fled to Scotland.
At Edinburgh they posed as merchants trading with Holland, and acted
the part with such complete success that they secured a considerable
amount of credit. After forging and cashing numerous acceptances, they
left for Liverpool, where, in the guise of "linen merchants," they
repeated their Edinburgh frauds; and then, transferring themselves
to Bristol, they became "African merchants." There they did a little
privateering with one Dawson, but that, being legalised piracy, did not
appeal to these instinctive criminals, to whom crime was a sport, as
well as a livelihood.

London called them irresistibly, and they responded.

Riding up to town from Bristol to Bath, and then along the Bath Road,
they overtook the postboy in the early hours of January 29th, 1781,
driving the mail-cart with the Bristol mails, between Slough and
Cranford Bridge, and bidding him "good night," passed him. Arriving at
the "Berkeley Arms," Cranford Bridge, they halted for refreshment, and
then turned back, with the object of robbing the mail.

George took a piece of black crape from his pocket and covered his face
with it; and then they awaited the postboy.

Halting him, George ordered him to alight, and when he meekly did so,
seized and bound him, and then flung him into a field. The two then
drove and rode off to Windmill Lane, Sion Corner, and thence on to the
Uxbridge road, through Ealing, and up Hanger Hill to Causeway Lane.
There, in "Farmer Lott's meadow," they rifled the contents of the cart
and took the bags bodily away.

Having disposed the mails carefully about their persons, they hurried
off on horseback for London, to a house in Orange Street, near
Piccadilly, where they were well known. The bags proved to contain
between ten and fifteen thousand pounds, in notes and bills.

A clever plan for immediately putting a great part of the notes in
circulation was at once agreed upon; and in the space of an hour or
two, George left the house fully clothed in a midshipman's uniform,
with Joseph following him dressed like a servant. They went to the
"White Bear," in Piccadilly, and, hiring a post-chaise, set out upon
what was nothing less than a hurried tour of the length and breadth of
England; tendering notes at every stage, and taking gold in exchange.
By way of Edgeware, they went to Watford, Northampton, Nottingham,
Mansfield, Chesterfield, Sheffield, York, Durham, Newcastle, and
Carlisle. Thence they returned, on horseback, by way of Penrith,
Appleby, Doncaster, Bawtry, and Retford, to Tuxford, where they
arrived February 1st. Putting up for a much-needed rest there, with an
innkeeper well known to them, they were informed that the Bow Street
runners had only that day passed through, in search of them, and had
gone towards Lincoln.

Early in the morning, the Westons resumed their express journey, making
for Newark, where they were favoured by some exclusive information from
an innkeeper friend, which enabled them narrowly to escape the runners,
who had doubled back from Lincoln.

Thence, post-haste, they went to Grantham, Stamford, and Huntingdon, to
Royston, halting two hours on the way at the lonely old inn known as
"Kisby's Hut."

At Ware they took a post-chaise and four, and hurried the remaining
twenty miles to London; arriving at the "Red Lion," Bishopsgate, at
eleven o'clock on the night of February 2nd. The officers of the law
were not remiss in the chase, and were at the "Red Lion" only one hour
afterwards.

Once in London, the brothers separated; Joseph taking another
post-chaise, and George a hackney-coach. They were traced to London
Bridge, but there all track of them vanished.

Meanwhile, the Post Office had issued a long and detailed notice of
the robbery, and had offered a reward of two hundred pounds for the
apprehension of the guilty person, or persons:

[Illustration: [++] Post Office logo.]

                                 "General Post Office, Jan. 29th, 1781.

     "The Postboy bringing the Bristol Mail this morning from
     Maidenhead was stop't between two and three o'clock by a single
     Highwayman with a crape over his face between the 11th and 12th
     milestones, near to Cranford Bridge, who presented a pistol to
     him, and after making him alight, drove away the Horse and Cart,
     which were found about 7 o'clock this morning in a meadow field
     near Farmer Lott's at Twyford, when it appears that the greatest
     part of the letters were taken out of the Bath and Bristol Bags,
     and that the following bags were entirely taken away:—

     Pewsy.
     Ramsbury.
     Bradford.
     Henley.
     Cirencester.
     Gloucester.
     Ross.
     Presteign.
     Fairford.
     Aberystwith.
     Carmarthen.
     Pembroke.
     Calne.
     Trowbridge.
     Wallingford.
     Reading.
     Stroud.
     Ledbury.
     Hereford.
     Northleach.
     Lechlade.
     Lampeter.
     Tenby.
     Abergavenny.
     Newbury.
     Melksham.
     Maidenhead.
     Wantage.
     Wotton-under-Edge.
     Tewkesbury.
     Leominster.
     Cheltenham.
     Hay.
     Cardigan.
     Haverfordwest.

     "The person who committed this robbery is supposed to have had an
     accomplice, as two persons passed the Postboy on Cranford Bridge
     on Horseback prior to the Robbery, one of whom he thinks was the
     robber; but it being so extremely dark, he is not able to give
     any description of their persons.

     "Whoever shall apprehend and convict, or cause to be apprehended
     and convicted, the person who committed this Robbery will be
     entitled to a reward of TWO HUNDRED POUNDS, over and above the
     Reward given by Act of Parliament for apprehending Highwaymen;
     or if any person, whether an Accomplice in the Robbery or
     knoweth thereof, shall make Discovery whereby the Person who
     committed the same may be apprehended and brought to Justice,
     such discoverer will upon conviction of the party be entitled to
     the Same Reward of TWO HUNDRED POUNDS and will also receive His
     Majesty's most gracious Pardon.

                          "By Command of the Postmaster-General,

                                                     "ANTH. TODD, Sec."

It was soon ascertained that the Westons were the robbers, and careful
descriptions of them were at once circulated:

     "George Weston is about twenty-nine years of age, five feet seven
     inches high, square-set, round-faced, fresh-coloured, pitted
     with small-pox, has a rather thick nose, his upper lip rather
     thick, his hair of lightest brown colour, which is sometimes
     tied behind, and at other times loose and curled; has much the
     appearance of a country dealer, or farmer. One of his thumb-nails
     appears, from an accident, of the shape of a parrot's bill, and
     he is supposed to have a scar on his right hand, from a stroke
     with a cutlass."

The younger brother was just as closely described:

     "Joseph Weston is about twenty-three years of age, five feet
     nine inches high, slender made, of a fair and smooth complexion,
     genteel person, has grey eyes and large nose with a scar upon it;
     his hair is of a light brown colour, sometimes tied behind, at
     other times loose and curled; his voice is strong and he speaks
     a little through his nose; has a remarkable small hand and long
     fingers."

While these descriptions were staring from every blank wall, George
and Joseph were hiding, in disguise, in the Borough. They had a large
amount of money, realised by their tremendous exertions over that
long journey, and they added judiciously to their store by carrying on
their business of lending money on plate and jewellery, and paying for
the articles in the remaining notes stolen from the Bristol mail. The
famous "Perdita" Robinson was one of those victimised in this way; and,
as a contemporary account says, "lost her diamond shoebuckles which a
certain Heir Apparent presented her with."

It was in October 1781, when paying for some lottery tickets in
Holborn, with stolen notes, that George and Joseph became acquainted
with two pretty girls, cousins, employed as milliners near Red Lion
Square. George gallantly bought some shares for them, and in the
evening took them to Vauxhall Gardens. The delighted girls were told
the two gentlemen were Nabobs just returned from India; and, dazzled
with the wealth they flung about, readily consented to go and live with
them. They were soon, accordingly, all four in residence in a fine
house near Brompton; George adopting the name of "Samuel Watson," and
Joseph passing as "William Johnson."

They left Brompton for a while and migrated to Winchelsea, where they
took the "Friars," a fine house with beautifully wooded grounds. The
foremost furnishers in London, Messrs. Elliot & Co., of 97, New Bond
Street, were given orders for furniture, cutlery, and a generous supply
of plate, and from other firms they procured horses and carriages,
finally establishing themselves at the mansion in December 1781.
While in residence there the ladies conducted themselves with such
propriety, and the gentlemen appeared so distinguished and so wealthy,
that they soon moved in the best society of the neighbourhood. It did
not, apparently, take long in those times, or in the neighbourhood
of Winchelsea, for strangers to obtain a footing in local society,
for all this short-lived social splendour began in December, and
ended in the middle of the following April. The last, sealing touch
of respectability and recognition was when George was elected
churchwarden of the parish church in Easter 1782. From that pinnacle
of parochial ambition, however, he and his were presently cast down,
for Messrs. Elliot & Co., growing anxious about their unpaid bills
for goods delivered, sent two sheriff's officers down to Winchelsea
to interview the brothers. The officers met them at Rye on horseback,
and endeavoured to arrest Joseph. When he refused to surrender, they
tried to dismount him, but the two brothers overawed them by presenting
pistols, and escaped; making their way back to Winchelsea, and thence
travelling at express speed to London, in their own handsome chariot.
Their identity with the Westons and the robbers of the mail was
revealed in that encounter with the sheriff's officers, one of whom
had observed George's peculiarly distorted thumb-nail. Information was
thereupon given, and a redoubled search begun.

They went at once to their old hiding-place in the Borough, and might
again have escaped detection had they been sufficiently careful. But,
gambling for high stakes at the "Dun Horse," they quarrelled violently,
and in the hearing of the ostler used some remarks that led him to
suspect them. He communicated his suspicions to the police at Bow
Street, and although they appear to have become uneasy and to have
then left the Borough, they were traced on April 17th to Clements'
Hotel, in Wardour Street. Mr. Clark, the officer sent to arrest them,
met Mrs. Clements at the entrance and asked if two gentlemen of the
description he gave were in the house. She said she would see, and went
and warned them. Down they came, and, with pistols cocked and presented
at him, walked past as he was standing in the passage, and, without
a word, into the street. Once out of the house, they ran swiftly up
Wardour Street, into Oxford Street, and then doubled into Dean Street
and into Richmond Buildings. Unfortunately for them, this proved to
be a blind alley, and an unpremeditated trap. They hurried out again,
but already the mob was coming down the street after them, and they
had only reached Broad Street when they were overtaken. Both fired
recklessly upon the crowd; no one but a butcher-boy being hit, and he
only slightly grazed under the left ear.

George was then knocked down by a carpenter, with a piece of wood. The
carpenter, we learn, "afterwards jumping upon him, kept him down till
his pistols were taken away."

Meanwhile Joseph had been vanquished in an equally unsportsmanlike way
by a carrier, "who had a large stick, with which he beat him about the
legs."

George was then pitched neck and crop, and still struggling, into a
hackney coach; but Joseph, being more tractable, was permitted to walk
to Bow Street, where, on being searched, he was found to have £240 in
his pockets, all in bank-notes that had been stolen from the mail.

On the day of their arrest they gave a bill of sale to one Lucius
Hughes, who disposed of plate to the amount of £2,500, at the price of
old silver; and jewels to the value of £4,000 were said to have been
sold to a Jew in St. Mary Axe.

After a preliminary examination, the brothers were committed to
separate prisons: Joseph to Tothill Fields Bridewell, and George to the
New Prison. They behaved with great insolence to the Bench, and seemed
to build much upon the postboy having died since the robbery. In court
they actually told Clark, who had arrested them, he was fortunate in
still having his brains in his skull that morning. Their coachman and
footman, attending upon them in the court, in livery, made an imposing
show. They were then remanded, and their wenches were in the meanwhile
arrested at Brompton, and appeared in court on the next hearing. No
evidence being forthcoming against them, they were discharged; but the
Westons were duly committed for trial, which began on May 15th, 1782.

They made a brave appearance in the dock, George being dressed quietly
but fashionably, in black, with his hair finely curled in the latest
style; while Joseph, whose taste was not so subdued, was radiant in a
scarlet coat with gold buttons, and hair "queued à l'Artois."

The trial was unexpectedly postponed, on the application of counsel
for the prosecution, owing to the death of Samuel Walker, and the
difficulty of collecting sufficient evidence; and so they were taken
back to Newgate. There they led a life typical of prison-life all
over England in those days. They entertained their fellow-prisoners,
gambled, and drank, and received their friends. They had plenty of
money, and as Newgate was then no ill place for those whose pockets
were well furnished, they were provided with every luxury that money
could buy. Unfortunately, however, they were heavily ironed: the one
circumstance that seared the souls of those gallant fellows. But, in
spite of these encumbering circumstances, they dreamt of liberty, and a
well-planned attempt to escape was made on July 2nd, the day before the
opening of the new sessions.

Their faithful young women took breakfast with them that morning, and
then left, whereupon one of the brothers called Wright, the warder on
duty at the time, and asked him to get a bottle of port and make a bowl
of negus for some expected company. He then handed him a guinea.

Wright had no sooner gone about this business than they slipped off
their fetters, which they had secretly and with much labour, filed
through. Then they calmly awaited the return of Wright, with the bowl.
It was too large to go through the hatch of their locked and bolted
door, as they had foreseen, and Wright was persuaded to unlock and open
the door and bring it in. When he had done so, the jovial highwaymen
hospitably invited him to take the first drink, and while he was
engaged in thus pleasing himself and themselves at the same time, they
made suddenly at him and pushed him violently over; then slamming the
door and fastening it securely upon him.

[Illustration: THE WESTONS ESCAPING FROM NEWGATE.]

An old woman who sold porter and such-like plebeian drinks to the
meaner prisoners, was at the head of the stone stairs up which they
then rushed, and stood still with amazement at sight of them, whereupon
they overset her and her cans, and then, by a short passage-way, came
to the outer door. They were each armed with a pistol, which their
thoughtful girls had smuggled into their cell. Escaping with them were
also one Lepierre, a suspected spy, and a certain Francis Storey.

The warder whose post was at this doorway was at that moment washing
down the steps. At once the fugitives flung themselves upon him, and
downed him as he shouted "Stop thief!" The cry was heard, and by the
time the Westons had emerged upon the street, they were followed by
a "runner," John Owens by name. The brothers very cleverly separated;
Owens following George, who ran into Newgate Street, doubled into
Warwick Lane, and made for Newgate Market. Here, however, he was felled
by the fist of a market-porter, but struggled again to his feet, and
desperately resisted until Owens and a crowd of excited spectators
arrived and dragged him back to Newgate.

Joseph was not more fortunate, and had only reached Cock Lane when his
flight also was stopped by a market-porter, one John Davis, who flung
down a sack of peas in his path. This Joseph easily avoided, but Davis
then laid hold of him by the collar.

"Let go!" said the highwayman, "or I will shoot you."

The porter did not let go, and Joseph fired and hit him in the neck.
But Davis held on until the crowd closed in, and Joseph also was soon
in his cell again.

So, too, was Lepierre, who was taken in Newgate Street. Storey was more
successful, and escaped altogether, although he had fetters on his
legs. The crowd, seeing him calmly walking along, thought he was being
re-conducted to gaol, and so did not interfere with him.

The brothers were brought to trial on July 6th, 1782, charged with
robbing the Bristol mail near Cranford Bridge, on January 29th, 1781.
Over a hundred witnesses appeared for the prosecution, among them,
people who had been given stolen notes by them. But the postboy,
Samuel Walker, having died, the prosecution failed.

They were then charged with forgery in respect of the notes and bills
stolen: George being convicted and sentenced to death. Joseph was
acquitted, but was then charged in the third instance with maliciously
wounding John Davis, for which he was found guilty and condemned. They
were executed at Tyburn on September 3rd, 1782.

Clothed quietly but fashionably in black, they went to the place
of execution in two carts, in company with several other condemned
criminals, but held themselves haughtily apart, as "gentlemen" should.
They refused the ministrations of the Ordinary, declaring themselves
to be Roman Catholics; and died firmly, and without any appearance of
contrition.




JACK RANN: "SIXTEEN-STRING JACK"


John Rann, better known as "Sixteen-string Jack," was born in the
neighbourhood of Bath, midway in the eighteenth century. As a boy he
earned a meagre but honest living by peddling articles of everyday
household consumption in the villages round about. He and his
donkey were well remembered in after years, and aroused the envious
anticipations of other small boys who, reckless of the appointed end
of highwaymen, looked forward to some happy day when they too might
perhaps blossom out from such obscure beginnings into such fame as his.
He was but twelve years of age when his handsome face attracted the
attention of a lady prominent in the neighbourhood. She offered him
a situation, and he gratefully accepted. A little later we find him
in London, occupied as a stable-helper in Brooke's Mews. From that he
became a postilion, and then an officer's servant. About the year 1770
he was coachman to a gentleman living in the neighbourhood of Portman
Square, and was at one time in the service of the Earl of Sandwich.
In this situation he obtained the nickname of "Sixteen-string Jack,"
from the bunches of eight parti-coloured ribbons he gaily wore at the
knees of his breeches; but by some intimates it was supposed that these
"sixteen strings" were a covert allusion to his having been sixteen
times arrested and charged, but on as many occasions acquitted. Such
were the legends that enwrapped the career of him whom Dr. Johnson
described as "above the common mark" in his line.

It was this love of finery that led to the undoing of Jack Rann,
but before it sent him down into the company of those who lived by
their wits, employed in unlawful enterprises, it raised him to better
situations. For Rann was a tall, smart fellow, and good clothes well
became him.

But flowered-satin waistcoats, and full-skirted damasked coats of silk,
elaborately embroidered, are not paid for out of a coachman's wages,
and Rann soon found himself deeply in debt. And, moreover, of what
possible use are brave costumes, but to flaunt and flourish about in?
And when you do so flourish, you must needs go the pace altogether.
There were excellent companions in those places to which Rann most
resorted, as a gentleman of fashion, at Vauxhall, and elsewhere; and
there were the card-tables, where he had a passing run of luck; and
there were the women. In spite of being pitted somewhat with the
small-pox, he was still a handsome fellow, and he played the very Cupid
with the girls.

All these items totted up to a very costly sum-total, and the
gaming-tables did not long stand him in good stead. At the moment when
he was in the sorest straits, he became acquainted with three men:
Jones, Clayton, and Colledge (this last known as "Eight-string Jack"),
in whose company he very speedily grew more and more reckless, and at
last was dismissed from his situation with a long-suffering nobleman,
and refused a character. Thus turned adrift upon the world, he began,
with those three companions, a career of pocket-picking, and thence
drifted by easy stages into the society of highwaymen and of receivers
of stolen goods.

In these circles there moved at that time a certain Eleanor Roche,
originally a milliner's apprentice, but who, from a somewhat
unfortunate friendship with an officer of the Guards, had declined upon
the condition of "fence," and generally, the fair friend and ally of
the nimble-fingered, and the speakers with travellers on the highways.
Jack Rann was a free-lover. Pretty faces, rosy lips, infallibly
attracted him, and although he loved his Nelly best, he scarce knew the
meaning of faithfulness.

But to Ellen Roche, "Sixteen-string Jack" was her own Jack, her hero;
and when once she had met him, she had eyes for none other.

Rann was first in custody in April 1774, at the Old Bailey, in
company with two others, named Clayton and Shepherd, on a charge of
robbing William Somers and Mr. Langford on the highway. All three
were acquitted, but on May 30th Rann was at Bow Street, charged
with robbing Mr. John Devall of his watch and money, near the ninth
milestone on the Hounslow Road. It was the watch brought him there.
The gallant Rann had brought it back with him from the road—just as
the hunter, home from the hill, returns with the day's spoil to his
domestic circle. He handed it to Ellen, who in turn sent out a certain
Catherine Smith to offer it in pledge with the nearest pawnbroker. The
pawnbroker, distrustful man, sent for the police, who, seeing at once
that Catherine Smith was merely an intermediary, apprehended Rann and
Ellen.

"Sixteen-string Jack" made a proud, defiant figure in the dock before
Sir John Fielding. He was dressed not only in, but in advance of
the fashion. He was in irons, but the grimness of those fetters was
disguised in the blue satin bows in which they were tricked out, and in
his fine coat he carried a nosegay as big as a birch-broom. Beside him,
but not so collected as he, stood Ellen, charged with receiving.

Ellen Roche had, indeed, lost her nerve altogether when Catherine Smith
deposed to having been told by her how Rann was expected home that
evening with some money; that he returned about ten o'clock, when Roche
told her he had brought ten guineas and a watch, and that she was sent
out to pawn the watch. Crying, and hardly aware of what she was doing,
Ellen at the first hearing owned that Rann had given her the watch, and
the two were thereupon committed.

At the trial, after having had plenty of time for reflection, she
stoutly declared that she never before had set eyes upon him, and that
her former evidence was a mistake!

Jack himself carried it off bravely, and, indeed, insolently. "I know
no more of the matter than you do," he replied to Sir John Fielding,
and added impudently, "nor half so much, neither."

The prosecution, on some technicality, broke down, and the pair were
released. They celebrated the happy occasion by dining extravagantly
and then spending the evening at Vauxhall, where Rann was the gayest of
the gay, and returned home with two watches and three purses.

An absurd burglary charge brought him into the dock again, that July.
The watch discovered him half-way through the window of a house in
which lodged one Doll Frampton, and not only hauled him out, but
marched him off to prison; but it appeared that he was only keeping an
appointment to supper with the weary Doll, who, tired of waiting for
him, had gone to bed. The Bench, assured of as much by the shameless
minx herself, dismissed the charge, and, in addition to some pertinent
remarks about this unconventional method of entry, gave him some
excellent advice on conduct. Although Rann had escaped so far, Sir John
Fielding said, his profession was perfectly well known, and he urged
the prisoner to leave his evil courses while yet there was time.

So far from paying attention to this well-meant discourse, Rann put
in an appearance the next Sunday, not with Doll, but with Ellen, at
Bagnigge Wells, then a famous place for dining and drinking. They
drove thither in a carriage and dressed—in the slang phrase—"up to the
nines." Jack was splendid in a scarlet coat, tambour waistcoat, white
silk stockings, and a laced hat. Of course there flew at his knees the
already famous sixteen strings.

[Illustration: JACK RANN.]

He was by nature boastful, and when the drink was in him bragged
without restraint or ordinary prudence. On this occasion he drank
freely, and, with an oath, declared himself a highwayman. Rather more
of a pickpocket, perhaps. The company trembled: some sought the way
out. "No fear, my friends," quoth he, "this is a holiday." Then he
fell to quarrelling, and presently lost a ring from his finger, and
declared those present had stolen it. Then again his mood changed.
"'Tis no matter," he exclaimed; "'tis but a hundred guineas gone,
and one evening's work will replace it." Then, growing more drunken
and incapable, they threw him out, and he was not in a fit condition
to resist. So, Ellen—the gentle Ellen—scratching the faces of the
foremost, as they were put out, they drove back to their lodgings near
Covent Garden.

"Fine treatment for a gentleman!" he hiccupped; and indeed a gentleman
he considered himself. But his highwayman's takings, large though they
occasionally were, did not keep pace with his gentlemanly expenses.
Debts accumulated, and sheriff's officers dogged his footsteps. He was
arrested for a debt of £50, and thrown into the Marshalsea prison; but
so much of a hero had he already become among those of his calling that
they clubbed together and liquidated the debt; and handsome Jack was
again free.

The sheriff's officers he affected to regard as low, churlish fellows,
but they would not be denied. His creditors were soon after him again,
and he was arrested when drinking in an alehouse in the then suburban
Tottenham Court Road. He shrank with horror from the touch of the two
"vulgar" bailiffs, but there was little help for it. He must pay up, or
be taken up. His drinking-companions found between them three guineas,
and he gave up his watch. Together, these involuntary contributions
made up more than the amount due. The bailiffs, on their part, agreed
to refund the balance when Rann was sufficiently in funds to redeem the
ticker; and cordiality then reigned. "Lend me five shillings," said
Rann to the bailiffs, "and I will treat you to a bowl of punch." They
fell in with the proposal, and a merry carouse ensued. Such were the
manners and customs of about a hundred and forty years ago.

Still, in the course of this merry evening, the subject of the manner
peculiar to bailiffs recurred to our Jack and rankled. "You have not,"
he grumbled, "treated me like a gentleman. When Sir John Fielding's
people come after me, they only hold up a finger, beckon, and I follow
like a lamb. There's your proper civility!"

It was soon after this that he visited Barnet races, fashionably
dressed; with waistcoat of blue satin trimmed with silver, and other
finery to match. Crowds followed him, eager to set eyes upon so
famous a person. Shortly afterwards, with perhaps some melancholic
foreshadowing of approaching doom, he attended a public execution at
Tyburn. In spite of opposition, he thrust through the ring formed by
the constables round the gallows. "For," said he, "perhaps it is very
proper I should be a spectator on this occasion." Why, he did not say,
but the inference was understood by some of the crowd.

In September 1774 he was arrested, together with one William Collier,
for a robbery on the Uxbridge road, and brought the next Wednesday
before Sir John Fielding, when Dr. Bell, chaplain to the Princess
Amelia, gave evidence that, between three and four o'clock in the
afternoon of Monday, when taking horse-exercise near Ealing, he
observed two men of mean (!) appearance and suspicious looks, who rode
past him. Presently, one of them—he thought it was Rann—turned his
horse's head and demanded his money. "Give it me," he said, "and take
no notice, or I'll blow your brains out!"

Dr. Bell handed over one shilling and sixpence, all he had about him,
and a common watch in a tortoiseshell case. So much tremendous bluster,
so paltry a booty: so poor a thing for which to throw away a life. For
that day's doings served to bring Rann to the gallows.

That evening, Ellen Roche and her servant took the watch to pawn
with one "Mr. Cordy," in the Oxford Road, or, as we should now say,
Oxford Street. Cordy was a suspicious man. He communicated with the
watchmaker, Grigman by name, of Russell Street, Covent Garden, who had
made it for Dr. Bell, who, when called upon, told how he had parted
with it.

The next day, Jack Rann and his doxy were arrested, and with them
Collier and Ellen Roche's servant, Christian Stewart. They all figured
in Bow Street dock, and later appeared on trial at the Old Bailey.

[Illustration: "SIXTEEN-STRING JACK" AND ELLEN ROCHE IN THE DOCK.]

Handsome Jack was no less a dandy on this occasion than he had been on
others, and he took the centre of the stage in his drama with a fine
air. To be sure, there were none who envied him the principal part. He
was dressed in pea-green coat and waistcoat, with unblemished white
buckskin breeches, and again his hat was silver-laced. He stood
there with every assurance of acquittal, and had taken thought to order
a splendid supper, wherewith to entertain his friends that evening,
to celebrate his release. But, as the grey day wore on, he grew less
confident. Dr. Bell's evidence was again taken, and a Mr. Clarke told
how, going to Miss Roche's lodging on that Monday night of the robbery,
he found two pairs of men's boots there, in a wet and dirty condition,
having evidently been worn that day. A Mr. Haliburton also swore that
he had waited at Miss Roche's lodgings that night until Rann and
Collier arrived.

William Hills deposed that he was servant to the Princess Amelia. He
had observed Rann, whom he knew well by sight, ascend the hill at
Acton, about twenty minutes before the robbery was committed.

This spot would be about where the Police Station now stands, in the
main road: less troubled nowadays with highwaymen than with electric
tram-cars.

In the end, Rann was found guilty and sentenced to die. Collier was
also found guilty, but recommended to mercy, and was afterwards
respited. Ellen Roche was sentenced to fourteen years' transportation,
and her servant was acquitted.

Thus the supper grew cold and was not eaten. The brave figure moved in
pea-green glory to his prison cell, and hoped there for a rescue that
never came. His last days were full-packed with the revelry the lax
prison regulations of the age permitted, and on Sunday, October 23rd,
he had seven girls to dine with him in gaol; and he the gayest of the
party. "Let us eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow we die." Or, at
any rate, in a month's time. So, with an air and a jest, behold him
on the fatal day, November 30th, 1774, the most admired figure in the
three-miles' journey from Newgate to Tyburn. Was it the cold November
air made him shiver, or the shadow of death, as, ladies' man to the
last, he raised his hat to the crowded windows lining Holborn and
thought how he would never come back? Whatever it was, it was no more
than involuntary: for, arrived at the fatal tree, he ended manfully in
his finery and his famous sixteen strings.




ROBERT FERGUSON—"GALLOPING DICK"


Robert Ferguson, who in after life became famous as "Galloping Dick,"
was a native of Hertfordshire. His father, a gentleman's servant,
proposed a like career for him, and had a mental picture of his son
gradually rising from the position of stable-boy, in which he was
placed, to that of coachman. In such respectable obscurity would Robert
have lived and died, had his own wild nature not pioneered a career
for him. He had proved a dull boy at school, but proud, and out of
school-hours showed a strange original spirit of daring, so that he was
generally to be found captaining his fellows in some wild exploit.

As a stable-boy, however, he proved efficient and obedient, and was
found presentable enough to take the postilion's place when the regular
man had fallen ill, on the eve of the family's journey to London in
their chariot. He performed that task to the satisfaction of every one,
but the other servant recovered, and the lad was obliged to return to
his stables and work in shirt sleeves or rough stable-jacket, instead
of titupping in beautifully white buckskin breeches, silk jacket, and
tall beaver hat, on one of the leading horses that drew the carriage
to town. The return to an inferior position through no fault of his
own was a bitter disappointment, and he determined to seek another
situation.

Oddly enough, at this juncture of affairs, a neighbouring lady who was
in want of a postilion chanced to ask the family who employed young
Robert what had become of their smart young man, and, when informed of
the situation, engaged him.

At this time he was close upon twenty years of age. Described as being
by no means handsome, he was of a cheerful and obliging temperament,
and might have long retained the post, had his employer not discovered
him in a discreditable love-affair with one of the maid-servants.
He was dismissed, but soon found another situation: but he never
afterwards kept a place for any length of time. Roystering companions
unsettled him and made him undesirable as a postilion.

[Illustration: "GALLOPING DICK."]

Coming up to London, he found employment in a livery-stable in
Piccadilly, but presently his father died and he found himself the
owner of his savings, amounting to £57. Alas! poor Robert. He had never
before possessed at one time the half of what he had now, and he acted
as though the sum of £57 was an endowment for life. He threw up the
Piccadilly livery-stable, and came out upon the world as a "gentleman";
or in other words, ruffled it in fine clothes in fashionable places.
He frequented theatres in this novel character, and seems to have
impressed a number of perhaps not very critical people. Amongst these
was a dissolute woman whom he met at Drury Lane. She believed him to
be a man of wealth, and sought to obtain a share of it. Ferguson flung
away all his money on her. It could not have been a difficult task,
one would say, nor have occupied him long. And when all the money
was gone, he went back, sadder possibly, but still not wiser, to his
livery-stable situation in Piccadilly, as postilion. It was in this
employment that he observed the debonair gentlemen who had been his
rivals in the affections of this woman calling upon her, and received,
where he had been thrust forth with contumely when his money was at an
end, and when she discovered that he was no man about town, but only
one who got his living in the stables. False, perfidious Nancy!

It was some time before the true character of those visitors was
revealed to him; but one day, acting as a postilion on the Great
North Road, the chaise he was driving was stopped by two highwaymen,
duly masked. One stood by the horses, while his companion robbed the
occupants of the chaise. It was a windy day, and a more than usually
violent gust blew the first highwayman's mask off. Instantly Ferguson
recognised the man who stood by the horses as one of his Nancy's
visitors.

Seeing this, the unmasked robber perceived, clearly enough, that the
situation was peculiarly dangerous, and, when he had galloped off with
his companion, laid the facts before him. They agreed that there was
nothing for it but to await Ferguson's return at a roadside inn, and
to bribe him to silence. There, accordingly, they remained until the
chaise on its return journey drew up at the door.

Two gentlemen, said the landlord, particularly desired to see the
postilion. He entered and accepted a price for his silence; further
agreeing to meet them that night at supper in the Borough. Meeting
there, according to arrangement, Ferguson was persuaded to throw in his
lot with the highway blades. His imagination took fire at the notion
of riding a fine horse, and, dressed in handsome clothes, presenting a
figure of romance; but his new-found friends were cool men of business,
and had nothing of that kind in view for their fresh associate. To cut
a fine figure was, no doubt, all very well, but the more important
thing was to know which travellers were worth robbing, and which were
not. If they could be reasonably well advised on that point, much
useless effort, and a considerable deal of risk, would be avoided, in
not stopping those whose pockets were so nearly next to empty as to
be not worth "speaking to" on the road. Their idea was that Ferguson
should continue in his employment of postilion, and, as a confederate,
keep them well informed of the movements of his clients.

Ferguson was disappointed in not being allowed a spectacular part, but
the profitable nature of the scheme appealed to him, and he agreed to
this distinctly well-conceived plan. So a long series of unsuspecting
travellers driven by him owed their extraordinary ill-luck on the road
entirely to the agency of their innocent-looking postilion, who was so
professionally interested in their movements, who was so obliging with
the portmanteaus and valises, and who secretly kept a keen eye upon the
contents of his customers' purses. Quite often it would happen that a
trace would be broken in some lonely situation, and then, strange to
say, while it was being mended, a couple of highwaymen would infallibly
appear, and threatening the postilion with horrid oaths when he
pretended to show fight, would at their leisure ransack all the luggage
and coolly request all money and personal adornments to be handed over.

Wine, women, and cards were Ferguson's downfall. Success in his new
line of life brought reckless conduct, and he grew so impossible
that the livery-stable, without in the least suspecting his honesty,
dismissed him for general unreliability. He then took to the road for a
while as a highwayman, and thus indulged his natural liking for finery.

He was an excellent horseman, and daring to the verge—or beyond the
verge—of recklessness. On one occasion, he and two companions "spoke
to" and were robbing two gentlemen on the road to Edgeware, but were
interrupted by the appearance of three other well-mounted travellers,
who gave chase. Ferguson escaped, but his two companions were caught,
brought to trial, and executed. It was this exploit that first procured
him the name of "Galloping Dick," although his name was Robert.
Complimented by admiring friends on his escape, he declared he would
gallop a horse with any man in the kingdom.

The name of "Galloping Dick" soon became well known, and was a name
of dread. No clattering horseman could come hurriedly along the road
without stirring the pulses of nervous travellers, who immediately
fancied "Galloping Dick" was upon them. Indeed, he soon became too
well known for any reasonable degree of safety, and he would then
for a while, for prudential reasons, find temporary employment as a
postilion. Frequently in custody at Bow Street, on various charges, he
was many times acquitted, on insufficient evidence; but was at last
arrested, at the beginning of 1800, on a charge of highway robbery,
sent for trial to the Lent Assizes at Aylesbury, convicted, and
executed.




JERRY ABERSHAW


The southern suburbs of London were haunted during the last quarter of
the eighteenth century by a youthful highwayman of a very desperate
kind. He was as successful as reckless, and captained a gang that made
Putney Heath and Wimbledon Common places to be dreaded as much as were
Hounslow Heath on the west, and Finchley Common in the north, and
brought the name of "Jerry Abershaw" into exceptional prominence.

The real name of this highwayman was Louis Jeremiah Avershaw, and he
was born in 1773, of the usual "poor but honest" parents. Indeed, it
would seem, in enquiring into the lives of the highwaymen, that they
in general came of such stock, whose only crime was their poverty:
although _that_, as we well know in this happy land of ours, is a very
heinous offence, it being the duty of every English man and woman to
pay rates and taxes to keep a constantly growing official class in
well-paid and easy employment.

We so rarely hear of a highwayman deriving from dishonest parents
that, it would seem, even in the more adventurous centuries, ill-led
lives were as a rule so short and sordid as to impress the children of
those who led them with the idea that honesty was not only really, in
the long run, the best policy, but that for evil courses there was no
long run at all. Otherwise, the life of the highwayman, if not by any
means, as a general rule, so gay as usually it was represented to be,
was sufficiently full of that spice of excitement which to the youthful
makes amends for much danger and discomfort, and sons might often have
succeeded fathers in the liberal profession of highway robbery.

The boyhood of Jerry Abershaw has never been dragged from the obscurity
that enwraps it. No slowly-budding flower he, but one that in one brief
day flung open its petals. Or rather, in less flowery language, we
learn nothing of the first steps that led him to the highway, and find
him at the very first mention of his doings already a cool and assured
character, robbing with impunity, and making one place in especial a
spot to be dreaded. This was the hollow of Putney Bottom, through which
the Portsmouth Road runs on its way to Kingston. The little Beverley
Brook trickles by, to this day, in the hollow; and Combe Wood, whose
thickets formed so convenient a lair for Abershaw, and a rallying-place
for his gang, is still very much what it was then.

Abershaw was not, of course, the first to see the strategic value of
the heath, and of such woody tangles as these, bordering the road for
quite three miles; for we read in Ogilby's great book on the roads,
published in 1675, of Kingston Hill, hard by as "not rarely infested
with robbers"; and a gibbet long stood near at hand, to remind those
robbers, and others who succeeded them, of their own probable fate.
But, if by no means the first, or even the last, who practised here, he
is easily the most famous, even though it be merely a pervasive fame,
not crystallised into many anecdotes.

[Illustration: JERRY ABERSHAW ON PUTNEY HEATH.]

The "Bald Faced Stag," that then stood, a lonely tavern, by the
roadside near the Beverley Brook, was a favourite meeting-place of
Abershaw and his fellows. It was afterwards rebuilt, as a superior
hostelry, in the days when the growth of travel and of coaching had
rendered the old roadside accommodation insufficient. This later house
may still be seen, standing nowadays as a private residence, with
imposing pillared portico, by the way.

Whether the landlord of the original "Bald Faced Stag," was in league
with Abershaw and his gang, or not, is impossible to say. Very
generally, the tavern-keepers of that age were suspected, and rightly
suspected, of a guilty acquaintance with the highwaymen, but it would
be too much to assume that they were all of that character; and indeed
we find in the sad story of one John Poulter, otherwise Baxter, who was
hanged in 1754 for highway robbery, that the frequenting by highwaymen
against his wish of an inn he kept in Dublin first ruined his trade
and compelled him in self-defence at last to seek a living on the road.

An innkeeper situated like him who kept the "Bald Faced Stag" in the
days of Abershaw would have no choice but to harbour the gang whenever
they felt inclined to confer their patronage upon him; but, to be quite
just, it would certainly appear that he was a willing ally, for, in the
most outstanding among the few stories told of Abershaw, it appears
that once, when taken ill on the road, the highwayman was put to bed
in the house and cared for while a doctor was procured. It was a Dr.
William Roots who answered the call, from Putney. The ailing stranger,
whose real name and occupation the doctor never for a moment suspected,
was bled, after the medical practice of the time, and the doctor was
about to leave for home, when his patient, with a great appearance of
earnestness, said: "You had better, sir, have someone to go back with
you, as it is a very dark and lonesome journey." This thoughtful offer
the doctor declined, remarking that "he had not the least fear, even
should he meet with Abershaw himself." The story was a favourite with
Abershaw: it afforded him a reliable criterion of the respect in which
the travelling public generally held him.

The notoriety Abershaw early attained led to his early end. The
authorities made especial efforts to arrest him, and, learning that he
frequented a public-house in Southwark, called the "Three Brewers,"
set a watch upon the place. One day the two officers detailed for this
duty discovered him in the house, drinking with some of his friends,
and entered to arrest him. But Abershaw was on the alert, and, as they
stood in the doorway, arose with a pistol in either hand, and, with a
curse, warned them to stand clear, or he would shoot them. Disregarding
this threat, they rushed in, and Abershaw, firing both pistols at once,
mortally wounded one officer and severely wounded the landlord in the
head.

But he did not escape. He was tried at Croydon Assizes, on July 30th,
1795, before Mr. Baron Penryn, for murder; the wounded officer, David
Price, having died in the interval. A second indictment charged him
with having attempted to murder the other, by discharging a pistol at
him.

Abershaw was taken by road from London to Croydon, and passing
Kennington Common, then the principal place of execution in Surrey,
he laughingly asked those in charge of him, if they did not share his
own opinion that he would himself be "twisted" there on the following
Saturday. That was the conventionally callous way in which the
highwaymen approached their doom.

To prove the charge of killing Price was naturally the simplest of
tasks, and the jury, returning from a three-minutes' deliberation, duly
found him guilty. Prisoner's counsel, however, raising an objection
on some legal quibble as to a flaw in the indictment, the point was
argued for two hours—and not decided; the judge desiring to consult his
learned brethren on the point. There is a certain grim humour about
these proceedings; because, whatever the result of this was likely
to be, there was yet the second indictment to be tried, and on that
alone there could be no doubt of Abershaw being capitally convicted.
It was then proceeded with, and Abershaw himself, seeing how he must
inevitably be found guilty, and hanged, threw off all restraint. He
insolently inquired of the judge, if he were to be murdered by perjured
witnesses, and in violent language declared his contempt for the Court.
Even at that solemn moment, when, having been found guilty on the
second count, the judge, in passing sentence, assumed the black cap,
he was not affected, except by rage and the spirit of mockery, and
followed the action of the judge by putting on his own hat. The gaolers
were at last compelled by his violence to handcuff him, and to tie
his arms and legs. In that condition he was removed to gaol, to await
execution.

There he must soon have realised the folly of resistance; for he became
quiet and apparently resigned. In the short interval that remained
between his sentence and that appearance on Kennington Common he had
accurately foreseen, he occupied himself with drawing rough pictures on
the whitewashed walls of his cell with the juice of black cherries that
had formed part of the simple luxuries his purse and the custom of the
prison permitted. These idle scribblings represented his own exploits
on the road. In one he appeared in the act of stopping a post-chaise
and threatening the driver: the words, "D—n your eyes! Stop!" appended.
The remainder of this curious gallery pictured the other incidents
common in a highwayman's life.

The time then allowed convicted criminals between their sentence and
execution was very short. On August 3rd he was hanged on Kennington
Common; game—or, rather, callous—to the last. Arrived there, he kicked
off his boots among the great crowd assembled, and died unshod, to
disprove an old saying of his mother's, that he was a bad lad, and
would die in his shoes. He was but twenty-two years of age when he met
this fate, not actually for highway robbery, but for murder. His body
was afterwards hanged in chains in Putney Bottom, the scene of his
chief exploits, and an old and nasty legend was long current in those
parts of a sergeant in a regiment soon afterwards marching past firing
at the distended body, by which (to make short of an offensive story)
the neighbourhood was nearly poisoned. The sergeant was reduced to the
ranks for this ill-judged choice of a target.




JOHN AND WILLIAM BEATSON


The very general idea that the highwayman ended with the close of the
eighteenth century is an altogether erroneous one, and has already been
abundantly disproved in these pages. They not only continued into the
nineteenth century, but were very numerously executed for their crimes.
Early among those who belong to that era were John Beatson and William
Whalley. Theirs is a sad tale of business failure and of a desperate
recourse to the road, rather than the story of professional highwaymen.

John Beatson was a Scotsman, who had in his youth been a sailor in
the merchant service, and had made many voyages to India and other
tropical countries. Tired at last of the sea, he settled at Edinburgh,
where he established himself as an innkeeper at the "College Tavern."
There he carried on a successful business for many years, and only
relinquished it at last in favour of his adopted son, William Whalley
Beatson, who for some time carried it on happily and profitably with
his wife. Unhappily, his wife died, and when he was left alone it was
soon seen, in the altered circumstances of the house, that it was
she, rather than her husband, who had in the last few years kept the
inn going. Left alone, and incapable of managing the domestic side of
the house, he was taken advantage of by the servants, who robbed him
at every opportunity; and, in short, in every respect the "College
Tavern" declined and ceased to pay its way. He gave it up and went to
London, with the idea of entering the wine and spirit trade there.
Arrived in London, he took a business in Bedford Street, Covent Garden,
and, finding it uncongenial, sold it to a man and accepted six months'
bills in payment. The purchaser went bankrupt within three months,
throwing Beatson himself into difficulties. At this juncture of affairs
he consulted with his adopted father as to what was to be done, and
the upshot of their long and anxious deliberations was that there was
no help for it but to try and retrieve their fortunes by robbing upon
the King's highway. Their first essay in this new business was begun
on July 18th, 1801, when they travelled from London to the "Rose and
Crown" at Godstone, Surrey, staying there the night. The next morning
they set off on foot, and at midday were at the "Blue Anchor," on the
road to East Grinstead. They dined there, and asked questions about
the mail, and did not leave until six o'clock. Between eight and nine
o'clock they were seen on East Grinstead Common. Half an hour after
midnight, the postboy who drove the mail-cart was stopped by two men
near Forest Row, south of East Grinstead. They produced a pistol and
threatened him with it if he refused to give up the bags. Then, he
unresisting, they led the horse into a meadow, where they took the bags
and carried them off. It was afterwards found that they had walked no
less a distance than six miles with them. They were afterwards found in
a wheatfield near the village of Hartfield, the letters strewn about in
the corn.

They had taken all the Bank of England notes, and notes issued by
country banks, and had left drafts and bills of exchange worth upwards
of £9,500.

The next morning the two Beatsons appeared at the "Chequers" at
Westerham, in a very exhausted condition, and had breakfast. With the
excuse that they were Deptford people, and under the necessity of
reaching the dockyard there in a hurry, they hastily hired a horse and
trap, paying for their refreshment with a £2 note, and for the hire
with one for £5.

The people of the "Chequers" inn thought it strange, when their man
returned, to hear that he had driven them, not to the dockyard at
Deptford, but to a coach-office in the town, where they had at once
taken places in a coach for London.

The fugitives did not hurry themselves when they reached town. On the
evening of their arrival, it was afterwards discovered, the elder
purchased a pair of shoes at a shop in Oxford Street, paying for them
with a £10 Bank of England note. They employed their time in London
in a shopping campaign, purchasing largely and always tendering
bank-notes, with the object of accumulating a large sum of money in
gold, by way of change.

At the end of this week they procured a horse and gig and left London,
saying they intended to travel to Ireland. Meanwhile, the loss of
so many bank-notes had been widely advertised and the good faith of
persons who presented any of them for payment enquired into. The
movements of the men who had stopped the driver of the mail-cart and
robbed him were traced, and soon the Holyhead Road was lively with the
pursuit of them.

They arrived at Knutsford, in Cheshire, only a short time before the
coming of the mail-coach bringing particulars of the robbery. Before
that, however, they had attracted a considerable deal of notice by
their singular behaviour at the "George" inn, where they had put up. To
draw attention by peculiarities of dress or demeanour is obviously the
grossest folly in fugitive criminals, whose only chance of safety lies
in unobtrusive manners and appearance. That would appear to be obvious
to the veriest novices in crime. But the Beatsons were no doubt by this
time agitated by the serious position in which they had irretrievably
placed themselves, and in so nervous a state that they really had not
full command of their actions. They adopted a hectoring manner at the
inn, and on the road had attracted unfavourable notice by the shameful
way in which they had treated their horse.

On the arrival of the mail containing the official notices of the
robbery and descriptions of the two men concerned in it, the appearance
of these two men with the gig seemed so remarkably like that of the
robbers, that a Post Office surveyor was sent after them. They had
already left Knutsford, and had to be followed to Liverpool, where they
were discovered at an inn, and arrested.

The mere hasty preliminary inspection of their travelling valise was
sufficient to prove that these were the men sought for. Bank-notes
to the amount of £1,700 were discovered, wrapped round by one of the
letters stolen; and the purchases of jewellery and other articles
carried with them were valued at another £1,300.

Taken back to London, the prisoners were charged in the first instance
at Bow Street, and then committed for trial at Horsham. An attempt they
made to escape from Horsham gaol was unsuccessful, and they were found
hiding in a sewer. Their trial took place before Mr. Baron Hotham on
March 29th, 1802. No fewer than thirty witnesses were arrayed against
them; chiefly London tradesmen, from whom they had made purchases and
tendered notes in payment. There could hardly ever have been a clearer
case, and the result of the trial was never for a moment in doubt.

The affectionate efforts of the elder man to shield his adopted son
drew tears from many eyes, but the readiness of that "son" to take
advantage of them and to throw the guilt upon him excited, naturally
enough, much unfavourable comment. Two statements had been prepared and
written by the prisoners, and both were read by the younger in court.
The first was by John Beatson, who declared himself to be guilty, but
his "son" innocent. Whalley's own statement, to the same effect, went
into a detailed story of how his "father" had given him a large number
of the notes, and had told him they were part of a large remittance he
had lately received from India.

The story was so clumsy and unconvincing, and the story told by the
prosecution so complete in every detail, that both prisoners were
speedily found guilty. They were condemned to death, and were hanged on
Saturday, April 7th, 1802, at Horsham, before a crowd of three thousand
people. The elder Beatson was seventy years of age and the younger but
twenty-seven.




ROBERT SNOOKS


The careers of the highwaymen were, in the vast majority of cases,
remarkably short, and they were, for the most part, cut off in the
full vigour of their manly strength and beauty. The accursed shears
of Fate—or, to be more exact, a rope dangling from a beam—ended them
before experience had come to revise their methods and fit them out
with the artistry of the expert.

But few were so summarily ended as the unfortunate Robert Snooks.
This person, a native of Hungerford, was in the year 1800 living at
Hemel Hempstead, in Hertfordshire, in the immediate neighbourhood of
Boxmoor. He had often observed the postboy carrying the well-filled
mail-bags across the lonely flat of Boxmoor, and (he is described as
having been of remarkably fine physical proportions) thought how easy a
thing it would be to frighten him into giving them up. Accordingly, on
one sufficiently dark night, he waited upon the moor for the postboy,
stopped him, and, adopting a threatening demeanour, instructed him to
carry the bags to a solitary spot and then go about his business. The
frightened official immediately hurried off to the postmaster of the
district: one Mr. Page, of the "King's Arms," Berkhamstead, and told
his tale; leaving Snooks to ransack the bags and take what he thought
valuable.

The bags, turned inside out, were found, the next morning, with a heap
of letters, torn open and fluttering in all directions across the
fields. It subsequently appeared that the highwayman had secured a very
considerable booty, one letter alone having contained £5 in notes.
The postboy did not know the man who had terrorised him: only that he
was a "big man"; but the simultaneous disappearance of Snooks left no
reasonable doubt as to who it was.

This was Snooks's first essay in the dangerous art, and it proved also
his last. Hurrying to London, he took up his abode in Southwark, and
presently had the dubious satisfaction of reading the reward-bills
issued, offering £300 for his capture. After a while he thought
himself comparatively safe, and was emboldened to make an effort at
negotiating one of the notes he still held. Afraid to do this in
person, he thought he might see what would happen if he tried to pass
one of the notes through the intermediary of the servant of the house
where he was lodging, and accordingly sent her to purchase a piece
of cloth for a coat, handing her a five-pound note. The tradesman
evidently found something suspicious about the note thus tendered,
and returned it, with the message that "there must be some mistake."
Whether the tradesman would have followed this up by communicating any
suspicions he may have had to the authorities does not appear; but "the
wicked flee when no man pursueth," and Snooks hurried off to what was
undoubtedly the most dangerous place for him. He fled to Hungerford,
his birthplace; yet, strange to say, he long evaded capture, and it was
not until 1802 that he was arrested, on the information of a postboy
who had been to school with him. He was in due course brought to trial
at Hertford Assizes, found guilty, and sentenced to death. It was
judged expedient, as a warning to others, that he should be executed on
the scene of his crime, the selection of the spot falling to Mr. Page,
who, besides being postmaster of Berkhamstead, was High Constable of
the Hundred of Dacorum. As a further warning, and one likely to be of
some permanence, it was originally proposed to gibbet the body of the
defunct Snooks on the same spot; so that, swinging there in chains on
the moor, it might hint to others the folly of doing likewise. But the
time was growing full late for such exhibitions; the inhabitants of the
district protested, and this further project was abandoned.

Journeying from Hertford gaol on the morning of the fatal March 11th,
1802, Snooks, according to a surviving tradition, was given a final
glass of ale at the "Swan" inn, at the corner of Box Lane, and is said
to have remarked to the rustics hastening to the scene of execution:
"Don't hurry; there'll be no fun till I get there."

The usual large and unruly crowd, that could always be reckoned upon
on such melancholy occasions, was present, and seemed to regard the
event as no more serious than a fair. To those thus assembled, Robert
Snooks, standing in the cart under the gallows, held forth in a moral
address:

"Good people, I beg your particular attention to my fate. I hope this
lesson will be of more service to you than the gratification of the
curiosity which brought you here. I beg to caution you against evil
doing, and most earnestly entreat you to avoid two evils, namely,
'Disobedience to parents'—to you youths I particularly give this
caution—and 'The breaking of the Sabbath.' These misdeeds lead to the
worst of crimes: robbery, plunder, bad women, and every evil course.
It may by some be thought a happy state to be in possession of fine
clothes and plenty of money, but I assure you no one can be happy with
ill-gotten treasure. I have often been riding on my horse and passed
a cottager's door, whom I have seen dressing his greens, and perhaps
had hardly a morsel to eat with them. He has very likely envied me in
my station, who, though at that time in possession of abundance, was
miserable and unhappy. I envied him, and with most reason, for his
happiness and contentment. I can assure you there is no happiness but
in doing good. I justly suffer for my offences, and hope it will be a
warning to others. I die in peace with God and all the world."

[Illustration: SNOOKS ADDRESSING THE CROWD AT HIS EXECUTION.]

The horse was then whipped up, the cart drawn away from beneath the
gallows-tree, and Robert Snooks had presently paid the harsh penalty
of his crime. He had behaved with remarkable courage, and, espying an
acquaintance in the crowd, offered him his watch if he would promise
to see that his body received Christian burial. But the man, unwilling
to be recognised as a friend of the criminal, made no response, and
Snooks's body was buried at the foot of the gallows. A hole was dug
there, and a truss of straw divided. Half was flung in first; the body
upon that, and the second half on top. The hangman had half-stripped
the body, declaring the clothes to be his perquisite, and would have
entirely stripped it, had not the High Constable interfered, insisting
that some regard should be had to decency.

A slow-moving feeling of compassion for the unhappy wretch took
possession of some of the people of Hemel Hempstead, who on the
following day procured a coffin, reopened the grave, and, placing the
body in the coffin, thus gave it some semblance of civilised interment;
but, those being the times of the body-snatchers, doubts have been
expressed of the body being really there. It is thought that the
body-snatchers may afterwards have visited the lonely spot and again
resurrected it.

Two rough pieces of the local "plum-pudding stone" were afterwards
placed on the grave, and remained until recent years.

Boxmoor is not now the lonely place it was. The traveller who seeks
Snooks's grave may find it by continuing northward from Apsley End,
passing under the railway bridges, and coming to a little roadside inn
called the "Friend at Hand." Opposite this, on the right-hand side
of the road, and between this road and the railway embankment runs a
long narrow strip of what looks like meadow land, enclosed by an iron
fence, This is really a portion of Boxmoor. At a point, a hundred and
fifty yards past the inn, look out sharply for a clump of five young
horse-chestnut trees growing on the moor. Close by them is a barren
space of reddish earth, with a grassy mound, a piece of conglomerate,
or "pudding-stone," and a newer stone inscribed "Robert Snooks, 11
March, 1802." This has been added since 1905, and duly keeps the spot
in mind.

[Illustration: SNOOKS'S GRAVE.]




HUFFUM WHITE


The decay of the highwayman's trade and its replacement by that of
the burglar and the bank-robber is well illustrated by the career of
Huffum, or Huffy, White, who was first sentenced for burglary in 1809.
Transportation for life was then awarded him, and we might have heard
no more of his activities, had not his own cleverness and the stupidity
of the authorities enabled him to escape from the hulks at Woolwich.
Thus narrowly missing the long voyage to Botany Bay, he made direct for
London, then as now the best hiding-place in the world. He soon struck
up an acquaintance with one James Mackcoull, and they proposed together
to enter upon a course of burglary; but at the very outset of their
agreement they were arrested. Mackcoull, as a rogue and vagabond, was
sent to prison for six months, and White was sentenced to death as an
escaped convict, the extreme penalty being afterwards reduced to penal
servitude for life.

[Illustration: HUFFUM WHITE ESCAPING FROM THE HULKS.]

On January 20th, 1811, Mackcoull was released, and at once, like
the faithful comrade he was, set about the task of securing White's
escape from the convict ship to which he had again been consigned.
Dropping overboard in the fog and darkness that enshrouded the lower
reaches of the Thames on that winter's evening into the boat that
Mackcoull had silently rowed under the bows of the ship, White was
again free.

An astonishing enterprise now lay before White, Mackcoull, and a new
ally: a man named French. This was nothing less than a plan to break
into the premises of the Paisley Union Bank at Glasgow. Arrived in
Glasgow, they at length, after several disappointments, succeeded in
forcing an entry on a Saturday night, selecting that time for the sake
of the large margin it gave them for their escape, until the re-opening
of the bank on the Monday morning. Their booty consisted of £20,000 in
Scotch notes: a large sum, and in that form an unmanageable one, as
they were eventually to discover.

The burglary accomplished, their first care was to set off at once for
London, posting thither by post-chaise, as fast as four horses could
take them. At every stage they paid their score, which they took care
should be a generous one, as beseemed the wealthy gentlemen they posed
as, with a £20 note: thus accumulating, as they dashed southward along
those four hundred miles, a heavy sum in gold.

On the Monday morning the loss of the notes was of course at once
discovered. Information was easily acquired as to the movements of
the men who were at once suspected, and they were followed along the
road, and some days later White was arrested in London by a Bow Street
runner, at the house of one Scoltock, a maker of burglars' tools. None
of the stolen property was found upon White, Mackcoull having been
sufficiently acute to place all the remaining notes in the keeping of
a certain Bill Gibbons, who combined the trade of bruiser with that of
burglars' banker.

Mackcoull himself went into hiding, both from the law and from his
associates, he having had the counting and custody of the notes, and
told White and French the amount was but £16,000.

It now became quite evident to French, at least, that, so far as he
and his friends were concerned, the remaining notes were merely so
much waste-paper. Their numbers were bound to be known, and they could
not safely be negotiated. So he suggested to Mrs. Mackcoull that they
should propose to return the paper-money to the Bank, and save further
trouble, on the understanding that they should not be prosecuted.

Mrs. Mackcoull appears to have had an influential friend named Sayer,
employed in close attendance upon the King, and by his good offices
secured a pardon for all concerned, on the conditions already named.
Unfortunately, she could not fully carry out the bargain agreed upon,
for, on the notes being counted, it was discovered that only £11,941
remained.

White, already in custody, was once more condemned to transportation
for life. The procedure must by this time have become quite staled by
familiarity, and we picture him going again to the hulks with an air of
intense boredom.

He, of course, again escaped, and was soon again on his burglarious
career: this time at Kettering among other places. But the exploit
which concluded his course was the almost purely highwayman business
of robbing the Leeds mail-coach, on October 26th, 1812, near Higham
Ferrers. He had as accomplices a certain Richard Kendall and one Mary
Howes. White had booked an outside seat on the coach, and had, in the
momentary absence of the guard in front, cleverly forced open the lock
of the box in which the mail-bags were kept, extracted the bags, and
replaced the lid. At the next stage he left the coach. The accomplices,
who had a trap in waiting, then all drove off to London, White
immediately afterwards making for Bristol, where he was soon located,
living with two notorious thieves, John Goodman and Ned Burkitt. A
descent was made upon the house, and the two arrested, but White
escaped over the roof of a shed, and through the adjoining houses.

He was traced in April 1813 to a house in Scotland Road, Liverpool,
where, in company with a man named Hayward, he was meditating another
burglary. The officers came upon them hiding in a cellar, and a
desperate struggle followed; but in the end they were secured.

Richard Kendall and Mary Howes, _alias_ Taylor, were already in
custody, and White was arraigned with them at the ensuing Northampton
Assizes, for the robbery of the Leeds mail. Witnesses spoke at this
trial to having seen the men in the gig on the evening of October 26th,
on the road near Higham Ferrers, and afterwards at the house of Mary
Howes, who lived close by, and the keeper of the turnpike deposed to
only one gig having passed through that evening. There were no fewer
than forty witnesses, and the trial occupied fourteen hours.

Mary Howes was acquitted, not from lack of evidence, but merely on a
technical flaw in the indictment; her offence having been committed in
another county. White and Kendall were convicted and sentenced to death.

White again came near to escaping. By some unknown means, a file had
been conveyed to him, and on the night before the execution he filed
through his irons, and then forced a way through several doors, being
only stopped at the outer gate. The following morning, August 13th,
1813—unlucky date, with two thirteens—he met his fate with an unmoved
tranquility. He declared Kendall to be innocent. When the chaplain
asked him earnestly if he could administer any comfort to him at that
solemn moment, he replied: "Only by getting some other man to be hanged
for me."

Kendall was then brought to the gallows, declaring himself to be
innocent, and a murdered man.

Mackcoull, the earlier associate of White, disappeared for years, but
was arrested for a robbery in 1820, and died in prison soon after
receiving sentence.

[Illustration: [++] Gibbet.]




INDEX


  Abershaw, Jeremiah, i. 104; ii. 361-369

  Adams, Richard, ii. 122

  Allen, —, i. 123

  — Robert, i. 276, 278-281

  Arnott, Lieut., i. 97

  Avery, —, ii. 121


  Beatson, John and William, ii. 370-375

  _Beggar's Opera, The_, i. 240; ii. 296

  Belchier, William, i. 224

  Berkeley, 5th Earl of, i. 237-240

  Bird, Jack, ii. 86-97

  Blake, Joseph ("Blueskin"), ii. 134-136

  Boulter, Thomas, ii. 238

  Bow Street Patrol, i. 123

  "Bowl" Inn, St. Giles-in-the-Fields, i. 166, 177-181

  Bracy, —, i. 76

  Bradshaw, Jack, ii. 101

  Brown, Thomas, i. 211

  Bunce, Stephen, ii. 117-120


  Carrick, Valentine, i. 145

  Catnack, James, i. 127-130

  Caxton, Gibbet, i. 201-204

  Cherhill Gang, i. 117

  Clarke, Sir Simon, Bart., i. 97

  Clavel, John, i. 307-316

  "Clever Tom Clinch," i. 166, 177

  Clewer, Revd. William, ii. 81

  "Clibborn's Post," i. 119-121

  Cottington, John ("MulledSack"), i. 158; ii. 26-34, 210

  Cox, Tom, i. 166, 254

  "Cutpurse," Moll (Mary Frith), i. 262-268; ii. 128, 129


  Darkin, Isaac, ii. 264-270

  Davis, William (the "Golden Farmer"), i. 317-332, 341

  Denville, Sir Josselin, i. 17; ii. 55

  Dickson, Christopher, i. 102

  Dorbel, Tom, ii. 72

  Dowe, Robert, i. 148, 153, 154

  Drewett, Robert, i. 211

  — William, i. 211

  Dudley, Captain Richard, i. 387-397; ii. 55

  Dun, Thomas, i. 17-22

  Du Vall, Claude, i. 175, 214, 224, 254, 334, 342-355; ii. 173,
    249, 272


  Edwards, William, ii. 79

  Elms, The, Smithfield, i. 157

  — — St. Giles-in-the-Fields, i. 158, 165

  — — Lane, Lancaster Gate, i. 158

  — — Tyburn, i. 162

  Everett and Williams, i. 254


  Falstaff, i. 62, 64, 217, 221

  Ferguson, Robert ("Galloping Dick"), i. 105; ii. 353-360

  Finchley Common, i. 245-249, 253-255, 319; ii. 122

  Frith, Mary ("Moll Cutpurse"), i. 262-268; ii. 128, 129


  Gad's Hill, i. 62, 214, 217-221, 314; ii. 10

  "Galloping Dick" (Robert Ferguson), i. 105; ii. 353-360

  Gibbets, i. 122, 199-212, 214, 363

  Gibson, John, i. 202

  Giles, St., i. 157

  "Golden Farmer," The (William Davis), i. 317-332, 341


  Hackney Marshes, i. 91; ii. 182, 208

  Haggarty, —, i. 243

  Hal, Prince, i. 62, 64, 217

  Hall, John, i. 154; ii. 110-116

  "Hand of Glory," The, i. 49-57, 210

  "Hangman's Highway," i. 156-198

  Harris, James, i. 89

  Hartley John, i. 101

  Hawes, Nathaniel, i. 253

  Hawke (or Hawkes), William, i. 147, 224

  Hawkins, John, i. 229-236

  — William, i. 229, 231, 232, 236

  Hill, Thos., i. 66

  Hillingdon Heath, i. 323, 324

  Hind, Capt. James, i. 65, 214, 273-306, 334; ii. 173, 249

  Holborn, i. 163-175

  — Bars, i. 172

  — Hill, i. 164, 170, 171

  Holloway, i. 243

  Hood, Robin, i. 23-48, 57

  Horner, Nicholas, ii. 148-157

  Hounslow Heath, i. 89, 121, 122, 123, 224-244, 267, 346, 388;
    ii. 29, 51, 71, 248, 252, 259


  Jackson, Francis, i. 356-386

  Johnson, Charles, Historian of Highwaymen, i. 14, 17, 18, 124, 235,
    270, 335, 339, 392; ii. 41, 158, 166, 233

  — Joe, ii. 167

  Joiner, Abraham, i. 67


  King, Augustine, i. 84

  — Matthew, ii. 206, 208, 209

  — Robert, ii. 206

  — Tom, ii. 198-203, 205-210, 228

  Knightsbridge, i. 222-224


  Lansdowne Passage, i. 110

  Lewis, Paul, ii. 316-319

  Lorrain, Rev. Paul, i. 132-134

  Low, Richard, ii. 115-117


  Maclaine, James, ii. 249, 271-300

  Maidenhead Thicket, i. 59, 295; ii. 38

  Marlborough Downs, i. 118

  Mary-le-Bourne, St., i. 159-161

  Mellish, Mr., Murder of, by highwaymen, i. 121

  Miles, Edward, i. 210

  Morgan, —, i. 99-101

  "Mulled Sack" (Cottington, John), i. 158; ii. 26-34, 210


  Nevison, John, or William ("Swiftnicks"), ii. 1-25, 229, 231,
    232, 234

  Newgate, i. 145, 146, 148-154, 156, 246, 249-254, 302; ii. 62, 63,
    131, 268, 296, 334-338, 352

  — Ordinaries of, i. 124-126, 131-139, 142-145, 169, 187, 365;
    ii. 117, 143, 272

  Newmarket, i. 78-82, 173-175; ii. 301

  New Oxford Street, i. 163, 176


  O'Brian, Patrick, ii. 81-85

  Ogden, Will, ii. 98-104

  "Old Mob" (Thomas Simpson), i. 254, 333-341

  Ovet, Jack, ii. 105-109

  Oxford Street, i. 163, 181, 192; ii. 279, 332


  Page, William, ii. 249-263

  Parsons, William, ii. 241-248

  Peace, Charles, i. 6-11

  _Peine forte et dure_, i. 249-254

  Phillips, Thos., i. 249-253

  Piccadilly, Highwaymen in, i. 109

  Plunkett, —, ii. 280-283, 286-290

  "Poor Robin," ii. 90-93

  Popham, Sir John, i. 62

  Porter's Block, Smithfield, i. 158; ii. 63

  Poulter, John, ii. 301-315

  Pressing to Death, i. 249-254

  Price, James, i. 211

  Pureney, Rev. Thos., i. 132, 133, 135-139, 142; ii. 117, 143, 147


  Rann, John ("Sixteen-string Jack"), ii. 340-352

  Ratsey, Gamaliel, i. 14-17

  Reresby, Sir John, i. 82

  Reynolds, Capt., i. 66

  — Tom, ii. 98, 104

  _Rizpah_, i. 204-206

  Robin Hood, i. 23-48, 57; ii. 233

  "Rowden the Pewterer," ii. 196, 198, 215

  Rumbold, Thomas, ii. 35-40


  St. Giles-in-the-Fields, i. 157, 176-181

  St. Mary-le-Bourne, i. 159-161

  St. Sepulchre, i. 148-155, 163, 165

  Salisbury Plain, i. 114, 117, 214, 318; ii. 41, 266

  Shakespeare, Highwaymen in, i. 62-64, 217, 221

  Sheppard, Jack, i. 137, 140, 183, 246, 247

  Shooter's Hill, i. 214-217, 276; ii. 101, 189, 260

  Shotover Hill, i. 255; ii. 30

  Shrimpton, John, i. 256-258

  Simms, Harry, i. 97

  Simpson, Thomas ("Old Mob"), i. 254, 333-341

  "Sixteen-string Jack" (Rann, John), ii. 340-352

  Smith, Capt. Alexander, Historian of Highwaymen, i. 11-14, 75, 124,
    235, 270, 335, 339, 391; ii. 41, 81-83

  Smith, Rev. Samuel, i. 132, 367

  Smithfield, i. 157; ii. 63, 281

  — Rounds, i. 158; ii. 34

  Snooks, Robert, ii. 376-383

  Spiggott, Wm., i. 248-253

  Stafford, Capt. Philip, i. 269-272

  Steele, Mr., Murder of, i. 240-244

  Stratford Place, i. 158-161

  Sunday Trading Act, i. 60

  "Swiftnicks" (Nevison, John, or William), ii. 1-25, 229, 231,
    232, 234

  Sympson, George, i. 229, 231


  Taylor, Tom, ii. 123-125

  Tooll, "Captain" Edmund, i. 246

  Tracey, Walter, ii. 158-165

  Turpin, Richard, i. 124, 129, 215, 245, 247; ii. 1, 173-240, 249

  Turpin's Oak, i. 245

  Twm Shon Catti, ii. 65-72

  Twysden, Bishop of Raphoe, i. 236

  Tyburn, i. 133, 146, 153, 155, 156-198, 245, 249, 254, 281, 354, 397;
    ii. 46, 59, 97, 116, 122, 147, 168, 248, 257, 284, 299, 319, 339


  Waltham Cross, i. 87

  Watling Street, i. 159

  Westons, The, ii. 320-339

  Weymouth, Charles, i. 102

  White, Huffum, ii. 384-391

  Whitney, Capt. James, i. 86, 158; ii. 41-64, 173

  "Who goes Home?" i. 92-95

  Wickes, Edward, i. 254; ii. 166-172

  Wild, Jonathan, i. 137, 187, 265; ii. 126-147

  Wild, Robert, i. 70-74

  Wilson, Ralph, i. 231, 232, 235, 236

  Witherington, Thos., i. 171

  Withers, John, ii. 75-80

  Wright, —, i. 231




_Printed and bound by Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ld., London and
Aylesbury._




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                         ANTHROPOLOGICAL PAPERS
                                   OF
                 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY

                           VOL. XXIV, PART II




             MYTHS AND TALES FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN APACHE


                                   BY

                          PLINY EARLE GODDARD

[Illustration: THE AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY SCIENCE EDUCATION]

                                NEW YORK
                   PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE TRUSTEES
                                  1919




            MYTHS AND TALES FROM THE WHITE MOUNTAIN APACHE.

                        BY PLINY EARLE GODDARD.




                             INTRODUCTION.


These myths and tales are the free translations of texts recorded in the
dialect of the White Mountain Apache. The texts themselves with word for
word translations follow as Part IV of the volume. They were recorded,
with one exception, during the winter of 1910 as a part of the studies
made in the Southwest under the yearly grant of Mr. Archer M.
Huntington. The creation myth, secured from Noze, differs in important
incidents from the versions given above from the San Carlos as well as
from versions secured from other White Mountain Apache. It should not be
assumed that these differences are tribal, it is more probable that they
are individual, since forms from the San Carlos and Navajo are closely
similar to each other.

The greater number of the remaining narratives were secured from the
father of Frank Crockett, the interpreter employed. Several of these are
ceremonial and religious in their character and probably would not have
been given except for the son's influence. Two of these were later
secured from San Carlos informants in more extended form but highly
corroborative in their general agreement.

The main purpose in recording these narratives was to secure sufficient
and varied connected texts in the dialect of the White Mountain Apache.
As a collection of mythology and folklore it is probably far from
complete. It is assumed, however, to be fairly representative.

                                                    PLINY EARLE GODDARD.

 January, 1919.




                               CONTENTS.


                                                       PAGE.

           INTRODUCTION                                   89

           CREATION MYTH                                  93

           NAIYENEZGANI                                  115

           THE PLACING OF THE EARTH                      119

           THE ADOLESCENCE CEREMONY                      123

           THE MIGRATION OF THE GANS                     124

           RELEASING THE DEER                            126

           DEER WOMAN                                    127

           THE GAMBLER WHO SECURED THE WATER-CEREMONY    128

           THE MAN WHO VISITED THE SKY WITH THE EAGLES   132

           HE WHO BECAME A SNAKE                         135

           THE HUNTER WHO SECURED THE BEAR CEREMONY      136

           THE CANNIBAL OWL                              137

           THE DOINGS OF COYOTE                          138

           BIBLIOGRAPHY                                  139




                           CREATION MYTH.[1]


There were many houses there. A maiden went from the settlement to the
top of a high mountain[2] and came where the rays of the rising Sun
first strike. She raised her skirt and the “breath” of the Sun entered
her. She went up the mountain four mornings, and four times the breath
of the Sun penetrated her. This girl who had never been married became
pregnant and the people were making remarks about it.

She went up the mountain on four successive days and four days after
that, eight days altogether, she gave birth to a child. Four days later,
the child stood on its feet. His fingers and toes were webbed and he had
neither eyebrows nor eyelashes and the hairs on his head were scattered,
one in a place. His ears were round with only the openings. Everyone
said he did not look like a man. After four more days he walked well and
played with the other children.

His mother went again to the east and lay down under a place where water
was dripping. The water fell into her as it dripped from the hanging
algæ. She did this four times and became pregnant. After four days they
all saw that her abdomen was enlarged and when she had been in that
condition four days, eight days in all, she gave birth to another
child.[3] When it was four days old it stood up and was able to walk
well. Its appearance was like that of the first child. It had webbed
hands and feet and was without hair. It had round ears with holes only.
The children walked about together, the head of one being higher than
that of the other.

The people were asking, “Whose children are these going about?” They
wanted to know who would make them like human beings. “Who are the kin
of the woman whose children are going about among us?” The mother had a
sister who wondered why the people were saying these things, for the
boys had a father who lived a long way off.

The boys were eight days old and big enough to run about and were
becoming intelligent. They asked their mother where their father was
living. “Why do you ask?” she said. “You cannot go to him.” “Why do you
say that? Why do you hide our father from us?” the boys asked. “Well, do
you really want to go where your father lives?” she asked them. “Why do
you suppose we are asking?” the boys replied. “We will go where our
father lives.” Their mother told them that they were talking foolishly,
that the distance was great, and that they would not be able to go. The
boys insisted but were again discouraged by their mother. They finally
said that it must be they had no father if they could not go to him. The
mother then consented and said they three would go to the top of a great
mountain. She cut a supply of meat and after four days, when it was near
dawn, they started. They came to the top of the mountain when it was day
and stood there facing the Sun. The woman stood between the boys holding
them by the hand. When the sun was rising she said: “Look, your father
is rising. Observe well. His breath streams out from four sides. Go
towards the streaming out of his breath. There are dangerous things
living in the east. What have you to go with?” She had a brown fly and
she gave it to the boys, that it might sit by their ears. The fly was to
show them the way and tell them where the dangerous ones lived.

She told them they were to start at midday. They remained there until
the sun reached the sky hole.[4] They then went four times around the
trees on top of the mountain. The woman started home and the boys set
out on their journey.

The boys went toward the east but the Sun was going in the opposite
direction.[5] The boys sat down and cried. A Raven, spreading out his
wings, alighted nearby and asked the boys why they were crying. The boys
replied that their father lived over there and that they were going to
visit him. The Raven asked if they were carrying anything in the way of
food with them. They replied that they had some meat. The Raven said
they might ride on his back if they would give him some of the meat. The
fly told them it would be all right to ride on the Raven, that the Raven
could see half the way and that there someone was living who knew the
remainder of the way. They were told by the Raven to break up the meat
and put the pieces in his mouth, that two of the parcels would sustain
him until he finished the journey as far as he knew the way. They were
directed to get on the Raven's back. The Raven began by flying near the
ground, then went higher and higher, circling around. A hot rain fell
but the Raven covered them with his wings. They kept putting the meat
into the Raven's mouth. When they had fed the Raven two pieces of the
meat they passed through a cloud where the large Eagle lived. The Raven
told them that that one (the Eagle) would now take them, that he knew
all the places because he saw everything upon the earth; that he himself
would go back.

The Eagle asked them where they were going, saying that he lived in a
dangerous place. The boys indicated the direction they were going,
saying they had been told their father lived there. Eagle said it was
true their father lived at that place and asked if they had heard about
his house. The boys replied that their mother had told them that the Sun
was their father and that he lived over there. Because she had told them
this they were on their way to see him. Eagle asked them by what means
they intended to go, saying even he was in danger from the Sun. The fly
staying by the ear of one of the boys flew away and soon returned with
the statement that the dangerous places did exist and that Eagle, with
whom they were sitting, was the one who knew and was in control of these
dangerous places. Before the house of the Sun was ice, interlocked like
fallen timber. Eagle addressed the boys, asking if they had with them
anything from the earth, meaning meat. They replied that they had and
each of the boys took some from his pocket. Eagle asked for some of it,
which when it was given him he ate.

Eagle then said they would set out, for he knew the trail. He requested
them to put meat in his mouth as he flew with them, indicating the
amount which would be sufficient, for the trail. When they were seated
on the Eagle he started down with them, circling around as he flew. A
storm of hail fell on them, the hailstones being large with thirty-two
points.[6] The eagle protected the boys by covering them with his wings
which were rolled back over them. When they had passed through the storm
Eagle asked that meat be put in his mouth. When he had been fed he flew
away with the boys and went through a hole which was there for him. When
he came to the trail he alighted and pointing out the path told them
that it led to the house of the Sun.[7] He said that he himself would
now turn back home.

The boys went forward until they crossed a shallow valley beyond which
was the house, which had projections running out in four directions.
When they walked with their eyes closed the house went out of sight, but
when they opened their eyes the house settled down again. It did this
four times and then it stood firmly. The two boys walked on and coming
to the house, stood in front of the entrance. An old woman who was the
wife of the Sun sat there.

She advised them to go on wherever they were intending to go, since a
person of mean disposition was soon to arrive. The woman who spoke to
them was really handsome but she sat there in the form of an old woman.
The boys replied that they had been told that their father lived there,
and that they had started to come that morning. The woman replied that
she did not know who their father was. The boys said that the Sun was
their father and they had come to visit him. The woman then asked who
had told them that the Sun was their father. They said their mother had
told them so. The woman told them that their father would soon return
and asked them to be seated on a chair she indicated. When they were
seated, the chair kept whirling around with them. When the chair would
lift up the woman would make it come down again. When the woman saw the
chair come down again she announced herself as nearly convinced they had
spoken the truth.

Saying that the Sun was now coming close, she took four silk blankets[8]
of different colors which had been sewed together projecting in four
directions and rolled the boys up in them. She put them into an inside
room. They heard the Sun come back and heard him speak. “Old woman,
where are the two men who came here?” he asked. The woman replied: “I
have not seen anyone. No one has been here.” “You say there is no one.
They must have come, for here are their tracks,” the Sun replied. “You
must have been cohabiting with someone else. You say you travel over
this broad earth and that you do not visit anyone. You must have been
deceiving me about it for two men came in from that trail saying they
are your children,” his wife said. The Sun asked that they be brought
in, and the woman opened the door, brought in the roll of blankets, and
threw it down. The Sun shook the blankets and two men stood up. The Sun
spoke: “Hesh, do you consider these to be my children? They do not look
like me.” He stood by them and repeated his question, calling attention
to their webbed hands and feet and their round ears. “Are you really my
children?” he asked them. “Who is called the Sun, I wonder?” the
youngest of the boys said, and water fell from his eyes. “Well, maybe
you are my children. Sit here and wait,” the Sun said. Their fly looked
around and reported that the man was their father. After examining the
room everywhere, the inner corners, the windows, and door, the fly told
them that ordeals were being prepared for them. He said that soon a
blazing sky would be arranged, into which they would be thrown. The fly
looked around for downy feathers which he gave the boys.

When the Sun had finished eating he asked that those who said they were
the Sun's children should be brought in. He threw them into the place of
danger. He pushed them in with lightning which had sharp spines. They
turned into downy feathers and stood in front of him again. “It is
true,” the Sun said. He threw them in four times, pushing them down.
Each time they turned into feathers and came back in front of the Sun as
before. The Sun then said he was convinced that they were his children.
His wife said: “They told you they were your children, but you have
treated them badly.” The Sun replied: “They certainly are my children
but I did not believe it before.” The Sun asked his wife to prepare a
sweatlodge as soon as they had eaten.

She made a sweatlodge covered with a blue blanket on one side, a black
one on another side, a white one on another side, and a yellow one on
another side. His wife had the stones heated red hot, like red hot iron.
They three went right in, but the Sun only came out again. When the bath
had been heated the fourth time the boys were as if they had been
boiled. He pushed back the skin which was between their fingers and
toes. He fixed for them their lower leg muscles, their knees, their
thighs, their biceps, their elbows, and their lower arms. He made the
hair of their heads come to their hips, twisting it off at that length.
He made their ears, their eyelashes, and their eyebrows, their noses,
their mouths, and their faces. He fixed every part of their bodies as it
should be. The Sun went out of the bath with the boys and sat with them
on the seat where his wife usually sat. They were just like men.[9] When
the wife of the Sun came and stood in front of them she looked at them
closely, but could not distinguish one from the other. “Move, husband,”
she said. The one sitting in the middle moved himself. “You told me you
had not been with any woman but you fooled me. These are your children.
You must have a wife. Go home with them,” the woman said.

The Sun spoke to his wife, saying that these were his children but that
if he went away with them to the earth she would be lonesome. Only today
there was a good sunset. “Just now when you said 'no' your eye winked,”
he said to her. “I am jealous of what is far away,” she said. The Sun
said he would not go, but would talk to his children.

“My boys, shall I give you names?” “Yes, it is not well to be without
names,” they replied. Then the Sun said he would name them. He told the
older his name would be Naiyenezgani and that he must behave well.[10]
He told the other one that he would be named Tobatc'istcini. “When you
are upon the earth you will be called so and you will tell them that
your father named you that. You shall say, 'He made my name
Naiyenezgani.' But you, 'Tobatc'istcini he made my name,' you must tell
them.”

The Sun then asked them for what they had come. They told him they had
come for his horse, his saddle, his bridle, his halter, his rope, and
his saddle blanket. The Sun asked who had told them he had such
property. The older one replied that their mother had told them what
property he had and had told them that she would be happy if they
brought it back to the earth. She said that he (the Sun) would also be
happy. The Sun replied that he had no property, no horse, saddle,
bridle, halter, rope, or saddle blanket. The fly had told them that the
Sun had these, but he looked around again and reported that the Sun had
them close by.

“Let us go over there,” one of them proposed. They went to a fenced
enclosure and entered through a gate. The yard was so full of black
bears that the mass of their moving backs occupied the entire space.
“Which of those are my horses?” the Sun asked. “They are fearful
animals,” the boys replied. “These are my horses,” the Sun insisted and
mounted one of them and rode around on it. The fly informed the boys
that they were being deceived. The Sun proposed that they should go in
another direction to another enclosure. Inside this yard were white-tail
deer, mule deer, elk, and mountain-sheep. The Sun announced that these
were his horses and told the boys to choose any one they liked and catch
it. “Which is the largest?” he asked them. “These are not horses,” the
boys replied, “they are named deer. We asked you for horses.” The Sun
insisted they were his horses and that he rode them great distances.
“Well, you have outwitted me. I thought I would succeed in outwitting
you, but you have won.” The younger brother asked the Sun what he was
concealing from them, saying he could find them. The Sun asked them not
to say that and proposed that they look in another place where he had a
few horses confined. They went to the place indicated and found the
place filled with antelope, sheep, goats, and pigs. “Catch any one of
these you want,” the Sun said. “You tend to them here alone,” the boys
replied and walked out leaving the Sun who followed behind.

They went to the house and ate a meal. Their fly told them that the
Sun's horses were in the enclosure that had four doors. When they had
finished eating they went to this enclosure which was a house with a
roof having holes in it. It had spikes like irons, sticking up from it.
It was closed and completely dark. “There are horses in there,” the fly
told them. The Sun said, “I told you it was useless.” One of the boys
asked that they might look in. There was a door there which he opened. A
little beyond it was another door, a little beyond another, and a little
beyond that another, and still beyond that another. They now came to
horses in the enclosure but could not enter. By standing on something
they could see through a hole in the roof. They could not get in between
the horses until they were caused to separate and to open up a passage.
The Sun then told them to catch the horse that they thought was his. The
fly sitting by one of their ears told them they were to catch the horse
with a rope which they should induce the Sun to give them. When the Sun
again urged them to catch the horse without delay, they asked whether
they should lead the horse by the mane or carry him out in their hands.
The Sun, with spotted ropes in his hand, went right through the door
which he opened. He gave one of the ropes to each of the boys, telling
them to catch the horses which were his. The animals were milling around
in the enclosure. In the center was one which was not moving, a sorrel
with a small white spot on its forehead. Its mane reached the ground.
When it raised its head one of the boys started toward it, the horses
separating. He threw the rope and caught the horse which he led back.
The Sun then told the other boy to catch a horse, wanting to know who
had told him which horse to catch. There was a stallion running around
the outside of the herd. Its mane reached the ground; he was acting wild
but the fly told them that although he acted as if he were mean he was
really gentle. He directed them to take both these horses from the Sun.
When the other boy started with his rope toward the stallion he was
running around the outside of the herd and coming toward the boy. When
he came close and saw the boy he stopped and then wheeled back. The boy
lassoed it and immediately the horse trotted up to him, nosing his arm.
He led the stallion up beside the sorrel horse which was a mare. The Sun
said: “There they are, ride them, take them with you to the earth.”

The boys then asked for the horse trappings for which they had also
come. The Sun said he did not know what they meant by horse trappings.
The younger boy said, “Well, if you do not know what horse trappings
are, do not again put them on these horses in the corral.” The Sun asked
who it was who had made them as smart as he was himself. They replied
that he, the Sun, had made them smart and had made them speak wisely.
They then asked by name for bridle, halter, saddle blanket, and
saddle.[11] Turning his back to the boys he walked away and opened a
door, bidding the boys enter. They went in and saw saddles lying there
with bridles hanging on the saddle horns. The blankets were lying
beneath. Before they went in the fly flew in and selected two out of all
the saddles. One was lying at the east and the other at the west. The
first was blue and the other yellow. The fly had returned to one of
their ears by the time the Sun said: “There are those saddles, take the
ones you want.” The fly told the boys that the saddles which looked good
really were not, but that they should choose the blue and yellow ones,
indicating them, and the blankets, halters, bridles, and ropes of
similar colors lying by them. These were the Sun's own particular set of
trappings. When the Sun urged them to hurry up each boy stepped toward
the saddle he had chosen. When they did so the saddles moved of
themselves with the blankets and bridles. There was a sound “gij” of the
moving leather and “tsil” as they came to rest.

The Sun turned his face away and took a black silk handkerchief which
had two white stripes around the border from his pocket. With this he
wiped his eyes. “I raised you for just this purpose,” he said. The Sun
started to walk toward the horses. Their fly had told them not to touch
the saddles, that the Sun himself would fix them. “They belong to you,”
the fly said. “Everything is alive; the rope on the horse moves about of
itself. The saddle will jump on of itself.”[12] The fly told them this.
The halter was gone, the bridle and saddle blanket which had been lying
on the saddle were gone. The halter, bridle, and saddle blanket that had
been with the blue saddle were also gone. The Sun called them to come
where he was standing. They both went out again and the doors of the
saddle room and of the stable were shut.

They went to the Sun, who was standing between the two horses so that
their heads projected as he held the bridles. They started away, the
boys walking in front of the Sun as he directed them to do. They passed
through the four doors to a post standing in front of the Sun's house.
He led the horses to the post where they stood without being tied.[13]
There were four chairs standing inside the Sun's house; and one by
itself for the woman.[14] His children sat on the chairs and his wife
sat on the one which was hers. The Sun addressed them as follows:—

“My boys, I will instruct you about the dangerous places you will come
to. The horses know the dangerous places on the way back. My wife is
pleased with you and treats you well. That is why you are to have these
horses, one of which is hers. The other is mine and so is the saddle,
bridle, halter, and saddle blanket. They are all mine. You will go back
to your kindred. When you are near, hurry. I will give you something.”

The Sun got up and reached inside to a shelf from which he took up an
iron knife like a sword. Turning around he took up a bow and arrows
having iron heads. There were two of the arrows. “I give these to you,”
he said. “You are giving us these! Our mother did not know about them.
Why does she not give us something?” the boys said. The Sun's wife said
she would speak a few words to them. “You shall be my nephews. Your
mother shall be my sister. She shall be like me. Because of this I have
treated you well. She shall be the same as I. I become an old woman and
at other times I am as if I were two years old. She shall be the same
way.[15] You shall tell her this before the Sun travels far. I am the
one telling you; he did not tell you. I will name my sister. Your father
will give you names.” The Sun picked something up and was still holding
it. “Wait, I will tell you something and after that he will give you a
name. I name her Nigostsanbikayo.[16] Every one will call her that. She
will come to me. You, too, will come to me. I give a name to your
mother. She will be called Ests'unnadlehi and she will help you. I make
a name for her, Ests'unnadlehi, and with that she will help you. When
she has children again they will be two girls. These girls will belong
to the people for there will be people.[17] She will help them. I, too,
will help them when they come to me. He, too, will help his children.
That is why I am telling you and you must remember it well. I have
finished. Your father will tell you about the objects he is about to
give you.”

The Sun gave the elder boy a weapon saying, “This will be called a 'blue
sword.' You will use it against the monsters on the earth. Because of
that I gave you the name, Naiyenezgani.” He gave the weapon to him
saying, “That is all for you.” Addressing the younger, he said, “Now I
give this to you, Tobatc'istcini. You will use this which I give you
against those who prey upon people. You are to help each other. I shall
be near you watching you. Whatever you do will be known to me. It will
be well if you kill these evil ones. The people will live everywhere.”
He gave him the bow with the injunction that he should draw the bow
three times without releasing the arrow and then he should shoot the
dangerous beings and they would fly apart. Having said this, he proposed
they should eat something. The Sun's wife was still sitting in her
accustomed seat. The men went to the table, well loaded with food
prepared by some unknown agency, and began to eat. The Sun's wife gave
the elder one a spotted belt with a yellow fringe hanging from its
border.

When they had finished the meal, the Sun said he did not know how the
visitors were to return. They went where the horses stood and the Sun
said, “Children, this stallion will go well in the lead. Now mount the
horses.” He held the stirrup and saddle horn and told the boys to get
on. They did so and rode away from the Sun's house where towards the
east a post stands up with white hair[18] which reaches to the ground
and turns up again. The rain falls on it. They rode their horses around
this post four times and came back where they were standing before, as
the Sun directed them to do.

When they had finished, the Sun's wife came up to them and told her
husband to count for his sons the two saddle blankets, two halters, two
bridles, two ropes, and two saddles. The Sun told them to start home;
that he was well acquainted with them. He charged them to take good care
of the saddle blankets and directed that the gray horse should go in the
lead because he knew the trail to the place midway between the earth and
the sky. From that point the sorrel horse was to lead because that one
knew the way from there on. When they returned where their mother lived
he told them to stake the horses out for four nights. The sorrel was to
be staked toward the east and the gray to the west. Having ridden the
horses among the people they were to unsaddle them in some good place. A
white saddle blanket was to be placed toward the east, a black one to
the south, a yellow one to the west, and a blue one to the north.[19]
The bridles, halters, ropes, and saddles were to be brought to the camp.
He charged them to keep in mind what he was telling, for he was telling
them this that they might be good men. He divided his property between
his boys. He told them after the horses had been running loose four days
to go to them early in the morning. This might be in any good place
where canyons meet, making a flat. When they came to them they were to
hold out their hands, palms upward, towards the horses. They were to
catch the horses while they were licking their hands. They were to
consider what he told them and when they should go for the horses after
four days, the four canyons coming together would be full of horses.
When their horses had been caught by holding out their hands, the saddle
blankets, one on the other, were to be put on them and the horses were
to be saddled. They were to ride the horses all day until sunset when
they were to be turned out again. Having turned them out, they were told
they might go the next day to see what was happening. Having finished
his speech he dismissed the boys.

They went with the Sun until they came to the top of the ridge, where
they stopped. The Sun felt the horses all over. He felt of their legs,
their feet, their faces, their ears, their manes, their backs, petting
them. “Goodbye, my horses,” he said, “travel well for my boys down to
the earth. There is food for you on the earth the same as here.” He
addressed the gray horse, telling him to be the leader on the way toward
the earth since he knew the way. He told the boys not to look at the
horses' feet nor to look behind them, but to keep their eyes fixed on
the tips of their ears.

They started; before they knew it the horses had changed places, and the
sorrel was leading. They thought the earth was far off but they soon
found the horses were trotting along on the earth. Now the horses were
running with them toward their camp. They rode up slowly where the
people were walking about. They rode to the camp side by side, and the
people all ran out to look at them. Their mother was standing outside
watching them and they rode up one on each side of her. “Mother,
Ests'unnadlehi, unsaddle our horses,” they said to her.

The people all came up to them. The woman, laughing, ran her hand over
the horses saying, “Your father gave you large horses.” When the people
had all come there, the boys told them to call their mother
Ests'unnadlehi. They all called her by that name. The older boy said
they were to call him Naiyenezgani. The younger one said they were to
call him Tobatc'istcini.[20] They addressed them saying, “When we were
here before you used to laugh at us because we were poor. We used to
walk because we were poor. We have visited our father where he lives.
The Sun's wife named our mother. Call me Naiyenezgani. That one was
given the name, Tobatc'istcini. These will be our names and be careful
to call them correctly. Do not come near these horses. We will stake one
out here and the other one there. They will remain tied out four days.
You may go.”

Before sundown on the fourth day the horses whinnied. They went to their
horses and saddled them. They rode around among the camps until sundown
and then rode them to a flat where four canyons came together. They hung
a white saddle blanket toward the east, a black one to the south, a
yellow one to the west, and a blue one to the north. Their fly told them
to hang the blankets in four places, making an enclosure of them. After
four days they were to come and would find conditions different. He
charged the boys not to miss doing just as their father had told them.
They went back to the camp carrying the saddles, bridles, halters, and
ropes. After two days had passed their fly flew away. He returned,
reporting that there were many horses filling the place where the four
canyons came together. The next day he reported that the horses were so
thick one could walk on their backs. The next day (the fourth), about
sunrise, the two boys went there with their ropes in their hands. When
they came to the eastern canyon it was full of white horses, the
southern one was full of black horses, the western was full of yellow
horses, and the northern canyon with blue (gray) horses.

They took down all the saddle blankets and piled them together. With
valleys in four directions full of horses they did not know their former
horses from the others. They considered how they might distinguish them.
The horses were milling around near where a blanket hung. They were all
mingled together with the colors mixed. The men approached the horses
but they stopped before they got to them. They extended their hands with
pollen on the palms and the horses whinneyed. Then two horses trotted up
to them and licked the pollen from the hands of their owners who caught
them while they did it.[21] They led these horses back to the camp where
the saddles, etc., were lying.

When they led these two horses all the others followed. Their fly told
them all about the two horses, what they had done, and that they had
made many horses for them. Four days from now it would come about that
the broad earth would be covered with horses. Their fly flew to the
Sun's camp and the Sun instructed him. “Drive the horses over this way
and put a halter on top of that mountain; put a rope on the top of this
mountain to the south; put a halter on the top of the mountain to the
west; and put a rope on the mountain to the north. Your father says
this,” the fly told them.

The older of the brothers told the people that they should ride the
horses and not think they were wild. “Catch any of them and saddle them.
When you have ridden your horses, then do not go near them for four
days. Keep away from the horses which are inside where the halters and
ropes are lying. Turn the horses loose in the space enclosed by the
ropes and the halter. If they see you they may stampede. These horses
will be of great value to you.”

The brothers rode the two horses and the others all followed. When the
two horses whinneyed, the others all answered. They took off the ropes
and went back to camp. They asked their mother to put up two posts and
to put a smooth pole across their tops. She was asked to put the saddles
on this pole with their horns toward the east.[22] The bridles were to
be hung on the saddle horns and the saddle blankets spread over the
saddles. They asked her to think about the saddles where they were lying
during the night.

She kept her mind on the saddles during the night and in the early
morning she went out to them. There were four saddles on the pole where
there had been only two. She still kept her mind on the saddles and the
next morning there were six lying there. “My child,” she said, “you
spoke the truth. I kept my mind on the saddles and six are now lying
there.” Tobatc'istcini said, “Very well, keep thinking about them all
night and go to them early in the morning.” When she went out, there
were eight saddles on the pole.

Naiyenezgani said he was going yonder and would be back by sunset. He
went to the mountain top where the halter lay. The Sun was standing
there. “It must be my father,” he said. “I did not know you. I am glad
you came down to me.” “Well, my son,” the Sun replied, “let us go around
the horses.” “What time will it be when we get around them?” the son
asked. Leaving the place where the halters were lying they went where
the ropes were. The space was level full of horses. “Fine, my son,” the
Sun said to Naiyenezgani, “with ropes and halters you made a fence so
the horses cannot get out. You have this broad world for a corral.”

They went on and came where the halters were piled up. “These halters
will round up the wild horses for you and you will put them on their
heads.” They went on and came where the rope hung. “These ropes will
drive the horses together for you. They will drive the wild horses close
to camp for you.” They started back and came where Naiyenezgani had met
the Sun. “I have done everything for you,” the Sun said. “Now I am going
back and leave you. You too will go home. Tomorrow it will be finished.
You will give your people two horses apiece. Give each of them one
stallion and one mare. Distribute them from noon until sunset. These
horses are mares and stallions in equal numbers. Tonight two saddles are
to be placed on the pole you put up. You shall keep three saddles and
give away seven. When you give away the horses give away seven saddles.
Now my son, we separate. Shake hands. Others will do as we do.” They
said _njo_ to each other and separated. It was not long before he was
back and stood there as the sun set. He was happy and laughing. “Where
have you been, my son?” his mother asked. “You must have been in a good
place or you would not be laughing.” “What did you say, mother?” he
replied. “I am happy; when I came over there where the halter lay I met
my father. I walked with him all day. As we walked around the horses he
told me about everything. I am happy.”

He said that none of them should go out tomorrow, but that he himself
would go out early. When he went out there in front of the yellow saddle
lay a white saddle. Behind that was a blue one. Between them was a
yellow saddle. The pole was full. There were ten saddles in a row. “I
told you to put up a long pole, and you put up a short one,” he said to
his mother. “You said dig one hole here and another there, my son,” she
replied. “Just these may well be our saddles,” he said. He called
Tobatc'istcini, saying they would go to catch the horses. “You go to the
rope over there. I, too, will go to the other rope. Hurry, we will catch
the horses,” he said to him. He ran where one rope was, and the other
one went where the other rope was. When they came to the two ropes, they
circled around, driving the horses all towards each other. They could
not find their own horses, the Sun's horses. They went into the
enclosure and walked around. Even when they went around that way they
could not find the horses. They looked for them again, going around
among the other horses, but they could not find them. The horses touched
each other, they were so thick.

Then Tobatc'istcini said, “Naiyenezgani, why do you act so? Is your mind
gone? You say you met your father yesterday and that you spent the day
going around the horses. He took them out of the herd, and away from
you.”

Naiyenezgani caught a black stallion and the other brother a sorrel
gelding. When they led them to the camp their mother asked
Tobatc'istcini why he had caught a sorrel and told him to turn him loose
and catch a white gelding. She said the gray and sorrel horses were made
for them and that they were well trained the day before. She told them
to hurry and drive the horses in. Tobatc'istcini rode the sorrel horse
back and unsaddled it. He then caught a white horse and drove the gray
horses back to the camp.[23]

“Let us go,” he said to his brother. They mounted the horses and rode
along. Their mother spoke to them, “My boys, take off that yellow saddle
and put on a white one.” When they came riding back where their mother
was, a horse whinneyed. It sounded like the voice of the gray stallion
that used to be his horse. Another horse whinneyed in this direction and
the voice was like that of the sorrel mare. They knew their horses when
they whinneyed and one said to the other, “Brother, those are our horses
whinneying but we cannot do anything about it.”[24] “Let us hurry,” the
other said. They rode toward the herd of horses but the horses started
to run and the herd broke up. While they were looking they ran where
their horses whinneyed. Their fly told them that the horses had already
run into the enclosure and that the four doors were shut. They heard
them whinneying far away. Their fly said the horses were already in
their stable, but they still whinneyed. They drove the other horses near
the camp. The older brother told the people to form in a line around the
horses. He said they were going to stake out horses for them. The people
replied that they had no ropes, that only the two brothers had them.
They asked the brothers to make ropes for them. They were told to wait
while they returned where the horses used to be. They told them that
they would have ropes the next day. The brothers went in different
directions, calling to each other. They met and sent their fly to the
Sun because the people were without ropes. He told his brother to go
back where he had been staying. He directed him also to take the bridle
off and to leave the rope as it was, tied to the saddle. “When the Sun
is in the middle of the sky we will drive the horses back. Although it
is late the Sun will be in the same place.[25] He (the Sun) may give us
something,” he said.

The fly returned and reported: “Your horse was standing behind him. He
sat watching where the stallions were fighting each other. He kept
looking at them and then he went a little way.”

The Sun's disk was yellow as at sunset. He looked down four times. The
yellow beams struck under his raised knees. From the other side they
also streamed toward him. Nothing happened, and he got up and went to
his horse. When he put his foot in the stirrup and mounted, ropes were
tied in four places to the saddle strings where there had been no ropes
before. Both saddles were that way. They both mounted together and their
horses pawed the ground and snorted. He rode back to the camp, loping,
and the other horses strung out behind him. The other brother was
running his horse on the other side. They stopped near the camp. The
horses were all lined up facing him. He called to the one on horseback,
“Come here.” He rode up to him and he asked how many ropes there were.
The other replied he did not know for he had not counted them, and
inquired of the other how many ropes he had. The first speaker replied
that he did not know. Then the younger brother said the other should
catch the horses for them and lead them out while he remained on his
horse where he was. The other brother then rode among the horses and
caught a mare. He led the horse out and gave the rope to one of the men.
He rode back among the horses and caught a stallion. When he had caught
six horses, the ropes were all gone. He beckoned with his hand and his
brother rode up to him. “Had you only six ropes?” he asked. “Yes, I only
had six and I have caught six horses. Now, take your turn and I will
remain here on horseback.” The second brother caught the horses and
reported that he had chosen the better horses. The horses were all good
but some of them looked to be small.

They told the people there were only seven saddles and that so many of
the men might have saddles, but that the others must ride around
bareback for the present. He told them that some time they might have
saddles because the Sun knew of their need and he himself knew it. He
instructed them to tie out their horses close by. He said if they heard
the horses nickering they would know that the stallions were covering
the mares. They would also know the colts when they were foaled. If they
turned their horses loose they might not know them. The ropes he said
would guard their horses for them. They would now drive back the other
horses while those who had received horses staked theirs out.

He drove the horses away and hung his bridle up. The other one he laid
in another direction. He took the saddle and everything else back to the
camp. They came back to the camp in the middle of the night but they did
not know it was night because the Sun had not moved.

When two days had passed two men came. There were many horses where they
had passed. They reported that something was running around the other
side of this large mountain. They did not know what it was, nor to whom
it belonged. They wondered what was meant and sent their fly to find
out. He flew away and came back almost immediately. He said it was true.
On the ridge beyond the mountain he saw horse tracks and a trail with
dust as fine as flour.

One of the brothers asked his mother to cook for the men quickly. It was
while they were eating that the fly reported. “Fly back there,” he
directed him. He told the visitors to remain, for they were no doubt
tired. They went back where the bridle was lying. They took off the rope
and hung it toward the east. They spoke to the bridle asking that the
horses, wherever they went, should come back together during the night.

The visitors were as the two brothers had been. They had no eyelashes or
eyebrows. Their ears were round and their heads were smooth. There were
webs between their fingers and toes. When they were asked whence they
came they replied that they had assumed there were people living
somewhere. Their own people had been killed off by something until only
the two were left. They saved themselves at night by digging a trench
and covering it with a large rock. When they started away, one of the
brothers asked where they were going. They replied that they did not
know where they were going but preferred not to stay where they were.
They said they did not like to be with many peoples. They preferred
staying there with their present hosts. Naiyenezgani asked them to tell
their story during the night.

When night came, he called four men to come and listen to what the
visitors were about to tell. He asked each of the four men to question
the guests. “What is the country called where you live and what kind of
thing is killing your people?” he asked. “Tell us about it.”

“The place where we live is called _danagogai_, plain. Something has
been killing our kinsfolk. It has been killing people everywhere on the
earth. We do not know what to do,” one of them replied. Naiyenezgani
told another of the men to question them. He asked if it were really
true that they had been living in that place, saying he did not believe
what the other had said. One of the guests replied that it was true. He
said they did not know how to tell untruths and that it was not right to
do so. “While we are here in camp it will kill someone.” He added, “I
have finished.” The second questioner said, “Why did you tell us this?
We are uneasy about it.” They replied that they were afraid of it and
therefore came there where they intended to live with them.

Naiyenezgani called upon a third man to question them. “Why did you
leave a trail for them?” he inquired. “When your kinsfolk were all
killed, why did you come to us leaving a trail?” The same man spoke
again. He directed that the next day a sweatbath should be prepared that
they should take a bath with the two visitors.

“You said the horses had gone far away. I presume they have already come
together again,” he said. “These some-kind-of-things you said were going
away we call horses. That is all I have to say.” “These two will speak
to you,” one of the company said.

“I cannot promise that I will kill that thing which has been killing
your people. Hurry to build the sweatlodge he mentioned,” Tobatc'istcini
said. “Make the sweatbath: we are going for the horses,” he added.

During the night the horses had come together. One bridle was lying at
the east and the other at the west. They told the horses they must all
stay there together. When the brothers returned the sweatlodge was built
and the stones were on the fire. Tobatc'istcini directed that the men
should stand in line while four of them should go into the bath four
times. He said that when they had come out the fourth time the visitors
would be like themselves. “You built this sweatbath, but it belongs to
the Sun,” he told them. When he (Naiyenezgani) went in with them the
fourth time he asked them where the thing was living which was killing
them. The visitors replied that he lived down this way, pointing toward
the west. “The one that has killed all of our people has something long
for a weapon,” he added. Naiyenezgani said, “Well, he has been killing
you.” When they came out the fourth time they all looked alike. They ate
and after the meal the brothers told them all to remain there while they
went to yonder white mountain ridge to look beyond. He looked at the
Sun.

They landed far away on the mountain ridge.[26] Beyond that mountain
they went to another. There was a plain on which a mountain was
standing. They landed next on that mountain. Tobatc'istcini said,
“Brother, is the dangerous thing feared by you? If you are afraid, I am
afraid. If you are not afraid neither am I afraid. You are the elder, I
am the younger.”

A man was walking in a valley without brush. He was the one who kills
people. They sent their fly to look over the body of their enemy, to
examine his ears, his eyes, and his mouth. The fly flew to the man and
alighted on his ear. When he alighted on his nose the man said, “It is
not just you. You smell like a man.”

The fly reported that they could not come up to the man, for while he
walked in one direction he could see behind because he had eyes in the
back of his head. He had no eyes in front. “He has something long in his
hand with which he kills people. When I sat on his nose he told me I
smelled like people,” the fly reported. “He is the same sort of a person
that you are.” The fly told them to go around to a certain gap in the
ridge, where the monster was accustomed to pass, and stand side by side.
He promised to let them know when the enemy approached. When the monster
walked along, the fly came back where the brothers were standing side by
side and said, “He is coming up here very close. If he stops here you
must cut his head off. Now, you shoot him,” he said. “If he sees anyone
he makes a sweep with his long weapon and kills the person even a long
way off.”

The man came close to them and stopped. One of them shot him and the
other cut his head off. He stood just as he was before. They shot again
and cut his head off again. The head fell but came back on again. One of
them shot at him the third time and the other cut his neck off again.
Then one of them ran around in front of him and shot him in the heart.
This time his flesh flew apart and was scattered over considerable
space. The flesh was quivering. That which they killed was called
Naiye'. “That is why he named you Naiyenezgani,”[27] their fly said.
“Because you and Tobatc'istcini both will kill dangerous beings your
father named you that.” “You did this in his presence. He was looking at
you and prevented the monster's making any move against you. He gave you
the weapons with which you killed him. He did it for the good of
mankind. Turn the head over and look at its face,” their fly told them.
They turned him over and looked at his face. His face was like anyone's
but he also had eyes in the back of his head.[28] No one could attack
him from in front, and he had eyes to see behind himself also. His knife
was sharp and the handle was good. “Let us take the knife to convince
the people. If we do not have the knife, they will not believe us if we
claim we have killed the Naiye' which used to kill people,” one of them
said.

On their return they landed on the white mountain ridge and returned to
the camp. When they had returned, Naiyenezgani directed that all the
people, including the children, should come together. He asked his
mother, because the people were assembling, to spread down a buckskin
and to place on it the arrows, his own weapon, and that of the slain
Naiye'. He asked the people to gather around it. He called the two
visitors, asking them to come to a designated spot. He told his brother
to stand in a certain position and said that he himself would stand in
another place. He said that he would address the people and told his
brother to do the same. “I am telling you this because you are seeing
what you have not seen before. You see today what our father gave us.
Now you speak to them,” he said to his brother.

Tobatc'istcini spoke as follows, “My name is Tobatc'istcini. Our father
gave us these things lying here. A being called Naiye' was using that
weapon over there to kill people. He had killed all the people except
the two who are sitting over there. We killed him.” “You, Naiyenezgani,
speak to them again,” he said to his brother.

“We started from here and we went up to the top of yonder mountain. We
went on to the top of a mountain standing beyond that. A small
mountain[29] stands beyond that and we went up to its top. There we saw
a man walking in a valley. He[30] went to him for us and returned. 'When
he walks he is blind, but he has eyes in the back of his head,' he
reported to us. 'He kills the people who are slipping up behind him.'
Now he will not kill anyone. We shall live safely.” He took up what used
to be his knife and carried it around for the people to see. The man's
blood was on it, and it was fearful to look at. “There is no place to
take hold of it. I will take hold of it here,” he said. “Do not look at
this which used to belong to Naiye'. It is dangerous. Have a meal and
then go home. Look after our horses well.”

Their mother asked why the two who had come to them should not accompany
them where the horses were. They went with them where the horses were.
“Catch the sorrel gelding when you want to. You can tell it by the white
spot on its shoulder,” he told one of them. To the other he said, “You
may catch this black one with a white spot on its forehead. If we are
away anywhere saddle them and ride them around among the horses and
through the camp. The horses look as if they were mean, as if they had
never had a rope on them, but they will not misbehave, they are not mean
and will not shy.” They started back and when they came to the camp
again they ate.

Two days after they had killed the Naiye' they said they were going in a
certain direction and that it might be late when they returned. They
went up to the top of a small sharp-topped mountain. They looked at the
Sun and, when it came up, yellow beams streamed out from the Sun's disk.
His breath took the shape of a rainbow. The sunbeams fell to the ground
over them. “It must be there,” he said. They started and landed on a
mountain top. From there they went to another and from that one to a
projecting ridge. Beyond that was a plain on which stood a blue
mountain. They landed on that. It seems that those who were killing the
people lived at a distance from each other and the people were living in
the center of the world. The killers of the people were working towards
each other.

The two brothers stood on the mountain side by side. They were made like
their father. You could hardly see their bodies. They were killing out
the Naiye'. “Fly over the country and hunt him up. He is living
somewhere,” one of them said to the fly. It flew off and went around
them in a circle. The next time it went around in a smaller circle. He
(the monster) was coming behind them. He had eyes looking both ways,
four eyes. He held something crooked. He stopped and looked carefully
behind himself. He did not look in front. He could look straight up and
could see people down below. The fly looked him all over, at his eyes,
his ears, his nose, and his face. “You are a burr,” he said to the fly.
The fly thought he said he was going to catch him. He flew between the
man's legs and returned where the brothers were sitting. “Did you say
Naiye'? You have come to a dangerous place,” the fly said to them. “As
he walks along he looks carefully behind himself. When he stops he looks
up and he can see the people who are below.[31] He carries a long,
crooked object with which he makes a sweep at people he sees in the
distance and catches them with his hook.”

The fly was sent again to find out from which point the monster could be
attacked with the best chances for success. They saw him walking in the
distance and then they saw him standing where he was accustomed to come
up the ridge. The fly reported that was a good place for the attack. The
brothers addressed each other. “What is the matter with you,
Tobatc'istcini?” Naiyenezgani asked. “You are the leader and should
speak first,” Tobatc'istcini replied. “Very well, you did not answer me.
We will attack him. I will cause large hail with thirty-two points to
fall on him. What are you going to do?” Naiyenezgani asked. “I will
cause hot rain to fall on him,” was the reply.

They went to him where he was walking. The sky made a noise and it began
to rain. The two brothers came toward him behind this rain. He put his
hand to the top of his head. It was hot rain which was falling. They
could see him, but he could not see them. “Let him walk between you,”
the fly directed. He was already exhausted with the hot rain and the
hail. Naiyenezgani stood here and Tobatc'istcini there. The monster
walked here saying, “It is a bad time. I, too, where I am, it is a bad
place.” As he walked one of the brothers raised his bow and brought it
down again, shooting. His companion cut off the monster's head. It came
back immediately as it was before. They shot and cut his head off again.
He fell three ways. They did the same thing to him the fourth time and
he spread out like water. “There shall not be those who kill,”
Naiyenezgani said. “This is the way I do to Naiye'. Just let him float
here in his blood. The people will live happily on the earth. I have
done well by them. Get ready, brother, we will go back. We will take the
weapon with which he has been killing people.” He rolled this weapon up
into a coil and put it in his blanket. “Come, we will go back,” he said.

They came back in the manner they went, landing on the successive
mountains until they reached the camp. They danced a war dance near the
camp. They danced, holding up the weapon they had taken. “Mother, we are
hungry, hurry and cook for us,” they said to her. When they had eaten
they asked their mother to assemble the people and to ask the visitors
also to come. She told the people to assemble, saying that her sons must
have seen something during the day they had been away which they would
tell them about. When the people had come together the weapon they had
brought back was lying there, not as yet untangled.

“We killed one like the other one. We both did it, but I could have done
it by myself, if I had been alone. If he had been alone he too could
have done it by himself,” Naiyenezgani said. “We both attacked him
because we could do it quickly. We killed him quickly because our father
helped us. If it had been one of you, you could have done nothing with
this one that we call Naiye'. He would have killed you right away and
eaten you up. He had killed all the people who lived with these two men,
and just now he was coming for you. Before we had known it, he would
have killed us all. There are no people living on the edges of the
earth. We are all that are left. He killed people this way. Suppose that
person should come on you, he would kill you this way.” He threw the
weapon to a distant bush. It went around the tree and it was as if it
had been cut off. “He was killing people thus. Now we will live well and
no one will bother us. A man is going around the earth in one day and he
will tell us about it.”[32] Tobatc'istcini started away and his mother
spoke to him. “My son, put on this belt,” she said, offering him the one
the Sun's wife had given her. “I am going around from here but today it
is late, I will go tomorrow,” he said. They went to bed. “Take good care
of things and do not be afraid of anything,” Tobatc'istcini said.

When it was daylight their mother prepared a meal for them and they ate.
“Come back safely, my son, as the people said to you,” the mother said.
“I am going, but I do not know when I shall come back,” Tobatc'istcini
replied. He started, telling them to watch for him on a certain mountain
point. “I will be back about noon.”

He started away, traveling with a blue flute which had wings.[33] He
went with this from place to place and was back home before long. He
went entirely around the border of the world on which people were
living. The belt was a blue flute. He thought with it four ways and
looked into it four ways. Before noon a light rain fell on the
projecting mountain. That cleared off and then he came laughing. “It was
not far, only so large,” he said, joining the tips of his forefinger and
his thumb. “Have you your property ready?” he asked. “Have you collected
everything that is ours? Tomorrow we will give out the horses, one
apiece to each of you. We shall not give out horses again. Bring the
horses near to the camp.”

They brought the saddles, the bridles, the halters, the ropes, and the
blankets. They two went where the horses were. They caught some of the
horses and saddled them, and drove the other horses near the camp where
they herded them. They called the people to assemble and when they came
caught horses for them. He gave away ten horses in all. “I will give you
no more horses,” he said. “Tomorrow we will go different ways.”[34] He
drove the horses back where they stayed. “Stake out our horses nearby
and leave the saddles on them all night,” he said. “This is all. You may
go in any direction you like.” “This way,” pointing to the east; “this
way,” south; “this way,” west; or “this way,” north. “We are going over
here where the end of the world is,” some of them said. Others said they
were going to the end of the world in this direction. In this manner,
each party chose a location.

When they had finished, they asked the brothers which way they were
going. They replied that they were going to drive their horses to the
top of yonder mountain (_bitsanldai_). “Take good care of your horses.
Look after them for twelve days and then they will be accustomed to you.
Now you may go. We are going also.” He drove his horses away saying,
“None of you are going with us. I thought some of you would go with us.
You are only giving us back our mother. Go on, mother, let your horse
lead.”

His mother inquired which way she should lead them. “Go on, go on, I
tell you,” he replied. She rode towards the east. Soon a little light
was to be seen under the horse. They went higher and higher until they
came to the mountain he spoke of. They rode their horses beside hers.
“Wait, mother,” he said and rode back. “Keep on down this mountain. It
is good country in this basin. We will live here,” he said. They talked
together. “You unsaddle over there, you over there, and you over there.
We will watch the horses.”

“You may have my yucca fruit which lies on the face of Turnbull
Mountain.”[35]

-----

Footnote 1:

  Told by a White Mountain Apache called Noze, at Rice, Arizona, in
  January. 1910. Noze was a native of Cedar Creek and came to the San
  Carlos Reservation when it was organized. He was for a long time the
  chief of a considerable band which in 1910 had greatly dwindled. He
  died some time between 1910 and the next visit in 1914.

Footnote 2:

  This mountain was said to be called _tsidalanasi_ and to stand by the
  ocean at the south. This is a remarkable statement as east would have
  been expected and as is so stated in fact in a following paragraph.

Footnote 3:

  This makes the boys brothers in our use of the word. They are always
  so called in the Navajo account according to which their mothers were
  sisters. Matthews, 105.

Footnote 4:

  At the center of the sky.

Footnote 5:

  And therefore the boys were not seen by the Sun.

Footnote 6:

  The sacred numbers are 4, 12, and 32.

Footnote 7:

  This method of making the journey has not been encountered before in
  this connection, but is an incident in a European story secured from
  the San Carlos, p. 82, above. The usual account includes a series of
  obstacles some of which resemble the incidents of a European story.
  See p. 116 below.

Footnote 8:

  Clouds according to the Navajo account, Matthews, 111; and below, p.
  117.

Footnote 9:

  Thus far the myth seems chiefly to deal with the adolescence ceremony
  of the boys. The San Carlos account brings in the Sun's father and
  brothers of the Sun's father as performers of this ceremony, while the
  Navajo account mentions the daughters of the Sun. See p. 11 above, and
  Matthews, 112.

Footnote 10:

  Other versions make this the second naming of the elder brother. His
  boyhood name was “Whitehead,” p. 31. Still other names are known to
  the Navajo. Matthews, 263-264.

Footnote 11:

  To know by name things or animals hitherto unknown is often mentioned
  as a great feat. P. 24.

Footnote 12:

  It is seldom that the Apache conception of animism is so plainly
  stated. Songs however abound in the designation of objects as
  “living.”

Footnote 13:

  When a youth went through an adolescence ceremony he did it with a
  definite career in mind. The normal myth of this type put the emphasis
  on the weapons secured and feats of warlike prowess in killing the
  monsters; that is, the warrior idea is uppermost. This version
  stresses the acquisition of horses and probably is a specialized myth
  for those who wish to be successful in acquiring and breeding horses.

Footnote 14:

  The house of the Sun with the stable and corral, the furniture of the
  house, and many other references indicate the home of a European and
  such seems to be the conception.

Footnote 15:

  The two wives of the Sun are often mentioned. The Navajo account has
  Esdzanadlehi go to the west where the sun visits her daily. Here and
  there, especially in the songs, the Moon is coupled with the Sun, and
  is feminine in sex. That the Moon and the Earth should both be called
  the “Woman who renews herself” is interesting. These conceptions are
  generally vague and implied rather than expressed.

Footnote 16:

  Earth, literally “There on the earth.”

Footnote 17:

  The narrator said those mentioned at the beginning of the narrative
  were not real people but just like shadows. The other versions have
  only the one family existing at this time.

Footnote 18:

  The reference may be to moss, especially as rain falling on it is
  mentioned below.

Footnote 19:

  The narrator said it was true that horses would not pass a blanket so
  placed in a narrow canyon.

  This order of the colors and their assignment varies from the one more
  generally found of black for the east and white for the south. P. 7,
  and Matthews, 215.

Footnote 20:

  This announcing of names is probably to be explained as ceremonial.
  Ordinarily, it is improper, probably because immodest to call one's
  own name.

Footnote 21:

  The use of pollen for sacred purposes is a very important feature
  among the Athapascan of the Southwest. It is always preferred to the
  cornmeal used by the Pueblo peoples.

Footnote 22:

  In the division of labor the women are supposed to saddle and unsaddle
  the horses.

Footnote 23:

  Because he must use a white saddle, the informant explained.

Footnote 24:

  The whinneying was heard from the top of the sky.

Footnote 25:

  The conception of time passing while the Sun stood still is fairly
  difficult for a people without timepieces.

Footnote 26:

  This method of traveling implies lightning, rainbow or a similar
  supernatural method, in this case said to be sunbeams.

Footnote 27:

  The name is Naiye', “a dangerous monster,” and -nezgani, “he who
  kills.”

Footnote 28:

  It is said above that he had no eyes in front.

Footnote 29:

  “Mountain, its child.”

Footnote 30:

  He did not mention his fly by name.

Footnote 31:

  Probably means he can see people who are on the opposite side of a
  hill.

Footnote 32:

  These monsters are not those in the usual versions. The bringing of
  trophies and the narratives remind one of counting coup in the Plains.
  The Navajo versions also mention the bringing back of trophies.

Footnote 33:

  One of the recognized methods of rapid locomotion. P. 20 above.

Footnote 34:

  The dispersion of the tribes, a common incident in origin myths.

Footnote 35:

  The formula for the completion of a narrative.




                           NAIYENEZGANI.[36]


Long ago the Sun set and, there in the west, he became the son-in-law of
Toxastinhn (Water-old-man) whose daughter he married. She, who was to
become the wife of the Sun, built a house with its door facing the
sunrise. She sat in the doorway facing the rising sun from which the red
rays streamed toward her. These rays entered her and since her period
was about to occur she became pregnant as a result.

When the child was born, its hands and feet were webbed. There was no
hair on its head and it had no nose. When the boy was grown up he asked
where his father lived. His mother replied that his father lived where
one could not go, for the Sun was his father. The boy asked again where
he lived. His mother said he lived at the sunrise, but that one could
not go there. The boy then said that he would go there and set out on
the journey.

He came where the cliffs come down of themselves. They moved in front of
him. The lightning shot across with him. Beyond that place he came to
the mountain of cactus which formed a dark barrier in front of him.
There a black whirlwind twisted through for him so that he passed by.
From there he went on where the mountain of mosquitoes stood like a
black ridge in front of him. A female rain fell for him and the wings of
the mosquitoes became damp; then he passed over. From there he went on
where the mountains moved up and down toward each other. He jumped away
from them and then toward them, but in no way could he get through.
Black-measuring-worm, whose back is striped with lightning, bent over it
with him.[37]

He walked on toward the house of the Sun. As he was going along, near
sundown, a spider drew its thread across below the boy's knee and
tripped him. He got up and went back, but fell again at the same place.
Wondering why he had fallen, he started on again, when he saw the head
of Spider-old-woman projecting from her hole so far (three inches) away.
“Grandchild, where are you going?” she asked. He replied that he was
going to the house of his father, the Sun. She told him to come into her
house instead. He replied that the opening was too small. When assured
that it was large enough, he went in. She told him one could not go to
the Sun. The spider girls were lying there without skirts or shirts.
They lay with the head of one toward the feet of the next. Spider-woman
asked what was the piece of cloth tied to his shirt. He gave it to her
and she worked with it all night; and the next morning each girl had a
shirt and a skirt. She made them from the young man's piece of
cloth.[38]

When the Sun rose, Spider-old-woman went out-of-doors. “It is not yet
time, my grandson,” she said. She held up five fingers horizontally and
said it would be time when the Sun shone over them.[39] When the time
came to go, they set out toward the house of the Sun. He came to the
front of the house where there were twelve doors and all of them were
shut. Without anyone opening a door for him, he came to Sun's wife.
“What sort of a person are you?” she asked. He replied he had come to
see his father. The woman warned him that no one was allowed around
there. She rolled him up in a blanket,[40] which she tied with
lightning, and hid him by the head of the bed.

When the sun set, he heard the noise of the Sun's arrival. The Sun came
inside his house. “I do not see anyone,” he said, “but from the mountain
where I go down some man had gone along.” “You tell me you do not have
love affairs where you go around. This morning your son came here.” She
went to the head of the bed, undid the lightning with which he was tied
up and took the boy out. The Sun saw it was his boy. There were twelve
pipes in which tobacco was burned. The Sun fixed a smoke for him in one
of these. It was not the Sun's proper tobacco, but a kind that killed
whoever smoked it. The boy drew on the pipe just once and the tobacco
was burned out. The Sun prepared another pipeful, which was gone when
the boy had drawn on the pipe twice. He filled a third pipe; this time
the boy drew on it three times and the tobacco was consumed. The last
time the pipe was filled, the boy drew four times before the tobacco was
burned out.

Toward the east, there was a blazing fire of black _yabeckon_ into which
the Sun threw the boy. He turned into a downy feather and landed in
front of his father who expressed his surprise. There was a fire of blue
_yabeckon_ toward the south into which the boy was next thrown. He again
turned into a feather and landed in front of his father. The fire toward
the west was of yellow _yabeckon_ from which the boy escaped in the same
manner. Finally, the boy was thrown into a white fire of _yabeckon_
which blazed up in the north. He escaped in the same manner as before.
Each time when the boy was thrown in, the fire had been poked with
lightning of the corresponding color.

When the boy had successfully withstood this last test, the Sun directed
his wife to prepare a sweatbath. She did this by spreading four blankets
of cloud: black, blue, yellow, and white. She put on the four blankets
from the four sides in proper rotation. The Sun went in with all his
boys. While they were in the bath, the skin between the boy's fingers
and toes was pulled back and joints made in his fingers. He was also
provided with hair, eyebrows, eyelashes, nose, and ears. Hair was placed
on his body and nails supplied for his fingers and toes. Counting this
boy, the Sun had twelve sons with whom he formed a line. He then asked
his wife to find him in the line, but this she was unable to do because
they all looked alike, she said.

The Sun then placed a gun and a panther-skin quiver on a shelf and asked
his son to choose which he would have. After sighting the gun, he
concluded he did not like it. He put the quiver over his shoulder and
took out two arrows. When he tried these, he hit the target in the
center. He chose the panther-skin quiver saying he liked it.[41] All the
other sons of the Sun had guns. The Sun had them shoot at each other in
fun. Those who had guns beat the boy who had arrows and drove him off.

On one side, horses were being made and on the other deer. The one who
was in charge of making these is named Iltca'nailt'ohn.

They put, for him, a light brown mountain, inside of which, cattle,
goats, sheep, pigs, horses, mules, and donkeys were living. All these
are the food of white people. In this mountain also were guns, blankets,
and all kinds of metals.

On the other side he put, for him, a mountain on which century plants
were growing with their yellow flower stalks standing all around the
edges. On this mountain, too, were sunflowers, yellow with blossoms,
cactus, yucca, piñon, oaks, junipers, the fruit of all of which was
perpetually ripe. All the other wild vegetable foods of the Indians grew
there also. The mountain was always yellow with flowers.

The Sun asked the boy which of these two mountains he would choose. He
decided to take the one which was yellow with flowers where fruit was
always ripe. He did not care for the light brown mountain which stood
toward the east. He announced that the yellow mountain would be his and
would belong in the future to the Indians.

They then opened a door in the side of the brown mountain and drove out
cattle, goats, sheep, pigs, horses, donkeys, and mules. These became the
property of your white people's nation. The Sun's son asked that some
horses be given him. The Sun reminded him he had asked for the other
mountain, and wanted to know why he had not then asked for horses.

From the east, mirage people rounded up some horses for him. The red
dust of the round-up covered the ground. “There are no horses,” the Sun
said. The boy asked again for horses only to be told he should have
asked before when he chose between the two mountains. He asked, that
notwithstanding, he be given some horses. The Sun took up a rope and led
back a chestnut stallion from the east. He tied the horse which stood
pawing the ground and nickering. The boy rode back on it to the place
where I suppose Toxastin and his grandmother lived. He rode back in a
single day and tied his horse. The horse kept nickering and pawing the
earth all the time; he would not graze and the boy was not satisfied. He
rode back to the house of the Sun, took off the rope; and the horse ran
off toward the east kicking up his heels.

The boy told his father, the Sun, that the stallion he had given him was
not satisfactory, and that he had come to ask for a different horse. His
father went away and returned with two horses, a stallion and a mare.
“These are what you want, I suppose,” the Sun said, and gave the boy a
rope, a halter, a saddle blanket, and a saddle.

The boy led the horse back to the place where Toxastin, his grandmother,
and his mother lived. He led the horses back to a place called
Cottonwood-branches-hang-down. To the south, blue cottonwood branches
hung down; to the west, yellow cottonwood branches hung down; to the
north, white cottonwood branches hung down. The place was named the
center of the earth. The saddle was placed at the east; the saddle
blanket at the south; the halter, at the west; and the rope, at the
north.

In the dry stream bed to the east, black burdocks grew; to the south,
blue burdocks grew; to the west, yellow burdocks; and to the north,
white burdocks. He turned out the two horses here to the east. Each time
the Sun's son came back there, he found the two horses playing. After
four days, he drove the horses up the valley a little way four times.
When he went the fourth day to see them he found the tracks of a colt.

That cottonwood tree stood in the center. On the east side of it a black
stallion stood; on the south side, a blue stallion; on the west side, a
yellow stallion; on the north side, a white stallion. Horses were
walking around in the valleys to the east, south, west, and north. Thus
there came to be horses here on the earth.

-----

Footnote 36:

  Told by the father of Frank Crockett, February, 1910. Frank's father
  was of the Bissaxa clan and was about sixty years old in 1910. He was
  still a growing youth when he left the White River country.

Footnote 37:

  These in part are the obstacles mentioned in the Navajo account. They
  are overcome in a different manner. Matthews, 109-110.

Footnote 38:

  Spider-woman is of considerable importance in the mythology of the
  Hopi. Voth, 2, 11. The Navajo account (Matthews, 109) omits the
  clothing-making episode. Spider-woman is the originator of spinning,
  Franciscan Fathers, 222. She is sometimes said to be the mother of the
  Sun and therefore Naiyenezgani's paternal grandmother.

Footnote 39:

  An Apache method of indicating time when the Sun is near the horizon.

Footnote 40:

  The blanket was probably a cloud. The word _caziz_ ought to mean
  “sun-sack.”

Footnote 41:

  Had Naiyenezgani taken the gun Indians would have been armed as white
  men are.




                     THE PLACING OF THE EARTH.[42]


They did not put this large one (the earth) that lies here in place
before my eyes.

The wind blew from four directions. When there was no way to make the
earth lie still, Gopher, who lives under the earth, put his black ropes
under the earth. Here his black rope lies under it; here his blue rope;
here his yellow rope; and here his white rope.

Over here (east) they made a black whirlwind stand with black metal
inside of it. Here (south) a blue whirlwind and blue metal were placed;
here (west) a yellow whirlwind and yellow metal; and here (north) a
white whirlwind and white metal. With these standing on all sides, the
earth came to its proper place and was stable.

“Now that this is as it should be, what shall we do next?” said one of
them. “To what purpose have we had such a hard time making this earth
lie properly which otherwise would have been unstable?” Then he began to
pat it with his hand. “Let a black cloud move about sprinkling,” he
said.

“There will be life from this; the world will be alive from the
dampness,” he said. “They did well by us, what shall we do? Now thank
you,” they said.

The people had nothing. The one who was in charge (the Sun); that one
only was walking around. “It will turn out well with him walking about,”
they said. They looked well at the one they meant. “That one is the
Sun,” they said. “We did it in the presence of that one walking about.”

Then Ests'unnadli said she would do something unseemly. Thinking she
would do it where the Sun first shone in the morning, she seated herself
there. She was doing this only that people might live. There were no
people and she thought there should be many and she did it for that
reason.

She became pregnant. She and the one walking around were the only ones
who understood about generation. She gave birth to a child there where
she sat. She went back to the child early each morning for four mornings
and on the fourth, the child walked back with her. He was entirely
dressed as he walked back with her.

“It is not good that there should be only this one,” she said. “It will
be well for me to do an improper thing again.” She sat repeatedly where
the water was dripping and became pregnant again. She gave birth a
second time to a child. “I will do as I did before,” she said. She went
to her child early each morning for four mornings. The fourth morning
after he was born, the child returned with her. He was dressed in
buckskin, shoes and all.

She had given birth to two children. The latter one she named
Tobate'isteini and the first one Bilnajnollije.[43] They were the
children of this one (the Sun).

A black water vessel by the door of the sun's house was flecked with
sunshine. He caused dark lightning to dart under it from four
directions. He caused it to thunder out of it in four directions. He
caused it to thunder in four directions. He caused male rain to fall in
four directions. He caused fruits to stand on the earth in lines
pointing in four directions. “Thanks,” they said, “he has treated us
well.”

A yellow water vessel by Ests'unnadlehi's door was flecked with light.
She caused yellow lightning to pass under it from four directions. She
caused it to thunder from it toward four directions. She caused female
rain to fall four times in four directions. She caused fruits to stand
in lines converging from four directions. “Thanks, she has treated us
well,” they said. “Because of her, things are well with us.” “She caused
the wind to agitate the grass from four directions for us,” they said.
“With no trouble for us it comes to its place. The earth will remain
well for us,” they said. “It is still the same way for us that it was
long ago. We are thankful yet.”

“Mother, where does our father live?” the boys asked. “Do not ask, for
he lives in a dangerous place,” Ests'unnadlehi replied. “Do not say he
lives in a dangerous place but show us where it is, for we are going
there,” they replied. “If you go you must travel only by night. During
the day one must sit still,” she told them. She said this, for she meant
for them to make the journey without being seen by the Sun.

They wondered why she told them to go only at night and resolved to
travel by day. They came near where the ground was black with mosquitoes
that had teeth of _becdiłxił_, and there was no way to pass through
them. They caused a rain, yellow with sunshine, to fall on them and wet
their wings so that they stuck to the trees. By this means, they passed
beyond them. “This is why she said it is dangerous,” they said to each
other. They came where the earth was crossed with a stripe of cactus
which had spines of _becdiłxił_. A black whirlwind with a core of
_becdiłxił_ passed, twisting through the cactus; the boys got by it.
“This was surely the bad place of which our mother told us,” they said.
As they were going on toward their father's house, they came to sand
which, if one stepped on it, rolled back with him. There was no way to
get through it. A big black measuring worm having his back striped with
a rainbow, bent himself over the sand for them and they crossed over.
They were now approaching their destination when they found the house
surrounded by thirty-two lakes which could not be avoided.

A turquoise bird sat in the ear of one of them and directed them on
their way. The Sun's wife saw the two men pass through, avoiding the
four bodies of water that surrounded the house. She concealed them under
the bed which stood in the house. When the Sun returned, he saw the
tracks of two men and asked where they had gone. The Sun's wife replied
that they were not there. “You are always saying you have made no visits
and yet your two sons come here,” she said. The Sun directed that they
should come to him. They sat facing him. He had tobacco hanging in sacks
in four places. It was black tobacco which grew on stalks of
_becdiłxił_. He had a turquoise pipe with thirty-two[44] holes for the
tobacco to burn in. With this tobacco, he killed those who were not
really his children. They heard him draw on the pipe once and then he
tapped it on something and the ashes rolled out. “Fix me a smoke, that
is why I came,” one of the boys said.

They two went to the sack which was hanging on this side. It was filled
with large blue tobacco which grew on stalks of _becdoł'ije_. He filled
a pipe with thirty-two bowls and lighted it again. Having drawn on the
pipe, he passed it to them. He heard them draw on the pipe once and then
the ashes fell out.

“Prepare a smoke for me, for I came for that purpose,” one of the boys
said again. When the other kinds, yellow, and white had been tried from
the remaining world-quarters, one of the boys produced some tobacco and
a pipe made of clay with a hole through it. “This is my pipe and my
tobacco,” the boy announced. “Why did you not tell me before that you
had tobacco?” the Sun said. He had chairs placed and took a seat between
the two boys. The three looked just alike. “Come, Djingona'ai,[45] move
yourself,” the Sun's wife said, so that she might distinguish him from
the others. “They are surely my children,” the Sun declared. “What do
you desire?” he asked them. The boys said they had come to hear him ask
that. The Sun urged them to ask for what they wished without delay as he
had many things.

The Sun had domesticated animals in four corrals on four sides of his
house. He had four kinds which were bad. They were bear, coyote,
panther, and wolf, of which one is afraid. He led a bear from the
eastern corral, remarking that this was probably the sort they meant,
that it was his pet. The boys refused it, saying they had come for his
horse. In turn he led animals from corrals at the south and west which
were refused each time on the advice of the monitor that sat in the ear
of one of the boys. The Sun pretended he had no other horse, that he was
poor. The monitor urged them to persist in their request, saying that
the Sun could not refuse. He finally led to them one of the horses which
was walking around unconfined. He was just skin and bones. The rope also
was poor. “Did you ask for this one?” the Sun said. “That is the one,”
they replied. The Sun told them the horse could not travel far, but the
boys said that was the animal they wanted.

He gave them the horse with the admonition that they must not let
Ests'unnadlehi see it or she would send them away with it, it looked so
bad. The boys assured him it would be all right. He replied that she
would be surprised at least. He requested them to tell Ests'unnadlehi
that he, the Sun, always told the truth. He charged the two boys that
they should not lie to each other. “This is a good day for you both,” he
told them. “Thank you, Ests'unnadlehi, my mother, thanks.” “Thank you,
Djingona'ai, my father. It is true that it is fortunate for us. It was
for that reason you raised us,” they said.[46]

-----

Footnote 42:

  Told in 1910 by a very dignified man, C. G. 2, of about sixty years.
  He is a leader of the Naiyenezgani songs used for adolescent girls.

Footnote 43:

  The lightning strikes with him, evidently a poetic name.

Footnote 44:

  It was explained that four was the real number, thirty-two being
  presumably a ceremonial or poetic exaggeration.

Footnote 45:

  “Goes by day,” the Sun.

Footnote 46:

  This fragment of the culture-hero story having been told, the narrator
  refused to proceed, perhaps because he knew it had already been
  several times recorded.




                     THE ADOLESCENCE CEREMONY.[47]


The Sun was the one who arranged the ceremony for unclean women. She
(Ests'unnadlehi) sat thus on her knees and the red light from the sun
shone into her. She was living alone.

When she becomes a woman they straighten her. The people stand in a line
and sing while the drum is beaten. They dance four nights. They paint
her with white clay that she may live a long time, and that her hair may
get white on one side of her head. They put up a cane with a curved top
for her around which she is to run. At one side a basket stands in which
there is tobacco and on the other side a basket containing corn.

When she has run around the cane in its first position, it is put up
again farther away, where she runs around it again and returns to the
line of singers. Again, the cane and basket of corn are moved out and
the girl runs around them. When she returns to the singers she dances,
having a downy feather tied at the crown of her head. The cane is put up
Hungerford, and Willoughby had brought in the South-Country adherents
of Lancaster, those at least of them whom the fields of St. Albans
and Northampton had left unharmed and unabashed. Sir Andrew Trollope
was there, with the remnant of the trained troops from Calais who had
deserted York at Ludford in the previous year. But the bulk of the
sixty thousand men who served under the Red Rose were the retainers of
the Northern lords. Henry Percy of Northumberland appeared in person
with all his following. The Durham vassals of the elder house of
Neville were arrayed under John Lord Neville, the younger brother of
Ralph of Westmoreland, though the Earl himself was (now as always) not
forthcoming in person. Beside the Neville and Percy retainers were the
bands of Lords Dacre, Welles, Roos, Beaumont, Mauley, and of the dead
Clifford--of all the barons and knights indeed of the North Country
save of the younger house of Neville.

The Lancastrian position was very strong. Eight miles north of
Ferrybridge the Great North Road is flanked by a long plateau some
hundred and fifty feet above the level of the surrounding country, the
first rising ground to the west that breaks the plain of York. The high
road to Tadcaster creeps along its eastern foot, and then winds round
its northern extremity; its western side is skirted by a brook called
the Cock, which was then in flood and only passable at a few points
beside the bridge where the high road crosses it. The Lancastrians were
drawn up across the plateau, their left wing on the high road, their
right touching the steep bank of the Cock. One flank was completely
covered by the flooded stream, while the other, the one which lay
over the road, could only be turned by the enemy if he went down into
the plain and exposed himself to a flank attack while executing his
movement. The ground, however, was very cramped for an army of sixty
thousand men; it was less than a mile and a half in breadth, and it
seems likely that the Lancastrians must, contrary to the usual English
custom, have formed several lines, one in rear of the other, in order
to crowd their men on to such a narrow space.

The Yorkists at Saxton lay just on the southern declivity of the
plateau, within two miles of the Lancastrian line of battle, whose
general disposition must have been rendered sufficiently evident by the
countless watchfires along the rising ground.

Although they knew themselves to be outnumbered by the enemy, Warwick
and King Edward were determined to attack. Each of them had a father
to revenge, and they were not disposed to count heads. Before it was
dawn, at four o'clock on the morning of that eventful Palm Sunday, the
Yorkist army was drawn out. The King rode down the line bidding them
remember that they had the just cause, and the men began to climb the
gentle ascent of the Towton plateau. The left wing, which was slightly
in advance of the main body, was led by Fauconbridge; the great central
mass by Warwick in person; the King was in command of the reserve.
Of the details of the marshalling we know no more, but the Yorkist
line, though only thirty-five thousand strong, was drawn up on a front
equal to that which the sixty thousand Lancastrians occupied, and must
therefore have been much thinner. When Norfolk and the missing right
wing should appear, it was obvious that they would outflank the enemy
on the side of the plain. Warwick's plan, therefore, was evidently to
engage the Lancastrians so closely and so occupy their attention that
Norfolk should be able to take them in flank without molestation on his
arrival.

In the dusk of the March morning, with a strong north wind blowing in
their faces, the clumps of Yorkist billmen and archers commenced to
mount the hill. No opposition was made to their approach, but when they
had advanced for one thousand yards along the summit of the plateau,
they dimly descried the Lancastrian host in order of battle, on the
farther side of a slight dip in the ground called Towtondale. At the
same moment the wind veered round, and a heavy fall of snow commenced
to beat in the faces of the Lancastrians. So thick was it that the two
armies could only make out each other's position from the simultaneous
shout of defiance which ran down each line. Fauconbridge, whose wing
lay nearest to the enemy, determined to utilise the accident of the
snow in a manner which throws the greatest credit on his presence
of mind. He sent forward his archers to the edge of the dip in the
plateau, with orders to discharge a few flights of arrows into the
Lancastrian columns, and then to retire back again to the line of
battle. This they did; the wind bore their arrows into the crowded
masses, who with the snow beating into their eyes could not see the
enemy that was molesting them, and considerable execution was done.
Accordingly the whole Lancastrian line of archers commenced to reply;
but as they were shooting against the wind, and as Fauconbridge's
men had withdrawn after delivering their volley, it resulted that
the Northeners continued to pour a heavy flight of arrows into the
unoccupied ground forty yards in front of the Yorkist position. Their
fire was so fast and furious that ere very long their shafts began
to run short. When this became noticeable, Fauconbridge led his men
forward again to the edge of Towtondale, and recommenced his deadly
volleys into the enemy's right wing. The Lancastrians could make little
or no reply, their store of missiles being almost used up; their
position was growing unbearable, and with a simultaneous impulse the
whole mass facing Fauconbridge plunged down into Towtondale, to cross
the dip and fall on the enemy at close quarters. The movement spread
down the line from west to east, and in a few minutes the two armies
were engaged along their whole front. Thus the Lancastrians, though
fighting on their own chosen ground, had to become the assailants, and
were forced to incur the disadvantage of having the slope against them,
as they struggled up the southern side of the declivity of Towtondale.

Of all the battles of the Wars of the Roses, perhaps indeed of all the
battles in English history, the fight of Towton was the most desperate
and the most bloody. For sheer hard fighting there is nothing that
can compare to it; from five in the morning to mid-day the battle
never slackened for a moment. No one ever again complained that the
Southern men were less tough than the Northern. Time after time the
Lancastrians rolled up the southern slope of Towtondale and flung
themselves on the Yorkist host; sometimes they were driven down at
once, sometimes they pushed the enemy back for a space, but they could
never break the King's line. Each time that an attacking column was
repelled, newly-rallied troops took its place, and the push of pike
never ceased. We catch one glimpse of Warwick in the midst of the
tumult. Waurin tells how "the greatest press of the battle lay on the
quarter where the Earl of Warwick stood," and Whethamsted describes him
"pressing on like a second Hector, and encouraging his young soldiers;"
but there is little to be gathered about the details of the fight.[5]
There cannot have been much to learn, for each combatant, lost in the
mist and drifting snow, could tell only of what was going on in his
own immediate neighbourhood. They have only left us vague pictures of
horror, "the dead hindered the living from coming to close quarters,
they lay so thick," "there was more red than white visible on the
snow," are the significant remarks of the chronicler. King Henry, as he
heard his Palm-Sunday mass in York Minster ten miles away--"he was kept
off the field because he was better at praying than at fighting," says
the Yorkist chronicler--may well have redoubled his prayers, for never
was there to be such a slaughter of Englishmen.

At length the object for which Warwick's stubborn billmen had so long
maintained their ground against such odds was attained. The column
under the Duke of Norfolk, which was to form the Yorkist right wing,
began to come up from Ferrybridge. Its route brought it out on the
extreme left flank of the Lancastrians, where the high road skirts the
plateau. Too heavily engaged in front to suspect that all the army of
York was not yet before them, Somerset and his colleagues had made no
provision against a new force appearing beyond their left wing. Thus
Norfolk's advancing columns were able to turn the exposed flank, open
an enfilading fire upon the enemy's left rear, and, what was still
more important, to cut him off from all lines of retreat save that
which led across the flooded Cock. The effect of Norfolk's advance was
at once manifest; the battle began to roll northward and westward,
as the Lancastrians gave back and tried to form a new front against
the unsuspected enemy. But the moment that they began to retire the
whole Yorkist line followed them. The arrival of Norfolk had been
to Warwick's men what the arrival of Blücher was to Wellington's
at Waterloo; after having fought all the day on the defensive they
had their opportunity at last, and were eager to use it. When the
Lancastrians had once begun to retire they found themselves so hotly
pushed on that they could never form a new line of battle. Their gross
numbers were crushed more and more closely together as the pressure
on their left flank became more and more marked, and if any reserves
yet remained in hand, there was no way of bringing them to the front.
Yet, as all the chroniclers acknowledge, the Northern men gave way to
no panic; they turned again and again, and strove to dispute every
step between Towtondale and the edge of the plateau. It took three
hours more of fighting to roll them off the rising ground; but when
once they were driven down their position became terrible. The Cock
when in flood is in many places unfordable; sometimes it spreads out
so as to cover the fields for fifty yards on each side of its wonted
bed; and the only safe retreat across it was by the single bridge on
the Tadcaster road. The sole result of the desperate fighting of the
Lancastrians was that this deadly obstacle now lay in their immediate
rear. The whole mass was compelled to pass the river as best it could.
Some escaped by the bridge; many forded the Cock where its stream ran
shallow; many yielded themselves as prisoners--some to get quarter,
others not, for the Yorkists were wild with the rage of ten hours'
slaughter. But many thousands had a worse fortune; striving to ford the
river where it was out of their depth, or trodden down in the shallower
parts by their own flying comrades, they died without being touched by
the Yorkist steel. Any knight or man-at-arms who lost his footing in
the water was doomed, for the cumbrous armour of the later fifteenth
century made it quite impossible to rise again. Even the billman and
archer in his salet and jack would find it hard to regain his feet.
Hence we may well believe the chroniclers when they tell us that the
Cock slew its thousands that day, and that the last Lancastrians who
crossed its waters crossed them on a bridge composed of the bodies of
their comrades.

Even this ghastly scene was not to be the end of the slaughter; the
Yorkists urged the pursuit for miles from the field, nearly to the
gates of York, still slaying as they went. The hapless King Henry,
with his wife and son, were borne out of the town by their flying
followers, who warned them that the enemy was still close behind, and
were fain to take the road for Durham and the Border. Only Richard
Tunstal, the King's Chamberlain, and five horsemen more guarded them
during the flight.

When Warwick and King Edward drew in their men from the pursuit, and
bade the heralds count the slain, they must have felt that their
fathers were well avenged. Nearly thirty thousand corpses lay on the
trampled snow of the plateau, or blocked the muddy course of the Cock,
or strewed the road to Tadcaster and York; and of these only eight
thousand were Yorkists. The sword had fallen heavily on the Lancastrian
leaders. The Earl of Northumberland was carried off by his followers
mortally wounded, and died next day. Of the barons, Dacre, Neville,
Mauley, and Welles, lay on the field. Thomas Courtney the Earl of
Devon was taken alive--a worse fate than that of his fellows, for
the headsman's axe awaited him. Of leaders below the baronial rank
there were slain Sir Andrew Trollope, the late Lieutenant of Calais,
Sir Ralph Grey, Sir Henry Beckingham, and many more whom it would be
tedious to name. The slaughter had been as deadly to the Northern
knighthood as was Flodden a generation later to the noble houses of
Scotland; there was hardly a family that had not to mourn the loss of
its head or heir.

The uphill fight which the Yorkists had to wage during the earlier
hours of the day had left its mark in their ranks; eight thousand had
fallen, one man for every six in the field. But the leaders had come
off fortunately; only Sir John Stafford and Robert Horne, the Kentish
captain, had fallen. So long indeed as the fight ran level, the knights
in their armour of proof were comparatively safe; it was always the
pursuit which proved so fatal to the chiefs of a broken army.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 5: There is nothing authentic to be discovered of the story
mentioned by Monstrelet, and popularised in Warwickshire tradition,
that the Earl slew his charger at Towton to show his men that he would
not fly.]




CHAPTER XI

THE TRIUMPH OF KING EDWARD


On the evening of that bloody Palm Sunday, King Edward, Warwick, and
the other Yorkist chiefs, slept in the villages round the battlefield.
Next morning, however, they set their weary army on the march to reap
the fruits of victory. In the afternoon they appeared before the gates
of York, where the heads of York and Salisbury, bleached with three
months of winter rains, still looked southward from the battlements.
The citizens had, as was usual in the time, not the slightest intention
of offering resistance, but they must have felt many a qualm as
Edward's men, drunk with slaughter and set on revenging the harrying of
the South by the Queen's army, drew up before their walls.

Edward, however, had already fixed on the policy from which he never
swerved throughout his reign--hard measure for the great and easy
measure for the small. The Mayor and citizens were allowed to "find
means of grace through Lord Berners and Sir John Neville, brother to
the Earl of Warwick"--doubtless through a sufficient gift of rose
nobles. These two lords led the Mayor and Council before the King, who
promptly granted them grace, and was then received into the town "with
great solemnity and processions." There Edward kept his Easter week,
and made every arrangement for the subjugation of the North. His first
act was to take down the heads of his father and his uncle from over
the gate, and provide for their reverent burial. His next was to mete
out to his Lancastrian prisoners the measure that York and Salisbury
had received. The chief of them, Courtney Earl of Devon and the Bastard
of Exeter, were decapitated in the market-place, and their heads sent
south to be set up on London Bridge. James Earl of Wiltshire--long
Salisbury's rival in the South--was caught a few days later, and
suffered the same fate.

The submission of the various Yorkshire towns was not long in coming
in, and it was soon ascertained that no further resistance was to be
looked for south of the Tees. The broken bands of the Lancastrians had
disappeared from Yorkshire, and Warwick's tenants from Middleham and
Sherif Hoton were now able to come in to explain to their lord how they
had fared during the Lancastrian ascendency at the hands of his cousins
of Westmoreland. In common with the few other Yorkists of the North,
they had received hard measure; they had been well plundered, and
probably constrained to pay up all that the Westmorelands could wring
out of them, as arrears for the twenty years during which the Yorkshire
lands of Neville had been out of the hands of the senior branch.

A few days after Easter, Warwick and Edward moved out of York and
pushed on to Durham. On the way they were entertained at Middleham
with such cheer as the place could afford after its plunder by the
Lancastrians. Nowhere did they meet with any resistance, and the task
of finishing the war appeared so simple that the King betook himself
homeward about May 1st, leaving Warwick with a general commission to
pacify the North. John Neville remained behind with his brother, as
did Sir Robert Ogle and Sir John Coniers, the only two Yorkists of
importance in the North outside the Neville family. The King took
with him the rest of the lords, who were wanted for the approaching
festivals and councils in London, and with them the bulk of the army.

The task which Warwick had received turned out to be a much more
formidable matter than had been expected. King Henry, Queen Margaret,
the Dukes of Somerset and Exeter, Lords Hungerford and Roos, with the
other surviving Lancastrian leaders, had fled to Scotland, where they
had succeeded in inducing the Scotch regents--Kennedy, Boyd, and their
fellows--to continue the policy of the late King, and throw themselves
heartily into the war with the Yorkists. The inducement offered was the
cession of Berwick and Carlisle, and the former town was at once handed
over "and well stuffed with Scots." Nor was it only on Scotch aid that
the Lancastrians relied; they had determined to make application to the
King of France, and Somerset and Hungerford sailed for the Continent
at the earliest opportunity. They were stayed at Dieppe by orders of
the wily Louis the Eleventh, who was averse to committing himself to
either party in the English struggle while his own crown was hardly
three months old; but their mission was not to be without its results.
Putting aside the hope of assistance from France and Scotland, the
Lancastrians had still some resources of their own on which they might
count. A few scattered bands of Percy retainers still kept the field in
Northumberland, and the Percy crescent still floated over the strong
castles of Alnwick, Bamborough, and Dunstanburgh.

The problem which fell into Warwick's hands was to clear the routed
Lancastrians out of Northumberland, and at the same time to keep good
watch against the inroads of the Scotch and the English refugees who
were leagued with them. Defensive and offensive operations would have
to be combined, for, on the one hand, the siege of the Percy castles
must be formed--and sieges in the fifteenth century were slow and weary
work--while, on the other, the raids of the lords of the Scotch Border
might occur at any time and place, and had to be met without delay.
Warwick was forced to divide his troops, undertaking himself to cover
the line of the Tyne and observe the Northumbrian castles, while his
brother John, who for his services at Towton had just been created Lord
Montagu, took charge of the force which was to fend off Scotch attacks
on the Western Marches.

In June the Scots and the English refugees crossed the Border in force;
their main body made a push to seize Carlisle, which the Lancastrian
chiefs, the Duke of Exeter and Lord Grey de Rougemont, promised to
deliver to them as they had already delivered Berwick. The town,
however, shut its gates; and the invaders were constrained to content
themselves with burning its suburbs and forming a regular siege. But as
they lay before it they were suddenly attacked by Montagu, who came up
long before he was expected, and beat them back over the Border with
the loss of several thousand men; among the slain was John Clifford,
brother to the peer who had fallen at Towton.

Almost simultaneously another raiding party, led by Lord Roos and
Sir John Fortescu, the late Chief-Justice, and guided by two of the
Westmoreland Nevilles, Thomas and Humphrey, slipped down from the
Middle Marches and attempted to raise the county of Durham. But as they
drew near to the ancestral Neville seat of Brancepeth, they were fallen
upon by forces brought up by Warwick, and were driven back on June
26th as disastrously as the main army for which they had been making a
diversion.

These two defeats cooled the ardour of the Scotch allies of the house
of Lancaster. Moreover, trouble was soon provided for them on their
own side of the Border. There were always discontented nobles to be
found in the North, and King Edward was able to retaliate on the Scotch
regents by concluding a treaty with the Earl of Ross, which set a
considerable rebellion on foot in the Highlands and the Western Isles.
By the time that the autumn came there was no longer any immediate
danger to be apprehended on the Borders, and Warwick was able to
relinquish his northern viceroyalty and come south, to pay his estates
a flying visit, and to obey the writ which summoned him in November to
King Edward's first Parliament at Westminster.

While Warwick had been labouring in the North, the King had been
holding his Court at London, free to rule after his own devices. At
twenty Edward the Fourth had already a formed character, and displayed
all the personal traits which developed in his later years. The spirit
of the fifteenth century was strong in him. Cultured and cruel, as
skilled as the oldest statesman in the art of cajoling the people,
as cool in the hour of danger as the oldest soldier, he was not a
sovereign with whom even the greatest of his subjects could deal
lightly. Yet he was so inordinately fond of display and luxury of all
sorts, so given to sudden fits of idleness, so prone to sacrifice
policy to any whim or selfish impulse of the moment, that he must have
seemed at times almost contemptible to a man who, like Warwick, had
none of the softer vices of self-indulgence. Still in mourning for a
father and brother not six months dead, with a kingdom not yet fully
subdued to his fealty, with an empty exchequer, with half the nobles
and gentry of England owing him a blood-feud for their kinsmen slain
at Towton, Edward had cast aside every thought of the past and the
morrow, and was bearing himself with all the thriftless good-humour of
an heir lately come to a well-established fortune. It seems that the
splendours of his coronation-feasts were the main things that had been
occupying his mind while Warwick had been fighting his battles in the
North. Reading of his jousts and banquets and processions, his gorgeous
reception by the city magnates, and his lavish distributions of honours
and titles, we hardly remember that he was no firmly-rooted King, but
the precarious sovereign of a party, surrounded by armed enemies and
secret conspirators.

In the lists of honours which Edward had distributed after his return
homeward from Towton field, Warwick found that he had not been
neglected. The offices which he had held in 1458-59 had been restored
to him; he was again Captain of the town and castle of Calais,
Lieutenant of the March of Picardy, Grand Chamberlain of England, and
High Steward of the Duchy of Lancaster. In addition he was now created
Constable of Dover and Warden of the Cinque Ports, and made Master of
the Mews and Falcons, and Steward of the Manor and Forest of Feckenham.
His position in the North, too, was made regular by his appointment
as Warden and Commissary General of the East and West Marches, and
Procurator Envoy and Deputy for all negotiations with the Scots.

Nor had the rest of the Neville clan been overlooked. John Neville had,
as we have already mentioned, received the barony of Montagu. George
Neville the Bishop of Exeter was again Chancellor. Fauconbridge, who
had fought so manfully at Towton, was created Earl of Kent. Moreover,
Sir John Wenlock, Warwick's most faithful adherent, who had done him
such good service at Sandwich in 1459, was made a baron. We shall
always find him true to the cause of his patron down to his death at
Tewkesbury field. Although several other creations swelled the depleted
ranks of the peerage at the same time, the Nevilles could not complain
that they had failed to receive their due share of the rewards.

Nor would it seem that at first the King made any effort to resent
the natural ascendency which his cousin exercised over his counsels.
The experienced warrior of thirty-three must still have overborne
the precocious lad of twenty when their wills came into contact. The
campaigns of 1459-60, in which he had learnt soldiering under Warwick,
must have long remained impressed on Edward's mind, even after he had
won his own laurels at Mortimer's Cross and shared with equal honours
in the bloody triumph of Towton. So long as Richard Neville was still
in close and constant contact with the young King, his ascendency was
likely to continue. It was when, in the succeeding years, his duties
took him for long periods far from Edward's side, that the Earl was to
find his cousin first growing indifferent, then setting his own will
against his adviser's, then deliberately going to work to override
every scheme that came to him from any member of the Neville house.

We have no particular notice of Warwick's personal doings in the
Parliament which sat in November and December 1461; but the language of
his brother George the Chancellor represents, no doubt, the attitude
which the whole family adopted. His text was "Amend your ways and
your doings," and the tenor of his discourse was to point out that
the ills of England during the last generation came from the national
apostasy in having deserted the rightful heirs so long in behalf of
the usurping house of Lancaster. Now that a new reign had commenced, a
reform in national morality should accompany the return of the English
to their lawful allegiance. The sweeping acts of attainder against
fourteen peers and many scores of knights and squires which the Yorkist
Parliament passed might not seem a very propitious beginning for the
new era, but at any rate it should be remembered to the credit of
the Nevilles that the King's Council under their guidance tempered
the zeal of the Commons by many limitations which guarded the rights
of numerous individuals who would have been injured by the original
proposals.

Moreover, the Government allowed the opportunity of reconciliation to
many of the more luke-warm adherents of Lancaster, who had not been
personally engaged in the last struggle. It is to Warwick's credit
that his cousin Ralph of Westmoreland was admitted to pardon, and not
taken to task for the doings of his retainers, under the conduct of
his brother, in the campaign of Wakefield and St. Albans. Ralph was
summoned to the Parliament, and treated no worse than if he had been a
consistent adherent of York. The same favour was granted to the Earl
of Oxford, till he forfeited it by deliberate conspiracy against the
King. Sanguine men were already beginning to hope that King Edward and
his advisers might be induced to end the civil wars by a general grant
of amnesty, and might invite his rival Henry to return to England as
the first subject of the Crown. Such mercy and reconciliation, however,
were beyond the mind of the ordinary partisan of York; and the popular
feeling of the day was probably on the side of the correspondent of the
Pastons, who complained "that the King receives such men as have been
his great enemies, and great oppressors of his Commons, while such as
have assisted his Highness be not rewarded; which is to be considered,
or else it will hurt, as seemeth me but reason."




CHAPTER XII

THE PACIFICATION OF THE NORTH


Whatever the partisans of peace may have hoped in the winter of
1461-62, there was in reality no prospect of a general pacification so
long as the indomitable Margaret of Anjou was still at liberty and free
to plot against the quiet of England. The defeats of her Scotch allies
in the summer of 1461 had only spurred her to fresh exertions. In the
winter, while Edward's Parliament was sitting at Westminster, she was
busy hatching a new scheme for simultaneous risings in various parts
of England, accompanied by descents from France and Brittany aided by
a Castilian fleet. Somerset and Hungerford had got some countenance
from the King of France, and Margaret's own hopeful heart built on
this small foundation a great scheme for the invasion of England. A
Scotch raid, a rising in Wales, a descent of Bretons upon Guernsey and
Jersey, and a great French landing at Sandwich, were to synchronise:
"if weather and wind had served them, they should have had one hundred
and twenty thousand men on foot in England upon Candlemass Day." But
weather and wind were unpropitious, and the only tangible result of the
plan was to cost the life of the Earl of Oxford, who had been told
off to head the insurgents of the Eastern Counties. He had been taken
into favour by King Edward, and we need have small pity for him when he
was detected in correspondence with the Queen at the very time that he
was experiencing the clemency of her rival. But it was an evil sign of
the times that he and his son were executed, not after a regular trial
before their peers, but by a special and unconstitutional court held by
the Earl of Worcester as Constable of England. For this evil precedent
Warwick must take the blame no less than Edward.

But Margaret of Anjou had not yet exhausted her energy. So soon as the
storms of winter were over and Somerset returned from France without
the promised succours, she resolved to set out in person to stimulate
the zeal of Louis the Eleventh, and to gather help from her various
relatives on the Continent. Escaping from Scotland by the Irish Sea,
she rounded the Land's End and came ashore with her young son in
Brittany. The Duke gave her twelve thousand crowns, and passed her
on to her father Réné in Anjou. From his Court she went on to King
Louis, who lay at Rouen. With him she had more success than might have
been expected, though far less of course than she had hoped. Louis
was able to show that he had already got together a fleet, reinforced
by some Breton and Castilian vessels, in the mouth of the Seine. In
return for an agreement by which Margaret promised the cession of
Calais, and perhaps that of the Channel Isles, he undertook to engage
frankly in the war, and to put at Margaret's disposition a force
for the invasion of England. The way in which Louis chose a leader
for this army was very characteristic of the man. He had in close
confinement at the time a favourite of his father and an enemy of his
own, Peter de Brézé, Count of Maulévrier and Seneschal of Normandy.
De Brézé was a gallant knight and a skilled leader; only a few years
before he had distinguished himself in the English war, and among other
achievements had taken and sacked Sandwich. The King now offered him
the choice of staying in prison or of taking charge of an expedition to
Scotland in aid of Margaret. De Brézé accepted with alacrity the latter
alternative, as much, we are told, from chivalrous desire to assist
a distressed Queen as from dislike for the inside of the dungeons of
Loches. Quite satisfied, apparently, at getting an enemy out of the
country on a dangerous quest, Louis gave him twenty thousand livres in
money, forty small vessels, and about two thousand men, and bade him
take the Queen whither she would go.

While Louis and Margaret were negotiating, their English enemies had
been acting with their accustomed vigour. When May came round Warwick
again resumed command of the Northern Border, and marched out to finish
the work that had been begun in the previous year. He was already on
Scottish ground, and had taken at least one castle north of the Border,
when he received a herald from the Scotch regents offering to treat
for peace. By his commission, drawn up in the last year, Warwick was
authorised to act as plenipotentiary in any such matter. Accordingly
he sent back his army and went himself to Dumfries, where he met Mary,
the Dowager Queen of Scotland, and the majority of the regents. They
concluded an armistice to last till St. Bartholomew's Day, and then
set to work to discuss terms of peace. The common report ran that the
Scots were ready not only to give up the Lancastrian cause, but even to
deliver over the person of King Henry. Moreover, there was talk of an
alliance by marriage between the English King and a Scotch Princess.
This new departure, mainly brought about by the Queen-Dowager's
influence,[6] was not without its effect on the Lancastrian partisans,
who found themselves left unsupported to resist Warwick's army, which
was, during the negotiations, put under the command of his brother
Montagu and set to reduce the Northumbrian fortresses. King Henry
fled from the Scotch Court and took refuge in one of the castles of
the Archbishop of St. Andrews, the chief member of the regency who
opposed peace with England. Lord Dacre, brother of the peer who fell at
Towton, surrendered himself to Montagu, and was sent to London, where
King Edward received him into grace. Even Somerset himself, the chief
of the party, lost heart, and began to send secret letters to Warwick
to ascertain whether there was any hope of pardon for him. Meanwhile
Naworth Castle was surrendered to Montagu, and the more important
stronghold of Alnwick yielded itself to Lord Hastings, who had been
detached to form its siege. Bamborough was given up by Sir William
Tunstal, and of all the Northern fortresses only Dunstanburgh remained
in Lancastrian hands, and it seemed that this place must fall ere the
year was out.

Believing that the war was practically at an end, Warwick now turned
south, and rode up to London to lay the Scotch proposal before the
King. But he had not long left the Border when the whole aspect of
affairs was once more transformed by the reappearance of Queen Margaret
on the scene.

While Montagu and Warwick had been in the North, King Edward had been
sorely vexed by rumours of French invasion. Seventy French and Spanish
ships were roaming the Channel, and Fauconbridge, who had set out to
find them with a hastily-raised fleet, came home without success. A
French force had mustered in Picardy, and Queen Margaret lay all the
summer at Boulogne, tampering with the garrison of Calais, who had
fallen into mutiny on account of long arrears of pay. But Calais failed
to revolt, Louis made no serious attempt on England, and the Queen
at last grew impatient and determined to start herself for England,
though she could only rely on the assistance of Peter de Brézé and his
two thousand men. Setting sail early in October, she passed up the
eastern coast, and landed in Northumberland, expecting that all the
North Country would rise to her aid. No general insurrection followed,
but Margaret's arrival was not without effect. Both Alnwick and
Bamborough fell into her hands--the former by famine, for it was wholly
unvictualled and could not hold out a week; the latter betrayed by the
governor's brother. Nor was this all; the presence of the Queen moved
the Scotch regents to break off their negotiations with England, and
denounce the truce which they had so recently concluded. All that the
statesmanship of Warwick and the sword of Montagu had done for England
in the year 1462 was lost in the space of a week.

The moment that the unwelcome news of Margaret's advent reached London,
Warwick flew to repair the disaster. Only eight days after the fall
of Bamborough he was already at the head of twenty thousand men, and
hastening north by forced marches. The King, ill-informed as to the
exact force that had landed in Northumberland, had sent out in haste
for every man that could be gathered, and followed himself with the
full levy of the Southern Counties.

The nearer the Yorkists approached to the scene of action the less
formidable did their task appear. The approach of winter had prevented
the Scots from putting an army into the field, and the Lancastrians
and their French allies had made no attempt to push out from their
castles. All that they had done was to strengthen the three strongholds
and fill them with provisions. In Alnwick lay Peter de Brézé's son and
some of the Frenchmen, together with Lord Hungerford. Somerset, who
had dropped his secret negotiations with Warwick when his mistress
returned from France, held Bamborough; with him were Lord Roos and
Jasper Earl of Pembroke. Sir Ralph Percy, the fighting-man of the Percy
clan--for his nephew the heir of Northumberland was a minor--had made
himself strong in Dunstanburgh. Meanwhile the Queen, on the approach
of Warwick, had quitted her adherents and set sail for Scotland with
her son and her treasure, under convoy of de Brézé and the main body of
the French mercenaries. But the month was now November, the seas were
rough, and off Bamborough she was caught in a storm; her vessel, with
three others, was driven against the iron-bound coast, and she herself
barely escaped with her life in a fishing-boat which took her into
Berwick. Her treasures went to the bottom; and of her French followers
four hundred were cast ashore on Holy Island, where they were forced to
surrender next day to a force sent against them by Montagu.

Warwick had now arrived at Newcastle, and King Edward was but a few
days' march behind him. Though the month was November, and winter
campaigns, especially in the bleak and thinly-populated North, were in
the fifteenth century as unusual as they were miserable, Warwick had
determined to make an end of the new Lancastrian invasion before the
Scots should have time to move. Luckily we have a full account of his
dispositions for the simultaneous siege of the three Percy castles,
from the pen of one who served on the spot.

The army was arranged as follows. King Edward with the reserve lay at
Durham, in full touch with York and the South. The Duke of Norfolk
held Newcastle, having as his main charge the duty of forwarding
convoys of victuals and ammunition to the front, and of furnishing
them with strong escorts on their way, to guard against any attempts
made by roving bands of Scots or Percy retainers to break the line
of communications, thirty miles long, which connected Newcastle with
the army in the field. The force under Warwick's immediate command,
charged with the reduction of the fortresses, was divided into four
fractions. The castles lie at considerable intervals from each other:
first, Bamborough to the north on a bold headland projecting into the
sea, a Norman keep surrounded with later outworks; next Dunstanburgh,
nine miles farther south, and also on the coast; lastly, Alnwick,
five miles south-west of Dunstanburgh, on a hill, three miles from the
sea-coast, overlooking the river Alne. Dunstanburgh and Bamborough,
if not relieved from the sea, could be surrounded and blockaded with
comparative ease; Alnwick, the largest and strongest of the three
castles, required to be shut in on all sides, and was likely to prove
by far the hardest task. Luckily for Warwick the Roman road known as
the Devil's Causeway was available for the connection of his outlying
forces, as it runs almost by the walls of Alnwick and within easy
distance of both Dunstanburgh and Bamborough. To each castle its own
blockading force was attached. Opposite Bamborough, the one of the
three which was nearest to Scotland and most exposed to attack by a
relieving army, lay Montagu and Sir Robert Ogle, both of whom knew
every inch of the Border. Dunstanburgh was beleaguered by Tiptoft Earl
of Worcester and Sir Ralph Grey. Alnwick was observed by Fauconbridge
and Lord Scales. Warwick himself, with the general reserve, lay at
Warkworth, three miles from Alnwick, ready to transfer himself to any
point where his aid might be needed.

The forces employed were not less than thirty thousand men, without
counting the troops on the lines of communication at Newcastle
and Durham. To feed such a body in the depth of winter, in a
sparsely-peopled and hostile country and with only one road open, was
no mean task. Nevertheless the arrangements of Warwick worked with
perfect smoothness and accuracy,--good witness to the fact that his
talent for organisation was as great as his talent for the use of
troops in the field. Every morning, we are told, the Earl rode out
and visited all the three sieges "for to oversee; and if they wanted
victuals or any other thing he was ready to purvey it to them with
all his power." His day's ride was not less than thirty miles in all.
The army was in good spirits and sure of success. "We have people
enow here," wrote John Paston, whose duty it was to escort Norfolk's
convoys to and fro, "so make as merry as ye can at home, for there is
no jeopardie toward."

A siege at Christmastide was the last thing that the Lancastrians had
expected at the moment of their rising; they had counted on having the
whole winter to strengthen their position. No hope of immediate aid
from Scotland was forthcoming, and after three weeks' blockade the
spirits of the defenders of Bamborough and Dunstanburgh sank so low
that they commenced to think of surrender. Somerset, as we have already
mentioned, had been in treaty with Warwick six months before, with the
object of obtaining grace from King Edward. He now renewed his offer to
Warwick, pledging himself to surrender Bamborough in return for a free
pardon. Ralph Percy, the commander of Dunstanburgh, professed himself
ready to make similar terms.

It is somewhat surprising to find that Warwick supported, and Edward
granted, the petitions of Somerset and Percy. But it was now two years
since the tragedy of Wakefield, both the King and his cousin were
sincerely anxious to bring about a pacification, and they had resolved
to forget their blood feud with the Beauforts. On Christmas Eve 1462,
therefore, Bamborough and Dunstanburgh threw open their gates, such
of their garrisons as chose to swear allegiance to King Edward being
admitted to pardon, while the rest, headed by Jasper of Pembroke and
Lord Roos, were allowed to retire to Scotland unarmed and with white
staves in their hands. Somerset and Percy went on to Durham, where they
swore allegiance to the King. Edward took them into favour and "gave
them his own livery and great rewards," to Somerset in especial a grant
of twenty marks a week for his personal expenses, and the promise of a
pension of a thousand marks a year. As a token of his loyalty Somerset
offered to take the field under Warwick against the Scots, and he was
accordingly sent up to assist at the siege of Alnwick. Percy was shown
equal favour; as a mark of confidence the King made him Governor of
Bamborough which Somerset had just surrendered.

After the yielding of his chief adversary, King Edward thought that
there was no further need for his presence in the North. Accordingly
he returned home with the bulk of the army, leaving Warwick with ten
thousand men, commanded by Norfolk and the Earl of Worcester, to finish
the siege of Alnwick. Somerset lay with them, neither overmuch trusted
nor overmuch contemned by his late enemies. Warwick's last siege,
however, was not destined to come to such an uneventful close as those
of Bamborough and Dunstanburgh. Lord Hungerford and the younger de
Brézé made no signs of surrender, and protracted their defence till
January 6th 1463.

On that day, at five o'clock in the dusk of the winter morning, a
relieving army suddenly appeared in front of Warwick's entrenchments.
Though it was mid-winter, Queen Margaret had succeeded in stirring up
the Earl of Angus--the most powerful noble in Scotland and at that
moment practical head of the Douglases--to lead a raid into England.
Fired by the promise of an English dukedom, to be given when King Henry
should come to his own again, Angus got together twenty thousand men,
and slipping through the Central Marches, and taking to the Watling
Street, presented himself most unexpectedly before the English camp.
With him was Peter de Brézé, anxious to save his beleaguered son, and
the Queen's French mercenaries.

For once in his life Warwick was taken by surprise. The Scots showed in
such force that he thought himself unable to maintain the whole of his
lines, and concentrated his forces on a front facing north-west between
the castle hill and the river. Here he awaited attack, but nothing
followed save insignificant skirmishing; Angus had come not to fight,
but only to save the garrison. When the English blockading force was
withdrawn, a party of Scotch horse rode up to the postern-gate of the
castle and invited the besieged to escape; accordingly Lord Hungerford,
the younger de Brézé, Sir Richard Tunstal, and the great majority of
the garrison, hastily issued forth and joined the relieving force. Then
Angus, to the surprise of the English, drew off his men, and fell back
hastily over the Border.

Warwick had been quite out-generalled; but the whole of his fault
seems to have been the neglect to keep a sufficient force of scouts on
the Border. If he had known of Angus's approach, he would have been
able to take proper measures for protecting the siege. But the main
feeling in the English army was rather relief at the departure of the
Scots than disgust at the escape of the garrison. "If on that day the
Scots had but been bold as they were cunning, they might have destroyed
the English lords, for they had double their numbers," writes the
chronicler. The thing which attracted most notice was the fact that
the renegade Somerset showed no signs of treachery, and bore himself
bravely in the skirmish, "proving manfully that he was a true liegeman
to King Edward." Henceforth he was trusted by his colleagues.

Some of the Alnwick garrison had been either unwilling or unable to
escape with Angus. These protracted the defence for three weeks longer,
but on January 30th they offered to surrender, and were allowed to
depart unharmed to Scotland. The castle was garrisoned for the King,
and entrusted to Sir John Ashley, to the great displeasure of Sir Ralph
Grey to whom it had been promised. We shall see ere long what evils
came from this displeasure.

It seemed now as if the war could not be far from its end. No single
place now held out for Lancaster save the castle of Harlech in North
Wales, where an obscure rebellion had been smouldering ever since 1461.
We must not therefore blame Warwick for want of energy, when we find
that in March he left the indefatigable Montagu in command, and came up
to London to attend the Parliament which King Edward had summoned to
meet in April. Nevertheless, as we shall see, his absence had the most
unhappy results on the Border.

We have no definite information as to Warwick's doings in the spring
of 1463, but we cannot doubt that it was by his counsel and consent
that in April his brother the Chancellor and his friend Lord Wenlock,
in company with Bourchier Earl of Essex, went over-sea to Flanders,
and contracted with Philip Duke of Burgundy a treaty of commercial
intercourse and a political alliance. Philip then conveyed the English
ambassadors to the Court of Louis of France, who was lying at Hesdin,
and with him they negotiated a truce to last from October 1st till the
new year. This was to be preliminary to a definite peace with France,
a plan always forward in Warwick's thoughts, for he was convinced that
the last hope of Lancaster lay in the support of Louis, and that peace
between Edward and the French King would finally ruin Queen Margaret's
plans.

But while George Neville and the Burgundians were negotiating, a new
and curious development of this period of lingering troubles had
commenced. Once more the Lancastrians were up in arms, and again the
evil began in Northumberland. Sir Ralph Grey had been promised, as we
mentioned above, the governorship of Alnwick, and had failed to receive
it when the castle fell. This so rankled in his mind that he determined
to risk his fortunes on an attempt to seize the place by force and
deliver it up again to the Queen. In the end of May he mastered the
castle by treachery, and sent for the Lancastrians from over the
Border. Lord Hungerford came up, and once more received command of the
castle which he had evacuated five months before. The news of this
exploit of Grey's was too much for the loyalty of Sir Ralph Percy, the
renegade governor of Bamborough. When de Brézé and Hungerford came
before his gates he deliberately surrendered the castle to them without
resistance.

The exasperating news that the North was once more aflame reached
Warwick as he banqueted with King Edward at Westminster on May 31st.
With his customary energy the Earl set himself to repair the mischief
before it should spread farther. On June 2nd he was once more marching
up the Great North Road, with a new commission to act as the King's
lieutenant in the North, while his brother Montagu was named under him
Lord Warden of the Marches. Warwick's plan of campaign this time was
not to reduce the castles at once, but to cut off the Lancastrians
from their base by forcing the Scots to conclude peace. Accordingly he
left the strongholds on his right and made straight for the Border.
His first exploit was to relieve Norham Castle, on the English side of
the Tweed, which was beset by four thousand Scotch borderers, aided
by Peter de Brézé and his mercenaries. Queen Margaret herself was in
their camp, and had dragged her unfortunate consort down to the seat
of war. When the English appeared, the Scots and French raised the
siege and retired behind the Tweed, where they set themselves to guard
the ford called the Holybank. But Warwick was determined to cross; he
won the passage by force of arms, and drove off its defenders. A few
miles across the Border he found de Brézé's Frenchmen resting in an
abbey, and fell on them with such vehemence that several hundreds were
taken prisoners, including the Lord of Graville and Raoul d'Araines, de
Brézé's chief lieutenants.

One chronicler records a curious incident at this fight. "At the
departing of Sir Piers de Bressy and his fellowship, there was one
manly man among them, that purposed to meet with the Earl of Warwick;
he was a taberette (drummer) and he stood upon a little hill with his
tabor and his pipe, tabering and piping as merrily as any man might.
There he stood by himself; till my lord Earl came unto him he would not
leave his ground." Warwick was much pleased with the Frenchman's pluck,
bade him be taken gently and well treated, "and there he became my
lord's man, and yet is with him, a full good servant to his lord."

The moment that Warwick was actually across the Tweed, the Scotch
regents offered him terms of peace. To prove their sincerity they
agreed to send off Queen Margaret. Such pressure was accordingly
put upon her that "she with all her Council, and Sir Peter with the
Frenchmen, fled away by water in four balyngarys, and they landed
at Sluis in Flanders, leaving all their horses and harness behind
them, so sorely were they hasted by the Earl and his brother the Lord
Montagu."[7] With the horses and harness was left poor King Henry, who
for the next two years wandered about in an aimless way on both sides
of the Border, a mere meaningless shadow now that he was separated from
his vehement consort.

Now at last the Civil War seemed at an end. With Margaret over-sea,
Somerset a liegeman of York, the Northumbrian castles cut off from any
hope of succour, and the Scots suing humbly for peace, Warwick might
hope that his three years' toil had at last come to an end. That, after
all, the struggle was to be protracted for twelve months more, was a
fact that not even the best of prophets could have predicted.

After the raid which drove Queen Margaret away, and turned the hearts
of the Scots toward peace, we lose sight of Warwick for some months.
We only know that, for reasons to us unknown, he did not finish his
exploits by the capture of the Northumbrian castles, but came home in
the autumn, leaving them still unsubdued. Perhaps after the winter
campaign of 1462-63 he wished to spend Christmas for once in his own
fair castle of Warwick. His estates indeed in Wales and the West
Midlands can hardly have seen him since the Civil War recommenced in
1459, and must have required the master's eye in every quarter. His
wife and his daughters too, now girls growing towards a marriageable
age as ages were reckoned in the fifteenth century, must long have been
without a sight of him.

While Warwick was for once at home, and King Edward was making a
progress round his kingdom with much pomp and expense, it would seem
that Queen Margaret, from the retreat in Lorraine to which she had
betaken herself, was once more exerting her influence to trouble
England. At any rate a new Lancastrian conspiracy was hatched in the
winter of 1463-64, with branches extending from Wales to Yorkshire.
The outbreak commenced at Christmas by the wholly unexpected rebellion
of the Duke of Somerset. Henry of Beaufort had been so well treated by
King Edward that his conduct appears most extraordinary. He had supped
at the King's board, slept in the King's chamber, served as captain of
the King's guard, and jousted with the King's favour on his helm; yet
at mid-winter he broke away for the North, with a very small following,
and made for the garrison at Alnwick. Probably Somerset's conscience
and his enemies had united to make his position unbearable. The
Yorkists were always taunting him behind his back, and when he appeared
in public in the King's company a noisy mob rose up to stone him, and
Edward had much ado to save his life. But whether urged by remorse for
his desertion of Lancaster, or by resentment for his treatment by the
Yorkists, Somerset set himself to join the sinking cause at one of its
darkest hours.

His arrival in the North, where he came almost alone, for his followers
were wellnigh all cut off at Durham, was the signal for the new
Lancastrian outbreak. Simultaneously Jasper of Pembroke endeavoured to
stir up Wales. A rising took place in South Lancashire and Cheshire,
in which at one moment ten thousand men are said to have been in the
field: a band set out from Alnwick, pushed by the Yorkist garrison
at Newcastle, and seized the Castle of Skipton in Craven, hard by
Warwick's ancestral estates in the North Riding; and Norham on the
Border was taken by treachery.

In March Warwick set out once more to regain the twice-subdued North.
The rising in Cheshire collapsed without needing his arms to put it
down, and he was able to reach York without molestation. From thence
he sent to Scotland to summon the regency to carry out the terms of
pacification which they had promised in the previous year. The Scots
made no objection, and offered to send their ambassadors to York if
safe escort was given them past the Lancastrian fortresses. Accordingly
Montagu started from Durham to pick up his troops at Newcastle, where
Lord Scrope was already arrayed with the levies of the Northern
Counties. This journey was near being Montagu's last, for a few miles
outside Newcastle he was beset by his cousin Sir Humphrey Neville,
the Earl of Westmoreland's nephew, who fell on his escort with eighty
spears as he passed through a wood. Montagu, however, escaped by a
detour and came safely into Newcastle, where he took charge of Scrope's
force and marched for the Scotch Border.

At Hedgeley Moor he found Somerset with all the Lancastrian refugees
barring the way. There had mustered all the survivors of the campaigns
of 1461-2-3, Roos and Hungerford, and Tailboys Lord of Kyme, and the
two traitors Ralph Grey and Ralph Percy. On April 15th their five
thousand men fell on Montagu, whose forces were probably about equal.
The shock was sharp but short; and when Ralph Percy, who led their
van, was struck down, the Lancastrians dispersed. Percy, if the tale
be true, refused to fly with the rest, and died crying, "I have saved
the bird in my bosom," meaning his loyalty to Henry. He should have
remembered his faith a year before, when he swore fealty to Edward at
Durham.

Montagu was now able to reach Scotland unmolested. He brought the Scots
Commissioners back to York, and a fifteen years' peace was safely
concluded, the Scots promising to give no further shelter to the
Lancastrians, and the English to disavow the Earls of Ross and Douglas
whom they had armed against the Scotch regency. "An the Scots be true,
the treaty may continue fifteen years," said the chronicler, "but it is
hard to trust Scots: they be ever full of guile and deceit."

Somerset and his followers were now without hope. Their refuge in
Scotland was cut off and their Northumbrian strongholds doomed to a
speedy fall, for King Edward had been casting all the winter a train of
great ordnance such as England had never seen before, and the pieces
were already on their way north. Nevertheless the desperate adherents
of Lancaster hardened their hearts, gathered their broken bands, and
made one last desperate stand for the mastery of the North. On the
Linhills, by the town of Hexham, they arrayed themselves against
Montagu on May 13th. But when the Yorkists came in sight the hearts of
the followers of Somerset failed them. All save five hundred melted
away from their banners, and the small band that stayed to fight was
broken, beaten, surrounded, and captured by Montagu's four thousand men
with perfect ease.

The Lancastrian lords had fought their last field; one and all were
slain or captured on the hill a mile outside Hexham town, where they
had made their stand. Montagu marked his triumph by the most bloody
executions that had been seen throughout the whole war. At Hexham, next
day, he beheaded Somerset, Sir Edmond Fitzhugh, a moss-trooping captain
called Black Jack, and three more. On the next day but one he slew at
Newcastle Lord Roos, Lord Hungerford, and three others. Next day he
moved south to his brother's ancestral seat of Middleham, and executed
Sir Philip Wentworth and six squires. Finally, he conducted to York and
beheaded there Sir Thomas Hussey and thirteen more, the remainder of
the prisoners of rank who had come into his hands.

For these sweeping executions Warwick must take part of the blame.
But there is this to be said in defence of Montagu's stern justice,
that Somerset and three or four others of the victims were men who had
claimed and abused Edward's pardon, and that Roos and several more had
been spared at the surrender of Bamborough in 1462. The whole body
had shown that they could never be trusted, even if they professed to
submit to York; and the practical justification of their death lies
in the fact that with their execution ceased all attempts to raise
the North in favour of the house of Lancaster. Public opinion among
the Yorkists had nothing but praise for Montagu. "Lo, so manly a man
is this good Lord Montagu," wrote a London chronicler, "he spared not
their malice, nor their falseness, nor their guile, nor their treason,
but slew many, and took many, and let smite off their heads"!

Even before the battle of Hedgeley Moor King Edward had set out to
reinforce Warwick and Montagu. The news of their victories reached
him on the way, but he continued to advance, bringing with him the
great train of artillery destined for the siege of the Northumbrian
fortresses. This journey was important to King Edward in more ways
than one. How he spent one day of it, May 1st, when he lay at Stony
Stratford, we shall presently see. If Warwick had but known of his
master's doings on that morning, we may doubt if he would have been so
joyous over his brother's victories or so remorseless with his captured
enemies.

The King came up to York in the end of May, "and kept his estate there
solemnly in the palace, and there he created John Lord Montagu Earl
of Northumberland," in memory of his good service during the last few
months, handing over to him, together with the Percy title, the greater
part of the great Percy estates--Alnwick and Warkworth and Langley and
Prudhoe, and many more fiefs between Tyne and Tweed.

Warwick now advanced northward to complete the work which his brother
had begun in the previous month, while the King remained behind in
Yorkshire and occupied himself in the capture of Skipton Castle in
Craven. On June 23rd the Earl appeared before Alnwick and summoned the
place. The Lancastrians had lost their leaders at Hexham, there was no
more fight in them, and they surrendered at once on promise of their
lives. Dunstanburgh and Norham followed the example of Alnwick. Only
Bamborough held out, for there Sir Ralph Grey had taken refuge. He knew
that his treachery at Alnwick in the last year could never be pardoned,
and utterly refused to surrender. With him was Sir Humphrey Neville,
who had so nearly destroyed Montagu two months before.

We happen to have an account of the siege of Bamborough which is
not without its interest. When the army appeared before the castle
Warwick's herald summoned it in form--

 Offering free pardon, grace, body, and livelihood to all, reserving
 two persons, Sir Ralph Grey and Sir Humphrey Neville. Then Sir Ralph
 clearly determined within himself to live or die within the place,
 though the herald charged him with all inconvenience and shedding of
 blood that might befall: saying in this wise: "My Lord ensureth you
 upon his honour to sustain this siege before you these seven years so
 that he win you: and if ye deliver not this jewel, which the King our
 dread Sovereign Lord hath greatly in favour, seeing it marches so nigh
 unto his enemies of Scotland, whole and unbroken with ordnance, and if
 ye suffer any great guns to be laid against it, it shall cost you a
 head for every gun shot, from the head of the chief man to the head of
 the least person within." But Sir Ralph departed from the herald, and
 put him in endeavour to make defence.

Warwick was therefore compelled to have recourse to his battering
train, the first that had been used to effect in an English siege.

 So all the King's guns that were charged began to shoot upon the
 said castle. "Newcastle," the King's greatest gun, and "London," the
 second gun of iron, so betide the place that the stones of the walls
 flew into the sea. "Dijon," a brass gun of the King's, smote through
 Sir Ralph Grey's chamber oftentimes, and "Edward" and "Richard," the
 bombardels, and other ordnance, were busied on the place. Presently
 the wall was breached, and my lord of Warwick, with his men-at-arms
 and archers, won the castle by assault, maugre Sir Ralph Grey, and
 took him alive, and brought him to the King at Doncaster. And there
 the Earl of Worcester, Constable of England, sat in judgment on him.

Tiptoft was a judge who never spared, and Grey a renegade who could
expect no mercy. The prisoner was sentenced to be beheaded, and only
spared degradation from his knighthood "because of his noble ancestor,
who suffered at Southampton for the sake of the King's grandfather,
Richard Earl of Cambridge." His head was sent to join the ghastly
collection standing over the gate on London Bridge.

With the fall of Bamborough the first act of King Edward's reign was at
an end.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 6: Queen Mary had, so the story runs, shown overmuch favour
to the Duke of Somerset. He openly boasted of his success in love, and
the Queen was ever after his deadly enemy.]

[Footnote 7: The famous story of the robber and Queen Margaret, placed
by so many writers after the battle of Hexham, seems quite impossible.
If the incident took place at all, it happened on the other side of the
Channel.]




CHAPTER XIII

THE QUARREL OF WARWICK AND KING EDWARD


With Hedgeley Moor and Hexham and the final surrender of the
Northumbrian castles ended the last desperate attempt of the
Lancastrians to hold their own in the North. The few surviving leaders
who had escaped the fate of Somerset and Hungerford left Scotland and
fled over-sea. Philip de Commines soon after met the chief of them in
the streets of Ghent "reduced to such extremity of want and poverty
that no common beggar could have been poorer. The Duke of Exeter was
seen (though he concealed his name) following the Duke of Burgundy's
train begging his bread from door to door, till at last he had a small
pension allowed him in pity for his subsistence." With him were some of
the Somersets, John and Edmund, brothers of the Duke who had just been
beheaded. Jasper of Pembroke made his way to Wales and wandered in the
hills from county to county, finding friends nowhere. No one could have
guessed that the cause of Lancaster would ever raise its head again.

The times of war were at length over, and Warwick, like the rest of
Englishmen, might begin to busy himself about other things than battles
and sieges. In July he was at last free, and was able to think of
turning southward to seek for more than a passing visit the Midland
estates of which he had seen so little for the last five years. After
a short interval of leisure, we find him in September sitting in the
King's Council, and urging on two measures which he held necessary for
the final pacification of the realm. The first was the conclusion of a
definite treaty of peace with France. It was from King Louis that the
Lancastrians had been accustomed to draw their supplies of ships and
money, and while England and France were still at war it was certain
that King Edward's enemies would continue to obtain shelter and succour
across the Channel. Accordingly the Earl urged on the conclusion of a
treaty, and finally procured the appointment of himself and his friend
and follower Wenlock as ambassadors to Louis. The second point of his
schemes was connected with the first. It was high time, as all England
had for some time been saying, that the King should marry.[8] Edward
was now in his twenty-fourth year, "and men marvelled that he abode
so long without any wife, and feared that he was not over chaste of
his living." Those, indeed, who were about the King's person knew that
some scandal had already been caused by his attempts, successful and
unsuccessful, on the honour of several ladies about the Court. Rumour
had for some time been coupling Edward's name with that of various
princesses of a marriageable age among foreign royal families. Some
had said that he was about to marry Mary of Gueldres, the Queen Dowager
of Scotland, and others had speculated on his opening negotiations for
the hand of Isabel of Castile, sister of the reigning Spanish King.
But there had been no truth in these reports. Warwick's scheme was to
cement the peace with France by a marriage with a French princess, and
in the preliminary inquiries which the King permitted him to send to
Louis the marriage question was distinctly mentioned. Louis' sisters
were all married, and his daughters were mere children, so that their
names were not brought forward, for King Edward required a wife of
suitable years, "to raise him goodly lineage such as his father had
reared." The lady whom Warwick proposed to the King was Bona of Savoy,
sister to Charlotte Queen of France, a princess who dwelt at her
brother-in-law King Louis' Court and in whose veins ran the blood both
of the Kings of France and the Dukes of Burgundy.

King Edward made no open opposition to Warwick's plans. The project
was mooted to King Louis, safe conducts for the English Embassy were
obtained, and Warwick and Wenlock were expected at St. Omer about
October 3rd or 4th. But at the last moment, when Warwick attended at
Reading on September 28th to receive his master's final instructions, a
most astounding announcement was made to him. We have an account of the
scene which bears some marks of truth.

The Council met for the formal purpose of approving the marriage
negotiations. A speaker, probably Warwick, laid before the King the
hope and expectation of his subjects that he would deign to give them a
Queen.

 Then the King answered that of a truth he wished to marry, but that
 perchance his choice might not be to the liking of all present. Then
 those of his Council asked to know of his intent, and would be told
 to what house he would go. To which the King replied in right merry
 guise that he would take to wife Dame Elizabeth Grey, the daughter of
 Lord Rivers. But they answered him that she was not his match, however
 good and however fair she might be, and that he must know well that
 she was no wife for such a high prince as himself; for she was not the
 daughter of a duke or earl, but her mother the Duchess of Bedford had
 married a simple knight, so that though she was the child of a duchess
 and the niece of the Count of St. Pol, still she was no wife for him.
 When King Edward heard these sayings of the lords of his blood and his
 Council, which it seemed good to them to lay before him, he answered
 that he should have no other wife and that such was his good pleasure.

Then came the clinching blow; no other wife could he have--for he was
married to Dame Elizabeth already!

In fact, five months before, on May 1st, when he ought to have been
far on his way to the North, King Edward had secretly ridden over from
Stony Stratford to Grafton in Northamptonshire, and wedded the lady.
No one had suspected the marriage, for the King had had but a short
and slight acquaintance with Elizabeth Grey, who had been living a
retired life ever since her husband, a Lancastrian knight, fell in
the moment of victory at the second battle of St. Albans. Edward had
casually met her, had been conquered by her fair face, and had made
hot love to her. Elizabeth was clever and cautious; she would hear of
nothing but a formal offer of marriage, and the young King, perfectly
infatuated by his passion, had wedded her in secret at Grafton in the
presence of no one save her mother and two other witnesses. This was
the urgent private business which had kept him from appearing to open
his Parliament at York.

The marriage was a most surprising event. Lord Rivers, the lady's
father, had been a keen Lancastrian. He it was who had been captured at
Sandwich in 1460, and brought before Warwick and Edward to undergo that
curious scolding which we have elsewhere recorded. And now this "made
lord, who had won his fortune by his marriage," had become the King's
father-in-law. Dame Elizabeth herself was seven years older than her
new husband, and was the mother of children twelve and thirteen years
of age. The public was so astonished at the match that it was often
said that the Queen's mother, the old Duchess of Bedford, must have
given King Edward a love philtre, for in no other way could the thing
be explained.

Warwick and the rest of the lords of the Council were no less vexed
than astonished by this sudden announcement. The Earl had broached
the subject of the French marriage to King Louis, and was expected to
appear within a few days to submit the proposal for acceptance. The
King, knowing all the time that the scheme was impossible, had allowed
him to commit himself to it, and now left him to explain to King Louis
that he had been duped in the most egregious way, and had been excluded
from his master's confidence all along. Very naturally the Earl let the
embassy drop; he could not dare to appear before the French King to ask
for peace, when the bond of union which he had promised to cement it
was no longer possible.

But vexed and angered though he must have been at the way in which
he had been treated, Warwick was too loyal a servant of the house of
York to withdraw from his master's Council. He bowed to necessity, and
acquiesced in what he could not approve. Accordingly Warwick attended
next day to hear the King make public announcement of his marriage in
Reading Abbey on the feast of St. Michael, and he himself, in company
with George of Clarence the King's brother, led Dame Elizabeth up to
the seat prepared for her beside her husband, and bowed the knee to her
as Queen.

For a few months it seemed as if the King's marriage had been a single
freak of youthful passion, and the domination of the house of Neville
in the royal Councils appeared unshaken. As if to make amends for his
late treatment of Warwick, Edward raised his brother George Neville
the Chancellor to the vacant Archbishopric of York, and in token of
confidence sent the Earl as his representative to prorogue a Parliament
summoned to meet on November 4th.

But these marks of regard were not destined to continue. The favours
of the King, though there was as yet no open breach between him and
his great Minister, were for the future bestowed in another quarter.
The house of Rivers was almost as prolific as the house of Neville;
the Queen had three brothers, five sisters, and two sons, and for
them the royal influence was utilised in the most extraordinary way
during the next two years. Nor was it merely inordinate affection for
his wife that led King Edward to squander his wealth and misuse his
power for the benefit of her relatives. It soon became evident that
he had resolved to build up with the aid of the Queen's family one of
those great allied groups of noble houses whose strength the fifteenth
century knew so well--a group that should make him independent of
the control of the Nevilles. A few days after the acknowledgment of
the Queen, began a series of marriages in the Rivers family, which
did not cease for two years. In October 1464, immediately after the
scene at Reading, the Queen's sister Margaret was married to Thomas
Lord Maltravers, the heir of the wealthy Earl of Arundel. In January
1465 John Woodville, the youngest of her brothers, wedded the Dowager
Duchess of Norfolk. This was a disgraceful match: the bridegroom was
just of age, the bride quite old enough to be his grandmother; but she
was a great heiress, and the King persuaded her to marry the sordid
young man. Within eighteen months more, nearly the whole of the family
had been married off: Anne Woodville to the heir of Bourchier Earl of
Essex; Mary Woodville to the eldest son of Lord Herbert, the King's
most intimate counsellor after Warwick in his earlier years; Eleanor
Woodville to George Grey heir of the Earl of Kent; and Catherine
Woodville, most fortunate of all, to the young Duke of Buckingham,
grandson of the old Duke who had fallen at Northampton. To end the tale
of the alliances of this most fortunate family, it is only necessary
to add that even before Queen Elizabeth's marriage her eldest brother
Anthony had secured the hand of Elizabeth, heiress of the Lord Scales
who was slain on the Thames in 1460. Truly the Woodville marriages may
compare not unfavourably with those of the Nevilles!

While the King was heaping his favours on the house of Rivers, Warwick
was still employed from time to time in the service of the Crown. But
he could no longer feel that he had the chief part in guiding his
monarch's policy. Indeed, the King seems to have even gone out of his
way to carry out every scheme on a different principle from that which
the Earl adopted. In the spring of 1465, at the time of the Queen's
formal coronation in May--a ceremony which he was glad enough to
escape--Warwick went over-sea to conduct negotiations with the French
and Burgundians. He met the Burgundian ambassadors at Boulogne, and
those of France at Calais. It was a critical time for both France
and Burgundy, for the War of the Public Weal had just broken out,
and each party was anxious to secure the friendship, or at least the
neutrality of England. With the Burgundians, whom Warwick met first,
no agreement could be made, for the Count of Charolois, who had now
got the upper hand of his aged father Duke Philip, refused to make any
pledges against helping the Lancastrians. He was at this very time
pensioning the exiled Somersets and Exeter, and almost reckoned himself
a Lancastrian prince, because his mother, Isabel of Portugal, was a
grand-daughter of John of Gaunt. Warwick and Charles of Charolois were
quite unable to agree. Each of them was too much accustomed to have his
own way, and though they held high feasts together at Boulogne, and
were long in council, they parted in wrath. There would seem to have
been something more than a mere difference of opinion between them,
for ever afterwards they regarded each other as personal enemies. King
Louis, whose ambassadors met Warwick a month later, proved far more
accommodating than the hot-headed Burgundian prince. He consented to
forget the matter of the marriage, and agreed to the conclusion of a
truce for eighteen months, during which he engaged to give no help to
Queen Margaret, while Warwick covenanted that England should refrain
from aiding the Dukes of Burgundy and Bretagne, now in full rebellion
against their sovereign.

Late in the summer of 1465 Warwick returned home just in time to hear
of a new stroke of fortune which had befallen his master. Henry the
Sixth had just been captured in Lancashire. The ex-king had wandered
down from his retreat in Scotland, and was moving about in an aimless
way from one Lancastrian household to another, accompanied by no one
but a couple of priests. One of Henry's entertainers betrayed him,
and he was seized by John Talbot of Basshall as he sat at meat in
Waddington Hall, and forwarded under guard to London. At Islington
Warwick rode forth to meet his late sovereign, and by the King's
orders led him publicly through the city, with his feet bound by
leather straps to his stirrups. Why this indignity was inflicted on
the unfortunate Henry it is hard to say; there cannot possibly have
been any fear of a rescue, and Warwick might well have spared his late
master the shame of bonds. Henry was led along Cheapside and Cornhill
to the Tower, where he was placed in honourable custody, and permitted
to receive the visits of all who wished to see him.

That Warwick was not yet altogether out of favour with King Edward was
shown by the fact that he was asked to be godfather to the Queen's
first child, the Princess Elizabeth, in the February of the following
year 1466. But immediately afterwards came the succession of events
which marked the final breach between the King and the Nevilles. In
March Edward suddenly dismissed from the office of Treasurer Lord
Mountjoy, a friend of Warwick's, and gave the post to his wife's father
Lord Rivers, whom he soon created an earl. The removal of his friend
was highly displeasing to Warwick; but worse was to follow. Warwick's
nephew George Neville, the heir of his brother John, had been affianced
to Anne heiress of the exiled Duke of Exeter; but the Queen gave the
Duchess of Exeter four thousand marks to break off the match, and the
young lady was wedded to Thomas Grey, Elizabeth's eldest son by her
first marriage. This blow struck the Nevilles in their tenderest point;
even the marriages which had made their good fortune were for the
future to be frustrated by royal influence.

The next slight which Warwick received at the hands of his sovereign
touched him even more closely. His eldest daughter Isabel, who had been
born in 1451, was now in her sixteenth year, and already thoughts about
her marriage had begun to trouble her father's brain. The Earl counted
her worthy of the highest match that could be found in the realm, for
there was destined to go with her hand such an accumulation of estates
as no subject had ever before possessed--half of the lands of Neville,
Montacute, Despenser, and Beauchamp. The husband whom Warwick had hoped
to secure for his child was George Duke of Clarence, the King's next
brother, a young man of eighteen years. Clarence was sounded, and
liked the prospect well enough, for the young lady was fair as well as
rich. But they had not reckoned with the King. After a long visit which
Clarence and his younger brother Richard of Gloucester had paid to
Warwick in the end of 1466, Edward got wind of the proposed marriage.
"When the King knew that his brothers had returned from their visit
to the Earl at Cambridge, he asked them why they had left his Court,
and who had given them counsel to visit the Earl. Then they answered
that none had been the cause save they themselves. And the King asked
whether there had been any talk of affiancing them to their cousins,
the Earl's daughters; and the Duke of Clarence"--always prompt at a
lie--"answered that there was not. But the King, who had been fully
informed of all, waxed wroth, and sent them from his presence." Edward
strictly forbade the marriage, and for the present there was no more
talk of it; but Clarence and Warwick understood each other, and were
always in communication, much to the King's displeasure. It did not
please him to find his heir presumptive and his most powerful subject
on too good terms.

The King waited a few months more, and then proceeded to put a far
worse insult on his old friends and followers. In May 1467 he sent
Warwick over-sea, with a commission to visit the King of France, and
turn the eighteen months truce made in 1465 into a permanent peace on
the best terms possible. The errand seemed both useful and honourable,
and Warwick went forth in good spirits; but it was devised in reality
merely to get him out of the kingdom, at a time when the King was
about to cross all his most cherished plans.

Louis was quite as desirous as Warwick himself to conclude a permanent
peace. It was all-important to him that England should not be on the
side of Burgundy, and he was ready to make the Earl's task easy.
The reception which he prepared for Warwick was such as might have
been given to a crowned head. He went five leagues down the Seine to
receive the English embassy, and feasted Warwick royally on the river
bank. When Rouen was reached "the King gave the Earl most honourable
greeting; for there came out to meet him the priests of every parish
in the town in their copes, with crosses and banners and holy water,
and so he was conducted to Notre Dame de Rouen, where he made his
offering. And he was well lodged at the Jacobins in the said town of
Rouen. Afterward the Queen and her daughters came to the said town that
he might see them. And the King abode with Warwick for the space of
twelve days communing with him, after which the Earl departed back into
England." And with him went as Ambassadors from France the Archbishop
of Narbonne, the Bastard of Bourbon (Admiral of France), the Bishop of
Bayeux, Master Jean de Poupencourt, and William Monipenny, a Scotch
agent in whom the King placed much confidence.

Warwick and the French Ambassadors landed at Sandwich, where they had
a hearty reception; for the people of Sandwich, like all the men of
Kent, were great supporters of the Earl. Posts were sent forward to
notify their arrival to the King, and the party then set out to ride
up to London. As they drew near the city the Earl was somewhat vexed
to find that no one came forth to welcome them on the King's behalf;
but presently the Duke of Clarence came riding alone to meet him, and
brought him intelligence which turned his satisfaction at the success
of the French negotiations into bitter vexation of spirit.

When Warwick had got well over-sea, the King had proceeded to work out
his own plans, secure that he would not be interrupted. He had really
determined to make alliance with Burgundy and not with France; and
the moment that the coast was clear a Burgundian emissary appeared in
London. Antony "the Grand Bastard," the trusted agent of the Court of
Charolois, ascended the Thames at the very moment that Warwick was
ascending the Seine. Ostensibly he came on a chivalrous errand, to
joust with the Queen's brother Lord Scales in honour of all the ladies
of Burgundy. The passage of arms was duly held, to the huge delight
of the populace of London, and the English chroniclers give us all
its details--instead of relating the important political events of
the year. But the real object of the Bastard's visit was to negotiate
an English alliance for his brother; and he was so successful that
he returned to Flanders authorised to promise the hand of the King's
sister Margaret to the Count of Charolois.

But Warwick had not merely to learn that the King had stultified his
negotiations with France by making an agreement with Burgundy behind
his back. He was now informed that, only two days before his arrival,
Edward had gone, without notice given or cause assigned, to his brother
the Archbishop of York, who lay ill at his house by Westminster Barrs,
and suddenly dismissed him from the Chancellorship and taken the great
seal from him. Open war had been declared on the house of Neville.[9]

But bitterly vexed though he was at his sovereign's double dealing,
Warwick proceeded to carry out the forms of his duty. He called on the
King immediately on his arrival, announced the success of his embassy,
and craved for a day of audience for the French Ambassadors. "When the
Earl spoke of all the good cheer that King Louis had made him, and
how he had sent him the keys of every castle and town that he passed
through, he perceived from the King's countenance that he was paying no
attention at all to what he was saying, so he betook himself home, sore
displeased."

Next day the French had the audience. The King received them in state,
surrounded by Rivers, Scales, John Woodville, and Lord Hastings. "The
Ambassadors were much abashed to see him, for he showed himself a
prince of a haughty bearing." Warwick then introduced them, and Master
Jean de Poupencourt, as spokesman for the rest, laid the proposals of
Louis before the King. Edward briefly answered that he had pressing
business, and could not communicate with them himself; they might say
their say to certain lords whom he would appoint for the purpose. Then
they were ushered out of his presence. It was clear that he would do
nothing for them; indeed the whole business had only been concocted to
get Warwick out of the way. It was abortive, and had been intended to
be so.

The Earl on leaving the palace was bursting with rage; his ordinary
caution and affability were gone, and he broke out in angry words even
before the foreigners. "As they rowed home in their barge the Frenchmen
had many discourses with each other. But Warwick was so wroth that he
could not contain himself, and he said to the Admiral of France, 'Have
you not seen what traitors there are about the King's person?' But
the Admiral answered, 'My Lord, I pray you grow not hot; for some day
you shall be well avenged.' But the Earl said, 'Know that those very
traitors were the men who have had my brother displaced from the office
of Chancellor, and made the King take the seal from him.'"

Edward went to Windsor next day, taking no further heed of the
Ambassadors. He appointed no one to treat with them, and they remained
six weeks without hearing from him, seeing no one but Warwick, who
did his best to entertain them, and Warwick's new ally the Duke of
Clarence. At last they betook themselves home, having accomplished
absolutely nothing. On the eve of their departure the King sent them a
beggarly present of hunting-horns, leather bottles, and mastiffs, in
return for the golden hanaps and bowls and the rich jewellery which
they had brought from France.

Warwick would have nothing more to do with his master. He saw the
Ambassadors back as far as Sandwich, and then went off in high dudgeon
to Middleham. There he held much deep discourse with his brothers,
George the dispossessed Chancellor, and John of Montagu the Earl of
Northumberland. At Christmas the King summoned him to Court; he sent
back the reply that "never would he come again to Council while all his
mortal enemies, who were about the King's person, namely, Lord Rivers
the Treasurer, and Lord Scales and Lord Herbert and Sir John Woodville,
remained there present." The breach between Warwick and his master was
now complete.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 8: There seems to be no foundation for the theory that
Warwick wished the King to marry his daughter Isabel. The Earl moved
strongly in favour of the French marriage, and his daughter was too
young, being only thirteen years of age, for a king desirous of raising
up heirs to his crown.]

[Footnote 9: It seems impossible to work out to any purpose the
statement of Polidore Vergil and others that Warwick's final breach
with the King was caused by Edward's offering violence to a lady of
the house of Neville. Lord Lytton, of course, was justified in using
this hint for his romance, but the historian finds it too vague and
untrustworthy.]




CHAPTER XIV

PLAYING WITH TREASON


Great ministers who have been accustomed to sway the destinies
of kingdoms, and who suddenly find themselves disgraced at their
master's caprice, have seldom been wont to sit down in resignation and
accept their fall with equanimity. Such a line of conduct requires a
self-denial and a high-flown loyalty to principle which are seldom
found in the practical statesman. If the fallen minister is well
stricken in years, and the fire has gone out of him, he may confine
himself to sermons on the ingratitude of kings. If his greatness has
been purely official, and his power entirely dependent on the authority
entrusted to him by his master, his discontent may not be dangerous.
But Warwick was now in the very prime of his life,--he was just
forty,--and he was moreover by far the most powerful subject within the
four seas. It was sheer madness in King Edward to goad such a man to
desperation by a series of deliberate insults.

This was no mere case of ordinary ingratitude. If ever one man had made
another, Richard Neville had made Edward Plantagenet. He had taken
charge of him, a raw lad of eighteen, at the moment of the disastrous
rout of Ludford, and trained him in arms and statecraft with unceasing
care. Twice had he saved the lost cause of York, in 1459 and in 1461.
He had spent five years in harness, in one long series of battles and
sieges, that his cousin might wear his crown in peace. He had compassed
sea and land in embassies that Edward might be safe from foreign as
well as from domestic foes. He had seen his father and his brother fall
by the axe and the sword in the cause of York. He had seen his mother
and his wife fugitives on the face of the earth, his castles burnt,
his manors wasted, his tenants slain, all that the son of Richard
Plantagenet might sit on the throne that was his father's due.

Warwick then might well be cut to the heart at his master's
ingratitude. It was no marvel if, after the King's last treachery to
him in the matter of the French embassy, he retired from Court and sent
a bitter answer to Edward's next summons. After the open breach there
were now two courses open to him: the first to abandon all his schemes,
and betake himself in silent bitterness to the management of his vast
estates; the second was to endeavour to win his way back to power by
the ways which medieval England knew only too well--the way which had
served Simon de Montfort, and Thomas of Lancaster, and Richard of York;
the way that had led Simon and Thomas and Richard to their bloody
graves. The first alternative was no doubt the one that the perfect
man, the ideally loyal and unselfish knight, should have chosen. But
Richard Neville was no perfect man; he was a practical statesman--"the
cleverest man of his time," says one who had observed him closely; and
his long tenure of power had made him look upon the first place in the
Council of the King as his right and due. His enemies the Woodvilles
and Herberts had driven him from his well-earned precedence by the
weapons that they could use--intrigue and misrepresentation; what more
natural than that he should repay them by the weapon that he could best
employ, the iron hand of armed force?

Hitherto the career of Warwick had been singularly straightforward and
consistent. Through thick and thin he had supported the cause of York
and never wavered in his allegiance to it. It must not be supposed that
he changed his whole policy when his quarrel with the King came to a
head. As his conduct in 1469, when his ungrateful master was in his
power, was destined to show, he had no further design than to reconquer
for himself the place in the royal Council which had been his from 1461
to 1464. Later events developed his plans further than he had himself
expected, but it is evident that at first his sole design was to clear
away the Woodvilles. The only element in his programme which threatened
to lead to deeper and more treasonable plans was his connection
with his would-be son-in-law George of Clarence. The handsome youth
who professed such a devotion to him, followed his advice with such
docility, and took his part so warmly in the quarrel with the King,
seems from the first to have obtained a place in his affections greater
than Edward had ever won. But Clarence had his ambitions; what they
were and how far they extended the Earl had not as yet discovered.

Warwick had now the will to play his master's new ministers an ill
turn; that he had also the power to do so none knew better than
himself. The lands of Neville and Montacute, Beauchamp and Despenser
united could send into the field a powerful army. Moreover, his
neighbours, in most of the counties where his influence prevailed,
had bound themselves to him by taking his livery; barons as well as
knights were eager to be of his "Privy Council," to wear his Ragged
Staff and ride in his array. The very aspect of his household seemed
to show the state of a petty king. Every one has read Hollingshead's
famous description, which tells how the little army of followers which
constituted his ordinary retinue eat six oxen daily for breakfast.

Nor was it only in the strength of his own retainers that Warwick
trusted; he knew that he himself was the most popular man in the
kingdom. Men called him ever the friend of the Commons, and "his open
kitchen persuaded the meaner sort as much as the justice of his cause."
His adversaries, on the other hand, were unmistakably disliked by
the people. The old partisans of York still looked on the Woodvilles
as Lancastrian renegades, and the grasping avarice of Rivers and his
family was stirring up popular demonstration against them even before
Warwick's breach with the King. A great mob in Kent had sacked one
of Rivers' manors and killed his deer in the autumn of 1467, and
trouble was brewing against him in other quarters. A word of summons
from Warwick would call rioters out of the ground in half the shires
of England. Already in January 1468 a French ambassador reports: "In
one county more than three hundred archers were in arms, and had made
themselves a captain named Robin, and sent to the Earl of Warwick to
know if it was time to be busy, and to say that all their neighbours
were ready. But my Lord answered, bidding them go home, for it was not
yet time to be stirring. If the time should come, he would let them
know."[10]

It was not only discontented Yorkists that had taken the news of
the quarrel between Warwick and his master as a signal for moving.
The tidings had stirred the exiled Lancastrians to a sudden burst
of activity of which we should hardly have thought them capable.
Queen Margaret borrowed ships and money from Louis, and lay in force
at Harfleur. Sir Henry Courtney, heir of the late Earl of Devon,
and Thomas Hungerford, son of the lord who fell at Hexham, tried to
raise an insurrection in the South-West; but they were caught by
Lord Stafford of Southwick and beheaded at Salisbury. As a reward
the King gave Stafford his victim's title of Earl of Devon. In Wales
the long-wandering Jasper Tudor suddenly appeared, at the head of
two thousand men, supported by a small French fleet. He took Harlech
Castle and sacked Denbigh; but a few weeks later Warwick's enemy,
Lord Herbert, fell upon him at the head of the Yorkists of the March,
routed his tumultuary army, retook Harlech, and forced him again to
seek refuge in the hills. Herbert, like Lord Stafford, was rewarded
with the title of the foe he had vanquished, and became Earl of
Pembroke. While these risings were on foot, Lancastrian emissaries were
busy all over England; but their activity only resulted in a series
of executions. Two gentlemen of the Duke of Norfolk's retinue were
beheaded for holding secret communication with the Beauforts while
they were in Flanders, following the train which escorted the Princess
Margaret at her marriage with Charles of Charolois, who had now become
Duke of Burgundy. In London more executions took place, and Sir Thomas
Cooke, late Lord Mayor, had all his goods confiscated for misprision
of treason. Two of the Lancastrian emissaries alleged, under torture,
the one, that Warwick had promised aid to the rising, the other that
Lord Wenlock, Warwick's friend and supporter, had guilty knowledge of
the scheme; but in each case the King himself acknowledged that the
accusation was frivolous--the random imagining of men on the rack,
forced to say something to save their own bones. It was not likely that
Warwick would play the game of Queen Margaret, the slayer of his father
and brother, and the instigator of attempts on his own life.

Startled by the sudden revival of Lancastrian energy, but encouraged
by the easy way in which he had mastered it, King Edward determined
to give the war-like impulses of his subjects vent by undertaking in
the next year a great expedition against France. He had the example of
Henry the Fifth before his eyes, and hoped to stifle treason at home by
foreign war. Among his preparations for leaving home was a determined
attempt to open negotiations with Warwick for a reconciliation. The
King won over the Archbishop of York to plead his cause, by restoring
to him some estates which he had seized in 1467; and about Easter
George Neville induced his brother to meet the King at Coventry.
Warwick came, but it is to be feared that he came fully resolved to
have his revenge at his own time, with his heart quite unsoftened
toward his master; yet he spoke the King fair, and even consented to be
reconciled to Lord Herbert, though he would have nothing to say to the
Woodvilles. He was also induced to join the company which escorted the
Princess Margaret to the coast, on her way to her marriage in Flanders.
After this Warwick paid a short visit to London, where he sat among
the judges who in July tried the Lancastrian conspirators of the city.
Clarence accompanied him, and sat on the same bench. He had spent the
last few months in moving the Pope to grant him a disposition to marry
Isabel Neville,[11] for they were within the prohibited degrees; but
under pressure from King Edward the Curia had delayed the consideration
of his request.

The autumn of 1468 and the spring of 1469 passed away quietly. Warwick
made no movement, for he was still perfecting his plans. He saw with
secret pleasure that the French, with whom peace would have been
made long ago if his advice had been followed, kept the King fully
employed. It must have given him peculiar gratification when his enemy
Anthony Woodville, placed at the head of a large fleet, made two most
inglorious expeditions to the French coast, and returned crestfallen
without having even seen the enemy.

Meanwhile the Earl had been quietly measuring his resources. He had
spoken to all his kinsmen, and secured the full co-operation of the
majority of them. George the Archbishop of York, Henry Neville heir to
Warwick's aged uncle Lord Latimer, Sir John Coniers of Hornby, husband
of his niece Alice Neville, his cousin Lord Fitzhugh, and Thomas "the
bastard of Fauconbridge," natural son to the deceased peer who had
fought so well at Towton, were his chief reliance. His brother John of
Montagu, the Earl of Northumberland, could not make up his mind; he did
not reveal Warwick's plans to the King, but he would not promise any
aid. William Neville of Abergavenny was now too old to be taken into
account. The rest of Warwick's uncles and brothers were by this time
dead.

By April 1469 the preparations were complete. Every district where the
name of Neville was great had been carefully prepared for trouble.
Kent, Yorkshire, and South Wales were ready for insurrection, and yet
all had been done so quietly that the King, who ever since he had
thrown off the Earl's influence had been sinking deeper and deeper into
habits of careless evil-living and debauchery, suspected nothing.

In April Warwick took his wife and daughters across to Calais,
apparently to get them out of harm's way. He himself, professing a
great wish to see his cousin Margaret, the newly-married Duchess of
Burgundy, went on to St. Omer. He there visited Duke Charles, and was
reconciled to him in spite of the evil memories of their last meeting
at Boulogne. To judge from his conduct, the Earl was bent on nothing
but a harmless tour; but, as a matter of fact, his movements were
but a blind destined to deceive King Edward. While he was feasting
at St. Omer he had sent orders over-sea for the commencement of an
insurrection. In a few days it was timed to break out. Meanwhile
Warwick returned to Calais, and lodged with Wenlock, who was in charge
of the great fortress.

His orders had had their effect. In the end of June grave riots broke
out in the neighbourhood of York. Ostensibly they were connected with
the maladministration of the estates of St. Leonard's hospital in that
city; but they were in reality political and not agrarian. Within a
few days fifteen thousand men were at the gates of York, clamorously
setting forth a string of grievances, which were evidently founded
on Cade's manifesto of 1450. Once more we hear of heavy taxation,
maladministration of the law, the alienation of the royal estates to
upstart favourites, the exclusion from the royal Councils of the great
lords of the royal blood. Once more a demand is made for the punishment
of evil counsellors, and the introduction of economy into the royal
household, and the application of the revenue to the defence of the
realm. The first leader of the rioters was Robert Huldyard, known as
Robin of Redesdale, no doubt the same Robin whom the Earl had bidden
in 1468 to keep quiet and wait the appointed time. John Neville the
Earl of Northumberland lay at York with a large body of men-at-arms,
for he was still Lieutenant of the North. Many expected that he would
join the rioters; but, either because he had not quite recognised the
insurrection to be his brother's work, or because he had resolved to
adhere loyally to Edward, Montagu surprised the world by attacking the
band which beset York. He routed its vanguard, captured Huldyard, and
had him beheaded.

But this engagement was far from checking the rising. In a week the
whole of Yorkshire, from Tees to Humber, was up, and it soon became
evident in whose interest the movement was working. New leaders
appeared. Sir John Coniers, the husband of Warwick's niece, and one
of the most influential Yorkists of the North, replaced Huldyard, and
assumed his name of Robin of Redesdale, while with him were Henry
Neville of Latimer and Lord Fitzhugh. Instead of lingering at the gates
of York, the great body of insurgents--rumour made it more than thirty
thousand strong--rolled southward into the Midlands. They were coming,
they said, to lay their grievances before the King; and in every place
that they passed they hung their articles, obviously the work of some
old political hand, on the church doors.

King Edward seems to have been taken quite unawares by this dangerous
insurrection. He had kept his eye on Warwick alone, and when Warwick
was over-sea he thought himself safe. At the end of June he had been
making a progress in Norfolk, with no force at his back save two
hundred archers, a bodyguard whom he had raised in 1468 and kept always
around him. Hearing of the stir in Yorkshire, he rode north-ward to
Nottingham, calling in such force as could be gathered by the way. As
he went, news reached him which suddenly revealed the whole scope of
the insurrection.

The moment that his brother's attention was drawn off by the Northern
rising, the Duke of Clarence had quietly slipped over to Calais, and
with him went George Neville the Archbishop of York. This looked
suspicious, and the King at once wrote to Clarence, Warwick, and the
Archbishop, bidding them all come to him without delay. Long before
his orders can have reached them, the tale of treason was out. Within
twelve hours of Clarence's arrival at Calais the long-projected
marriage between him and Isabel Neville had been celebrated, in full
defiance of the King. Warwick and Clarence kept holiday but for one
day; the marriage took place on the 11th, and by the 12th they were in
Kent with a strong party of the garrison of Calais as their escort.

The unruly Kentishmen rose in a body in Warwick's favour, as eagerly
as when they had mustered to his banner in 1460 before the battle of
Northampton. The Earl and the Duke came to Canterbury with several
thousand men at their back. There they revealed their treasonable
intent, for they published a declaration that they considered the
articles of Robin of Redesdale just and salutary, and would do
their best to bring them to the King's notice. How the King was to
be persuaded was indicated clearly enough, by a proclamation which
summoned out the whole shire of Kent to join the Earl's banner. Warwick
and his son-in-law then marched on London, which promptly threw open
its gates. The King was thus caught between two fires--the open rebels
lay to the north of him, his brother and cousin with their armed
persuasion to the south.

Even before Warwick's treason had been known, the King had recognised
the danger of the northern rising, and sent commissions of array all
over England. Two considerable forces were soon in arms in his behalf.
Herbert, the new Earl of Pembroke, raised fourteen thousand Welsh and
Marchmen at Brecon and Ludlow, and set out eastward. Stafford, the new
Earl of Devon, collected six thousand archers in the South-Western
Counties, and set out northward. The King lay at Nottingham with Lord
Hastings, Lord Mountjoy, and the Woodvilles. He seems to have had
nearly fifteen thousand men in his company; but their spirit was bad.
"Sire," said Mountjoy to him in full council of war, "no one wishes
your person ill, but it would be well to send away my Lord of Rivers
and his children when you have done conferring with them." Edward took
this advice. Rivers and John Woodville forthwith retired to Chepstow;
Scales joined his sister the Queen at Cambridge.

Meanwhile the Northern rebels were pouring south by way of Doncaster
and Derby. Their leaders Coniers and Latimer showed considerable
military skill, for by a rapid march on to Leicester they got between
the King and Lord Herbert's army. Edward, for once out-generalled, had
to follow them southward, but the Yorkshiremen were some days ahead
of him, and on July 25th reached Daventry. On the same day Herbert
and Stafford concentrated their forces at Banbury; but on their first
meeting the two new earls fell to hard words on a private quarrel, and,
although the enemy was so near, Stafford in a moment of pique drew off
his six thousand men to Deddington, ten miles away, leaving Pembroke's
fourteen thousand Welsh pikemen altogether unprovided with archery.

Next day all the chief actors in the scene were converging on the same
spot in central England--Coniers marching from Daventry on to Banbury,
Pembroke from Banbury on Daventry, with Stafford following in his
rear, while Warwick and Clarence had left London and were moving by
St. Albans on Towcester; the King, following the Yorkshiremen, was
somewhere near Northampton.

Coniers and his colleagues, to whom belong all the honours of
generalship in this campaign, once more got ahead of their opponents.
Moving rapidly on Banbury on the 26th, they found Pembroke's army
approaching them on a common named Danesmoor, near Edgecott Park,
six miles north of Banbury. The Welsh took up a position covered by
a small stream and offered battle, though they were greatly inferior
in numbers. The Northerners promptly attacked them, and though one
of their three leaders, Henry Neville of Latimer, fell in the first
onset, gained a complete victory; "by force of archery they forced the
Welsh to descend from the hill into the valley," though Herbert and
his brothers did all that brave knights could to save the battle. The
King was only a few hours' march away; indeed, his vanguard under Sir
Geoffrey Gate and Thomas Clapham actually reached the field, but both
were old officers of Warwick, and instead of falling on the rebels'
rear, proceeded to join them, and led the final attack on Herbert's
position.

Thunderstruck at the deep demoralisation among his troops which this
desertion showed, the King fell back on Olney, abandoning Northampton
to the rebels. Next day--it was July 27th--the brave Earl of Pembroke
and his brother Richard Herbert, both of whom had been taken prisoners,
were beheaded in the market-place by Coniers' command without sentence
or trial. Their blood lies without doubt on Warwick's head, for though
neither he nor Clarence was present, the rebels were obviously acting
on his orders, and if he had instructed them to keep all their
captives safe, they would never have presumed to slay them. Several
chroniclers indeed say that Warwick and Clarence had expressly doomed
Herbert for death. This slaughter was perfectly inexcusable, for
Herbert had never descended to the acts of the Woodvilles; he was an
honourable enemy, and Warwick had actually been reconciled to him only
a year before.[12] The execution of the Herberts was not the only token
of the fact that the great Earl's hand was pulling the strings all over
England. His special aversions, Rivers and John Woodville, were seized
a week later at Chepstow by a band of rioters--probably retainers from
the Despenser estates by the Severn--and forwarded to Coventry, where
they were put to death early in August. Even if Pembroke's execution
was the unauthorised work of Coniers and Fitzhugh, this slaying of the
Woodvilles must certainly have been Warwick's own deed. Stafford the
Earl of Devon, whose desertion of the Welsh had been the principal
cause of the defeat at Edgecott, fared no better than the colleague
he had betrayed. He disbanded his army and fled homeward; but at
Bridgewater he was seized by insurgents, retainers of the late Earl of
Devon whom he had beheaded a year before, and promptly put to death.

It only remains to relate King Edward's fortunes. When the news of
Edgecott fight reached his army, it disbanded for the most part, and he
was left, with no great following, at Olney, whither he had fallen back
on July 27th. Meanwhile Warwick and Clarence, marching from London on
Northampton along the Roman road, were not far off. The news of the
King's position reached their army, and George Neville the Archbishop
of York, who was with the vanguard, resolved on a daring stroke. Riding
up by night with a great body of horse he surrounded Olney; the King's
sentinels kept bad watch, and at midnight Edward was roused by the
clash of arms at his door. He found the streets full of Warwick's men,
and the Archbishop waiting in his ante-chamber. The smooth prelate
entered and requested him to rise and dress himself. "Then the King
said he would not, for he had not yet had his rest; but the Archbishop,
that false and disloyal priest, said to him a second time, 'Sire, you
must rise and come to see my brother of Warwick, nor do I think that
you can refuse me.' So the King, fearing worse might come to him, rose
and rode off to meet his cousin of Warwick."

The Earl meanwhile had passed on to Northampton, where he met the
Northern rebels on July 29th, and thanked them for the good service
they had done England. There he dismissed the Kentish levies which had
followed him from London, and moved on to Coventry escorted by the
Yorkshiremen, many of whom must have been his own tenants. At Coventry
the Archbishop, and his unwilling companion the King, overtook them.
The details of the meeting of Warwick and Clarence with their captive
master have not come down to us. But apparently Edward repaid the
Earl's guile of the past year by an equally deceptive mask of good
humour. He made no reproaches about the death of his adherents, signed
everything that was required of him, and did not attempt to escape.
The first batch of privy seals issued under Warwick's influence are
dated from Coventry on August 2nd.

The great Earl's treacherous plans had been crowned with complete
success. He had shown that half England would rise at his word; his
enemies were dead; his master was in his power. Yet he found that
his troubles were now beginning, instead of reaching their end. It
was not merely that the whole kingdom had been thrown into a state
of disturbance, and that men had commenced everywhere to settle
old quarrels with the sword--the Duke of Norfolk, for example,
was besieging the Paston's castle of Caistor, and the Commons of
Northumberland were up in arms demanding the restoration of the Percies
to their heritage. These troubles might be put down by the strong
arm of Warwick; but the problem of real difficulty was to arrange a
_modus vivendi_ with the King. Edward was no coward or weakling to be
frightened into good behaviour by a rising such as had just occurred.
How could he help resenting with all his passionate nature the violence
of which he had been the victim? His wife, too, would always be at his
side; and though natural affection was not Elizabeth Woodville's strong
point,[13] still she was far too ambitious and vindictive to pardon
the deaths of her father and brother. Warwick knew Edward well enough
to realise that for the future there could never be true confidence
between them again, and that for the rest of his life he must guard his
head well against his master's sword.

But the Earl was proud and self-reliant; he determined to face the
danger and release the King. No other alternative was before him, save,
indeed, to slay Edward and proclaim his own son-in-law, Clarence,
for King. But the memory of old days spent in Edward's cause was too
strong. Clarence, too, though he may have been willing enough to
supplant his brother, made no open proposals to extinguish him.

Edward was over a month in his cousin's hands. Part of the time he was
kept at Warwick and Coventry, but the last three weeks were spent in
the Earl's northern stronghold of Middleham. The few accounts which we
have of the time seem to show that the King was all smoothness and fair
promises; the Earl and the Archbishop, on the other hand, were careful
to make his detention as little like captivity as could be managed.
He was allowed free access to every one, and permitted to go hunting
three or four miles away from the castle in company with a handful
of the Earl's servants. Warwick at the same time gave earnest of his
adherence to the Yorkist cause by putting down two Lancastrian risings,
the one in favour of the Percies, led by Robin of Holderness, the other
raised by his own second-cousin, Sir Humphrey Neville, one of the elder
branch, who was taken and beheaded at York.

Before releasing the King, Warwick exacted a few securities from him.
The first was a general pardon to himself, Clarence, and all who had
been engaged in the rising of Robin of Redesdale. The second was a
grant to himself of the chamberlainship of South Wales, and the right
to name the governors of Caermarthen and the other South Welsh castles.
These offices had been in Herbert's hands, and the Earl had found that
they cramped his own power in Glamorganshire and the South Marches.
The third was the appointment as Treasurer of Sir John Langstrother,
the Prior of the Hospitallers of England; he was evidently chosen as
Rivers' successor, because two years before he had been elected to
his place as prior in opposition to John Woodville, whom the King had
endeavoured to foist on the order. The chancellorship, however, was
still left in the hands of Bishop Stillington, against whom no one had
a grudge; George Neville did not claim his old preferment.

By October the King was back in London, which he entered in great
state, escorted by Montagu, the Archbishop, Richard of Gloucester, and
the Earls of Essex and Arundel. "The King himself," writes one of the
Pastons that day, "hath good language of my Lords of Clarence, Warwick,
and York, saying they be his best friends; but his household have other
language, so that what shall hastily fall I can not say." No more, we
may add, could any man in England, the King and Warwick included.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 10: Letter of William Monipenny to Louis the Eleventh. He
calls it _le pays de Surfiorkshire_, a cross between Suffolk and
Yorkshire. But the latter must be meant, as Warwick had no interest in
Suffolk, and the captain is obviously Robin of Redesdale.]

[Footnote 11: Clarence's mother was Isabel's great aunt.]

[Footnote 12: It is fair to say that Herbert was universally disliked;
he was called the Spoiler of the Church and the Commons.]

[Footnote 13: As witness her dealings with Richard the Third after he
had murdered her sons.]




CHAPTER XV

WARWICK FOR KING HENRY


The peace between Warwick and King Edward lasted for a period even
shorter than might have been expected; seven months, from September
1469 to March 1470, was the term for which it was destined to endure.
Yet while it did hold firm, all was so smooth outwardly that its
rupture came as a thunderclap upon the world. Nothing, indeed, could
have looked more promising for lovers of quiet times than the events of
the winter of 1469-70. A Parliament ratified all the King's grants of
immunity to the insurgents of the last year, and while it sat the King
announced a project which promised to bind York and Neville more firmly
together than ever. Edward, though now married for six years, had no
son; three daughters alone were the issue of his union with Elizabeth
Woodville. He now proposed to marry his eldest daughter, and heiress
presumptive, to the male heir of the Nevilles, the child George, son of
Montagu.[14] To make the boy's rank suitable to his prospects, Edward
created him Duke of Bedford. Montagu had not joined with his brothers
in the rising, and had even fought with Robin of Redesdale, so it was
all the easier for the King to grant him this crowning honour.

In February Warwick was at Warwick Castle, Montagu in the North, while
Clarence and King Edward lay at London. All was quiet enough, when
suddenly there came news of troubles in Lincolnshire. Riotous bands,
headed by Sir Robert Welles, son of Lord Willoughby and Welles, had
come together, sacked the manor of a certain Sir Thomas Burgh, one of
Edward's most trusted servants, and were raising the usual seditious
cries about the evil government of the realm. At first nothing very
dangerous seemed to be on foot. When the King sent for Willoughby, to
call him to account for his son's doings, the old peer came readily
enough to London to make his excuses, relying on the safe conduct
which was sent him. But the riots were now swelling into a regular
insurrection, and soon news came that Sir Robert Welles had called out
the whole shire-force of Lincoln, mustered fifteen thousand men, and
was bidding his troops to shout for King Henry. Edward at once issued
commissions of array for raising an overwhelming force against the
rebels. Two of the commissions were sent to Warwick and Clarence, who
were bidden to collect the men of Warwickshire and Worcestershire.
Their orders were dated March 7th, but before they were half carried
out, the purpose for which they were issued had already been attained.
Edward, taking Lord Willoughby with him as a hostage, had rushed north
with one of these astonishing bursts of energy of which he was now and
again capable. Leaving London on the 6th, he reached Stamford on March
11th, with the forces of the home and eastern counties at his back.
On the 12th he met the rebels at Empingham near Stamford, and when
Welles would not bid them disperse, beheaded his aged father Willoughby
in front of his army. The Lincolnshire men fled in disgraceful rout
before the fire of the King's artillery, casting off their cassocks
with the colours of Welles in such haste that the fight was known as
Lose-coat Field. Sir Robert was caught and beheaded at Doncaster a
few days later, and the rising was at an end. On Tuesday the 21st the
King reviewed his troops: "It was said that never were seen in England
so many goodly men, and so well arrayed for a fight; in especial the
Duke of Norfolk was worshipfully accompanied, no lord there so well."
Warwick and Clarence, with a few thousand men from the shires they
had been told to raise, lay that day at Chesterfield, converging, in
accordance with their orders, on Lincoln.

Suddenly Edward announced to his army that he had learnt from the
dying confession of Sir Robert Welles that Warwick and Clarence were
implicated in the rising. Though Welles had sometimes used King Henry's
name, it was now said that he had really been proposing to place
Clarence on the throne, and was acting with Warwick's full approval.
Edward added that he had already sent to the Duke and the Earl, bidding
them come to his presence at once and unaccompanied. They had refused
to come without a safe conduct, so he now proclaimed them traitors, but
would grant them their lives if they would appear before him in humble
and obeisant wise within a week. The army was at once directed to march
on Chesterfield, but when the proclamation reached Warwick and Clarence
they did not obey it, and fled for their lives.

This series of events is the most puzzling portion of the whole of
Warwick's life. The chroniclers help us very little, and the only two
first-hand documents which we possess are official papers drawn up
by King Edward. These papers were so widely spread that we meet them
repeated word for word and paragraph for paragraph even in the French
writers,--with the names, of course, horribly mangled.[15] Edward said
that down to the very moment of Welles' capture he had no thought but
that Warwick and Clarence were serving him faithfully: it was Welles'
confession, and some treasonable papers found on the person of a squire
in the Duke of Clarence's livery who was slain in the pursuit, that
revealed the plot to him. The second document which the King published
was Welles' confession, a rambling effusion which may or may not fully
represent the whole story. Why Welles should confess at all we cannot
see, unless he expected to save his life thereby; and if he expected to
save his life he would, of course, insert in his tale whatever names
the King chose. Welles' narrative relates that all Lincolnshire was
afraid that the King would visit it with vengeance for joining Robin
of Redesdale last year. Excitement already prevailed, when there came
to him, about February 2nd, Sir John Clare, a chaplain of the Duke
of Clarence's, who asked him if Lincolnshire would be ready to rise
supposing there was another trouble this year, but bade him make no
stir till the Duke should send him word. Without waiting, according
to his own tale, for any further communication, Welles raised all
Lincolnshire, making proclamation in the King's name as well as that of
the Duke of Clarence. Some days after the riots began there came to him
a squire in the Duke's livery, who told him that he had provoked the
King, and that great multitudes of the Commons must needs die unless
they bestirred themselves. So this squire--Welles could not give his
surname but only knew that he was called Walter--took over the guiding
of the host till he was slain at Stamford. Moreover, one John Wright
came to Lincoln, bearing a ring as token, which he said belonged to the
Earl of Warwick, with a message of comfort to say that the Earl had
sworn to take such part as Lincolnshire should take. "And I understand
that they intended to make great risings, and as far as ever I could
understand, to the intent to make the Duke of Clarence King, and so it
was largely noised in our host." According to his story, Welles had
never seen either Warwick or Clarence himself, and had no definite
knowledge of their purpose. He only understood that the purpose was to
crown Clarence; all his information came from Clare and the anonymous
squire.

This is a curious tale, and suggests many doubts. If Warwick wished
to act again the comedy of last year, why should he send to a county
where he had no influence, to a staunch Lancastrian family (Welles'
grandfather fell in Henry's cause at Towton, and his father was the
Willoughby who tried to kidnap Warwick in 1460) in order to provoke a
rising? And if he had planned a rising in Lincoln, why did he make no
attempt to support it by calling out his own Midland and South Welsh
retainers, or raising Yorkshire or Kent, where he could command the
whole county? That the Earl was capable of treasonable double-dealing
he had shown clearly enough in 1469. But was he capable of such insane
bad management as the arrangements for Welles' insurrection show? Last
year his own relatives and retainers worked the plan, and it was most
accurately timed and most successfully executed. Why should he now make
such a bungle?

It is, moreover, to be observed that while Welles puts everything down
to Clarence in his confession, Warkworth and other chroniclers say that
he bade his men shout for King Henry, and all his connections were
certainly Lancastrian. Is it possible that he was trying to put the
guilt off his own shoulders, and to make a bid for his life, acting on
Edward's hints, when he implicated Warwick and Clarence in his guilt?

It is certainly quite in keeping with Edward's character to suppose
that, finding himself at the head of a loyal and victorious army, it
suddenly occurred to him that his position could be utilised to fall on
Warwick and Clarence and take his revenge for the deaths of Pembroke
and Rivers.

Whether this was so or not, the Duke and the Earl were most certainly
caught unprepared when Edward marched on Chesterfield. They left a
message that they would come to the King if he would give them a
safe conduct, and fled to Manchester. Edward threw his army between
them and York, where they could have raised men in abundance, and
the fugitives, after vainly trying to interest Lord Stanley in their
cause, doubled back on the Midlands. With a few hundred men in their
train they got to Warwick, but apparently there was no time to make a
stand even there. The King had sent commissions of array out all over
England to trusty hands, and forces under staunch Yorkists were closing
in towards the Midlands on every side. Edward calculated on having an
enormous army in the field by April; he himself was coming south with
quite twenty thousand victorious troops, and he had called out the
whole of the levies of Shropshire, Hereford, Gloucester, Stafford,
Wiltshire, Devon, Dorset, and Somerset. When he heard that Warwick was
moving south, he sent to Salisbury to order quarters and provisions for
forty thousand men, who would be concentrated there if the Earl tried
to reach the Montacute lands in that quarter.

So unprepared was the Earl for the assault that, packing up his
valuables in Warwick Castle, and taking with him his wife and his two
daughters, he fled for the South Coast without waiting to be surrounded
by his enemies. He quite outstripped the King, who had barely reached
Salisbury when he himself was at Exeter. There the Duke and Earl
seized a few ships, which they sent round to Dartmouth; more vessels
were obtained in the latter place, for the whole seafaring population
of England favoured the Earl. When Edward drew near, Warwick and his
son-in-law went on board their hastily-extemporised fleet and put
to sea. They ran along the South Coast as far as Southampton, where
they made an attempt to seize a part of the royal navy, including the
great ship called the _Trinity_, which had lain there since Scales'
abortive expedition in 1469. But Scales and Howard occupied the town
with a great Hampshire levy; the Earl's attack failed, and three of his
ships with their crews fell into the enemy's hands. Tiptoft Earl of
Worcester, "the great butcher of England," tried the captured men, and
a squire named Clapham and nineteen more were hung and then impaled by
him. This atrocious punishment sent a shock of horror through England,
and Tiptoft's name is still remembered rather for this abomination than
for all the learning and accomplishments which made him Caxton's idol.

Warwick made for Calais, where his friend Wenlock was in charge,
expecting free admittance. But the King had sent Galliard de Duras
and other officers across to watch the governor, and Wenlock, who was
somewhat of a time-server, dared not show his heart. When Warwick
appeared in the roads he refused him entry, and shot off some harmless
cannon toward the ships. At the same time he sent the Earl a secret
message that "he would give him a fair account of Calais upon the first
opportunity, if he would betake himself to France and wait." While
Warwick lay off Calais his daughter, Clarence's wife, was delivered of
a son. Wenlock sent out for her use two flagons of wine, but would not
give her a safe conduct to land--"a great severity for a servant to use
towards his lord," remarks Commines.

Repulsed from Calais, though we hear that the majority of the garrison
and inhabitants wished to admit them, Warwick and Clarence turned back,
and sought refuge in the harbour of Honfleur, where they trusted to get
shelter from Louis of France. On their way between Calais and Honfleur
they made prizes of several ships belonging to the Duke of Burgundy,
because they understood that he was arming against them. Louis kept
away from Warwick for a time; but he sent his secretary, Du Plessis, to
see him, and his admiral, the Bastard of Bourbon, gave the fugitives a
hearty welcome. Louis was still at war with England, and still dreading
a descent by King Edward on the French coast. He was delighted to
learn that he could now turn Warwick, whose abilities he had learnt
to respect, against his master--anything that would breed trouble in
England would keep his enemy occupied at home. The King's first orders
to his officers were to allow Warwick to fit out his ships, give him a
supply of money, and send him off to England as quickly as possible.
But the narrow seas were too well watched. Charles the Bold, irritated
at Warwick's capture of his merchantmen, had collected a great fleet
of seventy sail, which swept the Channel and watched the mouth of the
Seine.

The enforced delay in Warwick's departure allowed time for a new idea
to ripen in the French King's restless brain. Warwick had now broken
hopelessly with King Edward; they could never trust each other again.
Why therefore should not the Earl reconcile himself to the cause of
Lancaster? No sooner was the idea formed than Louis proceeded to send
for Queen Margaret out of her refuge in the duchy of Bar, and to lay
his plan before her and the Earl, when they all met at Angers in the
middle of July.

The scheme was at first sight revolting to both parties. There was so
much blood and trouble between them that neither could stomach the
proposal. If Margaret could bring herself to forget that Warwick had
twice driven her out of England, and had led her husband in ignominy to
the Tower, she could not pardon the man who, in his moment of wrath,
had stigmatised herself as an adulteress and her son as a bastard.[16]
Warwick, on the other hand, if he could forgive the plot against
his own life which the Queen had hatched in 1459, could not bear to
think of meeting the woman who had sent his gray-haired father to the
scaffold in cold blood on the day after Wakefield. King Louis asked
each party to forget their whole past careers, and sacrifice their
dearest hatreds to the exigencies of the moment.

If Warwick and Queen Margaret had been left to themselves, it is most
improbable that they would ever have come to an agreement. But between
them Louis went busily to and fro, for his unscrupulous mind was
perfectly unable to conceive that passion or sentiment could override
an obvious political necessity. Gradually the two parties were brought
to state their objections to the King's scheme, the first step towards
the commencement of negotiations. Warwick was the first to yield; the
Queen took far longer to persuade. The Earl, she said, had been the
cause of all the trouble that had come on herself, her husband, and
her son. She could not pardon him. Moreover, his pardon would lose
her more friends than he could bring to her. Warwick's answer was
straightforward. He owned all the harm he had done to her and hers.
But the offence, he said, had come first from her who had plotted
evil against him which he had never deserved. What he had done had
been done solely in his own defence. But now the new King had broken
faith with him, and he was bound to him no longer. If Margaret would
forgive him, he would be true to her henceforth; and for that the King
of France would be his surety. Louis gave his word, praying the Queen
to pardon the Earl, to whom, he said, he was more beholden than to any
other man living.[17]

The Queen so pressed, and urged beside by the counsellors of her father
King Réné, agreed to pardon Warwick. Louis then broached the second
point in his scheme. The new alliance, he urged, should be sealed by
a marriage; the Prince of Wales was now seventeen and the Lady Anne,
Warwick's younger daughter, sixteen. What match could be fairer or more
hopeful?

But to this the Queen would not listen. She could find a better match
for her son, she said; and she showed them a letter lately come from
Edward offering him the hand of the young Princess Elizabeth.[18]
Louis, however, was quietly persistent, and in the end the Queen
yielded this point also. On August 4th she met Warwick in the Church of
St. Mary at Angers, and there they were reconciled; the Earl swearing
on a fragment of the true cross that he would cleave to King Henry's
quarrel, the Queen engaging to treat the Earl as her true and faithful
subject, and never to make him any reproach for deeds gone by. The Earl
placed his daughter in the Queen's hands, saying that the marriage
should take place only when he had won back England for King Henry, and
then departed for the coast to make preparations for getting his fleet
to sea.

One person alone was much vexed at the success of Louis' scheme. The
Duke of Clarence had no wish to see his father-in-law reconciled to
the house of Lancaster, for he had been speculating on the notion
that if Warwick drove out Edward he himself would become King. But
wandering exiles must take their fortune as it comes, and Clarence had
to be contented with Queen Margaret's promise that his name should be
inserted in the succession after that of her son, when she and her
husband came to their own again. The Prince was a healthy promising
lad, and the prospect offered was hopelessly remote; Clarence began to
grow discontented, and to regret that he had ever placed himself under
Warwick's guidance. At this juncture his brother sent him a message
from England, through a lady attending on the Duchess, praying him
not to wreck the fortunes of his own family by adhering to the house
of Lancaster, and bidding him remember the hereditary hatred that
lay between them. Edward offered his brother a full pardon. Clarence
replied by promising to come over to the King so soon as he and Warwick
should reach England. Of all these negotiations Warwick suspected not a
word.

Edward was so overjoyed by his brother's engagement to wreck the Earl's
invasion, that he laughed at Charles of Burgundy for squandering money
in keeping a fleet at sea to intercept Warwick, and declared that what
he most wished was to see his adversary safely landed on English soil,
to be dealt with by himself.

He had his wish soon enough. In September the equinoctial gales caught
the Burgundian fleet and blew it to the four winds, some of the vessels
being driven as far as Scotland and Denmark. This left the coast clear
for Warwick, who had long been waiting to put to sea. The Earl had
already taken his precautions to make his task easy. A proclamation,
signed by himself and Clarence, had been scattered all over England by
willing hands. It said that the exiles were returning "to set right and
justice to their places, and to reduce and redeem for ever the realm
from its thraldom;" but no mention was made either of Edward or Henry
in it, a curious fact which seems to point out that the Lancastrian
alliance was not to be avowed till the last moment. But more useful
than many proclamations was the message which the Earl sent into the
North Country; he prayed his kinsman Fitzhugh to stir up Yorkshire and
draw the King northward, as he had done before, when he and Coniers
worked the rebellion of Robin of Redesdale.

Fitzhugh had no difficulty in rousing the Neville tenants about
Middleham; and Edward, as Warwick expected, no sooner heard of this
insurrection than he hurried to put it down, taking with him his
brother Richard of Gloucester, Scales, Hastings, Say, and many more
of his most trusted barons, with a good part of the army that was
disposable to resist a landing on the South Coast. Near York he was
to be met by Montagu, who had adhered to him for the past year in
spite of his brother's rebellion. But the King had paid Montagu
badly for his loyalty. He had taken from him the Percy lands in
Northumberland, and restored them to the young heir of that ancient
house, compensating, as he thought, the dispossessed Neville by making
him a marquis, and handing him over some of Warwick's confiscated
northern estates. Montagu complained in secret that "he had been given
a marquisate, and a pie's nest to maintain it withal," and was far from
being so contented as the King supposed.

On September 25th Warwick landed unopposed at Dartmouth. In his company
was not only Clarence but several of the great Lancastrian lords who
had been living in exile--Jasper of Pembroke, Oxford, and many more.
They brought with them about two thousand men, of whom half were French
archers lent by Louis. The moment that the invaders landed, Warwick
and Clarence declared themselves, by putting forth a proclamation in
favour of King Henry. Devon and Somerset had always been Lancastrian
strongholds, and the old retainers of the Beauforts and of Exeter came
in by hundreds to meet their exiled lords. In a few days Warwick had
ten thousand men, and could march on London; the King was at Doncaster,
and his lieutenants in the South could make no stand without him. A
little later Warwick's own Midland and Wiltshire tenants joined him,
the Earl of Shrewsbury raised the Severn valley in his aid, and all
Western England was in his hands.

Meanwhile King Edward, who had up to this moment mismanaged his
affairs most hopelessly, moved south by Doncaster and Lincoln, with
Montagu and many other lords in his train. On October 6th he lay in
a fortified manor near Nottingham with his bodyguard, while his army
occupied all the villages round about. There, early in the morning,
while he still lay in bed, Alexander Carlisle, the chief of his
minstrels, and Master Lee, his chaplain, came running into his chamber,
to tell him there was treachery in his camp. Montagu and other lords
were riding down the ranks of his army crying, "God save King Henry!"
The men were cheering and shouting for Warwick and Lancaster, and no
one was showing any signs of striking a blow for the cause of York.

Edward rose in haste, drew up his bodyguard to defend the approach
of the manor where he lay, and sent scouts to know the truth of the
report. They met Montagu marching against them, and fled back to
say that the rumour was all too true. Then Edward with his brother
Gloucester, Hastings his chamberlain, Say, and Scales, and their
immediate following, took horse and fled. They reached Lynn about eight
hundred strong, seized some merchantmen and two Dutch carvels which
lay in the harbour, and set sail for the lands of Burgundy. Buffeted
by storms and chased by Hanseatic pirates, they ran their ships ashore
near Alkmaar, and sought refuge with Louis of Gruthuyse, Governor of
Holland. King, lords, and archers alike had escaped with nothing but
what they bore on their backs; Edward himself could only pay the master
of the ship that carried him by giving him the rich gown lined with
martens' fur that he had worn in his flight.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 14: This plan, as Lingard astutely observes, may have two
meanings. Either, as we said above, it was a ratification of peace with
the Nevilles, or--and this is quite possible--it was intended to draw
Montagu apart from his brothers, by giving him a special interest in
Edward's prosperity.]

[Footnote 15: _E.g._ Waurin makes Ranby Howe, the muster-place of the
insurgents, into Tabihorch, and Lancashire into Lantreghier.]

[Footnote 16: Foreign writers record that Warwick used this language to
the legate Coppini in 1460.]

[Footnote 17: All this comes from the invaluable "Manner of the dealing
of the Earl of Warwick at Angiers," printed in the _Chronicle of the
White Rose_.]

[Footnote 18: This is a not impossible tale. Edward, fearing Warwick's
alliance to the Queen, might hope to separate them by offering
Margaret's son the ultimate succession to the throne. For he himself
having no male heir, the crown would go with his eldest daughter
Elizabeth.]




CHAPTER XVI

THE RETURN OF KING EDWARD


The expulsion of King Edward had been marvellously sudden. Within
eleven days after his landing at Dartmouth Warwick was master of all
England. Not a blow had been struck for the exiled King. From Calais to
Berwick every man mounted the Red Rose or the Ragged Staff with real
or simulated manifestations of joy. On October 6th the Earl reached
London, which opened its gates with its accustomed readiness. It had
only delayed its surrender in fear of a riotous band of Kentishmen,
whom Sir Geoffrey Gate had gathered in the Earl's name. They had
wrought such mischief in Southwark that the Londoners refused to let
them in, and waited for the arrival of Warwick himself before they
would formally acknowledge King Henry. Meanwhile all the partisans of
York had either fled from the city or taken sanctuary. Queen Elizabeth
sought refuge in the precincts of Westminster, where she was soon after
delivered of a son, the first male child that had been born to King
Edward.

Riding through the city Warwick came to the Tower, and found King Henry
in his keeper's hands, "not worshipfully arrayed as a prince, and not
so cleanly kept as should beseem his state." The Earl led him forth
from the fortress,--whither he had himself conducted him, a prisoner
in bonds, five years before,--arrayed him in royal robes, and brought
him in state to St. Paul's, the Lord Mayor and Sheriffs, with all the
Common Council, walking before him, "while all the people to right and
left rejoiced with clapping of hands, and cried 'God save King Henry!'"
Then the King, after returning thanks for his deliverance in the
Cathedral, rode down Cheapside and took up his residence in the palace
of the Bishop of London.

Henry was much broken and enfeebled by his captivity. "He sat on his
throne as limp and helpless as a sack of wool," says one unfriendly
chronicler. "He was a mere shadow and pretence, and what was done in
his name was done without his will and knowledge." All that remained
unbroken in him was his piety and his imperturbable long-suffering
patience. But his weakness only made him the more fit for Warwick's
purpose. His deliverance took place on the 6th, and on October 9th
we find him beginning to sign a long series of documents which
reconstituted the government of the realm. It was made clear from the
first that Warwick and his friends were to have charge of the King
rather than the Lancastrian peers. In the first batch of appointments
Warwick became the King's Lieutenant, and resumed his old posts of
Captain of Calais and Admiral. George Neville was restored to the
Chancellorship, and Sir John Langstrother, Prior of the Hospitallers,
received again the Treasury, which Warwick had bestowed on him in
1469. The Duke of Clarence was made Lieutenant of Ireland, a post
he had enjoyed under his brother till his exile in 1470. Among the
Lancastrians, Oxford was made Constable, and Pembroke joint-Lieutenant
under Warwick. The rest received back their confiscated lands, but got
no official preferment.

Oxford's first exercise of his power as Constable was to try Tiptoft
Earl of Worcester, one of the few of King Edward's adherents whom no
one could pardon. Oxford had to avenge on him his father and brother,
whom the Earl had sentenced to be drawn and quartered in 1462, while
Warwick remembered his adherents impaled in the previous April. The
Butcher of England got no mercy, as might be expected, and was beheaded
on October 18th.

A few days before summonses had been sent out in the King's name for
a Parliament to meet on November 26th, for Warwick was eager to set
himself right with the nation at the earliest opportunity. Every care
was taken to show that the new rule was to be one of tolerance and
amnesty. The whole of the surviving peers who had sat in Edward's
last Parliament were invited to present themselves to meet King
Henry--however bitter their Yorkist partizanship had been--save
six only, and of these four had fled over-sea--Gloucester, Scales,
Hastings, and Say.

The Parliament met and was greeted by George Neville the Chancellor
with a sermon adapted to the times, on the text from Jeremiah, "Turn,
O ye back-sliding children." The proceedings of the session are lost,
but we know that they were mainly formal, confirming the King's
appointments to offices, ratifying the agreement made between Queen
Margaret and Clarence, that the latter should be declared heir to
the throne failing issue to the Prince of Wales, and reversing the
attainder of Somerset and Exeter and the other Lancastrian lords, who
were thus able to take their seats in the Upper House.

The most important political event of the restoration, however, was
the conclusion of the treaty with France, which Warwick had had so
close to his heart ever since the first abortive negotiations in
1464. An embassy, headed by the Bishop of Bayeux, titular Patriarch
of Jerusalem, appeared in London when Warwick's power was firmly
established, and a peace for twelve years and treaty of alliance was
duly concluded. Its most important feature was that it bound England
to take the French King's side in the struggle with Burgundy. When he
heard that Edward had been expelled and could no longer aid Charles
the Bold, Louis had at once attacked the towns on the Somme, and taken
Amiens and several other important places. Next spring his contest
with the Duke would begin in earnest, and he was overjoyed to know
that the English power would be used for his aid, by one who had a
strong personal dislike to the Burgundian. Warwick at once took steps
to strengthen the garrison of Calais, which was at this time entirely
surrounded by the Duke's territory, and began to make preparations for
a campaign in the next spring.

It is rather difficult to gauge with accuracy the feeling with which
England received the restoration of King Henry. The nation, however,
seems on the whole to have accepted the new government with great
equanimity if with no very marked enthusiasm. The Lancastrians were
of course contented, though they would have preferred to have won back
their position by their own arms. Of the Yorkists it was supposed that
most of the important sections held by the Earl and not by King Edward.
This was certainly the case, as later events showed, with the Commons
in most parts of the country, and notably in Yorkshire and Kent, which
had up to this time been so strongly attached to the cause of York.
There were, however, classes in which the restoration was not so well
received. It was disliked by such of the Yorkist nobility as were not
Nevilles. The Duke of Norfolk and all the Bourchier clan--Essex, the
Archbishop, Cromwell, and Berners--had not been displeased when Warwick
chastened the Queen's relatives, but had not wished to see Edward
entirely deposed. Other peers, such as Grey Earl of Kent, and the Earl
of Arundel, had committed themselves even more deeply to Edward's side,
by allying themselves by marriage with the Woodvilles. It was gall
and bitterness to all those heads of great houses to have to seek for
pardon and favour from their late enemies. What, for example, must have
been Norfolk's feelings when he was compelled, as the Paston records
describe, to sue as humbly to the Lancastrian Earl of Oxford as his own
dependents had been wont to sue to himself?

Another quarter where the restoration was taken ill was to be found
among the merchants of London. The late King had been a great spender
of money, and was at the moment of his exile deep in the books of many
wealthy purveyors of the luxuries in which he delighted. All these
debts had now become hopeless, and the unfortunate creditors were
sulky and depressed. Moreover, Edward's courteous and affable manners
and comely person had won him favour in the eyes of the Londoners in
whose midst he habitually dwelt, and still more so, unless tradition
errs, in the eyes of their wives. Few persons in the city, except
declared Lancastrians, looked upon the new government with any approach
to enthusiasm.

There was one individual, too, whose feelings as to the new government
were likely to be of no mean importance. George of Clarence, though
he had followed Warwick to London and taken a prominent part in all
the incidents of the restoration, was profoundly dissatisfied with
his position. Even when he had been made Lieutenant of Ireland--an
office which he chose to discharge by deputy--and presented with many
scores of manors, he was in no wise conciliated. He was farther from
the throne as the Prince of Wales' ultimate heir than he had been in
the days of his own brother's reign. Had the chance been given him, it
seems likely that he would have betrayed Warwick and joined King Edward
after his return to England. But events had marched too rapidly, and he
had found no opportunity to strike a blow for York. During the winter
of 1470-71, however, he put himself once more in communication with his
brother. The correspondence was carried on through their sisters--the
Duchess of Exeter on the English side of the Channel and the Duchess
of Burgundy over-sea. By this means Clarence renewed his promises of
help to Edward, and swore to join him, with every man that he could
raise, the moment that he set foot again in England. Meanwhile Warwick
had no suspicion of his son-in-law's treachery. He trusted him to the
uttermost, heaped favours upon him, and even got his name joined with
his own and Pembroke's as Lieutenants for King Henry in all the realm
of England.

For five months the Earl's reign was undisturbed. There was no one in
the country who dared dispute his will. Queen Margaret, whose presence
would have been his greatest difficulty, had not yet crossed the seas.
Her delay was strange. Perhaps she still dreaded putting herself in the
hands of her old enemy; perhaps the King of France detained her till
Warwick should have made his power in England too firm to be troubled
by her intrigues. But the Earl himself actually desired her presence.
He several times invited her to hasten her arrival, and at last sent
over Langstrother, the Treasurer of England, to urge his suit and
escort Margaret and her son across the Channel. It was not till March
that she could be induced to move; and by March the time was overdue.

Meanwhile King Edward had received but a luke-warm reception at the
Court of Burgundy. Duke Charles, saddled with his French war, would
have preferred to keep at peace with England. His sympathies were
divided between Lancaster and York. If his wife was Edward's sister,
he himself had Lancastrian blood in his veins, and had long maintained
Somerset, Exeter, and other Lancastrian exiles at his Court. But he
was driven into taking a decided line in favour of Edward by the
fact that Warwick, his personal enemy, was supreme in the counsels
of England. If the Earl allied himself to Louis of France, it became
absolutely necessary for Duke Charles to lend his support to his exiled
brother-in-law, with the object of upsetting Warwick's domination.

Edward himself had found again his ancient restless energy in the day
of adversity. He knew that in the last autumn he could have made a
good defence if it had not been for Montagu's sudden treachery, and
was determined not to consider his cause lost till it had been fairly
tried by the arbitrament of the sword. He was in full communication
with England, and had learnt that many more beside Clarence were eager
to see him land. The adventure would be perilous, for he would have to
fight not only, as of old, the Lancastrian party, but the vast masses
of the Commons whose trust had always been in the great Earl. But peril
seems to have been rather an incentive than a deterrent to Edward,
when the reckless mood was on him. He took the aid that Charles of
Burgundy promised, though it was given in secret and with a grudging
heart. After a final interview with the Duke at Aire, he moved off in
February to Flushing, where a few ships had been collected for him in
the haven among the marshes of Walcheren. About fifteen hundred English
refugees accompanied him, including his brother of Gloucester and Lords
Hastings, Say, and Scales. The Duke had hired for him three hundred
German hand-gun men, and presented him with fifty thousand florins in
gold. With such slender resources the exiled King did not scruple to
attempt the reconquest of his kingdom. On March 11th he and his men set
sail. They were convoyed across the German Ocean by a fleet of fourteen
armed Hanseatic vessels, which the Duke had sent for their protection.
Yet the moment that Charles heard they were safely departed, he
published, for Warwick's benefit, a proclamation warning any of his
subjects against aiding or abetting Edward of York in any enterprise
against the realm of England.

However secretly Edward's preparations were concerted, they had not
entirely escaped his enemy's notice. Warwick had made dispositions
for resisting a landing to the best of his ability. A fleet stationed
at Calais, under the Bastard of Fauconbridge, watched the straits and
protected the Kentish coast. The Earl himself lay at London to overawe
the discontented and guard King Henry. Oxford held command in the
Eastern Counties--the most dangerous district, for Norfolk and the
Bourchiers were rightly suspected of keeping up communication with
Edward. In the North Montagu and the Earl of Northumberland were in
charge from Hull to Berwick with divided authority.

As Warwick had expected, the invaders aimed at landing in East Anglia.
On March 12th Edward and his fleet lay off Cromer. He sent two knights
ashore to rouse the country ere he himself set foot on land. But in
a few hours the messengers returned. They bade him hoist sail again,
for Oxford was keeping strict watch over all those parts, and Edward's
friends were all in prison or bound over to good behaviour. On
receiving this disappointing intelligence, Edward determined on one of
those bold strokes which were so often his salvation. If the friendly
districts were so well watched, it was likely that the counties where
Warwick's interest was supreme would be less carefully secured. The
King bade his pilot steer north and make for the Humber mouth, though
Yorkshire was known to be devoted to the great Earl.

That night a gale from the south swept over the Wash and scattered
Edward's ships far and wide. On March 15th it abated, and the vessels
came to land at various points on the coast of Holderness. The King and
Hastings, with five hundred men, disembarked at Ravenspur--a good omen,
for this was the same spot at which Henry of Bolingbroke had commenced
his victorious march on London in 1399. The other ships landed their
men at neighbouring points on the coast, and by the next morning all
Edward's two thousand men were safely concentrated. Their reception
by the country-side was most discouraging. The people deserted their
villages and drew together in great bands, as if minded to oppose the
invaders. Indeed, they only needed leaders to induce them to take the
offensive; but no man of mark chanced to be in Holderness. Montagu lay
in the West-Riding and Northumberland in the North. A squire named
Delamere, and a priest named Westerdale, the only leaders whom the men
of Holderness could find, contented themselves with following the King
at a distance, and with sending news of his approach to York.

A less resolute adventurer than Edward Plantagenet would probably have
taken to his ships again when he found neither help nor sympathy in
Yorkshire. But Edward was resolved to play out his game; the sight of
the hostile country-side only made him determine to eke out the lion's
hide with the fox's skin. Calling to mind the stratagem which Henry
of Bolingbroke had practised in that same land seventy-two years ago,
he sent messengers everywhere to announce that he came in arms not to
dispossess King Henry, but only to claim his ancestral duchy of York.
When he passed through towns and villages he bade his men shout for
King Henry, and he himself mounted the Lancastrian badge of the ostrich
feathers. In these borrowed plumes he came before the walls of York,
still unmolested, but without having drawn a man to his banners. Hull,
the largest town that he had approached, had resolutely closed its
gates against him.

The fate of Edward's enterprise was settled before the gates of York on
the morning of March 18th. He found the walls manned by the citizens
in arms; but they parleyed instead of firing upon him, and when he
declared that he came in peace, aspiring only to his father's dignity
and possessions, he himself with sixteen persons only in his train
was admitted within the gate. Then upon the cross of the high altar
in the Minster he swore "that he never would again take upon himself
to be King of England, nor would have done before that time, but for
the exciting and stirring of the Earl of Warwick," "and thereto before
all the people he cried, 'King Harry! King Harry and Prince Edward!'"
Satisfied by these protestations, the men of York admitted the invaders
within their walls. Edward, however, only stayed for twelve hours in
York, and next morning he marched on Tadcaster.

This day was almost as critical as the last. It was five days since
the landing at Ravenspur, and the news had now had time to spread.
If Montagu and Northumberland were bent on loyal service to King
Henry, they must now be close at hand. But the star of York was in the
ascendant. Northumberland remembered at this moment rather his ancient
enmity for the Nevilles than his grandfather's loyalty to Lancaster.
He gathered troops indeed, but he made no attempt to march south or
to intercept the invaders. It is probable that he was actually in
treasonable communication with Edward, as the Lancastrian chroniclers
declare. Montagu, on the other hand, collected two or three thousand
men and threw himself into Pontefract, to guard the Great North Road.
But Edward, instead of approaching Pontefract, moved his army on to
cross-roads, which enabled him to perform a flank march round his
adversary; he slept that evening at Sendal Castle, the spot where his
father had spent the night before the disastrous battle of Wakefield.
How Montagu came to let Edward get past him is one of the problems
whose explanation will never be forthcoming. It may have been that his
scouts lost sight of the enemy and missed the line of his flank march.
It may equally well have been that Montagu overvalued the King's army,
which was really no larger than his own, and would not fight till he
should be joined by his colleague Northumberland. Some contemporary
writers assert that the Marquis, remembering his old favour with the
King, was loath that his hand should be the one to crush his former
master. Others say that it was no scruple of ancient loyalty that moved
Montagu, but that he had actually determined to desert his brother and
join Edward's party. But his later behaviour renders this most unlikely.

Montagu's fatal inaction was the salvation of Edward. At Sendal he
received the first encouragement which he had met since his landing.
He was there in the midst of the estates of the duchy of York, and a
considerable body of men joined him from among his ancestral retainers.
Encouraged by this accession, he pushed on rapidly southward, and by
marches of some twenty miles a day reached Doncaster on the 21st and
Nottingham on the 23rd. On the way recruits began to flock in, and
at Nottingham a compact body of six hundred men-at-arms, under Sir
James Harrington and Sir William Parr, swelled the Yorkist ranks. Then
Edward, for the first time since his landing, paused for a moment to
take stock of the position of his friends and his enemies.

Meanwhile the news of his march had run like wild-fire all over
England, and in every quarter men were arming for his aid or his
destruction. Warwick had hoped at first that Montagu and Northumberland
would stay the invader, but when he heard that Edward had slipped
past, he saw that he himself must take the field. Accordingly he left
London on the 22nd, and rode hastily to Warwick to call out his Midland
retainers. The guard of the city and the person of King Henry was
left to his brother the Archbishop. Simultaneously Somerset departed
to levy troops in the South-West, and Clarence set forth to raise
Gloucestershire and Wiltshire. Oxford had already taken the field, and
on the 22nd lay at Lynn with four thousand men, the force that the not
very numerous Lancastrians of Norfolk, Suffolk, and Cambridge could put
in arms. From thence he directed his march on Newark, hoping to fall on
Edward's flank somewhere near Nottingham.

At that very moment the invader had thrown off the mask he had
hitherto worn. Finding himself well received and strongly reinforced,
he laid aside his pretence of asking only for the duchy of York, and
had himself proclaimed as King. But his position was perilous still:
Warwick was gathering head in his front; Montagu was following
cautiously in his rear; Oxford was about to assail his flank. The
enemies must be kept apart at all hazards; so Edward, neglecting the
others for the moment, turned fiercely on Oxford. He marched rapidly on
Newark with some five or six thousand men. This decision and show of
force frightened the Earl, who, though joined by the Duke of Exeter and
Lord Bardolph, felt himself too weak to fight. When the vanguard of the
Yorkists appeared, he hastily left Newark and fell back on to Stamford
in much disorder.

Having thus cleared his flank, Edward turned back on Nottingham and
then made for Leicester. Here he was joined by the Yorkists of the East
Midlands in great numbers; of the retainers of Lord Hastings alone no
less than three thousand came to him in one body.

Warwick, who lay only two short marches from the invader, was straining
every nerve to get together an army. His missives ran east and west to
call in all the knights of the Midlands who had ever mounted the Ragged
Staff or the Red Rose. One of these letters was found in 1889, among
other treasures, in the lumber room of Belvoir Castle. It was addressed
to Henry Vernon, a great Derbyshire landholder. The first part, written
in a secretary's hand, runs as follows:

 Right Trusty and Wellbeloved--I grete you well, and desire and
 heartily pray you that, inasmuch as yonder man Edward, the King our
 soverain lord's great enemy, rebel, and traitor, is now arrived in
 the north parts of this land, and coming fast on south, accompanied
 with Flemings, Easterlings, and Danes, not exceeding the number of
 two thousand persons, nor the country as he cometh not falling to
 him, ye will therefore, incontinent and forthwith after the sight
 hereof, dispose you to make toward me to Coventry with as many people
 defensibly arranged as ye can readily make, and that ye be with me in
 all haste possible, as my veray singular heart is in you, and as I may
 do thing [_sic_] to your weal or worship hereafter. And may God keep
 you.--Written at Warwick on March 25th.

Then in the Earl's own hand was written the post-script, appealing to
Vernon's personal friendship: "Henry, I pray you ffayle me not now, as
ever I may do for you."

Sad to say, this urgent appeal, wellnigh the only autograph of the
great Earl that we possess, seems to have failed in its purpose. Vernon
preferred to watch the game, and as late as April 2nd had made no
preparation to take arms for either side.

On March 28th Warwick with six thousand men advanced to Coventry, a
strongly-fortified town facing Edward's line of advance. On the same
day his adversary, whose forces must now have amounted to nearly ten
thousand, marched southward from Leicester. Next morning Warwick and
the King were in sight of each other, and a battle was expected. But
the Earl was determined to wait for his reinforcements before fighting.
He calculated that Montagu must soon arrive from the north, Oxford
from the east, Clarence from the south-west. Accordingly he shut
himself up in Coventry, and refused to risk an engagement. Edward,
whose movements all through this campaign evince the most consummate
generalship, promptly marched past his enemy and seized Warwick, where
he made his headquarters. He then placed his army across the high road
from Coventry to London, cutting off the Earl's direct communication
with the capital, and waited. Like the Earl he was expecting his
reinforcements.

The first force that drew near was Clarence's levy from the south-west.
With seven thousand men in his ranks the Duke reached Burford on April
2nd. Next day he marched for Banbury. On the 4th Warwick received the
hideous news that his son-in-law had mounted the White Rose and joined
King Edward. The treason had been long meditated, and was carried out
with perfect deliberation and great success. A few miles beyond Banbury
Clarence's array found itself facing that of the Yorkists. Clarence
bade his men shout for King Edward, and fall into the ranks of the
army that confronted them. Betrayed by their leader, the men made no
resistance, and allowed themselves to be enrolled in the Yorkist army.

Clarence, for very shame we must suppose, offered to obtain terms for
his father-in-law. "He sent to Coventry," says a Yorkist chronicler,
"offering certain good and profitable conditions to the Earl, if he
would accept them. But the Earl, whether he despaired of any durable
continuance of good accord betwixt the King and himself, or else
willing to maintain the great oaths, pacts, and promises sworn to Queen
Margaret, or else because he thought he should still have the upperhand
of the King, or else led by certain persons with him, as the Earl of
Oxford, who bore great malice against the King, would not suffer any
manner of appointment, were it reasonable or unreasonable." He drove
Clarence's messengers away, "crying that he thanked God he was himself
and not that traitor Duke."

Although Oxford had joined him with four thousand men, and Montagu was
approaching, Warwick still felt himself not strong enough to accept
battle when Edward and Clarence drew out their army before the gates of
Coventry on the morning of April 5th. He then saw them fall into column
of march, and retire along the London road. Edward, having now some
eighteen thousand men at his back, thought himself strong enough to
strike at the capital, where his friends had been busily astir in his
behalf for the last fortnight. Leaving a strong rear-guard behind, with
orders to detain Warwick at all hazards, he hurried his main body along
the Watling Street, and in five days covered the seventy-five miles
which separated him from London.

Meanwhile Warwick had been joined by Montagu as well as by Oxford, and
also received news that Somerset, with seven or eight thousand men
more, was only fifty miles away. This put him in good spirits, for he
counted on London holding out for a few days, and on the men of Kent
rallying to his standard when he approached the Thames. He wrote in
haste to his brother the Archbishop, who was guarding King Henry, that
if he would maintain the city but forty-eight hours, they would crush
the invading army between them. Then he left Coventry and hurried after
the King, who for the next five days was always twenty miles in front
of him.

But all was confusion in London. The Archbishop was not a man of war,
and no soldier of repute was at his side. The Lancastrian party in
the city had never been strong, and the Yorkists were now organising
an insurrection. There were more than two thousand of them in the
sanctuaries at Westminster and elsewhere, of whom three hundred were
knights and squires. All were prepared to rise at the first signal.
When news came that Edward had reached St. Albans, the Archbishop
mounted King Henry on horseback and rode with him about London,
adjuring the citizens to be true to him and arm in the good cause.
But the sight of the frail shadow of a king, with bowed back and
lack-lustre eyes, passing before them, was not likely to stir the
people to enthusiasm. Only six or seven hundred armed men mustered in
St. Paul's Churchyard beneath the royal banner.[19]

Such a force was obviously unequal to defending a disaffected city.
Next day, when the army of Edward appeared before the walls, Urswick
the Recorder of London, and certain aldermen with him, dismissed the
guard at Aldersgate and let Edward in, no man withstanding them. The
Archbishop of York and King Henry took refuge in the Bishop of London's
palace; they were seized and sent to the Tower. George Neville obtained
his pardon so easily that many accused him of treason. It seems quite
possible that, when he found at the last moment that he could not
raise the Londoners, he sent secretly to Edward and asked for pardon,
promising to make no resistance.

The capture of London rendered King Edward's position comparatively
secure. He had now the base of operations which he had up to this
moment lacked, and had established himself in the midst of a
population favourable to the Yorkist cause. Next day he received a
great accession of strength. Bourchier Earl of Essex, his brother
Archbishop Bourchier, Lord Berners, and many other consistent partisans
of York, joined him with seven thousand men levied in the Eastern
Counties. His army was now so strong that he might face any force which
Warwick could bring up, unless the Earl should wait for the levies of
the extreme North and West to join him.

On Maundy Thursday London had fallen; on Good Friday the King lay in
London; on Saturday afternoon he moved out again with his army greatly
strengthened and refreshed, and marched north to meet the pursuing
enemy. Warwick, much retarded on his way by the rear-guard which
the King had left to detain him and by the necessity of waiting for
Somerset's force, had reached Dunstable on the Friday, only to learn
in the evening that London was lost and his brother and King Henry
captured. He pushed on, however, and swerving from the Watling Street
at St. Albans threw himself eastward, with the intention, we cannot
doubt, of cutting Edward's communication with the Eastern Midlands,
where York was strong, by placing himself across the line of the Ermine
Street. On Saturday evening his army encamped on a rising ground near
Monken Hadley Church, overlooking the little town of Barnet which lay
below him in the hollow. The whole force lay down in order of battle,
ranged behind a line of hedges; in front of them was the heathy
plateau, four hundred feet above the sea, which slopes down into the
plain of Middlesex.

An hour or two after Warwick's footsore troops had taken post for the
night, and long after the dusk had fallen, the alarm was raised that
the Yorkists were at hand. On hearing of the Earl's approach the King
had marched out of London with every man that he could raise. His
vanguard beat Warwick's scouts out of the town of Barnet, and chased
them back on to the main position. Having found the enemy, Edward
pushed on through Barnet, climbed the slope, and ranged his men in the
dark facing the hedges behind which the Earl's army lay,

 much nearer than he had supposed, for he took not his ground so even
 in the front as he should have done, if he might better have seen
 them. And there they kept them still without any manner of noise or
 language. Both sides had guns and ordinance, but the Earl, meaning
 to have greatly annoyed the King, shot guns almost all the night.
 But it fortuned that they always overshot the King's host, and hurt
 them little or nought, for the King lay much nearer to them than they
 deemed. But the King suffered no guns to be shot on his side, or else
 right few, which was of great advantage to him, for thereby the Earl
 should have found the ground that he lay in, and levelled guns thereat.

So, with the cannon booming all night above them, the two hosts lay
down in their armour to spend that miserable Easter even. Next day it
was obvious that a decisive battle must occur; for the King, whose
interest it was to fight at once, before Warwick could draw in his
reinforcements from Kent and from the North and West, had placed
himself so close to the Earl that there was no possibility of the
Lancastrian host withdrawing without being observed. The morrow would
settle, once for all, if the name of Richard Neville or that of Edward
Plantagenet was to be all-powerful in England.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 19: The _Arrival of King Edward_ says "only six or seven
thousand" in the printed text. This must be a scribe's blunder,
being not a small number but a large one; and Waurin, who copies the
_Arrival_ verbatim, has "600 or 700."]




CHAPTER XVII

BARNET


The Easter morning dawned dim and gray; a dense fog had rolled up from
the valley, and the two hosts could see no more of each other than on
the previous night. Only the dull sound of unseen multitudes told each
that the other was still before them in position.

Of the two armies each, so far as we can judge, must have numbered
some twenty-five thousand men. It is impossible in the conflict of
evidence to say which was the stronger, but there cannot have been any
great difference in force.[20] Each had drawn itself up in the normal
order of a medieval army, with a central main-battle, the van and rear
ranged to its right and left, and a small reserve held back behind the
centre. Both sides, too, had dismounted nearly every man, according to
the universal practice of the English in the fifteenth century. Even
Warwick himself,--whose wont it had been to lead his first line to the
charge, and then to mount and place himself at the head of the reserve,
ready to deliver the final blow,--on this one occasion sent his horse
to the rear and fought on foot all day. He wished to show his men that
this was no common battle, but that he was risking life as well as
lands and name and power in their company.

In the Earl's army Montagu and Oxford, with their men from the North
and East, held the right wing; Somerset with his West-Country archery
and billmen formed the centre; Warwick himself with his own Midland
retainers had the left wing; with him was his old enemy Exeter,--his
unwilling partner in the famous procession of 1457, his adversary
at sea in the spring of 1460. Here and all down the line the old
Lancastrians and the partisans of Warwick were intermixed; the Cresset
of the Hollands stood hard by the Ragged Staff; the Dun Bull of Montagu
and the Radiant Star of the De Veres were side by side. We cannot doubt
that many a look was cast askance at new friends who had so long been
old foes, and that the suspicion of possible treachery must have been
present in every breast.

Edward's army was drawn up in a similar order. Richard of Gloucester
commanded the right wing; he was but eighteen, but his brother had
already learnt to trust much to his zeal and energy. The King himself
headed Clarence's men in the centre; he was determined to keep his
shifty brother at his side, lest he might repent at the eleventh hour
of his treachery to his father-in-law. Hastings led the rear-battle on
the left.

The armies were too close to each other to allow of manoeuvring; the
men rose from the muddy ground on which they had lain all night, and
dressed their line where they stood. But the night had led King Edward
astray; he had drawn up his host so as to overlap the Earl's extreme
left, while he opposed nothing to his extreme right. Gloucester in the
one army and Montagu and Oxford in the other had each the power of
outflanking and turning the wing opposed to them. The first glimpse of
sunlight would have revealed these facts to both armies had the day
been fair; but in the dense fog neither party had perceived as yet its
advantage or its danger. It was not till the lines met that they made
out each other's strength and position.

Between four and five o'clock, in the first gray of the dawning, the
two hosts felt their way towards each other; each side could at last
descry the long line of bills and bows opposed to it, stretching
right and left till it was lost in the mist. For a time the archers
and the bombards of the two parties played their part; then the two
lines rolled closer, and met from end to end all along Gladsmore
Heath. The first shock was more favourable to Warwick than to the
King. At the east end of the line, indeed, the Earl himself was
outflanked by Gloucester, forced to throw back his wing, and compelled
to yield ground towards his centre. But at the other end of the line
the Yorkists suffered a far worse disaster; Montagu and Oxford not
only turned Hastings' flank, but rolled up his line, broke it, and
chased it right over the heath, and down toward Barnet town. Many of
the routed troops fled as far as London ere they stopped, spreading
everywhere the news that the King was slain and the cause of York
undone. But the defeat of Edward's left wing had not all the effect
that might have been expected. Owing to the fog it was unnoticed by the
victorious right, and even by the centre, where the King and Clarence
were now hard at work with Somerset, and gaining rather than losing
ground. No panic spread down the line "for no man was in anything
discouraged, because, saving a few that stood nearest to them, no man
wist of the rout: also the other party by the same flight and chase
were never the greatlier encouraged." Moreover, the victorious troops
threw away their chance; instead of turning to aid his hard-pressed
comrades, Oxford pursued recklessly, cutting down the flying enemy for
a mile, even into the streets of Barnet. Consequently he and his men
lost themselves in the fog; many were scattered; the rest collected
themselves slowly, and felt their way back towards the field, guiding
themselves by the din that sounded down from the hill-side. Montagu
appears not to have gone so far in pursuit; he must have retained part
of his wing with him, and would seem to have used it to strengthen his
brother's hard-pressed troops on the left.

But meanwhile King Edward himself was gaining ground in the centre; his
own column, as the Yorkist chronicler delights to record, "beat and
bare down all that stood in his way, and then turned to range, first on
that hand and then on the other hand, and in length so beat and bare
them down that nothing might stand in the sight of him and of the
well-assured fellowship that attended truly upon him." Somerset, in
short, was giving way; in a short time the Lancastrian centre would be
broken.

At this moment, an hour after the fight had begun, Oxford and his
victorious followers came once more upon the scene. Lost in the fog,
they appeared, not where they might have been expected, on Edward's
rear, but upon the left rear of their own centre. They must have made a
vast detour in the darkness.

Now came the fatal moment of the day. Oxford's men, whose banners and
armour bore the Radiant Star of the De Veres, were mistaken by their
comrades for a flanking column of Yorkists. In the mist their badge had
been taken for the Sun with Rays, which was King Edward's cognisance.
When they came close to their friends they received a sharp volley of
arrows, and were attacked by Warwick's last reserves. This mistake
had the most cruel results. The old and the new Lancastrians had not
been without suspicions of each other. Assailed by his own friends,
Oxford thought that some one--like Grey de Ruthyn at Northampton--had
betrayed the cause. Raising the cry of treason, he and all his men fled
northward from the field.[21]

The fatal cry ran down the labouring lines of Warwick's army and
wrecked the whole array. The old Lancastrians made up their minds that
Warwick--or at least his brother the Marquis, King Edward's ancient
favourite--must have followed the example of the perjured Clarence.
Many turned their arms against the Nevilles,[22] and the unfortunate
Montagu was slain by his own allies in the midst of the battle. Many
more fled without striking another blow; among these was Somerset, who
had up to this moment fought manfully against King Edward in the centre.

Warwick's wing still held its ground, but at last the Earl saw that
all was lost. His brother was slain; Exeter had been struck down at
his side; Somerset and Oxford were in flight. He began to draw back
toward the line of thickets and hedges which had lain behind his army.
But there the fate met him that had befallen so many of his enemies,
at St. Albans and Northampton, at Towton and Hexham. His heavy armour
made rapid flight impossible; and in the edge of Wrotham Wood he was
surrounded by the pursuing enemy, wounded, beaten down, and slain.

The plunderers stripped the fallen; but King Edward's first desire was
to know if the Earl was dead. The field was carefully searched, and the
corpses of Warwick and Montagu were soon found. Both were carried to
London, where they were laid on the pavement of St. Paul's, stripped to
the breast, and exposed three days to the public gaze, "to the intent
that the people should not be abused by feigned tales, else the rumour
should have been sowed about that the Earl was yet alive."

After lying three days on the stones, the bodies were given over to
George Neville the Archbishop, who had them both borne to Bisham, and
buried in the abbey, hard by the tombs of their father Salisbury and
their ancestors the Earls of the house of Montacute. All alike were
swept away, together with the roof that covered them, by the Vandalism
of the Edwardian reformers, and not a trace remains of the sepulchre of
the two unquiet brothers.

Thus ended Richard Neville in the forty-fourth year of his age,
slain by the sword in the sixteenth year since he had first taken it
up at the Battle of St. Albans. Fortune, who had so often been his
friend, had at last deserted him; for no reasonable prevision could
have foreseen the series of chances which ended in the disaster of
Barnet. Montagu's irresolution and Clarence's treachery were not the
only things that had worked against him. If the winds had not been
adverse, Queen Margaret, who had been lying on the Norman coast since
the first week in March, would have been in London long before Edward
arrived, and could have secured the city with the three thousand men
under Wenlock, Langstrother, and John Beaufort whom her fleet carried.
But for five weeks the wind blew from the north and made the voyage
impossible; on Good Friday only did it turn and allow the Queen to
sail. It chanced that the first ship, which came to land in Portsmouth
harbour the very morning of Barnet, carried among others the Countess
of Warwick; at the same moment that she was setting her foot on shore
her husband was striking his last blows on Gladsmore Heath. Nor was
it only from France that aid was coming; there were reinforcements
gathering in the North, and the Kentishmen were only waiting for
a leader. Within a few days after Warwick's death the Bastard of
Fauconbridge had mustered seventeen thousand men at Canterbury in King
Henry's name. If Warwick could have avoided fighting, he might have
doubled his army in a week, and offered the Yorkists battle under far
more favourable conditions. The wrecks of the party were strong enough
to face the enemy on almost equal terms at Tewkesbury, even when their
head was gone. The stroke of military genius which made King Edward
compel the Earl to fight, by placing his army so close that no retreat
was possible from the position of Barnet, was the proximate cause of
Warwick's ruin; but in all the rest of the campaign it was fortune
rather than skill which fought against the Earl. His adversary played
his dangerous game with courage and success; but if only ordinary luck
had ruled, Edward must have failed; the odds against him were too many.

But fortune interposed and Warwick fell. For England's sake perhaps it
was well that it should be so. If he had succeeded, and Edward had been
driven once more from the land, we may be sure that the Wars of the
Roses would have dragged on for many another year; the house of York
had too many heirs and too many followers to allow of its dispossession
without a long time of further trouble. The cause of Lancaster, on the
other hand, was bound up in a single life; when Prince Edward fell
in the Bloody Meadow, as he fled from the field of Tewkesbury, the
struggle was ended perforce, for no one survived to claim his rights.
Henry of Richmond, whom an unexpected chance ultimately placed on the
throne, was neither in law nor in fact the real heir of the house of
Lancaster. On the other hand, Warwick's success would have led, so far
as we can judge, first to a continuance of civil war, then, if he had
ultimately been successful in rooting out the Yorkists, to a protracted
political struggle between the house of Neville and the old Lancastrian
party headed by the Beauforts and probably aided by the Queen; for it
is doubtful how far the marriage of Prince Edward and Anne Neville
would ever have served to reconcile two such enemies as the Earl and
Margaret of Anjou. If Warwick had held his own, and his abilities and
his popularity combined to make it likely, his victory would have meant
the domination of a family group--a form of government which no nation
has endured for long. At the best, the history of the last thirty years
of the fifteenth century in England would have been a tale resembling
that of the days when the house of Douglas struggled with the crown of
Scotland, or the Guises with the rulers of France.

Yet for Warwick as a ruler there would have been much to be said. To a
king of the type of Henry the Sixth the Earl would have made a perfect
minister and vicegerent, if only he could have been placed in the
position without a preliminary course of bloodshed and civil war. The
misfortune for England was that his lot was cast not with Henry the
Sixth, but with strong-willed, hot-headed, selfish Edward the Fourth.

The two prominent features in Warwick's character which made him a
leader of men, were not those which might have been expected in a man
born and reared in his position. The first was an inordinate love of
the activity of business; the second was a courtesy and affability
which made him the friend of all men save the one class he could not
brook--the "made lords," the parvenu nobility which Edward the Fourth
delighted to foster.

Of these characteristics it is impossible to exaggerate the strength
of the first. Warwick's ambition took the shape of a devouring love
of work of all kinds. Prominent though he was as a soldier, his
activity in war was only one side of his passionate desire to manage
well and thoroughly everything that came to his hand. He never could
cease for a moment to be busy; from the first moment when he entered
into official harness in 1455 down to the day of his death, he seems
hardly to have rested for a moment. The energy of his soul took him
into every employment--general, admiral, governor, judge, councillor,
ambassador, as the exigencies of the moment demanded; he was always
moving, always busy, and never at leisure. When the details of his life
are studied, the most striking point is to find how seldom he was at
home, how constantly away at public service. His castles and manors
saw comparatively little of him. It was not at Warwick or Amesbury,
at Caerphilly or Middleham that he was habitually to be found, but
in London, or Calais, or York, or on the Scotch Border. It was not
that he neglected his vassals and retainers--the loyalty with which
they rallied to him on every occasion is sufficient evidence to the
contrary--but he preferred to be a great minister and official, not
merely a great baron and feudal chief.

In this sense, then, it is most deceptive to call Warwick the Last
of the Barons. Vast though his strength might be as the greatest
landholder in England, it was as a statesman and administrator that he
left his mark on the age. He should be thought of as the forerunner
of Wolsey rather than as the successor of Robert of Belesme, or the
Bohuns and Bigods. That the world remembers him as a turbulent noble
is a misfortune. Such a view is only drawn from a hasty survey of the
last three or four years of his life, when under desperate provocation
he was driven to use for personal ends the vast feudal power that lay
ready to his hand. If he had died in 1468, he would be remembered
in history as an able soldier and statesman, who with singular
perseverance and consistency devoted his life to consolidating England
under the house of York.

After his restless activity, Warwick's most prominent characteristic
was his geniality. No statesman was ever so consistently popular
with the mass of the nation, through all the alternations of good
and evil fortune. This popularity the Earl owed to his unswerving
courtesy and affability; "he ever had the good voice of the people,
because he gave them fair words, showing himself easy and familiar,"
says the chronicler. Wherever he was well known he was well liked.
His own Yorkshire and Midland vassals, who knew him as their feudal
lord, the seamen who had served under him as admiral, the Kentishmen
who saw so much of him while he was captain of Calais, were all his
unswerving followers down to the day of his death. The Earl's boundless
generosity, the open house which he kept for all who had any claim on
him, the zeal with which he pushed the fortunes of his dependents, will
only partially explain his popularity. As much must be ascribed to his
genial personality as to the trouble which he took to court the people.
His whole career was possible because the majority of the nation not
only trusted and respected but honestly liked him. This it was which
explains the "king-making" of his later years. Men grew so accustomed
to follow his lead that they would even acquiesce when he transferred
his allegiance from King Edward to King Henry. It was not because he
was the greatest landholder of England that he was able to dispose of
the crown at his good will; but because, after fifteen years of public
life, he had so commended himself to the majority of the nation that
they were ready to follow his guidance even when he broke with all his
earlier associations.

But Warwick was something more than active, genial, and popular;
nothing less than first-rate abilities would have sufficed to carry him
through his career. On the whole, it was as a statesman that he was
most fitted to shine. His power of managing men was extraordinary; even
King Louis of France, the hardest and most unemotional of men, seems
to have been amenable to his influence. He was as successful with men
in the mass as with individuals; he could sway a parliament or an army
with equal ease to his will. How far he surpassed the majority of his
contemporaries in political prescience is shown by the fact that, in
spite of Yorkist traditions, he saw clearly that England must give up
her ancient claims on France, and continually worked to reconcile the
two countries.

In war Warwick was a commander of ability; good for all ordinary
emergencies where courage and a cool head would carry him through, but
not attaining the heights of military genius displayed by his pupil
Edward. His battles were fought in the old English style of Edward
the Third and Henry the Fifth, by lines of archery flanked by clumps
of billmen and dismounted knights. He is found employing both cannon
and hand-gun men, but made no decisive or novel use of either, except
in the case of his siege-artillery in the campaign of 1464. Nor did
he employ cavalry to any great extent; his men dismounted to fight
like their grandfathers at Agincourt, although the power of horsemen
had again revindicated itself on the Continent. The Earl was a cool
and capable commander; he was not one of the hot-headed feudal chiefs
who strove to lead every charge. It was his wont to conduct his first
line to the attack and then to retire and take command of the reserve,
with which he delivered his final attack in person. This caution led
some contemporary critics, especially Burgundians who contrasted his
conduct with the headlong valour of Charles the Rash, to throw doubts
on his personal courage. The sneer was ridiculous. The man who was
first into the High Street at St. Albans, who fought through the ten
hours of Towton, and won a name by his victories at sea in an age when
sea-fights were carried on by desperate hand-to-hand attempts to board,
might afford to laugh at any such criticism. If he fell at Barnet
"somewhat flying," as the Yorkist chronicler declares, he was surely
right in endeavouring to save himself for another field; he knew that
one lost battle would not wreck his cause, while his own life was the
sole pledge of the union between the Lancastrian party and the majority
of the nation.

Brave, courteous, liberal, active, and able, a generous lord to his
followers, an untiring servant to the commonweal, Warwick had all
that was needed to attract the homage of his contemporaries: they
called him, as the Kentish ballad-monger sang, "a very noble knight,
the flower of manhood." But it is only fair to record that he bore
in his character the fatal marks of the two sins which distinguished
the English nobles of his time. Occasionally he was reckless in
bloodshedding. Once in his life he descended to the use of a long and
deliberate course of treason and treachery.

In the first-named sin Warwick had less to reproach himself with than
most of his contemporaries. He never authorised a massacre, or broke
open a sanctuary, or entrapped men by false pretences in order to put
them to death. In battle, too, he always bid his men to spare the
Commons. Moreover, some of his crimes of bloodshed are easily to be
palliated: Mundeford and the other captains whom he beheaded at Calais
had broken their oath of loyalty to him; the Bastard of Exeter, whom he
executed at York, had been the prime agent in the murder of his father.
The only wholly unpardonable act of the Earl was his slaying of the
Woodvilles and Herberts in 1469. They had been his bitter enemies, it
is true; but to avenge political rivalries with the axe, without any
legal form of trial, was unworthy of the high reputation which Warwick
had up to that moment enjoyed. It increases rather than lessens the sum
of his guilt to say that he did not publicly order their death, but
allowed them to be executed by rebels whom he had roused and might as
easily have quieted.

But far worse, in a moral aspect, than the slaying of the Woodvilles
and Herberts, was the course of treachery and deceit that had preceded
it. That the Earl had been wantonly insulted by his thankless master in
a way that would have driven even one of milder mood to desperation,
we have stated elsewhere. An ideally loyal man might have borne the
King's ingratitude in silent dignity, and foresworn the Court for ever:
a hot-headed man might have burst out at once into open rebellion; but
Warwick did neither. When his first gust of wrath had passed, he set
himself to seek revenge by secret treachery. He returned to the Court,
was superficially reconciled to his enemies, and bore himself as if
he had forgotten his wrongs. Yet all the while he was organising an
armed rising to sweep the Woodvilles and Herberts away, and to coerce
the King into subjection to his will. The plan was as unwise as it
was unworthy. Although Warwick's treason was for the moment entirely
successful, it made any confidence between himself and his master
impossible for the future. At the earliest opportunity Edward revenged
himself on Warwick with the same weapons that had been used against
himself, and drove the Earl into exile.

There is nothing in Warwick's subsequent reconciliation with the
Lancastrians which need call up our moral indignation. It was the line
of conduct which forced him into that connection that was evil, not the
connection itself. There is no need to reproach him for changing his
allegiance; no other course was possible to him in the circumstances.
The King had cast him off, not he the King. When he transferred his
loyalty to the house of Lancaster, he never swerved again. All the
offers which Edward made to him after his return in 1471 were treated
with contempt. Warwick was not the man to sell himself to the highest
bidder.

If then Warwick was once in his life driven into treachery and
bloodthirsty revenge, we must set against his crime his fifteen long
years of honest and consistent service to the cause he had made his
own, and remember how dire was the provocation which drove him to
betray it. Counting his evil deeds of 1469-70 at their worst, he will
still compare not unfavourably with any other of the leading Englishmen
of his time. Even in that demoralised age his sturdy figure stands out
in not unattractive colours. Born in a happier generation, his industry
and perseverance, his courage and courtesy, his liberal hand and
generous heart, might have made him not only the idol of his followers,
but the bulwark of the commonwealth. Cast into the godless times of the
Wars of the Roses, he was doomed to spend in the cause of a faction the
abilities that were meant to benefit a whole nation; the selfishness,
the cruelty, the political immorality of the age, left their mark on
his character; his long and honourable career was at last stained by
treason, and his roll of successes terminated by a crushing defeat.
Even after his death his misfortune has not ended. Popular history has
given him a scanty record merely as the Kingmaker or the Last of the
Barons, as a selfish intriguer or a turbulent feudal chief; and for
four hundred and ten years he has lacked even the doubtful honour of a
biography.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 20: The Yorkist author of the _Arrival of King Edward_ says
that his patron had only nine thousand men. But we can account for many
more. Edward landed with two thousand; at least six hundred joined at
Nottingham, at least three thousand at Leicester; Clarence brought
seven thousand, Essex and the other Bourchiers seven thousand more.
This makes nineteen thousand six hundred, and many more must have
joined in small parties. On the other side Warwick had at Coventry six
thousand men; Oxford met him with four thousand, Montagu with three
thousand, Somerset with seven thousand, and he too must have drawn in
many small, unrecorded reinforcements. The Yorkists called his army
thirty thousand strong--probably overstating it by a few thousands.
Their own must have been much the same.]

[Footnote 21: Compare this with an incident at Waterloo. Ziethen's
Prussian corps, coming upon the field to the left rear of the English
line, took the brigade of the Prince of Saxe-Weimar for French owing to
a similarity in uniform, attacked them, and slew many ere the mistake
was discovered.]

[Footnote 22: There seems no valid reason for accepting Warkworth's
theory that Montagu was actually deserting to King Edward. But there is
every sign that the Lancastrians imagined that he was doing so. If he
had wished to betray his brother, he could have done it much better at
an earlier hour in the battle.]

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[Illustration: “GO FOR BATTEN. I’M RIGHT HERE, AND I’LL LOOK AFTER
BILL”]

------------------------------------------------------------------------

                               MARK TIDD

                     HIS ADVENTURES AND STRATEGIES

                                   BY

                          CLARENCE B. KELLAND

                             ILLUSTRATED BY

                              W. W. CLARKE

                      HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
                          NEW YORK AND LONDON

------------------------------------------------------------------------

                                Books by

                       CLARENCE BUDINGTON KELLAND

                       Mark Tidd in Egypt
                       Mark Tidd in Italy
                       Mark Tidd
                       Mark Tidd in the Backwoods
                       Mark Tidd in Business
                       Mark Tidd’s Citadel
                       Mark Tidd, Editor
                       Mark Tidd, Manufacturer
                       Catty Atkins, Bandmaster
                       Catty Atkins
                       Catty Atkins, Riverman
                       Catty Atkins, Sailorman
                       Catty Atkins, Financier

                           HARPER & BROTHERS
                            Established 1817

------------------------------------------------------------------------

                 COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY HARPER & BROTHERS

                PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

------------------------------------------------------------------------

                             ILLUSTRATIONS

  “GO FOR BATTEN. I’M RIGHT HERE, AND I’LL LOOK AFTER BILL”

  PLUNK AND ME WAS GOOD AND MAD

  THERE, CROUCHING ON THE BROW, WAS THE FIGURE OF A MAN

  “FELLERS, THE GUARD’S GOT LOOSE, AND HE’S WAITIN’ FOR US TO COME
  DOWN”

  “JUST RUNG TWICE RIGHT UNDER MY NOSE”

  SAMMY GRUNTED WHEN HE GOT THE FULL WEIGHT OF IT

  HE LET OUT A YELL AS LOUD AS A LOCOMOTIVE WHISTLE

  “YOU GIT RIGHT OUT OF HERE! G-G-GIT!”

------------------------------------------------------------------------

                               MARK TIDD




                               CHAPTER I


My name is Martin—James Briggs Martin—but almost everybody calls me
Tallow, because once when I was younger I saw old Uncle Ike Bond
rubbing tallow on his boots to shine them, and then hurried home and
fixed mine up with the stub of a candle and went to school. I guess
it couldn’t have smelled very good, for everybody seemed to notice
it, even teacher, and she asked me what in the world I’d been
getting into. After that all the boys called me Tallow, and always
will, I guess.

I tell you about me first only because I’m writing this account of
what happened. Mark Tidd is really the fellow I’m writing about, and
Mark’s father and mother, and the engine Mr. Tidd was inventing out
in his barn, and some other folks who will be told about in their
places. I helped some; so did Plunk Smalley and Binney Jenks, but
Mark Tidd did most of it. Mark Tidd sounds like a short name,
doesn’t it? But it isn’t short at all, for it’s merely what’s left
of Marcus Aurelius Fortunatus Tidd, which was what he was
christened, mostly out of Gibbon’s _Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire_, a big book that Mr. Tidd was so fond of reading that he
never read much of anything else except the papers.

Mark Tidd was the last of us four boys to move to Wicksville. I
was born there, and so was Plunk Smalley, but Binney Jenks moved
over from Sunfield when he was five. Mark he didn’t come to town
until a little over a year ago, and Plunk and me saw him get off
the train at the depot. I guess the car must have been glad when
he did get off, for he looked like he almost filled it up. Yes,
sir, when he came out of the door he had to _squeeze_ to get
through. He was the fattest boy I ever saw, or ever expect to see,
and the funniest-looking. His head was round and ’most as big as a
pretty good-sized pumpkin, and his cheeks were so fat they almost
covered up his eyes. The rest of him was as round as his face, and
Plunk said one of his legs was as big as all six of Plunk’s and
Binney’s and mine put together. I guess it was bigger. When Plunk
and me saw him we just rolled over and kicked up our legs and
hollered.

“I hope he’s goin’ to live in Wicksville,” says Plunk, “’cause we
won’t care then if a circus _never_ comes.”

A fat boy like that is a good thing to have in a town, so when
things sort of slow down you can always go and have fun with him. At
any rate, that was what we thought then. It seemed to us that Marcus
Aurelius Fortunatus Tidd was a ready-made joke put right into our
hands for us to fool with, but afterward we changed our minds
considerable.

Mark’s father and mother got off the train after him, and his father
said something to him we couldn’t hear. Mark waddled across the
platform to where Uncle Ike Bond’s bus stood waiting, and Plunk and
me listened to hear what he would say.

“D-d-do you c-carry p-p-p-passengers in that b-bus?” Yes, sir, he
said it just like that!

Well, Plunk he looked at me and I looked at him, and he soaked me in
the ribs and I smashed his hat down over his eyes, we were so
tickled. If we had been going to plan a funny kid we couldn’t have
done half so well. We’d have forgot something sure. But nothing was
forgot in Mark Tidd, even to the stutter.

Old Uncle Ike looked down off his seat at Mark, and his eyes popped
out like he couldn’t believe what they saw. He waited a minute
before he said anything, sort of planning in his mind what he was
going to say, I guess. That was a way Uncle Ike had, and then he
usually said something queer. This time he says:

“Passengers? What? Me carry passengers? No. I’ve just got this bus
backed up here to stiddy the depot platform. The railroad comp’ny
pays me to do it.”

Mark Tidd he looked solemn at Uncle Ike, and Uncle Ike looked solemn
at him. Then Mark says, respectful and not impertinent:

“If I was to sit here and hold down the p-p-platform could you drive
my folks? I could keep it from m-m-movin’ much.”

Uncle Ike blinked. “Son,” says he, “climb aboard, if this here
rattletrap looks safe to you, and fetch along your folks. We’ll
leave the platform stand without hitchin’ for wunst.”

At that me and Plunk turned to look at the fat boy’s father and
mother. Mr. Tidd was a long man, upward of six foot, I guess, and
not very wide. His shoulders kind of sloped like his head was too
heavy for them, and his head was so big that it was no wonder. His
hair was getting gray in front of his ears where it showed under his
hat, and he had blue eyes and thin cheeks and a sort of far-off,
pleasant expression, like he was thinking of something nice a long
ways away. He was leaning against a corner of the station reading
out of a big book and paying no attention to anybody. Afterward I
found out the book was Gibbon’s _Decline and Fall_, and that he
always carried it around with him to read in a little when he got a
spare minute.

Mrs. Tidd wasn’t that kind of person at all. As soon as Plunk and me
looked at her we knew she could make bully pies, and wouldn’t get
mad if her fat boy was to sneak into the pantry and cut a slice out
of one of them in the middle of the afternoon. You could tell she
was patient and good-natured, but, all the same, she wasn’t the kind
you could fool. If you came home with your hair wet it wouldn’t do
any good to tell her somebody threw a pail of water on it. She was
looking around to see what she could see, and I bet she didn’t miss
much.

The fat boy he motioned to her to come to the bus, and she spoke to
her husband. He looked up sort of vague, nodded his head, and came
poking across the platform, holding his book in front of him and
reading away as though he hadn’t a minute to spare, and clean forgot
all about the valise he’d set down beside him.

“Jeffrey,” says Mrs. Tidd, “you’ve forgot your satchel.”

He shut his book, but kept his finger in the place, and looked all
around him. Pretty soon he saw the satchel and nodded his head at
it. “So I have,” he says, “so I have,” and went back to get it.

Then all of them got into Uncle Ike’s bus, and he stirred up his
horses who had been standing ’most asleep, with heads drooping, and
they went rattling and banging up the street. When Uncle Ike’s bus
got started you could hear it half a mile. I guess it was all loose,
for it sounded like a hail-storm beating down on a tin roof.

“Wonder where they’re goin’?” says Plunk.

“You got to do more’n wonder if you’re goin’ to find out,” I says,
and started trotting after the bus. It wasn’t hard to keep it in
sight, because Uncle Ike’s horses got tired every little while and
came to a walk.

They stopped at the old Juniper house that had been standing vacant
for six months, ever since old man Juniper went to Chicago to live
with his daughter Susy’s oldest girl that had married a man with a
hardware store there. The yard was full of boxes and packing-cases
and furniture all done up with burlap and rope.

“They’re goin’ to _live_ here,” Plunk yells; and I was as glad as he
was. The benefits of having a stuttering fat boy living near you
aren’t to be sneezed at by anybody.

We found a shady place across the street and watched to see what
would happen. It’s always interesting to watch other folks work,
especially if what they’re doing is _hard_ work, and I guess
carrying furniture and trunks and boxes is about as hard as
anything.

Mrs. Tidd was ready for work before anybody else. She came to the
door with a big apron on and a cloth tied around her hair, and the
way she sailed into things was a caution. It seemed like she jumped
right into the middle of that mess, and in a minute things were
flying. Mr. Tidd came next with his book under his arm and stood in
the stoop looking sort of puzzled. Mrs. Tidd straightened up, and
then sat down on a packing-box.

“Jeffrey Tidd,” she said, not sharp and angry, but kind of patient
and rebuking, “go right back into the house and take those clothes
off. I knew if I didn’t stay right by you you’d get mixed up
somehow. Will you tell me why in the world you changed from your
second-best clothes to that Sunday black suit to move furniture?”

Mr. Tidd he looked pretty foolish and felt of his pants as though he
couldn’t believe they were his best ones.

“That does beat all,” he said. “It does beat all creation, Libby. I
wonder how these clothes come to be on me?”

“If you didn’t have ’em on under your others, which ain’t
impossible, you must have changed into ’em.”

“My best suit!” he said to himself, shaking his head like you’ve
seen the elephant do at the circus, first to one side and then to
the other. “My best clothes!”

“Maybe I’d better come along and see you get into the right ones
this time,” Mrs. Tidd suggested.

“I guess you don’t need to, Libby. I’ll take these off and hang ’em
in the closet, and I’ll hang my second-best ones up, too. Then I’ll
put on what’s left. That way I can’t go wrong.” He went off into the
house, and Mrs. Tidd flew at the piles of stuff again.

Pretty soon the fat boy came around the side of the house with a
quarter of a cherry pie in his hand and the juice dripping down
faster than he could suck it off.

“Marcus,” his mother called, “take holt of this bundle of bed-slats
and carry ’em up to the front room.”

Mark he grabbed them with one hand and hunched them up under his arm
so that one end dragged on the ground, walking off slow and eating
pie as he went. It took him quite a while to get back. I could see
him look across the street at Plunk and me as he came down the
steps. He stopped a minute, sort of thinking.

After a while Mr. Tidd came back again.

“Put the _Decline and Fall_ down somewheres so you can use both
hands, Jeffrey,” his wife says. And he did it as meek and obedient
as could be. Between them they carried a hair-cloth sofa in after
she had told Mark to fetch along some medium-sized boxes.

Mark stooped over one, and we could hear him grunt.

“Hello, Skinny,” Plunk yells. “Git your back into it and h’ist.
That’s the way to lift.”

The fat boy straightened up and looked at us quite a while. Then he
sat down on the box and called, “I bet the two of you can’t l-l-lift
it.”

“I’ll bet,” says Plunk, “we _kin_ lift it. I’ll bet we kin carry it
from here to the standpipe and back without lettin’ her down wunst.”

“Braggin’ don’t carry no b-boxes.”

The way he said it sort of made me mad. “Come on, Plunk,” I says;
“lets show this here hippopotamus whether we kin carry it or not.”
And we went running across the street.

“Where d’you want it put?” I says.

“No use you tryin’. You couldn’t g-git it up.”

“Git holt,” I says to Plunk. “Now, Mister What’s-your-name, where’s
it go?”

“Up-stairs in the hall; but you b-b-better not try. It’s too heavy
for you.”

Plunk and me took that box up-stairs a-flying and ran down again.

“There,” I says. “Now kin we carry it?”

He stuck up what there was to his nose. “One ain’t nothin’. I
carried the hull twelve out when we was movin’ in fifteen
mum-minutes.”

“If you did,” I says, “Plunk and me can carry ’em in in twelve.”

He just laughed.

“Doggone it,” I says, “we’ll show you, you’re so smart.”

“Can’t d-d-do it.”

“You ain’t the only kid that can carry things,” Plunk says, with a
scowl.

Mark he pulled out a little silver watch and held it in his hand.
“Twelve m-minutes, was it? Can’t do it. I’ll keep time.”

Well, Plunk and me went at those boxes like sixty, and the way we
ran them up-stairs was a terror to cats. When the last one was up we
were panting and sweating and most tuckered out. Mark looked off his
watch when we came out with a sort of surprised expression. “You
kids is stronger than I figgered. You did it in eleven minutes and a
half.”

“Sure,” I says.

“But them boxes wasn’t very heavy. You can’t carry that big box, by
j-jimminy!”

Plunk and me was good and mad, and if anybody’d seen the way we
hustled that big box in they wouldn’t have believed their eyes.

“That’s perty good,” says Mark. “Wouldn’t thought it of you kids.
Must be stronger here in Wicksville than over to Peckstown where I
come from.” He stopped a minute. “I can’t lift that big
rockin’-c-c-chair myself.”

“Huh!” snorted Plunk. “That’s a easy one.” And in we wrastled with
the chair.

We weren’t going to have any strange kid think we weren’t up to all
_he_ was, so we stayed right there all the afternoon, and I guess we
proved pretty conclusively we could carry. And that wasn’t all: we
proved we could _last_. I bet we carried two-thirds of the Tidds’
furniture in. When it was all done we sat down on the fence to pant
and rest. Mark’s mother called him.

“I got to go to s-s-s-supper,” he says. “Come again when you feel
s-s-strong.” And then he went into the house.

Plunk and me sat still quite a while. I began to think about it and
think about it, and I could see Plunk was thinking, too. In about
fifteen minutes I looked over at him and he looked over at me.

[Illustration: PLUNK AND ME WAS GOOD AND MAD]

“How many things did that fat kid carry in?” I says.

“I didn’t see him carry anythin’.”

“Neither did I.”

We thought quite a spell more. Then I said to Plunk, “I guess maybe
we better not do too much braggin’ about how much an’ how long we
kin carry.”

He grinned kind of sickly. “This here Mark Tidd,” he says, “ain’t
nobody’s fool—leastways, not on Mondays, which is to-day.”

When we got better acquainted with Mark Tidd he read a book called
_Tom Sawyer_ to us. I guess he got his idea of making us work out of
that; he was always taking schemes out of books.




                               CHAPTER II


Mrs. Tidd was just the kind of person I thought she would be. She
cooked lots of things and cooked them good; and, no matter how often
Mark wanted to eat, she never said a word. Plunk and Binney Jenks
and me got to going there a lot, and there was always cookies and
pie and things. Of course, we didn’t go specially to eat, but
knowing we’d get something wasn’t any drawback. I liked Mrs. Tidd,
and sort of admired her, too. She was always working at something
and managing things and keeping track of Mr. Tidd and Mark. I never
heard her complain, and I don’t remember ever seeing her sit down
except in the cool of the evening after supper.

I don’t want you to get the idea that Mr. Tidd was lazy or
shiftless, because he wasn’t. He was just queer, and his memory was
as long as a piece of string, which is the way we have in Wicksville
of saying there was no knowing just how long it really was. Lots of
times I’ve seen Mr. Tidd start out to do a job of work and forget
all about it before he got a chance to commence. He was sure to
forget if Mrs. Tidd didn’t take the _Decline and Fall_ away from him
before he went out of the door. Even that didn’t make it certain,
because something to think about might pop into his head all of a
sudden, and if it did he had to sit down and think about it then and
there. He was a machinist complicated by inventions. Every time he
saw you doing anything he’d stop right there and invent a better way
for you to do it; and mostly the new ways he invented wouldn’t work.

It was an invention that had brought all the Tidds to Wicksville.
Mark told us about it. It seems like Mr. Tidd had been inventing a
new kind of machine or engine or something that he called a turbine.
He’d been working on it a long time, making pictures of it and
figuring it out in his head, but he never had a chance to get right
down to business and actually _invent_ it till a little while before
they came to our town. Then an aunt of his up and died and left him
some money. He quit his job right off and came to Wicksville, where
it was quiet and cheap, to finish up doing the inventing. When he
got it done he wouldn’t need a job any more because it would make
him rich. We used to go out in the barn, where he was tinkering
away, and watch him for hours at a time, and he never paid any more
attention to us than as if we weren’t there at all. But he was
careful about other folks and wouldn’t let them step a foot inside
of the door. He was afraid somebody would see what he was up to and
go do it first, which would have been a mean trick.

Mr. Tidd wasn’t what you call _suspicious_; he wasn’t always
expecting somebody that he knew to do something to his engine, and I
guess any man that had wanted to could have got into the workshop
and looked it all over to his heart’s content by talking to Mr. Tidd
for an hour or so and listening to him tell about the Roman Empire,
and how it split down the middle and went all to smash. He was the
kind-heartedest man in the world, I guess, and never could see any
bad in any one—not in any one he really saw. He had a sort of
far-away idea that there was bad folks, and that some of them might
want to steal his invention, but if he had seen a man crawling
through a window of the barn he’d have found some excuse for him.
Anybody could fool him—that is, they could have if Mrs. Tidd hadn’t
been there; but she kept her eye on him pretty close and saw to it
he didn’t let any strangers come fooling around. If everybody had
been as careful as she was this story wouldn’t have happened.

The real beginning of things didn’t look like anything important at
all. It happened one afternoon when Mark Tidd and Plunk and Binney
and me were hanging around the depot platform waiting for the train
to come in. We didn’t expect anybody we knew to come, and there
wasn’t any reason for our being there except that there wasn’t any
reason for our being anywhere else. Plunk and I sat on one of those
baggage-trucks that run along straight for a while and then turn up
a hill at the end; Binney sat on a trunk; and Mark was on the
platform, because that was the safest place for him and wouldn’t
break down. It was hot and sleepy, and we wished we were somewheres
else or that something exciting would happen. It didn’t, so we just
sat there and talked, and finally we got to talking about Mr. Tidd’s
engine. We’d seen him tinkering around it, and he’d told us about
it, so we were interested.

“Wouldn’t it be great,” says Binney, “if it worked when he got it
done! Us fellers could say all the rest of our lives that we knew
intimate a inventor that was as big as Edison.”

We never had thought about that part of it before; but what Binney
said was so, and we got more anxious than ever for things to turn
out right.

“If it does,” says Plunk, “Mark’ll be rich, and maybe live to the
hotel. Think of bein’ able to spend a dollar ’n’ a half every day
for nothin’ but meals and a place to sleep.”

Mark he didn’t say anything, because he was drowsy and his head was
nodding.

“Mr. Tidd says it’ll reverlutionize the world,” Binney put in. “He
says if them Romans had had one of his gas-turbines the empire
never’d have fell.”

“If it goes, nothin’ else’ll be used to run automobiles. If Mr. Tidd
sold a engine for ev’ry automobile in the United States I guess he
could afford livin’ to the hotel. I’ll bet he could own a automobile
himself.”

“And they’ll use ’em in fact’ries and steamboats, ’cause they kin be
run with steam same as with gasolene.”

“And won’t be more’n a twentieth as big as engines is now.”

We kept on talking and describing what we thought Mr. Tidd’s turbine
would do and guessing how long it would be before he was ready to
try it to see if it went. We was so interested we never noticed a
man sitting a little ways off on a trunk. Pretty soon we did notice
him, though, for he got up deliberate like and stretched himself and
looked around as if he didn’t see anything, including us. Then his
eyes lit on Mark, and he kind of grinned. He lighted a cigar and
came walking over toward us.

“How about this train?” he asks, like he wasn’t much interested but
wanted to talk to pass away the time. “Is it generally much behind?”

“Not much,” I says. “I ain’t known it to be over a hour late for two
weeks.”

“Live here?” he asks, with another grin.

I nodded, but didn’t say anything out loud.

“Pretty quiet place for boys, isn’t it?”

“It ain’t what most folks’d call excitin’.”

After a minute he says: “I used to live in a little town like this
when I was a boy, and I remember there wasn’t very much to do. I
used to hang around the carpenter shop watching the carpenters work,
and around the machine shop seeing how the machinists did things. It
was pretty interesting. I suppose you do the same here.”

“We-ell, it ain’t exactly a machine shop we hang around.”

“Oh,” he says, “what is it?”

“It’s a—a—”

Just then Mark seemed to wake up sudden He grunted and interrupted
what I was going to say, and then did the saying himself. “It’s a
b-barn,” he says.

“Oh,” says the man, “a barn? What do you watch in the barn? The
horses?”

“No. Ain’t no h-h-horses.” Then he half shut his eyes like he was
going to take another nap.

The man didn’t say anything for a spell. “I was always interested in
machines when I was a boy,” he says, at last. “Any kind of a machine
or engine got me all excited. But we didn’t have as fine machines
then as you do now. They’re making improvements and inventing new
things every day. Some day they’re going to invent something to make
locomotives better—something along the turbine line, I expect. Know
what a turbine is?”

I was just going to say yes, when Mark woke up again. “Yes,” he
says, “a t-t-turbine is a climbin’ vine that grows over p-porches.”

The man kind of strangled and looked away. “No,” he says in a
minute, “I guess you got it mixed up with woodbine.”

“Maybe so,” says Mark.

We heard the engine whistle, and the man hurried off to see about
his baggage. The train pulled in and pulled out again and left us
sitting on the platform wondering what to do next. Mark stood up
slow and tired and yawned till it seemed like his head would come
off.

“Fellers,” says he, “you gabble like a lot of geese. Looked like
that man was more’n ord’nary interested in engines.”

“’Spose he heard what we was talking about?”

Mark looked at me disgusted. “Tallow,” says he, “don’t go layin’
down in no pastures, ’cause a muley cow ’thout horns’ll come and
chaw a hunk out of your p-p-pants.”

“I guess I ain’t so green,” I told him, but he only grinned.

“Let’s go swimmin’,” says Binney.

Mark shook his head and looked solemn. “Go ahead if you want to. No
swimmin’ for me; it’s Friday, and I stepped on a spider this
mornin’.”

Plunk busted out laughing. “Haw,” he says, “believin’ in signs. I
ain’t superstitious.”

Mark looked at him and blinked. “I ain’t superstitious, but I don’t
b’lieve in takin’ extra chances. Probably there ain’t nothin’ in it,
but you can’t never tell.”

That illustrates better than I can tell what kind of a fellow Mark
Tidd was—cautious, looking on all sides of a thing he was thinking
of doing, always trying to figure plans out ahead so nothing
disagreeable could happen. I don’t want you to think he was a
coward, because he wasn’t, but he never ran his head into trouble
that could be dodged ahead of time.

We all started for the river, because it would be cooler there even
if we didn’t go in, but on the way Mark found a four-leaf clover,
and a white cat ran across the road in front of us, so he figured it
out that if there _was_ any bad luck about Friday and killing a
spider those two good-luck signs had knocked the spots off it.




                              CHAPTER III


Mark Tidd wasn’t given much to exercise, but that isn’t saying he
couldn’t stir around spry if there was some good reason. He never
wanted to play baseball or tag or anything where you had to run, and
usually when a game was going on he’d be lying under a tree reading
a book. He said it was a lot easier reading about a game than
playing it, and more interesting than watching the kind we played.
He read a good deal, anyhow, mostly, I guess, because you can sit so
still to do it, and rest at the same time if you want to; and it was
surprising the things he got to know about that were useful to us.
Seemed like almost everything we wanted to do Mark would have read
about some better way of doing it, and that’s how we came to get up
the K. K. K., which stands for Ku Klux Klan.

We were all sitting in Tidd’s yard where the shade of the barn fell,
and nobody had said anything for quite a spell. I was beginning to
want to do something, and it was easy to see that Plunk and Binney
were wriggling around uneasy like; but Mark he lay with his little
eyes shut tight, looking as peaceful and satisfied as a turtle on a
log. All of a sudden the idea popped into my head, and I yelled
right out, “Let’s git up a secret society.”

Mark opened one eye and sort of blinked at me, and Plunk and Binney
sat up straight.

“What’ll we call it?” Binney wanted to know.

“Who’ll be officers?” Plunk asked.

“I dunno,” I says, sharp like, because they seemed to think I ought
to have the whole thing planned out for them to do without their
lifting a hand.

Mark rubbed his eyes and rolled over on his side. “What’s the main
thing about a s-secret society?” he asks.

“Payin’ dues,” I says, quick.

“Havin’ somethin’ to eat,” Binney guessed.

“Naw,” Mark grunts, contemptuous. “The main thing about a secret
society is the s-s-secret.”

We could see in a minute that he was right about that.

“So,” he went on, “if we’re goin’ to have a secret society the first
thing is to git a s-s-secret to have.”

“I don’t know no secret,” Binney said, shaking his head hard.

“Nor me,” said Plunk.

I thought a minute, because I knew a couple of secrets, but they
were secrets I didn’t calculate to tell anybody, least of all Mark
and Plunk and Binney; so I just shook my head, too.

“We’ll make a secret,” Mark told us.

“How?” I wanted to know, because I didn’t see how you could go to
work to make a secret, but I might have known Mark would find a way.

“Did you ever hear of the K-k-k-ku K-k-k-klux K-k-k-klan?”

“What?” I asked.

He said it over again.

“I didn’t git it that time,” I told him. “Sounds like a tongue-tied
hen tryin’ to cackle.”

Mark sort of scowled at me and did it all over, but not one of us
could make a thing of it.

“Write it,” I said; “that’s the only way we’ll ever git it.”

At first he wasn’t going to do it, but we argued with him that it
wasn’t any use spoiling a good thing like a secret society just
because he couldn’t mention plain a name he wanted to tell us; so at
last he wrote it down on a piece of paper. What he wrote was Ku Klux
Klan.

“It don’t make no sense,” Binney said. “What language is it, anyhow?
Dutch?”

“It ain’t no language. It’s a name.”

“Oh.”

“Of the most p-p-powerful secret society that ever was.”

“I reckon it was over in Russia or somewheres. It sounds like it.”

“It was right here in the United States.”

“Hum,” I said, because that name didn’t sound a bit like the United
States to me.

“It was after the war.”

“The Spanish War?”

“No. The North and South war.”

“Oh.... That one. What was it for?”

“For protection. They went ridin’ around at night rightin’ wrongs
and scarin’ folks and runnin’ things in general. They wore white
sheets over their heads.”

“Gee. Honest?”

“It’s in the histories.”

“And it was secret?”

“The most secret thing ever was. Even men in it didn’t know who one
another was.”

“Let’s have one,” Plunk yelled, squirming around like he was sitting
on an ant’s nest. “I kin git a sheet.”

“Who’s goin’ to b’long?” I said; and then we all looked at one
another.

“Nobody but us four,” Binney whispers, because he’s beginning to
feel secret already. There wasn’t any argument to that, so we agreed
to be a Ku Klux Klan, and to have our secret meeting-place in a
little cave up across from the island where the swimming-hole was.
It wasn’t much of a cave. Just a little round room dug out of the
hill by somebody a long time ago. I couldn’t stand up straight in
it, and when we four was all inside there wasn’t much room left—not
with Mark Tidd taking up the space he did.

Well, each of us got a sheet and hid it there, and we kept potatoes
to bake and an old frying-pan and a kettle and other things like
that in case of emergency, for there was no knowing what might come
up with an organization like ours, and we knew we had to be ready.
Mark made up passwords and grips and secret signs; and we had an
alphabet all of our own that we could write letters to one another
in, which was fine, even though there never seemed to be anything
very secret to write. But there come to be later on, and there was a
time when we was glad of the cave and the potatoes and the
frying-pan. But that wasn’t until the next spring, and lots of
things happened before then.

I guess maybe it was a month after we organized the Klan when the
stranger came to town. We were cooking dinner up at the cave that
day—a black bass, four perch, and a couple of blue-gills, with baked
potatoes—and we were just scouring the dishes with sand when we
looked down and saw Uncle Ike Bond come ambling along the river.
Uncle Ike drove the bus when it was necessary and fished the rest of
the time, which was most of the time; and he caught fish, too; lots
of them. I guess he got a good many on night lines.

Binney Jenks yelled down at Uncle Ike, and he looked up to see who
it was. When he recognized Mark Tidd he sat down sort of tired on a
log and motioned for us to come. He was a great friend of Mark’s
since the day the Tidds moved to town; and he let on to folks that
Mark was the smartest boy in Wicksville, which I wouldn’t be
surprised if he was.

We all went down the hill, three of us running, and Mark panting
along behind and puffing and snorting.

“Expectin’ any visitors?” Uncle Ike asked of Mark.

“No,” said Mark, and sat down.

“Um!” grunted Uncle Ike.

He pulled out his pipe and fussed at it with his jack-knife before
he filled it and lighted up. “Looks kinder like you was goin’ to
have some,” he said.

Mark didn’t answer anything or ask questions, because if you do
Uncle Ike is apt to shut up like a clam and not tell you another
thing. He waited, knowing Ike’d tell on if there was anything to
say. The old man puffed away for a spell and then asked:

“Father’s makin’ some sort of a whirligig, ain’t he?”

“Yes. He’s inventin’ a e-e-engine.”

“Um!” grunted Uncle Ike. “Calc’late it’s wuth anythin’?”

Mark nodded yes.

“Feller come in on the mornin’ train that seemed tolerable
int’rested in sich whirligigs,” said Uncle Ike. “He allowed to set
onto the seat with me and asked was I acquainted in town—me! Asked
was I acquainted in town!” It was hard for me to tell whether this
made Uncle Ike mad or tickled him. He was that way, and you never
could make him out. Sometimes when he was maddest he looked most
tickled, and when he was most tickled he looked maddest.

“I allowed as how I knowed a few of the citizens by sight and more’n
a dozen to speak to,” Uncle Ike went on, “and then he up and begun
wantin’ to know. When folks gits to the wantin’-to-know stage on
short acquaintance I git to the don’t-want-to-tell stage, and Mister
Man didn’t collect no amazin’ store of knowledge, not while he was
a-ridin’ on _my_ bus.”

He stopped talking and looked at Mark, and Mark looked at him. Then
Uncle Ike winked at Mark. “If I was a smart boy,” he said, “and a
stranger feller come to town snoopin’ around and askin’ questions
about whirligigs, I’d sorter look into it, I would. And if that
stranger feller was askin’ about the i-dentical kind of a whirligig
my father was makin’ in the barn and calc’latin’ to git rich out of
I’d look into it perty close. And if my father was one of these here
inventor fellers that forgits their own names and would trust a cow
to walk through a cornfield I’d be perty sharp and plannin’ and keep
my eye peeled. That’s what I’d do, and I ain’t drove a bus these
twenty years for nothin’, neither. The place to git eddicated,” he
said, “is on top of a bus. There ain’t nothin’ like it. There’s
where you see folks goin’ away and comin’ home, and there’s where
you see strangers and actors and travelin’-men, and everybody that
walks the face of the earth. Colleges is all right, maybe, for
readin’ and writin’, but when it comes to knowin’ who you kin depend
on and who you got to look out for the bus is the place.”

“Did he ask about f-f-father?” Mark wanted to know.

“He didn’t mention him by name,” said Uncle Ike, grinning. “But he
says to me, says he, ‘This is a nice town,’ says he, ‘and a town
that looks as if there was smart folks in it. It’s lettle towns like
this,’ he says, ‘that inventors and other great men comes from,’
says he. ‘Have you got any inventors here?’ he asks.

“‘There’s Pete Biggs,’ I says. ‘He’s up and invented a way to live
without workin’.’

“‘Is that all?’ he asks, kind of disappointed.

“‘Wa-al,’ I says, like I was tryin’ hard to remember, ‘I _did_ hear
that Slim Peters invented some kind of a new front gate that would
keep itself shut. But ’twan’t no go,’ I says, ‘’cause Slim he had to
chop down the gate with a ax,’ I says, ‘the first time he wanted to
go through it. It was a fine gate to stay shut,’ I says, ‘but it
wa’n’t no good at all to come open.’

“‘Ain’t there anybody here tryin’ to make an engine?’ he put in.

“‘Engine?’ says I. ‘Engines is already invented, ain’t they? What’s
the use inventin’ when some other feller’s done it first?’

“‘I mean a new kind of an engine,’ he says, ‘a kind they call a
turbine?’

“‘Oh,’ says I. ‘I ain’t met up with no engines like that, not in
Wicksville. We ain’t much on fancy names here, and I guess if a
Wicksville feller had invented anythin’ he wouldn’t have named it
that—he’d ’a’ called it a engine right out.’

“‘Umph!’ says the feller, like he was mad, and then got out at the
hotel. I stopped long enough to see him talkin’ with Bert Sawyer, so
it’s likely he knowed all Bert did inside of ten minutes. And that’s
all there was to it.” He looked at Mark with his eyes twinkling.

Mark got up kind of slow, blinking his eyes and looking back at
Uncle Ike.

“I guess I’ll go home,” he said.

Uncle Ike slapped his knee and laughed a rattling kind of laugh way
down in his throat. “There,” he whispered, like he was talking
confidential to Binney and Plunk and me, “what’d I tell you? Hey?
What’d I tell you? Don’t take him long to make up his mind, eh?
Quicker’n a flash; slicker’n greased lightnin’!”

We went off up the hill after Mark, leaving Uncle Ike sitting on the
log laughing to himself and slapping his leg every minute or so. He
sat there till we were out of sight.




                               CHAPTER IV


Mark was pretty quiet walking along, thinking hard what to do, or
whether he had better do anything; but finally he seemed to make up
his mind and hurried off faster than I ever saw him walk before. And
it was a warm day, too. We turned into his yard, and as we went
through the gate he jerked his thumb toward the back yard.

“You w-w-wait there,” he stuttered. “I may want you.” Then he went
in the front door.

As we walked by we looked through the window and saw the stranger
sitting in the parlor talking to Mr. Tidd, and he was nodding and
smiling and being very polite; or, anyhow, it seemed that way to me.
I always was sort of curious, so I stopped close to the window and
listened, while Plunk and Binney went on around the house. I guess
it isn’t very nice to listen that way, but I never thought of that
until it was all over.

Mr. Tidd was talking.

“Yes, sir,” he was saying, “the world don’t hold another book like
this. The title says it’s _The Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire_, but it’s about more than that. Why, it’s about everything.
It don’t matter what happens, you can find the answer to it in
Gibbon.... Yes, sir, _The Decline and Fall_ is the greatest book of
’em all.”

“I agree with you entirely, Mr. Tidd, entirely. It has been some
time since I read the book, sir, but I have been promising myself
that pleasure—and profit—for several months. I shall read it again,
sir, as soon as I get home.”

“You will never regret it,” said Mr. Tidd, and patted the book in
his lap.

Somehow the stranger’s face seemed familiar to me, but for a while I
couldn’t place him. Then all of a sudden it came to me: he was the
man we saw on the depot platform who asked about turbines. I almost
yelled out loud to Mark.

I listened again and heard the stranger say:

“I’m in the engineering business, Mr. Tidd, and that’s why I came to
see you. I heard you were working on some sort of a machine, and, as
my company always wants to keep in touch with the latest
developments of mechanics and engineering, I dropped in to have a
chat with you.”

“Yes, yes,” said Mr. Tidd; but it was plain he was thinking about
something else.

“It happens often,” said the stranger, “that men like yourself, who
have valuable ideas, lack the money to carry them out. Very
frequently my company, if the idea seems all right, advances the
money to carry on experiments.”

“Money,” said Mr. Tidd, vaguely. “Oh yes, money. I don’t need money.
No. I have all the money I need.”

The stranger looked disappointed, but he didn’t say anything about
it.

“You’re fortunate,” he told Mr. Tidd, “but maybe there’s something
else I could do for you.”

“Not as I know of. Don’t seem like I needed a thing, but I’m much
obliged, much obliged.”

“What is the nature of the work you are doing?” asked the man. I
didn’t think he liked to come right out with the question that way,
but probably he couldn’t invent any other way to get at it.

“It’s a turbine,” said Mr. Tidd, right off, and his eyes began to
shine. “It’s a practical turbine for locomotives and automobiles and
power-plants and what not. Why, sir, this engine of mine will stand
on a base no bigger than a cook-stove and develop two hundred
horse-power; and it will be reversible. I have a new principle, sir,
for the application of steam; a new principle, it is—” He stopped
suddenly, shook his head, and said, with a patient sort of smile,
“My folks don’t like to have me talk too much about it.”

“Of course,” agreed the stranger, who had been leaning forward and
edging farther toward the front of his chair, with interest. “Of
course. It is never wise to discuss such things too freely. How far
has your work progressed?”

“Not far, not far. In the experimental stages. I have something to
show for my work—nothing to boast of, but enough. Enough to make me
sure.”

“I should be very interested to look over your workshop,” suggested
the stranger. “I always like to see how a thorough machinist has
things arranged.”

At that I ducked and ran around the house, and just a moment later
Mark came tiptoeing out of the kitchen door. He held up his finger
for us to be still and then motioned for us to follow him to the
barn.

In the barn he grabbed up a lot of drawings and stuffed them into my
hands.

“Here. Take these and hide back of the f-f-fence.”

Then he gave Binney and Plunk some funny-looking pieces of steel to
carry, and snatched some other things himself, and we all sneaked
out through the back gate and crouched down behind the fence out of
sight.

“Father’s goin’ to s-show him the shop,” whispered Mark. “I guess
the feller was fixin’ to git a squint at these things. If he was
it’s all right, and if he wasn’t no harm’s done.”

In about two shakes of a lamb’s tail Mr. Tidd and the stranger came
out of the shop and went inside. We had our ears to the wall and
could hear how Mr. Tidd was being taffied by the man, and we could
tell by the way he answered back that he was getting to like the
stranger more and more every minute. Butter wouldn’t melt in that
man’s mouth. He was as full of compliments as an old grist-mill is
of rats.

After a while we heard Mr. Tidd say:

“I dunno’s there’d be any objection to your lookin’ at my drawin’s
and patterns and stuff. ’Twon’t do no harm, I calc’late.”

The man didn’t say anything, and pretended he wasn’t paying
attention. We could hear Mr. Tidd moving around, and then he stopped
still, and I knew he was scratching his head, though I couldn’t see
him, because he always scratches his head when he can’t figure out
just what’s going on.

“I swan,” he said, kind of vague and wondering, “I’d ’a’ bet I left
them things right here; I’d ’a’ bet a cookie. But they ain’t
here—not a sign of ’em. Now, ain’t that the beatenist? I must ’a’
carted ’em off some place without thinkin’. Um! Hum!... Where’n
tunket could it ’a’ been?”

“What seems to be the matter?” asked the stranger, and his voice
sounded anxious to me. It did to Mark, too, because he nudged me.

“I’ve up and mislaid my drawin’s and things,” said Mr. Tidd,
sounding like he was apologizing. “Ain’t that the dumbest thing! I’m
always a-layin’ things around and forgettin’ ’em.”

“Surely they must be in the shop some place,” suggested the
stranger.

Again we could hear Mr. Tidd rummaging around, but it wasn’t any
use. “No,” he said, “no, they ain’t here. I wonder if I could ’a’
left ’em down to the grocery.”

“What would you be doing with them at the grocery?”

“Nothin’ that I know of, but I might have tucked ’em under my arm
and gone just the same. Like’s not I did. Wa-all, I’m sorry I can’t
show ’em to you, but maybe they’ll turn up to-morrow.”

“I’ve got to leave on the late train,” said the stranger.

“Too bad,” said Mr. Tidd, his mind still wondering where his things
were. “Too bad.” And with that he forgot all about the stranger and
went out of the barn and off up the street talking to himself and
scratching his head. The stranger looked after him and bit his lips;
then he grinned like the joke was on him, and he went, too.

“Well,” I asked Mark, “what now?”

“We’ll put ’em right back,” he said, grinning, “and dad won’t know
but what he just overlooked ’em.”

We fixed everything like it was, and then we went down-town to see
what we could find out about the stranger.

He was in the hotel when we got there, and it was easy to get out of
Bert Sawyer all he knew about him. His name was Henry C. Batten, and
he lived in Pittsburg. He was a traveling man for the International
Engineering Company, Bert thought, and later we found out it was so,
because he left one of his cards in his room and Bert found it.

We sat on the hotel steps until Uncle Ike Bond’s bus rattled up to
carry folks to the late train. The stranger squeezed through the
door and sat down in a corner, looking as if he wasn’t pleased with
things in general. Uncle Ike winked at Mark.

“How’d you make out?” he whispered.

Mark went up close and told him all about it, and Uncle Ike like to
have fallen off the seat laughing.

“What’d I tell you?” he chuckled to nobody in particular. “Ain’t he
a slick one? Ain’t he? Slicker’n greased pole I call him, eh?”

Then he gathered up the lines, but stooped over again to whisper,
“If ever this thing gits where you need help from Uncle Ike Bond
just up and say so in his hearin’, and we’ll see what a eddication
got on top of a bus is good for.”

I didn’t see what good he could ever do anybody, but that just shows
how you can be mistaken in folks.




                               CHAPTER V


Right up till snow was on the ground the Ku Klux Klan used to meet
in the cave. We would go up there Saturday mornings, all coming by
different roads, and when we met there would be passwords and
signals and grips and all sorts of secret things. After a while we
got so many signs that a fellow had to be pretty careful what he was
up to so as not to be telling the other members he was in deadly
peril, or that a secret meeting was called at once, or something
else, because almost everything we did had a meaning. For instance,
if I was to reach around and scratch my back when Mark or Plunk or
Binney were looking, that meant that I had to speak to them right
away about something important; and if one of us shoved both hands
in his pockets at once that meant to look out because enemies were
watching. All our signals were simple things like that that wouldn’t
be noticed. Mark got most of them up, and I guess there were more
than a hundred things to be remembered.

We used to sit in the cave and wish there were some real wrongs
being done that we could right, or that we had some kind of a
powerful enemy, or that there was a mean, miserable whelp that we
could visit at night with our white sheets on and tie him to a tree
and frighten him into being a good citizen; but there weren’t any,
and we had to take it out in making believe. But that was almost as
much fun.

We had one sign that was never to be used except when we were
desperate and needed help and succor, and that was to untie your
necktie and tie it up again. But the best one of all was the
jack-knife sign, and it was a dandy, because there were so many ways
of using it. If one of us met the other and said “Lemme take your
jack-knife,” that was one way; or if you sent a note by somebody
else with the word jack-knife in it, or anything like that. But the
best way was the one to be used if you were a captive, or if enemies
were surrounding the cave and you wanted to have your comrades rally
around you. Nobody would ever suspect it. All you had to do was to
meet somebody, a farmer or a man fishing or any one, and give him
your knife and tell him please to give it to any one of the society.
As soon as that one got the knife he had to collect the others and
make for the cave as fast as he could. It worked bully. Lots of
times I’ve sent my little brother over to Mark’s with my knife, and
dozens of times Mark or Binney or Plunk have sent their knives to
me. Once Binney sent his by his father, who was going past my house.
I don’t believe the real, original Ku-Kluxers had a better sign than
that.

The cave was up on the side hill like I told you, and looked down on
the river. I told you, too, how Uncle Ike Bond was always fishing
when he could get time, which was most always, and he used to come
past almost every time we were there. After a while it got so he’d
stop to talk to us or we’d go down to talk to him. Finally one day
he grinned, knowing-like, and asked what we were doing there so
much.

We looked at one another, and then Mark reached around and scratched
his back. That meant, of course, that he had to speak about
something important right away, so we got up and told Uncle Ike we’d
be back in a minute. He grinned and nodded.

We went off out of earshot, and Mark Tidd whispered:

“Uncle Ike’s a pretty good f-f-friend, ain’t he?”

We said yes, he was.

“I think he’s catchin’ on that we’re up to somethin’.”

“Maybe so,” I said.

“Let’s make him a m-member. Then he can’t give us away. Besides,
he’d be a pretty valuable one, anyhow.”

We talked it over awhile, and it was decided unanimous to make him a
Ku-Kluxer, so we went back to where he was sitting.

“Uncle Ike,” says Mark, “can you keep a secret?”

“Wa-all, I hain’t never been tempted very hard, but I guess I can
keep one good enough for ordinary purposes.”

“This is the secretest thing that ever was,” says Binney.

“Um!” says Uncle Ike. “You don’t tell!”

“We’re the Ku Klux Klan,” says Plunk, to save Mark the trouble of
stuttering so many k’s.

“And we want you to join if you’ll take the oath.”

“Sure,” says Uncle Ike. “I’ve always hankered to b’long to somethin’
secret, but I hain’t never seemed to git around to it.”

Mark recited the oath, and Uncle Ike swore to it solemn as could be.
He seemed real glad to be a member. After that we spent most of the
afternoon teaching him our secret signs and tokens and things. He
said he didn’t think he could learn all of them, but that a few
dozen of the most important would do. He seemed particular delighted
with the jack-knife sign.

“But looky here,” he said, shaking his finger in our faces, “don’t
go workin’ any of them signs on me unless you mean ’em in earnest.
You young fellers kin fool with ’em as much as you want to, but
don’t go sendin’ me no jack-knives till you git where you need my
help and need it bad. I’m too old to go gallivantin’ around chasin’
wild geese.”

After that he stopped to our meetings more often than ever, and
pretty nearly every time he’d have a big bass, or maybe a nice mess
of pan-fish for us to cook for our dinner. We were all glad we made
him a member.

All this while Mr. Tidd was working steady on his turbine, and it
was getting nearer and nearer to being ready for a trial to see if
the model would work and do what he thought it was going to do. He
didn’t do anything else but work in the barn and read the _Decline
and Fall_ and forget things. I mean he didn’t have any job, but
lived on money that he had in the bank. If it hadn’t been for that
he’d have had to go on being a machinist all the rest of his life,
and probably wouldn’t ever have had time to do any inventing.

With all his forgetting and absent-mindedness and inventing he was
one of the most patient men. I never heard him speak sharp, and, no
matter what happened, good or bad, he took it just the same, not
seeming much disturbed; and always simple and kind-spoken to
everybody. He always would stop to answer questions or explain
things or just talk to us boys if we came into the shop, and never
told us to get out or quit bothering him. Nothing bothered him. But
Mrs. Tidd wasn’t that way. She’d worry and worry, and sometimes when
she was flying around up to her ears in work she’d out with
something cross, not meaning it at all, but letting it fly off the
tip of her tongue. But she was never short with Mr. Tidd and never
exasperated with him, no matter what he forgot or did wrong.

All four of us—that is, Mark and Plunk and Binney and me—went out to
Mr. Tidd’s shop to ask if Mark could come with us and camp Friday
night and Saturday and Saturday night and Sunday at our cave. The
rest of us had asked and could go if we wanted to. We wanted to, but
we didn’t want to without Mark.

Mr. Tidd was tinkering and filing and fussing around with some
little parts of his turbine, and we had to speak two or three times
before he heard us; then he turned around surprised-like and said,
“Bless my soul, bless my soul,” as if we had just come from a
thousand miles away in an airship. He laid down his tools and leaned
his arm on his bench and stared at us a minute. Then he said “Bless
my soul” again and reached for his handkerchief.

“You’ve got it tied around your neck,” Binney told him.

Mr. Tidd felt and found it where Binney said. “Well, well,” he sort
of whispered. “However come that there?”

“Pa,” began Mark, “can I go camping at the cave? The fellers are
goin’.”

“Camping,” said Mr. Tidd; “camping at the cave? To be sure—at the
cave. Um! What cave?”

“Our cave,” we all said at once.

We told him all about it, and he was as interested as could be,
asking questions and nodding his head and smiling, just like he
wanted to go to the cave himself.

“Can I go, pa?” Mark asked, when we were through.

“Far’s _I’m_ concerned you can,” said Mr. Tidd, “but you better ask
your ma. She sort of looks after such things. I guess she looks
after everything; and, Mark, when you ask her see if she knows where
my shoes are. I swan I couldn’t find ’em this mornin’ when I came
out—couldn’t find hide nor hair of ’em. It does beat all how things
get lost.”

Mrs. Tidd was dusting the parlor when we went in, and had a cloth
tied around her hair. She was just _flying_ around, poking behind
things and into corners and going as fast as if she had to have it
all done in two minutes.

“Ma,” Mark says, poking his head through the door, “can I go campin’
with the fellers?”

“No,” says Mrs. Tidd, without turning her head. Then she stopped a
second and felt of her hair. “What’s that you say?”

Mark asked her again, and we chipped in and explained.

“Was ever such a boy!” she said to herself. “Here I got all the
cleanin’ and dustin’, and bread in the oven. Will you be careful and
cover up good at night and not get into any mischief?”

Mark nodded.

“What you going to have to eat?”

I told her we’d bake potatoes and have fish and one thing another.

“You sha’n’t do no sich thing—gain’ without proper food!” And off
she flew to the kitchen and got a basket in a jiffy. Into it she put
a big chunk of ham, and a loaf of bread and some butter, and a whole
pie and half a chocolate cake, and what was left of a pot of baked
beans. “There,” says she, “I guess that’ll keep you from starvin’.”

We said good-by and started for the door, but she came running after
us. “Mark,” she says, “you take these gray blankets, and, mind you,
bring them back again or you’ll hear from me.” Then she kissed him
and flew back to her dusting again.

We had all of our things in the front yard, and it didn’t take us
any time to get them packed on our backs and start for the river. It
was only about half an hour’s walk, but it took us a little longer
to get there on account of Mark, who wanted to rest every little
while; but it wasn’t really resting he wanted; it was a piece of his
mother’s cake. We ate it all up before we got to the cave at all.

We got at the cave from the top of the hill and threw our things
down on the slope in front. It was a little chilly in the shade, so
Mark told us to gather wood for a fire while he packed things away
the way they ought to be. I guess we were gone twenty minutes. When
we came back everything was just where we left it, and Mark was
standing looking into the cave with his face wrinkled up like it
gets when he’s puzzled.

“Been workin’ hard, ain’t you?” sings out Plunk.

Usually Mark would have said something back, but this time he
didn’t. He turned around and asks, “Have any of you been here since
last Saturday?”

Nobody had.

“S-somebody’s been in the cave.”

“How do you know?” I asked him.

“Things been moved around, and some p-p-potaters is gone,” he
stuttered.

“Let’s look,” says Binney; and we all crowded in. Mark knew where
everything ought to be, even if we didn’t, and he told us just what
had been touched and what hadn’t. “He used the f-fryin’-pan,” he
grumbled. “Look!”

Sure enough, there was the frying-pan with grease sticking to the
bottom, and we never left it that way.

“Wonder who it could have been?” says Plunk.

“Maybe it was Uncle Ike,” guessed Binney.

“No,” says Mark, “he’d ’a’ cleaned the pan.”

That was right. We knew he wouldn’t leave any dirty dishes around.

Well, it kind of upset us. Of course, the cave wasn’t ours, and
anybody could come into it that wanted to, but nobody ever did. It
was such a little cave that it didn’t amount to much to look at, and
it was quite a climb; and now here was somebody poking into our
things, and it made us pretty sore.

“Probably some feller come along fishin’ and happened onto it,”
Binney guessed.

It didn’t do any good to bother about it, so we set to work and
packed our things away and got a fire ready to light. In front of
the cave was a little patch of sand—white sand crumbled off the
sandstone that the cave was carved out of, I guess—and it was there
we had our fires and did our cooking. Mark always fixed the fires,
because he knew how to pile the sticks and get them to blazing even
if the wind was blowing like sixty. Now he was crouched down ready
to strike a match when all of a sudden he said something like he was
startled.

“What’s matter?” I asked him.

He didn’t answer, but bent over and looked at something in the sand.
Somehow I felt shivery all at once without any reason, and walked
over where he was to see what he was looking at. There in the sand
was some kind of a footprint; it was a bare foot, but big, bigger
than two ordinary men’s feet, with the toes growing sort of
sideways. I looked at Mark, and he looked at me.

“What made it?” I whispered. For a minute it didn’t seem safe to
speak out loud.

“I dunno,” says Mark, with his eyes big and his face serious. “Looks
like a man if the toes weren’t on sideways.”

We called Plunk and Binney, but they couldn’t make anything out of
it, so we built the fire good and big, just in case it was some kind
of a wild animal. We knew animals were afraid of fire.

It was Binney who thought about the frying-pan. “It must be a man,
or it wouldn’t have used the pan,” he says.

That was right. Animals don’t cook. Plunk drew a long breath. “Maybe
it’s a wild man,” he said, trembly voiced.

“Like there was with that circus last summer,” I said, remembering
the pictures in front of the tent of seven men catching a thing all
hair and beard, with skins on it for clothes, and big teeth. We all
got closer to the fire.

“Bosh!” snorts Mark; but his voice was a little dry, and he didn’t
look any too comfortable. “There ain’t any wild men.” But he didn’t
believe it and we didn’t believe it.

“What had we better do?” asks Binney.

“Nothing,” says Plunk, letting on he wasn’t afraid. “It won’t hurt
anybody even if it is a wild man. And, besides, there are four of
us.”

That wasn’t so very encouraging, judging from the size of the
footprint. Anything with a foot as big as that could take four boys
at a bite.

“Had we better stay?” Binney was pretty scared and showed it.

“Of course,” Plunk told him. “We ain’t babies. We got to stay.”

We couldn’t very well back down after that. I expect every one of us
was willing enough to pack up and go, but nobody would start it, so
we sat close to the blaze and talked about other things, and made
believe to one another that wild men were the last thing in the
world we’d ever think of running away from.

It began to get dark, and we cooked supper. It wasn’t a very
cheerful meal because every once in a while one of us would stop to
listen and ask, “What was that?” There were lots of noises, like
there always are in the woods, but they never seemed so shivery
before. The moon didn’t come up till late, and it was dark as a
pocket except where our fire lighted things up for a few feet.

“We ought to have a gun,” said Plunk, after we had been quiet a long
time.

“Bosh!” said Mark. “Let’s go to b-b-bed.”


Miracle discredits the ordered scheme of creation; and quite as much
does it do so if you believe creation to be the work of a personal
Deity. Creation (science shows us more and more) was from its inception
a process of absolutely related causes and effects--a whole system
reared up through millions and millions of years upon a structure
involving infinite millions of lives and deaths--and the whole a
perfect sequence of causal happenings.

That is “life” as it is presented to man’s reason and understanding;
and if his reason and understanding are not to faint utterly, he must
in his search for a moral principle “find God (as the Psalmist puts
it) in the land of the living,” or not at all. For as he estimates
the moral value of things solely by that empyric sense which has been
evolved in him through a faithful recognition of the inevitable laws of
cause and effect, so must he become demoralised, if he is to be taught
that what he has regarded as inevitable can be capriciously suspended
by a power independent of those laws which life has taught him to
reverence.

Do not think, for a moment, that I am questioning the power of faith
or the power of prayer. It is a tenable proposition that they are the
most tremendous power in the world; and yet we may hold that they take
effect through the natural law alone, and have come into existence
through the courses of evolution--or, if you like to put it so--in a
faithful following of the Will which, in the act of Creation, made a
compact and kept it.

But if the compact of Creation was not kept, if that impact of spirit
upon matter (which through such vast eras and through such innumerable
phases of life worked by cause and effect) was ever tampered with so
that cause and effect were suspended, then the whole process becomes
discredited to our moral sense, and its presiding genius is discredited
also.

Are we to suppose that through the earlier millions of years, when only
the elementary forms of life were present upon this globe, cause and
effect went on unsuspended and unhindered, and that these processes,
having once been started (engendered, let us assume, by the Immanent
Will), held absolute sway over the development of life for millions and
millions of years, until a time came when humanity appeared, and the
idea of religion and a Deity entered the world; and that this process
then became subject to a dethronement? Are we to believe that then
intervention in a new form, and upon a different basis (not of cause
and effect) began to take place? If that is the proposition, then, it
seems to me, we are asked (having accepted the idea of a Creator) to
impute to Him discreditable conduct--to believe that a point came in
these causal processes which He had instituted when He could no longer
“play the game” without arbitrary interference with its rules, and
that the appearance of man upon the globe was the signal for a fatal
weakening to His character.

I have seen a clergyman cheat at croquet. He was the by-word of the
neighbourhood for that curious little weakness; but I assure you that
the spectacle of that reverend gentleman surreptitiously pushing his
ball into better position with his foot instead of depending upon the
legitimate use of his mallet, was no more ignoble a spectacle than
that which I am asked to contemplate by believers in miracle when they
present to my eyes a Deity who (upon their assertion) does similar
things.

Test upon this basis of morality the most crucial of all events in
Christian theology.

The idea of the Incarnation of God in human form as the final
and logical fulfilment of the Creative purpose and process--the
manifestation of the Creator in the created--has had for many great
thinkers a very deep attraction. But if the process which brings Him
into material being--the so-called Virgin-Birth--is not a process
implicit in Nature itself and one that only depends for its realisation
on man’s grasp of the higher law which shall make it natural and normal
to the human race--if the Virgin-Birth is miracle instead of perfectly
conditioned law revealing itself, then, surely, such a device for
bringing about the desired end is “discreditable conduct”--because
it discredits that vast system of evolution through cause and effect
which we call “life.” From such an Incarnation I am repulsed as from
something monstrous and against nature; and the doings and sayings of
a being so brought into the world are discredited by the fact of a
half-parentage not in conformity with creative law.

Now when one ventures to question the moral integrity of so fundamental
a religious doctrine, and to give definite grounds as to why adverse
judgment should be passed on it, there will not be lacking theologians
ready to turn swiftly and rend one something after this manner: “Who
are you, worm of a man, to question the operations of the Eternal mind,
or dare to sit in judgment on what God your maker thinks good?”

The answer is “I don’t. It is only your interpretation of those
operations that I question.” But on that head there is this further to
say: “By the Creative process God has given to man a reasoning mind;
and it is only by the use of the reason so given him that man can
worship his Maker.” To give man the gift of reason and then to take
from him the right fully to exercise it, is discreditable conduct.

That tendency I attribute not to the Deity but to the theologian--more
especially as I read in the Scriptures that where God had a special
revelation to make to a certain prophet who thought a prostrate
attitude the right one to assume under such circumstances, divine
correction came in these words, “Stand upon thy feet, and I will speak
to thee.” Some people seem to think that the right attitude is to stand
upon their heads.

It is told in some Early Victorian memoirs that a group of Oxford
dons were discussing together the relations of mortal man to his God,
and one postulated that the only possible attitude for man to assume
in such a connection was that of “abject submission and surrender.”
But even in that dark epoch such a doctrine was not allowed to go
unquestioned. “No, no,” protested another, “deference, not abject
submission.” And though it is a quaint example of the Oxford manner,
surely one must agree with it. Reason being man’s birthright, “Stand
upon thy feet and I will speak to thee,” is the necessary corollary.
Even if there be such a thing as divine revelation--the revelation
must be convincing to man’s reason, and not merely an attack upon his
nerves, or an appeal to his physical fears.

Similarly any form of government or of society which does not allow
reason to stand upon its feet and utter itself unashamed is a
discreditable form of discipline to impose, if reason is to be man’s
guide.

Now I do not know whether, by characterising the device of a
“miraculous” birth as discreditable to its author, I am not incurring
the penalty of imprisonment in a country which says that it permits
free thought and free speech (at all events in peace-time). A few years
ago a man was sent to prison--I think it was for three months--for
saying similar things: a man who was a professed unbeliever in
Divinity. And quite obviously the discreditable conduct in that case
was not of the man who acted honestly up to his professions, but of
this country which, professing one thing, does another. And the most
discreditable figure in the case was the Home Secretary who, though
entirely disapproving of this legal survival of religious persecution,
and with full power to exercise the royal prerogative of mercy which
has now become his perquisite, refused to move in the matter, and said
he saw no reason for doing so. His discredit was, of course, shared by
the Cabinet, by Parliament and by the Country--which (without protest
except from a few distinguished men of letters and leaders of religious
thought) allowed that savage sentence to stand on grounds so antiquated
and so inconsistent with our present national professions.

Nationally we are guilty of a good deal of discreditable conduct on
similar lines. We profess one thing, and we do another.

Our politicians tell us that they rely upon the voice of the people,
yet often they employ the political machine which they control, for
the express purpose of evading it. A few years ago a Liberal statesman
was appointed to Cabinet-rank, and had in consequence to go to his
constituency for re-election. He belonged to the party which makes a
particular boast of its trust in the popular verdict. But in order
to make his election more safe--before his appointment became public
property--he communicated to his party agent his ministerial knowledge
of the coming event so that the date of the bye-election could be
calculated. And the agent proceeded to book up all the public halls
in the constituency over the period indicated. Then, in order that
the scandal might not become too flagrant he generously released a
proportion of his bookings to his Conservative opponent, but refused to
release any at all to his Labour opponent; and on those nicely arranged
conditions he fought his election--and got beaten.

Now that was surely discreditable conduct, for here was a statesman
who, while ostensibly appealing to the voice of the people was doing
his level best behind the scenes to deny to it a full and a free
opportunity of expression. Yet the whole political world was in so
discreditable a condition that there were actually people who thought
then--and perhaps still think to-day--that that budding politician
was unfairly and hardly treated when he was thereafter pursued from
constituency to constituency by his cheated opponent, and successfully
prevented from re-entering Parliament even to this day. Probably in
other branches of life he was an upright and honourable man, but
politics had affected him, as religion or social ambition has affected
others, and made him a discreditable witness to the faith which he
professed.

Now when you have great organisations and great institutions thus
discrediting themselves by conniving at the double-dealings of those
whom they would place or keep in authority--you cannot expect the
honestly critical observer to continue to place their judgment above
his own, or to believe (when some difficult moral problem presents
itself) that there is safety for his own soul in relying upon their
solution of it.

The sanction of the popular verdict in a community which is true to
its professions is very great and should not lightly be set aside. But
the sanction of a community or of an organisation which is false to
its professions is nil. And it is in the face of such conditions (to
which Society and religion always tend to revert so long as their claim
is to hold power on any basis of inequality or privilege) that the
individual conscience is bound to assert itself and become a resistant
irrespective of the weight of numbers against it. And so, in any State
where it can be said with truth that the average ethical standard for
individual conduct is better than the legal standard, the duty of
individual resistance to evil law begins to arise. “Bad laws,” said a
wise magistrate, “have to be broken before they can be mended.” And
to be broken with good effect they must be broken not by the criminal
classes but by the martyrs and the reformers. It is not without
significance that every great moral change in history has been brought
about by lawbreakers and by resistance to authority.

When the English Nonconformists of two or three centuries ago were
fighting governments and breaking laws, they were doing so in defence
of a determination to hold doctrines often of a ridiculous kind and
productive of a very narrow and bigoted form of religious teaching--a
form which, had it obtained the upper hand and secured a general
allegiance, might have done the State harm and not good. But, however
egregious and even pernicious their doctrine, the justice (and even
the value) of the principle for which they contended was not affected
thereby. The life of the spirit must take its chance in contact with
the life material, and Society must have faith that all true and vital
principles will (given a free field and no favour) hold their own
against whatever opponents. That is the true faith to which Society is
called to-day--but which it certainly does not follow--especially not
in war time.

We talk a great deal about liberty, democratic principle, and
government by majority; but if those ideals have any real meaning, they
mean that--given free trade in ideas and in propaganda on all ethical
and moral questions--you have got to trust your community to choose
what it thinks good. And to refuse to the general community the means
of deciding for itself by the utmost freedom of discussion, is--in
a State based on these principles--the most discreditable conduct
imaginable.

But of what worth, you may ask, is this moral sanction of a majority?
I am not myself greatly enamoured of majority rule in the sense of a
majority exercising compulsion on a minority. Compulsion by a majority
I should often think it a duty to resist. But to the testimony of a
majority that refrained from compulsion I should attach the greatest
possible weight. There you would get a public opinion which by its own
self-restraint and scrupulous moderation of conduct would be of the
highest moral value. For Society fearlessly to admit the full and open
advocacy of that which it disapproves is the finest proof I can imagine
of its moral stability, and of its faith in the social principles it
lives by.

Broadly speaking--with the exception I have already referred to--that
view is now admitted in matters of religion; you may hold and you
may advocate what religious principles you like. But you are not so
free to hold and advocate social and ethical principles. The veto of
Society has shifted, and you are far less likely to incur opprobrium
and ostracism to-day if you advocate polytheism than if you advocate
polygamy or pacifism. And the reason for this, I take to be, that the
religion of modern Society is no longer doctrinal but ethical; and so
our tendency is to inhibit new ethical teaching though we would not for
a moment countenance the inhibition of new doctrinal teaching.

That is our temptation, and I think that in the coming decade there
will be a great fight about it; we are not so prepared as we ought to
be to allow a free criticism of those social institutions on which our
ideas of moral conduct are based, even when they cover (as at present
constituted) a vast amount of double-dealing.

Take for instance this Western civilization of ours which bases its
social institutions of marriage, property, and inheritance on the
monogamic principle, but persists in moral judgments and practices
whose only possible justification is to be found in the rather
divergent theory that the male is naturally polygamous and the female
monogamous.

These two ideals, or social practices, make mutually discrediting
claims the one against the other. I am not concerned to say which I
think is right. But on one side or the other we are blinking facts, and
are behaving as though they had not a determining effect upon conduct
and character which Society ought straightforwardly to recognise.

The man who maintains that it is impossible for the male to live
happily and contentedly in faithful wedlock with one wife and then
goes and does so, commits himself by such matrimonial felicity to
discreditable conduct--discreditable to his professions, I mean. And it
is, of course, the same if his inconsistency takes him the other way
about.

There may, however, be an alternative and more honest solution to this
conflict of claims; both may contain a measure of truth. It may be true
that monogamy--or single mating--faithfully practised by man and woman
alike, is ideally by far the best solution of the sex-relations, and
the best for the State to recognise and encourage by all legitimate
means; just as vegetarianism and total abstinence may be the best
solution of our relation to food, or non-resistance of our relation
to government, or abject submission of our relation to theological
teaching. But though these may be ideals to strive for, it does not
follow that human nature is so uniformly constructed upon one model
as to justify us in making them compulsory, or in turning round and
denouncing as moral obliquity either plural mating or the eating of
meat, or the drinking of wine, or rebellion against civil authority, or
free thought in matters of religion.

If the community deliberately decides that one of these courses gives
the better social results, it is within its power to discourage the
other course, without descending to compulsion; and I am inclined to
think that this may, in the majority of cases, be done by treating the
desires and appetites of resistant minorities as taxable luxuries. If
the State finds, for instance, that alcoholism increases the work of
its magistrates and police, and diminishes the health and comfort of
home-conditions, it may quite reasonably tax beer, wine and spirits,
not merely to produce revenue but to abate a nuisance. But it would be
foolish, were it to go on to say that everybody who incurred such taxes
was guilty of moral obliquity.

In the same way, if the State wishes to discourage vegetarianism and
temperance, it will tax sugar, currants, raisins, tea, cocoa and
coffee, and will continue to tax them till it has diminished the
consumption; and incidentally it will let meat go free. But it will
not pass moral judgments--having the fear of human nature before its
eyes--on those who conscientiously bear the burden of those taxes
rather than give up what they think good for them.

I could imagine the State, in its wisdom, seeking to discourage luxury
and the accumulation of wealth into the possession of the few, by
imposing a graduated income tax of far more drastic severity than
that which is now depleting the pockets of our millionaires--but not
therefore saying that all who incurred income tax above a certain scale
were guilty of moral obliquity.

We have seen a State which required an increase of its population
setting a premium on children so as to encourage parents to produce
them; and I can imagine a State which required a diminution in the
increase of its population setting a tax on children, but not therefore
joining in the cry of the Neo-Malthusians that every married couple
who produced more than four children were guilty of a kind of moral
depravity. And further, I can imagine a State which wished to encourage
pure and unadulterated monogamy putting a graduated tax, practically
prohibitive in price, on any other course of conduct productive of
second or third establishments. But I do not see why the State, as
State, should concern itself further, or why Society should concern
itself more deeply about sexual than it does about commercial and trade
relations, wherein it allows far more grievous defections from the
ideal of human charity to exist.

Leaving it to the individual is not to say that your views as to
the desirability of such conduct will not influence your social
intercourse, and perhaps even affect your calling list. A great many
things affect our calling lists, without any necessity for us to be
self-righteous and bigoted about the principle on which we make our
own circle select. There are some people who will call upon the wives
of their doctors, but not of their dentists; there are others who will
not call upon the organist who conducts them to the harmonies of Divine
Service on Sunday, but would be very glad to call upon Sir Henry Wood,
who conducts their popular concerts for them during the week. We make
our selection according to our social tastes and aspirations, and
sometimes those social tastes may include a certain amount of moral
judgment. But that moral judgment need not make us interfere; if it
keeps us at a respectful and kindly distance from those whom we cannot
regard with full charity, it keeps us sufficiently out of mischief.

Take the public hangman, for instance. I, personally, would not have
him upon my calling list. I would like to put a graduated tax upon
him and tax him out of existence. I think he is lending himself to a
base department of State service; but I also think that the State is
tempting him; and I think that, in a symbolical way, all of you who
approve of capital punishment ought to put the public hangman upon
your calling list--or not exclude him because of his profession (which
you regard as useful and necessary), but only because he happens to
be personally unattractive to you. If you exclude him, because of
his profession, while you consider his profession a necessity--you
are guilty, I think, of discreditable conduct, and in order to stand
morally right with yourselves you had better go (I speak symbolically)
and leave cards on him to-morrow.

What I mean seriously to say is this: there is a great danger to
moral integrity in any acceptance of social conditions which you
would refuse to interpret into social intercourse. If you believe
prostitution to be necessary for the safety of the home--which is the
doctrine of some--you must accept the prostitute as one who fulfils an
honourable function in the State. If you accept capital punishment,
you must accept the hangman. If you accept meat, you must accept the
slaughterman; if you accept sanitation you must accept the scavenger.
If you accept dividends or profit from sweated labour, you must
accept responsibility for sweated conditions, and for the misery, the
ill-health, the immorality and the degradation which spring from them.

We may be quite sure that far worse things come from these conditions
on which we make our profit than are contained in the majority of those
lives which, because of their irregularities or breaches of convention,
we so swiftly rule off our calling lists. If we are not willing to
forego the dividends produced for us out of our tolerated social
conditions, why forego contact with that human material which they
bring into being? But if you accept contact there, then you will have a
difficulty in finding any human material of greater abasement to deny
to it the advantage of your acquaintance.

I have purposely put my argument provocatively, and applied it to
thorny and questionable subjects, because I want to reach no halfway
conclusion in this matter, and because the real test of our spiritual
toleration is now shifting from matters religious to matters social,
from questions of doctrine to questions of daily life. To-day we must
be prepared to tolerate a propaganda of social ideas--the products of
which, if they succeeded in obtaining a hold, would in the estimation
of many be as regrettable as were the products of Calvinism or
Puritanism in the past, when they were much more powerful than now.

Our hatred of these new social ideas may be just as keen as the hatred
of Catholicism for Protestantism or of Protestantism for Catholicism,
in days when religious doctrine seemed to matter everything. More
keen it could not be. The dangers these new ideas present could not
be greater in our eyes than in the eyes of our forefathers were the
dangers of false doctrine three centuries ago. But the principle
which demands that they shall be free to state their case and to make
converts remains always the same. Nevertheless it is unlikely to be
granted without struggle except by an intelligent minority.

The religious movement of the twentieth century, I say again, is not
doctrinal but social; and its scripture is not the Bible or any written
word, but human nature itself.

We are on the brink of great discoveries in human nature, and many
of our ethical foundations are about to be gravely disturbed. The
old Manichee dread of the essential evil--the original and engrained
sin--of human nature remains with us still, and there will be a great
temptation, as there always has been, not merely to controvert (which
is permissible) but to persecute and suppress those who preach new
ideas. It is against such discreditable conduct that we have now to be
on our guard.

At the threshold of this new era to which we have come, with our old
civilisation so broken and shattered about us by our own civilising
hands, the guiding spirit of man’s destiny has its new word to say,
to which we must listen with brave ears. And first and foremost it is
this, “Stand upon thy feet--and I will speak with thee.”




WHAT IS WOMANLY?

(1911)


The title of my lecture has, I hope, sent a good many of you here--the
women of my audience, I mean--in a very bristling and combative frame
of mind, ready to resent any laying down of the law on my part as to
what is or what is not “womanly.” I hope, that is to say, that you are
not prepared to have the terms of your womanliness dictated to you by a
man--or, for that matter, by a woman either.

For who can know either the extent or the direction of woman’s social
effectiveness until she has secured full right of way--a right of way
equal to man’s--in all directions of mental and physical activity, or,
to put it in one word, the right to experiment?

There are, I have no doubt, many things which women might take it into
their heads to do, which one would not think womanly at their first
performance, but which one would think womanly when one saw their
results at long range. No rule of conduct can be set up as an abstract
right or wrong; we must form our ethics on our social results; and in
the world’s moral progress the really effective results have generally
come by shock of attack upon, or of resistance to, some cherished
conventions of the day.

Take, for example, a thing which has seemed to concern only the male
sex, but which has really concerned women just as intimately--the
history of our male code of honour in relation to the institution of
duelling. There was a time in our history when it would have been very
difficult to regard as manly the refusal to fight a duel. But it is
not difficult to-day to see in such a refusal a very true manliness.
We in this country have got rid of the superstition that honour can in
any way be mended by two men standing up to take snap-shots at each
other; and now that we are free from the superstition ourselves, we can
understand, looking at other countries--Germany, for instance--that it
must often require more courage to refuse to fight than to consent. But
we have arrived at that stage of enlightenment only because in our own
history there have been men courageous enough and manly enough to dare
to be thought unmanly and cowardly. And as with our manhood so with
our womanhood; you cannot judge of what is womanly merely on the lines
of past conventions, produced under circumstances very different from
those of our own days. You must give to women as you give to men the
right to experiment, the right to make their own successes and their
own failures. You cannot with good results lay upon men and women, as
they work side by side in the world (very often under hard competitive
conditions) the incompatible rules which govern respectively a living
language and a dead language. A living language is constantly in
flux, inventing new words for itself, modifying its spelling and its
grammatical construction, splitting its infinitives. In a dead language
the vocabulary is fixed, the spelling is fixed, the construction is
fixed; but the use and the meaning often remain doubtful. And so, if
you attempt to determine the woman’s capabilities merely by her past
record, and to fix the meaning of “womanliness” in any way that forbids
flux and development, then you are making the meaning and the use of
the word very doubtful.

Now, obviously, if to be “womanly” means merely to “strike an average,”
and be as like the majority of women as possible--womanliness as a
quality is not worth thinking about; it will come of its own accord,
and exists probably a good deal in excess of our social need for it. It
stands on a par with that faculty for submission to the unconscionable
demands of others which makes a sheep sheepish and a hen prolific.
To be what Henry James calls “intensely ordinary” is, from the
evolutionary point of view, to be out of the running.

We see this directly we start applying the word “manly” to men.
For we do not take that to mean merely average quality--if it did,
over-eating, over-drinking, and that form of speech which I will call
over-emphasis--would all be manly qualities--and the evolution of the
race would, according to that doctrine, lie on the lines of all sorts
of over-indulgence. But when we say “manly,” we mean the pick and
polish of those qualities which enable a man to possess himself and to
develop all his faculties; and if it denotes discipline it also denotes
an insistence on freedom--freedom for development, so that all that is
in him may be brought out for social use.

Now, the great poverty which modern civilization suffers from, is the
undevelopment or the under-development of the bulk of its citizens.
And the great wastage that we suffer from lies in the misdirection
toward the over-indulgence of our material appetites--of the energies
which should make for our full human development. And you may be quite
sure that where in a community of over-population and poverty such as
ours, the average man, as master, is demanding for himself more of
these things than his share, there the average woman (where she is in
economic subjection) is getting less than her share. Yet there are
many people who (viewing this problem of woman’s subjection where the
savage in man is still uppermost) will tell you that it is “womanly”
to be self-sacrificing and self-denying; they will say that it is the
woman’s nature to be so more than it is the man’s; for, like Milton, in
his definition of the ideal qualities of womanhood, they put the word
“subjection” first and foremost. That condition, which, according to
Scripture, only followed after the curse as its direct product, was,
you will remember, predicated by Milton, quite falsely, as essential
even to the paradisal state; and when in _Paradise Lost_ he laid down
this law of “subjection” as the right condition for unfallen womanhood,
he went on to describe the divinely appointed lines on which it was to
operate. The woman was to subject herself to man--


                             “with submission,
     And sweet, reluctant, amorous delay.”


Those, surely, are the qualifications of the courtesan for making
herself desired; and it is no wonder, if he had such an Eve by his side
as was invented for him by Milton, that Adam fell.

Where true womanliness is to end I do not know; but I am pretty sure
of this--that it must begin in self-possession. It is not womanly
for a woman to deny herself either in comforts or nourishment, or
in her instincts of continence and chastity in order that someone
else--whether it be her children or her husband--may over-indulge.
It _is_ womanly (it is also manly), when there is danger of hurt or
starvation to those for whom you are responsible, to suffer much rather
than that they should suffer; but it is not in the least womanly
or manly to suffer so that they may indulge. The woman who submits
to the starving of herself or of her children by a drunken or a
lazy husband is not in any positive sense womanly--for she is then
proving herself ineffective for her social task. And she would be more
effective, and therefore more womanly, if she could, by any means you
like to name, drive that lazy husband into work, or abstract from that
drunken husband a right share of his wages. And if by making his home
a purgatory to him she succeeded, she would be more womanly in the
valuable sense of the word than if (by submission to injustice) she
failed, and let her children go starved.

Then, again, a woman may see that the children she and her husband
are producing ought never to have been born. And if that is so, is it
womanly for her to go on bearing children at the dictates of the man,
even though St. Paul says, “Wives, obey your husbands”? Is she any more
womanly, if she knowingly brings diseased offspring into the world,
than he is manly in the fathering of them?

But now, come out of the home into Society--not into any of those
departments of unsolved problems where humanity is seen at its
worst--pass all those by for the moment--and come to the seat of
administration--into that great regulator of Society, the law-courts
(in the superintendence and constitution of which woman is conspicuous
by her absence). There, as in matters connected with the male code of
honour, any duty of initiative on the part of women may seem, at first
sight, to be far removed. But let us see! In the law-courts you meet
with a doctrine--a sort of unwritten law--that there are certain cases
to which women must not listen. And occasionally “all decent women” are
requested to leave the court, when “decent” men are allowed to stay.
Now, in the face of that request it must be a very painful thing indeed
for a woman to hold her ground--but it may be womanly for her to do
so. It may be that in that case there are women witnesses; and I do
not think our judges sufficiently realise what mental agony it may be
to a woman to give evidence in a court where there are only men. I am
quite sure that in such cases, if the judge orders women generally out
of court, he ought to provide one woman to stand by the woman in the
witness-box. How would any man feel, if he were called before a court
composed only of women, women judges, a woman jury, women reporters,
and saw all men turned out of the court before he began his evidence?
Would he feel sure that it meant justice for him? I think not.

Now these cases to which women are not to listen almost always
specially concern women; yet here you have men claiming to deal with
them as much as possible behind the woman’s back, and to keep her in
ignorance of the lines on which they arrive at a conclusion. Surely,
then, it would be well for women of expert knowledge and training to
insist that these things shall not be decided without women assessors,
and to be so “womanly” as to incur the charge of brazenness and
immodesty in defending the woman’s interest, which in such matters is
also the interest of the race.

But it is only very gradually--and in the face of immemorial
discouragement--that this communal or social spirit, when it began to
draw woman outside her own domesticity, has fought down and silenced
the reproach raised against it, of “unwomanliness,” of an intrusion
by woman into affairs which were outside her sphere. The awakening of
the social conscience in women is one of the most pregnant signs of
the time. But see what (in order to make itself effective) it has had
to throw over at each stage of its advance--things to which beautiful
names have been given, things which were assumed all through the
Victorian era to be essential to womanliness, and to be so engrained in
the woman’s nature, that without them womanliness itself must perish.
The ideal of woman’s life was that she should live unobserved except
when displayed to the world on the arm of a proud and possessive
husband, and the height of her fortune was expressed in the phrase
enviously quoted by Mrs. Norton, “Happy the woman who has no history.”
Now that ideal was entirely repressive of those wider activities which
during the last fifty years have marked and made happy, in spite of
struggle, the history of woman’s social development; and every fresh
effort of that social spirit to find itself and to become effective has
always had to face, at the beginning of each new phase in its activity,
the charge of unwomanliness.

Compare that attack, fundamental in its nature, all-embracing in
its condemnation, with the kind of attack levelled against the
corresponding manifestations of the social or reforming spirit in
man. In a man, new and unfamiliar indications of a stirring-up of the
social conscience may earn such epithets of opprobrium as “rash,”
“hot-headed,” “ill-considered,” “impracticable,” “utopian”--but
we do not label them as “unmanly.” Initiative, fresh adventure of
thought or action in man have always been regarded as the natural
concomitant of his nature. In a woman they have very generally been
regarded as unnatural, unwomanly. The accusation is fundamental: it
does not concern itself with any unsoundness in the doctrines put
forward; but only with the fact that a woman has dared to become their
mouthpiece or their instrument. Go back to any period in the last 200
years, where a definitely new attempt was made by woman toward civic
thought and action, and you will find that, at the time, the charge
of “unwomanliness” was levelled against her; you find also that in
the succeeding generation that disputed territory has always become
a centre of recognised womanly activity. Take, for instance, the
establishment of higher training for girls; there are towns in this
country where the women, who first embarked on such a design, were
jeered and laughed at, and even mobbed. And the same thing happened in
an even greater degree to the women who sought to recover for their own
sex admission to the medical profession: and while the charge levelled
against them was “unwomanliness,” it was yet through their instincts
of reserve and sex-modesty that their enemies tried to defeat them.
Even when they gained the right of admission to medical colleges there
were lecturers who tried, by the way they expressed themselves in their
lectures, to drive them out again.

Or take the very salient instance of Florence Nightingale. When she
volunteered to go out and nurse our soldiers in the Crimea, the
opposition to a woman’s invasion of a department where men had shown a
hopeless incompetence at once based itself on the plea that such a task
was “unwomanly.” Though in their own homes from time immemorial, women
had been nursing fathers, brothers, sons, uncles, cousins, servants,
masters, through all the refined and modestly-conducted diseases to
which these lords of creation are domestically subject, directly one
woman proposed to carry her expert knowledge into a public department
and nurse men who were strangers to her, she was told that she was
exposing herself to an experience which was incompatible with womanly
modesty. Well, she was prepared to let her womanly modesty take its
risk in face of the black looks of scandalised officials of Admiralty
or War Office; and she managed to live down pretty completely the
charge of unwomanliness. But the example is a valuable one to remember,
for there you get the claim of convention to keep women from a great
work of organisation and public service, although already, in the home,
their abilities for that special service had been proved. And so,
breaking with that convention of her day Florence Nightingale went to
be the nursing mother of the British Army in the Crimea, and came home,
the one conspicuously successful general of that weary and profitless
campaign, shattered in health by her exertions, but of a reputation so
raised above mistrust and calumny that through her personal prestige
alone was established that organisation of nursing by trained women
which we have in our hospitals to-day.

Take again the special and peculiar opposition which women had to face
when they began to agitate against certain laws which particularly
affected the lives of women and did cruel wrong to them even in their
home relations. Read the life of Caroline Norton, for instance--a woman
whose husband brought against her a public charge of infidelity, though
privately admitting that she was innocent; and when, after that charge
was proved to be baseless, she separated from her husband, refusing to
live with him any more, then he, in consequence of that refusal cut
her off absolutely from her children, though they were all under seven
years of age. That wrong, which our laws had immemorially sanctioned,
roused her to action, and it was through her efforts, so long ago as
1838, that the law was altered so as to allow a mother of unblemished
character right of access to her own children during the years of early
infancy!

And that is how the law still stands to-day--a woman’s
contribution--the most that could be done at the time for justice
to women. But there is no statue to Caroline Norton in Parliament
Square--or anywhere else, so far as I know.

But what I specially want to draw attention to is this--that when
she wrote the pamphlet with which she started her agitation all
her relatives entreated her not to publish it, because it would be
an exposure to the world of her own private affairs. By that time,
however, Caroline Norton had learned her lesson in “womanliness,” and
she no longer said “Happy is the woman who has no history.” Her answer
was: “There is too much fear of publicity among women: with women it
is reckoned a crime to be accused, and such a disgrace that they wish
nothing better than to hide themselves and say no more about it.”
Does not that set forth in all its weakness the conventional womanly
attitude of the period?

The Bill which, through her efforts, was brought three times before
Parliament, was at first defeated. How? By the votes of the Judges,
to whom the House of Lords left the matter to be decided. And Lord
Brougham, in speaking against that Bill used this line of argument:
There were, he said, several legal hardships which were of necessity
inflicted on women; therefore we should not relieve them from those
which are not necessary--the necessary hardships being the greater;
and it being bad policy to raise in women a false expectation that
the legal hardships relating to their sex were of a removable kind!
Was ever a more perverted and devilish interpretation given to the
Scripture, “To him that hath shall be given, and from her that hath not
shall be taken even that which she hath.”

Let us remember that we are the direct descendants and inheritors of
the age and of the men who pronounced these unjust judgments, and that
no miracle has happened between then and now to remove the guilt of
the fathers from the third and the fourth generation. Heredity is too
strong a thing for us to have any good ground for believing that our
eyes, even now, are entirely opened. There are many of us who cannot
drink port at all, because our grandfathers drank it by the bottle
every night of their lives.

We inherit constitutions, personal and political--we also inherit
proverbs, which express so vividly and in so few words, the full-bodied
and highly-crusted wisdom of former generations. Those proverbs
expressed once--else they had not become proverbs--an almost universal
contemporary opinion. Some of them are now beginning to wear thin, have
of recent years been dying the death, and will presently be heard no
more. But their source and incentive are still quite recognisable; and
their dwindled spirit still lives in our midst.

There was one, for instance, on which genteel families were brought up
in the days of my youth--a rhymed proverb which laid it down that--


     A whistling woman and a crowing hen
     Are hateful alike to God and men.


Now let us look into the bit of real natural history which lies at
the root of that proverb. A crowing hen is a disturbance, but so is a
crowing cock. But the hen is not to crow because she only lays eggs,
and because the bulk of hens manage to lay eggs without crowing. They
make, it is true, a peculiar clutter of their own which is just as
disturbing; but that is a thoroughly feminine noise and a dispensation
of Providence; and they don’t do it at all times of the night, and
without a reason for it, as cocks do. But as a matter of fact it is far
more easy to prevent a cock from crowing than a hen from cluttering;
you have only to put a cock in a pen the roof of which knocks his head
whenever he rears himself up to crow and he will remain as silent as
the grave, though he will continue to do that spasmodic duty by his
offspring which is all that nature requires of him. But no such simple
method will stop the cluttering of a hen when her egg is once well and
truly laid; the social disturbance caused by the pomp of masculine
vain-glory is far less inevitable than the disturbance caused by the
circumstances of maternity. Yet the normal masculine claim to pomp of
sound is more readily allowed in our proverbial philosophy than the
occasional feminine claim.

And that is where we have gone wrong; it is really maternity which
under wholesome conditions decides the social order of things; and we
have been fighting against it by putting maternity into a compound
and setting up paternity to crow on the top rail. We have not learned
that extraordinary adaptability to sound economic conditions which we
find in many birds and in a few animals. There exists, for instance,
a particular breed of ostriches, which mates and lays its eggs in a
country where the days are very hot and the nights very cold; and as
it takes the female ostrich some 13 or 14 days to lay all her eggs
and some weeks to incubate, she cannot as she does in other countries
deposit them in the sand and leave the sun to hatch them, because
after the sun has started the process, the cold night comes and kills
them. The mother bird finds, therefore, that she cannot both produce
and nurse her eggs; yet directly they are laid somebody must begin
sitting on them. Well, what does she do? She goes about in flocks,
13 or 14 females accompanied by an equal number of the sterner sex.
And on a given day, all the hens lay each an egg in one nest, and one
of the father birds is selected to sit upon them. And so the process
goes on till all the males are sedentarily employed in hatching out
their offspring. And I would ask (applying for the moment our own
terminology to that wonderfully self-adaptive breed of sociologists)
are not those male ostriches engaged in a thoroughly “manly”
occupation? Could they be better engaged than in making the conditions
of maternity as favourable and as unhampered as possible? Yet how
difficult it is to make our own countrymen see that the strength of a
nation lies mainly--nay, entirely--in eugenics, in sinking every other
consideration for that great and central one--the perfecting of the
conditions of maternity.

But let us come back for a moment to whistling. It is an accomplishment
which, as a rule, men do better than women; it is the only natural
treble left to them after they reach the age of puberty; and they are
curiously proud of it; perhaps, because women, as a rule, have not
the knack of it. Now, the real offence of a woman’s whistling was not
when she did it badly (for that merely flattered the male vanity) but
when she did it well; and no doubt it was because some women managed
to do it well that the proverb I speak of was invented. We should not
have been troubled with such a proverb if crowing hens and whistling
women had been unable to raise their accomplishment above a whisper.
Yet whistling is really quite beautiful, when it is well done; and why
is woman not to create this beauty of sound, if it is in her power
to create it, merely because it finds her in a minority among her
sex? Does it make her less physically fit, less capable of becoming a
mother--less inclined, even, to become a mother? No; it does none of
these things; but it distinguishes her from a convention which has laid
it down that there are certain things which women can’t do; and so,
when the exceptional woman does it, she is--or she was the day before
yesterday--labelled “unwomanly.”

I do not suggest that whistling is a necessary ingredient for
the motherhood of the new race; but, as a matter of fact, I have
noticed that those women who whistle well have, as a rule, strength
of character, originality, the gift of initiative and a strong
organising capacity; and if these things do go together, then surely
we should welcome an increase of whistling as a truly womanly
accomplishment--something attained--which has not been so generally
attained hitherto.

Let us pass now to a much more serious instance of those artificial
divisions between masculine and feminine habits of thought and
action which have in the past seemed so absolute, and are, in fact,
so impossible to maintain. For you can have no code or standard of
manhood that is not intimately bound up with a corresponding code or
standard of womanhood. What raises the one, raises the other, what
degrades the one degrades the other; and if there is in existence,
anywhere in our social system, a false code of manliness, there
alongside of it, reacting on it, depending on it, or producing it, is a
false code of womanliness.

Take, for example, that matter of duelling already referred to, in
relation to the male code of honour, and the manliness which it is
supposed to encourage and develop. You might be inclined to think that
it lies so much outside the woman’s sphere and her power of control,
as to affect very little either her womanliness or her own sense of
honour. But I hope to show by a concrete example how very closely
womanliness and woman’s code of honour are concerned and adversely
affected by that “manly” institution of duelling--how, in fact, it
has tended to deprive women of a sense of honour, by taking it from
their own keeping and not leaving to them the right of free and final
judgment.

Here is what happened in Germany about seven years ago. A young married
officer undertook to escort home from a dance the fiancée of another
officer; and on the way, having drunk rather more than was good for
him, he tried to kiss her. She resented the liberty, and apparently
made him sufficiently ashamed of himself to come next day and beg her
pardon. Whether she would grant it was surely a matter for herself to
decide; she accepted his apology, and there, one would have thought,
the matter might have ended. But unfortunately, several months later,
word of this very ordinary bit of male misdemeanour reached the ears
of the lady’s betrothed. It at once became “an affair of honour”--his
affair, not the lady’s affair--his to settle in his own way, not hers
to settle in her way. Accordingly he calls out his brother officer,
and, probably without intending it, shoots him dead. The murdered
man, as I have said, was married, and at that very time his wife was
in expectation of having a child. The child was prematurely born to a
poor mother gone crazed with grief. There, then, we get a beautiful
economic product of the male code of honour and its criminal effects on
Society; and if traced to its source we shall see that such a code of
honour is based mainly on man’s claim to possession and proprietorship
in woman--for, had the woman not been one whom he looked upon as his
own property, that officer would have regarded the offence very lightly
indeed. But because she was his betrothed the woman’s honour was not
her own, it was his; she was not to defend it in her own way--though
her own way had proved sufficient for the occasion--he must interfere
and defend it in his. And we get for result, a man killed for a petty
offence--the offence itself a direct product of the way in which
militarism has trained men to look on women--a woman widowed and driven
to the untimely fulfilment of her most important social function in
anguish of mind, and a child born into the world under conditions which
probably handicapped it disastrously for the struggle of life.[1]

Now, obviously, if women could be taught to regard such invasions
of their right to pardon offence in others as a direct attack upon
their own honour and liberty--a far worse attack than the act of
folly which gave occasion for this tragedy--and if they would teach
these possessive lovers of theirs that any such intrusion on their
womanly prerogative of mercy was in itself an unforgivable sin against
womanhood--then such invasions of the woman’s sphere would quickly come
to an end. They might even put an end to duelling altogether.

See, on the other hand, how acceptance of such an institution trains
women to give up their own right of judgment, to think even that
honour, at first hand, hardly concerns them. Is it not natural that, as
the outcome of such a system from which we are only gradually emerging,
we should hear it said of these conventionally womanly women that they
have “a very low sense of honour.”

Low it must naturally be. For that attitude of complaisant passivity
on the part of the woman while two male rivals fight to possess her is
the normal attitude of the female in the lower animal world; but it is
an attitude from which, as the human race evolves into more perfect
self-government, you see the woman gradually drawing away. While it
pleases something in her animal instincts, it offends something in her
human instincts; and while to be fought over is the highest compliment
to the female animal, it is coming to be something like an insult to
the really civilized woman--the woman who has the spirit of citizenship
awake within her. One remembers how Candida, when her two lovers are
debating which of them is to possess her--brings them at once to their
senses by reminding them that it is not in the least necessary that
she should be possessed by either of them; but she does in the end
give herself to the one who needs her most. That may be the truest
womanliness under present conditions; as it may once have been the
truest womanliness for the woman to give herself to the strongest. But
it may be the truest womanliness, at times, for the woman to bring men
to their senses by reminding them that it is not necessary for her to
give herself at all. To be quite sure of attaining to full womanliness,
let her first make sure that she possesses herself. In the past men
have set a barrier to her right of knowledge, her right of action,
her right of independent being; and in the light of that history it
seems probable that she will best discover her full value by insisting
on right of knowledge, on right of way, and on right of economic
independence. So long as convention lays upon women any special and
fundamental claim of control--a claim altogether different in kind
and extent from the claim it lays upon men--so long may it be the
essentially womanly duty of every woman to have quick and alive within
her the spirit of criticism, and latent within her blood the spirit of
revolt.

FOOTNOTE:

[1] It may be noted that the war has caused a recrudescence of this
brutal “code of honour” in our own country. But here it has not
troubled to resume the obsolete form of the duel. The “defender of his
wife’s honour” simply commits murder, and the jury acquits.




USE AND ORNAMENT

(OR THE ART OF LIVING)

(1915)


I suppose you would all be very much surprised if I said that not use
but ornament was the object of life.

I refrain from doing so because so definite a statement makes an
assumption of knowledge which it may always be outside man’s power to
possess. The object of life may for ever remain as obscure to us as its
cause. It seems, indeed, likely enough that the one ignorance hinges
necessarily on the other, and that without knowing the cause of life
neither can we know its object.

The writers of the Scottish Church Catechism, it is true, thought
that they knew why man was created. The social products of their
cocksure theology cause me to doubt it. I would prefer to worship more
ignorantly a more lovable deity than the one which is there presented
to my gaze.

But though we may never know why we are here, we may know, by taking a
little thought and studying the manifestations of the life around us,
what aspects of it make us glad that we are here. And gladness is as
good a guide as any that I know to the true values of life.

Examining life from that standpoint I know of nothing that gives me
more delight than the decoration and embellishment with which man has
overlaid all the mere uses of existence--things which without those
embellishments might not delight us at all--or only as a dry crust of
bread delights in his necessity the starving beggar, or ditch-water one
dying of thirst.

I can scarcely think of a use in life which I enjoy, that I do not
enjoy more because of the embellishment placed about it by man, who
claims to have been made “in God’s image.” Nothing that my senses
respond to with delight stays limited within the utilitarian aspect
on which its moral claims to acceptance are too frequently based--or
remains a benefit merely material in its scope.

When we breathe happily, when we eat happily, and when we love happily,
we do not think of the utilitarian ends with which those bodily
instincts are related. The utilitarian motive connects, but only
subconsciously, with that sense of well-being and delight which then
fills us; and the conscious life within us is happy without stooping to
reason.

Underlying our receptivity of these things is, no doubt, the fact that
our bodies have a use for them. But were we to consider the material
uses alone, our enjoyment would be less; and if (by following that
process) we absorbed them in a less joyous spirit, our physical
benefit, so science now tells us, would be less also.

For some reason or another, which is occasionally hard to define, you
find pleasure in a thing over and above its use; and I want to persuade
you that the finer instinct, the genius of the human race, tends always
in that direction--not to rest content with the mere use of a thing,
but to lay upon it that additional touch of adornment--whether by
well-selected material, or craftsman’s skill, or social amenity, which
shall make it a thing delightful to our senses or to our intelligence.

Take, for instance, so simple a thing as a wine-glass, or a
water-glass. Materially, it is subject to a very considerable
drawback; it is brittle, and if broken is practically unmendable.
From the point of view of utility, strength, cheapness, cleanliness,
it has no advantage over hardware or china. But in its relation to
beverages beautiful in colour and of a clear transparency, glass has a
delightfulness which greatly enhances the pleasure of its use. There
is a subtle relation between the sparkle of the glass, and the sparkle
produced in the brain by the sight and the taste of good wine (or--let
me add, for the benefit of temperance members of my audience--of good
ginger-ale). I think one could also trace a similar delight to the
relations subsisting between glass in its transparency and a draught of
pure water.

That relationship set up between two or more senses (in this case
between the senses of sight, taste and touch) brings into being a new
value which I ask you to bear in mind, as I shall have a good deal to
say about it later--the value of association. The more you examine into
the matter, the more you will find that association is a very important
element for evoking man’s faculties of enjoyment; it secures by the
inter-relation of the senses a sort of compound interest for the appeal
over which it presides. And it is association, with this compound
appeal, which again and again decides (over and above all questions
of use) what material is the best, or the most delightful, to be
employed for a given purpose. You choose a material because it makes a
decorative covering to mere utility. That beauty of choice in material
alone is the beginning of ornament.

When I began, I spoke for a moment as though use and ornament were
opposite or separate principles; but what I shall hope soon to show
is that they are so interlocked and combined that there is no keeping
them apart when once the spirit of man has opened to perceive the true
sacramental service which springs from their union, and the social
discordance that inevitably follows upon their divorce. But as man’s
ordinary definition of the word “use” is sadly material and debased,
and as his approval and sanction of the joys of life have too often
been limited by a similar materialism of thought, one is obliged, for
the time being, to accept the ordinary limiting distinction, so that
the finer and less realised uses of beauty and delight may be shown
more clearly as the true end to which all lesser uses should converge.

Life itself is a usage of material, the bringing together of atoms into
form; and we know, from what science teaches of evolution, that this
usage has constantly been in the direction of forms of life which,
for certain reasons, we describe as “higher.” Emerging through those
forms have come manifestations or qualities, which quite obviously give
delight to the holders of them; and we are able to gather in watching
them, as they live, move, and have their being, that for them life
seems good. It is no part of their acceptance of what has come that
they are here not to enjoy themselves.

Thus we see from the upward trend of creation a faculty for enjoyment
steadily emerging, and existing side by side with fears, risks, and
hardships which the struggle for existence entails--probably an even
increased faculty for enjoyment, as those fears and risks become more
consciously part of their lives. And I question whether we should think
that the wild deer had chosen well, could it resign its apprehension
of death at the drinking-place for the sake of becoming a worm--the
wriggling but scarcely conscious prey of the early bird.

Man (the most conscious prey of death) has also his compensations;
but, wishing to eat his cake and have it, he insists that his increased
self-consciousness is the hall-mark of an immortality which he is
unwilling to concede to others. He sees (or the majority of those see,
who preach personal immortality after death) no moral necessity for
conceding immortality to the worm because the early bird cuts short
its career, or to the wild deer because it enjoys life, shrinks from
death, and endures pain; or to the peewit, because she loves her young;
or to the parrot, because it dies with a vocabulary still inadequate
for expressing that contempt for the human species with which the caged
experience of a life-time has filled its brain. Yet, for these and
similar reasons applied to himself, man thinks that immortality is his
due.

In doing so, he does but pursue, to a rather injudicious extent, that
instinct for the ornamentation and embellishment of the facts of life
which I spoke of to begin with. For whether it be well-founded or not,
a belief in immortality gives ornament to existence.

Of course, it may be bad ornament; and I think it becomes bad ornament
the moment he bases it upon the idea that this life is evil and not
good. If he says “Life is so good that I want it to go on for ever and
ever,” and thinks that he can make it better by asserting that it will
go on for ever and ever, that is a playful statement which may have
quite a stimulating effect on his career, and make him a much more
charming and social and imaginative person than he would otherwise be.
But if he wants a future life merely because he regards this life as a
“vale of misery”--and wants that future life to contain evil as well
as good--a Hell as well as a Heaven (in order that he may visualise
retribution meted out on a satisfactory scale upon those whom he cannot
satisfactorily visit with retribution to-day) then, I think, that it
tends to become bad ornament, and is likely to make him less charming,
less social, and less imaginatively inventive for the getting rid of
evil conditions from present existence than he would be if he had not
so over-loaded his brain with doctrinal adornments.

Still, it is ornament of a kind; and with ornament, good or bad (the
moment he has got for himself leisure or any elbow-room at all in the
struggle for existence) man cannot help embellishing the facts of
life--the things that he really knows.

Now that instinct for embellishment is of course latent in Nature
itself, or we should not find it in man; and it comes of Nature (the
great super-mathematician) putting two and two together in a way which
does not merely make four. When two and two are put together by Nature,
they come to life in a new shape; and man is (up-to-date) the most
appreciative receptacle of that fact which Nature has yet produced. Man
builds up his whole appreciation of life by association--by studying
a method of putting two and two together which comes to something very
much more than a dead numerical result.

This, as I have said, is Nature’s way of giving to our investments in
life a compound interest. Man throws into life his whole capital, body,
soul, and spirit; and as a result of that investment Nature steadily
returns to him year by year--not detached portions of his original
outlay, but something new and different. Out of every contact between
man’s energy and Nature’s, something new arises. And yet, though new,
it is not strange; it has features of familiarity; it is partly his,
partly hers; and if his spirit rises above the merely mechanical, it
is endeared to him by and derives its fullest value from association.
All beautiful work, all work which is of real use and benefit to the
community, bears implicitly within it this mark of parentage--of the
way it has been come by, through patience, skill, ingenuity, something
more intimate and subtle than the dead impenetrable surface of a thing
mechanically formed without the accompaniment either of hope or joy.

This creation of new values by association (which you can trace through
all right processes of labour) is seen even in things which have very
little of human about them.

The germ of its expression is to be found in that simplest of
arithmetic propositions to which I have just referred: two and two
make--not two twos but four, which is, in fact, a fresh concept; and
the mind that can embrace so much--the idea of four as a number with
an identity of its own has already raised itself above the lowest
level of savagery. In that mind something has begun out of which the
social idea may presently be developed; for the man who has conceived
the number four will presently be identifying his new concept with a
variety of correspondencies under fresh aspects: he will discover that
certain animals have four legs, whereas, until then, his view of them
was rather that of the child who said that a horse had two legs in
front, two legs behind, and two at each side--a statement which shows,
indeed, that the horse has been earnestly considered from as many
points of view as are sometimes necessary to enable a Cabinet Minister
to make up his mind, but, for all that, never as a whole; and in such a
mind, though the identity of the horse may be established from whatever
point of view he presents himself, the thought of the horse, as a being
of harmoniously related parts, having order and species, has not yet
been established. Until a man can count, and sum up the results of
his counting in synthesis, Nature is composed merely of a series of
units--and the mind cannot begin that grouping and defining process
which leads to association and from that to the development of the
social idea.

You will remember in _Alice through the Looking Glass_, when the two
Queens set to work to test her educational proficiency--you will
remember how the White Queen says (in order to discover whether Alice
can do addition) “What’s one, and one, and one, and one, and one, and
one?”

“I don’t know,” says Alice, “I lost count.”

“She can’t do addition,” says the White Queen.

Well--she “lost count,” and, therefore, that series of ones failed to
have any fresh meaning or association for her.

In the same way the primitive savage loses count; beyond three, numbers
are too many for him--they become merely a “lot.” But war and the
chase begin to teach him the relative value of numbers; and he finds
out that if one lot goes out to fight a bigger lot, the smaller lot
probably gets beaten; so that, before long, calculation of some sort
becomes necessary for the preservation of existence. He finds out also
(and this is where ornament begins to come in) that a certain amount of
wilful miscalculation has a beauty and a value of its own. So, after
going out to fight ten against ten, and defeating them, he comes back
and says to his wives and the surrounding communities by whom he wishes
to be held in awe--“My lot killed bigger lot--much, much bigger lot.”
And so, when he comes later on to set down his wilful miscalculations
in records of scripture, he provides delightful problems for the Bishop
Colensos of future ages--problems the undoing of which may shake to
the foundations the authority of documents which some mid-Victorian
school of Christianity has hitherto held to be divinely and verbally
inspired--not realising that the normal tendency of human nature is
to be decorative when writing its national history or when giving its
reasons for having plunged into war.

You begin now, then, to perceive (if you did not before), the
importance of ornamental association, even when confined to matters of
arithmetic; and the moral value to future ages not merely of calculated
truths but of calculated untruths.

But this merely figurative illustration of the quickness of the human
brain, in its primitive stage, to use mathematics to unmathematical
ends (or science to ends quite unscientific) does not bring us very far
upon the road to that self-realisation, in ornament rather than in use,
which I hope to make manifest by tracing to their most characteristic
forms of expression the higher grades of civilization.

And I shall hope, by and by, to show that you cannot be social without
also being ornamental; it is the beginning of that connecting link
which shall presently make men realise that life is one, and that all
life is good.

Take, to begin with, the earliest instruments by which primitive man
began raising himself from the ruck of material conditions; his
weapons--first of the chase, and then of war. No sooner had he proved
their use than he began to ornament them--to make them records,
trophies, and so--objects of beauty. He cannot stop from doing so;
his delight in the skill of his hands breaks out into ornament. It is
the same with the arts of peace, the work of the woman-primitive--she
moulds a pot, or weaves a square of material, and into it--the moment
she has accomplished the rudiments--goes pattern, beauty, something
additional and memorable that is not for use material, but for use
spiritual--pleasure, delight.

And that quite simple example, from a time when man was living the
life, as we should now regard it, of a harried and hunted beast--with
his emergence from surrounding perils scarcely yet assured to him--goes
on consistently up and up the scale of human evolution; and the more
strongly it gets to be established in social institutions, the more
noble is likely to be the form of civilization which enshrines it. And
the less it shows, the less is that form of civilization likely to be
worthy of preservation, or its products of permanent value to the human
race.

It is not the millionaire who leaves his mark on the world so that
hereafter men are glad when they name him; it is the “maker” who
has turned uses into delights; not the master of the money-market,
but the Master of Arts. The nearest thing we have on earth to that
immortality which so many look to as the human goal lies in those forms
of ornament--of embellishment over and above mere use--which man’s
genius has left to us in architecture, poetry, music, sculpture, and
painting. Nothing that stops at utility has anything like the same
value, for the revelation of the human spirit, as that which finds its
setting in the Arts--the sculptures of Egypt and Greece, the Gothic
and Romanesque cathedrals of France, England, Germany and Italy, the
paintings of the Renaissance, the masterpieces of Bach and Beethoven,
the poems and writings all down the ages of men comparatively poor in
monetary wealth, but rich beyond the dreams of avarice in their power
to communicate their own souls to things material and to leave them
there, when their own bodies have turned to dust. In the embellishment
they added to life they bestowed on the age in which they lived its
most significant commentary. There you will find, as nowhere else, the
meaning and the interpretation of the whole social order to which these
forms were as flower and fruit. Ancient Greece is not represented to us
to-day by its descendants in the flesh (as an expression of that life
they have ceased to exist) but by those works of art and philosophy
through which men--many now nameless--made permanent the vision of
delight to which, in the brief life of the flesh, they had become
heirs. The self-realisation of that age--all the best of it that we
inherit--comes to us through embodiment in forms transcending material
use.

Run your mind’s eye through the various peoples and nationalities of
Europe--of the world--and you will find that their characteristic
charm--that which is “racy” of their native soil, marking the
distinction between race and race, lies in the expression they have
given to life over and above use. If we had kept to use, race would
have remained expressionless. Race expresses itself in ornament; and
even among a poor peasant people (and far more among them than among
the crowded and over-worked populations of our great cities where
we pursue merely commercial wealth) comes out in a characteristic
appreciation of the superabundance of material with which, at some
point or another, life has lifted them above penury. In the great
civilizations it extends itself over a rich blend of all these, drawn
from far sources; and the more widely it extends over the material uses
of life, the higher and the more permanent are the products of that
form of civilization likely to be. What does it mean but this?--man is
out to enjoy himself.

Having said that, need I add that I put a very high interpretation upon
the word “joy”?

To that end--man’s enjoyment of life--all art is profoundly useful. I
put that forward in opposition to the specious doctrine of Oscar Wilde
that “all art is entirely useless.” But it is usefulness extended in a
new direction; leaving the material uses, by which ordinary values are
measured, it shifts to the spiritual; and by the spiritual I mean that
which animates, vitalizes, socializes.

To that end it may often be--and is generally the case--that, in the
material sense, art is a useless addition or refinement upon that which
was first planned merely for the service of man’s bodily needs. Yet
where the need is of a worthy and genuine kind, art never ceases to
rejoice at the use that is underlying it. This can be clearly seen in
architecture, where the beauty of design, the proportion, the capacity
of the edifice--though far transcending the physical need which called
it into being--remain nevertheless in subtle relation thereto, and give
to it a new expression--useless indeed to the body--but of this use to
the mind, that it awakens, kindles, enlivens, sensitizes--making it to
be in some sort creative, by perception of and response to the creative
purpose which evoked that form. You cannot enter a cathedral without
becoming aware that its embracing proportions mean something far more
than the mere capacity to hold a crowd; its end and aim are to inspire
in that crowd a certain mental attitude, a spiritual apprehension--to
draw many minds into harmony, and so to make them one--a really
tremendous fact when successfully achieved.

Now nothing can be so made--to awaken and enlarge the spirit--without
some apparent wastefulness of material or of energy. A cathedral will
absorb more stone, and the labour of more men’s lives, before it is
finished, than a tenement of equal housing capacity which aims only at
providing warmth and a cover from the elements. To provide so much joy
and enlargement to the human spirit, a kind of waste, upon the material
plane, is necessary; and the man without joy or imagination in his
composition is likely to say on beholding it: “Why was all this waste
made?”

Bear in mind this accusation of waste which can constantly be made,
from a certain standpoint against all forms of joy evolved by the art
of living--possibly against all forms of joy that you can name; for all
joy entails an expenditure of energy, and for those who do not realise
the value of joy such expenditure must necessarily seem wasteful.

But when a man employs hand or brain worthily, straightway he discovers
(latent within that connection) the instinct of delight, of ornament.
He cannot rejoice in his craftsmanship without wishing to embellish
it--to place upon it the expression of the joy which went with the
making. All that he does to this end is apparently (from the material
point of view) useless; but from the spiritual it is profoundly useful;
and from the spirit (and this I think is important) it tends to re-act
and kindle the craftsman to finer craftsmanship than if he had worked
for utility alone.

Now if spirit thus acts on matter--achieving its own well-being only
through a certain waste of material, or expenditure of labour upon the
lower plane, yet communicating back to matter influences from that
state of well-being to which it has thus attained--may it not be that
waste of a certain kind (what I would call “selective waste” _versus_
“haphazard waste”) is the concomitant not only of spiritual but of
material growth also? May it not be that evolution has followed upon a
course of waste deliberately willed and insisted on--and that without
such waste, life--even material life--had not evolved to its present
stage?

We see a certain wastefulness attaching to many of the most beautiful
biological manifestations in the world. Up to a certain point, the
construction of flower, bird, beast, fish, shows a wonderful economy of
structure, of means to end (it is the same also in the arts). But there
comes a point at which Nature, “letting herself go,” becomes fantastic,
extravagant--may one not say “wilful”?--in the forms she selects for
her final touches of adornment. And is it not nearly always when the
matter in hand is most closely related to the “will to live”--or, in
other words, in relation to the amative instincts--that the “art of
living” breaks out, and that Nature quits all moderation of design and
becomes frankly ornamental and extravagant? Just at the point where to
be creative is the immediate motive, where, in the fulfilment of that
motive, life is found to be a thing of delight, just there, Nature,
being amative, becomes playful, exuberant and ornamental.

There are some birds which, in this connection, carry upon their
persons adornments so extravagant that one wonders how for so many
generations they have been able to live and move and multiply, bearing
such edifices upon their backs, their heads, their tails--that they
were not a crushing hindrance to the necessary affairs of life. They
certainly cannot have been a help; and yet--they still persist in them!

Taking, then, these natural embryonic beginnings as our starting point,
I would be inclined to trace out the living value of art and ornament
somewhat upon these lines: Exuberance--the emergence of beauty and
adornment, in addition to the mere functional grace arising out of
fitness for use--has always been going on through the whole process
of creation among animate nature. We see it established in a thousand
forms, not only in bird, beast and reptile, but in the vegetable
world as well. The tendency of all life that has found a fair field
for its development, is to play with its material--to show that it
has something over and above the straight needs imposed on it by the
struggle for existence, which it can spare for self-expression.

It has been lured on to these manifestations mainly by that “will
to live” which underlies the attractions of sex. That exuberance
is an essential feature of the evolutionary process at the point
where self-realisation by self-reproduction is the game to play.
Under that impulse the selective principle begins to assert itself,
and straightway the outcome is ornament. Self-realisation (by
self-reproduction under all sorts of images and symbols) is the true
basis of ornament and of art: self-realisation!

The spirit of man, moving through these means, impresses itself
reproductively on the spirits of others with a far better calculation
of effect than can be secured through bodily inheritance. For in
physical parentage there is always the chance of a throw-back to
tainted origins; the sober and moral citizen cannot be sure of sober
and moral children in whom the desire of his soul shall be satisfied.
They may be drawn, by irresistible forces, to take after some giddy and
disreputable old grandfather or grandmother instead of after him; for
in his veins run the parental weaknesses of thousands of generations;
and over the racial strain that passes through him to others he
possesses no control whatever. But the man who has given ornament to
life in any form of art--though he commits it to the risks and chances
of life, the destructive accidents of peace and war--is in danger
of no atavistic trick being played upon the product of his soul; he
is assured of his effect, and so long as it endures it reflects and
represents his personality more faithfully than the descendants of his
blood.

Now for the satisfaction of that instinct, the perpetuation of name
and identity is not necessary. The artist would not (if told that his
self-realisation was destined to become merged anonymously in the
existence of fresco, or canvas, or mosaic)--he would not therefore lay
down his mallet or his brush, and say that in that case the survival
of these things to a future age was no survival for him. The maker of
beautiful inlay would not lose all wish to do inlay if the knowledge
that he, individually, as the craftsman were destined to oblivion.
Let the future involve him in anonymity as impenetrable as it liked,
he would still go on expressing himself in ornament; self-realisation
would still be the law of his being.

That is the psychology of the artist mind--of that part of humanity
which produces things that come nearest, of all which earth has to
show, to conditions of immortality, and so presumably are the most
satisfying to man’s wish for continued individual existence. The makers
of beauty do not set any great store on the continuance of their
names--the continuance of their self-realisation is what they care
about.

But the possessors of these works of beauty do very often make a great
point of having their own names perpetuated, even though the vehicle is
another personality than their own. And so very frequently we have the
names passed down to us of these parasites of immortality--the tyrants
for whom palaces, or arches, or temples were built--but not the names
of the artists who designed them, whose immortality they really are.
And though the official guide may refresh our memory with snippets
of history, and say this, that, or the other about the name to which
the temple remains attached--the really important thing that lives,
survives, and influences us is not the externally applied name, but the
invested beauty which has no name, but is soul incarnate in stone to
the glory of God--the self-realisation of a being who (but for that)
has passed utterly from remembrance.

That, as I have said before, is the nearest thing to immortality that
we know. And it comes to us, in a shape which, (so to be informed with
immortality) cannot limit itself to the demands of use. When all the
claims of use are satisfied, then the life of personality begins to
show--the fullest and the most permanent form of self-realisation known
to man on earth lies in ornament.

Of course, when I say “ornament,” I use the word in a very wide sense.
What I have said of sculpture, painting or architecture, applies
equally to poetry, music or philosophy. I would even go further, and
apply it in other directions where no material matrix for it exists.
Every department of mental activity has its ornament--the culminating
expression of that particular direction of the human will. Faith is
the ornament of destiny, Hope the ornament of knowledge, Love the
ornament of sex. Without these ornaments destiny and knowledge and sex
would have no beauty that the soul of man should desire them. Those
additions or glosses were quite unnecessary to existence--up to a
point; for millions of years the world did without them, and Evolution
managed to scramble along without faith, without hope, without love.
But Evolution itself brought them into being; and then for millions of
years they existed in germ, without self-consciousness; but steadily,
as they germinated, they produced beauty and a sense of design in
their environment. Co-ordination, dovetailing (peaceful word!), the
harmonising and gentle effect of one life upon another, as opposed to
the savage and predatory, began to have effect. And in response came
ornament; faith, hope and love showed their rudimentary beginnings even
in the lower animals.

One of the most perfectly decorative objects that I have ever seen in
the animal world (you will find it in still-life form in our Natural
History Museum) is the device by which a certain small possum has
taught her young to accompany her from branch to branch. Along her back
she seats her litter, then over their heads like the conducting-wire
of a tram-line she extends her tail--and then (each like an electric
connecting rod) up go the little tails, make a loop, adjust themselves
to the maternal guide-rope, and hang on. And there, safe from upset, is
the family-omnibus ready to start!

Of course, you may say that is use; but it is use in which the
spiritualities, faith, hope and love, begin to appear; and in the
gentleness of its intention it forms a basis for the up-growth
of beauty. Now all the arts are, in the same way, first of all
structural--having for their starting-point a sound and economic use of
the material on which they are based. Music, architecture, poetry, and
the rest were all, to begin with, the result of an instinctive choice
or selection, directed to the elimination of superfluities, accidents,
excrescences--which to the craftsman’s purpose are nothing.

Nature, in her seed-sowing, has gone to work to propagate by profusion;
her method is to sow a million seeds so as to make sure that some may
live; thus she meets and out-matches the chances that are against her.
The seed of Art sprang up differently; maker-man took hold of the one
selected seed, not of a dozen, or of a thousand dozen promiscuously,
and bent his faculties on making that one seed (his chosen material)
fit to face life and its chances: if a house--walls and roof
calculated to keep out the rain and resist the force of storms: if a
textile--fabric of a staple sufficient to resist the wear and tear to
which it would be subjected: if a putting together of words meant to
outlast the brief occasion of their utterance--then in a form likely
to be impressive, and therefore memorable; so that in an age before
writing was known they might find a safe tabernacle, travelling from
place to place in the minds of men. And similarly with music--a system
of sounds so ruled by structural law as to be capable of transmission
either by instrument, or by voice disciplined and trained to a certain
code of limitations. And being thus made memorable and passed from
mouth to mouth, from one place to another, and from age to age, they
acquired a social significance and importance; till, seeing them thus
lifted above chance, man set himself to give them new forms of beauty
and adornment.

And the governing motive was, and always has been, first man’s wish to
leave memorable records--beyond the limits of his own generation--of
what life has meant for him; and secondly (and this is the more
intimate phase) the delight of the craftsman in his work, the
exuberance of vital energy (secure of its structural ground-work)
breaking out into play. “See,” it says, “how I dance, and gambol, and
triumph! This superfluity of strength proves me a victor in my struggle
to live.”

Nothing else does; for if (having survived the struggle) man only lives
miserably--scrapes through as it were--the question in the face of so
poverty-stricken a result, may still be--“Was the struggle worth it?”
And so by his arts and graces, by his adornment of his streets, temples
and theatres, by his huge delight in himself, so soon as the essentials
of mere material existence are secured to him, man has really shown
that life is good in itself, that he can do well enough without the
assurance of personal immortality held out to him by the theologians.
Whether that be or be not his reward hereafter, he will still strive to
express himself; but for that end mere use alone will not satisfy him.

We have seen, then, how man, in his social surroundings, begins to
secure something over and above the mere necessities of life; and so,
after providing himself with a certain competence of food, clothing
and shelter, has means and energy left for the supply of luxuries,
ornaments, delights--call them what you will. And according to
the direction in which he flings out for the acquisition of these
superfluities--so will his whole manhood develop, or his type of racial
culture be moulded.

Far back in the beginnings of civilization one of the first forms
taken by this surplus of power and energy over mere necessity was the
acquisition of slaves and wives. Civilization then began to ornament
itself with two modes of body-service--the menial attendance of the
slave upon his master, and the polygamous sexual attendance of the
woman upon her lord.

To-day we think that both those things were, from a moral point of
view, bad ornament. But you cannot look into the history of any
civilization conducted on those lines without seeing that they
decorated it--and that, out of their acceptance, came colour,
pomp, splendour, means for leisure, for enjoyment--for a very keen
self-realisation of a kind by the few at the expense of the many. And
the masterful few made that form of decorated civilization more sure
for themselves by extending a good deal of the decorative element
to the subservient lives around them. The slaves wore fine liveries
and lorded it over lower slaves, the favourite wives lived in luxury
and laziness, eating sweets and spending their days in the frivolous
mysteries of the toilet.

At a certain point in the social scale this form of ornamental
existence produced great misery, great hardships, great abasement. But
it was not instituted and maintained for that reason. Those underlying
conditions were a drawback, they were a misuse of human nature employed
as a basis for that ornamental superstructure to build on. And out of
that underlying misuse came the weakness and the eventual decay of that
once flourishing school of ornament.

But when that school of ornament was threatened by other schools, it
was ready to fight to the death for its ornamental superfluities--for
polygamy, for slavery, for power over others, which had come to mean
for it all that made life worth living! Life was quite capable of
being carried on without those things--was, and is, happily lived by
other races to the accompaniment of another set of ornaments which
those races think more enjoyable. But no race will consent to live
without some sort of ornament of its own choosing; and when its choice
of ornaments, or of social superfluities, over and above the needs
of existence, is seriously threatened from without it declares that
it is fighting not merely for liberty but for existence. Yet we know
quite well that the people of invaded and conquered States continue
in the main to exist--they continue even to wear ornaments; but these
are apt to be imposed ornaments galling to the national pride. And so
to-day, in the midst of a vast belligerency, we have committees and
consultations going on, to see to it lest, at the end of the war, under
German dominance, our women should have their future fashions imposed
on them from Berlin instead of from Paris, a fearful doom for any lady
of taste to contemplate.

The example may seem frivolous, but it is a parable of the truth;
we call our ornaments our liberties, and if we cannot ourselves die
fighting for them, we make others die for us.

Let us take up (for illustration of the same point) another stage
of civilization--that of ancient Greece. In Greece the city was the
centre of civilization, and its public buildings became the outward and
visible sign of the people’s pride of life and of their sense of power.
The fact that their private dwellings were very simple, and that they
expended nearly the whole of their artistry upon public works (things
to be shared and delighted in by all the citizens in common) had a
profound influence upon their civilization. That new social ideal of
civic pride found its way irresistibly into ornament. You could not
have had civic pride in anything like the same degree without it.

But Greek civilization did not fall into decay because of the beauty
and perfection with which it crowned itself in the public eye, but
because of certain underlying evils and misuses in the body politic--in
which again slavery and the subjection of women had their share. Greek
civilization fell because it failed to recognise the dignity of all
human nature; it reserved its sense of dignity for a selected race
and class; it failed to recognise the dignity of all true kinds of
service, and prided itself in military service alone--in that and in
the philosophies and the arts. It built a wonderful temple to its gods,
but failed in a very large degree to take into God the whole body of
humanity over which it had control. And so, Greek civilization broke up
into portions of an unimportant size and perished.

At a later day--and again with the city as centre to its life of
self-realisation--we get the great period of the Italian Renaissance,
a period in which civic and feudal and ecclesiastical influences
alternately jostled and combined.

And out of these three prides arose a wonderfully complex
art--tremendously expressive of what life meant for that people. And
you got then (for the first time, I think), grouped under the civic
arm, a new life-consciousness--the consciousness of the guilds, the
workers, and the craftsmen. The dignity of labour began to assert
itself; and when it did, inevitably it broke into ornament on its own
account--not at the bidding of an employer, but for the honour and
glory of the worker himself. And so, from that date on, the homes and
halls and churches of the guilds became some of the noblest monuments
to what life meant for men who had found joy in their labour.

Now that did not come till the craftsman had won free from slavery
and from forced labour; but when he was a freeman, with room to turn
round, he built up temples to his craft, to make more evident that the
true goal of labour is not use but delight. And only when it fell back
into modern slavery at the hands of commercial capitalism, only then
did labour’s power of spontaneous expression depart from it and become
imitative and debased.

I could take you further, and show you (among the survivals from our
England of the Middle Ages) the “joy of the harvest” expressed in the
great granaries and tithe-barns which still crown like abbey-churches
the corn-lands of Home. Concerning one of these William Morris said
that it stood second in his estimation among all the Gothic buildings
of Europe! Think of it!--of what that means in the realisation of
life-values by the age which had a mind so to celebrate man’s rest
after the labour of the harvest! In those days England was called
“merry” and foreigners who came to her shores reported as a national
characteristic the happy looks of her people: even their faces showed
adornment! And thus it is that beautiful use always clothes itself in
beauty.

I have said that all art is useful. To many that may have seemed a
very contentious statement. But how can one separate beauty from use
if one holds that everything which delights us is useful? On that
statement there is only one condition I would impose. The use in
which we delight must not mean the misuse or the infliction of pain
on others. In those periods of civilization to which I have referred
(so magnificent in their powers of self-discovery and self-adornment),
there were always dark and cruel habitations where the “art of living”
was not applied. They were content that the beauty on which they prided
themselves should be built up on the suffering, the oppression, or the
corruption of others. In the lust of their eyes there was a blind spot,
so that they cared little about the conditions imposed by their own
too arrogant claim for happiness on the lives that were spent to serve
them. And out of their blindness came at last the downfall of their
power.

So it has always been, so it always must be. I believe that beauty,
delight, ornament, are as near to the object of life as anything that
one can name, and that through right uses we attain to these as our
goal. But it is no good claiming to possess delightful things if we do
not see to it that those who make them for us have also the means to
live delightfully.

If man cannot make all the uses and services of life decent and
wholesome as a starting-point, neither can he make life enjoyable--not,
I mean, with a good conscience. If he would see God through beauty, he
must see Him not here and there only, but in the “land of the living”;
else (as the psalmist said) his spirit must faint utterly.

Our life is built up--we know not to what ultimate end--on an infinite
number of uses, functions, mechanisms. These uses enable us to live;
they do not necessarily enable us to enjoy. You can quite well imagine
the use of all your senses and organs so conditioned that you could
not enjoy a single one of them, and yet they might still fulfil their
utilitarian purpose of keeping you alive.

I need not rehearse to you in troublesome detail conditions of life
where everything you see is an eyesore, every touch a cause of
shrinking, every sound a discord, where taste and smell become a revolt
and a loathing.

Our modern civilization derives many of its present comforts from
conditions such as these under which thousands, nay millions, of
subservient human lives become brutalised. So long as we base our
ideal of wealth on individual aggrandisement, and on monetary and
commercial prosperity, and not (as we should do) upon human nature
itself--making it our chief aim that every life should be set free for
self-realisation in ornament and delight--so long will these things be
inevitable.

But when we, as men and women, and as nations, realise that human
nature is the most beautiful thing on earth (in its possibilities, I
mean) then surely our chief desire will be to make that our wealth here
and now, and out of it rear up our memorial to the ages that come after.




ART AND CITIZENSHIP

(1910)


The most hardened advocate of “Art for Art’s sake,” will hardly deny
that Art, for all its “sacred egoism,” is a social force. The main
question is where does your Art-training begin?

The conditions of the home, the workshop, and of social industries
do more than the schools and the universities to educate a nation;
and more especially, perhaps, to educate it toward a right or a wrong
feeling about Art.

And if, in these departments, your national education takes a wrong
line, then (however much you build schools over the heads of your
pupils and intercept their feet with scholarships, and block their
natural outlook on life with beautiful objects produced in past ages
and in other countries) your Art-training will partake of the same
condemnation.

True education, as opposed to merely commercial education, is a
training of mind and body to an appreciation of right values; values,
not prices. The man who has an all-round appreciation of right values
is a well-educated man; and he could not have a better basis either for
the love or the practice of Art than this appreciation of what things
are really worth.

But, in the present age, which prides itself on its inhuman system
of specialisation as a means to economy, such a man is rather a
rare phenomenon; for it is about as difficult to get out of present
conditions a true appreciation of life values--a true Art-training--as
it is to get a true artist. Where your national conditions shut down
the critical faculties, and make their exercise difficult, there too,
your creative artistic faculties are being shut down and made difficult
also. They are far more interdependent than your average Art-teacher
or Art-student is generally willing to admit. The idea that he has to
concern himself with conditions outside his own particular department
threatens him with extra trouble, and the burden of a conscience
that the doctrine of “Art for Art’s sake,” will not wholly satisfy;
and so he is inclined to shut his eyes, and direct his energies to
the securing of favourable departmental instead of right national
conditions.

But the man, or woman, who embarks whole-heartedly on Art-training
must in the end find himself involved in a struggle for the recovery
of those true social values which have been lost (or the acquisition
of those which are as yet unrealised) and for the substitution, among
other things, of true for false economics. He cannot afford to live
a life of aloof specialisation, when the conditions out of which he
derives and into which he is throwing his work are of a complementarily
disturbing kind. If, that is to say, the give-and-take conditions
between artistic supply and social demand have become vitiated, if
the conditions of the market, or of society, are unfavourable to the
reception of products of true worth, then the artist must to some
extent be an active party in the struggle for getting things set right.

That does not mean that, if he has a gift for the designing of
stage-scenery, he should necessarily be involved in a struggle to
secure a good drainage system (though even that should have an interest
for him) but it does mean very much that he should be tremendously
interested in the education of his own and the public mind to the point
of receiving good drama rather than bad, in order that his art may have
worthy material to work upon; and as good drama largely arises from a
lively conscience and the quickening in the community of new ideas, he
will wish his public a keen and open mind on all social questions.

Similarly a man who designs for textile fabrics should be very much
concerned indeed in getting cleanly conditions and pure air in the
towns and dwelling-houses where his designs have to live and look
beautiful, or grow ugly and rot. And there you get set before you in
small, the opposition between the interests of Art and the supposed
interests of trade. It is--or it is supposed to be--in the interest of
trade that things should wear out or get broken, and be replaced by
other things. It is in the interest of Art that they should not wear
out, that they should last; that everything worthy which is given to
man’s hand to do should have secured to it the greatest possible length
of life. And the reason is that the artist, if he be a true artist,
realises the value of things, the life value; that he is on the side of
creation and not of destruction, of preservation and not of waste. He
has within his nature an instinct that the greatest possible longevity
is the right condition for all manual labour; that when a man sets his
hand to a thing he should have it as his main aim to give good value,
to make it so that it will endure. And in this connection I would like
to substitute for the words “art training” the word “education.” It
is in the interests of education that things should be made to last,
and that only things should be made of any lasting material that
deserve lasting. Nothing should be produced the value of which will
become negligible before it is honestly worn out. And so it is in the
interest of education, as of Art, that we should eliminate as much as
possible the passing and the ephemeral, the demand of mood and fashion,
the thing cheaply chosen, cheaply acquired, and cheaply let go; and
substitute the thing that we shall have a long use for, and should like
to keep permanently--the thing acquired with thought and care, and
thoughtfully and carefully preserved because it has in itself a value.

But you won’t get any broad exercise of that kind of choice between
evil and good until you get a sense of right values--going far away
from what apparently touches art--in the mind, and the public and
private life of the community. And so, as I started by saying, true Art
is bound up with true education and social conditions. Good citizenship
is one of the conditions for setting national Art upon a proper basis.
A lively sense of your duty to your neighbour cannot fail to have an
effect upon your taste in art.

Now I want to bring this view of things home to you. So I will ask
everyone here to think for a moment of their own homes, their own
living-rooms, and especially of their parlours or drawing-rooms, which
are by their nature intended to express not so much our domestic
necessities as our domestic sense of the value of beauty, recreation,
and rest. And to begin with, how do you show your sense of duty to
the architect, who has (if you are fortunate) designed for you rooms
of pleasant and restful proportions? How many of the objects in those
rooms help at all to give a unifying and a harmonious effect, or are
in themselves in any way beautiful--things, that is to say, which (if
not of actual use) we love to set our eyes on, and feel what fineness
of skill in handling, what clean human thought in design went to their
production? Have those things been put there quite irrespective of
their price and the display they make of their owner’s “comfortable
circumstances”? Are they subordinated to a really intelligent sense
of what a living-room should be? Or are they merely a crowd, a
litter, things flung into the room pell-mell by a house-mistress
bent on securing for her parlour-maid a silly hour’s dusting every
day of objects--not of virtue--and for herself the recognition by
her neighbours that she has money enough to throw away in making her
living-room a silly imitation of a shop for bric-a-brac. Can you, even
those of you who do not live in streets where you have to safeguard
your privacy--can you look out of the window without being tickled in
the face by lace curtains, blind-tassels, or potted palm-leaves? Can
you sit down to the writing-table without entangling the legs of your
chair in a woolly mat and your feet in the waste-paper basket, or get
at the drawer of the cabinet without moving two or three arm-chairs,
or play the piano without causing the crocks which stand upon it to
jangle? Is the rest and recreation you get in that room anything else
but a sense of self-complacency based upon pride of possession? I ask
you to think what your furnishing of your rooms means, and remember
that to every person who comes into those rooms--and more especially
perhaps to the maids whom you set to dust them--you are helping to give
either an Art-training or an anti-Art-training, a training in true uses
and values, or in misuses and mere waste and wantonness.

Of course I know that to some extent you are victims. You have dear
friends who will give you presents, and you can’t hurt their feelings
by not putting up another shelf, or erecting another glass-shade,
where neither are wanted, or driving another peg into the wall to hang
a picture where no picture can be properly seen. And probably the
reason you cannot is because you have shown yourself so thoughtless
and haphazard in all your ideas about decoration and house-furnishing
that even in that house, which you falsely assert to be your castle,
you stand defenceless before this invasion of ornamental microbes!
Obviously the house is not yours if others can break in and spoil its
borders with their own false taste. But I can assure you that those
inroads do not happen to people whose rooms show a scrupulous sense of
selection. You inspire then (even in the thoughtless) a certain dread
and respect. Though they regard you as uncanny and call you a crank,
you are beginning their Art-training for them.

I remember, in this connection, a Quaker acquaintance whose friends
descended upon him at the time of his marriage with certain household
monstrosities which he was expected thereafter to live down to. It was
a cataclysm which he could not avert; but he found a remedy. He became
a passive resister to the Education rate, and year by year he placed
at the disposal of the distraining authorities a selection of his
wedding-presents till his house was purged of them. I have said that
you cannot separate Art-training from general education; and here, at
all events, you find the two happily combined--a war on bad art and on
a bad educational system joined economically in one.

So much, then, for thoughtless superfluity as an impediment to a
recognition of true values. I want now to come to the importance of
permanence as a condition underlying the aim of all production if
it is to be wholesome in its social results. I have said that an
instinct for permanence is what differentiates artistic from supposed
trade interests. Take architecture. Do you imagine that architects or
builders are likely to design or build in the same style for a system
of short leaseholds as they might for freeholds? And is the building
which is calculated just to “save its face” until the lease expires
likely to be so good either in design or workmanship?

Read, in that connection, what Coventry Patmore says in his essay on
“Greatness in Architecture”:

“The house and cottage builder of the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries was,” he says, “fully aware that the strength of a rafter
lay rather in its depth than its breadth, and that, for a time at
least, a few boards two inches thick and ten inches deep, set edgeways,
would suffice to carry the roof, which nevertheless it pleased him
better to lay upon a succession of beams ten inches square. It is the
reality, and the modest ostentation of the reality, of such superfluous
substantiality that constitutes the whole secret of effect in many an
old house that strikes us as “architectural,” though it may not contain
a single item of architectural ornament; and, in the very few instances
in which modern buildings have been raised in the same fashion, the
beholder at once feels that their generous regard for the far future
is of almost as poetical a character as the aged retrospect of a
similar house of the time of Henry VII. or Elizabeth. A man,” he goes
on, “now hires a bit of ground for eighty or ninety years; and, if he
has something to spare to spend on beauty, he says to himself: ‘I will
build me a house that will last my time, and what money I have to spare
I will spend in decorating it. Why should I waste my means in raising
wall and roof which will last five times as long as I or mine shall
want them?’ The answer is: Because that very ‘waste’ is the truest and
most striking ornament; and though your and your family’s enjoyment of
a house thus magnanimously built may last but a tenth of its natural
age, there lies in that very fact an ‘ornament’ of the most noble and
touching kind, which will be obvious at all seasons to yourself and
every beholder, though the consciousness of its cause may be dormant;
whereas the meanness of the other plan will be only the more apparent
with every penny you spend in making it meretricious.”

Again, are you likely to get so good an architectural design where you
cannot be fairly sure that the use for which the building is raised
is likely to be permanent? And do our modern trade conditions and
present enormous demand for thoughtless superfluities tend to make that
prospect more probable? If not, then instability of trade, or trade
directed to the satisfaction of frivolous and ephemeral demands is bad
for architecture, and hinders any worthy development in it of national
characteristics.

But there, mind you, in trade, lies to-day the very life of the nation;
for the life of our teeming millions depends on it. By our industrial
specialisation in the pursuit of wealth vast numbers of us have ceased
to be self-supporting in the necessaries of life. And the question for
artists is, are we basing our national life on conditions that cannot
secure permanence and stability in the things which we produce? Is it
a necessary condition of our industrial development that things should
have a shorter life and we a shorter use for them than in the old days?
To the artist the drawback of machine-made things is not necessarily
in the mechanism of their production (for in some cases your machine
relieves the human hand of a hard and wearing monotony), but there is
a very obvious drawback if it imposes upon the worker merely another
form of hard and wearing monotony, and at the same time shortens the
life of the thing produced. If handicraft does not offer to the worker
worthier conditions for hand and brain, and insure longer life in the
thing produced, it is no good pinning our faith to it. Eliminate it,
and let machinery take its place. You have not, then, in the transfer,
destroyed any right values, and you are not going counter to the
conditions which tend to produce national Art.

But, as an example of the particular value which does sometimes attach
to hand labour (irrespective of its artistic value), I have here a
small unused sample of chair-cover material of English make, produced
about eighty years ago, at a probable cost--so I am told by experts--of
under £2 the square yard. The chairs it was made to cover are now
in my possession. During the twenty-five years of my own personal
acquaintance with them they have had plenty of hard wear; but even at
the corners that material has not yet begun to wear out; and the colour
has only become softer and more mellow in quality.

Within the last ten years I endeavoured to get that covering matched in
a modern material, and I paid for the nearest match I could get about
one-fifth of the price I have quoted. That material has already gone
shabby; and where it is most worn and faded the colour, instead of
mellowing, has gone dead and dirty in quality. The older material will
probably outlast my time.

There, then, are the comparative values of the old and the new
material. You pay the higher price for the old, but in the end it is
more economical. And it has this double advantage (or what would be a
double advantage in a State where industrial conditions were sound),
that it inclines its possessor to adopt a more permanent style of
furnishing, by making age beautiful and change unnecessary; and so it
sets free a great amount of human labour for other purposes; not merely
the labour of the textile workers who have not to provide new covers,
but the labour of the upholsterers, who are not called upon to rip off
a series of old covers and fit on new ones, dragging old nails out and
driving fresh nails in, with the result that the framework of the chair
itself is presently worn out and a new one required in its place. All
that labour is saved.

That small example is important because it exemplifies those
possibilities of permanence attaching to certain forms of hand-labour
out of which can be developed a school of textile manufacture
indigenous in character--indigenous in that you give it time to become
embedded in its domestic setting, and to make for itself domestic
history. It enables you to develop an appreciation for subtleties
of colour, and to secure tones and harmonies which you cannot get
ready-made in a shop: it gives to a piece of furniture life-value.

But it is bad for trade!

Now why is it bad for trade? It is bad for trade because our modern
industrial conditions have brought us to this pass, that it is no
longer our national aim to direct labour and set it free for other
work that really needs to be done. Our national problem is rather to
find work for people, at times even to invent needs, and to create a
fictitious turnover in trade so that we may not have upon our hands an
enormous increase of the unemployed problem. And as hands go begging,
as we have more hands in the country than we can employ on useful and
fit labour (fit, I mean, for such fine implements as these and for the
brains behind them), therefore hands are inevitably put to degrading
uses, and the joy goes out of work; and for the delight (or at least
the intelligent patience) of true craftsmanship is substituted the
soul-destroying bondage of mechanical labour at something which is not
really worth producing.

You may take that, I think, as a test whether a State is in industrial
health or disease--whether, namely, it tends more in the direction
of setting labour free for other and higher purposes (through the
permanent quality of its products), and so evolving an aristocracy of
labour; or whether (owing to their ephemeral quality) it constantly
tends to invent work of a lower and more trivial kind, and to provide
jobs of an ephemeral character which are not really wanted.

Now bad and wasteful taste is directly productive, not so much of trade
as of fluctuations in trade, because that sort of taste soon tires
and asks for change; and the consequence is that thousands of workers
(especially women, whose industries used to be home industries before
machinery drew them out of the homes) are in this country constantly
being thrown out of one useless employment into another, and very often
have to pass through a fresh apprenticeship at a starvation wage.
And so, when we create frivolous demands for things that we shall not
want the day after to-morrow, we are not (as we too often think) doing
anything that is really good for trade, but only something much more
horrible, which you will understand without my naming it.

You see, then, how very closely the artist’s inclination toward
permanence of taste may be connected with morality. And if that
instinct for permanence (with an accompanying adaptation of material
and design to making things last their full time without waste) is not
present in the craftsmanship of our day, then we have not got the true
basis, either in spirit or material, for Art to build upon.

Now I am going to put before you some quite homely instances, because
I think they will stick best in your memories, in order to show
you that the real struggle of the artist to-day is not so much to
secure appreciation of beauty in line and texture, as honesty of
construction, and real adaptation of form to utility and of production
to lastingness. I have been noticing, with quite simple objects of
domestic use, that the trade-purpose toward them seems almost the
opposite. The trade purpose is to present us with an article which,
apparently sound in construction, will break down at some crucial point
before the rest of it is worn out. A watering can, a carving fork,
a kettle, a dustbin, a coal scuttle, the fixings of a door-handle,
are generally made, I find, on an ignobly artful plan which insures
that they shall break down just at that point where the wear and tear
come hardest, so that an article otherwise complete shall be scrapped
wastefully or go back to the trade to be tinkered.

But leave things the actual design of which you cannot control, and
come to dress, our own daily wearing apparel. I do not know if the men
of my audience are aware that undergarments wear out much quicker if
they are tight-fitting and worn at a stretch than if they are loose,
but that is so. And, in consequence, a smart shopman has the greatest
reluctance to sell you anything that is, as he conceives it, one size
too large for you. The reason being that the looser fit lasts longer
and is bad for trade--that it makes for endurance instead of for
galloping consumption.

In the majority of houses whose cold water systems I have inspected
the pipes are nearly always run at the most exposed angle of the
containing walls, so that if there is a frost, the frost may have a
chance of getting at the pipes and bursting them, and so give the trade
a fresh job. Again, every housewife knows that in the ordinary daily
conflicts between tea-sets and domestic service more cups get broken
than saucers. And I suppose every household in London has got some
corner shelf piled with superfluous saucers (useless widowers mourning
the departure of their better halves); but it is very exceptional--only
in one shop that I know--that one is able to replace the cup (in
certain stock patterns) without encumbering oneself with the saucer
which one does not want. The saucers continue to be made in wasteful
superabundance, because waste of that sort is “good for trade.”

I have been assured by an observant housewife that certain articles do
now and again appear upon the market specially designed to safeguard by
little constructive devices, the main point of wear-and-tear through
which they become useless, and that presently these things disappear
and are unobtainable, presumably because they prove too lasting, and so
are “bad for trade.” And they are allowed to disappear because we, as a
community, have not sufficiently set our hearts and minds against waste
and uselessness. We buy cheaply because we think cheaply, and because
we have lost our sense of honour towards the products of men’s hands,
and toward that wonderful instrument itself which we are content to
put to such base uses, letting the workers themselves see how much we
despise the things they have made.

I have seen in London a comic music-hall “turn” in which the comedy
largely consisted in a continuous breakage of piles of plates by a
burlesque waiter, who, in the course of his duties, either drops them,
falls against them, sits on them, or kicks them. During the turn I
should say some thirty or forty plates get broken. They were cheap
plates, no doubt; but it seems to me that if there is any fun in this
monotonous repetition of destruction, then the greater the cost and
waste of human labour the more irresistibly comic should the situation
appear; and the management which provided Worcester or Dresden china
for its low-comedy wits to play upon would have logical grounds for
considering that it was thereby supplying its audience with livelier
entertainment more satisfying to its taste.[2]

Now what I want you to see is that such a production would not be
entertaining to an audience which had not come to regard the labour of
man’s hands with a licentious indifference--which had not developed the
gambler’s contempt for the true relations between labour and value.
And here I want to put before you a proposition which may at first
shock you, but which I hope to prove true. And that is that labour in
itself, apart from its justification in some useful result, is bad and
degrading; the man who is put to work which he knows is to have no
result comes from that work more degraded and crushed in spirit than
the man who merely “loafs” and lives “naturally.”

Perhaps the readiest example of that is the old treadmill system which
was once employed in our prisons, where the prisoner was set to grind
at a crank artificially adjusted to his physical strength, but having
no useful result; and I believe that the main reason why prisoners
on those machines were not allowed to grind their own bread or put
their strength to any self-supporting industry was because it was “bad
for trade” and brought them into competition with the contractors who
supplied food to his Majesty’s prisons. It was not the monotony half
so much as the consciousness that it was without result which made
that form of labour so degrading and so utterly exhausting to mind and
body. You might think it was the compulsion; but I am not sure that
compulsion to work may not sometimes be very moral and salutary. At any
rate, here is an instance of the same thing presented under voluntary
conditions. A man out of work applied to a farmer for a job; the
farmer had no job for him, and told him so; but as the man persisted
he started him at half a crown a day to move a heap of stones from one
side of the road to the other. And when the man had done that and asked
what next he was to do, he told him to move them back again! But though
that man was out of work, and was on his way to earn the half-crown,
rather than submit his body to the conscious degradation of such
useless labour, he did as the farmer had calculated on his doing, and
threw up the job.

That same quality of outrage and degradation attends on all labour that
is subject, within the worker’s knowledge, to wanton destruction, or is
obviously of no real use or of “faked” value. And the finer the skill
employed the greater the anguish of mind, or else the hard callousness
of indifference which must result. Call upon men to make useless
things, or things which you mean wantonly to destroy the day after
to-morrow, or to which by the conditions you tolerate you make a fair
length of life impossible--call upon labour to do those things, and you
are either filling its spirit with misery and depression, or you are
making it, in self-defence, callous and hard.

Industrial conditions which encourage the building of houses that are
only intended to last a lease; which permit the destruction of our
canal system because that means of transit has proved a dangerous
rival to the railway system; which impose a quick change in fashions
on which depend various kinds of ephemeral and parasitic industries;
which encourage a vast production of ephemeral journalism and
magazine illustration which after a single reading is thrown aside
and wasted--all these things, which have become nationalised in our
midst, are a national anti-Art training. We English have, as the
result of these things, no national school of architecture; we have
no national costume (though I myself can remember the time when in
our Midland counties not only the farm labourer, but the small yeoman
farmer himself went to church as well as to labour in the beautiful
smock-frock worn by their forefathers) and we have killed out from our
midst one of the most beautiful national schools of popular art that
ever existed, the school of the illustrators of the ’sixties; and we
have done these things mainly from our increasing haste to get hold of
something new, and our almost equal haste, when we have it, to throw it
away again.

We have cast our bread upon the waters. The sort of wealth to the
pursuit of which nations have committed themselves needs (it now
appears) an enormous amount of protection. And it cannot have been
without some demoralising effect upon the mind of the community that
we have been driven by our outstanding necessities to build every
year six or seven of those enormous engines of destruction called
“Dreadnoughts,” whose effective lease of life is about 20 years,
something considerably shorter than the lease of life which we allow
for our most jerry-built lodging-houses! And on these short-lived
products of industry (which are to-day the sign and symbol and
safeguard of our world-power), our aristocracy of labour has been
spending its strength, and the nation has now to depend on them for
its safety. The cost of building a “Dreadnought” is about the same
as the cost of building St. Paul’s Cathedral. Imagine to yourself a
nation building every year six or seven St. Paul’s Cathedrals, with the
consciousness that in twenty-five or thirty years they will all again
be levelled to the dust, and you will get from that picture something
of the horror which an artist is bound to feel at the necessity
which thus drives us forward, even in peace-time, to the continuous
destruction, on such a colossal scale, of the labour of men’s hands.
And the more it is revealed to us to-day (by the present catastrophe)
as an absolute political necessity, the more is the disorder of
civilization we have arrived at condemned.

Well, I must leave now, in that example I have set before you, the
wasteful aspect of modern industry, in order to touch briefly on
another, and an almost equally hateful aspect, which I will call “the
vivisection of modern industry.” I mean its subdivision into so many
separate departments, or rather fragments, that it loses for the mind
of the worker all relation to the thing made--that time-saving device
at the expense of the human hand and brain, which we glorify under the
term “specialisation.” Now, however much you may defend that system on
ground of trade competition, the artist is bound by his principles to
regard it as a national evil; for anything which tends to take away
the worker’s joy and pride in the distinctiveness of his trade and
to undo its human elements is anti-Art training. And so that inhuman
specialisation which (for the sake of trade cheapness) sets down a man
to the performance of one particular mechanical action all his life,
in the making of some one particular part of some article which in its
further stages he is never to handle, or a woman to stamp out the tin
skeleton of a button, with her eyes glued to one spot for ten hours
of the day--all these dehumanising things are anti-Art because they
are destructive of life-values. We have erected them into a system,
and while cutting prices by such means at one end, we are mounting up
costs at the other. We are promoting, maybe, a quicker circulation of
the currency of the realm, but we are impoverishing the currency of
the race. For that hard mechanical efficiency we are paying a price
which is eating up all our real profits; quite apart from its effect
in the increase of lunacy and of the unfit birth-rate and death-rate
among children, it is helping to implant in the whole world of labour
a bitter and a revengeful spirit which we have no right to wonder at
or to blame. And the results affect us not only in our workshops but
in our pastimes, by driving those whose labour is so conditioned into
a more consumptive form of pleasure-seeking and relaxation. You cannot
put people into inhuman conditions for long hours of each day, and
expect them to be normal and humane when you turn them out to their
short hours of leisure. I am pointing to conditions which you know
probably as well as, or better than, I do; but I am pointing to them
for the express purpose of saying that you cannot dissociate them from
your national appreciation of Art. The more you can connect the worker
with the raw material on the one hand and the finished product on the
other, the more surely you are establishing conditions out of which
national Art can grow; and the more you dissociate him from these two
ends of his material the more you make national Art impossible.

I will give you an instance, quite away from sweated labour conditions,
where you will see at once how wasteful and opposed to Art is this
system of breaking up craftsmanship into departments. It was an
architect who told me that the following system is quite frequently
followed in dealing with the stone out of which we build the outside
walls of our modern churches. It is hewn at the quarries into a rough
surface, thoroughly expressive of the stonemason’s craft, and not in
any way too rough for its purpose. It is then taken and submitted by
machinery to a grinding process which makes it mechanically smooth, and
it is then handed over to other workmen who give back to it a chiselled
surface of an absolutely uniform and mechanical character which
expresses nothing. And with that wanton and wasteful lie we are content
to set up temples to the God of Truth!

Now if the Church has become so blind to the values of life, and so
lacking in any standard of honour toward the labour of men’s hands, as
to allow itself to be so clothed in falsehood, yet I do still plead
that those who call themselves artists shall protest by all means in
their power against the systematisation of such indignities toward
handicraft. That is the sort of thing against which any national Art
training we have ought to fight.

How can we fight? Best of all, I believe, by establishing a standard
of honour toward manual labour; and, quite definitely, wherever we
have Art schools, by training all students to hate and despise shams
and to loathe all waste of labour. But, perhaps, the most direct way
would be for the State to set up, in every town, in connection with
its Art schools and its technical schools, a standard of honesty by
practical demonstration, in the staple industry of the locality. I
would not trouble, so long as that industry had a useful purpose,
how much or how little it was connected with Art; but I would give
the youth of that place the chance of an honest apprenticeship under
true human conditions to the trade in which they might be called upon
to spend their lives. I would not have those schools of labour adopt
any amateurishness of method or standard; they should not obstinately
reject the aid of machinery where machinery can relieve monotony, but
they should very carefully consider at what stage the dehumanising
element came in, either by substituting mechanism for skill, or by
separating the worker too much from his work in its completed form.
And from those schools of labour I would allow people to purchase all
the work of these State-apprentices which their master-craftsmen could
pass as being of a standard quality. They would not compete in point
of cheapness with the trade article, for their price would almost
certainly be higher, but they would, I trust, compete in point of
quality and design; and by exhibiting a standard, and making the thing
procurable, they might create a demand which the very trade itself
would at last be forced to recognise.

This is but a very bald and brief statement of the kind of extension I
mean; but what I want to put to you is this, that wherever a nation has
turned from agriculture to trade, there, if you want national Art you
must invade those trade conditions and set up your standard of honour,
not outside, but in the trades themselves; you must get hold of those
who are going to be your workers and craftsmen and put into them (by
exhibiting to them manual labour under right human conditions) the old
craftsman’s pride which existed in the days of the Guilds, when the
trade unions were not merely organisations to secure good wages, but
to secure good work, and to maintain a standard of honour in labour.
But you must not stop there. To make your training in any true sense
national you must make it characteristic, or rather it must make
itself. It must aim at bringing out racial and local character; and
before it can do so we must recover that love of locality which we have
so largely lost. A mere multiplication of schools and classes where a
departmental system evolved at some city centre is put in force, is not
national: it is only metropolitan, perhaps only departmental. You can
put such a system, in a certain superficial way, into the heads and
hands of your local students, but you cannot put it into the blood.
Unless your Art training enters into and links up the lives of those
you would teach with a larger sense of citizenship, it isn’t national.
They won’t carry it away with them into their daily pursuits, they
won’t make a spontaneous and instinctive application of it; they will
only come to it at class-hours, and, when class-hours are over, quit
again. I have spoken of the necessity of a standard of honour toward
labour, but we need also a standard of honour toward life. It is still,
you see, values--life-values--that I am trying to get at as a basis for
Art.

Now to some of you I must have seemed, in all conscience, gloomy
and pessimistic in my outlook on present conditions; and therefore,
before I end, I will try to emit a ray of hope. There are certain
social developments going on around us which make me hope that we
may yet emerge from this valley of the shadows through which we are
still stumbling. One is that there has been in the last generation a
very general breakdown of the old artificial class notion of the kind
of work which was compatible with “gentility.” And one meets to-day
people, whose culture has given them every chance to develop that
standard of honour toward life (without which their claim to be gentry
means nothing); you meet with many such people nowadays who have come
back to manual labour in various forms, in farming, in horticulture,
and in craftsmanship--some also, I am glad to say, who have become
shopkeepers--and who are bringing, presumably, their standard of honour
to bear on those trades on which they no longer foolishly look down.
Among these a definite revival of handicraft is taking place, and
where they are doing their work honestly and well they are undoubtedly
inculcating a better taste. It is especially among this class which
has come back to handicraft that one meets with domestic interiors of
a fine and scrupulous simplicity which we may eventually see imitated
(meretriciously, perhaps, but on the whole beneficially) even in
lodging-houses which are at present the dust-hung mausoleums of the
aesthetic movement of thirty years ago.

Another matter for congratulation--not a movement, but a survival--is
the unspoiled tradition of beauty which still exists in the cottage
gardens of England. There, in our villages, you find a note of beauty
that has scarcely been touched by the evil of our modern conditions.
And I take it as a proof that where, by some happy chance, we have
managed to “let well alone,” there the instinct for beauty and for
fitness is still a natural ingredient of industrial life. That survival
of taste in our cottage gardens is culture in the best sense of the
word; and it is still popular. We do not yet dig our gardens by
machinery; when we do they will die the death.

And two other bright points of movement, which I look to as having in
them the basis of a true Art training, are the widespread revival,
in so many of our towns and villages, through the efforts of Miss
Mary Neal, Mr. Cecil Sharp and others, of our old folk-songs and
Morris dances, and lastly--perhaps I shall surprise you--the Boy Scout
movement.

Coming into contact with these two movements, I have found that they
have in them certain elements in common. Instituted with a rare
combination of tact and enthusiasm, they have taken hold of the blood;
they have got home at a certain point in boy and girl nature which has
already made them become native. I find that these two organisations
tend to develop among their members grace and vigour of movement, good
manners, a cheerful spirit, a more alert interest in the things about
them, a feeling of comradeship, and best of all, a certain sense of
honour toward life. And therefore, even in a place technically devoted
to the training of students, I say boldly that I see nowhere better
hope of a sound basis for national Art than in this revival of village
dancing and folk-song and in the Boy Scout movement.

The assertion may perhaps seem strange and ironic to some of you
that it is not from a study of beautiful objects that the sense of
beauty can be made national, but only in the recovery of an ordered
plan for our social and industrial life, and in the finding of a true
and worthy purpose for all that our hands are put to do. But in that
connection you may remember how Ruskin maintained that great Art has
only flourished in countries which produced in abundance either wine or
corn; in countries, that is to say, where the greatest industries were
those with which we most readily associate that note of joy which has
become proverbial, the joy of the harvest. It is perhaps too much to
dream that we shall ever again see England living upon its own corn;
and the greatest forms of Art may, therefore, remain for ever beyond
our reach. But until a nation does honour to the human hand as the
most perfect and beautiful of all instruments under the sun, by giving
it only honourable and useful tasks--until then I must rather wish
you to be good valuers, keen--indignantly keen--to destroy the false
values which you see about you, than that you should be either good
draughtsmen or good artists.

You can do honest and good work as designers and illustrators and
architects, as workers in wood and metal and stone; but you are
hampered and bound by the conditions of your day, and you cannot by
your best efforts make Art national till you have established joy in
labour. No great school of Art can ever arise in our midst in such a
form as to carry with it through all the world its national character,
until the nation itself has found that voice (which to-day seems so
conspicuously absent, even when we close our shops to make holiday); I
mean the voice of joy.

FOOTNOTE:

[2] _By that reckoning we in Europe are to-day the best comedians the
world has ever seen. Out of peace-conditions nations produce their
wars._




CONSCIOUS AND UNCONSCIOUS IMMORTALITY.

(1915.)


We are frequently told (more especially by those whose profession it is
to preach belief in a revealed religion), that if man be not endowed
with an immortal soul, then the game of life is not worth the candle.
Incidentally we are warned that if the bottom were knocked out of that
belief, morals would go to pieces and humanity would become reprobate.

Now I can imagine a similar sort of claim put forward in other
departments of life for other pursuits which seem to their advocate to
make life more appetising.

I can imagine sportsmen saying that without sport men would cease to
be manly, morals and physique would deteriorate and life be no longer
worth living. I can imagine the butcher saying that without meat, and
the licensed victualler that without beer, men were of all things the
most miserable. I have recently seen advertisements which say that
only by supporting the cinema (made beautiful by the feet of Charlie
Chaplin), can we hope to be victorious in the present war.

The assertion that man cannot do without certain things which, as a
matter of fact, vast numbers of his fellows are constantly doing
without--(and with no very marked set-back as regards health,
efficiency, or general morals)--is a questionable way of forcing home
conviction that these things or beliefs are indispensable. It is quite
possible that beer, meat, the pursuit of game, the personality of
Charlie Chaplin, and a belief in immortality are all alike capable of
giving stimulus to the human soul (especially to those souls which
have come by habit to depend upon them). But it is quite certain that
other human souls have found without them sufficient stimulus to make
life worth living. And though, against that fact, it may be argued
that these unconsciously receive their driving force, their social
and ethical standards, from those whose motive power they reject as
superfluous, and that we, who do not go to see Charlie Chaplin on the
films, are winning this war somewhat circuitously through the powers of
those who do--the argument is hardly a convincing one, since it remains
for ever in the nature of an unproved hypothesis.

But when the majority of those who believe in personal immortality are
asked for the ground of their belief, it generally resolves itself into
this: they have an intense individual conviction that it is so--so
intense that to hold the contrary becomes “unthinkable.” But that
intense, individual conviction, over things we greatly care about, is
a constant phenomenon of the working of the human mind, and is not
limited to belief in a future state. To a convinced Liberal it is
“unthinkable” that he should ever pass into such a state of mental
annihilation as to become a Conservative. To a convinced Conservative
it is unthinkable that he should fall from the grace which guides
him into the slough of Liberalism. It is the same with Protestant or
Catholic, with Socialist, Universalist, or Sectarian: conviction always
presents an adamantine front to opposing forces and arguments--so long
as it lasts.

The same phenomenon constantly occurs in the domain of the amative
passion. The lover (if he be really in love), believes that his love
will last for ever--that nothing can possibly change it; and all the
evidence in the world that lovers of a like faith have too often lived
to see the immortal dream put on mortality, will fail to convince him
(while he is in the toils) that his own love is liable to any such
change as theirs.

The reason is that strongly vitalised forces always carry with them a
sense of permanence.

The vital spark (focused within us by strong conviction or emotion),
is but an individually apprehended part of a great whole: for this
thread of life passing through us has already stretched itself out
over millions of years, and countless atavisms have touched it to
individual ends which were not ours; the will to live has clung to it
by myriads of adhesions, feelers, tentacles, and not by human hands
alone (though our palms still moisten, and our arms fly upward to
the imaginary branch overhead when danger of falling threatens us,
because the instinct of our arboreal ancestry still prevails in us over
reason). And through those atavisms, the struggle to secure survival
for the family, the clan, the race, has left an impress which may
very naturally convey from the general to the individual a sense of
immortality.

For of all these constituent forces the majority knew and thought
very little about death, except in their instinctive and spasmodic
efforts to escape from it; and when at last man began to envisage death
consciously and philosophically, straightway, with all these atavisms
behind him, he belittled it with dreams of a future life.

It was as perfectly natural a thing to do as for the lover to declare
that his love for his mistress was eternal and not merely for a
season, since any lesser statement would fail to convey adequately
the intensity of the force by which he was moved. Moreover, though
in millions of individual cases the statement and the sincere belief
that the love experienced will remain changeless and eternal, are
contradicted by later fact, it is at least true that the passion itself
is an ever-recurring phenomenon of life, and does, by its infinite
recurrence and resurrection in form beyond form through evolving
generations, present to finite minds an aspect of immortality. Just as
the water we drink is an imperishable thing, though after drinking it
we shall thirst again, so is that love, which satisfies the lover’s
soul, a principle of life extending illimitably beyond his own use for
it. And if that be true about love, why should it not be true about
life?

For surely (put it thus), when across limited vision a thread passes,
of which the eye can see neither the beginning nor the end, and
when upon that thread, for the time being, the limited life hangs
all its hopes, is it not quite natural for that clinging life to
identify itself, through the closeness of its momentary contact,
with the spiritually apprehended whole, and to identify with that
concept of a general continuity its own present degree of individual
consciousness. Moreover, in a world governed by cause and effect, it
can hardly be predicated that the results either of love or hatred,
individually indulged, are not, or may not be illimitable, even though
the individual spirit be not there to preside consciously over their
extended operations.

When, therefore, so much is true, when so many elements which pass
through our lives have (by association), links and connections which
to finite minds seem infinite, they may well impress us (by reason of
the close identification established between us and them for the time
being) with a sense that our own individual share and apprehension of
them are addressed also to a universal goal.

“Universal,” for surely mere continuity--a stretching out of length
without corresponding breadth--ought not to be the limit of our
claim. Yet it is significant that, in their demand for personal
immortality, so many thinkers have found sufficient satisfaction in
the idea of an extended survival through time into eternity, without
making a corresponding demand for extension into unity through space.
They are willing, that is to say, to put up for all eternity with
those limitations of personality which they enjoy--the relations of
_meum_ and _tuum_ upon which the possessive life of the senses is
based, but not with those limitations (the prospect of which they do
not enjoy), the termination of those same relationships imposed by
death. It seems rather a one-sided way of doing things--this narrowing
of the claim in a two-dimensional direction (one might almost say
in a one-dimensional), yet it has been very generally done--I shall
presently hope to show why--and most of our Western theology has built
up our future hopes for us entirely on those lines. Personality,
the sort of personality we have learned to enjoy, is based upon
limitations. Abolish limitations in your conception of future life, and
for the majority of those pious minds which now clamour for it as their
due you abolish personality also; it is swallowed up not in death but
in a life from which the individual power to focus and to enjoy has
disappeared.

It is true that there has now begun, in modern socialistic
Christianity, a yeasting of desire for an all round, or expansive,
as well as a forward, or extensive personality after death; that an
all-embracing and not merely an all-surviving consciousness is more
and more predicated for the full satisfaction of man’s spiritual need.
But that was by no means the form of moral hunger which permeated
primitive or mediæval Christianity, and sufficed, we are to suppose,
to keep poor human nature from that depravity into which it will fall
if belief in personal immortality is surrendered. Oregon, as we know,
looked forward to finding in the nether groans of the damned a full
completion of the orchestral harmonies of Heaven; and in the whole
conception of immortality as it has illumined the path of the Church
from its beginning down to quite modern times, individualism has been
rampant. On that basis, so long as it satisfied his moral conscience,
man did great things with it, making it shine as a great light by the
unflinching witness which he bore to its efficacy through suffering and
through martyrdom.

It is probably true that an individualistic form to the doctrine was
then, and always will be, necessary to attract those whose lives have
been run from a highly individualised standpoint; and that, for them,
death-bed consolation would hardly be achieved in the presentation of
a doctrine so defined as to threaten annihilation to all the fetish
worship and social values of the past.

“God would think twice,” said a courtly French Abbé of the seventeenth
century to a King’s mistress who, upon her death-bed, was seized by
spiritual qualms--“God would think twice before damning a lady of your
quality.” And no one who holds by class-distinctions really wishes to
find in the New Jerusalem any abolition of that respect for persons
or prejudices which has, in this world, been the main ground on which
their self-esteem and their estimate of personality have been based.

To them the most “unthinkable” proposition would be not the contraction
of the future world to narrower and more select limits than those of
the one they know, but a future world conducted on any code of morals
which had not their own entire approval and sanction.

We are told that the late Queen Victoria looked forward with very
great interest to a future meeting with the Hebrew patriarchs, with
Abraham, Moses, and Elijah, but hoped to be excused from any personal
acquaintance with King David on account of his affair with Bathsheba.
And when we realise how very often the hope of Heaven is really a
species of self-love and self-applause, conditional on Heaven being
what we ourselves want it to be, one is led to wonder whether the real
condition for entry into that state of bliss may not prove to be the
precise opposite, and whether the disciplinary motto upon its portal
may not be those mystic words, hitherto attributed to another place,
“All hope abandon ye who enter here.” That, after all, is only a more
emphatic way of stating what Christ Himself laid down as the path by
which man should attain; that only those namely who were ready to
lose life should find it. And I rather question whether our Christian
individualists have, up till now, been honestly prepared to “lose life”
in the full sense, without condition or reserve, and whether, (if they
have not), they have yet attained the spiritual standpoint necessary to
bring them within the terms of the promise.

So far I have dealt with the doctrine of immortality as presented to us
from the individualistic basis alone. But, in some form or another, the
doctrine of immortality belongs to many religions and schools (indeed,
one might almost say to all) and has, therefore, most varied and even
contradictory meanings attached to it. In some schools, as we have
seen, it sets great store on the survival of the individual; in others
individuality is held to be of small account--a diminishing rather than
a persistent factor in the ultimate ends of life viewed as a whole.

I remember in that connection discussing with the late Father George
Tyrrell, in the days before Rome’s excommunication fell on him, the
divergent views as to immortality of Christianity and Buddhism; and
at that time he held that the superiority of the Christian faith
lay in its insistence on the personal immortality, conscious and
self-contained, of every human being. Some years later, a month before
his death, we discussed the matter again; and I asked him then, in what
degree, if at all, his view as to personal immortality had changed.
His answer gave me a curious instance of those scientific analogies by
which Modernism has been seeking to deliver the Roman Church from its
mediæval entanglements.

“In the main,” he said, “I have only changed in my apprehension of what
‘personality’ really is. Just as one may find in an hysterical subject
five or six pseudo-personalities which reveal themselves in turn, each
one of which is a character quite separately and consistently defined,
but not one of them (however completely in possession for the time) a
real person, so it seems to me must we regard all those limitations
of ‘personality’ which find expression in individual form. There is
only one true personality, and that is Christ; anything less than the
one all-embracing whole is but a simulacrum, concealing rather than
revealing the true substance and form.”

I cannot pretend to give his actual words, but I believe that I have
accurately stated the sense of them; and you will see, I think, that
they go a long way toward the adaptation of the Christian to the
Buddhistic standpoint. That tendency, I believe, we shall find more
and more at work in the Christian Church as time goes on--not merely
because by such a definition the doctrine will be better able to hold
its own against the inroads of science--but because it gives also a
better response to that socialising genius of the human race which
is coming more and more to demand a perfect unity as the ultimate
expression of good.

That, then, we shall probably find to be the future tendency of
idealism. There remains, of course, the Rationalistic school of
thought, by which the possibility of individual or personal survival
after death is from first to last either absolutely denied or very
severely discountenanced as an idea based upon wholly insufficient
evidence.

Nevertheless, in some form or another, immortality, conscious or
unconscious, personal or impersonal, is accepted by all schools alike;
the scientific law of the conservation of energy being one form of it
which human reason would now find it very difficult to deny.

Let us for one moment apply that law to our own individual lives and
consciousness.

Has life convinced us that we are all self-contained persons? Through
social contact we have undergone many changes, many damages, and
many repairs. Parts of us have gone to other people, parts of other
people have come, to us. We have shed and have absorbed quite as much
spiritually as materially; and though through our material changes we
retain a certain likeness, so that friends meeting us after a seven
years’ absence recognise us again in bodies no particle of which have
they ever seen before; and though similarly we can recognise our
inner selves across wider intervals of time, have we any reason to
suppose that our identity is more fixed in the spiritual substance
than in the material? For myself, I hope not. May one not prefer the
idea of interchange between life and life, to the notion that one is
to remain for ever fixed and self-possessed--a thing apart? The more
we are compounded of other lives, the more we have contributed to
the lives of others--the more can we recognise our entrance into the
only eternal life that we can demonstrably be sure about, or that can
(so it must seem to many of us), be sensibly desired or deserved. Is
Eternal Bliss, in the individual sense, a more tolerable doctrine than
eternal Hell-fire? Though, indeed, this latter may be but a scientific
statement of fact perverted and made foolish by the theologians.
For life, after all, is but a form of combustion for ever going on,
and outside of it we know nothing. No doubt the atoms of our being,
whether physical or spiritual, will forever form part of it; but I see
no reason why our spirits should not be as diffused, through proper
elemental changes, as our bodies are now being diffused from day to
day; or why I should repine that I personally shall not always be there
to preside over the operation and find it good. Even if, at the far end
of this earth’s history, everything is again to be reabsorbed in the
heat and light out of which it came, I can trust the suns and planets
to fulfil their mission of progress--or the will of God--quite as well
as, or better than, in my own small sphere I can trust Constitutional
Governments or Established Churches. And since these lesser lights,
in their foolish and providential dealings, do not confound my faith,
neither do the stars in their courses fight against it. Rather do they
confirm me in my sense that even the most acute perceptions with which
human life is endowed fail of themselves to justify me in any claim to
a larger lease of life than can naturally belong to them; for I see in
the universe things far greater than any individual man, doing service
and sustaining the life of countless millions, (which without them
could not live at all), without any prospect of so great a reward.

The eye of the sun itself is blind; and for ever, while it dazzles
us with its light, blind it must remain. Nay, what need has it for
sight at all, if in blindness it be able to fulfil its mission? And
yet implicit within its vast energies, there lies the gift of sight.
For that blind Eye of Heaven taught us to see; our substance came from
it, our eyes were made by it, and without it was not anything made on
earth that was made. And if, by this gift of sight, it has opened to us
so vast a space for our understanding to dwell in--bestowing so huge
a conception of life on this frail vessel of clay--if by so giving
of itself through long aeons of time it has opened to us so much more
than it knows itself, cannot we render back without grudging these
shorter, frailer lives of ours, whose brevity, perhaps, is the very
price required of us for their enjoyment, since without such limits our
far-reaching comprehension of space and its possessions could never
have been gained. Should there be any despair, or any depression in
the thought that from the blind eye of day and from the powers of its
heat was developed the human brain? For if from that apparent Blindness
of our Universe came really the eyes of life by which we perceive all
things, can we not commit our spirits back to its keeping with an
equal trust that what lies ahead will be at least as good as what lies
behind, though we be not there to see it?

But the law of the conservation of energy does not in the least satisfy
the aspirations of those who are out for personal immortality in the
individual sense. To these it seems a grievance that they should have
been called into being for any end not wholly satisfying to that
Ego which is now laying upon their consciousness the weight of its
possessive limitations. This separative quality of the Ego is to them
the whole principle of existence; without it they cannot see life.
To them, life in any less focused or more diffused form would be no
better than annihilation, an obvious setting-back of the evolutionary
process by which creation has led step by step to that degree of
self-consciousness realised in the human race.

Do not these objectors forget not merely how considerable a part of
human nature already moves and has its being on the lines of a diffused
and rather decentralised subconsciousness, but also how largely the
genius of the human race has committed to such conditions of separation
from all possible enjoyment by the Ego, some of the rarest gifts and
highest efforts at self-realisation that the world has ever seen? It
is a condition attaching to all the more permanent forms of expression
in the arts, to everything that man designs and makes for the delight
of the generations that come after. It is a condition willingly
accepted by all who rejoice in their power to throw the influence of
their personalities beyond the material uses of their own present
existence. And in that willingness to lose out of themselves for
future generations--to turn aside from mere physical enjoyment--the
life-forces within them, in that willingness artist, poet, and thinker,
have come far nearer to the finding of life than those who live
indulgently for ends finished by their own absorption thereof.

Now it is the supporters of the individualistic school of thought who
have generally urged that grave moral dangers would befall the human
race were a belief in personal immortality to perish; and it is at
least arguable (by minds that can only see values individually), that
if man is not to be permanently rewarded or punished for his present
and future conduct, he has no reason for conducting himself as a decent
part of the social whole, and that it would be better for him to break
out on entirely individual lines, live a short and merry life, and
throwing all altruistic and ethical considerations to the winds, enjoy
himself as much as he can while the material is to him.

On paper that consideration may seem to hold strong ground; but when it
is put into practice the facts of life are found to be overwhelmingly
against it. For one thing excess and self-indulgence fail to produce
enjoyment, for another the socialising of life by mutual aid tends
quite obviously to the increase of comfort, safety, and happiness. And
where apparently it does not is mainly at that point where rampant
individualism grasps and warps it to its own ends, making the social
organism subserve not the goodwill of the many but the ill-will of the
few.

But the ethical argument about the bad effects of non-belief in
personal immortality has been considerably discounted by the growing
sensitiveness of the modern conscience--more especially among those who
are in a serious sense “free-thinkers”--toward the social ills lying
around us. Generally speaking, our sense of duty toward our neighbour
is much more lively than it was in the mid-Victorian era; but our
conviction of personal immortality is probably far less. The two things
do not go together: the diminution of church attendance in the last
fifty years has not worsened the conditions of labour.

It may, however, be argued that an instinct for immortality is still
subconsciously at work within us, colouring our actions and directing
us on right ethical lines. But if it be a subconscious direction
which thus works in us for righteousness, it may equally be to a
subconscious end. The subconscious impulse may merely be guiding us to
a subconscious realisation which would not at all satisfy the advocates
of conscious immortality after death. What works subconsciously can in
all probability find satisfaction in a subconscious reward. The chemic
processes of the stomach and of the blood, for instance, are largely
subconscious in their operation; and their needs may be subconsciously
appeased without the brain being told anything about it through the
usual intermediaries of taste and mastication. We have a preference for
a conscious performance of the functions of life which we have always
been accustomed to perform consciously; but a very large proportion of
our life-functions work themselves out subconsciously and independently
of our will. Our hearts beat, our blood circulates, our nails grow,
our stomachs digest, our wounds heal, whether we tell them to or no,
and yet we are quite happy about them. We do not consider (because
they operate by a volition of which we are unaware), that therefore we
carry about with us a body of death from which our conscious ego must
needs shrink in disgust--a dead heart, dead stomach, dead blood--that
the unconsciousness which accompanies health is a state nearer to
annihilation, and so less to be desired, than the pains accompanying
functional disturbances.

When those things happen--functional disturbances--we are conscious
of something more immediately relating to death than to life: it is
because of local mortification that we become so much aware of things
which our immortal part helps us to use unconsciously and without
thought. Virtue itself, when engrained, tends to become instinctive and
subconscious instead of an effort.

There is quite as much evidence, therefore, in our own bodies that
unconsciousness is the real gate to immortal life, and the condition
toward which all that is best and highest in us is seeking, as of the
contrary teaching that increased self-consciousness is man’s final
goal. In the functional working of our own bodies an enormous amount of
self-consciousness has been eliminated, and we do not for our happiness
or self-realisation wish it restored to us; whole tracts and areas are
immune from it, or only make a spasmodic grab at our consciousness when
things go ill with them. “If you go on doing that,” they say, when
you misuse them, “we will make you know that we are here.” And so you
become conscious of them: but that doesn’t make you happier. Yet in a
sort of way, I suppose, a man would realise himself more completely if
he had sciatica all over him, and could count up his nerves, and tell
all his bones by the aches and pains attaching to them.

Now it is easy enough for a man to say (I think it was H. M. Stanley,
the explorer, who did say so) that he would rather endure torment for
all eternity than accept a state of annihilation. In thus protesting
he is talking through his hat of something too far beyond human
experience for the mind to realise. Toothache he has probably always
found bearable, because he knew that in course of time it would end. On
the other hand, sound dreamless sleep is probably not less bearable to
him because during that sleep he has not a ghost of a notion that he
will ever wake up again. He is carried, that is to say, every day of
his life while in health, into a state closely resembling annihilation
of consciousness, in which such annihilation has no terrors for him
at all; he accepts it as a comfortable part of existence, and goes to
it with delight when his faculties are tired. Its attractions for him
would naturally be less while all his senses were alert and fresh.

But the waking man is not the whole man; the subconscious life,
acquiescent to imposed conditions, occupies by far the larger part
of him. He can, therefore, only predicate the inclinations of his
waking hours; in sleep he may revert to a very strong affinity for that
annihilation of self-conscious life against which, in his waking hours,
he protests his dread.

And now a further word of comfort for those moral teachers who assure
us that if once we let go the idea of personal immortality, with its
accompanying implications of eternal reward or punishment, the conduct
of the human race is bound to degenerate, and that man’s only logical
motto will then be, “Let us eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow we
die.”

To refute that deduction we have but to remember that sociology is a
thing of ancestry and evolution, and has committed us to a weight of
facts against which precept and theory are powerless. We have only
to look back into Nature to see how persistently (without, one must
suppose, any promise of future reward after death) a contrary instinct
emerges from the establishment of the social bond in nest and herd and
hive. And why--if that emerging instinct leads on, in man’s reasoned
estimation, to foolishness--why do we so specially admire the communal
life of ant and bee, and incline sometimes to wonder whether (behind so
marvellous an order of altruistic energy) there be not concealed more
and not less of spiritual apprehension than in the more individualistic
forms of insect and animal life? And why, on the contrary, has the
wise cuckoo become a sort of byword for the singular economy with which
it has disentangled its life from care or responsibility?

It is surely very unfair thus to erect the cuckoo into a moral emblem
for reprobation, if it is only doing by instinct, what man would do by
reason and logic were the darkness of his own destiny made clear to him.

And similarly, it is surely disingenuous on our part to exalt as a
moral emblem the instinct of ant and bee to subordinate the life of the
individual to the general--if we deny to ant and bee the immortality
by which alone such altruism can be recompensed; or if we are to
believe that a clearer knowledge of their future lot would cause them
in logic and reason to declare that life on those terms was not worth
living, and that “to eat, drink, and die to-morrow” were better than to
live longer and labour for a vain repetition of lives like their own
indefinitely multiplied. It is ridiculous to impose the moral emblem
unless you grant also the justifying conditions.

Because the bee and the ant live unconscious of their impending doom,
are we, therefore, to regard them as a hoodwinked race, set to labour
at the dictates of the Creative capitalist on terms which contain in
them no adequate reward? Suppose, for a moment, that revelation could
descend upon ants’ nest and hive, and tell these workers that beyond
death the future held for them no store--that their immortality
was the immortality not of individual but of race; and suppose that
thereupon they all struck and went forth to die each singly in their
own way--would that moral emblem impress us, do you think, as a thing
worthy of imitation or of praise?

But why (let us think) is the predication of such an event so
impossible and so grotesque? Is it not because the life, the individual
life of ant or bee is so impregnated with that instinct of communalism
which gives the species its distinctive character, that it is
impossible to sunder them, or to imagine the individual capable (while
in the social _milieu_) of pursuing individual ends alone, after a
following, over millions of years, of life in the communal form. Life,
the thread of life which runs through them, is too much engrained with
communism for separatist principles ever again to prevail.

And surely it is the same with man. Individualism, separatism,
self-obsessionism, though still present in the phenomena of existence,
are more and more subject to qualifications from which they cannot
escape. And even the most evil form of individualism has to be
parasitic or predatory; it cannot exist alone; even against its
will it becomes conditioned by other lives. And the communal sense
of man, implicit within the innumerable forms of life through which
he has evolved, will continue to lay its hold on the parasitic and
the predatory, and will do so quite effectively on the basis of an
evolutionary past, the tendencies of which were established before ever
theological definitions came to give them impulse and strength.

Is it not almost ludicrous to suggest that that communal instinct
will cease to play, if the hope of individual reward after death is
withdrawn from the human race? Will man--because he is nobler than
the beast, because at his best he does things more altruistic, more
self-sacrificing, more self-forgetting, more self-transcending than any
of these--do less nobly because he envisages destiny, which (if he see
it as destiny) he will see as the logical outcome of evolutionary law?

It is possible, it is even probable, that all phases of theological
thought have had their use in giving direction and stimulus to the
human brain; if they have done nothing but stimulate rebellion against
obscurantist authority they have had value of a positive kind. But
we may go even further than this, for “everything possible to be
believed,” says Blake, “is an image of truth.” And under many a
concept, distorted by ignorance or guile, has lain a germ of the true
life which draws man on to communal ends. In time that germ puts off
the husk that seemed once (perhaps in some cases actually was) the
protective armoury through which alone it could survive for the use
of a later day. But though old reasons have been shed, the essential
value has not changed; and often it is less by logic and reason than
by the strong and subtle links of association that we preserve what is
good of past credulities.

The doctrine of conscious immortality, however much belittled by its
appeal to selfish individualism, has done a work for the human race.
It has held the germ of an ideal for unity which is receiving a more
universal interpretation to-day than the earlier theologians would ever
have allowed, or than man, in his then stage of development, could have
thought it worth while to hand on to his intellectual heirs. Perhaps
only because he conceived it in just such a form have its values been
preserved.

I am reminded in this connection of the method by which the wild swine
of the New Forest were taught to obey the voice of the horn by means
of which the swine-herd, called them back each night from their free
roaming in the forest. The way he did it was this. Having first formed
his herd, some four or five hundred strong, he penned them in a narrow
space where water and warm shelter were to be found; and there, in the
allotted enclosure, according them no liberty, he fed them daily to the
sound of the horn. Food and music became a sort of celestial harmony to
pig’s brain--when they heard the one, good reason was given them for
expecting the other.

Presently, in a well-fed condition, they were set free to roam; and
being full and satisfied they did not roam far; and at night the horn
sounded them back to an ample meal, and continued to sound while again
they ate and were satisfied.

So at last, by association, the horn came to have such a beneficent
meaning that the mere sound of it sufficed to bring them back at
nightfall to their appointed place of rest. They might roam for miles
and miles during the day, but night and the sound of the horn brought
them all back safe to fold. And when that habit had become established,
they did not cease to return even though the swineherd no longer
supplied the food which had first given music its charm to those savage
breasts.

And, similarly, I doubt not, that, though all hope of material profit
or reward be withdrawn from man’s mind, that call of the horn which
he has heard of old will still bring his spirit to the resting-place
at the appointed time; nor will he wish either to shorten his days or
debase his pleasures because the horn has ceased to provide the meal
which it once taught him to expect.

Do not let anything I have said be taken as suggesting that the
spiritual forces of man’s nature may not be conserved, transmuted,
re-assimilated, or re-distributed, as surely and with as little waste
as are the material elements of life which pass through disintegration
and decay into new forms. The processes by which such changes are
wrought may be, and may ever remain, a mystery to human sense. There
may be yet in the making a new order or plane of evolution by which
the process will be quickened and perfected. Soul of man may be in
the making, though it may be very far removed from that aspect of
individualism with which the anthropomorphic tendencies of theology
have burdened it. But--whether life thus rises by unknown law to
further ends, or whether it passes out, like the life of leaves, into
the general decay with which autumn each year fertilises the bed of
mother earth--of one thing I would ask you to be confident--that the
bandying of words and theories, and the discussion, tending this way
or that, of man’s destiny after death, are not in any way likely to
alter or to undo those forward-driving forces and communal desires with
which, from an inheritance of so many millions of years, the life of
humanity has become endowed. The will to live will still lift up the
race and carry it forward to new ends, whether man thinks he sees in
death the end of his personal existence, or only a new and a better
beginning. And whether he claims or resigns that prospect of reward he
will never be able to rid himself of the sense which revives after all
failures and crimes, that man is his brother-man--or be able to refrain
at his best from laying down his life, without calculation of personal
benefit to himself, so that others may live.

The highest manifestations of human genius, the most perfected forms
of self-realisation in art, in literature, and science, have been
given to us--and will continue to be given to us--independent of any
bargain that name and identity shall for ever remain attached thereto
while posterity enjoys the benefit. The artist might foresee that his
name would, in a brief time, become dissociated from his work, and his
memory blotted out from the book of the living; he would produce it all
the same. The reformer might know that his motives would be aspersed,
that his name would become after death a spitting and a reproach; but,
for the sake of the cause he believed in, he would still be willing to
die a dishonoured death and leave a reprobated name, to a world that
had failed to understand.

That is human nature at its best; and you will not change it or
endanger it through any increased doubt thrown by modern thought or
science on the prospect of conscious immortality after death. For
whether we recognise it or not, a subconscious spirit, not perhaps of
immortality but of unity, permeates us all; and for furtherance and
worship of that which his soul desires, the spirit of man will ever be
ready to work and strive, and to pass unconditionally into dust--if
that indeed be the condition on which he holds his birthright in a life
worth living.


W. H. Smith & Son, The Arden Press, Stamford Street, London, S.E.1




+-------------------------------------------------+
|Transcriber’s note:                              |
|                                                 |
|Obvious typographic errors have been corrected.  |
|                                                 |
+-------------------------------------------------+






                           LAMBKIN’S REMAINS

                                BY H. B.

           _Author of “The Bad Child’s Book of Beasts,” etc_


                              PUBLISHED BY
                   THE PROPRIETORS OF THE _J.C.R._ AT
                              J. VINCENT’S
                         96, HIGH STREET OXFORD

                                  1900


_Lambkin on “Sleep” appeared in “The Isis.” It is reprinted here by
kind permission of the Proprietors. The majority of the remaining
pieces were first published in “The J. C. R.”_

[_All rights reserved._]




                               DEDICATION


                                   TO

                          THE REPUBLICAN CLUB

                            I AM DETERMINED
                                   TO
                                DEDICATE
                               THIS BOOK
                     AND NOTHING SHALL TURN ME FROM
                               MY PURPOSE.




DEDICATORY ODE.


    I mean to write with all my strength
      (It lately has been sadly waning),
    A ballad of enormous length--
      Some parts of which will need explaining.[1]

    Because (unlike the bulk of men,
      Who write for fame and public ends),
    I turn a lax and fluent pen
      To talking of my private friends.[2]

    For no one, in our long decline,
      So dusty, spiteful and divided,
    Had quite such pleasant friends as mine,
      Or loved them half as much as I did.

           *       *       *       *       *

    The Freshman ambles down the High,
      In love with everything he sees,
    He notes the clear October sky,
      He sniffs a vigorous western breeze.

    “Can this be Oxford? This the place”
      (He cries), “of which my father said
    The tutoring was a damned disgrace,
      The creed a mummery, stuffed and dead?

    “Can it be here that Uncle Paul
      Was driven by excessive gloom,
    To drink and debt, and, last of all,
      To smoking opium in his room?

    “Is it from here the people come,
      Who talk so loud, and roll their eyes,
    And stammer? How extremely rum!
      How curious! What a great surprise.

    “Some influence of a nobler day
      Than theirs (I mean than Uncle Paul’s),
    Has roused the sleep of their decay,
      And decked with light their ancient walls.

    “O! dear undaunted boys of old,
      Would that your names were carven here,
    For all the world in stamps of gold,
      That I might read them and revere.

    “Who wrought and handed down for me
      This Oxford of the larger air,
    Laughing, and full of faith, and free,
      With youth resplendent everywhere.”

    Then learn: thou ill-instructed, blind,
      Young, callow, and untutored man,
    Their private names were----[3]
      Their club was called REPUBLICAN.

           *       *       *       *       *

    Where on their banks of light they lie,
      The happy hills of Heaven between,
    The Gods that rule the morning sky
      Are not more young, nor more serene

    Than were the intrepid Four that stand,
      The first who dared to live their dream,
    And on this uncongenial land
      To found the Abbey of Theleme.

    We kept the Rabelaisian plan:[4]
      We dignified the dainty cloisters
    With Natural Law, the Rights of Man,
      Song, Stoicism, Wine and Oysters.

    The library was most inviting:
      The books upon the crowded shelves
    Were mainly of our private writing:
      We kept a school and taught ourselves.

    We taught the art of writing things
      On men we still should like to throttle:
    And where to get the blood of kings
      At only half-a-crown a bottle.

           *       *       *       *       *

    Eheu Fugaces! Postume!
      (An old quotation out of mode);
    My coat of dreams is stolen away,
      My youth is passing down the road.

           *       *       *       *       *

    The wealth of youth, we spent it well
      And decently, as very few can.
    And is it lost? I cannot tell;
      And what is more, I doubt if you can.

    The question’s very much too wide,
      And much too deep, and much too hollow,
    And learned men on either side
      Use arguments I cannot follow.

    They say that in the unchanging place,
      Where all we loved is always dear,
    We meet our morning face to face,
      And find at last our twentieth year....

    They say, (and I am glad they say),
      It is so; and it may be so:
    It may be just the other way,
      I cannot tell. But this I know:

    From quiet homes and first beginning,
      Out to the undiscovered ends,
    There’s nothing worth the wear of winning,
      But laughter and the love of friends.

           *       *       *       *       *

    But something dwindles, oh! my peers,
      And something cheats the heart and passes,
    And Tom that meant to shake the years
      Has come to merely rattling glasses.

    And He, the Father of the Flock,
      Is keeping Burmesans in order,
    An exile on a lonely rock
      That overlooks the Chinese border.

    And One (myself I mean--no less),
      Ah!--will Posterity believe it--
    Not only don’t deserve success,
      But hasn’t managed to achieve it.

    Not even this peculiar town
      Has ever fixed a friendship firmer,
    But--one is married, one’s gone down,
      And one’s a Don, and one’s in Burmah.

           *       *       *       *       *

    And oh! the days, the days, the days,
      When all the four were off together:
    The infinite deep of summer haze,
      The roaring boast of autumn weather!

           *       *       *       *       *

    I will not try the reach again,
      I will not set my sail alone,
    To moor a boat bereft of men
      At Yarnton’s tiny docks of stone.

    But I will sit beside the fire,
      And put my hand before my eyes,
    And trace, to fill my heart’s desire,
      The last of all our Odysseys.

    The quiet evening kept her tryst:
      Beneath an open sky we rode,
    And mingled with a wandering mist
      Along the perfect Evenlode.

    The tender Evenlode that makes
      Her meadows hush to hear the sound
    Of waters mingling in the brakes,
      And binds my heart to English ground.

    A lovely river, all alone,
      She lingers in the hills and holds
    A hundred little towns of stone,
      Forgotten in the western wolds.

           *       *       *       *       *

    I dare to think (though meaner powers
      Possess our thrones, and lesser wits
    Are drinking worser wine than ours,
      In what’s no longer Austerlitz)

    That surely a tremendous ghost,
      The brazen-lunged, the bumper-filler,
    Still sings to an immortal toast,
      The Misadventures of the Miller.

    The vasty seas are hardly bar
      To men with such a prepossession;
    We were? Why then, by God, we _are_--
      Order! I call the club to session!

    You do retain the song we set,
      And how it rises, trips and scans?
    You keep the sacred memory yet,
      Republicans? Republicans?

    You know the way the words were hurled,
      To break the worst of fortune’s rub?
    I give the toast across the world,
      And drink it, “Gentlemen: the Club.”




CONTENTS.


                                                      PAGE

          DEDICATORY ODE                                 v

          PREFACE                                       xv

       I. INTRODUCTORY                                   1

      II. LAMBKIN’S NEWDIGATE                           14

     III. SOME REMARKS ON LAMBKIN’S PROSE STYLE         22

      IV. LAMBKIN’S ESSAY ON “SUCCESS”                  28

       V. LAMBKIN ON “SLEEP”                            37

      VI. LAMBKIN’S ADVICE TO FRESHMEN                  42

     VII. LAMBKIN’S LECTURE ON “RIGHT”                  51

    VIII. LAMBKIN’S SPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE              58

      IX. LAMBKIN’S ADDRESS TO THE LEAGUE OF PROGRESS   72

       X. LAMBKIN’S LEADER                              83

      XI. LAMBKIN’S REMARKS ON THE END OF TERM          88

     XII. LAMBKIN’S ARTICLE ON THE NORTH-WEST CORNER
            OF THE MOSAIC PAVEMENT OF THE ROMAN VILLA
            AT BIGNOR                                   95

    XIII. LAMBKIN’S SERMON                             104

     XIV. LAMBKIN’S OPEN LETTER TO CHURCHMEN           114

      XV. LAMBKIN’S LETTER TO A FRENCH FRIEND          123

     XVI. INTERVIEW WITH MR. LAMBKIN                   132




PREFACE


The preparation of the ensuing pages has been a labour of love, and
has cost me many an anxious hour. “Of the writing of books,” says the
learned Psalmist (or more probably a Syro-Chaldæic scribe of the third
century) “there is no end”; and truly it is a very solemn thought
that so many writers, furnishing the livelihood of so many publishers,
these in their turn supporting so many journals, reviews and magazines,
and these last giving bread to such a vast army of editors, reviewers,
and what not--I say it is a very solemn thought that this great mass
of people should be engaged upon labour of this nature; labour which,
rightly applied, might be of immeasurable service to humanity, but
which is, alas! so often diverted into useless or even positively
harmful channels: channels upon which I could write at some length,
were it not necessary for me, however, to bring this reflection to a
close.

A fine old Arabic poem--probably the oldest complete literary work in
the world--(I mean the Comedy which we are accustomed to call the Book
of Job)[5] contains hidden away among its many treasures the phrase,
“Oh! that mine enemy had written a book!” This craving for literature,
which is so explicable in a primitive people, and the half-savage
desire that the labour of writing should fall upon a foeman captured in
battle, have given place in the long process of historical development
to a very different spirit. There is now, if anything, a superabundance
of literature, and an apology is needed for the appearance of such a
work as this, nor, indeed, would it have been brought out had it not
been imagined that Lambkin’s many friends would give it a ready sale.

Animaxander, King of the Milesians, upon being asked by the Emissary
of Atarxessus what was, in his opinion, the most wearying thing in the
world, replied by cutting off the head of the messenger, thus outraging
the religious sense of a time to which guests and heralds were sacred,
as being under the special protection of Ζεύς (pronounced “Tsephs”).

Warned by the awful fate of the sacrilegious monarch, I will put a term
to these opening remarks. My book must be its own preface, I would that
the work could be also its own publisher, its own bookseller, and its
own reviewer.

It remains to me only to thank the many gentlemen who have aided me
in my task with the loan of letters, scraps of MSS., portraits, and
pieces of clothing--in fine, with all that could be of interest in
illustrating Lambkin’s career. My gratitude is especially due to Mr.
Binder, who helped in part of the writing; to Mr. Cook, who was kind
enough to look over the proofs; and to Mr. Wallingford, Q.C., who very
kindly consented to receive an advance copy. I must also thank the
Bishop of Bury for his courteous sympathy and ever-ready suggestion; I
must not omit from this list M. Hertz, who has helped me with French,
and whose industry and gentlemanly manners are particularly pleasing.

I cannot close without tendering my thanks in general to the printers
who have set up this book, to the agencies which have distributed it,
and to the booksellers, who have put it upon their shelves; I feel a
deep debt of gratitude to a very large number of people, and that is a
pleasant sensation for a man who, in the course of a fairly successful
career, has had to give (and receive) more than one shrewd knock.

  THE CHAPLAINCY,
  BURFORD COLLEGE,
  OXFORD.

P.S.--I have consulted, in the course of this work, Liddell and
Scott’s _Larger Greek Lexicon_, Smith’s _Dictionary of Antiquities_,
Skeats’ _Etymological Dictionary_, _Le Dictionnaire Franco-Anglais,
et Anglo-Français_, of Boileau, Curtis’ _English Synonyms_, Buffle on
_Punctuation_, and many other authorities which will be acknowledged in
the text.




Lambkin’s Remains

_Being the unpublished works of J. A. Lambkin, M.A. sometime Fellow of
Burford College_




I.

INTRODUCTORY


It is without a trace of compunction or regret that I prepare to edit
the few unpublished essays, sermons and speeches of my late dear
friend, Mr. Lambkin. On the contrary, I am filled with a sense that
my labour is one to which the clearest interests of the whole English
people call me, and I have found myself, as the work grew under my
hands, fulfilling, if I may say so with due modesty, a high and noble
duty. I remember Lambkin himself, in one of the last conversations I
had with him, saying with the acuteness that characterised him, “The
world knows nothing of its greatest men.” This pregnant commentary upon
human affairs was, I admit, produced by an accident in the _Oxford
Herald_ which concerned myself. In a description of a Public Function
my name had been mis-spelt, and though I was deeply wounded and
offended, I was careful (from a feeling which I hope is common to all
of us) to make no more than the slightest reference to this insult.

The acute eye of friendship and sympathy, coupled with the instincts of
a scholar and a gentleman, perceived my irritation, and in the evening
Lambkin uttered the memorable words that I have quoted. I thanked him
warmly, but, if long acquaintance had taught him my character, so had
it taught me his. I knew the reticence and modesty of my colleague,
the almost morbid fear that vanity (a vice which he detested) might be
imputed to him on account of the exceptional gifts which he could not
entirely ignore or hide; and I was certain that the phrase which he
constructed to heal my wound was not without some reference to his own
unmerited obscurity.

The world knows nothing of its greatest men! Josiah Lambkin! from
whatever Cypress groves of the underworld which environs us when on
dark winter evenings in the silence of our own souls which nothing can
dissolve though all attunes to that which nature herself perpetually
calls us, always, if we choose but to remember, your name shall be
known wherever the English language and its various dialects are
spoken. The great All-mother has made me the humble instrument, and I
shall perform my task as you would have desired it in a style which
loses half its evil by losing all its rhetoric; I shall pursue my way
and turn neither to the right nor to the left, but go straight on in
the fearless old English fashion till it is completed.

Josiah Abraham Lambkin was born of well-to-do and gentlemanly parents
in Bayswater[6] on January 19th, 1843. His father, at the time of his
birth, entertained objections to the great Public Schools, largely
founded upon his religious leanings, which were at that time opposed
to the ritual of those institutions. In spite therefore of the
vehement protestations of his mother (who was distantly connected on
the maternal side with the Cromptons of Cheshire) the boy passed his
earlier years under the able tutorship of a Nonconformist divine, and
later passed into the academy of Dr. Whortlebury at Highgate.[7]

Of his school-days he always spoke with some bitterness. He appears
to have suffered considerably from bullying, and the Headmaster,
though a humane, was a blunt man, little fitted to comprehend the
delicate nature with which he had to deal. On one occasion the nervous
susceptible lad found it necessary to lay before him a description of
the treatment to which he had been subjected by a younger and smaller,
but much stronger boy; the pedagogue’s only reply was to flog Lambkin
heartily with a light cane, “inflicting,” as he himself once told me,
“such exquisite agony as would ever linger in his memory.” Doubtless
this teacher of the old school thought he was (to use a phrase then
common) “making a man of him,” but the object was not easily to be
attained by brutal means. Let us be thankful that these punishments
have nearly disappeared from our modern seminaries.

When Josiah was fifteen years of age, his father, having prospered
in business, removed to Eaton Square and bought an estate in Surrey.
The merchant’s mind, which, though rough, was strong and acute,
had meanwhile passed through a considerable change in the matter
of religion; and as the result of long but silent self-examination
he became the ardent supporter of a system which he had formerly
abhorred. It was therefore determined to send the lad to one of the
two great Universities, and though Mrs. Lambkin’s second cousins, the
Crumptons, had all been to Cambridge, Oxford was finally decided upon
as presenting the greater social opportunities at the time.[8]

Here, then, is young Lambkin, in his nineteenth year, richly but
soberly dressed, and eager for the new life that opens before him. He
was entered at Burford College on October the 15th, 1861; a date which
is, by a curious coincidence, exactly thirty-six years, four months,
and two days from the time in which I pen these lines.

Of his undergraduate career there is little to be told. Called by his
enemies “The Burford Bounder,” or “dirty Lambkin,” he yet acquired the
respect of a small but choice circle who called him by his own name. He
was third _proxime accessit_ for the Johnson prize in Biblical studies,
and would undoubtedly have obtained (or been mentioned for) the
Newdigate, had he not been pitted against two men of quite exceptional
poetic gifts--the present editor of “The Investor’s Sure Prophet,” and
Mr. Hound, the well-known writer on “Food Statistics.”

He took a good Second-class in Greats in the summer of 1864, and was
immediately elected to a fellowship at Burford. It was not known at the
time that his father had become a bankrupt through lending large sums
at a high rate of interest to a young heir without security, trusting
to the necessity under which his name and honour would put him to pay.
In the shipwreck of the family fortunes, the small endowment was a
veritable godsend to Josiah, who but for this recognition of his merits
would have been compelled to work for his living.

As it was, his peculiar powers were set free to plan his great
monograph on “Being,” a work which, to the day of his death, he
designed not only to write but to publish.

There was not, of course, any incident of note in the thirty years
during which he held his fellowship. He did his duty plainly as it lay
before him, occasionally taking pupils, and after the Royal Commission,
even giving lectures in the College hall. He was made Junior Dean in
October, 1872, Junior Bursar in 1876, and Bursar in 1880, an office
which he held during the rest of his life.

In this capacity no breath of calumny ever touched him. His character
was spotless. He never offered or took compensations of any kind, and
no one has hinted that his accounts were not accurately and strictly
kept.

He never allowed himself to be openly a candidate for the Wardenship of
the College, but it is remarkable that he received one vote at each of
the three elections held in the twenty years of his residence.

He passed peacefully away just after Hall on the Gaudy Night of last
year. When his death was reported, an old scout, ninety-two years of
age, who had grown deaf in the service of the College, burst into tears
and begged that the name might be more clearly repeated to him, as he
had failed to catch it. On hearing it he dried his eyes, and said he
had never known a better master.

His character will, I think, be sufficiently evident in the writings
which I shall publish. He was one of nature’s gentlemen; reticent,
just, and full of self-respect. He hated a scene, and was careful to
avoid giving rise even to an argument. On the other hand, he was most
tenacious of his just rights, though charitable to the deserving poor,
and left a fortune of thirty-five thousand pounds.

In the difficult questions which arise from the superior rank of
inferiors he displayed a constant tact and judgment. It is not always
easy for a tutor to control and guide the younger members of the
aristocracy without being accused of pitiless severity on the one
hand or of gross obsequiousness on the other. Lambkin, to his honour,
contrived to direct with energy and guide without offence the men upon
whom England’s greatness depends.

He was by no means a snob--snobbishness was not in him. On the
other hand, he was equally removed from what is almost worse than
snobbishness--the morbid terror of subservience which possesses some
ill-balanced minds.

His attitude was this: that we are compelled to admit the aristocratic
quality of the English polity and should, while decently veiling
its cruder aspects, enjoy to the full the benefits which such a
constitution confers upon society and upon our individual selves.

By a genial observance of such canons he became one of the most
respected among those whom the chances of an academic career presented
to him as pupils or parents. He was the guest and honoured friend of
the Duke of Cumberland, the Duke of Pembroke, the Duke of Limerick
(“Mad Harry”), and the Duke of Lincoln; he had also the honour of
holding a long conversation with the Duke of Berkshire, whom he met
upon the top of an omnibus in Piccadilly and instantly recognised. He
possessed letters, receipts or communications from no less than four
Marquises, one Marquess, ten Barons, sixteen Baronets and one hundred
and twenty County Gentlemen. I must not omit Lord Grumbletooth, who had
had commercial dealings with his father, and who remained to the end of
his life a cordial and devoted friend.[9]

His tact in casual conversation was no less remarkable than his general
_savoir faire_ in the continuous business of life. Thus upon one
occasion a royal personage happened to be dining in Hall. It was some
days after the death of Mr. Hooligan, the well-known Home Rule leader.
The distinguished guest, with perhaps a trifle of licence, turned to
Lambkin and said “Well, Mr. Bursar, what do you think of Hooligan?” We
observed a respectful silence and wondered what reply Lambkin would
give in these difficult circumstances. The answer was like a bolt from
the blue, “De mortuis nil nisi bonum,” said the Classical Scholar, and
a murmur of applause went round the table.

Indeed his political views were perhaps the most remarkable feature
in a remarkable character. He died a convinced and staunch Liberal
Unionist, and this was the more striking as he was believed by all his
friends to be a Conservative until the introduction of Mr. Gladstone’s
famous Bill in 1885.

In the delicate matter of religious controversy his own writings must
describe him, nor will I touch here upon a question which did not rise
to any considerable public importance until after his death. Perhaps
I may be permitted to say this much; he was a sincere Christian in
the true sense of the word, attached to no narrow formularies, but
following as closely as he could the system of Seneca, stiffened (as it
were) with the meditations of Marcus Aurelius, though he was never so
violent as to attempt a practice of what that extreme stoic laid down
in theory.

Neither a ritualist nor a low-churchman, he expressed his attitude
by a profound and suggestive silence. These words only escaped him
upon one single occasion. Let us meditate upon them well in the stormy
discussions of to-day: “Medio tutissimus ibis.”

His learning and scholarship, so profound in the dead languages, was
exercised with singular skill and taste in the choice he made of modern
authors.

He was ignorant of Italian, but thoroughly conversant with the
French classics, which he read in the admirable translations of the
‘Half-crown Series.’ His principal reading here was in the works of
Voltaire, wherein, however, he confessed, “He could find no style,
and little more than blasphemous ribaldry.” Indeed, of the European
languages he would read German with the greatest pleasure, confining
himself chiefly to the writings of Lessing, Kant, and Schiller. His
mind acquired by this habit a singular breadth and fecundity, his style
a kind of rich confusion, and his speech (for he was able to converse
a little in that idiom) was strengthened by expressions of the deepest
philosophic import; a habit which gave him a peculiar and individual
power over his pupils, who mistook the Teutonic gutturals for violent
objurgations.

Such was the man, such the gentleman, the true ‘Hglaford,’ the modern
‘Godgebidden Eorldemanthingancanning,’ whose inner thoughts shall unroll
themselves in the pages that follow.




II.

Lambkin’s Newdigate

POEM WRITTEN FOR “NEWDIGATE PRIZE” IN ENGLISH VERSE

BY J. A. LAMBKIN, ESQ., OF BURFORD COLLEGE

_N.B._--[_The competitors are confined to the use of Rhymed Heroic
Iambic Pentameters, but the introduction of_ LYRICS _is permitted_]

Subject: “THE BENEFITS CONFERRED BY SCIENCE, ESPECIALLY IN CONNECTION
WITH THE ELECTRIC LIGHT”

_For the benefit of those who do not care to read through the Poem but
desire to know its contents, I append the following headings_:


INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

    Hail! Happy Muse, and touch the tuneful string!
    The benefits conferred by Science[10] I sing.


HIS THEME: THE ELECTRIC LIGHT AND ITS BENEFITS

    Under the kind Examiners’[11] direction
    I only write about them in connection
    With benefits which the Electric Light
    Confers on us; especially at night.
    These are my theme, of these my song shall rise.
    My lofty head shall swell to strike the skies,[12]
    And tears of hopeless love bedew the maiden’s eyes.


SECOND INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

    Descend, O Muse, from thy divine abode,


OSNEY

    To Osney, on the Seven Bridges Road;
    For under Osney’s solitary shade
    The bulk of the Electric Light is made.
    Here are the works, from hence the current flows
    Which (so the Company’s prospectus goes)


POWER OF WORKS THERE

    Can furnish to Subscribers hour by hour
    No less than sixteen thousand candle power,[13]
    All at a thousand volts. (It is essential
    To keep the current at this high potential
    In spite of the considerable expense.)


STATISTICS CONCERNING THEM

    The Energy developed represents,
    Expressed in foot-tons, the united forces
    Of fifteen elephants and forty horses.
    But shall my scientific detail thus
    Clip the dear wings of Buoyant Pegasus?


POETICAL OR RHETORICAL QUESTIONS

    Shall pure statistics jar upon the ear
    That pants for Lyric accents loud and clear?
    Shall I describe the complex Dynamo
    Or write about its commutator? No!


THE THEME CHANGES

    To happier fields I lead my wanton pen,
    The proper study of mankind is men.


THIRD INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

    Awake, my Muse! Portray the pleasing sight
    That meets us where they make Electric Light.


A PICTURE OF THE ELECTRICIAN

    Behold the Electrician where he stands:
    Soot, oil, and verdigris are on his hands;
    Large spots of grease defile his dirty clothes,
    The while his conversation drips with oaths.
    Shall such a being perish in its youth?
    Alas! it is indeed the fatal truth.
    In that dull brain, beneath that hair unkempt,
    Familiarity has bred contempt.
    We warn him of the gesture all too late;
    Oh, Heartless Jove! Oh, Adamantine Fate!


HIS AWFUL FATE

    Some random Touch--a hand’s imprudent slip--
    The Terminals--a flash--a sound like “Zip!”
    A smell of Burning fills the startled Air--
    The Electrician is no longer there!

       *       *       *       *       *


HE CHANGES HIS THEME

    But let us turn with true Artistic scorn
    From facts funereal and from views forlorn
    Of Erebus and Blackest midnight born.[14]


FOURTH INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

    Arouse thee, Muse! and chaunt in accents rich
    The interesting processes by which
    The Electricity is passed along:
    These are my theme, to these I bend my song.


DESCRIPTION OF METHOD BY WHICH THE CURRENT IS USED

    It runs encased in wood or porous brick
    Through copper wires two millimetres thick,
    And insulated on their dangerous mission
    By indiarubber, silk, or composition,
    Here you may put with critical felicity
    The following question: “What is Electricity?”


DIFFICULTY OF DETERMINING NATURE OF ELECTRICITY

    “Molecular Activity,” say some,
    Others when asked say nothing, and are dumb.
    Whatever be its nature: this is clear,
    The rapid current checked in its career,
    Baulked in its race and halted in its course[15]
    Transforms to heat and light its latent force:


CONSERVATION OF ENERGY. PROOFS OF THIS: NO EXPERIMENT NEEDED

    It needs no pedant in the lecturer’s chair
    To prove that light and heat are present there.
    The pear-shaped vacuum globe, I understand,
    Is far too hot to fondle with the hand.
    While, as is patent to the meanest sight,
    The carbon filament is very bright.


DOUBTS ON THE MUNICIPAL SYSTEM, BUT--

    As for the lights they hang about the town,
    Some praise them highly, others run them down.
    This system (technically called the arc)
    Makes some passages too light, others too dark.


NONE ON THE DOMESTIC

    But in the house the soft and constant rays
    Have always met with universal praise.


ITS ADVANTAGES

    For instance: if you want to read in bed
    No candle burns beside your curtains’ head,
    Far from some distant corner of the room
    The incandescent lamp dispels the gloom,


ADVANTAGES OF LARGE PRINT

    And with the largest print need hardly try
    The powers of any young and vigorous eye.


FIFTH INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

    Aroint thee, Muse! inspired the poet sings!
    I cannot help observing future things!


THE ONLY HOPE OF HUMANITY IS IN SCIENCE

    Life is a vale, its paths are dark and rough
    Only because we do not know enough.
    When Science has discovered something more
    We shall be happier than we were before.


PERORATION IN THE SPIRIT OF THE REST OF THE POEM

    Hail! Britain, mistress of the Azure Main,
    Ten Thousand Fleets sweep over thee in vain!
    Hail! mighty mother of the brave and free,
    That beat Napoleon, and gave birth to me!
    Thou that canst wrap in thine emblazoned robe
    One quarter of the habitable globe.
    Thy mountains, wafted by a favouring breeze,
    Like mighty hills withstand the stormy seas.


WARNING TO BRITAIN

    Thou art a Christian Commonwealth. And yet
    Be thou not all unthankful--nor forget
    As thou exultest in Imperial might
    The benefits of the Electric Light.




III.

Some Remarks on Lambkin’s Prose Style


No achievement of my dear friend’s produced a greater effect than the
English Essay which he presented at his examination. That so young
a man, and a man trained in such an environment as his, should have
written an essay at all was sufficiently remarkable, but that his
work should have shown such mastery in the handling, such delicate
balance of idea, and so much know-ledge (in the truest sense of the
word), coupled with such an astounding insight into human character
and contemporary psychology, was enough to warrant the remark of the
then Warden of Burford: “If these things” (said the aged but eminent
divine), “if these things” (it was said in all reverence and with a
full sense of the responsibility of his position), “If these things are
done in the green wood, what will be done in the dry?”

Truly it may be said that the Green Wood of Lambkin’s early years as an
Undergraduate was worthily followed by the Dry Wood of his later life
as a fellow and even tutor, nay, as a Bursar of his college.

It is not my purpose to add much to the reader’s own impressions of
this _tour de force_, or to insist too strongly upon the skill and
breadth of treatment which will at once make their mark upon any
intelligent man, and even upon the great mass of the public. But I may
be forgiven if I give some slight personal memories in interpretation
of a work which is necessarily presented in the cold medium of type.

Lambkin’s hand-writing was flowing and determined, but was often
difficult to read, a quality which led in the later years of his life
to the famous retort made by the Rural Dean of Henchthorp to the
Chaplain of Bower’s Hall.[16] His manuscript was, like Lord Byron’s
(and unlike the famous Codex V in the Vatican), remarkable for its
erasures, of which as many as three may be seen in some places
super-imposed, ladderwise, _en échelle_, the one above the other,
perpendicularly to the line of writing.

This excessive fastidiousness in the use of words was the cause of his
comparatively small production of written work; and thus the essay
printed below was the labour of nearly three hours. His ideas in this
matter were best represented by his little epigram on the appearance
of Liddell and Scott’s larger Greek Lexicon. “Quality not quantity”
was the witty phrase which he was heard to mutter when he received his
first copy of that work.

The nervous strain of so much anxiety about his literary work wearied
both mind and body, but he had his reward. The scholarly aptitude of
every particle in the phrase, and the curious symmetry apparent in
the great whole of the essay are due to a quality which he pushed
indeed to excess, but never beyond the boundary that separates Right
and Wrong; we admire in the product what we might criticise in the
method, and when we judge as critics we are compelled as Englishmen and
connoisseurs to congratulate and to applaud.

He agreed with Aristotle in regarding lucidity as the main virtue
of style. And if he sometimes failed to attain his ideal in this
matter, the obscurity was due to none of those mannerisms which are so
deplorable in a Meredith or a Browning, but rather to the fact that he
found great difficulty in ending a sentence as he had begun it. His
mind outran his pen; and the sentence from his University sermon,
“England must do her duty, or what will the harvest be?” stirring and
patriotic as it is, certainly suffers from some such fault, though I
cannot quite see where.

The Oxymoron, the Aposiopesis, the Nominativus Pendens, the Anacoluthon
and the Zeugma he looked upon with abhorrence and even with dread.
He was a friend to all virile enthusiasm in writing but a foe to
rhetoric, which (he would say) “Is cloying even in a demagogue, and
actually nauseating in the literary man.” He drew a distinction between
_eloquence_ and rhetoric, often praising the one and denouncing the
other with the most abandoned fervour: indeed, it was his favourite
diversion in critical conversation accurately to determine the meaning
of words. In early youth he would often split an infinitive or end
a sentence with a preposition. But, ever humble and ready to learn,
he determined, after reading Mrs. Griffin’s well-known essays in the
_Daily American_, to eschew such conduct for the future; and it was a
most touching sight to watch him, even in extreme old age, his reverend
white locks sweeping the paper before him and his weak eyes peering
close at the MSS. as he carefully went over his phrases with a pen,
scratching out and amending, at the end of his day’s work, the errors
of this nature.

He commonly used a gilt “J” nib, mounted upon a holder of imitation
ivory, but he was not cramped by any petty limitations in such details
and would, if necessity arose, make use of a quill, or even of a
fountain pen, insisting, however, if he was to use the latter, that it
should be of the best.

The paper upon which he wrote the work that remains to us was the
ordinary ruled foolscap of commerce; but this again he regarded as
quite unimportant. It was the matter of what he wrote that concerned
him, not (as is so often the case with lesser men) the mere accidents
of pen or paper.

I remember little else of moment with regard to his way of writing, but
I make no doubt that these details will not be without their interest;
for the personal habits of a great man have a charm of their own. I
read once that the sum of fifty pounds was paid for the pen of Charles
Dickens. I wonder what would be offered for a similar sacred relic, of
a man more obscure, but indirectly of far greater influence; a relic
which I keep by me with the greatest reverence, which I do not use
myself, however much at a loss I may be for pen or pencil, and with
which I never, upon any account, allow the children to play.

But I must draw to a close, or I should merit the reproach of lapsing
into a sentimental peroration, and be told that I am myself indulging
in that rhetoric which Lambkin so severely condemned.




IV.

Lambkin’s Essay on “Success”


ON “SUCCESS:” ITS CAUSES AND RESULTS

[Sidenote: Difficulty of Subject]

In approaching a problem of this nature, with all its anomalies and
analogues, we are at once struck by the difficulty of conditioning any
accurate estimate of the factors of the solution of the difficulty
which is latent in the very terms of the above question. We shall do
well perhaps, however, to clearly differentiate from its fellows the
proposition we have to deal with, and similarly as an inception of
our analysis to permanently fix the definitions and terms we shall be
talking of, with, and by.

[Sidenote: Definition of Success]

Success may be defined as the _Successful Consummation of an Attempt_
or more shortly as the _Realisation of an imagined Good_, and as it
implies Desire or the Wish for a thing, and at the same time action
or the attempt to get at a thing,[17] we might look at Success from
yet another point of view and say that _Success is the realisation
of Desire through action_. Indeed this last definition seems on the
whole to be the best; but it is evident that in this, as in all
other matters, it is impossible to arrive at perfection, and our
safest definition will be that which is found to be on the whole most
approximately the average mean[18] of many hundreds that might be
virtually constructed to more or less accurately express the idea we
have undertaken to do.

So far then it is evident that while we may have a fairly definite
subjective visual concept of what Success is, we shall never be able to
convey to others in so many words exactly what our idea may be.

                “What am I?
       ,     .     .     .     .
    An infant crying for the light
    That has no language but a cry”

[Sidenote: Method of dealing with Problem]

It is, however, of more practical importance nevertheless, to arrive
at some method or other by which we can in the long run attack the
very serious problem presented to us. Our best chance of arriving at
any solution will lie in attempting to give objective form to what it
is we have to do with. For this purpose we will first of all divide
all actions into (א) Successful and (ב) Non-successful[19] actions.
These two categories are at once mutually exclusive and collectively
universal. Nothing of which Success can be truly predicated, can at
the same time be called with any approach to accuracy Unsuccessful;
and similarly if an action finally result in Non-success, it is quite
evident that to speak of its “Success” would be to trifle with words
and to throw dust into our own eyes, which is a fatal error in any
case. We have then these two primary catēgories what is true of one
will, with certain reservations, be untrue of the other, in most cases
(we will come to that later) and _vice-versâ_.

  (1)   Success.
  (2)   Non-success.

[Sidenote: First great Difficulty]

But here we are met at the outset of our examination by a difficulty of
enormous dimensions. There is not one success; there are many. There
is the success of the Philosopher, of the Scientist, of the Politician,
of the Argument, of the Commanding Officer, of the Divine, of the
mere unthinking Animal appetite, and of others more numerous still.
It is evident that with such a vast number of different subsidiary
catēgories within our main catēgory it would be impossible to arrive at
any absolute conclusions, or to lay down any firm general principle.
For the moment we had erected some such fundamental foundation the
fair structure would be blown to a thousand atoms by the consideration
of some fresh form, aspect or realisation, of Success which might
have escaped our vision, so that where should we be then? It is
therefore most eminently a problem in which we should beware of undue
generalisations and hasty dogmatism. We must abandon here as everywhere
the immoral and exploded cant of mediæval deductive methods invented by
priests and mummers to enslave the human mind, and confine ourselves to
what we absolutely _know_. Shall we towards the end of this essay truly
_know_ anything with regard to Success? Who can tell! But at least let
us not cheat ourselves with the axioms, affirmations and dogmas which
are, in a certain sense, the ruin of so many; let us, if I may use a
metaphor, “abandon the _à priori_ for the _chiaro-oscuro_.”

[Sidenote: Second much greater Difficulty]

But if the problem is complex from the great variety of the various
kinds of Success, what shall we say of the disturbance introduced
by a new aspect of the matter, which we are now about to allude to!
Aye! What indeed! An aspect so widespread in its consequences, so
momentous and so fraught with menace to all philosophy, so big with
portent, and of such threatening aspect to humanity itself, that we
hesitate even to bring it forward![20] _Success is not always Success:
Non-success (or Failure) is an aspect of Success, and vice-versâ._ This
apparent paradox will be seen to be true on a little consideration.
For “Success” in any one case involves the “Failure” or “Non-success”
of its opposite or correlative. Thus, if we bet ten pounds with one of
our friends our “Success” would be his “Non-success,” and _vice-versâ_,
collaterally. Again, if we desire to fail in a matter (_e.g._, any man
would hope to fail in being hanged[21]), then to succeed is to fail,
and to fail is to succeed, and our successful failure would fail were
we to happen upon a disastrous success! And note that the _very same
act_, not this, that, or another, but THE VERY SAME, is (according
to the way we look at it) a “successful” or an “unsuccessful” act.
Success therefore not only _may_ be, but _must_ be Failure, and the two
catēgories upon which we had built such high hopes have disappeared for
ever!

[Sidenote: Solemn considerations consequent upon this]

Terrible thought! A thing can be at once itself and not itself--nay
its own opposite! The mind reels, and the frail human vision peering
over the immense gulf of metaphysical infinity is lost in a cry for
mercy and trembles on the threshold of the unseen! What visions of
horror and madness may not be reserved for the too daring soul which
has presumed to knock at the Doors of Silence! Let us learn from the
incomprehensible how small and weak a thing is man!

[Sidenote: A more cheerful view]

But it would ill-befit the philosopher to abandon his effort because
of a kind of a check or two at the start. The great hand of Time
shouts ever “onward”; and even if we cannot discover the Absolute in
the limits of this essay, we may rise from the ashes of our tears to
better and happier things.

[Sidenote: The beginning of a Solution]

A light seems to dawn on us. We shall not arrive at the full day
but we shall see “in a glass darkly” what, in the final end of our
development, may perhaps be more clearly revealed to us. It is evident
that we have been dealing with a relative. _How_ things so apparently
absolute as hanging or betting can be in any true sense relative we
cannot tell, because we cannot conceive the majestic whole of which
Success and Failure, plus and minus, up and down, yes and no, truth
and lies, are but as the glittering facets of a diamond borne upon the
finger of some titled and wealthy person.

Our error came from foolish self-sufficiency and pride. We thought
(forsooth) that our mere human conceptions of contradiction were real.
It has been granted to us (though we are but human still), to discover
our error--there is no hot or cold, no light or dark, and no good or
evil, all are, in a certain sense, and with certain limitations (if I
may so express myself) the Aspects----

_At this point the bell rang and the papers had to be delivered up.
Lambkin could not let his work go, however, without adding a few words
to show what he might have done had time allowed. He wrote:--_

“No Time. Had intended examples--Success, Academic, Acrobatic,
Agricultural, Aristocratic, Bacillic ... Yaroslavic, Zenobidic,
etc. Historical cases examined, Biggar’s view, H. Unity, Univ.
Consciousness, Amphodunissa,[22] Setxm [Illustration].”




V.

Lambkin on Sleep


[_This little gem was written for the great Monograph on “Being,” which
Lambkin never lived to complete. It was included, however, in his
little volume of essays entitled “Rictus Almae Matris.” The careful
footnotes, the fund of information, and the scholarly accuracy of
the whole sketch are an example--(alas! the only one)--of what his
full work would have been had he brought it to a conclusion. It is an
admirable example of his manner in maturer years._]

In sleep our faculties lie dormant.[23] We perceive nothing or almost
nothing of our surroundings; and the deeper our slumber the more
absolute is the barrier between ourselves and the outer world. The
causes of this “Cessation of Consciousness” (as it has been admirably
called by Professor M‘Obvy)[24] lie hidden from our most profound
physiologists. It was once my privilege to meet the master of physical
science who has rendered famous the University of Kreigenswald,[25] and
I asked him what in his opinion was the cause of sleep. He answered,
with that reverence which is the glory of the Teutonic mind, “It is in
the dear secret of the All-wise Nature-mother preserved.” I have never
forgotten those wise and weighty words.[26]

Perhaps the nearest guess as to the nature of Sleep is to be
discovered in the lectures of a brilliant but sometimes over-daring
young scholar whom we all applaud in the chair of Psychology. “Sleep”
(he says) “is the direct product of Brain Somnolence, which in its
turn is the result of the need for Repose that every organism must
experience after any specialised exertion.” I was present when this
sentence was delivered, and I am not ashamed to add that I was one of
those who heartily cheered the young speaker.[27]

We may assert, then, that Science has nearly conquered this last
stronghold of ignorance and superstition.[28]

As to the Muses, we know well that Sleep has been their favourite
theme for ages. With the exception of Catullus (whose verses have been
greatly over-rated, and who is always talking of people lying awake
at night), all the ancients have mentioned and praised this innocent
pastime. Everyone who has done Greats will remember the beautiful
passage in Lucretius,[29] but perhaps that in Sidonius Apollinaris, the
highly polished Bishop of Gaul, is less well known.[30] To turn to our
own literature, the sonnet beginning “To die, to sleep,” etc.,[31] must
be noted, and above all, the glorious lines in which Wordsworth reaches
his noblest level, beginning--

  “It is a pleasant thing to go to sleep!”

lines which, for my part, I can never read without catching some of
their magical drowsy influence.[32]

All great men have slept. George III. frequently slept,[33] and that
great and good man Wycliffe was in the habit of reading his Scriptural
translations and his own sermons nightly to produce the desired
effect.[34] The Duke of Wellington (whom my father used to call “The
Iron Duke”) slept on a little bedstead no larger than a common man’s.

As for the various positions in which one may sleep, I treat of them
in my little book of Latin Prose for Schools, which is coming out next
year.[35]




VI.

Lambkin’s Advice to Freshmen


Mr. Lambkin possessed among other great and gracious qualities the
habit of writing to his nephew, Thomas Ezekiel Lambkin,[36] who
entered the college as an undergraduate when his uncle was some four
years a Fellow. Of many such communications he valued especially
this which I print below, on account of the curious and pathetic
circumstances which surrounded it. Some months after Thomas had been
given his two groups and had left the University, Mr. Lambkin was
looking over some books in a second-hand book shop--not with the
intention of purchasing so much as to improve the mind. It was a
favourite habit of his, and as he was deeply engaged in a powerful
romance written under the pseudonym of “Marie Corelli”[37] there
dropped from its pages the letter which he had sent so many years
before. It lay in its original envelope unopened, and on turning to
the flyleaf he saw the name of his nephew written. It had once been
his! The boy had so treasured the little missive as to place it in his
favourite book!

Lambkin was so justly touched by the incident as to purchase the
volume, asking that the price might be entered to his account, which
was not then of any long standing. The letter he docketed “to be
published after my death.” And I obey the wishes of my revered friend:

  “MY DEAR THOMAS,

“Here you are at last in Oxford, and at Burford, ‘a Burford Man.’ How
proud your mother must be and even your father, whom I well remember
saying that ‘if he were not an accountant, he would rather be a Fellow
of Burford than anything else on earth.’ But it was not to be.

“The life you are entering is very different from that which you
have left behind. When you were at school you were under a strict
discipline, you were compelled to study the classics and to play
at various games. Cleanliness and truthfulness were enforced by
punishment, while the most instinctive habits of decency and good
manners could only be acquired at the expense of continual application.
In a word, ‘you were a child and thought as a child.’

“Now all that is changed, you are free (within limits) to follow your
own devices, to make or mar yourself. But if you use Oxford aright she
will make you as she has made so many of your kind--a perfect gentleman.

“But enough of these generalities. It is time to turn to one or two
definite bits of advice which I hope you will receive in the right
spirit. My dear boy, I want you to lay your hand in mine while I speak
to you, not as an uncle, but rather as an elder brother. Promise me
three things. First never to gamble in any form; secondly, never to
drink a single glass of wine after dinner; thirdly, never to purchase
anything without paying for it in cash. If you will make such strict
rules for yourself and keep them religiously you will find after years
of constant effort a certain result developing (as it were), you will
discover with delight that your character is formed; that you have
neither won nor lost money at hazards, that you have never got drunk
of an evening, and that you have no debts. Of the first two I can only
say that they are questions of morality on which we all may, and all
_do_, differ. But the third is of a vital and practical importance.
Occasional drunkenness is a matter for private judgment, its rightness
or wrongness depends upon our ethical system; but debt is fatal to any
hope of public success.

“I hesitate a little to mention one further point; but--may I say
it?--will you do your best to avoid drinking neat spirits in the early
morning--especially Brandy? Of course a Governor and Tutor, whatever
his abilities, gets removed in his sympathies from the younger men.[38]
The habit may have died out, and if so I will say no more, but in my
time it was the ruin of many a fair young life.

“Now as to your day and its order. First, rise briskly when you are
called, and into your cold bath, you young dog![39] No shilly-shally;
into it. Don’t splash the water about in a miserable attempt to deceive
your scout, but take an Honest British Cold Bath like a man. Soap
should never be used save on the hands and neck. As to hot baths,
never ask for them in College, it would give great trouble, and it is
much better to take one in the Town for a shilling; nothing is more
refreshing than a good hot bath in the Winter Term.

“Next you go out and ‘keep’ a Mosque, Synagogue, or Meeting of the
Brethren, though if you can agree with the system it is far better to
go to your College Chapel; it puts a man right with his superiors and
you obey the Apostolic injunction.[40]

“Then comes your breakfast. Eat as much as you can; it is the
foundation of a good day’s work in the Vineyard. But what is this?--a
note from your Tutor. Off you go at the appointed time, and as you
may be somewhat nervous and diffident I will give you a little
Paradigm,[41] as it were, of a Freshman meeting his Tutor for the first
time.

“[_The Student enters, and as he is half way through the door says:--_]

“_St._--Good morning! Have you noticed what the papers say
about--[_Here mention some prominent subject of the day._]

“[_The Tutor does not answer but goes on writing in a little book; at
last he looks up and says:--_]

“_Tut._--Pray, what is your name?

“_St._--M. or N.

“_Tut._--What have you read before coming up, Mr. ----?

“_St._--The existing Latin authors from Ennius to Sidonius
Apollinaris, with their fragments. The Greek from Sappho to Origen
including Bacchylides.

[_The Tutor makes a note of this and resumes...._]

“_Tut._--Have you read the Gospels?

“_St._--No, Sir.

“_Tut._--You must read two of them as soon as possible in the Greek, as
it is necessary to the passing of Divinity, unless indeed you prefer
the beautiful work of Plato. Come at ten to-morrow. Good morning.

“_St._--I am not accustomed to being spoken to in that fashion.

[_The Tutor will turn to some other Student, and the first Student will
leave the room._]

“I have little more to say. You will soon learn the customs of the
place, and no words of mine can efficiently warn you as experience
will. Put on a black coat before Hall, and prepare for that meal
with neatness, but with no extravagant display. Do not wear your cap
and gown in the afternoon, do not show an exaggerated respect to the
younger fellows (except the Chaplain), on the one hand, nor a silly
contempt for the older Dons upon the other. The first line of conduct
is that of a timid and uncertain mind; it is of no profit for future
advancement, and draws down upon one the contempt of all. The second
is calculated to annoy as fine a body of men as any in England, and
seriously to affect your reputation in Society.

“You will find in every college some club which contains the wealthier
undergraduates and those of prominent position. Join it if possible
at once before you are known. At its weekly meetings speak soberly,
but not pompously. Enliven your remarks with occasional flashes of
humour, but do not trench upon the ribald nor pass the boundary of
right-reason. Such excesses may provoke a momentary laugh, but they
ultimately destroy all respect for one’s character. Remember Lot’s wife!

“You will row, of course, and as you rush down to the river after a
hurried lunch and dash up to do a short bit of reading before Hall,
your face will glow with satisfaction at the thought that every day of
your life will be so occupied for four years.

“Of the grosser and lower evils I need not warn you: you will not give
money to beggars in the street, nor lend it to your friends. You will
not continually expose your private thoughts, nor open your heart to
every comer in the vulgar enthusiasm of some whom you may meet. No, my
dear Ezekiel, it would be unworthy of your name, and I know you too
well, to fear such things of you. You are a Gentleman, and that you
may, like a gentleman, be always at your ease, courteous on occasion,
but familiar never, is the earnest prayer of--

  “JOSIAH LAMBKIN.”




VII.

Lambkin’s Lecture on “Right”


Of the effects of Mr. Lambkin’s lectures, the greatest and (I venture
to think) the most permanent are those that followed from his course
on _Ethics_. The late Dean of Heaving-on-the-Marsh (the Honourable
Albert Nathan-Merivale, the first name adopted from his property in
Rutland) told me upon one occasion that he owed the direction of his
mind to those lectures (under Providence) more than to any other
lectures he could remember.

Very much the same idea was conveyed to me, more or less, by the
Bishop of Humbury, who turned to me in hall, only a year ago, with a
peculiar look in his eyes, and (as I had mentioned Lambkin’s name) said
suddenly, like a man who struggles with an emotion:[42] “Lambkin(!)[43]
... did not he give lectures in your hall ... on Ethics?” “Some,”
I replied, “were given in the Hall, others in Lecture Room No. 2
over the glory-hole.” His lordship said nothing, but there was a
world of thought and reminiscence in his eyes. May we not--knowing
his lordship’s difficulties in matters of belief, and his final
victory--ascribe something of this progressive and salutary influence
to my dear friend?


ON “RIGHT”

  [_Being Lecture V. in a course of Eight, delivered, in the Autumn
  Term of 1878._]

We have now proceeded for a considerable distance in our journey
towards the Solution. Of eight lectures, of which I had proposed to
make so many milestones on the road, the fifth is reached, and now we
are in measurable distance of the Great Answer; the Understanding of
the Relations of the Particular to the Universal.

It is an easy, though a profitable task to wander in what the late Sir
Reginald Hawke once called in a fine phrase “the flowery meads and
bosky dells of Positive Knowledge.” It is in the essence of any modern
method of inquiry that we should be first sure of our facts, and it
is on this account that all philosophical research worthy of the name
must begin with the physical sciences. For the last few weeks I have
illustrated my lectures with chemical experiments and occasionally
with large coloured diagrams, which, especially to young people like
yourselves have done not a little to enliven what might at first appear
a very dull subject. It is therefore with happy, hopeful hearts,
with sparkling eyes and eager appetite that we leave the physical
entry-hall of knowledge to approach the delicious feast of metaphysics.

But here a difficulty confronts us. So far we have followed an
historical development. We have studied the actions of savages and the
gestures of young children; we have enquired concerning the habits
of sleepwalkers, and have drawn our conclusions from the attitudes
adopted in special manias. So far, then, we have been on safe ground.
We have proceeded from the known to the unknown, and we have correlated
Psychology, Sociology, Anatomy, Morphology, Physiology, Geography,
and Theology (_here Mr. Darkin of Vast, who had been ailing a long
time, was carried out in a faint; Mr. Lambkin, being short-sighted,
did not fully seize what had happened, and thinking that certain of
his audience were leaving the Hall without permission, he became as
nearly angry as was possible to such a man. He made a short speech on
the decay of manners, and fell into several bitter epigrams. It is only
just to say that, on learning the occasion of the interruption, he
regretted the expression “strong meat for babes” which had escaped him
at the time._)

So far so good. But there is something more. No one can proceed
indefinitely in the study of Ethics without coming, sooner or later,
upon the Conventional conception of _Right_. I do not mean that this
conception has any philosophic value. I should be the last to lay down
for it those futile, empirical and dogmatic foundations which may
satisfy narrow, deductive minds. But there it is, and as practical men
with it we must deal. What is _Right_? Whence proceeds this curious
conglomeration of idealism, mysticism, empiricism, and fanaticism to
which the name has been given?

It is impossible to say. It is the duty of the lecturer to set
forth the scheme of truth: to make (as it were) a map or plan of
Epistemology. He is not concerned to demonstrate a point; he is not
bound to dispute the attitude of opponents. Let them fall of their own
weight (_Ruant mole suâ_). It is mine to show that things _may_ be thus
or thus, and I will most steadily refuse to be drawn into sterile
argument and profitless discussion with mere affirmations.

“The involute of progression is the subconscious evolution of the
particular function.” No close reasoner will deny this. It is the
final summing up of all that is meant by Development. It is the root
formula of the nineteenth century that is now, alas! drawing to a close
under our very eyes. Now to such a fundamental proposition I add a
second. “The sentiment of right is the inversion of the subconscious
function in its relation to the indeterminate ego.” This also I take
to be admitted by all European philosophers in Germany. Now I will not
go so far as to say that a major premiss when it is absolutely sound,
followed by a minor equally sound, leads to a sure conclusion. God
fulfils himself in many ways, and there are more things in heaven and
earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. But I take this
tentatively: that if these two propositions are true (and we have the
word of Herr Waldteufel,[44] who lives in the Woodstock Road, that
it is true) then it follows conclusively that no certainty can be
arrived at in these matters. I would especially recommend you on this
point (_here Mr. Lambkin changed his lecturing voice for a species of
conversational, interested and familiar tone_) to read the essay by
the late Dr. Barton in _Shots at the Probable_: you will also find the
third chapter of Mr. Mendellsohn’s _History of the Soul_ very useful.
Remember also, by the way, to consult the footnote on p. 343, of
Renan’s _Anti-Christ_. The Master of St. Dives’ _Little Journeys in the
Obvious_ is light and amusing, but instructive in its way.

There is a kind of attitude (_this was Lambkin’s peroration, and he was
justly proud of it_) which destroys nothing but creates much: which
transforms without metamorphosis, and which says “look at this, I have
found truth!” but which dares not say “look away from that--it is
untrue.”

Such is our aim. Let us make without unmaking and in this difficult
question of the origin of _Right_, the grand old Anglo-Saxon sense
of “Ought,” let us humbly adopt as logicians, but grimly pursue as
practical men some such maxim as what follows:

“Right came from nothing, it means nothing, it leads to nothing; with
it we are nothing, but without it we are worse than nothing.”[45]

Next Thursday I shall deal with morality in international relations.




VIII.

Lambkin’s Special Correspondence


Lambkin was almost the first of that great band of Oxford Fellows who
go as special correspondents for Newspapers to places of difficulty
and even of danger. On the advantages of this system he would often
dilate, and he was glad to see, as he grew to be an older, a wealthier,
and a wiser man, that others were treading in his footsteps. “The
younger men,” he would say, “have noticed what perhaps I was the first
to see, that the Press is a Power, and that men who are paid to educate
should not be ashamed to be paid for any form of education.” He was,
however, astonished to see how rapidly the letters of a correspondent
could now be issued as a book, and on finding that such publications
were arranged for separately with the publishers, and were not the
property of the Newspapers, he expressed himself with a just warmth in
condemnation of such a trick.

“Sir” (said he to the Chaplain), “in my young days we should have
scorned to have faked up work, well done for a particular object, in
a new suit for the sake of wealth”; and I owe it to Lambkin’s memory
to say that he did not make a penny by his “Diary on the Deep,”[46]
in which he collected towards the end of his life his various letters
written to the Newspapers, and mostly composed at sea.

The occasion which produced the following letter was the abominable
suppression by Italian troops of the Catholic Riots at Rome in 1873.
Englishmen of all parties had been stirred to a great indignation at
the news of the atrocities. “As a nation” (to quote my dear friend) “we
are slow to anger, but our anger is terrible.” And such was indeed the
case.

A great meeting was held at Hampstead, in which Mr. Ram made his famous
speech. “This is not a question of religion or of nationality but of
manhood (he had said), and if we do not give our sympathy freely, if we
do not send out correspondents to inform us of the truth, if we do not
meet in public and protest, if we do not write and speak and read till
our strength be exhausted, then is England no longer the England of
Cromwell and of Peel.”

Such public emotion could not fail to reach Lambkin. I remember his
coming to me one night into my rooms and saying “George (for my name
is George), I had to-day a letter from Mr. Solomon’s paper--_The Sunday
Englishman_. They want me to go and report on this infamous matter, and
I will go. Do not attempt to dissuade me. I shall return--if God spares
my life--before the end of the vacation. The offer is most advantageous
in every way: I mean to England, to the cause of justice, and to that
freedom of thought without which there is no true religion. For,
understand me, that though these poor wretches are Roman Catholics, I
hold that every man should have justice, and my blood boils within me.”

He left me with a parting grip of the hand, promising to bring me back
photographs from the Museum at Naples.

If the letter that follows appears to be lacking in any full account of
the Italian army and its infamies, if it is observed to be meagre and
jejune on the whole subject of the Riots, that is to be explained by
the simple facts that follow.

When Lambkin sailed, the British Fleet had already occupied a deep and
commodious harbour on the coast of Apulia, and public irritation was
at its height; but by the time he landed the Quirinal had been forced
to an apology, the Vatican had received monetary compensation, and the
Piedmontese troops had been compelled to evacuate Rome.

He therefore found upon landing at Leghorn[47] a telegram from the
newspaper, saying that his services were not required, but that the
monetary engagements entered into by the proprietors would be strictly
adhered to.

Partly pleased, partly disappointed, Lambkin returned to Oxford,
taking sketches on the way from various artists whom he found willing
to sell their productions. These he later hung round his room, not on
nails (which as he very properly said, defaced the wall), but from a
rail;--their colours are bright and pleasing. He also brought me the
photographs I asked him for, and they now hang in my bedroom.

This summary must account for the paucity of the notes that follow, and
the fact that they were never published.

[There was some little doubt as to whether certain strictures on
the First Mate in Mr. Lambkin’s letters did not affect one of our
best families. Until I could make certain whether the Estate should
be credited with a receipt on this account or debited with a loss I
hesitated to publish. Mr. Lambkin left no heirs, but he would have been
the first to regret (were he alive) any diminution of his small fortune.

I am glad to say that it has been satisfactorily settled, and that
while all parties have gained none have lost by the settlement.]


       *       *       *       *       *


THE LETTERS

  _s.s. Borgia, Gravesend,
  Sunday, Sept. 27th, 1873_

Whatever scruples I might have had in sending off my first letter
before I had left the Thames, and upon such a day, are dissipated
by the emotions to which the scenes I have just passed through give
rise.[48]

What can be more marvellous than this historic river! All is dark, save
where the electric light on shore, the river-boats’ lanterns on the
water, the gas-lamps and the great glare of the town[49] dispel the
gloom. And over the river itself, the old Tamesis, a profound silence
reigns, broken only by the whistling of the tugs, the hoarse cries of
the bargemen and the merry banjo-party under the awning of our ship.
All is still, noiseless and soundless: a profound silence broods over
the mighty waters. It is night.

It is night and silent! Silence and night! The two primeval things!
I wonder whether it has ever occurred to the readers of the _Sunday
Englishman_ to travel over the great waters, or to observe in their
quiet homes the marvellous silence of the night? Would they know of
what my thoughts were full? They were full of those poor Romans,
insulted, questioned and disturbed by a brutal soldiery, and I thought
of this: that we who go out on a peculiarly pacific mission, who have
only to write while others wield the sword, we also do our part. Pray
heaven the time may soon come when an English Protectorate shall be
declared over Rome and the hateful rule of the Lombard foreigners shall
cease.[50]

There is for anyone of the old viking blood a kind of fascination in
the sea. The screw is modern, but its vibration is the very movement
of the wild white oars that brought the Northmen[51] to the field of
Senlac.[52] Now I know how we have dared and done all. I could conquer
Sicily to-night.

As I paced the deck, an officer passed and slapped me heartily on
the shoulder. It was the First Mate. A rough diamond but a diamond
none the less. He asked me where I was bound to. I said Leghorn. He
then asked me if I had all I needed for the voyage. It seems that I
had strayed on to the part of the deck reserved for the second-class
passengers. I informed him of his error. He laughed heartily and said
we shouldn’t quarrel about that. I said his ship seemed to be a Saucy
Lass. He answered “That’s all right,” asked me if I played “Turn-up
Jack,” and left me. It is upon men like this that the greatness of
England is founded.

Well, I will “turn in” and “go below” for my watch; “you gentlemen of
England” who read the _Sunday Englishman_, you little know what life is
like on the high seas; but we are one, I think, when it comes to the
love of blue water.

  _Posted at Dover, Monday, Sept. 28, 1873._

We have dropped the pilot. I have nothing in particular to write.
There is a kind of monotony about a sea voyage which is very depressing
to the spirits. The sea was smooth last night, and yet I awoke this
morning with a feeling of un-quiet to which I have long been a
stranger, and which should not be present in a healthy man. I fancy
the very slight oscillation of the boat has something to do with it,
though the lady sitting next to me tells me that one only feels it in
steamboats. She said her dear husband had told her it was “the smell of
the oil”--I hinted that at breakfast one can talk of other things.

The First Mate sits at the head of our table. I do not know how it is,
but there is a lack of _social reaction_ on board a ship. A man is a
seaman or a passenger, and there is an end of it. One has no fixed
rank, and the wholesome discipline of social pressure seems entirely
lost. Thus this morning the First Mate called me “The Parson,” and I
had no way to resent his familiarity. But he meant no harm; he is a
sterling fellow.

After breakfast my mind kept running to this question of the Roman
Persecution, and (I know not how) certain phrases kept repeating
themselves literally “_ad nauseam_” in my imagination. They kept pace
with the throb of the steamer, an altogether new sensation, and my
mind seemed (as my old tutor, Mr. Blurt, would put it) to “work in a
circle.” The pilot will take this. He is coming over the side. He is
not in the least like a sailor, but small and white. He wears a bowler
hat, and looks more like a city clerk than anything else. When I asked
the First Mate why this was, he answered “It’s the Brains that tell.” A
very remarkable statement, and one full of menace and warning for our
mercantile marine.

       *       *       *       *       *

  _Thursday, Oct. 1, 1873._

I cannot properly describe the freshness and beauty of the sea after a
gale. I have not the style of the great masters of English prose, and
I lack the faculty of expression which so often accompanies the poetic
soul.

The white curling tips (white horses) come at one if one looks to
windward, or if one looks to leeward seem to flee. There is a kind of
balminess in the air born of the warm south; and there is jollity in
the whole ship’s company, as Mrs. Burton and her daughters remarked to
me this morning. I feel capable of anything. When the First Mate came
up to me this morning and tried to bait me with his vulgar chaff I
answered roundly, “Now, sir, listen to me. I am not seasick, I am not a
landlubber, I am on my sea legs again, and I would have you know that I
have not a little power to make those who attack me feel the weight of
my arm.”

He turned from me thoroughly ashamed, and told a man to swab the decks.
The passengers appeared absorbed in their various occupations, but I
felt I had “scored a point” and I retired to my cabin.

My steward told me of a group of rocks off the Spanish coast which we
are approaching. He said they were called “The Graveyard.” If a man can
turn his mind to the Universal Consciousness and to a Final Purpose all
foolish fears will fall into a secondary plane. I will not do myself
the injustice of saying that I was affected by the accident, but a lady
or child might have been, and surely the ship’s servants should be
warned not to talk nonsense to passengers who need all their strength
for the sea.

  _Friday, Oct. 2, 1873._

To-day I met the Captain. I went up on the bridge to speak to him.
I find his name is Arnssen. He has risen from the ranks, his father
having been a large haberdasher in Copenhagen and a town councillor. I
wish I could say the same of the First Mate, who is the scapegrace son
of a great English family, though he seems to feel no shame. Arnssen
and I would soon become fast friends were it not that his time is
occupied in managing the ship. He is just such an one as makes the
strength of our British Mercantile marine. He will often come and walk
with me on the deck, on which occasions I give him a cigar, or even
sometimes ask him to drink wine with me. He tells me it is against the
rules for the Captain to offer similar courtesies to his guests, but
that if ever I am in Ernskjöldj, near Copenhagen, and if he is not
absent on one of his many voyages, he will gratefully remember and
repay my kindness.

I said to the Captain to-day, putting my hand upon his shoulder, “Sir,
may one speak from one’s heart?” “Yes,” said he, “certainly, and God
bless you for your kind thought.” “Sir,” said I, “you are a strong,
silent, God-fearing man and my heart goes out to you--no more.” He was
silent, and went up on the bridge, but when I attempted to follow him,
he assured me it was not allowed.

Later in the day I asked him what he thought of the Roman trouble. He
answered, “Oh! knock their heads together and have done with it.” It
was a bluff seaman’s answer, but is it not what England would have said
in her greatest days? Is it not the very feeling of a Chatham?

I no longer speak to the First Mate. But in a few days I shall be able
to dismiss the fellow entirely from my memory, so I will not dwell on
his insolence.

  _Leghorn, Oct. 5, 1873._

Here is the end of it. I have nothing more to say. I find that the
public has no need of my services, and that England has suffered a
disastrous rebuff. The fleet has retreated from Apulia. England--let
posterity note this--has not an inch of ground in all the Italian
Peninsula. Well, we are worsted, and we must bide our time; but this I
will say: if that insolent young fool the First Mate thinks that his
family shall protect him he is mistaken. The press is a great power and
never greater than where (as in England) a professor of a university or
the upper classes write for the papers, and where a rule of anonymity
gives talent and position its full weight.[53]




IX.

Lambkin’s Address to the League of Progress


Everybody will remember the famous meeting of the Higher Spinsters
in 1868; a body hitherto purely voluntary in its organisation, it
had undertaken to add to the houses of the poor and wretched the
element which reigns in the residential suburbs of our great towns. If
Whitechapel is more degraded now than it was thirty years ago we must
not altogether disregard the earlier efforts of the Higher Spinsters,
they laboured well each in her own sphere and in death they were not
divided.

The moment however which gave their embryonic conceptions an organic
form did not sound till this year of 1868. It was in the Conference
held at Burford during that summer that, to quote their eloquent
circular, “the ideas were mooted and the feeling was voiced which
made us what we are.” In other words the Higher Spinsters were merged
in the new and greater society of the League of Progress. How much
the League of Progress has done, its final recognition by the County
Council, the sums paid to its organisers and servants I need not here
describe; suffice it to say that, like all our great movements, it
was a spontaneous effort of the upper middle class, that it concerned
itself chiefly with the artisans, whom it desired to raise to its own
level, and that it has so far succeeded as to now possess forty-three
Cloisters in our great towns, each with its Grand Master, Chatelaine,
Corporation of the Burghers of Progress and Lay Brothers, the whole
supported upon salaries suitable to their social rank and proceeding
entirely from voluntary contributions with the exception of that part
of the revenue which is drawn from public funds.

The subject of the Conference, out of which so much was destined to
grow, was “The Tertiary Symptoms of Secondary Education among the Poor.”

Views upon this matter were heard from every possible standpoint; men
of varying religious persuasions from the Scientific Agnostic to the
distant Parsee lent breadth and elasticity to the fascinating subject.
Its chemical aspect was admirably described (with experiments) by Sir
Julius Wobble, the Astronomer Royal, and its theological results by the
Reader in Burmesan.

Lambkin was best known for the simple eloquence in which he could
clothe the most difficult and confused conceptions. It was on this
account that he was asked to give the Closing Address with which the
Proceedings terminated.

Before reciting it I must detain the reader with one fine anecdote
concerning this occasion, a passage worthy of the event and of the man.
Lambkin (as I need hardly say) was full of his subject, enthusiastic
and absorbed. No thought of gain entered his head, nor was he the
kind of man to have applied for payment unless he believed money to
be owing to him. Nevertheless it would have been impossible to leave
unremunerated such work as that which follows. It was decided by the
authorities to pay him a sum drawn from the fees which the visitors had
paid to visit the College Fish-Ponds, whose mediæval use in monkish
times was explained in a popular style by one who shall be nameless,
but who gave his services gratuitously.

After their departure Mr. Large entered Lambkin’s room with an
envelope, wishing to add a personal courtesy to a pleasant duty, and
said:

“I have great pleasure, my dear Lambkin, in presenting you with this
Bank Note as a small acknowledgment of your services at the Conference.”

Lambkin answered at once with:

“My dear Large, I shall be really displeased if you estimate that
slight performance of a pleasurable task at so high a rate as ten
pounds.”

Nor indeed was this the case. For when Lambkin opened the enclosure
(having waited with delicate courtesy for his visitor to leave
the room) he discovered but five pounds therein. But note what
follows--Lambkin neither mentioned the matter to a soul, nor passed
the least stricture upon Large’s future actions, save in those matters
where he found his colleague justly to blame: and in the course of the
several years during which they continually met, the restraint and
self-respect of his character saved him from the use of ignoble weapons
whether of pen or tongue. It was a lesson in gentlemanly irony to see
my friend take his place above Large at high table in the uneasy days
that followed.


  THE ADDRESS

  MY DEAR FRIENDS,

I shall attempt to put before you in a few simple, but I hope
well-chosen words, the views of a plain man upon the great subject
before us to-day. I shall attempt with the greatest care to avoid
any personal offence, but I shall not hesitate to use the knife with
an unsparing hand, as is indeed the duty of the Pastor whosoever he
may be. I remember a late dear friend of mine [who would not wish me
to make his name public but whom you will perhaps recognise in the
founder and builder of the new Cathedral at Isaacsville in Canada[54]].
I remember his saying to me with a merry twinkle of the eye that
looms only from the free manhood of the west: “Lambkin,” said he,
“would you know how I made my large fortune in the space of but three
months, and how I have attained to such dignity and honour? It was by
following this simple maxim which my dear mother[55] taught me in the
rough log-cabin[56] of my birth: ‘Be courteous to all strangers, but
familiar with none.’”[57]

My friends, you are not strangers, nay, on the present solemn occasion
I think I may call you friends--even brethren!--dear brothers and
sisters! But a little bird has told me.... (_Here a genial smile passed
over his face and he drank a draught of pure cold water from a tumbler
at his side._) A little bird has told me, I say, that some of you
feared a trifle of just harshness, a reprimand perhaps, or a warning
note of danger, at the best a doubtful and academic temper as to the
future. Fear nothing. I shall pursue a far different course, and
however courteous I may be I shall indulge in no familiarities.

“The Tertiary symptoms of Secondary Education among the Poor” is
a noble phrase and expresses a noble idea. Why the very words are
drawn from our Anglo-Saxon mother-tongue deftly mingled with a few
expressions borrowed from the old dead language of long-past Greece and
Rome.

What is Education? The derivation of the word answers this question. It
is from “e” that is “out of,” “duc-o” “I lead,” from the root Duc--to
lead, to govern (whence we get so many of our most important words such
as “Duke”; “Duck” = a drake; etc.) and finally the termination “-tio”
which corresponds to the English “-ishness.” We may then put the whole
phrase in simple language thus, “The threefold Showings of twofold
Led-out-of-ishness among the Needy.”

The Needy! The Poor! Terrible words! It has been truly said that
we have them always with us. It is one of our peculiar glories in
nineteenth century England, that we of the upper classes have fully
recognised our heavy responsibility towards our weaker fellow-citizens.
Not by Revolution, which is dangerous and vain, not by heroic
legislation or hair-brained schemes of universal panaceas, not by
frothy Utopias. No!--by solid hard work, by quiet and persistent
effort, with the slow invisible tenacity that won the day at Badajoz,
we have won this great social victory. And if any one should ask me for
the result I should answer him--go to Bolton, go to Manchester, go to
Liverpool; go to Hull or Halifax--the answer is there.

There are many ways in which this good work is proceeding. Life is a
gem of many facets. Some of my friends take refuge in Prayer, others
have joined the Charity Organisation Society, others again have
laboured in a less brilliant but fully as useful a fashion by writing
books upon social statistics which command an enormous circulation. You
have turned to education, and you have done well. Show me a miner or
a stevedore who attends his lectures upon Rossetti, and I will show
you a man. Show me his wife or daughter at a cookery school or engaged
in fretwork, and I will shew you a woman. A man and a woman--solemn
thought!

A noble subject indeed and one to occupy the whole life of a man! This
“Education,” this “Leading-out-of,” is the matter of all our lives here
in Oxford except in the vacation.[58] And what an effect it has! Let me
prove it in a short example.

At a poor lodging-house in Lafayette, Pa., U.S.A., three well-educated
men from New England who had fallen upon evil times were seated at a
table surrounded by a couple of ignorant and superstitious Irishmen;
these poor untaught creatures, presuming upon their numbers, did not
hesitate to call the silent and gentlemanly unfortunates “Dommed
High-faluthing Fules”; but mark the sequel. A fire broke out in the
night. The house was full of these Irishmen and of yet more repulsive
Italians. Some were consumed by the devouring element, others
perished in the flames, others again saved their lives by a cowardly
flight.[59] But what of those three from Massachusetts whom better
principles had guided in youth and with whom philosophy had replaced
the bitter craft of the Priest? They were found--my dear friends--they
were found still seated calmly at the table; they had not moved; no
passion had blinded them, no panic disturbed: in their charred and
blackened features no trace of terror was apparent. Such is the effect,
such the glory of what my late master and guide, the Professor of
Tautology, used to call the “Principle of the Survival of the Fittest.”

(_Applause, which was only checked by a consideration for the respect
due to the Sacred edifice._)

Go forth then! Again I say go forth! Go forth! Go forth! The time is
coming when England will see that your claims to reverence, recognition
and emolument are as great as our own. I repeat it, go forth, and when
you have brought the great bulk of families to change their mental
standpoint, then indeed you will have transformed the world! For
without the mind the human intellect is nothing.




X.

Lambkin’s Leader


Mr. Solomon was ever determined to keep the _Sunday Englishman_ at a
high level. “We owe it” (he would say) “first to the public who are
thereby sacrificed--I mean satisfied--and to ourselves, who secure
thereby a large and increasing circulation.” [“Ourselves” alluded to
the shareholders, for the _Sunday Englishman_ was a limited Company, in
which the shares (of which Mr. Solomon held the greater number) were
distributed in the family; the tiniest toddler of two years old was
remembered, and had been presented with a share by his laughing and
generous parent.]

In this laudable effort to keep “abreast of the times” (as he phrased
it), the Editor and part Proprietor determined to have leaders written
by University men, who from their position of vantage enjoy a unique
experience in practical matters. He had formed a very high opinion
of Lambkin’s journalistic capacity from his unpublished letters as a
special correspondent. Indeed, he was often heard to say that “a man
like him was lost at Oxford, and was born for Fleet Street.” He wrote,
therefore, to Mr. Lambkin and gave him “Carte Blanche,” as one French
scholar to another, sending him only the general directions that his
leader must be “smart, up-to-date, and with plenty of push,” it was to
be “neither too long nor too short,” and while it should be written in
an easy familiar tone, there should be little or no seriously offensive
matter included.

Mr. Lambkin was delighted, and when at his request the article had been
paid for, he sent in the following:

       *       *       *       *       *

THE LEADER.

“The English-Speaking Race has--if we except the Dutch, Negro, and
Irish elements--a marvellous talent for self-government. From the
earliest origins of our Anglo-Saxon forefathers to the latest Parish
Council, guided but not controlled by the modern ‘Mass Thegen’ or local
‘Gesithcund man,’ this talent, or rather genius, is apparent. We cannot
tell why, in the inscrutable designs of Providence, our chosen race
should have been so specially gifted, but certain it is that wherever
plain ordinary men _such as I who write this and you who read it_,[60]
may be planted, there they cause the desert to blossom, and the waters
to gush from the living rock. Who has not known, whether among his
personal acquaintance or from having read of him in books, the type
of man who forms the strength of this mighty national organism? And
who has not felt that he is himself something of that kidney? We stand
aghast at our own extraordinary power, and it has been finely said that
Nelson was greater than he knew. From one end of the earth to the other
the British language is spoken and understood. The very words that I am
writing will be read to-morrow in London, the day after in Oxford--and
from this it is but a step to the uttermost parts of the earth.

“Under these conditions of power, splendour, and domination it is
intolerable that the vast metropolis of this gigantic empire should
be pestered with crawling cabs. There are indeed many things which in
the Divine plan have it in their nature to crawl. We of all the races
of men are the readiest to admit the reign of universal law. Meaner
races know not the law, but we are the children of the law, and where
crawling is part of the Cosmos we submit and quit ourselves like
men, being armed with the armour of righteousness. Thus no Englishman
(whatever foreigners may feel) is offended at a crawling insect or
worm. A wounded hare will crawl, and we Read that ‘the serpent was
cursed and crawled upon his belly’; again, Aristotle in his Ethics
talks of those whose nature (φύσις) it is ‘ἕρπειν,’ which is usually
translated ‘to crawl,’ and Kipling speaks of fifes ‘crawling.’ With

Rhoda looked at him and was able to command a smile. “Excuse me,” she
said politely, “but how many did you say you thought I had concealed in
this buggy?”

“Only one,” the marshal answered curtly. “You can get out if you want
to while we examine it.”

She jumped to the ground and stood by, smiling, while they took out the
rugs and looked under the seat.

Disappointed glances passed from one to another. Evidently, they had
felt sure they would find the missing slave in her buggy. Rhoda took
off her wrap and shook it ostentatiously. “You see, I haven’t got him
concealed about my clothing. You can search my pocket too, if you
like,” she added innocently.

“You’ve beat us this time, young lady,” he responded angrily, “but we
know what your father is up to, and you with him, and we’ll get you
yet.”

She turned upon him with dignity. “May I ask, Mr. Hanscomb, that
you will finish your examination of this little buggy where there is
scarcely room for one, as soon as possible, so that I can go on. I am
on an errand for my father, and I would like to finish it and get home
before dark. Perhaps you would like to look under the horse’s collar
and split open the whip-stock.”

The marshal flushed with annoyance. “All right. You can go on now. But
you’d better be careful about taking in any more niggers.”

She drove slowly on up the hill and they brought their horses’ heads
together for a conference. She was trembling with anxiety lest it might
occur to them to search the woodland on the west of the road, and she
wanted to know what they were going to do before she would have to pass
out of sight down the other side of the hill. To gain time she dropped
her whip, and jumped out to get it. Then she adjusted a buckle in the
harness and examined a thill strap. A stolen glance let her see that
they were starting back toward the town.

But now a new anxiety filled her. Did they know of the cave? Would they
think of it as a possible hiding place? The cave was such a little
one,--it was of no interest to any one but children--perhaps they had
never heard of it, or had forgotten it if they had. She longed to look
around and see if they stopped, but she feared to show interest in
their movements, lest she might renew their suspicions. Had the boy
left footprints as he ran from the buggy to the fence? She tried to
remember whether the ground there was hard or muddy, but could recall
nothing. In an agony of apprehension she reached the top of the hill
and started down the descent.

“I must know, whatever happens,” she presently said to herself.
Stopping the horse she sprang out and ran back a little way, to
where her eyes could command the opposite hill. The horsemen were
disappearing over its crest. Her knees were shaking as she hurried back
to the buggy, but she pulled herself together and considered what would
be the best plan to get the fugitive out of the cave and on to the next
station. For she feared to go back openly now, lest some member of the
marshal’s party might return. A little farther on, she remembered,
was a cross way and striking off from this, a short distance to the
westward, an old wood road which ended near the cave. “It used to be
there,” she thought anxiously, “but I haven’t been down it since--oh, I
don’t know when! I’ll have to take chances on its being there yet.”

But on the cross road she met farmer Gilbertson, in a big, deep-bedded
wagon filled with a load of loose hay. She told him of her narrow
escape.

“You better drive in and get him in your little buggy,” he advised,
“and I’ll wait out here and take him home with me, under the hay. It’ll
be safe enough--this road ain’t traveled much.”

It was not long until Rhoda was driving homeward again, deep joy in her
heart that the fugitive had escaped such imminent danger, but wondering
much how the marshal had discovered the secret of their woodshed.




CHAPTER XVI


When Mrs. Ware reached home that afternoon she found Marshal Hanscomb
and his men, baffled and angry, completing their search of the house.

“Mr. Hanscomb, what does this mean?” she demanded.

“It means that runaway niggers have been making a hiding place of your
house and that we’ve been barely too late to catch one.”

“I assure you, Mr. Hanscomb, that nothing of the sort has been going
on in my house. Dr. Ware’s sympathies, it is true, are with the
anti-slavery cause, but he is not a nigger-stealer.”

“If you think so, madam,”--there was the hint of a sneer in his
tone--“you’d better go out to the woodshed and look at that room built
into the middle of your woodpile and see how lately it’s been occupied.”

She turned upon him a face of offended dignity. Her small, plump
figure, in its balloon-like skirt, stiffened with a haughtiness
which impressed even the angry marshal. “I trust, sir, that you have
satisfied yourself there is no one concealed in the house or on the
premises.”

“We have, madam, for the present. We happened to be a few minutes too
late.”

“Then I will bid you good-evenin’.” With a stately nod she left him,
going at once to her own room, behind whose closed door she remained
until her husband’s return.

Rhoda and her father, coming from opposite directions, drove up to
their east gate at the same moment, in the red glow of a March sunset.
She told him hurriedly of the happenings of the afternoon and of the
narrow chance by which she had finally saved the mulatto lad from
recapture. At the veranda steps Jim met them, with an excited account
of the marshal’s visit and his search of the house. He evidently knew
of the woodshed hiding place, the man said, for he went to it at once.

“Was any one at home?”

“No, sah, nobody but Lizzie and me. But Mrs. Ware, she done come before
they leave.”

“Then she knows now,” Rhoda told herself. “Oh, to think she had to find
it out that way!”

They walked silently down the veranda, avoiding each other’s eyes,
and entered at the front door. Mrs. Ware was coming down the stairs.
Rhoda stopped short, but her father walked swiftly past her and held
out his hand to his wife. She could not see his face, but the look
on her mother’s countenance stabbed her to the heart. In it the girl
read resentful inquiry, wounded faith, reproachful love. They seemed
oblivious of her, as Mrs. Ware stood looking into her husband’s face
with that hurt look upon her own. She did not take the hand he held
out. Then Rhoda saw him sweep her close to his side and heard him say
in a choking voice, “Come, Emily!” He led her into the living-room and
closed the door.

What passed between them there Rhoda never knew--what confessions
of outraged rights, what heart-barings of living tenderness, what
recognitions of inner imperatives, what renewals of the bonds of love
and trust. She crouched where she had dropped on the stair step,
miserably conscious that this was the climax of the estrangement
over her between her father and mother, feeling keenly that it had
been her mother’s right to know the use that was being made of her
home, appreciating her father’s motive in wishing to keep it hidden,
remorseful for the wound her share in it would deal her mother’s heart,
but unable to give up one jot of her conviction that what she and her
father had been doing had been demanded of them by the highest laws of
God and the most sacred rights of man.

In a jumble of thought and feeling, swept by waves of passionate
sympathy and compassion for both of the two within that closed door,
Rhoda sat huddled on the stairs until her mother came out. “Mother!”
she called, springing up and holding out her hands.

Mrs. Ware came up and took them, saying simply, “How cold they are,
honey!” and pressed them to her breast. In the dim light the girl could
see that her face was very pale but that her eyes were shining with
calm happiness.

“Oh, mother! We both felt that you ought to know about it--”

“It’s all right, dear child. I would rather your father had confided in
me from the first--”

“It wasn’t that he doubted you, mother! Oh, don’t think that! He knew
you would be loyal to him--but he thought it might give you pain to
know--”

“Yes, honey, I understand--I appreciate all that. But don’t you see,
dear, I would have liked to be trusted by my husband, even if it had
hurt--a little?”

“It was your right to know, mother.”

“Perhaps I don’t think so much about that as you would, Rhoda, but--a
woman who loves needs to feel that she is trusted as well as loved.
But it’s all right now. I know how you and your father feel about it,
that you are doing only what seems to you right, although to me, dear
child, it seems very wrong. I don’t want to know any more about it than
I must, and you mustn’t expect me to help you in the least, but not for
the world, dearie, would I hinder you and your father from doing what
you think is right.”

Rhoda bowed her head upon her mother’s shoulder whispering, “Dear
mother!”

“Your father and I understand each other better now,” Mrs. Ware went
on in tender tones. “There has been some misunderstanding between us
about you and Jeff, but this has cleared it all up, and so I am glad
it happened. He has promised me that he will not try to influence you
in any way against marrying Jeff. So you see now, dearie, that it is
possible, after all, for husband and wife to live together in love and
trust and happiness, even though they do hold opposite opinions about
slavery!”

There was a sound of quick, light footsteps across the veranda and
Charlotte came in breezily, cheeks glowing and eyes sparkling. “What’s
the matter?” she exclaimed. “What’s happened?” Then sudden recollection
came to her of what probably had happened and of her own share in it,
and a look of confusion crossed her face. Rhoda saw it and instant
suspicion was born in her mind that here was the medium through which
information had reached the marshal.

“Sister, was it you?” she asked on the impulse, her tone gentle but
reproachful.

“Was what me?” Charlotte flared back.

“I think you know what I mean.”

Dr. Ware had come out of the living-room and was standing in the
doorway. Charlotte threw at him a coaxing, appealing glance.

“You’d better tell the truth about it, Charlotte,” he responded. The
girl shrank back a little at his tone and something of surprise crossed
her face. Never before had he spoken to her with so near an approach
to sternness. His large, calm eyes were upon her, dispassionate but
disapproving. She could not withstand their compulsion.

“Well, then, I did,” she exclaimed defiantly, tossing her head as she
took a step forward. “And I think I did no more than was right and I’m
glad I did it. When people are disobeying the laws and are criminals,
even if they are your own people--”

“There, child, that will do,” her father interrupted, lifting an
admonishing hand. “Remember, please, that you are only eighteen, and
that your father is in no need of moral instruction at your hands. I
understand how you feel about this question and I am perfectly willing
for you to believe as seems to you right. I expect you to grant the
same privilege to me and to every other member of my family. And as
long as you live under your father’s roof, my daughter, he has the
right also to expect from you loyalty to his interests. Do you think I
shall have it hereafter?”

Charlotte burst into tears. In all her saucy little life no one had
ever spoken to her with such severity. “I only told Billy Saunders,”
she sobbed, “and I told him not to tell!”

Instantly her father was beside her, patting her shoulder, an arm
about her waist. “There, there!” he soothed. “I didn’t suppose you
realized what you were doing. As it happened, no great harm came of it.
Just remember, after this, that it is not your duty to sit in judgment
on my actions. Then we shall all move along as happily as ever.”

When Rhoda went to her room and her eyes fell upon her writing table,
sudden misgiving caught her breath. She had not stopped to make it
tidy, after her letter-writing in the morning, because of her hurried
departure for the sewing circle, and its unaccustomed disorder brought
sharply to her mind the letter she had written. And that other
sheet--had she destroyed it, as she meant to do? She looked the table
over hastily, shuffling the clean sheets of paper in her hand. “How
silly!” she thought. “Of course I destroyed it! I remember, I picked up
several sheets together that I didn’t want, and burned them, and that
was among them!”

Still, for a moment, the uneasy fear persisted that perhaps she had put
it into her letter. She burned with shame at the thought that her lover
might read those words. Then with a sudden vault her mind faced about
and she felt herself almost exulting that at last he might know how
much she cared, that at last, in spite of herself she had surrendered.

“If I did send it,” she thought as she sat at her window, in the dark,
“he will come and I shall have to give up.”

Her mother’s words recurred to her: “You see that it is possible for
husband and wife to live together in love and trust and happiness, even
though they do hold opposite opinions about slavery.” They would be
happy--ah, no doubt about that! And perhaps, if they were married and
constantly together, she could make Jeff see the wrongs of slavery.
She could point out to him specific instances of injustice and rouse
that side of his conscience which now seemed to be dead. He had such
a fine, noble nature in all other things--it was only because he had
been brought up in this belief and had always been accustomed to taking
slavery for granted. With his great love for her she would surely be
able to exert some influence over him, and she would use it all to one
end.

She knew of other men who had been slaveholders but, becoming convinced
that it was wrong, had freed their slaves and joined the anti-slavery
ranks. Some, even, worked with the Underground Railroad. What a
splendid thing it would be if she could win him over to the side of
liberty! For such a result, she told herself, she would be willing to
crucify her conscience for a little while and be a part of the thing
she abhorred.

She slept that night with a smile on her face and when she wakened in
the morning her first consciousness was of an unusual lightness and
happiness in her heart. Then she remembered, and flushed to her brows.

“But it was all true,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to send it, and
I’m sure I didn’t. But I--almost--wish I had.”




CHAPTER XVII


When Jefferson Delavan received the mail containing the three letters
from Hillside his lover’s eye saw at once the envelope bearing the
handwriting of Rhoda Ware. Everything else was pushed aside and this
was hastily torn open. He turned the sheets over and swept them with
a hungry look, as though he would devour all their contents at one
glance. And so it happened that before he had read another line his
eyes fell upon the page on which she had poured out her heart, which
she thought she had burned--but almost wished she had not.

He had to read it twice before he could believe that his eyes were
not playing him some trick. Then he sprang up joyously, with a great
light in his face, and ordered his horse. The rest of his mail, even
to Rhoda’s letter, was thrust into his pocket, while he made ready for
immediate journey. Slaves went scurrying hither and thither, urged to
unaccustomed speed by their master’s impetuous commands, and in less
than half an hour he was in his saddle.

He struck across the country on the turnpike road straight for the
Kentucky shore of the Ohio river opposite Hillside. Quicker time
might have been possible by the more roundabout route by railroad to
Cincinnati, but his only thought was that thus he was headed directly
toward the white house on the hill.

He galloped his horse for an hour or two before he remembered that
it would be the part of wisdom not to take too much out of it at the
start, laughed aloud as he slowed down, slapped its neck in sheer joy,
and sang lustily the tale of “Lord Lovell.” Then he remembered, that
he had not read the whole of Rhoda’s letter. He drew it forth, and was
reminded in so doing that he had other letters in his pocket. But they
could wait. He plunged into hers and read it eagerly through, dropping
the bridle and allowing his horse to take a slower pace. Now and then
he smiled or gave a little, tender laugh, as he came upon a mirthful
sally, or again he frowned thoughtfully and shook his head at her
argument. And presently he was staring in bewilderment at the closing
paragraph with its denial of his suit. His heart sank as he hastily
searched out the other sheet for reassurance. Yes, there it was, and
there could be no mistaking the longing call of her heart that spoke so
piteously through its brief lines.

“This other, she wrote with her head,” he told himself, “and then
her heart gave up and made her write this. Ah, the dear, dear girl!
It’s like her to surrender like this, so completely, and even against
herself when she lets her heart get the upper hand. Oh, my arms will
be all the tying she’ll need, and there’ll be kisses enough to stop her
mouth as long as we live!”

With a caressing touch he put the missive away in an inner pocket
and urged his horse on again, smiling and humming softly. At last he
recalled the other letters. Mrs. Ware’s he read first and found in it
confirmation of the view he had already taken of Rhoda’s surprising
message. The girl was evidently longing for sight of him once more, her
mother said, and if he were to come soon perhaps he could storm her
stubborn heart. He laughed again and exclaimed aloud, “Yes, indeed, I’m
coming, and if there’s any more storming necessary--” and the sentence
broke off into another exultant laugh.

Then he bethought him of the other letter. It was without date line or
signature and with puzzled eyes he read its few lines, in the middle of
the page: “When true hearts pine and gallants stay away, then what can
ladies do? Alas the day, they can but pine when cruel gallants come no
more!”

He looked the sheet all over and examined the envelope inside and out
to find some clue to its authorship. But there was not the least sign,
and the postmark was indistinct. It was written upon the same kind of
paper and inclosed in the same kind of envelope as Rhoda always used,
but the handwriting was not Rhoda’s, and it seemed so unlike her to
send such an indirect, silly little message that he said at once, “No,
it’s not from Rhoda.” But who could there be among his friends or
acquaintance likely to take such interest in his courtship, of which so
few of them knew, and send him this sort of romantic hint? Of course,
it might be from some friend of Rhoda’s in whom she had confided.

“It must be that little rogue of a Charlotte!” he presently exclaimed.
“She has sharp eyes in her head, that’s plain enough, always, and she
has seen how it is with her sister and thought she might help things
along by giving me a hint. Bless her heart! She’s a dear little thing,
if she does like to flirt, and after Rhoda and I are married we’ll
bring her down to Fairmount and give her the best time she’s had in all
her life and perhaps marry her to Lloyd Corey or Frank Morehead.”

While this was not the outcome of her anonymous message which Charlotte
hoped to bring about when she penned it, she would perhaps have been
as willing to accept it, had her thoughts ranged so far ahead, as the
one she planned to compass. Nor would she have been taken aback had
she known, while she fluttered about on the tiptoe of expectancy for
whatever might happen, with what ardor Jefferson Delavan’s thoughts
were turning toward Rhoda on his northward ride.

If her missive induced him to come again to their house what did it
matter whether he thought its words referred to Rhoda or to some one
else? Since Rhoda was determined she would not marry him, he would
soon find out his mistake and would be quite willing to look for
consolation elsewhere. Had he not shown her every attention on the trip
to Cincinnati? And when had she failed to set a man’s heart aflame, if
she had really wanted to witness the conflagration? Let her once more
have the opportunity--and she smiled at the brown eyes reflected back
from her mirror, confident that they had lost none of their power.

He would be able to reach the Ohio river by the morrow’s night, Delavan
thought, and the next morning he would cross over and hasten up the
hill to claim the sweet promise that beckoned to him from that glimpse
of Rhoda’s secret heart. As he mused over her words, and the wonder of
it that she should at last have called him, it occurred to him that
perhaps she had not meant to put that sheet into her letter. Perhaps
she had merely written down that revelation of her feelings as ease to
her own aching heart. But he laughed joyously.

“She’s let me know how it is with her, whether she meant to send it or
not, and I’ll do just as she begs me to, this time!”

And so he urged his horse onward, his glowing heart beating high in
his breast, sure of the happiness waiting for him at the end of his
journey, and counting off the lessening hours that lay between him and
the banks of the river. But that night there came a violent rainstorm
that carried away bridges and left swollen streams rushing through
overflowed valleys. It delayed him two days, so that it was not until
the sixth day after Rhoda penned her letter that he reached Hillside.

And in the meantime the Supreme Court had announced its decision in
the Dred Scott case, delighting the South, staggering the North, and
fanning to still higher and hotter flame the fires of contention over
the ever-burning question of slavery. Jefferson Delavan heard the news
as he fumed over his delay, storm-bound in the hotel of a country
town. He and half a dozen other slave owners from the town and near-by
plantations, who dropped into the hotel during the evening, rejoiced
over the victory as they sat around a bowl of punch.

“This will put an end to the whole controversy and give the country
peace at last,” said Delavan.

“It knocks the feet from under the Republican party,” declared another.
“They’ll be capable of no more mischief now!”

“Yes, gentlemen,” exclaimed a third, “it surely ties the hands of the
northern fanatics. They can no longer stop our growth!”

“Under the protection of this decision,” Delavan followed on, “we can
take our slaves wherever we like, and, with the northern Democracy
becoming more and more favorable to us, we shall soon win back the
ground we have lost!”

“Nor will our growth be all in that direction!” said another, slowly
and significantly.

“No, indeed!” was Delavan’s quick response. “Mexico and Central America
will be ours for the taking as soon as we realize our strength.
Gentlemen!” He sprang to his feet, his face glowing with enthusiasm,
his glass held high. “Gentlemen, I give you a toast: To the Republic of
the South, our own fair Land of Dixie, firm footed on the foundation of
slavery, and spreading wide wings North, South, East and West; her day
shall come soon and endure forever!”

With shouts of approval the others were on their feet at once, drinking
the toast, cheering the sentiment, and waving hats, pipes, glasses,
whatever their hands could seize. And no ghost of a misgiving visited
Jefferson Delavan, in the midst of their exultant rejoicing, as to how
that decision might affect his personal fate.

To Rhoda Ware, as she looked back upon them, the days following that of
her adventure with the negro lad were like a beautiful dream. After her
one moment of apprehension she did not believe that she had put into
her letter the telltale sheet whereon she had poured out her heart.
She was sure she had burned it. But that instant of anxious fear that
her lover would read her confession had given to her traitor heart its
opportunity. In the brief respite of secret rejoicing she had allowed
it to take, it had leaped to the saddle and it would not give up again
to her mind and conscience the right of command. So she submitted to
the sway of her love and battled with it no more.

“He will know--he will feel it, even though I didn’t send what I
wrote,” she whispered to herself. “And if he doesn’t come soon, I will
write to him--and tell him--yes, I’ll tell him to come!”

She spent much time alone in her room, seated at a southern window that
commanded a view of the street leading up from the steamboat landing,
the little bundle of letters and the faded rose held caressingly in her
hands. It happened that no fugitives came to their door during this
time, or she might have suffered sudden awakening from her dream.

As it was, she thought of nothing but the coming of her lover and her
surrender to his suit. Now and then her reverie strayed on into the
future and she pictured their life together in Jeff’s beautiful home at
Fairmount, with the slaves all freed and giving faithful service for
wages. Staying so much apart and living in her own rose-colored dreams,
the strenuous enthusiasms of the recent months, even her immediate
surroundings, seemed to lose their reality. The same emotional force
in her character which enabled her to enter with such zeal into the
anti-slavery work and to be so absorbed by it that she could sacrifice
her love upon its altar made it possible now,--indeed, made it
inevitable,--when she had once given up to the opposing influence, that
she should be swept by its forceful current to the other extreme.

A new expression came into her face. Her dreams drew a soft and tender
veil across the usually intent and serious look of her eyes, and all
her countenance glowed with her inner happiness. Her mother saw the
change in expression and demeanor with inward delight. For when it
came to the affections Mrs. Ware was able to interpret her daughter’s
feelings and actions with more surety than in matters of the mind and
conscience.

Charlotte, in whose heart rankled resentment against her father and
sister for their anti-slavery views, their Underground work, and
the reproach that had been administered to her, noted the new look
on Rhoda’s face and said bitterly to herself: “Yes, I suppose she’s
getting hold of a whole pack of niggers to steal and send on to
Canada!” She told herself petulantly that she was no longer of any
consequence in their home and began to feel an angry sense of injury
at the bonds tacitly imposed upon her conduct by the ideas and actions
of her father and sister. She longed for some happening that would
take her away and put her into surroundings where she could feel her
accustomed sense of freedom and personal importance.

And so, the wish being father to the conviction, Charlotte felt every
day more and more sure that Jefferson Delavan would soon reappear,
that Rhoda would refuse him again, and that then she could capture
his repulsed heart and speedily win from him a proposal of marriage.
She would hold him off a little while, and make him all the more
eager--that would be easy enough--and when at last she did consent, he
would of course want an early marriage, and to that, too, she would
reluctantly consent--“Oh, the sooner the better,” her thoughts broke
into sudden storm, “so that I can get away from this black abolition
hole!”

Dr. Ware observed with surprise the look upon his daughter’s face and
the change in her manner. He felt the lessening of her ardor in their
mutual interests and was not slow to attribute her silence, her drawing
away from the life of the household and her self-absorbed, dreamlike
demeanor to its true cause.

“Something has happened,” he said to himself, “that, for the time
being, has made her give up the struggle against her heart, and,
like a river that has burst through its dam, her love is overflowing
everything else in her nature. Well, I’m glad Delavan isn’t here now,
and I hope her conscience will get its head above water again before
she sees him. The good Lord grant that something happens to bring her
back to herself before it’s too late!”

But he said nothing to his daughter, faithfully observing the pledge
he had made to his wife at their recent reconciliation. Nor did he and
Mrs. Ware speak to each other about it, although it was uppermost in
both their thoughts. The renewed tenderness between them was too sacred
for either to dare the risk of marring its bloom by even so much as an
allusion to a subject upon which they were so widely divided.

On the fourth day of her surrender Rhoda sat at her window reading
a letter from her friend, Julia Hammerton. Her active spirit was
beginning to bestir itself again and as she finished the epistle she
stretched her arms above her head and with a little frown remembered
that she had that morning neglected one of her usual duties. Then,
“Dear me,” she exclaimed, “I’ve forgotten all about that for-- Oh, it
must be several days! I suppose mother has attended to it,” she rebuked
herself, and then smiled tenderly at the sunshine which filled all her
inner consciousness.

“I’ve been very happy, these days,” she thought, “but I’m afraid I’ve
been awfully lazy and selfish too. I must go down now and get to work.”

She looked out of the window and saw Horace Hardaker and the elder
Kimball, father of Walter and Lewis, coming up the hill. Her thought
reverted to the missive from Horace’s sister.

“I’ll take Julia’s letter down and read it to them. There’s such a lot
of news from Kansas in it that will interest them. Dear Julia! Horace
ought to be proud of her--and he is, I know. She’s been so brave and so
true!”

The hint of a shadow crossed her face as she looked absently at the
letter in her hand. From somewhere far back in her mind seemed to come
a faint question, Had she also been true? But she lifted her head
proudly with the quick answering thought:

“Of course I am true. I shall not change my convictions the least
little bit, even if I do marry Jeff. And perhaps I can do more good as
his wife than I could in any other way.”

“As the mistress of slaves!” came back the accusing whisper.

In the office she found her father and the two others deeply engrossed
in conversation, their looks anxious and gloomy, but their manner
showing excitement.

“Come in, Rhoda,” said Dr. Ware, as she hesitated at the door, “and
hear the bad news.”

“Bad news! Oh, father, what is it?”

“The Supreme Court has decided the Dred Scott case and the result is
even worse than we have feared. Chief Justice Taney has dragged his
official robes through slavery filth and given to the pro-slaveryites
everything they want!”

“Oh, father--Horace! What does he say?”

“The decision is,” answered Hardaker, “that a slave cannot be a
citizen--practically, that a nigger has no rights a white man is
bound to respect--that Congress has no right to prohibit slavery
in the territories, and that therefore the Missouri Compromise is
unconstitutional and void.”

“It knocks the very breath out of the Republican party,” added Dr.
Ware. “Its existence is based on the effort to get Congress to forbid
slavery in the territories. So, now--where is it? Where are we?”

“We are done for, all of us,” said Kimball, in hopeless tones. “It
has knocked the footing from under the whole anti-slavery fight. It
binds us hand and foot, and it looks now as if we might as well stop
fighting.”

“Oh, no, Mr. Kimball!” Rhoda exclaimed. “Don’t say that! We must keep
on fighting as long as there’s one of us left!”

“She’s right, Kimball!” said Dr. Ware, his glance resting for a moment
upon his daughter’s face. She looked up in some confusion at having
broken in so abruptly, and met his eyes. Cool and clear, they seemed to
be looking into her very heart and down in their gray depths as they
turned away she felt rather than saw a gleam of gratification. The
hot blood flushed her face, and conscience, that had just now barely
stirred under its rose-leaf coverlet, roused and began to tell her that
she too must keep on fighting. Had her father guessed how near she had
been to deserting their cause, she wondered.

“Yet, she’s right,” Dr. Ware was repeating, with a thump of his fist on
the table. “We’ve got to find standing ground somewhere, and somehow
keep up the fight!”

“Their next step will be to reopen the slave trade--they’re demanding
that already,” Kimball went on. “And then we shall have once more all
the horrors of the slave ships sheltered under the law and people
taught to regard the traffic as right because it is legal.”

“Yes,” broke in Hardaker, “that’s the worst of these legalized
wrongs--the way they debauch the consciences of people. Look at the way
the northern Democrats are defending the right of property in slaves! A
few years ago they admitted slavery was wrong, but said it was here and
so we must make the best of it. Now they say it is all right and must
be protected and are tumbling over one another in their eagerness to
give the South everything she wants!”

“Well, this decision gives her everything she wants now, and opens the
door for her to take anything else she may want later.”

Kimball’s thin old hands were clenched together and his gray-bearded
face was sad with the hopelessness of age. For thirty years he had
been fighting with all his strength in the cause of the slave and he
had seen the anti-slavery sentiment grow from the conviction of a mere
handful of people to the determination of a mighty multitude. And now,
when at last it seemed as if they had almost reached the point where
at least the thing could be penned up in small space and its political
power taken from it, now had come this deadly blow, to nullify every
effort they could make.

Rhoda knew what long years of endeavor and sacrifice he had spent
in the anti-slavery cause and how ardent had been his hope that he
might live to see slavery ended and the whole country made free. She
watched him now, her cheeks flushing and her heart responding with full
sympathy to the grief and despair that filled his breast.

“If Congress,” he went on bitterly, “must recognize and defend the
master’s right to his slave wherever he takes him, then there can be no
hindrance to slavery in any part of this country, and Toombs and Davis
and all the rest of them can yet call the roll of their slaves in the
shadow of Bunker Hill monument, or any place else they wish. That, my
friends, is what this decision means!”

His voice trembled and Rhoda saw in his eyes the tears of an old
man whose dearest hope had come to naught. She was conscious of a
remorseful shame, as though she herself had been in some measure
responsible for his grief and despair. For had she not, was her swift,
self-accusing thought, been ready to compromise with this monster?

“No, no, Mr. Kimball, you mustn’t give up like that,” Hardaker was
exclaiming, “not while there’s one of us left to die fighting. And the
election last fall showed that there are more than a million of us, who
at least are ready to help. Rhoda’s got the right idea,” and he looked
at her with smiling approval.

Again she blushed and turned her eyes away, feeling acutely that she
did not deserve this praise and miserably wondering if they would
despise her were she to tell them that she had been willing, only an
hour before, to become a slaveholder’s wife.

“It seem to me,” Horace went on, “that we’ve got to go right on with
the popular propaganda against slavery. Why, this very decision of
Chief Justice Taney--it’s so atrocious and inhuman, it will be the
best campaign document we’ve ever had. We ought to circulate it by the
thousand! I’m not sure, friends, but it will be a good thing for us, in
the long run!”

Dr. Ware smiled slightly. He was accustomed to the enthusiasm with
which Hardaker, in a dozen sentences, could convince himself of the
truth of a proposition which, five minutes before, he would have
flouted. Nevertheless, this idea appealed to him.

“There’s a good deal in that, Horace,” he acquiesced, “and I think we’d
better take it up in the Rocky Mountain Club. But while we’re appealing
to the northern voters we mustn’t forget the South. We must extend and
increase our Underground work, because it is making slave property most
precarious all along the border states. The more slaves we can run off
the more uncertain the whole institution becomes, and the more angry we
make the South--and there’s nothing irritates them so much as this--the
sooner the crisis will come. War is the only possible solution of
this problem, friends. So I say, let’s bring on the crisis as soon as
possible, and fight it out!”

At that moment there was a knock at the office door and a request for
Dr. Ware’s services in another part of the town. The two visitors went
down the hill again and Rhoda, invited by the bright sunshine, strolled
down the veranda and across the yard to the grape arbor. She wanted to
be alone and think matters over, find where she stood and allay the
turmoil between her heart and her conscience.

As she walked down the path she saw that Jim was already making
preparations for the spring. This great bed was to be filled again with
white petunias--they had liked it so much last year. Again she seemed
to sense their odor, as on that June night, and to hear a voice vibrant
with tones of love. No, she could not think here,--her heart would
not let her. She turned away and hurried to her room. But there too
every inch of space was like a seductive voice calling to her with the
memories of the last few days. With a sudden grip upon herself--a quick
indrawing of breath and a pressure of teeth upon her lip, the outward
signs of inner process of taking herself in hand--she went deliberately
downstairs and out into the woodshed.

There she sat down upon a chunk of wood and faced the little room, with
its door heedlessly exposed and open, just as the marshal had left it.
The sight stung her, as she had known it would, with an accusation of
apostasy. But her spirit rose up quickly in self-defense.

“No, I didn’t desert our cause, even in thought,” she declared to
herself. “I’m not so bad as that, I hope. I only thought I could marry
Jeff and still help it along. But I’m afraid I couldn’t. Yes, I know
what mother said, and for a little while it did seem possible--just
because I wanted it so much, I suppose. But mother and I are so
different. I couldn’t be in the midst of things that I thought were
wrong without trying to make them right. Jeff would free his slaves if
I asked him to--I’m sure he would.”

She lingered over the thought a moment and a fond smile curved her
lips. “Yes, I’m sure he would, and I wouldn’t have to be a mistress
of slaves. But that isn’t the whole of it. He told me once, and it’s
been in all his letters, how wrapped up he is in the interests of the
South. And that means slavery. It’s his own section and what they think
are their rights, against all the rest of us and against freedom, and
eternal right, and the upward progress of the world. We’d still be
just as much divided and opposed to each other as ever.”

The memory returned to her of her father sitting at his desk, his face
drawn with sadness and sadness in his voice, as she had seen him on
that evening in the previous autumn when she had asked if her mother
could not be told what they were doing. She shivered a little.

“No, I shouldn’t like to think of my husband feeling like that, knowing
that he couldn’t tell me of his dearest hopes and plans and ambitions,
and feel sure of my sympathy. No, that wouldn’t be being married,
really married.”

A little longer she sat with her chin in her hand and stared at
the open door of the tiny room. Her face gradually took on a stern
expression that made it, notwithstanding its youthful smoothness,
curiously like her father’s.

“No,” she said aloud as she rose, “it can’t be. It’s just as impossible
still as it has been all the time--even if I did think for a little
while--”

Her face suddenly melted into tenderness and her voice sank to a
whisper. “It was a lovely dream while it lasted, and I’m glad--it
didn’t do anybody, not even me, any harm, and I’m glad--yes, I’m
glad--I had it!” The little lines at the corners of her mouth deepened,
her upper lip lifted, and her flashing smile lit up her countenance
and shone in her eyes. “It’s almost like looking back on having been
married for a little while!” she thought.




CHAPTER XVIII


“Rhoda,” called Mrs. Ware from the veranda steps, “will you come here,
please?”

Rhoda was standing between the rows of lilac that hedged the walk to
the front gate, inspecting the swelling buds and saying to herself
with pleasure that they looked as if they would bloom early that year.
The lilac was her best-loved flower and these two lines of bushes had
been planted because of her pleading, ten years before. Every season
she watched anxiously for the buds to show sign of returning life, and
Charlotte declared that after they began to swell she measured them
with a tape line every day to mark their growth. When they bloomed she
kept bowls of the flowers all over the house and was rarely without a
spray in her hair or her dress.

Mrs. Ware noted that her daughter’s step was not as brisk as usual and
saw that the glow was gone from her face, while into her eyes had come
a look of wistfulness. Believing she knew the cause, she longed to take
the girl in her arms and say, “Don’t worry, dear. He’ll be here soon,
I’m sure, for I wrote to him to come.” But she thought it best to keep
her own secrets and so what she said was:

“Mrs. Winston has just sent word that little Harriet is worse and she
wants your father to come at once. He’s not likely to be back here
before noon. So I want you to drive me over to their house and then
take the message to your father--I know where he is--so he can stop
there before he comes home. Get ready at once, honey. I’ve told Jim to
harness up, and I’ve only to put on my bonnet.”

Charlotte watched them as they drove down the hill, thinking
discontentedly, “Mother doesn’t care half as much about me as she does
about Rhoda. She’d just give her eyes to have Rhoda marry Jeff, and she
never shows the least interest that way in me. I don’t believe she’d
care if I was to be an old maid. An old maid! Oh, la! Well, I’m not
going to, and I’ll not marry anybody in Hillside, either.”

Looking rather pleased with herself at this ultimatum she sauntered
into the house and the notes of the “Battle of Prague” were soon
resounding through the silent rooms. But the clanging of the knocker at
the front door presently crashed them into discord. A moment later she
crossed the hall into the parlor, whither Lizzie had shown Jefferson
Delavan, thinking:

“What good luck there’s nobody at home but me! I wish Rhoda had refused
him again first. Well, I’ll tell him she’s going to.”

A twinkle of amusement came now and then into Delavan’s eyes as he
watched the airs and graces, the sidelong glances, and all the dainty
feminine tricks of movement and gesture and poise with which Charlotte
accompanied her conversation. It was not her physical habit ever to
remain quietly seated, or even in the same position for more than a
few minutes. Her restless spirits, her active body and her native
vivacity of manner combined to keep her in motion almost as incessant
and quite as unconscious as that of a bird flitting about in a tree.
Although she did not know it this habit was one of her most charming
characteristics. She had a certain dignity of carriage, like her
mother’s, which made itself manifest, notwithstanding her absurdly
large hoopskirt, and this, with her grace of action and of posture,
made her movements always pleasing to look at, while her bird-like
flights gave an elusiveness to her manner that enhanced her charm.

She saw the admiration in Delavan’s face as his eyes followed her, and
tilted her skirts in a way that would have scandalized her mother,
although she observed that her companion seemed not at all dismayed by
the glimpses of slender foot and ankle that she made possible. That
occasional twinkle of amusement she took as a tribute to her gaiety and
laughed and chattered all the more.

“Has your true heart been pining, Miss Charlotte?” he presently asked
in a quizzical tone, as he leaned upon the back of her chair, looking
down smilingly into her pretty, upturned face.

She flushed a little, but made wide eyes at him and said, “What do you
mean?”

“Oh, I was given to understand that some hearts in Hillside are in a
rather bad way. Is yours true and does it pine?”

She made a graceful little gesture and turned upon him with a merry
face and a look distinctly provocative: “Suppose it was, either or
both, what would it matter to you?”

She looked up at him, smiling, with saucy lips and inviting eyes, and
before she knew what he was doing he had slipped an arm around her
waist and lifted her to her feet. She struggled to free herself, but
he held her against his breast, pushed back her head and kissed her
squarely upon the lips, once, twice, and thrice. With her hands against
his chest she tried to push him away and struggled to turn her face
from his. But she was helpless in his grasp until he released her.

“You brute!” she exclaimed, dashing the angry tears from her eyes. “How
dare you!”

He leaned against the back of the chair, hand in pocket, and laughed
indulgently. “Didn’t you want me to? It looked that way.”

“Of course I didn’t,” she stormed. “You’re a horrid thing, and I hate
you!”

“Well, I’m glad to know you didn’t. It’s much better that you were only
pretending.”

“How do you think Rhoda will take it, when I tell her? And I shall!”

“Oh, tell her if you like. But how do _you_ think she will take your
trying to persuade a kiss from her lover?”

Her eyes blazed angrily and she stamped her foot, but said nothing.

“Never mind, little sister,” he went on, patting her shoulder. “I was
only giving you a lesson, and it’s much better to keep such things in
the family. Remember after this that if you ask a man so plainly to
kiss you he’s very likely to do it.”

“Don’t call me ‘sister,’ you horrid thing! I’m not!” she exclaimed,
turning away.

“I hope you will be some day.”

“I won’t! Rhoda isn’t going to marry you!”

“So she’s told me a number of times!” and he laughed again, an easy,
happy, self-satisfied laugh.

She faced about, curiosity in her heart. Had something happened without
her knowledge? Would he seem so sure, would he wear openly that look
of confident love if Rhoda had not accepted him? The imp of mischief
stirred once more in her breast. She moved a step nearer.

“Say, do you know, Jeff, that’s the first time a man ever kissed me!”

“You’ve had better luck than you deserve, little sister.”

“If you’re so much in love with Rhoda what did you want to do it for?”

“Why did you look as if you wanted me to if you didn’t?”

“I didn’t look that way!”

“Oh, didn’t you? Then my previous observations have been at fault.
Perhaps I thought I’d like to find out why you sent me that anonymous
letter. At first I thought you meant it as a hint for Rhoda’s sake. But
after you’d been five minutes in this room it seemed to me that you
were taking very queer means for advancing her interests. If you had
unfortunately fallen in love with me yourself it wouldn’t have been
quite so bad. But you haven’t, little sister, you haven’t. You’d have
wanted me to kiss you again if you had.”

“You’re a horrid brute, that’s what you are, and I hate you!”

“I’m sorry to hear it, for I’ve always liked you, and you’re Rhoda’s
sister. But I hope you’ll remember that treachery isn’t a nice thing,
in either love or war.”

She moved uncertainly toward the door and, glancing through the
window, saw her sister drive past the front gate. “There’s Rhoda!” she
exclaimed, casting back at him a fiery glance. “I shall tell her just
the sort of man you are!” But she did not forget to give her hoopskirt
an extra tilt as she dashed out. Delavan, noting it, smiled as he
followed her to the door and cast a glance after her figure, hurriedly
retreating up the stairs.

Rhoda did not know that Jeff was there until she came into the
hall through the office and saw him standing in the parlor door.
“Sweetheart!” he called in low tones, and moved toward her, with
outstretched hand. A glad light came into her face at sight of him, but
she stood still and did not speak, until he was at her side.

“Don’t, Jeff! When I have told you so many times it can’t be!” she
pleaded, and drew away from him as he would take her in his arms.

“I know, dearest! But it’s different now, when I know what you really
want!”

She turned so that he could not see her face and asked with a sort of
gasp, “What do you mean?”

If he could have seen her countenance as she stood with face averted,
finger on lip, listening breathlessly for his reply, nothing would have
prevented him from seizing her in his arms and doing as she had begged
in the letter she had not meant him to see. For it glowed with love and
trembled upon surrender and shone with gladness that he knew her inmost
heart.

“Ah, Rhoda Ware, I know your secret now!” He was bending near her, his
hands hovering over her, but still he would not touch her while she
seemed unwilling. “I know, now, how much you love me, and how ready at
last you are to give up to your heart. Come then, dear one, or I shall
surely do as you bade me in your letter!”

A sudden stiffening and shrinking in her attitude made him fall back
a step and look at her anxiously. Slowly, very slowly, she turned,
lifting her head, until she faced him. And slowly the love-light and
the trembling nearness to surrender faded out of her countenance and
left it drawn with the effort by which she had forced herself once more
to the point of denial, with lips compressed and gray eyes steely with
resolution.

“Jeff,” she began, and her voice was unsteady, “it’s not fair to either
of us that you saw what I wrote. I didn’t mean to put that into my
letter--I wrote it out only because my heart ached so and it seemed
some relief. But I thought I’d burned it. I’m sorry it got mixed in
with the other sheets. But it was a mistake, and you’ll forgive me,
won’t you, dear Jeff, and you won’t feel that it was a promise?”

Her voice fell away into pleading tones and she stood hesitating,
poised, as if wishing him to stand aside and let her pass. With
instinctive deference he stepped aside and she moved quickly to the
foot of the stairs. But he sprang after her and seized her hand,
exclaiming, as he drew her into the parlor, “No, Rhoda! I shall not let
you ruin both our lives and break both our hearts, after that glimpse
you gave me of yours!”

She steadied herself for the struggle she knew must come, and suddenly
felt her nerves grow firm and her brain clear, as they always did when
she faced great need. She was calmer than he and more mistress of
herself as she said:

“I can’t say anything different to what I’ve always said, and said in
that letter, that I feel to the bottom of my heart that slavery is such
a wrong, such a curse, such a horrible thing that I can’t marry you
because you believe in it and are a part of it.”

[Illustration: “‘Don’t, Jeff, please don’t!’ she pleaded.”]

He gazed at her silently a moment, and the love in his face, that had
but just now been more of the body than of the soul, was transfused
with admiration of her spirit. “And you can still say that to me,” he
marveled in hushed accents, “after your heart has ached as it must have
when you wrote those lines?”

She dropped her eyes lest he see the sudden start of tears. It was a
subtle undermining of her defenses, had he known it, thus to cease
demanding and reveal such understanding and sympathy. Of such sort was
her ideal love, and it hurt more than ever to put it from her. One hand
was pressed against her heart, as if she could thus lessen the physical
pain, and she said piteously, “It’s aching now, Jeff!”

He looked at her irresolutely. Her drooping figure, her averted face,
her trembling voice--they were all such a plea of weakness to strength,
of feminine trust to masculine power to help, that even if he had not
loved her the impulse to take her in his arms and comfort her would
have been well-nigh overpowering. But he knew not what unexpected
visage her spirit might next reveal and he had already learned that,
although the primitive woman in her might call loudly one moment, in
the next the civilized woman would thrust her into her cave and in
dignity and strength stand guard at the door. For a moment he wavered,
then with clenched hands turned on his heel and walked across the room,
exclaiming:

“And you won’t let me stop it, you won’t let me comfort you!” Then he
faced about and as his eyes fell again upon her, he cried, “By heaven,
I will!” And he sprang toward her.

But already she had gathered up her resolution once more and it was the
civilized woman, not to be won save with her own consent, who moved
aside and eluded the embrace with which he would have swept her to his
breast. He dropped on his knees at her feet and buried his face in her
dress. A moment she stood with both hands clenched against her heart.
Then she bent over him and laid them as softly upon his head as a
compassionate mother might have done.

“Don’t Jeff, please don’t!” she pleaded. “It’s so hard already--don’t
make it harder, for both of us. We’ll have to just recognize what is,
and accept it.”

He rose again, seizing one of her hands as it fell from his head. “But
what is, Rhoda, except that we love each other with such strength that
God who made us must have meant us to be husband and wife? What else is
there that matters, beside that?”

“I’ve told you so often, dear, what it is that matters!”

“What do you want me to do, dear heart? I’ll free my slaves, if you
wish, and pay them wages.”

Her face lighted and she smiled wistfully at him, but shook her head.
“It’s deeper than that, Jeff, deeper than just the ownership of a few
slaves. I knew you would do that, for my sake. I told myself so--” she
broke off, smiled fondly upon him, then laid her free hand upon the two
already clasped.

“Listen, Jeff, let me tell you--I didn’t intend to, but perhaps it’s
best. After I sent you that last letter, I had a sudden fear that I had
put in the sheet I didn’t mean you to see. It was only a second, and
then I felt sure I had burned it. But for a little while I--I almost
wished I had, and in my heart I said I would give up and that I would
write you to come. It seemed as if you would know anyway, and as if you
were coming, without my telling you. And for three or four days I sat
at my window and watched for you and dreamed about our love, and about
our life together at beautiful Fairmount--” she hesitated an instant
and blushed faintly, but the true woman in her sent her on--“with
our children growing up around us, and we so happy and growing old
together-- Oh, Jeff, it was such a beautiful dream!”

“Not half so beautiful or happy as the reality would be, sweetheart!
Oh, Rhoda, won’t you make it true!”

“We’d be happy for a while, dear, but we’d wake up, sooner or later,
just as I did, and then we’d find out that there was no true marriage
between us, and our happiness would end.”

Denial was in his face and voice as he quickly answered: “Never, Rhoda!
I can’t believe it! Why should we waken? Why did you?”

“It was the Dred Scott decision.”

He smiled incredulously. “I suppose I would have anyway, after a
little,” she went on, “if you hadn’t got here first--” and she smiled
up at him ingenuously.

“O, how I wish I had! If it hadn’t been for that storm--”

“It’s better to wake up too soon than too late,” she broke in. “As
soon as I knew about that decision and all that the chief justice
had said, and understood how delighted the South is over it, and how
it has saddened and discouraged all of us up here at the North who
hate slavery, then I saw once more that I couldn’t compromise with my
conscience, not the least little bit.”

“But, Rhoda, you won’t have to, if I free my slaves. And I will!”

“I’ve thought that all out, and it wouldn’t help us any--though I’d be
glad for the slaves. Don’t you see, Jeff, that if you should free them,
still believing in slavery as you do, and still being devoted to the
South and wanting with all your soul to further her interests, which
you think are bound up in slavery--don’t you see that after a while you
would begin to feel that for my sake you had done something wrong, had
been false to your own ideals? And I would know it and it would make me
unhappy. I don’t think, Jeff, that I’d want you to free your negroes,
except as you might be convinced that it’s wrong to keep them enslaved.”

She stopped and looked up at him with her flashing smile. “I’ll run
every one of them off to freedom that I can get a chance to, but--”

He smiled back at her indulgently, and then they both laughed a little,
glad of the relief from the high tension which had held them.

“Rhoda, you are such a dear girl!” he murmured fondly. Her hands were
imprisoned, one in each of his, but he did not attempt to lessen the
distance between them. The earthly side of their love was fading out of
their mutual consciousness, for the moment, as their thoughts mounted
to the things of the spirit.

“It’s such a wide gulf between us, although we are so near,” she went
on. “Your letters have shown me that. To the bottom of your heart you
believe that all that the South is struggling for is right and good and
is her just right and will be for the good of the world.”

He threw back his head and his eyes shone. “I do, Rhoda,” he exclaimed
with emphasis. “I love the South, and her ideals are mine and her
ambitions are mine! They are just and right and the more widely they
are spread the better it will be for civilization and the whole world!”

She nodded. “Yes, I understand how you feel, though I didn’t at first.
And I believe to the bottom of my heart that the enslavement of man by
man”--her face was glowing now with the inner fires of conviction and
her low voice thrilled with the intensity of her feeling--“is wrong and
degrades both of them and is the cause of no end of horrible things.
And I don’t believe that anything good can ever come out of it.”

“But you don’t know, Rhoda--you never have seen--” he began earnestly.

“Ah, but I have seen, Jeff,” she broke in sadly. “I’ve seen the poor
negroes that my father and I have helped on their way to Canada taking
such desperate risks and enduring such awful sufferings in the hope
of winning their freedom that I don’t need to see anything else.
Divided like that, dear, on a matter that goes so deep with both of
us, there could be no real understanding and sympathy between us, no
true marriage. I think your convictions and your ideals are wrong--they
are hateful to me--but I honor you for being true to them. I honor
you more and love you more than I would if you gave them up, while you
still believed in them, for love of me.”

“You are right, dear heart,” he said, the pain of baffled and hopeless
love sounding in his voice. “I could not be false to my convictions and
my principles, even for you, my sweet, any more than you could be false
to yours. You make me understand, as I haven’t before, what this means
to you.”

“No, Jeff, I can’t see that there’s any hope for us, for our happiness,
on this earth, as long as this thing lasts that lies between us.
Perhaps, in heaven--”

Their eyes met, and her voice trembled and ceased. They stood with
hands clasped, looking through open windows into each other’s souls,
gazing deep into the warm and lovely depths of love, which they were
putting behind them, and turning their vision upward along the heights
where material aims crumbled away and hope and aspiration became only
the essence of the soul’s ideals. And as they gazed it seemed to them
that somewhere up in that dim region of eternal truth their spirits met
and were joined.

A faint sigh fluttered from Rhoda’s lips. With a start Delavan dropped
her hands and sank upon the sofa beside them. His head bowed on his
breast and a deep, shuddering breath, that was almost a sob, shook his
body.

“I think I’ll go now,” said Rhoda tremulously.

“No, don’t go. I want you beside me a little while. Sit down here. No,
don’t be afraid--give me your hand.”

For a little space they sat in silence, like two children venturing
into some unknown region and gaining courage by clasp of hands. At last
he rose.

“I will leave you now, dear heart. But it’s not good-by, even yet. I
still believe that sometime I shall call you wife. I’m proud to have
won your love, Rhoda, prouder than of anything else I shall ever do.”

He pressed her hand to his lips, bowed ceremoniously, and a moment
later she was listening to the sound of his footsteps as he walked down
the path to the gate.




CHAPTER XIX


After the discovery of the hiding place in the woodshed, Dr. Ware
and his Underground co-workers thought it best for a little while to
receive no runaways in his house. For it was closely watched, not only
by the officers whose duty it was to enforce the Fugitive Slave law,
but also by the slave hunters who made it a business to trail and
capture northward-bound chattels for the sake of the rewards offered by
their owners. In order to divert suspicion Walter and Lewis Kimball and
several other young men who were in the habit of keeping a lookout for
the fugitives contrived to secrete them elsewhere until surveillance
upon the white house on the hilltop was relaxed.

In the meantime Dr. Ware made ready a new place of concealment. An end
of the cellar extending beneath the room occupied by the two black
servants was separated from the rest by a solid wall. A trap door was
cut in the floor and a flight of stairs set in. Carpet concealed the
door and over it was usually set a table, chairs, or other furniture.
The cellar room was dark and had little ventilation, but Dr. Ware and
Rhoda congratulated themselves that it would be perfectly safe.

“Why, father, it’s like a dungeon in a castle,” the girl exclaimed with
a laughing face as she came up after making it ready with pallets and
cots and a generous supply of old quilts and blankets. “While they are
shut up in there they can rest and sleep, and so can we, without the
least fear that they’ll be discovered!”

Dr. Ware cast an observant look at her alert and smiling countenance.
Not since the adventure with the marshal had she seemed so like her
usual self. Following those self-absorbed days, when she had seemed
to be going about in a happy dream, had come a period of depression.
His professional eye had noted that she did not eat as a healthy young
creature should and his fatherly solicitude had made him quickly
conscious of her lessened vivacity of spirit. The changes in her
demeanor cost him a good deal of anxious thought--much more, indeed,
than she supposed he ever bestowed upon her. He knew that Jefferson
Delavan had been there again, but Rhoda told him nothing of what
had passed between them. So he merely guessed that his daughter had
struggled once more with her heart and had paid dearly for the victory.

He watched her anxiously, but shrank from speaking to her about her
physical state because he felt sure of its emotional cause and could
foresee the trend the conversation would take. For the leading-strings
of habit were strong upon them both, and even stronger was the
constraint of self-consciousness in a middle-aged man who all his life
had cultivated the intellectual side of his nature at the expense of
the emotional. Only toward the wife who had woven so strong a mesh
about his heart in the days when the blood of young manhood was hot and
winey and, in different scope and color, toward the child who so much
resembled her, had he ever been able to express in words and actions
the inner warmth and tenderness of his heart.

Of Rhoda he made a companion much more than he did of either his wife
or Charlotte. When she settled down at home after the three years she
had spent, in her latter teens, at Dr. Scott’s Female Institute, he had
been much pleased to find that he could talk with her seriously upon
most subjects that interested him. And since then they had grown into a
deep and wide intellectual understanding and sympathy. But between them
there was no emotional expression of their mutual feeling.

During this last year he had watched with pride her rapid development
in character and intellect. Her Underground work had stimulated her
sympathies and trained her in self-reliance and her increased interest
in political affairs had broadened and developed her intellectually
until, from an attractive girl of rather more than average endowment
she had become a woman whose companionship her father enjoyed upon an
equal footing. Blind babies, if the windows of sense perception are not
opened into their minds, become imbecile. Perhaps--but everybody knows
that argument by analogy is the most deceptive of all the paths by
which human beings endeavor to find truth.

So, to go back to Rhoda and the new place of concealment in the cellar.
Dr. Ware was much gratified to see her more lively demeanor that
morning and began to hope that, with the renewal of their Underground
operations and the constant call they would make upon both heart and
head, she would soon forget the pain that had been benumbing her
energies. She told him she was going to a meeting of the sewing circle
that afternoon at which they were to consider the question of enlarging
its sphere and turning it into an anti-slavery society. He thought it a
good idea and encouraged her to do all she could toward that end.

She went early to Mrs. Hardaker’s house, where the meeting was to be
held, and proved to be the first arrival. Horace was there, not having
yet returned to his office after dinner, and as she entered he greeted
her with--

“Rhoda, here’s a grand thing! Just listen!”

She saw that he had the New York “Tribune” in his hands, and as he
began to read her attention was at once absorbed by the bitter and
mournful eloquence of Horace Greeley’s lament over the Dred Scott
decision--a bit of literature that ought to be among the classics of
American journalism and studied by every aspirant for its honors. But
it is buried too deep among the yellowing sheets of forgotten newspaper
files to be known, in these busy days of a later generation, to any
but an occasional investigator. It had its own brief day of vigorous
life, when it stirred profoundly the minds and hearts of tens upon
tens of thousands of earnest men and women. And then like a dead leaf
it fluttered down to earth, to become a part of that debris of the
centuries that makes a richer soil for the growth of human souls.

With quickening pulse Rhoda listened to the stately march of the
sentences, as Hardaker’s fluent, oratorical voice gave to each its full
significance. As he came to the closing lines his listener’s breath was
catching now and then and her eyes and cheeks were aflame:

“The star of freedom and the stripes of bondage are henceforth one.
American republicanism and American slavery are in the future to be
synonymous. This, then, is the final fruit. In this all the labors of
our statesmen, the blood of our heroes, the lifelong cares and toils of
our forefathers, the aspirations of our scholars, the prayers of good
men, have finally ended. America the slave breeder and slaveholder!”

As Hardaker looked up and saw her countenance aglow with the fires of
her soul it occurred to him that, after all, Rhoda Ware was beautiful.
Like the tuned strings of a musical instrument her emotional nature had
responded to the touch upon her convictions, and behind this mingled
glow of indignation and aspiring soul he felt all the forces of her
woman’s heart, her powers of loving, her wealth of compassion and
tenderness. As he left the house he muttered to himself:

“A girl like that--she ought to be a Joan of Arc!” For the first time
in his rather long and somewhat spasmodic suit for her heart hope of
final success almost fell away from him. If such a rare, fine creature
mated at all, he felt rather than put into definite thought, it surely
ought to be with some being of finer clay than the average man. And
then he jammed his hat down hard and said to himself, definitely and
savagely: “The idea of her marrying a damned slaveholder!” Horace
Hardaker was a church member in good standing, and it was only in the
intimacy of his soul and upon most infrequent occasions that he allowed
himself such lapses of speech. When he did it was a sure sign that his
indignation had a strong personal tang.

The band of women in Mrs. Hardaker’s parlor talked while they sewed,
discussing the proposition of turning themselves into a more ambitious
society. Some were averse, saying they already did as much as they
could and that, moreover, to venture outside the sphere of their homes
and attempt to do things that men could do better would not be a proper
and becoming course. Rhoda, stitching busily, now and then put in an
argument or answered an objection. Her ardor, pleasant demeanor, and
practical capacity had made her a favorite with all the members of the
society, old and young. Her unfortunate love affair, of which all of
them knew something, invested her with a romantic interest and set her
a little apart, because of her opportunity and her sacrifice.

Of a sudden Rhoda felt her heart swell with the desire for utterance.
She began speaking, at first with her needle still busy. But, after
the first two or three sentences, her work dropped from her hands
and she leaned forward, her face glowing, as she dwelt upon the
discouragement which had fallen upon all who hoped for either the
ending or the staying of the progress of slavery, and of the greater
need than ever before that every one who believed slavery to be an evil
should work against it with zeal. She spoke quietly and simply, with
the intense and moving earnestness of a strong personality in the grip
of a passionate conviction. One after another the women dropped their
needles and listened with rapt attention. For a few minutes she talked
and then she caught up the paper and read the article in the “Tribune.”
At its close the utter silence of the room was broken only by a
half-suppressed sob here and there. After a moment she said modestly:

“Well, friends, what are we going to do about this matter?”

A woman in the back of the room began clapping her hands softly, and
presently Rhoda was shrinking back, blushing and abashed, before the
storm of applause. Immediately and enthusiastically, and perhaps not in
strict accord with parliamentary rules, it was decided to change their
circle into a “Female Anti-Slavery Society,” to continue their present
work and to add to it whatever their hands might find to do, and to
make Rhoda Ware its president. Surprised and embarrassed, she tried to
decline the honor. But the women, crowding around her with praise and
caresses, would not let her refuse.

At home she said nothing of the affair to her mother or sister, to
neither of whom did she ever make mention of any of her anti-slavery
activities. All that portion of her life, which, indeed, had come to be
the major part, had as little community with them as if there had been
between them no bond of love and use and relationship. To her father
she related the bare facts of the occasion. But he soon heard from
Horace Hardaker, whose mother had told him all about it, a full and
enthusiastic account of what had taken place.

Rhoda grieved much over the growing alienation between herself and her
mother and sister. Charlotte held herself plainly aloof, and Rhoda was
puzzled by an evident resentment in her attitude. She did not know that
Charlotte held her responsible for her own failure to capture the fancy
of Jefferson Delavan.

“She’s no right to keep him dangling after her if she doesn’t intend to
marry him,” was the vexed young woman’s summing up of the situation,
having quite decided that if her sister would only move out of the way
she herself would soon be mistress of Fairmount.

As the spring and summer went by Mrs. Ware’s hope for a marriage
between Jeff and Rhoda dwindled into profound disappointment. A sadness
came into her face and voice that smote her daughter to the heart.
The sick-headaches, to which she had long been subject, became more
frequent, and other ailments began to manifest themselves. Fearing
remorsefully that her anti-slavery work and her refusal to marry
Delavan were at the bottom of her mother’s failing health, the girl
strove in all tender, care-taking ways of which she could think to make
amends for the double hurt and disappointment. In the conduct of the
house Mrs. Ware leaned upon her more than ever. But as the months wore
on Rhoda felt keenly that the old tenderness and intimacy between them
were disappearing.

The warm weather brought much increase of Underground traffic. At
that time and during the years immediately following the work of the
Road was at its height. For its operations there were friends, money,
workers in plenty, and slaves were gathered up even before they reached
the free-state border, and hurried on from hand to hand in such secrecy
and safety that they had hardly a care or a responsibility until they
found themselves secure on British soil.

To Rhoda her father gave over most of the care of the fugitives
upon their arrival and while they were secreted in the cellar. Not
infrequently also she drove them on to the next station, sometimes in
the night, sometimes by day, in a spring wagon with a false bottom
which he had bought for this purpose. Occasionally Chad Wallace
appeared in the neighborhood with his peddler’s wagon at their service,
if it did not already contain its complement of hidden chattels.
Now and then farmer Gilbertson, on a trip to town, hauled back some
“baggage” well concealed in his wagon bed, to be stowed away in his
hollow haystack until it could be sent on to the next station. A man
who had a market garden out on the same road and drove back and forth
a good deal with vegetables for the Hillside market and for steamboat
supplies, and another who traveled about ostensibly selling reeds often
carried black passengers.

With hands and head and heart all so full Rhoda found little time
to spend in thinking of her own unhappiness. Nevertheless, the day
never went by that had not a little space saved out from other things
and held apart for thought of her lover. Now and then a letter passed
between them. But from these missives was dropped all mention of both
slavery and love, although on both sides the correspondence breathed a
sense of mutual tenderness and understanding that amounted to a sort
of spiritual intimacy. To Rhoda these letters were the treasure of her
heart. They were read over and over again, held caressingly in her
hands during the brief minutes of each day when she gave herself up to
thought of him, and kept under her pillow or upon her breast while she
slept. Every night, when she knelt at her bedside, her petitions to the
Heavenly Father begged for His blessing upon her efforts in behalf of
the slaves, pleaded that He would soon put forth His hand and make an
end of slavery, and implored the safety and the happiness of her lover.

In the late summer there came a message from Fairmount. Emily Delavan,
Mrs. Ware’s namesake, was to be married in October and the Ware family
was bidden to the festivities. The news set Charlotte upon the borders
of ecstatic delight. The visit, which was to be prolonged through
several weeks, would not only be filled with no end of alluring
pleasures and amusements, but it should open, she decided at once,
the door of escape from her home into more congenial surroundings.
It would be just the sort of environment,--a gay crowd of people
with nothing to do but enjoy themselves--in which she knew she always
appeared to best advantage. Two or three uninterrupted weeks of it,
with Jefferson Delavan always there to feel the effects of her charms,
and she could be quite sure of the result. But--there was Rhoda.

“If she’s there,” Charlotte grumbled to herself, “she’ll just keep
on making Jeff think she’s going to marry him some day, and have him
dangling after her all the time.”

Why should Rhoda want to go at all, if she really meant to play fair
with Jeff? The girl soon came to the conclusion, with which she
promptly acquainted her sister, that the other ought not to attend the
wedding.

“It will be very unkind to me if you insist on going, Rhoda,” she
complained. “It will spoil all my pleasure.”

“Sister! Why do you say that?”

“Because you’ll keep Jeff hanging around you all the time, just as he
does when he’s here. Somehow you manage to make him think that you’re
going to marry him sometime when you know you don’t intend to at all.
It isn’t fair to me, Rhoda, you know it isn’t.”

Rhoda had already begun to plan ways and means by which her duties and
responsibilities could be cared for during her absence, for she wished
much to make the visit. Her youthful spirit, so much neglected and
denied of late, was asserting itself once more and eagerly anticipating
the new experience and the promised social gaieties. But above all she
wished to go in order that she might be with her lover in his own home,
and afterward be able to picture his daily life more vividly in her
thought.

“You’re not being fair to me now, Charlotte,” she replied. “I’ve told
Jeff over and over that I can’t marry him. And I’m sure I don’t want to
hinder him from marrying any one else, if he wants to.”

“Then be as good as your word, Rhoda, and stay away from where he is.
He’s attentive enough to me when you’re not around, and if you’ll just
give me a fair chance--you’ll see--I’ll come back engaged!”

Rhoda threw up her head and answered, with a calm intensity in her tone
that made Charlotte look at her curiously: “Very well. I’ll stay at
home. I’ve no claim on Jeff, and you can do whatever you like.”

Charlotte flew across the room, threw her arms around Rhoda’s neck,
kissed her and declared she was a “dear old thing.” And Rhoda, warming
in response and comforted a little for her own hurt, smiled with
pleasure at this outburst of affection, returned her caresses and
called her “silly little sister.”

“You can be an old maid if you want to and spend your life working for
niggers,” Charlotte exclaimed, dancing about the room, “but I mean
to have a good time and make the niggers work for me!” She stopped
suddenly and with head on one side regarded Rhoda anxiously. “Will you
promise,” she broke out, “that you won’t tell mother why you don’t go?”

“Of course I won’t tell her!”

“Nor anybody else?”

“No!”

“Good sister! Then I’ll love you more than ever!”

When Rhoda declared, and her mother could not induce her to change her
decision, that it would be impossible for her to go, the disappointment
was so keen that it sent Mrs. Ware to bed with one of her severest
headaches. Rhoda cared for her with all tenderness, and, in secret
bitterness and tears that her mother must now think more hardly of her
than she deserved, wished that Charlotte would offer to give back her
promise. But she would not ask it of her sister, and to that young
woman, in the height of girlish spirits, busy with the dressmaker and
her own plans, there never occurred the faintest idea of making the
offer.

Mrs. Ware knew, even before she tried, that she could not induce her
husband to accept the hospitality of a slave owner, and so, finally,
it was only herself and her younger daughter who made the journey. As
they were saying good-by Charlotte whispered to her sister:

“This time next year, Rhoda, I’ll be inviting you to Fairmount!”




CHAPTER XX


Letters from Mrs. Ware and Charlotte told of much gaiety and of days
that were an unceasing round of enjoyment. Charlotte wrote that it was
“heaven upon earth” and that never before had she “even imagined how
happy a girl could be.” But in her mother’s letters Rhoda detected a
note of melancholy. Although at one with the life around her in memory,
training, sympathy and belief, she yet seemed to feel herself an alien
while in the midst of it and to be saddened by her own lack of complete
accord.

“Poor mother!” thought Rhoda. “She loves father and me so much that she
can’t help feeling loyal to us with a part of her heart. Dear, dear
mother!”

Moreover, Mrs. Ware was not well, and declared she would be glad to
return home. She related briefly that Jeff and Emily had divided the
estate, two thirds of which, according to their father’s will, belonged
to the brother. Emily had chosen some land and a number of slaves
and, as her husband already has as many negroes as he needed, it was
their intention to realize upon these at once and put the money into
improvements upon his estate.

“They’ll be sold ‘down south,’ I suppose,” said Rhoda, as she read the
letter aloud to her father.

“Very likely. Those big cotton, cane and rice plantations are an
insatiable market for slaves. They can’t get enough labor. That is why
the South is so anxious to reopen the African slave trade. It’s an
open secret, which the North winks at, as it does at everything the
South chooses to do, that the traffic is already going on. Since the
Dred Scott decision there is nothing they stop at. It’s a pity Chad
Wallace or Alexander Wilson isn’t in the neighborhood of Fairmount just
now. If they were, Emily’s husband wouldn’t be able to make so many
improvements!”

A few days later Dr. Ware called Rhoda into his office, anxiety in his
demeanor. “I’ve just received this letter from Wilson,” he exclaimed,
“written in Louisville. See what he says:

“‘DEAR FRIEND WARE: Am sending you to-day by express one blackbird, a
fine specimen, securely boxed. I was fortunate enough to secure a live
one, as I knew you would find the specimen more interesting alive than
dead.’”

“Father!” cried Rhoda, her eyes wide and horrified. “He’s sent some
one in a box! All the way from Louisville! Oh, we must see about it at
once!”

“The letter was evidently written in great haste,” Dr. Ware continued,
“on a dirty scrap of paper and,--yes, it was mailed on the boat.”

“Then the box came on the steamboat with the letter!”

“Yes, and will be at the express office now. Jim must take the spring
wagon and go after it.”

Rhoda waited in extreme anxiety for Jim’s return, fearful lest the poor
creature should be dead in the box. Even Dr. Ware showed a lessening
of his usual calm. They said little to each other during the man’s
absence, but together made ready everything that might be necessary
if the “blackbird” should be unconscious. They knew of more than one
daring escape from slavery by similar methods. And they knew too of
the recent release from a southern penitentiary, after an eight years’
term, of a man who had been convicted of attempting to rescue a slave
by this same means.

The box, short and narrow and looking hardly large enough to contain a
human being, was hurried into Jim’s room and the cover quickly removed.
Within was the huddled figure of a woman, her knees drawn up to her
chin, and all her body held in the close confines as tightly as in a
vise. She did not move and when they spoke to her there was no answer.

“No, she’s not dead,” said Dr. Ware, his finger on her pulse. They
lifted her out and restorative measures soon brought her back to
consciousness. But she was ghastly pale and trembling from head to foot.

“You poor thing! You’re safe now,” Rhoda soothed, patting her arm, as
she began to sob hysterically. “We are your friends and we’ll take care
of you.”

She was young and comely, perhaps one-fourth colored, with neither
complexion nor features showing more than a faint trace of her negro
heritage. Presently they were able to give her food and water, and a
little later she told them her story. As she talked Rhoda sat beside
her, clasping her hand and now and then patting her arm in sympathy and
encouragement. Her speech was simple, but good, showing intelligence
and some training.

“How did Mr. Wilson happen to send you in a box?” asked Dr. Ware.

“It was the only way. They had to get rid of me quick. I’d been sold to
a trader from New Orleans and he’d brought me and a lot of others to
Louisville to take us on the steamboat. I knew he’d paid a big price
for me, and from that and the way he talked me over I knew what he’d
bought me for. I made up my mind I’d rather die, or do anything. A
chance happened to come, on the street in Louisville, as he was taking
us to the boat, and in a crowd I give him the slip.

“I didn’t know what I’d do or where I’d go, but I just hurried along
down another street, and then I saw the man who’d been at master’s
plantation last year and told us about going to Canada if we wanted to
try it.”

“Yes--Mr. Wilson,” Dr. Ware interrupted.

“I knew him right away, though he looked different, and I spoke to him
and told him what I wanted. He said to follow him and we walked fast
and turned up and down streets, and came to a free woman’s house. But
they’d followed us, and in two or three minutes they were at the door.
The woman took me into the back room and told me to jump into that
box. Then she put the cover down quick and went back and I heard the
men go all round the house looking for me and they swore at the woman
and told her they’d seen me come in and they’d watch the house and
keep on searching it till they got me. Then the man--Mr. Wilson, you
said?--spoke up right loud and said he couldn’t wait any longer and
would she have his clothes ready if he’d send for the box right away,
’cause he wanted to catch the boat for Cincinnati. I ’spected he meant
me, and he did. She put a pillow in the box and some biscuits and a
bottle of water, and cut a little hole in the side, so I could breathe.

“I thought I was gwine die in the box,” the woman went on, again
showing signs of hysteria, as memory of her experience returned. “It
was such a little box I had to be all crunched up and I got awful
pains, and sometimes it seemed as if I’d just have to scream right out.
And then I’d think what would happen if I did, and I’d be caught and
they’d flog me and send me--where they’d bought me for, and then I’d
bite hard on the pillow and keep still. And once the box was turned up
so I was on my head till I knew I was gwine die in another minute, but
they turned it down again and I didn’t.”

She stopped speaking, as long, nervous sobs shook her frame. The tears
were streaming down Rhoda’s face and her bosom was heaving as with
trembling hands she administered the draught her father had prepared.
Dr. Ware noted her agitation and admonished her gently to calm herself.
The old fear of displeasing him by showing too much emotion quickly
steadied her nerves. To distract her thoughts from the fugitive’s
harrowing experience he began to question the woman, as she grew quiet
once more, about her life in slavery.

“You must have had a hard master to be willing to take such chances to
gain your freedom.”

“It was the trader I run away from, ’cause I knew what he’d bought me
for. Master was a kind man.”

“But he sold you.”

“It wasn’t master that sold us. He never does. It was Miss Emily,
’cause she married.”

A chill struck to Rhoda’s heart. Was her fate to be forever linked
in this way with that of the slaves from Fairmount? She was glad her
father did not even look at her as he passed, with apparent unconcern,
to the logical next question:

“Who was your master?”

“Jefferson Delavan, of Fairmount, just beyond Lexington. He was a kind
man and never sold any of the slaves. His mother, old mistress, was
kind too, when she was alive, and she took pains with some of us. She
was teaching me to be her maid. But Miss Emily’s different. She’s sold
nearly all of us that fell to her share.”

Dr. Ware stole an anxious glance at Rhoda. She was sitting at the
bedside, with the woman’s hand clasped in hers, her eyes straight in
front, her lips pressed together and her face stern.

“It’s hardly fair to make the blame personal,” he ventured. She flashed
up at him indignant eyes and her voice was bitter with scorn as she
replied:

“But he allowed her to be sold, father, and for such a purpose!”

He hesitated, considering a temptation. In his daughter’s present mood
it would be easy to deepen this impulse of condemnation and so perhaps
undermine her love for Delavan. But the next instant he told himself
that it would not be fair. “The man has enough to answer for--let him
at least have justice,” was his thought.

Rhoda felt his calm eyes upon her, but she would not meet them. “You
must remember,” he was saying judicially, “that no man can be better
than the system of which he is a part. It is quite possible that
Delavan knew nothing of all this, except that his sister chose certain
slaves as her share. I don’t know very much about him, but I think he’s
decent enough to have protested if he had known of this woman’s fate.
I also think it’s most unlikely it would have done any good if he had.
And there it is, Rhoda! No matter how well-intentioned an individual
slaveholder may be, he is likely to be swept along any minute by his
system into its worst abominations. Our indictment must always be
against the system, not against individuals.”

When Rhoda knelt at her bedside that night the look of scorn had faded
from her countenance and in its place were tears. “Dear Father in
Heaven,” she prayed, “do not let Thy punishment fall upon him. He knows
not what he does. His eyes are so blinded that he cannot see how evil
these things are. Do not punish him, do not let Thy vengeance fall upon
him, until his eyes are opened and he sees that they are evil. And
grant, O God, I beg of Thee, grant me this, that I may make amends to
this poor creature for his wrong. If Thy vengeance is ripe and can be
stayed no longer, let it fall upon my head. Let me bear his punishment.
But grant me first that I may save her.”

The fugitive, whose name, Lear White, it was decided should be changed
to Mary Ellen Dunstable, had been so unnerved by her sufferings that
for several days she sorely needed Rhoda’s care and Dr. Ware’s medical
attention. Rhoda would not permit her to go into the cellar hiding
place, but made a bed for her in her own room and watched over her
with every solicitude. A dust of powder over her light-colored face
was enough to give her the appearance of a white girl of brunette
complexion. Only a close observer would be likely to note that the
whites of her eyes and the form of her nose gave a hint of negro origin.

“Father,” said Rhoda, when the girl had been two days in the house, “I
can’t bear to think of sending Mary Ellen on in the usual way. She took
such awful chances to escape from a horrible fate, and she came so near
to death in that box, that it seems to me almost as if God had put her
into my charge, and meant for me to make up to her for all that she has
suffered. I feel as if I ought not to let her out of my hands until she
is safe in Canada.”

“Well, what have you thought of doing? Have you a plan?”

“Yes. Mary Ellen looks so much like a white woman that I’m sure she
and I could travel together, as two girl friends, and go to Cleveland
by the canal. There I can put her on one of our friendly boats and
the captain will take charge of her till she is safe on the ferry at
Detroit.”

They talked the matter over at length, Rhoda dwelling upon the girl’s
nervous condition, which had so lessened her self-reliance and her
courage as to make doubtful the wisdom of sending her on alone by
the ordinary methods. But another reason of equal strength in her own
mind, although she did not mention it to her father, was her conviction
that here was an opportunity to make atonement for what she felt to be
her lover’s sin. Moreover, the girl clung to her with such implicit
confidence in her power to shield and save that Rhoda’s heart rose high
with a passion of resoluteness, like a mother’s for her threatened
offspring.

It was finally decided that her plan should be carried out. The Female
Anti-Slavery Society offered its little store of cash--pitifully small
since the money panic of two months previous--to help defray Mary
Ellen’s expenses. Several of the members donated material they had
bought for their own winter wardrobes and helped Rhoda make it up into
gowns for the fugitive.

On her way downtown one day Rhoda saw a new handbill on the trunk of
a tree at the crossing of the two main streets. It was of a sort that
had been familiar to her since her childhood. At one side was a crude
woodcut of a negro on the run, a bundle on the end of a stick across
his shoulder. She stopped to read it, wondering if it concerned any of
the blacks who had been sheltered under their roof. It offered three
hundred dollars reward, told of the running away of “my negro girl,
Lear White,” gave a detailed and accurate description of her, saying
she was “light-colored and good-looking,” and was signed, “William
H. Burns,” with his address in Louisville. Rhoda walked on, smiling,
thinking in what a little while that poster would be of no consequence
whatever to Lear White, for they were to start the next morning.

In the afternoon Marcia Kimball came, to help Rhoda with the final
preparations. They tried upon Mary Ellen the gown, in which they had
just set the last stitches, that she was to wear on the journey. Much
pleased with its effect, Marcia whitened her face with a fresh dusting
of powder, and she stood before them a handsome brunette with a pale
complexion, big, soft, black eyes and coal-black, waving hair. Marcia
clapped her hands, exclaiming:

“Splendid, Rhoda! Nobody would ever guess! Oh, you’ll get through all
right!”

Rhoda, standing beside the window, glanced out and her face grew grave.
“Come here a minute, Marcia,” she said. Some men were entering at the
side gate. Miss Kimball paled. “Marshal Hanscomb!” she whispered.

“Yes, but I don’t believe they suspect that she’s here. There are
three men in the cellar, that Mr. Gilbertson is going to stop for this
evening. We must put on a bold front. Don’t let Mary Ellen know--she’d
be scared to death, and they might guess. Come,” she exclaimed in a
louder voice, turning gaily from the window, “let’s go downstairs and
have some music. Marcia, you ought to hear Mary Ellen sing ‘Nellie
Gray’! Come down and you and she sing it together, and I’ll play!”

Laughing and talking, with every appearance of gaiety, though the
hearts of two of them were beating fast, the three went down to the
living-room and took their places at the piano. With ears strained to
catch the sounds from the other parts of the house, Rhoda struck the
opening notes and the two voices sang:

  “There’s a low green valley on the old Kentucky shore,
  Where I’ve whiled many happy hours away,
  A-sitting and a-singing by the little cottage door
  Where lived my darling Nellie Gray.”

Rhoda stopped for a moment and heard the tramp of the men as they came
up the stairs from the cellar. Then she laughed merrily.

“Why, Marcia, you’re singing all out of tune! I never heard you do that
before. Come, now, let’s all sing the chorus together!”

Mary Ellen’s voice rose, rich and melodious, above the other two as the
music made its mournful plaint through the simple lines:

  “Oh, my poor Nellie Gray,
  They have taken her away,
  And I’ll never see my darling any more!”

The men were going through the rooms upstairs and one of them said to
another, as he stopped to listen, “That girl can sing, can’t she?”

Rhoda heard them coming downstairs and knew that Marcia was looking at
her with eyes wide and face a little pale. Would they come in? Suddenly
she was aware that her nerves were steady and strong as steel and that
her heart was beating as calmly as ever. “Now for the next verse,
Marcia!” and her fingers moved across the keys. Then she heard the men
at the door.

“There’s some one in the hall. I must see what they want,” she said,
rising and casting an encouraging smile at Miss Kimball. Marcia gazed
at her wonderingly as she moved calmly across the room and then,
feeling the contagion of her courage, turned quickly to Mary Ellen, and
to draw her attention away from the door so that she would not face it,
began asking her what other songs she knew.

“Excuse me, Miss Ware, for disturbing you and your friends,” Marshal
Hanscomb was saying, “but my duties under the law make it necessary for
me to search your house.”

“Certainly, Mr. Hanscomb. Come in if you wish to. Miss Kimball is
here--I think you know her--and the other lady is my friend, Miss
Dunstable, from Cincinnati, who has been visiting me for the last week.”

The marshal stepped inside, his assistants close behind him. Rhoda
cast a single glance toward the piano and saw thankfully that Marcia
was still holding Mary Ellen’s attention. “If only she won’t look
around,” was her anxious thought. Then turning to the marshal she said
seriously, with a gentle smile:

“You see, there’s no one else visible in here, Mr. Hanscomb, but if you
want to look under the piano and up the chimney--” she stopped on a
rising inflection and looked at him gravely. His eyes flashed, but he
merely sent an inquiring glance around the room, saw that there were
no closets or recesses, and then moved toward the door, saying, “Thank
you, Miss Ware.”

Rhoda closed the door behind him and leaned against it while she drew
a long breath and pressed her lips together tightly for a moment. Then
she went back to the piano saying, “Now, Marcia, suppose we let Mary
Ellen sing that next verse all alone. I want you to hear her.”

The men on the veranda steps, taking their departure, paused and
listened to the closing lines as Mary Ellen, in a voice of mournful
sweetness, sang on alone:

  “They have taken her to Georgia,
  For to wear her life away,
  As she toils in the cotton and the cane.”

“That girl makes a right good imitation of the way a darkey’s voice
sounds,” said the one who had spoken before. “I reckon she’s practised
it.”




CHAPTER XXI


Rhoda’s heart was high with expectation of success when she and Mary
Ellen started upon the journey to Cleveland. The runaway, in her new
gown and a bonnet and veil, played her part perfectly, and Rhoda told
her father that he might expect her back in a few days with the news
that all had gone well. “And I,” she added to herself, “shall then be
able to feel that I have paid off Jeff’s debt of wrongdoing to this
poor girl.”

As they were going on board the steamboat Jim came hurrying down to the
landing from the post-office with the morning mail, which contained
a letter for Rhoda. She saw that it was from Charlotte, and put it
unopened into her pocket to read later. For, notwithstanding her inward
assurance that her adventure could not fail, she felt anxious about the
short time they would have to remain on the river boat. Slave traders
and their agents and slave catchers were constantly journeying up and
down the river, and if one of these who had appraised Mary Ellen in her
days of bondage should happen to see her he might recognize her as Lear
White. She kept her charge engaged in conversation, the better to carry
out the pretense that they were two ladies traveling together, and
warned her not to raise her veil.

The transfer to the canal boat safely made, Rhoda felt much less
anxious and relaxed a little of her care. They sat upon the deck,
and Mary Ellen lifted her veil now and then, the better to see the
succession of charming views through which they passed. The wooded
hills were ablaze with autumn foliage and these alternated with open
lands where fields of brown stubble, acres of ripened corn, pasturing
cattle and busy farm yards told of autumn’s rewards for the year’s
labor. Mary Ellen was much interested in all this and had many
questions to ask as to how the work was done and whether or not it
would be the same in Canada. Several hours passed in this way before
Rhoda bethought her again of the letter from Charlotte. Smiling at
thought of the enthusiastic account it would contain of the round of
pleasures since her last missive, she took it from her pocket and
drew a little apart, while Mary Ellen became engrossed in looking at
a town which they were approaching. A number of people were at the
landing and she gazed at them, the tree-shaded streets, the buildings
and the church spires with the self-forgetfulness of a child amid new
surroundings.

Instead of the long letter she expected Rhoda found in the envelope a
single sheet and dashed across the middle of it the one sentence, “I
told you I’d soon be engaged, and I am! Charlotte.”

The words danced and blurred before her eyes as she stared at them,
all her attention indrawn to the pain in her breast. This, then, was
all love meant to a man--the whim of a moment or a month, ready to be
captured by the first pretty girl who made the effort. Had it not been
the same with Horace Hardaker? Why should she have expected Jeff’s love
to be of any more substantial fiber? And, moreover, what right had she
to expect or wish him to be faithful to her? But her quivering heart
cried out that if he had loved as she did he would have been faithful,
even unto death. And down in the bottom of her soul she knew that her
pain was not all for his lost love, that some of it, much of it, was
for her ideal of his love and faith and chivalrous heart, stabbed to
death by this immediate surrender to Charlotte’s allurements.

“Miss Rhoda! Miss Rhoda! Miss Rhoda!”

The frightened cry, repeated over and over, seeming at first to come
out of some far-off space, pierced her indrawn consciousness. She
looked up in a dazed way, her thoughts stumbling back slowly to her
surroundings. Then she saw that Mary Ellen, between two men, was being
hustled off the boat.

She sprang after them and seized the arm of one of the men. “What are
you doing?” she demanded.

“You’ll soon find out what you’ve been doing!” the man replied.

“This is an outrage!” Rhoda exclaimed. “Let this woman go, or I
shall have you arrested! She is Miss Dunstable of Cincinnati, and is
traveling with me. Let her go, I say!”

The man laughed and pushed on. “No, she ain’t. She’s Lear White and
she’s a slave and belongs to William H. Burns. I’m his agent and I was
with him when he bought her and helped to take her and the rest of his
gang to Louisville, where she give him the slip. I come up through this
black abolition country to watch for her, and I knew her the minute I
set eyes on her, though you have got her fixed up so fine.”

With one sweep of his handkerchief across her cheek, he exposed a broad
stripe of browner skin. He laughed contemptuously, and a number of
others who had gathered round them on the landing laughed also. Rhoda
heard the epithet, “nigger-thief,” in derisive tones passed from one
to another. She knew well that if the crowd’s sympathies were with him
there was no telling what it might do. Gripping his arm with both hands
and bracing herself against his effort to move on, she faced about,
head high and eyes flashing, and cried:

“Is there no one here who will help me to save this poor girl?”

Then she was aware that from the back of the concourse some men were
pushing their way toward her. She struggled against the efforts of
Mary Ellen’s captors to go on and would not release her hold of the
one next her, thinking that here might be deliverance, or, at least,
help. As they came nearer she saw that one was in Quaker garb, and her
hopes rose. In the matter of a runaway slave there was no doubting on
which side would be the active sympathy and assistance of a Friend. In
response to his inquiry she told him her own and her father’s name.

“Yes, yes,” he said heartily, “I’ve heard of Dr. Ware.” He glanced at
Mary Ellen, dumb and patient between her captors, then back at Rhoda,
and understanding flashed between their eyes.

“Don’t be afraid,” he said. “Thee’ll soon find friends here, who’ll do
their best to bring things out all right for thee and for her too.”

They moved on, the mob around them rapidly increasing. By the looks
of the men and the remarks which reached her ears she knew that it
was, for the most part, pro-slavery in feeling. The Quaker was walking
beside her, but his companions had disappeared. Presently he whispered:

“The marshal will be here soon. Perhaps thee could slip away and hide.
There’ll be help if thee wants to try it.”

Rhoda shook her head and whispered back: “No, no. I mustn’t leave her.”

In a whisper so low it barely reached her ears she heard him say:
“Never mind her. She’ll be looked after.”

But before Rhoda could reply three men, pushing their way
authoritatively, were beside them, and a moment later she found
herself under arrest and being marched along between the marshal’s two
assistants.

Soon she saw that a change was taking place in the character of the
crowd. Its numbers were being rapidly augmented, but most of those
who were joining it now were silent, and Rhoda guessed by their looks
and by the glint of an eye here and there that they were moved by a
determined purpose. The marshal surveyed them anxiously, spoke to his
aids, and they, with Rhoda between them, held back, then edged their
way into a cross street and let the throng surge on past them. Then
they rushed her along until they came to a two-story brick building,
where they gave her into the charge of another official, who locked her
into an upstairs room.

Through the barred windows she could see the mob, now at a standstill
half a block down the street, eddying round the center where stood
Mary Ellen between her two captors, a drooping figure of despair and
resignation. On the outskirts and apparently merely looking on was
the Quaker, who had told her his name was Daniel Benedict. And still
farther away her eye caught sight of a familiar form, old and shabby,
topped by a bell-crowned hat, standing beside a dingy peddler’s wagon
and watching the proceedings with an interest which broke out now and
then in shrill calls and shuffling capers.

Rhoda leaned against the bars, her hands wrung together, and waited
breathlessly for what might happen next. The men were surging and
pushing this way and that, and she soon made out a resolute movement
on the part of those who were on the outside to force their way to the
center. Many of those who made up the nucleus had been moved apparently
by idle curiosity, and they were now falling back, out of the way of
the onward efforts of the others.

“There’s the marshal,” Rhoda exclaimed to herself, pressing her face
against the bars, “right in front of Mary Ellen! Oh, poor, poor girl!
Surely, God won’t let them take her back! Those men are pushing up
closer! What’s the marshal saying? Oh, he’s calling for a posse! There,
they’re fighting! Oh, see, they’ve got hold of him!”

In her excitement she was breaking into speech. “Oh, oh! They’ve
knocked down the trader!--and the other man--Mary Ellen--they’ve got
her! They’ve got her! And they’re shooting! Oh, again! Again!”

Hands clasped hard against her heart, she stood breathless, silent,
watching the struggle, while the sound of shots, the cries of the
mob, and the shouts of the officers broke the stillness of the room.
“There, they are getting her out! Oh, don’t hurt her! Now--oh, run,
Mary Ellen, run, run! Oh, they’re helping her--two men--and another
running ahead-- Oh, God, help her, help her to safety!”

She leaned against the side of the window, sight swimming and lips
trembling, as Mary Ellen and her body-guard of rescuers, dashing down
another street, passed from her view. Then she turned her attention
back to the throng of men who seemed now to be intricately struggling
with one another. But presently the mass began to resolve itself. A
number, which seemed to contain both parties, for some were evidently
trying to stop or hinder the others, rushed after the slave girl and
her protectors. Many others fell back and stood near to be on hand for
the next development. They had not long to wait, for the marshal and
his assistants, regaining their feet, speedily began arresting their
assailants. Rhoda presently saw them marching up to the jail door with
a dozen men under guard, of whom several were wounded.

A few minutes later she heard a tenor voice, surprisingly good though
somewhat cracked with age, singing loudly in the street, “In Dixie land
I’ll take my stand.” She smiled, for she knew the voice at once, and
hurried back to the window. Chad Wallace in his dingy peddler’s wagon
was passing the jail. His eyes were roving carelessly over the front
of the building and she felt sure he saw her, although he made no sign.
But he flourished his whip in a wide circle round his head and held it
poised for a moment above his shoulder, pointing back into the middle
of his wagon.

Later in the day Daniel Benedict came to see her and gave her
explanation of what had happened. His wrinkled, benignant face and
silver gray hair seemed to her distraught heart to carry assurance of
fatherly protection.

“Thy friend is safe now,” he told her, “and not much the worse for her
experience.”

“I saw from that window,” she exclaimed, “the way they got her out of
the crowd. It was wonderful--just pushing a way for her and handing her
on from one to another and protecting her with their bodies!”

“Yes,” assented the Quaker, calmly, “it was good work, and quickly
done--else, they would not have succeeded. I could take no part in it,
for, as thee doubtless knows, it is against my principles to offer
violent resistance to the law. But,” he hesitated a moment and Rhoda
saw a twinkle flicker across his kindly eyes, “I do not feel that it
is necessary to hinder those who think differently. There is a pretty
strong anti-slavery sentiment here, although there is plenty for the
other side too, and we determined some time ago that not another seeker
after freedom should ever be sent back to his chains from this place.
Those who had no scruples against violent resistance were to be free
to do whatever they might think best and, for the rest of us,”--and his
eyes twinkled again,--“there would not be lacking work for us, either.”

“But Mary Ellen? How did the trader get hold of her? Do you know how it
happened? I had been so watchful, and had let her raise her veil only
now and then, when it seemed safe. I had not left her side since we
started, until just before the awful thing happened. Then I heard her
call and they were dragging her off the boat. I was hardly three feet
away and had had my hand off her arm, oh, it seemed hardly a minute!
Have you talked with her? Has she told you?”

He nodded gravely and the suggestion of a smile appeared about his
lips. Rhoda guessed that Mary Ellen was hidden in his house. “Yes,
I have talked with the fugitive. She was leaning on the rail, so
interested in looking at the town and at the landing as the boat came
up that she forgot about her veil. Then, among the people on shore she
recognized the trader and was so frightened that she seemed to lose the
power of motion. He saw her the same instant, rushed upon the boat and
seized her.”

“Oh, the fault is all mine!” moaned Rhoda. “I should not have left
her, I should not have taken my eyes off her, for one single minute! I
was too proud, Mr. Benedict, and this is my punishment. For I thought
nobody but me could get her safely to Cleveland and I had been so
successful with others--and with her too--that I thought I couldn’t
fail!”

“Well, she is safe again. But thee is likely to suffer sadly for thy
one moment of forgetfulness.”

She told him Mary Ellen’s story, dwelling especially upon her
sufferings during her long hours in the box. When she ended he brought
his fist down on his knee and exclaimed solemnly:

“She has earned her freedom twenty times over and she shall have
it--fugitive slave law, constitution, marshals, or presidents
notwithstanding, even if--if--Daniel Benedict has to forget his
principles for once!”

The next day he came again to see her, bringing with him his wife, a
little woman in Quaker bonnet and gown, with a strong face and a sweet
smile. Mary Ellen, they told her, had been safely started on her way
again at midnight. Chaddle Wallace had taken her in his peddler’s
wagon. Their news well-nigh dissipated Rhoda’s anxiety. For, of all
the many fugitives he had hauled part or all the way to the northern
boundary she knew that not one had failed to reach Canada in safety.




CHAPTER XXII


In the depths of humiliation Rhoda mourned over the fiasco of her
attempt to guide Mary Ellen to freedom. But she soon found that the
fiasco itself was bearing a rich crop of results. She was indicted
for aiding and abetting the escape of a runaway slave and a dozen men
of the rescuing party for obstructing the United States marshal in
the performance of his duties and preventing him from rendering back
the fugitive. The anti-slavery side retorted by arresting Gordon, the
slave trader’s agent, and the slave catcher accompanying him, under the
state’s personal liberty law, for kidnaping, and several members of the
marshal’s posse, who had used fire-arms, for assault with intent to
kill.

As the news spread, meeting after meeting was held all through the
central and eastern part of the state and up into the Western Reserve,
denouncing the law, expressing sympathy with its victims and declaring
the righteousness of setting at naught its provisions. Through the
southern portion of the state and wherever there was sufficient
pro-slavery feeling to crystallize into such action, counter-meetings
were held, which reprobated the unfairness to the South, characterized
in contemptuous terms the actions and principles of believers in the
“higher law,” declared them to be traitors and called upon the Federal
Government to use stern measures in upholding the Fugitive Slave Act.

On the advice of Horace Hardaker, who was to conduct her case, and that
of the counsel for her fellow prisoners, both Rhoda and they refused
to enter recognizance that they would appear in court when wanted, and
therefore were compelled to remain in jail.

“It’s an unrighteous law in every respect,” said Hardaker, “and our
contention will be that it is unconstitutional and void. To consent to
return for trial under it would make tacit recognition of its validity.
And that we won’t do. Besides, staying in jail will make martyrdom out
of it, and the effect will be all the more potent.”

But Rhoda, although she saw that her failure, in the outcome, would
be of more consequence than success would have been, felt the pangs
of humbled pride. She talked the matter over with Rachel, Daniel
Benedict’s wife. For between her and the Quakeress a warm affection
had quickly developed. Rachel Benedict visited her as often as the
prison officials would allow, and Rhoda soon found that the little,
dove-gray figure, with the sweet, strong face and the silver hair, was
sure to bring assuaging of her heartaches and renewal of her spiritual
strength. Without making any mention of her personal affairs, Rhoda
yet found it possible to talk with her new friend with more intimacy
and with greater surety of understanding and response than she had ever
been able to do with her mother.

“I was so proud, so self-complacent,” she said, “that I thought I could
make amends to Mary Ellen for the wrongs that had been done to her.
And I showed myself unworthy even to try. I let her be taken, just by
being wrapped up for a few minutes in my own affairs, in something that
troubled me. Oh, it has been a bitter lesson!”

“Thee seems to me to be too much troubled by thy repentance. If thee
lets it engross thee it too will become a sin. And perhaps the sin for
which thee is repenting does not deserve so much repentance, after all.
If thee did this thing believing in thy inmost soul that it was right
and wishing in thy inmost soul to do good to others by means of it,
then don’t disturb thy heart, Rhoda Ware, with how it seems to have
come out. It hasn’t ended yet. And thee can be sure there is plenty of
time yet for more good to come out of it than thee ever dreamed of.”

“Yes, it didn’t make any difference to Mary Ellen,” Rhoda answered
thoughtfully, “for she reached Canada just as safely as if I’d taken
her all the way myself. But such an awful wrong had been done to
her,--it seemed more horrible than any other case I had known about,
and I wanted to suffer for it myself. I wanted to make atonement for
another person’s sin. And it has all ended in failure!”

“Well, isn’t thee suffering for it? Isn’t thee suffering a great deal
more than if thee had been successful? But don’t delude thyself,
Rhoda Ware, by thinking thee can do any good by suffering for another
person’s sins. We have got to sweat and suffer stripes ourselves for
the evil that is in us if we are to be purged of our sins!”

At her window that night, Rhoda pondered long upon these words. “I
suppose Mrs. Benedict is right,” she said to herself finally. “It was
only my pride--and my love, that made me think I could atone for even
this one bit of his wrongdoing. He will have to suffer for it, for all
of it, himself, before he can see that it is wrong. And we shall all
have to suffer, North and South alike, for this awful sin of slavery,
for the North is to blame almost as much as the South.

“‘Sweat and suffer stripes’! Bloody sweat, father thinks it will
be,--he is so sure that it will end in war. Will it come in our time?
Oh, surely, things cannot go on like this much longer! So much anger on
both sides, so much indignation in the North, so many threats in the
South--and all getting worse and worse every year--Oh, if war is to be
the end, we must be getting nearly there! War!”

She shivered and pressed her hands against her face. As the grisly
specter of blood and smoke passed vaguely before her mind’s eye her
anxious thoughts hovered with instant anxiety over the dear image of
him who she knew would be among the first to challenge the issue. Then
with a little cry she sprang to her feet.

“Shall I never remember I must not think of him like that!” she asked
herself with bitterness. “My sister’s husband! O, God, help me to
forget!” She paced about the room with frowning brows and lips pressed
hard together, telling herself, as she had already done a hundred
times, that she must learn to forget, as it had been so easy for him to
do. And there she touched upon her deepest wound, that his love had not
been as fine and as true as she had thought it.

“How could he love another--so different--and wish to marry her, after
all that has passed between us? I could not--how could he?” was the
question that would come back, again and again. She tried to subdue
it by telling herself that since he could, since his love and faith
were not equal to hers, he was not worthy of her love and deserved
only forgetfulness complete, eternal. But her heart cried out fiercely
against this edict of her brain and clung to its need of believing in
him.

“He is fine and noble in many, many ways,” at last she said to herself,
“in nearly all ways the finest and the noblest man I’ve ever known, and
if his love fell short of all I thought it was, I must try to forgive
him that, as I forgive him his blindness about the wickedness of
slavery, which kept us apart, and, I suppose--deep down in my heart--I
suppose--I’ll always love him. But I’ll try, oh, I’ll try from this
minute, always to think of him as Charlotte’s husband. He mustn’t be
Jeff to me any more--just Charlotte’s husband! Charlotte’s husband!”

During her days in jail she spent much time embroidering dainty things
for Charlotte’s trousseau, and into these she found herself able to
stitch, along with the tears that would fall now and then, prayers and
hopes for Charlotte’s happiness and earnest desires, since the marriage
must be, that she would make her husband happy. But on this latter
question she found herself haunted by a doubt that would yield to no
arguments based on the sequence of love and happiness.

Charlotte and Mrs. Ware returned home immediately after Rhoda’s arrest
and it was some time, after her sister’s first brief announcement
of her engagement, before she heard again from either of them. And
afterward their letters were filled mainly with accounts of their plans
and preparations for Charlotte’s trousseau and wedding. In her replies
she could not bring herself to write Jeff’s name and so referred to him
only as “Charlotte’s lover,” or “Charlotte’s intended.” She noticed too
that her mother spoke of him only in the same way while her sister
wrote of him as “he,” in capital letters.

“They are afraid of hurting my feelings by mentioning his name,” I
suppose, Rhoda said to herself. “I must get used to it, but--I’m glad
they don’t.”

Charlotte’s letters were brief and infrequent and each one contained,
in addition to talk about her bridal plans, advice in plenty on the
propriety of Rhoda’s giving up her “nigger thieving” and her black
abolition acquaintance, now that the family was identified with
southern interests.

“Dear little sister!” Rhoda would say to herself with an indulgent
smile as she read these admonitions. “She’s such a child, and she’s so
positive she knows all about it! I wonder if she’ll ever really grow
up!”

But her mother’s letters gave her much concern. Her arrest and
imprisonment had caused Mrs. Ware severe shock and deep grief and
her heart was wrung that the necessity was upon her to cause so much
suffering.

“I must do whatever I can,” she moaned. “It’s on my conscience and I
must, and I can’t be sorry I did this, dear, dear mother, even for your
sake. I couldn’t live if I didn’t do my best to fight this awful evil!”

Evidently, too, Mrs. Ware was not well. The physical ailments that had
interfered with her enjoyment of her visit to Fairmount had grown
worse since her return. Notwithstanding all this the mother heart of
her yearned over and wished to be with her first-born. But to this
desire Rhoda gave constant denial, lest her burden of grief and pain be
made harder to bear.

Dr. Ware came to see his daughter as often as his practice would
allow, but his visits were necessarily brief and infrequent. He spoke
occasionally of Charlotte’s engagement and Rhoda thought he seemed
pleased with it.

“It’s a very good thing, I guess,” he said one day, with a cheerfulness
that gave Rhoda a little twinge of unhappiness.

“But he always has loved Charlotte so much,” she thought, “and wanted
her to have everything she wanted that he’d be glad to have her happy
no matter if--”

“She’ll be in harmony with her surroundings and he seems to be very
much in love with her,” Dr. Ware went on. Rhoda turned quickly away
lest he see the little spasm of pain that she felt sure was showing
itself upon her countenance.

“Your mother, of course, is deeply pleased,” he continued. “I don’t
know but it is giving her almost as much pleasure as your marriage
would have done. It will be a good thing for Charlotte to be married
happily and settled down. She’ll come out all right. I never have had
any doubts about her, in the long run, because she’s so much like what
her mother was at her age.”

Horace Hardaker came often to consult with Rhoda in the preparation of
her case. He hoped to make a telling presentment and was enthusiastic
over the excitement that already had been aroused.

“Of course,” he said to her one day in the early winter, when the date
set for her trial was almost at hand, “the law and the facts are all
against us. The only thing we can do is to appeal to the sentiment
against the law. Whether we lose or win, the affair is making a big
breeze that’s going to be bigger yet!”

“You know, Horace,” she replied, “that I don’t care in the least what
they do with me,--except on mother’s account. What I want most is to
help all I can in the fight against slavery and if it will do more good
for me to stay in jail than to go home and work with the Underground
again, why then--” she looked straight at him and a smile flashed from
her lips up into her eyes--“in jail let me stay!”

He smiled back at her and his blue eyes lighted with admiration as
he laid one hand for a moment over hers. “Rhoda, I’ve told you this
before, but I must say it again, and I shall always say it--you’re the
grandest girl there is anywhere!”

After he was gone she sat with a tender smile on her lips. “Dear
Horace!” she was thinking. “Such a good friend as he is! Sound and true
to the bottom of his heart! Why didn’t I happen to fall in love with
him?... Well, it seems to be getting nearly time--for me to refuse him
again!”

It was within a day or two of the opening of her trial, which was to
be the first of the series, when Rhoda finally brought herself to the
point of writing to Jefferson Delavan. Many times she had told herself
that, since he was to marry her sister, she ought to let him know that
in her heart were only wishes for his happiness. But it had been a hard
thing to do and she had postponed it from week to week. At last, her
sense of duty would be put off no longer and she resolutely faced the
heartache that she knew the task would make all the more poignant.

“Dear Friend,” she wrote. “Charlotte has told me of the happiness
that came to her and to you during her visit to Fairmount. I am sure
you will believe me when I say it is my most earnest wish that that
happiness will never be any less than it is now and that it will grow
greater during the many long years of wedded life that I hope are
before you. In your and her feelings and convictions there is nothing
to divide you, nothing to prevent the complete union of hearts and
souls which is the only thing that can make marriage worth while. I
am sure, since you love her, that you will always be very tender to
Charlotte. To me she has always been just ‘little sister’ and it is
difficult for me to realize that she is really a woman and about to
become a wife. At home we have always spoiled her and that has made
her, sometimes, in a merry way, rather ruthless of other people’s
feelings. But I have no doubt your love will make you understand that
this is only on the surface and that her heart is true and loving. For
you both, dear friend, soon to be brother, my heart is full of every
good wish. Always your friend, Rhoda”--she paused here, on the point of
signing her name in the old way, but “Adeline” seemed sacred to those
other days and to the love that had been between them then, and she
could not write it here. So she added only “Ware” and quickly folded
and sealed the letter.

As she looked at the envelope it seemed as if it were the coffin of her
love, ready for burial, as if she had said a last good-by to all the
pleasure it had brought into her heart. Now only the pain was left. She
bowed her head upon her hands and some scalding drops trickled through
her fingers. Her jailer’s knock sounded at the door and she sprang to
her feet and dried her eyes. Hardly had she time to control her sobs
when it opened and Jefferson Delavan crossed the threshold.

His look was deeply earnest and intent upon her as he moved forward,
holding out both hands and saying, “Rhoda! I could stay away no longer!”

“Jeff!” she faltered, stepping back. “I--I--had just written to you!”

“Written to me! Rhoda! Did you ask me to come?”

There was no mistaking the look of glad surprise and love that suddenly
broke over his countenance. Rhoda gazed at him in perplexity and
instinctively pressed one hand against her heart, as if to keep down
the responsive love that was trying to leap upward, as she said to
herself, “Charlotte’s husband! Charlotte’s husband!”

Still moving backward, away from him, as he followed her across the
room exclaiming again, “Sweetheart, did you ask me to come?” her
bewildered, apprehensive thought sprang to the conclusion that she must
make him be true to Charlotte, that she must not let him betray the
“little sister.”

“Charlotte--” she ejaculated--“your engagement--I wrote to wish you
happiness!”

He stopped short and stared at her with puzzled eyes. “What under
heaven do you mean?”

“Why, your engagement to my sister! Aren’t you going to marry
Charlotte?”

“Assuredly, I’m not!” was his quick and emphatic answer.

“Have you--have you--broken it off, then--so soon?” She was moving her
trembling hands over each other, unable to keep them still, and holding
her face half averted, afraid to look at him save in brief glances,
lest her eyes might betray the love that was swelling in her heart.

“You are talking in puzzles, Rhoda! I’ve never had the faintest desire
to marry Charlotte, or anybody but you.”

Her face dropped lower and her bosom heaved. What could it all
mean? Had they been deceiving her? And why? “She said--that is--I
understood--” she stumbled. Then he broke in upon her embarrassed
bewilderment.

“She didn’t say she was going to marry me, did she? Lloyd Corey is the
happy man. It was love at first sight, of the most violent sort, with
him, and he would take nothing but an outright ‘yes’ for his answer,
and that inside of two weeks. It was a pretty little love comedy, and I
wished a hundred times that you were there to watch it with me.”

She moved unsteadily to a chair and sank down, her face in her hands.
It had been such tragedy to her! And now it was taking all her
self-control to hold herself firmly in hand under the reaction. At once
he was beside her, dropping upon one knee and trying to take her hands
from her face. “What is it, Rhoda? What is the matter? Look at me,
dearest!”

“Yes, Jeff--let me realize--wait--one moment!” He watched her
anxiously, her hands in his, as with a deep, long breath, a tension of
the muscles and a pressing together of her lips she regained control of
herself. She withdrew her hands and slowly lifted her face as he rose
to his feet.

“It’s nothing, Jeff--no, I don’t mean that--it is so much. But--I
thought--Charlotte led me to think that--she was going to marry
you--and now--to find that you’re not--that you still--” She stopped
and half turned away her face, trying to hide the confession she knew
was there of all it meant to find that his love was still her own.
But already he had seen enough to set his heart on fire and he sprang
toward her, as if to take her in his arms.

“And you cared so much? Rhoda, deny me no longer!”

She drew away from him and said humbly: “Can you forgive me, Jeff?
Indeed, I would not have thought it possible, but it seemed to have
happened. It was just one of Charlotte’s tricks.”

“Forgive you, dear heart? I do not think you could do anything that I
would not forgive!”

Her glance swept the room. Then she looked up at him with a smile and
said significantly, “Even this?”

“Even this, Rhoda, else I would not be here. I held out against the
pleading of my heart as long as I could. But I longed so much to see
you and wanted so much to help you, that I couldn’t stay away any
longer. I’ve come, dear, to beg you once more to be my wife. Let me
give you, at once, the protection of my name--”

She drew back and lifted her head proudly. “I have already the
protection of my father’s name and the approval of my conscience. I
should feel myself a coward, and a traitor to myself, if I tried to
crawl under any other now.”

“I understand what you mean--and I beg your pardon. But we both know
now, more surely than we knew before, how necessary we are to each
other, how deep and true and everlasting our love is. Don’t you
realize that neither of us can ever be happy until we have joined our
lives together? What are the days and the weeks for us now but just a
constant yearning for each other’s presence. Look forward, Rhoda, to
months and years of that, think of how much more life will mean for us
both, if only you will give up and listen to what your heart tells you.”

She had risen and was standing beside her chair, one hand on its back.
He came close to her and rested his hand near hers. She was conscious
too that his other arm was outstretched behind her, hovering close,
ready to sweep her into his embrace. The struggle in her heart, longing
to heed the call of his, quick with desire to make amends for the
injustice she had done him, tumultuous with rejoicing that his love
had been all she had thought it, was almost more than she could bear.
He was so near--she had only to lean toward him a little, and his arm
would be around her and her head upon his breast. Ah, the blessed
peace there would be in that haven of repose! Already she could feel
its stilling waters wrapping round her, numbing the power of resistance.

He leaned a little nearer and his voice was low and compellingly sweet,
“Rhoda! Come to my arms, where you belong! Do not deny our love any
longer!”

She saw his hand on the back of the chair moving instinctively toward
her own,--a sinewy, brown, masterful hand, which held her eyes as
it drew nearer, little by little, as if drawn by some irresistible
attraction. She knew that his eyes in that same way were fixed upon
her own, long, slender, nervous, the sort of hand that works out
the behests of a strenuous soul. And she knew, also, as she waited,
silent, trying to force herself to voice once more the dictates of her
conscience, she knew that, if his hand touched hers before she could
bring herself to speak, she could resist no longer. Still she stood,
speechless, her fascinated eyes upon his masterful hand, her body
thrilling with the surety that if she did not speak now, at once, in
another moment she would be in his arms, and the struggle over.

  “Oh, my poor Nellie Gray,
  They have taken her away,
  And I’ll never see my darling any more!”

The words of the negro song, in a negro woman’s voice, came floating
into the room, mingled with the sounds of broom and scrubbing brush.
They brought to Rhoda instant memory of Mary Ellen’s melodious tones,
singing in happy unconsciousness of peril, and of her own strained
and fearful attention as she listened to the footsteps steps of the
marshal’s posse. And then like a flash passed before her mind’s eye
the ashen face and shaking figure of Mary Ellen, as her father and Jim
lifted her from the box that had almost been her deathbed.

The numbing waters fell away, she raised her hand and pressed it
against her heart with the impulsive, unconscious gesture he knew so
well, and moved apart.

“Jeff, it’s no use talking any more about this,” she said in tremulous
accents. “The last time we said all that is to be said.”

“Don’t say that! It makes everything so bare and hopeless! It makes me
fear that you have killed your love. Rhoda, you do love me, yet?”

She turned slowly toward him and lifted her downcast face, alight with
all the glow that was in her heart. “Jeff,” and the word as it came
from her tenderly smiling lips was a caress, “Jeff, I love you so
much that my heart has made me forgive you even that you allowed Mary
Ellen--Lear White--to be sold.”

“My sweet! And I love you so much that my heart has made me forgive
even your stealing her away!”

For a moment it seemed to them that gray eyes and brown melted into
each other. And then the comedy of their cross-conscienced hearts
struck her sense of humor, the corners of her mouth trembled and
deepened and a smile flashed over her face and sparkled in her eyes.
At that they both laughed, softly, in the tenderness of perfect
understanding. Then she saw the old baffled, determined look overspread
his face as turning sharply he strode across the room and back.

“My God, Rhoda! Why have our hearts snared us into this misery? Why
don’t you loathe me as you do all that I believe in and stand for?
Why can’t I condemn and scorn you as I do all the rest of your tribe?
Why must I, when I detest and am injured by what is dearest to you,
still see in you my ideal of all that is lovable and womanly? My love,
my love, why can’t I hate you instead of loving you so that you are
the only woman in all the world I want for my wife? Must our love be
forever a curse instead of a blessing?”

He flung himself into a chair beside the table, every muscle of his
body expressive of anger and rebellion at the mysterious forces of
human life that had played this scurvy trick upon them, pitted against
each other loving heart and steadfast conscience and left them, like
two cocks in a pit, to fight it out in a struggle to the death.

Did they laugh at him and at her, those Caliban spirits of the
universe, that with grim and cruel humor are forever setting human
purpose awry and sending it, lop-sided and ludicrous, far aside its
mark? Did they laugh and cheer and find pleasure in that struggle,
the sure result of the innate upward-strivingness of the human soul,
like human beings around a cock-pit betting upon which instinct, which
spirit, which physique, shall prove the stronger? Or, perhaps, was
Caliban pushed aside by some Angel of the Sword, infinitely just and
infinitely merciful, that with stern lips whispered to pitying eyes,
“No, let them struggle, for only by struggling, even to the uttermost,
can their souls grow!”

Softly Rhoda came near, hesitatingly put forth one hand and let it
rest for an instant upon his arm. At her touch he straightened up and
unconsciously one hand sought the place upon his arm where hers had
lain. “I don’t believe, dear, it will be forever. I don’t believe it
will be very much longer.”

“What do you mean, Rhoda?” he cried, springing up. “Do you really think
there is hope for us?”

“Yes, Jeff, I do. But I don’t suppose you’ll see it as I do. It’s only
that I think,” she was speaking timidly, and yet with a grave eagerness
of voice and manner, “and so do a good many of us, that slavery can’t
last much longer. We feel sure that its end is bound to come, in one
way or another, and that before long. And when slavery is swept away,
Jeff, and the whole country is clean of it, then there will be no gulf
between us!”

Her serious eyes were luminous as they met his unbelieving ones and in
her face was the subdued glow of one who looks afar off upon a land of
promise and knows that toward it his feet are set. Love and disbelief
were mingled in the somber countenance he bent upon her.

“No, Rhoda, I do not agree with you. And much as I love you, sweet, I
would not, if I could, purchase our happiness at such a cost. I would
not, if I could, be such a traitor to the South. But I shall always
love you, dear heart, and I shall always hope that you will yet be
mine.” He held her hand tenderly for a moment in both of his, pressed
it to his lips, bowed gravely, and left the room.




CHAPTER XXIII


“It’s going to be a good speech, Horace, and it will surely attract
attention,” said Rhoda Ware to her counsel on the day before the
opening of her trial.

Hardaker had just gone over with her an outline of the address he would
make in summing up her case. It was intended for the people outside
the court room, near and far, who would talk about it and read it in
the newspapers, quite as much as for the ears of the jurors. So high
and strong had risen the feeling on the slavery question that in some
parts of Ohio, as well as elsewhere, the lawyer who devoted energy and
ability to the defense of captured fugitives and their helpers could
be sure of early and ample political reward. Hardaker was ambitious.
He meant, as soon as he could reach an opening door, to enter upon a
public career and he had mapped out for himself election to Congress,
and after that a steady ascent to high places in national affairs--such
a career as, half a century ago, engaged the talents and aspirations
of ten times as many eager and capable young men as now think it worth
consideration. The fact is an ugly one and not creditable to the
quality of our national growth.

But for Horace Hardaker in this present case the spurrings of ambition
were only an added incentive. His conviction was profound that slavery
was an evil and the Fugitive Slave Act a monstrous law and his desire
to oppose either or both or anything that tended to strengthen the
institution of slavery amounted to a passion. And, in addition to these
motives, his intimate friendship with Dr. Ware and his love for Rhoda
incited him to exert himself to the utmost in her defense.

“I hope it will, Rhoda,” he replied, “but I’m doubtful if it will do
you any good. Your violation of the law was open and flagrant and we
don’t want to deny it or attempt to mitigate it in the least.”

“Indeed we don’t.”

“The decision in the case, then, will depend entirely on the political
sympathies of the jury, and the other side is not likely to allow any
man on it who has anti-slavery convictions. It would be a victory worth
while, Rhoda, if I could get you off! Not only for you, which would
gratify me enough, but for the anti-slavery cause! To have conviction
refused in a case as bare-faced as this would be a big blow toward
making the Fugitive Slave law a dead letter!”

“If I could think,” said Rhoda earnestly, “that any act of mine would
help to bring that about, I’d be willing to undergo this all over
again.”

He looked at her admiringly and drew his chair nearer, as he said:
“Well, you can rest assured that your attempt to help Mary Ellen is
having important results. And the waves are spreading out and getting
bigger, Rhoda!” Another hitch brought his chair still closer.

“I’m glad of that, and I want you to remember, Horace, when you are
making your speech, that you are not to consider me or my sentence
at all. Say the thing that will help toward what we all want. Don’t
think about me--just think about Mary Ellen and what she was willing
to undergo, and all the rest of those poor black creatures that are
longing so for their freedom.”

His chair was beside hers now and he was seizing her hand. “Rhoda! Not
think about you! How can I help it? Don’t you know I’m always thinking
about you and always hoping that some day you’ll think better about
what I’ve been hoping for so long? Isn’t there any chance, any prospect
of a chance, for me yet?”

She laid her free hand upon his two that were clasping hers. “I’m
sorry, Horace! You know how much I like you, how much I prize your
friendship--but you are like a dear brother to me, Horace, and I can’t
think of you any other way!”

“But isn’t it possible that sometime--don’t you think, Rhoda, that
after a while you’ll learn to like me the other way too? You know what
I am, you know how much I love you--won’t my heart’s love draw yours,
after a while?”

She shook her head and drew her hands away. “No, Horace, there isn’t
any hope, not the least in the world. And I wish, dear Horace, I wish
you would put it quite out of your mind. Don’t waste any more time
thinking about me. There is many a nice girl who would make you a good
wife, and I do wish, Horace, for your own sake, you would fall in love
with one and marry her.”

He looked at her searchingly. “When a girl talks that way she really
means it.”

“You know I mean it, Horace.”

“I mean, Rhoda, that she knows her own heart, clear through, and feels
sure about it.”

“That’s the way I know mine,” she answered softly.

He seized her hand again as he exclaimed, “Does that mean, Rhoda, that
there is some one else and that your heart is full already?”

“Yes, Horace. It means that I love some one else so deeply that I can
never have a love thought for any other man. I love him with all my
heart, although I don’t suppose I shall ever marry him. But I shall
never marry any one else, and I could no more think of you or any one
else with the kind of love you want than I could if I were his wife.”

There was something like reverence in the gesture with which he put
down her hand. “Then that is the end of it for me, Rhoda. Would
you mind telling me, is it that”--he paused an instant, supplying
mentally the adjective with which he usually thought of Rhoda’s
lover--“slaveholder, Delavan, from Kentucky?”

“Yes, Horace.”

He rose and took up his hat. “If that’s the way it is with you,” he
began, then stopped, looking fixedly. “Poor girl!” he went on, resting
his hand lightly for an instant upon her head. “You ought to have had a
happier fate!”

“It’s as good as I deserve, Horace,” she replied cheerfully. Then her
face lighted with the glow that had been in her heart since Delavan’s
visit, and she went on: “And it might have been so much worse!”

That same glow, as of profound inward happiness, was upon her
countenance the next day as she sat in the court room. On one side of
her was her father and on the other sat Rachel Benedict, with wrinkled
hands primly folded in the lap of her plain gray gown, her kindly,
bright old eyes and sweet smile bent now and then upon her young
friend as she whispered some encouraging word. Behind her were Mrs.
Hardaker and Marcia Kimball and other friends from the Hillside Female
Anti-Slavery Society.

In the back of the room, throughout the trial, sat Jefferson Delavan.
He was always in his place in the same seat, when she entered, and
their eyes would meet once and a faint smile play around her lips for
an instant. Then she would not look again in his direction, but her
face kept always its glow of inward happiness.

Horace Hardaker sat with his gaze moodily fixed upon Delavan’s dark
head. Jeff’s eyes were upon Rhoda’s face and Hardaker felt resentfully
that within their depths must lie some hint of the lover’s yearning. It
was almost time for him to begin his address. But his thoughts were not
upon what he was about to say nor upon how he could most move the jury.
Instead they were busy, with indignant wonder, upon how “that damned
slaveholder” had contrived to win the rich and undying love of such a
girl as Rhoda Ware.

For the way of a man with a maid is always a sealed book to other men.
A woman can guess, or she knows instinctively, how and why another
woman has won a man’s love. But the side of a man’s nature with which
he does his wooing is so different from any manifestation of himself
that he makes among his fellows that to them it is an unknown land.
Therefore they are inclined to be skeptical as to its attractiveness.

But Hardaker was much more than skeptical. He was irritated, and even
angry, that “such a man as that” should have dared to think himself
worthy of Rhoda’s love. And when he presently rose to address the jury
the rankling in his heart lent sharper vigor to every thrust he made
against the slave power and put into his tones a savage indignation
as, with eyes fixed upon Delavan’s face, he thundered his indictments.

An audience of character and intelligence crowded the court room to the
doors, while outside, in the hall and around the windows people stood
on benches, listening intently, for hours at a time. From all over the
county, from surrounding counties, and from as far away as Cleveland,
men of substance and of prominence had left their homes and business
and journeyed hither to listen to the proceedings and to testify by
their presence their sympathy with the defense.

But the pro-slavery side also had its representatives, although in
the minority, who were of equal consequence and standing. It was such
an audience as would gratify any attorney, wishing to influence the
community as well as the jury.

As he rose for his address Hardaker presented a manly, attractive
figure and a vigorous, almost a magnetic, personality. Sweeping the
court room with his eyes, he waited for a moment and then began with a
couplet from a popular anti-slavery song, a song that had roused the
echoes in thousands of enthusiastic gatherings, all over the North. No
one within the reach of his voice needed any explanation of its meaning:

  “’Tis the law of God in the human soul,
  ’Tis the law in the Word Divine.”

He quoted the injunction of the Mosaic law against the returning of an
escaped servant and the commands of the New Testament for the succor
of the oppressed, and in vivid language set them forth as the law of
the Divine Word, the command of God, and therefore infinitely more
binding upon men and women who believed in God and accepted the Bible
as his Word than any law made by man in defiance of the Almighty’s
command. In a voice that gave full value to its pathetic appeal he told
the story of Mary Ellen’s heroic endeavor to escape from bondage and
a fate “like unto the fires of hell.” Then he called upon the fathers
and mothers of all young girls to tell him if the command of Christ,
“Do unto others as you would that others do unto you,” had lost all
its meaning, if humanity, Christianity, fatherhood--even ordinary
manhood--no longer felt its force. Following the precedent set by a
number of lawyers of wide reputation he analyzed the relation of the
Fugitive Slave Act to the Constitution and concluded that it violated
the rights guaranteed by the basic law of the country, and therefore,
since it was unconstitutional, to disregard its provisions was not
unlawful and his client had committed no crime.

“This law was passed at the behest of the slave power,” he declared.
“It was conceived in iniquity, the iniquity of the South’s
determination to put upon slavery the seal of national approval; it was
begotten in corruption, the corruption of compromise and bargain; and
it was born in the dastardly willingness of misrepresentatives of the
people to truckle to Southern arrogance and betray the convictions and
the conscience of the North.

“Shall we then, free men and women of Ohio, betrayed as we have been
and misrepresented as we are by this so-called law, be expected to
cast aside the commands of Christianity and the obligations of common
brotherhood, transform ourselves into bloodhounds to chase the panting
fugitive and send him back to his chains and, as in this case, to
such a hell of lust and vice as all decent manhood and womanhood must
shudder at? In the name of all that humanity holds sacred, I answer,
no! A thousand times, no!

“The learned counsel for the prosecution has seen fit to sneer at our
belief in the higher law,” Hardaker went on, with body erect and hand
upraised, his full, melodious, resonant voice filling the court room
and the corridors and carrying his words even into the street. “I
answer that that law has my entire allegiance and that I stand here to
defend and uphold it and to demand the rights of those who feel bound,
as I do, by its commands. I feel assured, and you well know, gentlemen
of the jury, that I voice the sentiments of thousands upon thousands
of Christ-loving and God-fearing men and women when I say that if any
fleeing bondman comes to me in need of help, protection, and means of
flight, so help me the living God in my hour of greatest need, he
shall have them all, even to the last drop of my life’s blood!”

Like the sudden upburst of a volcano, the court room broke into
resounding applause. Men sprang to their feet, swung their hats and
cheered. Women stood upon benches, waved handkerchiefs and clapped
their hands. The rapping of the judge’s gavel and the cries of the
officers for “order in the court” were drowned in the uproar and hardly
reached even their own ears. Then the sharp insistence of hisses began
to be heard. Jefferson Delavan, who had been listening with hands
clenched, frowning brows and angry eyes, added his voice to the sounds
of disapproval. For a few minutes the tumult continued, and then, at
the judge’s order, the court officers began forcing the people out.

They poured into the street and organized a mass-meeting in the square
in front of the court house. Numbers of men came running from all
directions and while the meeting was in progress word filtered out that
the jury had found the prisoner guilty and the judge’s sentence had
imposed a fine of one thousand dollars and costs and imprisonment for
thirty days.

Resolutions were at once passed denouncing the judge and deciding,
“since the courts no longer dispensed justice,” to proceed to the jail,
liberate the other prisoners and protect them from the operations of
“an outrageously unjust and tyrannous enactment.”

Delavan, looking on at the outskirts of the gathering, heard the
resolutions. He knew that Rhoda would soon be conducted back to her
quarters in the jail and he ran thither, hoping to arrive before the
crowd of rescuers. In custody of the marshal she had just reached the
jail entrance.

“Rhoda!” he exclaimed. “You are in danger here! A mob is coming to
break in the doors. Marshal, bring her with me, so we can find a place
of safety for her.”

She drew herself up and looked at him with the same pale face and
brilliant eyes with which in the woods, so long ago, she had opposed
his quest for his fugitive slave. Scarcely she seemed the same being
who, only a few days before, had almost trembled into his embrace.

“No,” she said slowly, “these are my people and with them is where I
belong. This is where your law has sent me and while I am in its power
I want no place of safety. Marshal, take me in!”

The marshal was doubtful, asked Delavan what he meant and what he
purposed to do, and while he hesitated the mob came rushing up the
street and his only course was to hurry inside with her and bar the
door.

The mass of men surged against the jail entrance and with pieces of
timber and bars of iron soon forced their way in. Then they trooped
through the building, sweeping along all the prisoners who were
awaiting trial under the Fugitive Slave law. They urged Rhoda to walk
out into freedom and defiance of her sentence. But she smilingly shook
her head and told them:

“No, thank you. It’s better to serve out my sentence, and then I’ll be
free to defy the law again in my own way.”

Exultantly the throng poured out into the street again with the
prisoners, and faced two companies of militia, ready to fire. Even the
hottest heads among them paused at this and after some parleying they
agreed to disperse and allow the men to be taken back to confinement.

Among those awaiting trial for aiding in Mary Ellen’s rescue and escape
were the pastor of the leading Presbyterian church in the town, the
superintendent of a Methodist Sunday School, a professor from Oberlin
College who had happened to be in the place on that day, a merchant,
two lawyers and a physician, together with some clerks, laboring men,
a farmer and several free negroes. The day following the conclusion of
Rhoda’s trial was Sunday, and the Presbyterian minister preached from
the jail yard to a large concourse of people who stood for two hours
in a biting wind, for it was now well on in the winter, listening with
the closest attention. The sermon, which was mainly an anti-slavery
address, added fuel to the already flaming excitement.

Meetings were held and bands of men began to organize and arm
themselves. Militia guarded the jail night and day. The pro-slavery
sympathizers, though in the minority in this region, yet made up a
considerable share of the populace, and, angered and uneasy, they also
began to prepare for whatever might happen. To hints that the Fugitive
Slave law prisoners might yet be delivered from jail they retaliated
with threats that those of their own party who were under durance for
infraction of state laws should no longer suffer imprisonment.

So acute did the situation become that Governor Chase hurried to
Washington to consult with President Buchanan, assuring him that while
he intended to support the federal government, as long as its authority
was exercised legitimately, nevertheless he felt it his duty to protect
the state officials and the state courts and that this should be done,
though it took every man in the state to do it.

Finally, a compromise was arranged by which the federal government
dropped the remaining prosecutions for the escape of Mary Ellen and
released the prisoners, while the state authorities dismissed the suits
against the slave trader’s agent and his companion and the members of
the marshal’s posse.

The episode was amicably settled, but the flames of contention had been
so fed by it that they mounted higher and higher. Meetings continued
to be held all over those portions of the state where anti-slavery
sentiment was strong. They culminated, soon after Rhoda’s release,
in an immense mass-convention at Cleveland attended by many thousand
people and addressed by public men of distinction, where, amid the
greatest enthusiasm, resolutions were passed denouncing the Dred Scott
decision and declaring the Fugitive Slave Act unconstitutional and
therefore void.

In the pocket of the dress she had worn on the day of her arrest
Rhoda chanced to find, soon after this convention, Charlotte’s note
telling of her engagement. She smiled soberly as she thought of all the
consequences that had resulted from this manifestation of her sister’s
puckish spirit.

“If she hadn’t misled me this way,” Rhoda’s thoughts ran, “I wouldn’t
have forgotten about everything else the way I did for a few minutes,
and I would have kept watch of Mary Ellen and made her keep her veil
down, and then that man wouldn’t have recognized her, and we’d have
gone right on and nothing would have happened!”

Rhoda’s trial aroused the keenest interest all over the North. But
it was an interest that cared only for principles. The personalities
of those engaged in the matter were of the slightest consequence.
Everywhere, in newspapers and in conversation, there was discussion
of the affair, and of the consequences to which it might lead. But the
people concerned in it were only so many cogs in a mighty Wheel of
Fate, turning resistlessly, and ever about to bring into the present,
out of the unknown future, no man could tell what.

To the South and its northern sympathizers the whole affair was
irritating and alarming in high degree. Democratic newspapers and their
readers declared the attitude of “Chase and his abolition crew” to
be equivalent to a declaration of war against the United States and
welcomed the prospect, while the compromise by which the difficulty was
finally settled they described with bitterness as “another triumph”
for the creed of the “traitorous higher law with its open sanction of
treason and rebellion.”

But there was one element in the North to whom Rhoda Ware’s share
in these events was not a matter of indifference. In the eyes of
the abolitionists she was a martyr to the cause to which they were
zealously devoted and during the month in which she served out her
sentence letters poured in upon her containing money for the payment
of her fine and warm words of praise. The Female Anti-Slavery Society
of Hillside sent her the whole of their small store, saying, “we shall
be proud to share even so little in the martyrdom of our beloved
president.” Rhoda wept over it, knowing well at what cost of personal
sacrifice the little hoard had been gathered. But she knew, too,
that to beg them to take back their offering would be to stab their
very hearts. Other anti-slavery societies in Ohio and elsewhere sent
contributions. There were checks from rich men in New York, New England
and Pennsylvania, whose purses were always open for the anti-slavery
cause and whose custom it was to give brotherly encouragement to
Underground operators who fell into the toils of the Fugitive Slave
Act by helping to pay their fines. The amount in which Rhoda had been
mulcted was entirely paid, as was the assessment in many another case,
by these enthusiastic co-workers.

Most precious to her, however, were the letters which came from
abolitionists all over the country with their words of praise,
sympathy, encouragement and hope. Many of them were from men and women
whose names will be found in the pages of American history as long as
the conflict over slavery holds a place therein. Long afterward, when
many years of peace had enabled all the people of the land to look back
with calm philosophy upon those heated years of contention, and the
impartial muse of history had given to the Underground Railroad a high
place among the causes which brought on the Civil War and abolished
servitude, Rhoda Ware held these letters among her most prized mementos
of those stirring days of which she was a part.




CHAPTER XXIV


The lilac bushes were again in bud and Rhoda Ware was looking at them,
pulling down here and there a tall one to see if it was not farther
advanced than the rest, and reckoning how soon they would burst into
flower, when she saw a tall, erect old man enter the gate. He came up
the walk with a peculiar directness of manner, as of one accustomed
to go forward with eyes and will upon a single aim. As he approached
and asked for Dr. Ware, Rhoda saw in his face something of that same
quality of underlying sternness, a sternness expressive rather of
uncompromising moral sense than of severity of feeling or of judgment,
that marked her father’s countenance. His silver-white beard, long and
full, lent to this austereness a patriarchal dignity.

She took him to her father’s door, but Dr. Ware was engaged with a
patient. The stranger asked if it were not she who had been concerned,
the previous autumn, in the escape of the slave girl, Lear White, and
they talked of that affair and of the consequences to which it led.
She felt a magnetic quality in his grave and mellow tones, and in the
steady gaze of his deep-set eyes, alert, luminous, penetrating, she was
conscious of that compelling force that lies in the look of all men
able to impress themselves upon others. Presently he told her who he
was and she thrilled as she heard him speak the words, “Captain John
Brown, of Kansas.”

“My father and I have spoken of you often, Captain Brown,” she said,
her eyes and face lighting with the admiration which abolitionists felt
for the man whom already they regarded as a hero.

“Yes. We have known each other for many years, and we have been agreed
about slavery since a time when there were so few of us that we all
felt as brothers.”

She had many questions to ask of matters in Kansas, where, she found,
he knew the husband of her friend, Julia Hammerton. As they talked she
saw presently that his eyes were fixed upon Bully Brooks, who, in full
grown feline dignity, was sunning himself on the veranda. The cat’s
air of complacent ease disappeared and, after some worried movements,
it suddenly sprang up with arched back and swelling tail, spat its
displeasure and ran away. Charlotte, coming in at the east gate, saw
her pet’s performance and shot a questioning glance at Rhoda and the
stranger as she passed them.

A little later, when her father had taken Captain Brown into his
office, Rhoda found Charlotte with Bully Brooks in her lap, alternately
soothing his ruffled dignity and stirring him to angry protest.

“Rhoda, who is that horrid old man?” she demanded.

“Why do you call him horrid? He is the finest, noblest-looking old man
I’ve ever seen, and his character is as noble as his appearance.”

“Oh, la! I asked you who he is.”

Rhoda hesitated, considering whether or not it would be prudent to let
Charlotte know the identity of her father’s visitor. For there was much
pro-southern sentiment in Hillside and, although John Brown was not yet
an outlaw with a price on his head, he was detested and considered an
active enemy by all friends of the South. Charlotte noted her pause and
bent upon her a keen gaze. Apparently Rhoda did not want to tell her
who he was and therefore it became at once an urgent necessity for her
to find out. Rhoda felt those intent brown eyes studying her face and
decided it would be better not to give her sister reason for suspecting
any mystery.

“I suppose he’s some old nigger-stealer,” Charlotte was saying, still
watching Rhoda’s expression, “and that’s why you think he’s such a
noble character. Lloyd thinks, and so do I, that nigger-stealing ought
to be punished by hanging.”

Rhoda smiled at her. “Would my little sister like to see me hanging
from a limb of that maple tree yonder?”

“But you’d quit if you knew you were going to be hung for it.”

“No, I wouldn’t.”

Charlotte regarded her with wide eyes. In her secret heart she was
beginning to feel not a little awe of this quiet elder sister upon
whose countenance she sometimes surprised a look of exaltation. And
therefore, to save her own sense of dignity, immensely increased by the
prospect of her marriage, she had taken refuge in a patronizing manner.

“Of course you would,” she said, with a superior air and a toss of
her pretty head. “You say that just to brave it out. Has old Mr.
White-Beard come to help you make plans to get arrested again?”

“No. He wanted to see father.”

“Oh, well! Who is he? John Brown, or Horace Greeley, or Governor Chase?
One of them is as bad as another and they’re all tarred with the same
brush.”

“Which do you think?” asked Rhoda calmly.

Charlotte leaned forward, all eagerness, her intuitions, as they so
often did, flashing straight to the truth. “Not John Brown?” she
ejaculated. Rhoda nodded, and Charlotte drew back with a little gasp
and then seized the cat in her lap with extravagant exclamations of
pride and affection.

“My precious Bully Brooks! You knew who he was, didn’t you, and you
told him what you thought of him! He’s a regular old ogre, Rhoda,
and Bully Brooks felt it, didn’t you, you darling cat! And you shall
go with Charlotte, when she’s married, to Corey’s Hall, so you shall,
where there won’t be any nigger-stealers to make you angry.”

Rhoda looked on with amusement. Not even yet, although Charlotte’s
wedding day was fast approaching, could she think of her sister as
other than a merry sprite, a spoiled child, of whom it would be too
much to expect the sense of ordinary responsibilities. But now a
feeling of uneasiness grew upon her, and when presently both rose to go
into the house she said:

“By the way, sister, please remember that it is not necessary for you
to tell any one about Captain Brown’s being here, either now or after
he has gone.”

Charlotte tilted her chin saucily and laughed. “Don’t you know, Rhoda,
that I never make promises--except for the fun of breaking them?
Besides, I’m a southerner now.”

Rhoda laid her hand gently upon the other’s shoulder. “Stop, sister.
This is a serious matter. I can’t forget that once you played the
traitor--pardon me, there is no other word for it, although I don’t
think you meant it that way--but it was the traitor to father and to
me. You know how much father loves you and how he’ll miss you after
you’re married. Do you want to make him feel so much safer then that
he can’t help being glad you’re gone?”

It was a new experience for even Rhoda to take her reckless audacities
with so much seriousness, and she looked up wonderingly, at first with
pouting and then with trembling lips. “I don’t see why you want to make
me so unhappy at home, when I’m soon going to leave it,” she sobbed.
“Do you want to make me hate my home and be glad to go away?”

Rhoda longed to take the dainty, drooping little figure into her arms
and speak words of soothing. But she held to her purpose. “Do you want
to make father, who loves you so much, glad to have you go away?”

Charlotte stamped her foot. “Of course I don’t!” she exclaimed, her
fists in her eyes. “And you’re perfectly horrid to say such things!”

At once Rhoda gave way to compassion, for she felt that she had gained
her point. She drew her sister within her arm, patting her shoulder and
kissing her forehead. “There, there, dear! Never mind. I only wanted to
make sure we could trust you.”

In the afternoon when Dr. Ware was ready to make his round of visits,
he asked Rhoda to go with him upon a trip he had to make into the
country. As they drove through the glistening young spring he told her
of his conversation with his morning’s visitor.

“Captain Brown gave me permission to talk it over with you,” he said.
“I assured him you could be trusted.” Rhoda’s heart swelled with
pleasure at her father’s words and at the matter-of-fact way in which
he spoke them, for both words and manner made her know how habitual
with him their companionship had become.

“I’ve known him for a good many years,” Dr. Ware went on, “and I’ve
always believed that some day he’d strike a big blow, square on
slavery’s head, do some big thing that would help immensely to get rid
of it. For a man of Brown’s intelligence, character and personality
can’t live half his lifetime absorbed by one idea without making
something happen. He and I agree on one point, that slavery can be
wiped out only by violence. We both see that its roots have gone so
deep that to pull them up will make a terrible upheaval. He hasn’t the
faith that I have, hasn’t any, in fact, in political measures and the
Republican party. He doesn’t believe, as I do, that all this is helping
to keep the roots from spreading and getting stronger, and that it will
make our victory quicker and easier, when the time for violence does
come.

“He thinks that time is nearly here and that he is going to bring it
about. He proposes to establish himself, before long, somewhere along
the free-state border, with a band of picked followers, drilled in
arms, and gather into his fortified camp all the negroes from the
near-by plantations. Such of these as wish to go to Canada will be
passed on by the Underground, while those who prefer will stay with him
and help gather in more slaves from greater distances. As the success
of his forays becomes known he thinks that other men will join him from
all over the North, until his army, increased also by daring spirits
from among the fugitive slaves, will be so large and formidable and
slave property be made so insecure that slavery will collapse like the
shell of a ruined house.”

Rhoda’s cheeks were flushed and her eyes shining. “What a daring
scheme, father! Do you think it will succeed?”

Dr. Ware smiled doubtfully and shook his head. “I don’t think he can
carry it through to the end he feels sure of, and I told him so this
morning. But his heart is set on it. He has been slowly maturing the
plan for twenty-five years, and has even made a tour of the great
battlefields and important fortifications of Europe, studying them
in the light of this purpose. It seems to me impossible that he can
succeed. But he’ll scare the South out of its wits and make it angrier
and more determined than ever, and that will be a good thing. With the
rising tide of public opinion in the North, it will bring the clash
that’s bound to come a big notch nearer.”

“Did he want you to join him, father?”

“Yes. I knew about his plan--we’ve talked of it before. I have so much
faith in the power of the one-ideaed man to achieve things that I’ve
always told him he could call on me for any help it was in my power to
give. I’ve contributed what I could to his Kansas campaign, and I gave
him this morning for this scheme all I could spare. I told him, too,”
Dr. Ware hesitated a little over his words now, “that I might join him
in person somewhat later, if his first attempts prove successful, and
that perhaps you would come too. For with your knowledge of nursing you
would be useful. Do you think you would care to throw yourself into
such a scheme as his, full of danger and sure to fail, but likely to
deliver an effective blow?”

His eyes were upon her, clear and calm as usual, but brilliant now with
the fires of zeal. As they searched her face her own looked back at
him, as glowing with zeal as his. “You know I would, father--you did
right to tell him so. I’m always ready to go anywhere or do anything
that will help our cause. But--mother--what about mother?”

He shook his head sadly and turned away. “Your mother, Rhoda, is
incurably ill. She cannot be with us much longer. I had her consult two
physicians in Cincinnati on her way home from Fairmount, and they both
told her it is only a question of time.”

“Oh, father! Can’t we do anything for her? Why didn’t you tell me
before?”

“There is nothing we can do but make her as comfortable and care free
as possible while she is with us. I didn’t tell you before because she
didn’t want you to know about it until after Charlotte’s wedding, and
she doesn’t want Charlotte to know it at all. She wants everything to
be as cheerful and happy as possible while Charlotte is here. Please
don’t let her guess that you know.”

Charlotte was to be married in May, and during the remaining weeks of
that time Rhoda watched her mother with anxious and loving care, taking
upon herself, as Mrs. Ware seemed willing to relinquish it, every
household responsibility, and noted with aching heart the wasting of
her face and figure.

“I believe she is just keeping up by her will power,” Rhoda said to Dr.
Ware, “so that there shall be nothing to make Charlotte unhappy during
her last weeks at home.”

“Yes,” assented her father, “she wants Charlotte to remember the months
of her engagement as the happiest time in her life. We must be prepared
for a reaction after it is all over.”

After Rhoda’s trial and imprisonment no mention of that matter was
ever made between her and her mother. When she returned home Mrs. Ware
received her with the utmost love and tenderness, but without the
least reference to the reasons for her absence. In neither words nor
manner did she recognize that that absence had been anything other than
an ordinary social visit and if it had to be spoken of she referred to
it merely as the time “when you were away.”

So, now, she made no sign to either her husband or her daughter that
she had any knowledge of the Underground activities in which they were
engaged or of the fugitive slaves who were sheltered in the house.
Rhoda was never able to guess whether she knew much or little of what
went on under her roof nor whether or not she resented it or was
grieved by it. But the girl’s heart ached constantly with sympathy for
what she felt must be her mother’s pain.

Her compassion and sorrow, however, did not lead her to consider for
a moment the idea of giving up the work. Rather, they inspired her to
greater zeal, in both thought and action, and to more intense desire
to aid in the destruction of slavery. For, in her mind, whatever grief
her mother felt, whatever alienation there was between them, were among
the evil results of the slave system, just as was the division between
her and Jefferson Delavan, and the only way of rightfully fully meeting
them was to attack their cause.

At the wedding Rhoda was bridesmaid and Delavan was groomsman. As she
saw her mother’s eyes fixed wistfully upon them she felt fresh twinges
of self-reproach. She knew the deep pleasure that Charlotte’s marriage
to a southerner had brought to the ailing woman, and she knew that this
would be as nothing beside her satisfaction and delight could she see
her other daughter united in marriage to the son of her old friend.
Could it be, after all, Rhoda began to ask herself, that here was where
her highest duty lay? Ought she, at whatever cost to herself, make
happy her mother’s last days?

It seemed to Rhoda that everything conspired, throughout the wedding
festivities, to bring her and Delavan alone together, although she knew
that they were both trying to avoid such meetings. But he forebore to
speak of love, and afterward the merry friendliness of these brief
occasions, just touched as they were with the fragrance of intimacy,
were among her dearest memories.

When he bade her good-by she felt the lover in his manner and his voice
as he said: “It has been two years, Rhoda, but I shall wait two years
more, and ten times that, before I give up hope of our wedding!”

Rhoda looked at him with her flashing smile, that lifting of her short
upper lip and trembling at its corners and lighting of her eyes, which
always sent through his veins a fresh thrill of love, and answered:
“Oh, Jeff! What a long time to prepare for a wedding in!”

After it was all over Mrs. Ware failed rapidly. Rhoda watched her
wasting cheeks and growing feebleness with an agony of compassion and
constant tumultuous questioning of herself. Her mother had not spoken
to her for a long time about Delavan’s suit, but she knew that the wish
was gathering strength in her breast as she came nearer and nearer to
death’s door. Rhoda felt it in the wistful look with which the brown
eyes, grown so large and childlike in the peaked face, followed her
about the room. It spoke to her in the plaintive appeal of the soft
southern voice and it pulled mightily at her heartstrings in the
clinging to hers of the thin hands, a little while ago so plump and
fair.

With her own heart playing traitor, as it always did with every
weakening of her resolution, with love and compassion for the invalid
pleading incessantly, with a remorse-wrung conscience recalling every
hurt she had ever given to her mother and urging that she ought to
salve those many wounds with this final atonement, the torment of it
became almost greater than she could bear.

One day she found her father alone in his office and, impelled by her
distraught heart, she forgot her usual restraints, flung herself on her
knees beside his chair and laid her face against his knee.

“Oh, father,” she begged, “help me to see what I ought to do! I know
mother wants me to marry Jeff--she doesn’t say a word about it, but I
feel all the time that it is making her last days full of sorrow. It
seems to me sometimes that I can’t stand it another minute, that I must
give up, because it will make her happy. Would it help her, father, if
I did?”

Dr. Ware laid his hand upon her shoulder. Even in her wretchedness the
action gave her a little thrill of pleasure, for it was nearer a caress
than she could remember he had ever given her.

“Nothing can help your mother now, child. With her, it is a matter of a
few months, or weeks, or, perhaps, even days. It would make her happy
for that little time--I know it as well as you do. You could feel that
you had enabled her to end her days in peace. But whether or not you
ought to sacrifice your sense of right to your sense of duty to her is
something that only you can decide.”

“I know it, father,” she answered in low tones as she rose to her feet
and wiped the tears from her eyes.

She went out into the yard, gay with the luxuriant blooms of early
summer. The white petunias sent up their fragrance and the memories it
brought pierced her very heart with poignant sweetness. She went on
into the grape arbor and sat down in its cool shadows, asking herself
why it was that she could keep her own soul clean only at the expense
of another’s happiness.

“My happiness, Jeff’s happiness,” she thought, “they are of our own
making and we can choose our own conditions. But mother, poor, dear,
little mother, so sick, with such a little while to live, and her
happiness so bound up in this! And if I do it I shall feel all my
life that it was wrong, that my soul isn’t clean. Oh, mother, how can
I become a part of this abomination of slavery, this vile, accursed
thing! I’d be glad to die, a hundred times over, for you--but to live
and be a part of such wickedness-- Oh, mother, how can I? How can I?”

The end came sooner than they expected. On a hot afternoon in
midsummer, when the late, red rays of the sun, shining through the
half-closed shutters, lay in bands across the floor, Mrs. Ware called
Rhoda. “Come close, honey, down beside me,” she said, and Rhoda knelt
at the bedside. Her mother slipped a feeble arm around her neck.

“You’ve been a dear, loving daughter to me,” she said, “even if we’ve
thought so differently about some things. You are like your father,
Rhoda, and that has always been a pleasure to me. You’ve wanted to make
me happy, just as he always has, and in almost everything you have. No
mother ever had a better, dearer daughter than you, honey.”

“Oh, mother,” Rhoda exclaimed, the tears welling into her eyes, for in
the pale, pitiful face she saw the shadow of the death angel’s wing and
felt his near approach in the chill that struck into her own breast.
“Dear mother, I’ve never done half enough for you, never been half as
good and loving to you as you deserved!”

“Always you have, dear, except in one thing. You know how much for two
years I’ve wanted you to marry Adeline’s son, dear Jeff. And you would
not. I haven’t much longer to live, and if you want to make my deathbed
happy promise me that you will. Oh, Rhoda, send for Jeff and marry him
here beside my bed and have your dying mother’s blessing!”

Rhoda was sobbing with her face upon her mother’s shoulder. “Dearest
mother,” she pleaded, “don’t ask that of me.”

“It’s the only thing in all the world that I want, honey. You love
Jeff, and he adores you, and I know that you’ll be happy together, if
you’ll only give up that nonsensical idea that has taken possession of
you. It’s your happiness that I want, Rhoda, yours and Jeff’s. And I
know, oh, so much better than you do, what makes a woman happy. I can’t
die feeling that I have done my duty to my little girl and made sure of
her happiness, unless she will promise me this. Will you do it, Rhoda?”

“Let me be the judge of my happiness, mother, as you were the judge of
yours!”

“Your mother knows best, child! Take her word for it, and let her bless
you with her last breath, as you’ll always bless her if you do. It’s
the last thing she’ll ever ask of you.”

The invalid’s tones were growing weaker and something querulous sounded
in them as she repeated, “Promise me, Rhoda, promise!”

The linked hands upon Rhoda’s neck loosened their hold and the tired
arms slipped down. She bowed her head upon her mother’s breast as she
sobbed, “Let me think for a minute, mother, dear! It breaks my heart
not to do what you want!”

“It breaks mine, Rhoda, that you don’t. Oh, honey, let me die in peace
and happiness! Promise me that you’ll marry Jeff!”

Rhoda saw that her father had entered the room and was standing at her
side. She sprang to her feet, threw her arms about his neck and with
her head upon his shoulder burst into a passion of tears.

“Father, tell me what to do!” she wailed.

His arms were about her, his face upon her hair, and his tears were
mingling with hers. In that supreme moment of grief, compassion and
struggle the icy barriers that had kept their hearts apart melted away
and they clung together in their common despair, groping through their
sobs for the right thing to say and do.

Suddenly they were startled by a gay little laugh from the bed. “You’ve
come at last, have you, Adeline, dearest! How late you are!” the dying
woman exclaimed, holding out her hands in welcome. From her face the
shadow had passed and in its place shone a girlish happiness. She was
back again among the friends of her youth, chatting and laughing with
“dearest Adeline,” and calling upon “mammy” to do this and that. And
so, babbling of her girlhood’s pleasures, she passed into the dark
beyond.




CHAPTER XXV


During the late summer and autumn of that year Rhoda and her father
and their friends watched with the keenest interest, as did people
all over the country, the struggle in Illinois between Lincoln and
Douglas. In the Cincinnati and New York papers they read the speeches,
printed at length, of both the aspirants for senatorial honors, and on
many an evening, gathered on the veranda of the Ware home or, after
the evenings grew cool, around the fireplace in the living-room, they
discussed all the features of that famous intellectual wrestling match.

Horace Hardaker had been nominated for Congress by the Republican party
and was conducting a vigorous campaign. Nevertheless, he found time
to come frequently up the hill to Dr. Ware’s house for these talks.
Marcia Kimball came also, at first with her brothers, but after a
little Rhoda observed that it was oftener with Hardaker that she made
her appearance and always upon his arm that she leaned when they went
away. With an inward smile Rhoda noticed too that Horace, with apparent
unconsciousness, began to address his conversation mainly toward Marcia.

“I don’t expect to be elected,” he said one evening, “that is, not
this time. But I’m giving the ground a good, deep plowing, and there’ll
be a different crop to reap two years from now.”

His opponent, a Douglas Democrat, won the day, but by so narrow
a margin that Hardaker was almost as exultant as if he had been
successful. “Two years more of the way things are going now,” he
declared, “and we’ll sweep the country!”

“Suppose you do, what good will it do?” said old Mr. Kimball. “Your
Republican party expressly says it won’t interfere with slavery in the
South.”

“It will bring on a crisis,” interjected Dr. Ware, “and a crisis
is exactly the thing we want. The South won’t stand a Republican
president. And when she tries to leave the Union the upheaval will
come.”

Not long after the election Hardaker sought Rhoda in more buoyant mood
than ever, to tell her that he and Marcia were to be married. She
assured him that she was heartily glad, and really felt all that she
said, and even more. But her sincere rejoicing did not prevent her from
looking sadly out of her window that night and feeling that something
very dear and pleasant had gone out of her life beyond all recovery.
She would not, if she could, have held Hardaker’s love in fruitless
thrall, but it had been so comforting, so gratifying, to know how
surely it was hers and she had so grown to expect one of his recurrent
proposals every year or so that it cost her a little wrench now to give
it all up.

“He’ll make Marcia a good, loving husband,” she thought, “and with his
talent and ambition he’ll succeed. Oh, they’ll be happy, and I’m glad.”

Her eyes grew sad and the lines of her face drooped as she sat beside
her window. And after a while she took out the little box with its
treasure of letters and withered flower. She did not read the letters,
of which there was now nearly a box full, but turned them over
caressingly in her hands and now and then pressed one to her lips.

Rhoda was bridesmaid when Horace and Marcia were married in the early
spring. “It’s your third time, isn’t it, dear,” said Marcia as her
friend draped about her shoulders the folds of her bridal veil. “I do
hope it will be you yourself, next time!”

“So do I, Marcia!” said Rhoda frankly, looking up with a smile.
“There isn’t a girl anywhere who’d more willingly be a bride than I,
if--if--if!”

“Rhoda, you’re the dearest, bravest girl!” cried Marcia, squeezing her
hand. “If I was in your place I’d be crying my eyes out instead of
laughing like that!”

“Then I wouldn’t have you for my bridesmaid if you couldn’t give your
eyes a rest that long,” rejoined Rhoda gaily.

Spring and summer came and went, and for Rhoda Ware the weeks passed
with uneventful flow. Through their house there trickled a thin stream
of slaves fleeing northward, sometimes half a dozen or more within a
week and sometimes not more than one or two. The trouble and cost of
recovering their runaway negroes, even when they were infrequently able
to get possession of them again, had caused the southern slaveholders
to give over their efforts. In these last years of the decade it was
unusual for a fugitive to be pursued and therefore the traffic of the
Underground was carried on with little risk.

Rhoda busied herself with these duties, the ordering of her father’s
household, her anti-slavery work and her reading. Gradually the thought
grew up in her breast that she would like to study medicine. She talked
the matter over with her father and he offered, if she wished, to send
her to one of the medical colleges that within a few years had been
opened for women. But she would not leave him alone and so, under his
guidance, she spent her leisure time reading in his medical library,
discussing his cases with him, and often going with him upon his visits.

Dr. Ware received an occasional brief letter from John Brown in which
his scheme was referred to with cautious phrasing as a speculation in
sheep. Toward midsummer he wrote that he was getting his shepherds
together and expected to collect a band of sheep in the Virginia
mountains, where he thought there would be good pasturage, about the
middle of October.

“He is bound to come into collision with the federal government very
soon,” said Dr. Ware to his daughter as they talked this letter over
together. “Of course he knows that will be the end of his enterprise
and of him too.”

“He won’t care,” answered Rhoda, “what becomes of him if he can make
just one thrust at slavery.”

“That’s true. And the more I think of it the more I believe that even
if he fails in his first attempt, as he is very likely to do, it will
be a good strong thrust that will make the South fairly stagger. I told
him I’d wait to see whether or not he made a beginning before I decided
about joining him. But I doubt very much, Rhoda, whether you and I will
have a chance to work under John Brown.”

“I’ll be ready to go whenever you say the word, father,” she said with
grave earnestness.

Now and then a letter passed between Rhoda and Jefferson Delavan, a
letter of intimate friendliness, telling of personal matters and mutual
interests. Once only did he touch upon the slavery question, which
formerly they had argued with such earnestness, and then he filled a
long letter with an endeavor to prove to her that the negro race had
been benefited by slavery, that in taking it from its barbarous state
and bringing it in contact with civilization the slaveholders had
lifted it to a higher plane of moral and intellectual life.

When she replied she said merely, “No more of that, please, if you
still love me! Each of us knows that the other’s convictions are honest
and deeply rooted. We can’t agree, so let’s not argue, but just enjoy
our friendship.”

Nor was there in their correspondence any mention of love, or of
possible or impossible marriage. But toward the end of summer, when a
little band of men was warily gathering in a Maryland farmhouse, one of
Jeff’s letters set Rhoda’s heart to fluttering. There was in it, save
for some terms of endearment which seemed to have flowed unconsciously
from his pen, no putting into words of a lover’s hopes. But she felt
through every line the burning of the lover’s heart. And a few weeks
later there came a brief note saying, “I shall be in Hillside soon and
shall count on seeing you.”

For a day Rhoda’s heart sang with joy, “He is coming, he is coming!
I shall see him, have him here beside me!” and would listen to no
warnings of her mind.

Then she wrote, “Don’t come! I beg of you, Jeff, don’t come! What is
the use!” And lest her courage might fail her, she quickly sealed and
posted her missive.

But when the October woods were bright with flaming color, and the
little band of men in the Maryland farmhouse were waiting for the order
to march, and Rhoda and her father were saying to each other every
morning, “There may be news to-day,” Jefferson Delavan appeared at her
door.

“I told you not to come!” she said, and gave him her hand, while face
and eyes belied the meaning of her words. His heart gladdened at
their sweet shining as he held her hand in both of his and answered,
“And I disobeyed--because I couldn’t help it.” Then, for a moment,
their starving, delighted gaze fed upon each other’s eyes, until
Rhoda suddenly felt that he was about to break into lover’s speech.
Impulsively she laid a finger across his lips. He seized and held it
there while she exclaimed:

“Don’t speak, Jeff, don’t say anything. It’s such a lovely day--the
hills are so beautiful--let’s have a ride together!”

He agreed, glad of anything that would insure her presence near him,
and they were soon galloping over country roads and across the wooded
hills, brilliant in the gala robes with which Nature celebrates her
thanksgiving for another year of sun and life and growth.

As they rode, the motion and the wine-like air and the joy in her heart
lifted Rhoda into exultant mood, deepened the wild rose-bloom in her
cheeks and kindled her serious eyes into sparkling gaiety. “Let me have
this little time!” her heart pleaded. “It may be the last. After _that_
has happened he may never come again!”

And so, with thrilling nerves and singing heart, the Cavalier in her
breast dominated the Puritan and sent to the four winds warnings
of conscience and thought of to-morrow. Forgotten was the safety
of the three fugitive slaves, at that moment hiding in her cellar,
forgotten the fateful Thing for whose birth in the Virginia mountains
she had been waiting, cast away from her mind was all thought of the
anti-slavery contest, nor was there room in her heart for zeal in its
cause. She was mere woman, loving and beloved, and glorying inwardly
in her power over her lover. Her Cavalier inheritance took possession
of her and bade her snatch the pleasure of the hour. Her father’s
offspring dwindled away into the smallest recesses of her nature and it
was her mother’s daughter who sat in the saddle, slender and graceful,
and with starry eye and alluring smile kindled fresh fires in her
lover’s breast.

With pride and pleasure she saw them burning in his face and eyes as
he drew beside her and murmured, “Rhoda, you are so beautiful!” Her
mirror had told her many times, and she had agreed in its verdict, that
she was not beautiful. And so all the more precious to her was this
tribute of love, and more than once did she win it, as they rode and
rode, during the long afternoon.

A sudden memory came of the tale of courtship her mother had told to
her and Jeff, on that June night so long ago, and across her mind’s eye
there flitted the vision she had often called up, of the pretty, wilful
girl and the resolute young man with his hand on her bridle, galloping,
galloping-- “And that was love--and this is love, and it is mine!”
her heart sang. Quickly her brain flashed back the question, “Would I
yield, as mother did, if--if--if--” And the Cavalier in her heart sang
back, exulting, “I would! I would!”

On their way home they came to an old wood road and turned into it from
the cross-country way upon which they had been galloping. Checking
their horses they rode slowly down the brilliant avenue of gold and
russet and crimson, talking, now earnestly, now gaily, upon one or
another of the multitude of things, personal and impersonal, which to
lovers can bourgeon instantly into matters of moment and interest by
the mere fact of mention in the loved one’s voice. Gradually the road
dwindled away and they came upon steeper hills and a rocky surface.
But Rhoda knew where they were and said that by turning sharply to the
eastward they could gain the high road. Dismounting they led their
horses across the hills, the fallen autumnal glories billowing beneath
their feet.

Already Rhoda’s mood had begun to sober. The Puritan was claiming his
own again. Down that wood road she had driven her buggy, on a winter
day, to bring out the fugitive negro lad whom she had sent flying to
the cave for safety from the pursuing marshal. They passed the cave
itself, where, more than three years previous, she had hidden the
mulatto, running for the freedom dearer than life from this very man
who was bending near her now with ardent looks of love. She shivered a
little as she remembered the slave’s sullen resolution, the pistol in
his hand, and the tone in which he had said, “I won’t go back.” As Jeff
bent with loving solicitude to draw her wrap closer about her shoulders
she was thinking, “And he said they were brothers.”

They struck a path which climbed a steep hill, and when they came to a
jutting rock Delavan looked around him with sudden recollection. “Why,
I’ve been here before!” he exclaimed. “It was here I met you, dear,
that day--don’t you remember? What a long time you have made me wait,
sweetheart, for your promise!” His lover’s longing, made a hundredfold
more imperious by the allurement there had been all the afternoon in
her laugh, her voice, her smile, her lips, her eyes, her manner, would
be put aside no longer, and he turned upon her with an impetuosity that
would brook no protest.

“Do you, remember, dearest, the proof of my love I gave you that
day? I’m ready to give you, here on this same spot, another proof, a
thousand times greater! It will sweep away everything that keeps us
apart, Rhoda! Everything!”

She looked at him silently, sweet wonder parting her lips and shining
starlike in her big gray eyes. Her cheeks were paler now, with the
ebbing of the exultant tide that had kept her all the afternoon on its
crest. But to him this soft, subdued mood bespoke the sweetheart ready
to tremble into his embrace and made her all the more adorable. He
seized her hand and she let it lie in his close, warm grasp as he went
on:

“I have made up my mind to give up everything to our love. I will free
all my niggers--for the sake of your dear conscience not one shall be
sold--and see that they find places where they can earn their livings.
Then I will sell my property and we will put this country and its
accursed contentions behind us. We will go to England, dear heart,
or France, and live where there will come hardly an echo of all this
strife to disturb our blessed content and happiness!”

She dropped her eyes from his and for a long moment stood motionless
while it seemed to her that her very heart stood still. With swift
inner vision, like that of a drowning man, she saw those years of
wedded life, long years of comradeship and love and deepest joy, with
dear children growing up beside them, and her heart yearned toward its
peace and happiness with such urgency that she dared not try to speak.

“Think, Rhoda, dear,” he was pleading, “think of the quiet, blissful
years that are waiting for us! Our two hearts together, and nothing,
nothing at all to come between them!”

Her very lips were pale with desire of it as she whispered: “I am
thinking, and, oh, Jeff, the thought of it, the joy of it, almost
makes my heart stop beating. But have you thought, dear, dear Jeff,
what a sacrifice this will be for you? I know how much you love the
South. Would you never regret it, never wish to come back and throw
yourself into her service? If that should happen, it would be the end
of happiness for us both, for I should know it--our hearts would be
so close together--even if you didn’t say a word. Have you thought of
that, dear Jeff?”

He smiled at her with loving confidence. “I’ve thought that all out,
dear heart. For weeks I’ve been thinking of it, and threshing it all
out in my mind, until I feel quite sure of myself. I do love my dear
Southland and as you know so well my ambition has always been to spend
my life in her service. But there are plenty of other men who can do
her work as well as I can, and not at the cost of their heart’s love
and life’s happiness. I am willing to let them do it while I take my
love and my happiness. My sweet! I knew your dear, generous heart would
ask me that!” He bowed over her hand, which he still held in his, and
pressed it to his lips.

Her heart was pleading: “He is right. There are plenty of others who
can do his work, and there are surely many, many who can do what little
is possible for me better than I. Why not put it all aside and take the
love and happiness that belong to us?” And then, like an icy grip upon
her softening, yielding heart came remembrance of the Thing that was
about to happen in the Virginia mountains.

She drew her hand from his and in sudden dismay walked apart a few
paces, saying, “Let me think for a minute, Jeff!” She dropped her
riding skirt, whose fulness she had been carrying over one arm, and its
long black folds swept around her slender figure as she leaned against
a tree with her face in her hands. So tall and straight and slim she
looked, drooping against the tree trunk, that the fancy crossed his
mind she was like some forsaken, grieving wood nymph, and all his body
ached with the longing to enfold her in his arms and comfort whatever
pain was in her heart. But his love as well as his courtesy forbade him
to intrude upon her while she stood apart, and he waited for her to
turn to him again.

Rhoda was thinking of what she knew was about to happen and of what it
would mean to him. Her father had said that it would be like the sudden
ringing of an alarm bell and that, however this initial attempt turned
out, it might cause the whole South to take up arms at once and declare
war. She knew how her lover’s spirit would leap at such an emergency.
Did she wish to put his love and his promise to such a test at the very
beginning? Slowly she walked back and stood in front of him.

“Jeff, this is truly a wonderful proof of your love that you have
given me!” Her voice was tremulous with desire of all she felt she
was putting away, but she went bravely on: “I don’t believe any other
woman ever had such proof! Indeed,” and she smiled tenderly at him, “I
don’t believe any other woman was ever loved quite so much. It makes me
feel your love in my heart, oh, so much more precious than even it was
before! But I want you to be quite sure, dear Jeff!”

“I am sure, sweetheart!” he broke in.

“But won’t you wait a little while, two weeks, no, three weeks, before
I--we decide? I ask you to go home, at once, and not to see me or write
to me for three weeks more. And then you can let me know whether or
not you still wish to put your ideals and ambitions aside for the sake
of love. But I want you to consider the question then just exactly as
if we had never talked of it before. You are not to feel yourself in
the least bound by what you have told me to-day. If anything should
happen between now and then that makes you feel that the South still
has a claim upon you, anything that would make you in the very least
unwilling to--to carry out this plan, then I want you to tell me so
frankly--with perfect frankness, dear Jeff, as perfect as our love.”

“And is that all the hope you will give me, dearest?” he pleaded. “No
promise to take back with me?”

She was standing beside the path, on the rising ground a little above
him, and she leaned toward him, resting her hands lightly upon his
shoulders as she said, her face all tenderness:

“Dear Jeff, it is for your sake I am asking it!”

He seemed scarcely to hear what she said, and touched her cheek with a
caressing palm as he exclaimed, “Rhoda, my sweet, your face is like a
guardian angel’s!”

Before Jefferson Delavan reached Fairmount again the Thing had happened
that made the North gasp with wonder and set the South beside itself
with fear and rage. The amazing audacity of John Brown’s attack upon
Harper’s Ferry and the rankling distrust between the two sections make
reasonable, to impartial eyes of a later day, the alarming significance
which the southern people, especially those in the border states, saw
in Brown’s foredoomed enterprise. The slaveholders of Kentucky were
aroused to almost as extreme a pitch of angry apprehension and defiance
as were the people of Virginia.

Rhoda Ware had not to wait even three weeks for the expected letter
from Jefferson Delavan.

“You were right,” he wrote. “You saw the obstacles that lie between us
more clearly than I did--or, perhaps, you had more information than I
of the treacherous lengths to which the North would dare to go in the
desire to overthrow the ordinary rights of a state and to undermine the
power of the government under which both sections have solemnly sworn
to live. This attempt to incite the slaves to insurrection and the
butchery of their masters proves to all of us that neither property nor
life is safe in the South. At any moment another plot may break forth,
no man can tell where, and be more successful than this one was. The
South needs now, more than she ever did before, every one of her sons
whom she can trust. I cannot desert her in her hour of peril. From the
bottom of my heart I thank you, Rhoda, that you made it possible for me
to remain, without dishonor, in the position where every instinct of
duty and honor and loyalty demands that I stay. It was like you to know
that, much as I love you, love would have to yield to honor if it came
to a test between the two, and it has made me love you all the more,
if that were possible, to know that your love is so rich and noble and
generous.

“God knows what the future may hold for us two. For the first time
since our love began I can see no hope for us. The feeling between
the North and the South grows intolerable and the bonds between them
cannot last much longer. As long as the South and her interests are in
danger, my conscience, my sense of duty, my loyalty, all my ideals and
aspirations, bid me stay here. And here I know you will not come.

“But whatever happens, dear, I shall always thank God that I have had
the privilege of knowing and loving you, while the knowledge that you,
such a peerless woman as you, have loved me will be as long as I live
the most precious treasure of my heart. I have many dear memories
of our love, but the dearest of them all is of that last day we had
together, that splendid ride, when you were so adorable, and of all the
sweet pictures of you that I cherish the sweetest of all is of your
face as you leaned toward me in the wood and said, ‘It is for your
sake, dear Jeff.’

“Only God knows whether or not we shall ever see each other again. But
I shall always love you, and as long as we both live I shall treasure
in my heart the belief that you still love me. Good-by, dear heart.”

“At last, it is all over,” Rhoda said to herself when she had read
the letter. “He sees, at last, as I did so long ago, that there is no
hope for us. No--he sees none, now, but I can a little. John Brown has
brought the war ten years nearer, father says, and any time it may
come. And the war will end slavery. But it’s best not to hope too
much.”

She took out the box of his letters and read them all over again,
touching them tenderly and kissing the withered rose. “I’d better burn
them all now,” she told herself, “and try not to think so much about it
after this.”

With such pain in her heart as might have been in Abraham’s when he led
Isaac to the altar, she carried her little love treasure to the fire.
But even as she held it poised over the flames her resolution failed
her. It was too much a part of herself and she could not do it. The
little box was put away again in its hiding place and in the months
that followed, whenever the ache in her breast would not be hushed in
any other way, she solaced her love and longing by reading the letters
over and over again, until she almost knew them, word for word.




CHAPTER XXVI


A year and a half and more went by before Rhoda again saw Delavan. The
campaign of 1860, with its grim earnestness and sober exaltation, had
passed. She had been stirred by it to her heart’s core, as had all men
and women of the North, and had shared her father’s satisfaction over
the result. Hers was indeed an even deeper and gladder satisfaction
than his, for to passionate abhorrence of slavery and the belief that
now was the beginning of its end was added her secret small hope that
afterward might come the fulfilment of her long denied love.

“We mustn’t forget, Rhoda,” her father said as they talked over the
results of the election, “that probably only a rather small percentage
of those who voted for Lincoln want to have slavery abolished in
the states where it already exists. They really think the national
government has no right to interfere. But if there is war, and
undoubtedly there will be, a man of Lincoln’s shrewd common-sense will
know that by freeing the slaves he will cut off the South’s right hand.
With such a man as he is in the president’s chair I feel confident,
though a good many abolitionists don’t, that we can look forward to the
end of slavery.”

The southern states were leaving the Union and the Confederacy had
been organized. Rhoda knew that Kentucky was rent almost to her every
hearthstone with discussion of whether North or South should have
her loyalty. Charlotte had lately written: “Everybody is all torn
into strips over the question whether or not Kentucky shall join the
Confederacy. Nobody talks or thinks or dreams of anything else. But
Lloyd and I are going to secede, whether Kentucky does or not.”

Now and then, at long intervals, had come a brief letter from Jefferson
Delavan. But he said nothing in any of these missives of love and but
little of the mighty questions that were absorbing the minds and hearts
and souls of men, women and children, North and South, and her replies
were of the same sort. It was as if two loving but far divided souls,
journeying through space, sought now and then by a faint call to bridge
the distance between them.

The tense, dark days of Lincoln’s inauguration were over, the guns of
Sumter had cleared away the last clouds of uncertainty, and war was at
hand.

The lilacs were in bloom again and Rhoda, moving slowly down the path,
broke off here and there a branch and presently stood at the front
gate, her fragrant burden gathered loosely into one arm against her
white dress. In her delight in their delicate beauty and savor she bent
her face to the flowers, forgetting for the moment the things of the
outside world. When she lifted it again Jefferson Delavan stood before
her.

“I have come to say good-by, Rhoda,” was his greeting, as he entered
the gate.

“Good-by?-- You are--going--” she stammered.

“I am going to join the fortunes of the South,” he replied, as they
walked up the path. “Kentucky has been false to her sister states and
deserted them when they need her most. By a single vote she has decided
upon neutrality. You, Rhoda, can understand what a bitter dose that is
for me.”

“You can’t endure it?” she hesitated as they turned into the walk to
the grape arbor.

“No, I can’t, and there are many other Kentuckians who feel as I do. I
am going at once to join the southern army, and Corey and Morehead and
a dozen others that I know are going too.”

“Father has joined the Union army as a surgeon and I am going as a
nurse.”

They had reached the arbor and stood facing each other, she with her
armful of lilacs still held against her white dress, both too much
absorbed to be quite conscious of their actions. A sober smile curved
by ever so little the grim line of his lips.

“Then you will be fighting for your side as well as I for mine, though
in a different way. But across the battlefields, Rhoda, I shall hear
your heart calling mine, and I shall know too that it is telling me to
fight right on.”

“Yes,” she broke out earnestly, “I know that you are fighting for your
convictions and your ideals and you will not be worthy of my love if
you don’t fight until you either win or are conquered. I don’t want you
to compromise, or to yield, until you have fought to the last drop of
your strength.”

“It’s going to be a bitter struggle and a long one, whatever the most
of them, on both sides, think now. In the South there isn’t much belief
that the North will fight, or can fight. But I know better, Rhoda. You
have taught me better, you and your father. You have made me understand
what determination there is at the bottom of all this.”

“It’s a war between two ideals,” she said, “whatever else they may say
it is. But it’s really that, between two ideals of civilization.”

“And men,” he added quickly, “always fight for their ideals as they do
for nothing else. It will be to the last gasp.”

She looked away and shuddered. “Oh, it is all so horrible, even to
think of! But it is a long and horrible iniquity that has caused it
and must now be paid for. Rachel Benedict told me once that we must
ourselves pay with sweat and stripes for the evil that we do. I believe
it’s true, and the North and the South must pay together for all this
long evil of slavery, for they are both responsible. But this war will
end it.”

He smiled upon her indulgently. “Can you think so, Rhoda, you, who
understand how we feel and how determined we are?”

She stepped back and proudly lifted her head. Into her face came the
look of exaltation he had seen there, in this same arbor, long before.
It seemed to remove her far from him, and therefore set his heart to
throbbing all the more with longing for her.

“Yes,” she said, “this war will end it, because God is on our
side. And afterward--oh, Jeff!”--her face melted to tenderness
again--“beyond--after the end, after God has spoken and slavery has
been ended, then there will be peace, and for us--” her voice dropped
low--“happiness!”

“God be the judge between us, Rhoda Ware,” he exclaimed, “as to which
is right! Will you accept His judgment, as He speaks it in battle, and
promise to be my wife when the war is over, whatever He has said?”

Again her face was lifted, glowing with exaltation. “God will never
allow such an atonement for evil-doing as this war will be,” she said
solemnly, “to be crowned by that very evil itself. With faith in Him--I
promise!”

Scarcely had the words left her tongue when she found herself swept to
his breast and his lips upon her brow, her eyes, her mouth.

“Rhoda, my love, my love,” he whispered, “it is a long good-by that
lies before us, perhaps even as long as it has been since I first
begged for your love, here among these vines.”

“And there are battles and dangers, oh, so many,” she whispered back,
“between now and--the end.”

“But I have a talisman that will carry me safe through it all, to the
end--and you. See, my sweet, how long I have kept it!” From an inner
pocket he took a little package and showed her a withered rose, the
mate of the one she herself so treasured. “I have kept it there, next
to my heart, ever since the night you gave it me, for my thoughts, five
years ago!”

She looked at it with wondering love, pressed it to her lips and
listened with a sweet smile upon them as he said, putting it back
again: “It shall lie there always, dear heart, until all my thoughts
are yours and yours are mine. And it will always tell me, as plainly as
if with your own dear lips, to fight to the uttermost!”

Again she lifted her head proudly. “Yes, to the uttermost, Jeff! For
that way only can your eyes be opened!”

       *       *       *       *       *

He was gone, and she sat alone in the arbor, with her lilacs pressed
to her bosom, and listened as the strains of martial music came to her
ears. It was a band playing, downtown, where volunteers were being
drilled. She could hear the tramp of feet, the rattle of musketry, and
the words of command.

Louder and louder the sound seemed to grow in her ears until it became
the booming of unnumbered cannon and the tramp, tramp, tramp of a
million men. The smoke of battle dimmed her eyes and all around her
she seemed to hear the cries and groans of mangled and dying men. With
white lips she whispered to herself, “With bloody sweat and stripes we
must pay--it is God’s law!”

Slowly her features relaxed, and presently, with a tender smile curving
her lips, she buried her face in the lilac blooms. For the awful sights
and sounds had faded away and she had seen a vision of the afterward.


THE END




TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:


  Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.

  Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.

  Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.

  Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.

  The cover image for this eBook was created by the transcriber using
    the original cover and is entered into the public domain.
AND GRAMARYE ***





                     TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF GRANTA
                             AND GRAMARYE.

                            [Illustration:

                      E. Joyce Shillington Scales
                                 1919.

                  _Entrance Gateway, Jesus College._]




                        TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF
                          GRANTA AND GRAMARYE

                                  BY

                              “INGULPHUS”
                (ARTHUR GRAY, Master of Jesus College)


                        _With illustrations by_
                      E. JOYCE SHILLINGTON SCALES


                “Merry and tragical, tedious and brief:
              That is hot ice and wondrous strange snow.”

                     _A Midsummer Night’s Dream._


                              CAMBRIDGE:
                         W. HEFFER & SONS LTD.
         LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & CO. LTD.




                   FIRST PUBLISHED, DECEMBER, 1919.


For permission to reprint these tales, which originally appeared in
_The Cambridge Review_, _The Gownsman_ and _Chanticlere_ (the Jesus
College Magazine), the writer thanks the editors and proprietors of
those papers.




                               Contents


                                                                    PAGE

  I. TO TWO CAMBRIDGE MAGICIANS                                     viii

  II. THE EVERLASTING CLUB                                             1

  III. THE TREASURE OF JOHN BADCOKE                                    9

  IV. THE TRUE HISTORY OF ANTHONY FFRYAR                              19

  V. THE NECROMANCER                                                  28

  VI. BROTHER JOHN’S BEQUEST                                          37

  VII. THE BURDEN OF DEAD BOOKS                                       48

  VIII. THANKFULL THOMAS                                              67

  IX. THE PALLADIUM                                                   76

  X. THE SACRIST OF SAINT RADEGUND                                    84




                         List of Illustrations


  I. ENTRANCE GATEWAY, JESUS COLLEGE                      _Frontispiece_

  II. DOORWAY, COW LANE                                                5

  III. ORIEL WINDOW OF HALL AND ENTRANCE TO “K” STAIRCASE             11

  IV. OLD HALL, MASTER’S LODGE                                        17

  V. NORTH-WEST CORNER OF CLOISTERS                                   20

  VI. THE MASTER’S STALL                                              23

  VII. MAIN GATEWAY AND PORTER’S LODGE                                31

  VIII. ON “A” STAIRCASE                                              33

  IX. FIREPLACE IN MASTER’S LODGE                                     41

  X. A CORNER OF THE LIBRARY                                          51

  XI. CHAPEL DOORWAY IN MASTER’S GARDEN                               57

  XII. NORMAN GALLERY, NORTH TRANSEPT                                 71

  XIII. SOUTH-WEST PIER OF TOWER                                      74

  XIV. IN THE FENS                                                    83

  XV. ENTRANCE TO CHAPTER HOUSE                                       87

  XVI. THE CHANCEL SQUINT                                             90




                      To Two Cambridge Magicians


  In London lanes, uncanonized, untold
  By letter’d brass or stone, apart they lie,
  Dead and unreck’d of by the passer-by.
  Here still they seem together, as of old,
  To breathe our air, to walk our Cambridge ground,
  Here still to after learners to impart
  Hints of the magic that gave Faustus art
  To make blind Homer sing “with ravishing sound
  To his melodious harp” of Oenon, dead
  For Alexander’s love; that framed the spell
  Of him who, in the Friar’s “secret cell,”
  Made the great marvel of the Brazen Head.
  Marlowe and Greene, on you a Cambridge hand
  Sprinkles these pious particles of sand.




                         The Everlasting Club


There is a chamber in Jesus College the existence of which is probably
known to few who are now resident, and fewer still have penetrated into
it or even seen its interior. It is on the right hand of the landing on
the top floor of the precipitous staircase in the angle of the cloister
next the Hall--a staircase which for some forgotten story connected
with it is traditionally called “Cow Lane.” The padlock which secures
its massive oaken door is very rarely unfastened, for the room is bare
and unfurnished. Once it served as a place of deposit for superfluous
kitchen ware, but even that ignominious use has passed from it, and it
is now left to undisturbed solitude and darkness. For I should say that
it is entirely cut off from the light of the outer day by the walling
up, some time in the eighteenth century, of its single window, and such
light as ever reaches it comes from the door, when rare occasion causes
it to be opened.

Yet at no extraordinarily remote day this chamber has evidently been
tenanted, and, before it was given up to darkness, was comfortably
fitted, according to the standard of comfort which was known in college
in the days of George II. There is still a roomy fireplace before which
legs have been stretched and wine and gossip have circulated in the
days of wigs and brocade. For the room is spacious and, when it was
lighted by the window looking eastward over the fields and common, it
must have been a cheerful place for a sociable don.

Let me state in brief, prosaic outline the circumstances which account
for the gloom and solitude in which this room has remained now for
nearly a century and a half.

In the second quarter of the eighteenth century the University
possessed a great variety of clubs of a social kind. There were
clubs in college parlours and clubs in private rooms, or in inns
and coffee-houses: clubs flavoured with politics, clubs clerical,
clubs purporting to be learned and literary. Whatever their professed
particularity, the aim of each was convivial. Some of them, which
included undergraduates as well as seniors, were dissipated enough, and
in their limited provincial way aped the profligacy of such clubs as
the Hell Fire Club of London notoriety.

Among these last was one which was at once more select and of more evil
fame than any of its fellows. By a singular accident, presently to be
explained, the Minute Book of this Club, including the years from 1738
to 1766, came into the hands of a Master of Jesus College, and though,
so far as I am aware, it is no longer extant, I have before me a
transcript of it which, though it is in a recent handwriting, presents
in a bald shape such a singular array of facts that I must ask you to
accept them as veracious. The original book is described as a stout
duodecimo volume bound in red leather and fastened with red silken
strings. The writing in it occupied some 40 pages, and ended with the
date November 2, 1766.

The Club in question was called the Everlasting Club--a name
sufficiently explained by its rules, set forth in the pocket-book. Its
number was limited to seven, and it would seem that its members were
all young men, between 22 and 30. One of them was a Fellow-Commoner of
Trinity: three of them were Fellows of Colleges, among whom I should
specially mention a Fellow of Jesus, named Charles Bellasis: another
was a landed proprietor in the county, and the sixth was a young
Cambridge physician. The Founder and President of the Club was the
Honourable Alan Dermot, who, as the son of an Irish peer, had obtained
a nobleman’s degree in the University, and lived in idleness in the
town. Very little is known of his life and character, but that little
is highly in his disfavour. He was killed in a duel at Paris in the
year 1743, under circumstances which I need not particularise, but
which point to an exceptional degree of cruelty and wickedness in the
slain man.

I will quote from the first pages of the Minute Book some of the laws
of the Club, which will explain its constitution:--

“1. This Society consisteth of seven Everlastings, who may be Corporeal
or Incorporeal, as Destiny shall determine.

2. The rules of the Society, as herein written, are immutable and
Everlasting.

3. None shall hereafter be chosen into the Society and none shall cease
to be members.

4. The Honourable Alan Dermot is the Everlasting President of the
Society.

5. The Senior Corporeal Everlasting, not being the President, shall be
the Secretary of the Society, and in this Book of Minutes shall record
its transactions, the date at which any Everlasting shall cease to
be Corporeal, and all fines due to the Society. And when such Senior
Everlasting shall cease to be Corporeal he shall, either in person or
by some sure hand, deliver this Book of Minutes to him who shall be
next Senior and at the time Corporeal, and he shall in like manner
record the transactions therein and transmit it to the next Senior. The
neglect of these provisions shall be visited by the President with fine
or punishment according to his discretion.

6. On the second day of November in every year, being the Feast of All
Souls, at ten o’clock _post meridiem_, the Everlastings shall meet
at supper in the place of residence of that Corporeal member of the
Society to whom it shall fall in order of rotation to entertain them,
and they shall all subscribe in this Book of Minutes their names and
present place of abode.

7. It shall be the obligation of every Everlasting to be present at the
yearly entertainment of the Society, and none shall allege for excuse
that he has not been invited thereto. If any Everlasting shall fail
to attend the yearly meeting, or in his turn shall fail to provide
entertainment for the Society, he shall be mulcted at the discretion of
the President.

8. Nevertheless, if in any year, in the month of October and not less
than seven days before the Feast of All Souls, the major part of the
Society, that is to say, four at the least, shall meet and record in
writing in these Minutes that it is their desire that no entertainment
be given in that year, then, notwithstanding the two rules last
rehearsed, there shall be no entertainment in that year, and no
Everlasting shall be mulcted on the ground of his absence.”

The rest of the rules are either too profane or too puerile to be
quoted here. They indicate the extraordinary levity with which the
members entered on their preposterous obligations. In particular, to
the omission of any regulation as to the transmission of the Minute
Book after the last Everlasting ceased to be “Corporeal,” we owe the
accident that it fell into the hands of one who was not a member of the
society, and the consequent preservation of its contents to the present
day.

Low as was the standard of morals in all classes of the University in
the first half of the eighteenth century, the flagrant defiance of
public decorum by the members of the Everlasting Society brought upon
it the stern censure of the authorities, and after a few years it was
practically dissolved and its members banished from the University.
Charles Bellasis, for instance, was obliged to leave the college,
and, though he retained his fellowship, he remained absent from it
for nearly twenty years. But the minutes of the society reveal a more
terrible reason for its virtual extinction.

Between the years 1738 and 1743 the minutes record many meetings of
the Club, for it met on other occasions besides that of All Souls
Day. Apart from a great deal of impious jocularity on the part of the
writers, they are limited to the formal record of the attendance of
the members, fines inflicted, and so forth. The meeting on November
2nd in the latter year is the first about which there is any departure
from the stereotyped forms. The supper was given in the house of the
physician. One member, Henry Davenport, the former Fellow-Commoner of
Trinity, was absent from the entertainment, as he was then serving
in Germany, in the Dettingen campaign. The minutes contain an entry,
“Mulctatus propter absentiam per Presidentem, Hen. Davenport.” An entry
on the next page of the book runs, “Henry Davenport by a Cannon-shot
became an Incorporeal Member, November 3, 1743.”

[Illustration: _Doorway, Cow Lane._]

The minutes give in their own handwriting, under date November 2, the
names and addresses of the six other members. First in the list, in
a large bold hand, is the autograph of “Alan Dermot, President, at
the Court of His Royal Highness.” Now in October Dermot had certainly
been in attendance on the Young Pretender at Paris, and doubtless
the address which he gave was understood at the time by the other
Everlastings to refer to the fact. But on October 28, five days
_before_ the meeting of the Club, he was killed, as I have already
mentioned, in a duel. The news of his death cannot have reached
Cambridge on November 2, for the Secretary’s record of it is placed
below that of Davenport, and with the date November 10: “this day was
reported that the President was become an Incorporeal by the hands of
a french chevalier.” And in a sudden ebullition, which is in glaring
contrast with his previous profanities, he has dashed down “The Good
God shield us from ill.”

The tidings of the President’s death scattered the Everlastings like
a thunderbolt. They left Cambridge and buried themselves in widely
parted regions. But the Club did not cease to exist. The Secretary
was still bound to his hateful records: the five survivors did not
dare to neglect their fatal obligations. Horror of the presence of the
President made the November gathering once and for ever impossible:
but horror, too, forbade them to neglect the precaution of meeting
in October of every year to put in writing their objection to the
celebration. For five years five names are appended to that entry in
the minutes, and that is all the business of the Club. Then another
member died, who was not the Secretary.

For eighteen more years four miserable men met once each year to
deliver the same formal protest. During those years we gather from
the signatures that Charles Bellasis returned to Cambridge, now, to
appearance, chastened and decorous. He occupied the rooms which I have
described on the staircase in the corner of the cloister.

Then in 1766 comes a new handwriting and an altered minute: “Jan. 27,
on this day Francis Witherington, Secretary, became an Incorporeal
Member. The same day this Book was delivered to me, James Harvey.”
Harvey lived only a month, and a similar entry on March 7 states that
the book has descended, with the same mysterious celerity, to William
Catherston. Then, on May 18, Charles Bellasis writes that on that day,
being the date of Catherston’s decease, the Minute Book has come to
him as the last surviving Corporeal of the Club.

As it is my purpose to record fact only I shall not attempt to describe
the feelings of the unhappy Secretary when he penned that fatal
record. When Witherington died it must have come home to the three
survivors that after twenty-three years’ intermission the ghastly
entertainment must be annually renewed, with the addition of fresh
incorporeal guests, or that they must undergo the pitiless censure of
the President. I think it likely that the terror of the alternative,
coupled with the mysterious delivery of the Minute Book, was
answerable for the speedy decease of the two first successors to the
Secretaryship. Now that the alternative was offered to Bellasis alone,
he was firmly resolved to bear the consequences, whatever they might
be, of an infringement of the Club rules.

The graceless days of George II. had passed away from the University.
They were succeeded by times of outward respectability, when religion
and morals were no longer publicly challenged. With Bellasis, too, the
petulance of youth had passed: he was discreet, perhaps exemplary. The
scandal of his early conduct was unknown to most of the new generation,
condoned by the few survivors who had witnessed it.

On the night of November 2nd, 1766, a terrible event revived in the
older inhabitants of the College the memory of those evil days. From
ten o’clock to midnight a hideous uproar went on in the chamber of
Bellasis. Who were his companions none knew. Blasphemous outcries and
ribald songs, such as had not been heard for twenty years past, aroused
from sleep or study the occupants of the court; but among the voices
was not that of Bellasis. At twelve a sudden silence fell upon the
cloisters. But the Master lay awake all night, troubled at the relapse
of a respected colleague and the horrible example of libertinism set to
his pupils.

In the morning all remained quiet about Bellasis’ chamber. When his
door was opened, soon after daybreak, the early light creeping through
the drawn curtains revealed a strange scene. About the table were drawn
seven chairs, but some of them had been overthrown, and the furniture
was in chaotic disorder, as after some wild orgy. In the chair at the
foot of the table sat the lifeless figure of the Secretary, his head
bent over his folded arms, as though he would shield his eyes from
some horrible sight. Before him on the table lay pen, ink and the red
Minute Book. On the last inscribed page, under the date of November
2nd, were written, for the first time since 1742, the autographs of
the seven members of the Everlasting Club, but without address. In the
same strong hand in which the President’s name was written there was
appended below the signatures the note, “Mulctatus per Presidentem
propter neglectum obsonii, Car. Bellasis.”

The Minute Book was secured by the Master of the College, and I believe
that he alone was acquainted with the nature of its contents. The
scandal reflected on the College by the circumstances revealed in it
caused him to keep the knowledge rigidly to himself. But some suspicion
of the nature of the occurrences must have percolated to students and
servants, for there was a long-abiding belief in the College that
annually on the night of November 2 sounds of unholy revelry were
heard to issue from the chamber of Bellasis. I cannot learn that the
occupants of the adjoining rooms have ever been disturbed by them.
Indeed, it is plain from the minutes that owing to their improvident
drafting no provision was made for the perpetuation of the All Souls
entertainment after the last Everlasting ceased to be Corporeal. Such
superstitious belief must be treated with contemptuous incredulity.
But whether for that cause or another the rooms were shut up, and have
remained tenantless from that day to this.

[Illustration]




                     The Treasure of John Badcoke


As this narrative of an occurrence in the history of Jesus College
may appear to verge on the domain of romance, I think it proper to
state by way of preface, that for some of its details I am indebted to
documentary evidence which is accessible and veracious. Other portions
of the story are supplied from sources the credibility of which my
readers will be able to estimate.

On the 8th of November, 1538, the Priory of St. Giles and St. Andrew,
Barnwell, was surrendered to King Henry VIII. by John Badcoke, the
Prior, and the convent of that house. The surrender was sealed with the
common seal, subscribed by the Prior and six canons, and acknowledged
on the same day in the Chapter House of the Priory, before Thomas Legh,
Doctor of Laws.[1]

Dr. Legh and his fellows, who had been deputed by Cromwell to visit the
monasteries, had too frequent occasion to deplore the frowardness of
religious households in opposing the King’s will in the matter of their
dissolution. Among many such reports I need only cite the case of the
Prior of Christ Church, Canterbury, mentioned in a letter to Cromwell
from one of his agents, Christopher Leyghton.[2] He tells Cromwell
that in an inventory exhibited by the Prior to Dr. Leyghton, the
King’s visitor, the Prior had “wilfullye left owte a remembraunce of
certayne parcells of silver, gold and stone to the value of thowsandys
of poundys”; that it was not to be doubted that he would “eloyne owt
of the same howse into the handys of his secret fryndys thowsandes of
poundes, which is well knowne he hathe, to hys comfort hereafter”; and
that it was common report in the monastery that any monk who should
open the matter to the King’s advisers “shalbe poysenyde or murtheryde,
as he hath murthredde diverse others.”

Far different from the truculent attitude of this murderous Prior
was the conduct on the like occasion of Prior John Badcoke. Dr. Legh
reported him to be “honest and conformable.” He furnished an exact
inventory of the possessions of his house, and quietly retired on the
pittance allowed to him by the King. He prevailed upon the other canons
to shew the same submission to the royal will, and they peaceably
dispersed, some to country incumbencies, others to resume in the
Colleges the studies commenced in earlier life.

John Badcoke settled in Jesus College. The Bursar’s Rental of 1538-39
shows that his residence there began in the autumn of the earlier year,
immediately after the surrender of the monastery. Divorced from the
Priory he was still attached to Barnwell, and took up the duties of
Vicar of the small parish church of St. Andrew, which stood close to
the Priory gate. So long as Henry VIII. lived, and the rites of the old
religion were tolerated, he seems to have ministered faithfully to the
spiritual needs of his parishioners, unsuspected and unmolested.

More than twelve months elapsed before the demolition of the canons’
house was taken in hand, and, for so long, in the empty church the
Prior still offered mass on ceremonial days for the repose of the souls
of the Peverels and Peches who had built and endowed the house in long
bygone days, and were buried beside the High Altar. In the porter’s
lodge remained the only occupant of the monastery--a former servant of
the house, who, from the circumstance that in his secular profession he
was a mason, had the name of Adam Waller. Occasional intruders on the
solitude of the cloister or the monastic garden sometimes lighted on
the ex-Prior pacing the grass-grown walks, as of old, and generally in
company with a younger priest.

[Illustration: Oriel Window of Hall & Entrance to ‘K’ Staircase]

This companion was named Richard Harrison. He was not one of the
dispossessed canons, but came from the Priory of Christ Church,
Canterbury, of which mention has been made. He was the youngest and
latest professed of the monks there, a nephew of the Prior, as also of
John Badcoke. He had not been present at the time of Dr. Leyghton’s
visitation, as he happened then to be visiting his uncle at Barnwell.
As the Canterbury monks were ejected in his absence he had remained
at Barnwell, and there he shared his uncle’s parochial duties. He,
too, became a resident at Jesus, and he occupied rooms in the College
immediately beneath those of Badcoke.

Late in the year 1539 the demolition of Barnwell Priory was begun. Adam
Waller was engaged in the work. One incident, which apparently passed
almost unnoticed at the time, may be mentioned in connection with this
business. The keys of the church were in the keeping of Waller, who
had been in the habit of surrendering them to the two ecclesiastics
whenever they performed the divine offices there. On the morning when
the demolition was to begin, it was found that the stone covering
the altar-tomb of Pain Peverel, crusader and founder of the Priory,
had been dislodged, and that the earth within it had been recently
disturbed. Waller professed to know nothing of the matter.

The account rolls of the College Bursars in the reigns of Henry
VIII. and Edward VI. fortunately tell us exactly the situation of
the rooms occupied by Badcoke and Harrison, and as, for the proper
understanding of subsequent events, it is necessary that we should
realise their condition and relation to the rest of the College, I
shall not scruple to be particular. They were on the left-hand side of
the staircase now called K, in the eastern range of the College, and
at the northern end of what had once been the dormitory of the Nuns of
St. Radegund. Badcoke’s chamber, which was on the highest floor, was
one of the largest in the College, and for that reason the Statutes
prescribed that it should be reserved “for more venerable persons
resorting to the College”; and Badcoke, being neither a Fellow nor a
graduate, was regarded as belonging to this class. Below his chamber
was that of Harrison, and on the ground-floor was the “cool-house,”
where the College fuel was kept. Between this ground-floor room and L
staircase--which did not then exist--there is seen at the present day a
rarely opened door. Inside the door a flight of some half-dozen steps
descends to a narrow space, which might be deemed a passage, save that
it has no outlet at the farther end. On either side it is flanked, to
the height of two floors of K staircase, by walls of ancient monastic
masonry; the third and highest floor is carried over it. Here, in the
times of Henry VIII. and the Nunnery days before them, ran or stagnated
a Stygian stream, known as “the kytchynge sinke ditch,” foul with scum
from the College offices. Northward from Badcoke’s staircase was “the
wood-yard,” on the site of the present L staircase. It communicated by
a door in its outward, eastern wall with a green close which in the old
days had been the Nunnery graveyard. In Badcoke’s times it was still
uneven with the hillocks which marked the resting-places of nameless,
unrecorded Nuns. The old graveyard was intersected by a cart-track
leading from Jesus Lane to the wood-yard door. The Bursar’s books show
that Badcoke controlled the wood-yard and coal-house, perhaps in the
capacity of Promus, or Steward.

Now when Badcoke and Harrison came to occupy their chambers on K
staircase, Jesus, like other Colleges in those troublous times, had
fallen on evil days. Its occupants comprised only the Master, some
eight Fellows, a few servants, and about half-a-dozen “disciples.”
Nearly half the rooms in College were empty, and the records show
that many were tenantless, _propter defectum reparacionis_; that is,
because walls, roofs and floors were decayed and ruinous. Badcoke,
being a man of means, paid a handsome rent for his chambers, not less
than ten shillings by the year, in consideration of which the College
put it in tenantable repair; and, as a circumstance which has some
significance in relation to this narrative, it is to be noted that the
Bursar--the accounts of the year are no longer extant--recorded that
in 1539 he paid a sum of three shillings and fourpence “to Adam Waller
for layyinge of new brick in yᵉ cupboard of Mr. Badcoke’s chamber.”
The cupboard in question was seemingly a small recessed space, still
recognisable in a gyp-room belonging to the chambers which were
Badcoke’s. The rooms on the side of the staircase opposite to those of
Badcoke and Harrison were evidently unoccupied; the Bursar took no
rent from them. The other inmates of the College dwelt in the cloister
court.

In this comparative isolation Badcoke and Harrison lived until the
death of Henry VIII. in 1546. In course of time Harrison became a
Fellow of the College; but Badcoke preferred to retain the exceptional
status of its honoured guest. To the Master, Dr. Reston, and the
Fellows, whose religious sympathies were with the old order of things,
their company was inoffensive and even welcome. But trouble came upon
the College in 1549, when it was visited by King Edward’s Protestant
Commissioners. It stands on record, that on May 26th “they commanded
six altars to be pulled down in the church,” and in a chamber, which
may have been Badcoke’s, “caused certayn images to be broken.” Mr.
Badcoke “had an excommunicacion sette uppe for him,” and was dismissed
from the office, whatever it was, that he held in the College. Worse
still for his happiness, his companion of many years, Richard Harrison,
was “expulsed his felowshippe” on some supposition of trafficking with
the court of Rome.[3] He went overseas, as it was understood, to the
Catholic University of Louvain in Flanders.

In 1549 Badcoke must have been, as age went in the sixteenth century,
an old man. His deprivation of office, the loss of his friend, and
the abandonment of long treasured hopes for the restitution of the
religious system to which his life had been devoted, plunged him in
a settled despondency. The Fellows, who showed for him such sympathy
as they dared, understood that between him and Harrison there passed
a secret correspondence. But in course of years this source of
consolation dried up. Harrison was dead, or he had travelled away
from Louvain. With the other members of the College Badcoke wholly
parted company, and lived a recluse in his unneighboured room. By the
wood-yard gate, of which he still had a key, he could let himself
out beyond the College walls, and sometimes by day, oftener after
nightfall, he was to be seen wandering beneath his window in the Nuns’
graveyard, his old feet, like Friar Laurence’s, “stumbling at graves.”
An occasional visitor, who was known to be his pensioner, was Adam
Waller. But, though Waller was still at times employed in the service
of the College, his character and condition had deteriorated with
years. He was a sturdy beggar, a drunkard, sullen and dangerous in his
cups, and Badcoke was heard to hint some terror of his presence. At
last the Master learnt from the ex-Prior that he was about to quit the
College, and none doubted that he would follow Harrison to Louvain.

Shortly after this became known, Badcoke disappeared from College. He
had lived in such seclusion that for a day or two it was not noticed
that his door remained closed, and that he had not been seen in his
customary walks. When the door was at last forced it was discovered
that he had indeed gone, but, strangely, he had left behind him the
whole of his effects. Adam Waller was the last person who was known to
have entered his chamber, and, being questioned, he said that Badcoke
had informed him of his intention to depart three days previously,
but, for some unexplained reason, had desired him to keep his purpose
secret, and had not imparted his destination. Badcoke’s life of
seclusion, and his known connection with English Catholics beyond sea,
gave colour to Waller’s story, and, so far as I am aware, no enquiries
were made as to the subsequent fate of the ex-Prior. But a strange fact
was commented on--that the floor of the so-called cupboard was strewn
with bricks, and that in the place from which they had been dislodged
was an arched recess of considerable size, which must have been made
during Badcoke’s tenancy of the room. There was nothing in the recess.
Another circumstance there was which called for no notice in the then
dilapidated state of half the College rooms. Two boards were loose in
the floor of the larger chamber. Thirty feet below the gap which their
removal exposed, lay the dark impurities of the “kytchynge sinke ditch.”

Adam Waller died a beggar as he had lived.

A century after these occurrences--in the year 1642--the attention of
the College was drawn by a severe visitation of plague to a much-needed
sanitary reform. The black ditch which ran under K staircase was
“cast,” that is, its bed was effectually cleaned out, and its channel
was stopped; and so it came about that from that day to this it has
presented a clean and dry floor of gravel. Beneath the settled slime of
centuries was discovered a complete skeleton. How it came there nobody
knew, and nobody enquired. Probably it was guessed to be a relic of
some dim and grim monastic mystery.

Now whether Adam Waller knew or suspected the existence of a treasure
hidden in the wall-recess of Badcoke’s chamber, and murdered the
ex-Prior when he was about to remove it to Louvain, I cannot say.
One thing is certain--that he did not find the treasure there. When
Badcoke disappeared he left his will, with his other belongings, in
his chamber. After a decent interval, when it seemed improbable that
he would return, probate was obtained by the Master and Fellows, to
whom he had bequeathed the chief part of his effects. In 1858 the wills
proved in the University court were removed to Peterborough, and there,
for aught I know, his will may yet be seen. The property bequeathed
consisted principally of books of theology. Among them was Stephanus’
Latin Vulgate Bible of 1528 in two volumes folio. This he devised “of
my heartie good wylle to my trustie felow and frynde, Richard Harrison,
if he shal returne to Cambrege aftyr the tyme of my decesse.” Richard
Harrison never returned to Cambridge, and the Bible, with the other
books, found its way to the College Library.

Now there are still in the Library two volumes of this Vulgate Bible.
There is nothing in either of them to identify them with the books
mentioned in Badcoke’s will, for they have lost the fly-leaves which
might have revealed the owner’s autograph. Here and there in the
margins are annotations in a sixteenth-century handwriting; and in the
same handwriting on one of the lost leaves was a curious inscription,
which suggests that the writer’s mind was running on some treasure
which was not spiritual. First at the top of the page, in clear
and large letters, was copied a passage from Psalm 55: “Cor meum
conturbatum est in me: et formido mortis cecidit super me. Et dixi,
Quis dabit pennas mihi sicut columbae, et volabo et requiescam.” (My
heart is disquieted within me: and the fear of death is fallen upon
me. And I said, O that I had wings like a dove: for then would I fly
away, and be at rest.) Then, in lettering of the same kind, came a
portion of Deuteronomy xxviii. 12: “Aperiet dominus thesaurum suum,
benedicetque cunctis operibus tuis.” (The Lord will disclose his
treasure, and will bless all the works of thy hands.) Under this, in
smaller letters, were the words, “Vide super hoc Ezechielis cap. xl.”

[Illustration: Old Hall, Master’s Lodge.]

If in the same volume the chapter in question is referred to, a
singular fact discloses itself. Certain words in the text are
underscored in red pencil, and fingers, inked in the margin, are
directed to the lines in which they occur. Taken in their consecutive
order these words run: “Ecce murus forinsecus ... ad portam quae
respiciebat viam orientalem ... mensus est a facie portae extrinsecus
ad orientem et aquilonem quinque cubitorum ... hoc est gazophylacium.”
This may be taken to mean, “Look at the outside wall ... at the gate
facing towards the eastern road ... he measured from the gate outwards
five cubits (7¹⁄₂ feet) towards the north-east ... there is the
treasure.”

The outer wall of the College, the wood-yard gate and the road through
the Nuns’ cemetery must at once have suggested themselves to Richard
Harrison, had he lived to see his friend’s bequest, and he must have
taken it as an instruction from the testator that a treasure known
to both parties was hidden in the spot indicated, close to Badcoke’s
chamber. And the first text cited must have conveyed to him that his
friend, in some deadly terror, had transferred the treasure thither
from the place where the two friends had originally laid it. But
the message never reached Harrison, and it is quite certain that no
treasure has been sought or found in that spot. If the Canterbury or
any other treasure was deposited there by Badcoke it rests there still.

To those who are curious to know more of this matter I would say:
first, ascertain minutely from Loggan’s seventeenth-century plan of the
College the position of the wood-yard gate; and, secondly, which indeed
should be firstly, make absolutely certain that John Badcoke was not
mystifying posterity by an elaborate jest.


FOOTNOTES:

[1] Cooper, _Annals_, I., p. 393.

[2] _The Suppression of the Monasteries_ (Camden Society’s
Publications), p. 90.

[3] Cooper, _Annals_, II. p. 29.




                  The True History of Anthony Ffryar


The world, it is said, knows nothing of its greatest men. In our
Cambridge microcosm it may be doubted whether we are better informed
concerning some of the departed great ones who once walked the confines
of our Colleges. Which of us has heard of Anthony Ffryar of Jesus?
History is dumb respecting him. Yet but for the unhappy event recorded
in this unadorned chronicle his fame might have stood with that of
Bacon of Trinity, or Harvey of Caius. _They_ lived to be old men:
Ffryar died before he was thirty--his work unfinished, his fame unknown
even to his contemporaries.

So meagre is the record of his life’s work that it is contained in a
few bare notices in the College Bursar’s Books, in the Grace Books
which date his matriculation and degrees, and in the entry of his
burial in the register of All Saints’ Parish. These simple annals I
have ventured to supplement with details of a more or less hypothetical
character which will serve to show what humanity lost by his early
death. Readers will be able to judge for themselves the degree of care
which I have taken not to import into the story anything which may
savour of the improbable or romantic.

Anthony Ffryar matriculated in the year 1541-2, his age being then
probably 15 or 16. He took his B.A. degree in 1545, his M.A. in 1548.
He became a Fellow about the end of 1547, and died in the summer of
1551. Such are the documentary facts relating to him. Dr. Reston was
Master of the College during the whole of his tenure of a Fellowship
and died in the same year as Ffryar. The chamber which Ffryar occupied
as a Fellow was on the first floor of the staircase at the west end
of the Chapel. The staircase has since been absorbed in the Master’s
Lodge, but the doorway through which it was approached from the
cloister may still be seen. At the time when Ffryar lived there the
nave of the Chapel was used as a parish church, and his windows
overlooked the graveyard, then called “Jesus churchyard,” which is now
a part of the Master’s garden.

[Illustration: _North West Corner of Cloisters._]

Ffryar was of course a priest, as were nearly all the Fellows in his
day. But I do not gather that he was a theologian, or complied more
than formally with the obligation of his orders. He came to Cambridge
when the Six Articles and the suppression of the monasteries were of
fresh and burning import: he became a Fellow in the harsh Protestant
days of Protector Somerset: and in all his time the Master and the
Fellows were in scarcely disavowed sympathy with the rites and beliefs
of the Old Religion. Yet in the battle of creeds I imagine that he
took no part and no interest. I should suppose that he was a somewhat
solitary man, an insatiable student of Nature, and that his sympathies
with humanity were starved by his absorption in the New Science which
dawned on Cambridge at the Reformation.

When I say that he was an alchemist do not suppose that in the middle
of the sixteenth century the name of alchemy carried with it any
associations with credulity or imposture. It was a real science and
a subject of University study then, as its god-children, Physics and
Chemistry, are now. If the aims of its professors were transcendental
its methods were genuinely based on research. Ffryar was no visionary,
but a man of sense, hard and practical. To the study of alchemy he was
drawn by no hopes of gain, not even of fame, and still less by any
desire to benefit mankind. He was actuated solely by an unquenchable
passion for enquiry, a passion sterilizing to all other feeling. To
the somnambulisms of the less scientific disciples of his school, such
as the philosopher’s stone and the elixir of life, he showed himself a
chill agnostic. All his thought and energies were concentrated on the
discovery of the _magisterium_, the master-cure of all human ailments.

For four years in his laboratory in the cloister he had toiled at
this pursuit. More than once, when it had seemed most near, it had
eluded his grasp; more than once he had been tempted to abandon it as
a mystery insoluble. In the summer of 1551 the discovery waited at his
door. He was sure, certain of success, which only experiment could
prove. And with the certainty arose a new passion in his heart--to make
the name of Ffryar glorious in the healing profession as that of Galen
or Hippocrates. In a few days, even within a few hours, the fame of his
discovery would go out into all the world.

The summer of 1551 was a sad time in Cambridge. It was marked by a more
than usually fatal outbreak of the epidemic called “the sweat,” when,
as Fuller says, “patients ended or mended in twenty-four hours.” It
had smouldered some time in the town before it appeared with sudden
and dreadful violence in Jesus College. The first to go was little
Gregory Graunge, schoolboy and chorister, who was lodged in the College
school in the outer court. He was barely thirteen years old, and known
by sight to Anthony Ffryar. He died on July 31, and was buried the
same day in Jesus churchyard. The service for his burial was held in
the Chapel and at night, as was customary in those days. Funerals in
College were no uncommon events in the sixteenth century. But in the
death of the poor child, among strangers, there was something to move
even the cold heart of Ffryar. And not the pity of it only impressed
him. The dim Chapel, the Master and Fellows obscurely ranged in their
stalls and shrouded in their hoods, the long-drawn miserable chanting
and the childish trebles of the boys who had been Gregory’s fellows
struck a chill into him which was not to be shaken off.

Three days passed and another chorister died. The College gates were
barred and guarded, and, except by a selected messenger, communication
with the town was cut off. The precaution was unavailing, and the boys’
usher, Mr. Stevenson, died on August 5. One of the junior Fellows,
sir Stayner--“sir” being the equivalent of B.A.--followed on August
7. The Master, Dr. Reston, died the next day. A gaunt, severe man was
Dr. Reston, whom his Fellows feared. The death of a Master of Arts on
August 9 for a time completed the melancholy list.

Before this the frightened Fellows had taken action. The scholars were
dismissed to their homes on August 6. Some of the Fellows abandoned the
College at the same time. The rest--a terrified conclave--met on August
8 and decreed that the College should be closed until the pestilence
should have abated. Until that time it was to be occupied by a certain
Robert Laycock, who was a College servant, and his only communication
with the outside world was to be through his son, who lived in Jesus
Lane. The decree was perhaps the result of the Master’s death, for he
was not present at the meeting.

Goodman Laycock, as he was commonly called, might have been the sole
tenant of the College but for the unalterable decision of Ffryar
to remain there. At all hazards his research, now on the eve of
realisation, must proceed; without the aid of his laboratory in College
it would miserably hang fire. Besides, he had an absolute assurance of
his own immunity if the experiment answered his confident expectations,
and his fancy was elated with the thought of standing, like another
Aaron, between the living and the dead, and staying the pestilence with
the potent _magisterium_. Until then he would bar his door even against
Laycock, and his supplies of food should be left on the staircase
landing. Solitude for him was neither unfamiliar nor terrible.

[Illustration: _The Master’s Stall._]

So for three days Ffryar and Laycock inhabited the cloister, solitary
and separate. For three days, in the absorption of his research,
Ffryar forgot fear, forgot the pestilence-stricken world beyond the
gate, almost forgot to consume the daily dole of food laid outside his
door. August 12 was the day, so fateful to humanity, when his labours
were to be crowned with victory: before midnight the secret of the
_magisterium_ would be solved.

Evening began to close in before he could begin the experiment which
was to be his last. It must of necessity be a labour of some hours,
and, before it began, he bethought him that he had not tasted food
since early morning. He unbarred his door and looked for the expected
portion. It was not there. Vexed at the remissness of Laycock he waited
for a while and listened for his approaching footsteps. At last he took
courage and descended to the cloister. He called for Laycock, but heard
no response. He resolved to go as far as the Buttery door and knock.
Laycock lived and slept in the Buttery.

At the Buttery door he beat and cried on Laycock; but in answer he
heard only the sound of scurrying rats. He went to the window, by the
hatch, where he knew that the old man’s bed lay, and called to him
again. Still there was silence. At last he resolved to force himself
through the unglazed window and take what food he could find. In the
deep gloom within he stumbled and almost fell over a low object, which
he made out to be a truckle-bed. There was light enough from the window
to distinguish, stretched upon it, the form of Goodman Laycock, stark
and dead.

Sickened and alarmed Ffryar hurried back to his chamber. More than ever
he must hasten the great experiment. When it was ended his danger would
be past, and he could go out into the town to call the buryers for the
certain about it--that the moment the prodigal son fell on his knees and
wept, he made his having wasted his substance with harlots, his swine-
herding and hungering for the husks they ate, beautiful and holy moments
in his life.  It is difficult for most people to grasp the idea.  I dare
say one has to go to prison to understand it.  If so, it may be worth
while going to prison.

There is something so unique about Christ.  Of course just as there are
false dawns before the dawn itself, and winter days so full of sudden
sunlight that they will cheat the wise crocus into squandering its gold
before its time, and make some foolish bird call to its mate to build on
barren boughs, so there were Christians before Christ.  For that we
should be grateful.  The unfortunate thing is that there have been none
since.  I make one exception, St. Francis of Assisi.  But then God had
given him at his birth the soul of a poet, as he himself when quite young
had in mystical marriage taken poverty as his bride: and with the soul of
a poet and the body of a beggar he found the way to perfection not
difficult.  He understood Christ, and so he became like him.  We do not
require the Liber Conformitatum to teach us that the life of St. Francis
was the true _Imitatio Christi_, a poem compared to which the book of
that name is merely prose.

Indeed, that is the charm about Christ, when all is said: he is just like
a work of art.  He does not really teach one anything, but by being
brought into his presence one becomes something.  And everybody is
predestined to his presence.  Once at least in his life each man walks
with Christ to Emmaus.

As regards the other subject, the Relation of the Artistic Life to
Conduct, it will no doubt seem strange to you that I should select it.
People point to Reading Gaol and say, 'That is where the artistic life
leads a man.'  Well, it might lead to worse places.  The more mechanical
people to whom life is a shrewd speculation depending on a careful
calculation of ways and means, always know where they are going, and go
there.  They start with the ideal desire of being the parish beadle, and
in whatever sphere they are placed they succeed in being the parish
beadle and no more.  A man whose desire is to be something separate from
himself, to be a member of Parliament, or a successful grocer, or a
prominent solicitor, or a judge, or something equally tedious, invariably
succeeds in being what he wants to be.  That is his punishment.  Those
who want a mask have to wear it.

But with the dynamic forces of life, and those in whom those dynamic
forces become incarnate, it is different.  People whose desire is solely
for self-realisation never know where they are going.  They can't know.
In one sense of the word it is of course necessary, as the Greek oracle
said, to know oneself: that is the first achievement of knowledge.  But
to recognise that the soul of a man is unknowable, is the ultimate
achievement of wisdom.  The final mystery is oneself.  When one has
weighed the sun in the balance, and measured the steps of the moon, and
mapped out the seven heavens star by star, there still remains oneself.
Who can calculate the orbit of his own soul?  When the son went out to
look for his father's asses, he did not know that a man of God was
waiting for him with the very chrism of coronation, and that his own soul
was already the soul of a king.

I hope to live long enough and to produce work of such a character that I
shall be able at the end of my days to say, 'Yes! this is just where the
artistic life leads a man!'  Two of the most perfect lives I have come
across in my own experience are the lives of Verlaine and of Prince
Kropotkin: both of them men who have passed years in prison: the first,
the one Christian poet since Dante; the other, a man with a soul of that
beautiful white Christ which seems coming out of Russia.  And for the
last seven or eight months, in spite of a succession of great troubles
reaching me from the outside world almost without intermission, I have
been placed in direct contact with a new spirit working in this prison
through man and things, that has helped me beyond any possibility of
expression in words: so that while for the first year of my imprisonment
I did nothing else, and can remember doing nothing else, but wring my
hands in impotent despair, and say, 'What an ending, what an appalling
ending!' now I try to say to myself, and sometimes when I am not
torturing myself do really and sincerely say, 'What a beginning, what a
wonderful beginning!'  It may really be so.  It may become so.  If it
does I shall owe much to this new personality that has altered every
man's life in this place.

You may realise it when I say that had I been released last May, as I
tried to be, I would have left this place loathing it and every official
in it with a bitterness of hatred that would have poisoned my life.  I
have had a year longer of imprisonment, but humanity has been in the
prison along with us all, and now when I go out I shall always remember
great kindnesses that I have received here from almost everybody, and on
the day of my release I shall give many thanks to many people, and ask to
be remembered by them in turn.

The prison style is absolutely and entirely wrong.  I would give anything
to be able to alter it when I go out.  I intend to try.  But there is
nothing in the world so wrong but that the spirit of humanity, which is
the spirit of love, the spirit of the Christ who is not in churches, may
make it, if not right, at least possible to be borne without too much
bitterness of heart.

I know also that much is waiting for me outside that is very delightful,
from what St. Francis of Assisi calls 'my brother the wind, and my sister
the rain,' lovely things both of them, down to the shop-windows and
sunsets of great cities.  If I made a list of all that still remains to
me, I don't know where I should stop: for, indeed, God made the world
just as much for me as for any one else.  Perhaps I may go out with
something that I had not got before.  I need not tell you that to me
reformations in morals are as meaningless and vulgar as Reformations in
theology.  But while to propose to be a better man is a piece of
unscientific cant, to have become a deeper man is the privilege of those
who have suffered.  And such I think I have become.

If after I am free a friend of mine gave a feast, and did not invite me
to it, I should not mind a bit.  I can be perfectly happy by myself.  With
freedom, flowers, books, and the moon, who could not be perfectly happy?
Besides, feasts are not for me any more.  I have given too many to care
about them.  That side of life is over for me, very fortunately, I dare
say.  But if after I am free a friend of mine had a sorrow and refused to
allow me to share it, I should feel it most bitterly.  If he shut the
doors of the house of mourning against me, I would come back again and
again and beg to be admitted, so that I might share in what I was
entitled to share in.  If he thought me unworthy, unfit to weep with him,
I should feel it as the most poignant humiliation, as the most terrible
mode in which disgrace could be inflicted on me.  But that could not be.
I have a right to share in sorrow, and he who can look at the loveliness
of the world and share its sorrow, and realise something of the wonder of
both, is in immediate contact with divine things, and has got as near to
God's secret as any one can get.

Perhaps there may come into my art also, no less than into my life, a
still deeper note, one of greater unity of passion, and directness of
impulse.  Not width but intensity is the true aim of modern art.  We are
no longer in art concerned with the type.  It is with the exception that
we have to do.  I cannot put my sufferings into any form they took, I
need hardly say.  Art only begins where Imitation ends, but something
must come into my work, of fuller memory of words perhaps, of richer
cadences, of more curious effects, of simpler architectural order, of
some aesthetic quality at any rate.

When Marsyas was 'torn from the scabbard of his limbs'--_della vagina
della membre sue_, to use one of Dante's most terrible Tacitean
phrases--he had no more song, the Greek said.  Apollo had been victor.
The lyre had vanquished the reed.  But perhaps the Greeks were mistaken.
I hear in much modern Art the cry of Marsyas.  It is bitter in
Baudelaire, sweet and plaintive in Lamartine, mystic in Verlaine.  It is
in the deferred resolutions of Chopin's music.  It is in the discontent
that haunts Burne-Jones's women.  Even Matthew Arnold, whose song of
Callicles tells of 'the triumph of the sweet persuasive lyre,' and the
'famous final victory,' in such a clear note of lyrical beauty, has not a
little of it; in the troubled undertone of doubt and distress that haunts
his verses, neither Goethe nor Wordsworth could help him, though he
followed each in turn, and when he seeks to mourn for _Thyrsis_ or to
sing of the _Scholar Gipsy_, it is the reed that he has to take for the
rendering of his strain.  But whether or not the Phrygian Faun was
silent, I cannot be.  Expression is as necessary to me as leaf and
blossoms are to the black branches of the trees that show themselves
above the prison walls and are so restless in the wind.  Between my art
and the world there is now a wide gulf, but between art and myself there
is none.  I hope at least that there is none.

To each of us different fates are meted out.  My lot has been one of
public infamy, of long imprisonment, of misery, of ruin, of disgrace, but
I am not worthy of it--not yet, at any rate.  I remember that I used to
say that I thought I could bear a real tragedy if it came to me with
purple pall and a mask of noble sorrow, but that the dreadful thing about
modernity was that it put tragedy into the raiment of comedy, so that the
great realities seemed commonplace or grotesque or lacking in style.  It
is quite true about modernity.  It has probably always been true about
actual life.  It is said that all martyrdoms seemed mean to the looker
on.  The nineteenth century is no exception to the rule.

Everything about my tragedy has been hideous, mean, repellent, lacking in
style; our very dress makes us grotesque.  We are the zanies of sorrow.
We are clowns whose hearts are broken.  We are specially designed to
appeal to the sense of humour.  On November 13th, 1895, I was brought
down here from London.  From two o'clock till half-past two on that day I
had to stand on the centre platform of Clapham Junction in convict dress,
and handcuffed, for the world to look at.  I had been taken out of the
hospital ward without a moment's notice being given to me.  Of all
possible objects I was the most grotesque.  When people saw me they
laughed.  Each train as it came up swelled the audience.  Nothing could
exceed their amusement.  That was, of course, before they knew who I was.
As soon as they had been informed they laughed still more.  For half an
hour I stood there in the grey November rain surrounded by a jeering mob.

For a year after that was done to me I wept every day at the same hour
and for the same space of time.  That is not such a tragic thing as
possibly it sounds to you.  To those who are in prison tears are a part
of every day's experience.  A day in prison on which one does not weep is
a day on which one's heart is hard, not a day on which one's heart is
happy.

Well, now I am really beginning to feel more regret for the people who
laughed than for myself.  Of course when they saw me I was not on my
pedestal, I was in the pillory.  But it is a very unimaginative nature
that only cares for people on their pedestals.  A pedestal may be a very
unreal thing.  A pillory is a terrific reality.  They should have known
also how to interpret sorrow better.  I have said that behind sorrow
there is always sorrow.  It were wiser still to say that behind sorrow
there is always a soul.  And to mock at a soul in pain is a dreadful
thing.  In the strangely simple economy of the world people only get what
they give, and to those who have not enough imagination to penetrate the
mere outward of things, and feel pity, what pity can be given save that
of scorn?

I write this account of the mode of my being transferred here simply that
it should be realised how hard it has been for me to get anything out of
my punishment but bitterness and despair.  I have, however, to do it, and
now and then I have moments of submission and acceptance.  All the spring
may be hidden in the single bud, and the low ground nest of the lark may
hold the joy that is to herald the feet of many rose-red dawns.  So
perhaps whatever beauty of life still remains to me is contained in some
moment of surrender, abasement, and humiliation.  I can, at any rate,
merely proceed on the lines of my own development, and, accepting all
that has happened to me, make myself worthy of it.

People used to say of me that I was too individualistic.  I must be far
more of an individualist than ever I was.  I must get far more out of
myself than ever I got, and ask far less of the world than ever I asked.
Indeed, my ruin came not from too great individualism of life, but from
too little.  The one disgraceful, unpardonable, and to all time
contemptible action of my life was to allow myself to appeal to society
for help and protection.  To have made such an appeal would have been
from the individualist point of view bad enough, but what excuse can
there ever be put forward for having made it?  Of course once I had put
into motion the forces of society, society turned on me and said, 'Have
you been living all this time in defiance of my laws, and do you now
appeal to those laws for protection?  You shall have those laws exercised
to the full.  You shall abide by what you have appealed to.'  The result
is I am in gaol.  Certainly no man ever fell so ignobly, and by such
ignoble instruments, as I did.

The Philistine element in life is not the failure to understand art.
Charming people, such as fishermen, shepherds, ploughboys, peasants and
the like, know nothing about art, and are the very salt of the earth.  He
is the Philistine who upholds and aids the heavy, cumbrous, blind,
mechanical forces of society, and who does not recognise dynamic force
when he meets it either in a man or a movement.

People thought it dreadful of me to have entertained at dinner the evil
things of life, and to have found pleasure in their company.  But then,
from the point of view through which I, as an artist in life, approach
them they were delightfully suggestive and stimulating.  The danger was
half the excitement. . . . My business as an artist was with Ariel.  I
set myself to wrestle with Caliban. . . .

A great friend of mine--a friend of ten years' standing--came to see me
some time ago, and told me that he did not believe a single word of what
was said against me, and wished me to know that he considered me quite
innocent, and the victim of a hideous plot.  I burst into tears at what
he said, and told him that while there was much amongst the definite
charges that was quite untrue and transferred to me by revolting malice,
still that my life had been full of perverse pleasures, and that unless
he accepted that as a fact about me and realised it to the full I could
not possibly be friends with him any more, or ever be in his company.  It
was a terrible shock to him, but we are friends, and I have not got his
friendship on false pretences.

Emotional forces, as I say somewhere in _Intentions_, are as limited in
extent and duration as the forces of physical energy.  The little cup
that is made to hold so much can hold so much and no more, though all the
purple vats of Burgundy be filled with wine to the brim, and the treaders
stand knee-deep in the gathered grapes of the stony vineyards of Spain.
There is no error more common than that of thinking that those who are
the causes or occasions of great tragedies share in the feelings suitable
to the tragic mood: no error more fatal than expecting it of them.  The
martyr in his 'shirt of flame' may be looking on the face of God, but to
him who is piling the faggots or loosening the logs for the blast the
whole scene is no more than the slaying of an ox is to the butcher, or
the felling of a tree to the charcoal burner in the forest, or the fall
of a flower to one who is mowing down the grass with a scythe.  Great
passions are for the great of soul, and great events can be seen only by
those who are on a level with them.

* * * * *

I know of nothing in all drama more incomparable from the point of view
of art, nothing more suggestive in its subtlety of observation, than
Shakespeare's drawing of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.  They are Hamlet's
college friends.  They have been his companions.  They bring with them
memories of pleasant days together.  At the moment when they come across
him in the play he is staggering under the weight of a burden intolerable
to one of his temperament.  The dead have come armed out of the grave to
impose on him a mission at once too great and too mean for him.  He is a
dreamer, and he is called upon to act.  He has the nature of the poet,
and he is asked to grapple with the common complexity of cause and
effect, with life in its practical realisation, of which he knows
nothing, not with life in its ideal essence, of which he knows so much.
He has no conception of what to do, and his folly is to feign folly.
Brutus used madness as a cloak to conceal the sword of his purpose, the
dagger of his will, but the Hamlet madness is a mere mask for the hiding
of weakness.  In the making of fancies and jests he sees a chance of
delay.  He keeps playing with action as an artist plays with a theory.  He
makes himself the spy of his proper actions, and listening to his own
words knows them to be but 'words, words, words.'  Instead of trying to
be the hero of his own history, he seeks to be the spectator of his own
tragedy.  He disbelieves in everything, including himself, and yet his
doubt helps him not, as it comes not from scepticism but from a divided
will.

Of all this Guildenstern and Rosencrantz realise nothing.  They bow and
smirk and smile, and what the one says the other echoes with sickliest
intonation.  When, at last, by means of the play within the play, and the
puppets in their dalliance, Hamlet 'catches the conscience' of the King,
and drives the wretched man in terror from his throne, Guildenstern and
Rosencrantz see no more in his conduct than a rather painful breach of
Court etiquette.  That is as far as they can attain to in 'the
contemplation of the spectacle of life with appropriate emotions.'  They
are close to his very secret and know nothing of it.  Nor would there be
any use in telling them.  They are the little cups that can hold so much
and no more.  Towards the close it is suggested that, caught in a cunning
spring set for another, they have met, or may meet, with a violent and
sudden death.  But a tragic ending of this kind, though touched by
Hamlet's humour with something of the surprise and justice of comedy, is
really not for such as they.  They never die.  Horatio, who in order to
'report Hamlet and his cause aright to the unsatisfied,'

   'Absents him from felicity a while,
   And in this harsh world draws his breath in pain,'

dies, but Guildenstern and Rosencrantz are as immortal as Angelo and
Tartuffe, and should rank with them.  They are what modern life has
contributed to the antique ideal of friendship.  He who writes a new _De
Amicitia_ must find a niche for them, and praise them in Tusculan prose.
They are types fixed for all time.  To censure them would show 'a lack of
appreciation.'  They are merely out of their sphere: that is all.  In
sublimity of soul there is no contagion.  High thoughts and high emotions
are by their very existence isolated.

* * * * *

I am to be released, if all goes well with me, towards the end of May,
and hope to go at once to some little sea-side village abroad with R---
and M---.

The sea, as Euripides says in one of his plays about Iphigeneia, washes
away the stains and wounds of the world.

I hope to be at least a month with my friends, and to gain peace and
balance, and a less troubled heart, and a sweeter mood.  I have a strange
longing for the great simple primeval things, such as the sea, to me no
less of a mother than the Earth.  It seems to me that we all look at
Nature too much, and live with her too little.  I discern great sanity in
the Greek attitude.  They never chattered about sunsets, or discussed
whether the shadows on the grass were really mauve or not.  But they saw
that the sea was for the swimmer, and the sand for the feet of the
runner.  They loved the trees for the shadow that they cast, and the
forest for its silence at noon.  The vineyard-dresser wreathed his hair
with ivy that he might keep off the rays of the sun as he stooped over
the young shoots, and for the artist and the athlete, the two types that
Greece gave us, they plaited with garlands the leaves of the bitter
laurel and of the wild parsley, which else had been of no service to men.

We call ours a utilitarian age, and we do not know the uses of any single
thing.  We have forgotten that water can cleanse, and fire purify, and
that the Earth is mother to us all.  As a consequence our art is of the
moon and plays with shadows, while Greek art is of the sun and deals
directly with things.  I feel sure that in elemental forces there is
purification, and I want to go back to them and live in their presence.

Of course to one so modern as I am, 'Enfant de mon siecle,' merely to
look at the world will be always lovely.  I tremble with pleasure when I
think that on the very day of my leaving prison both the laburnum and the
lilac will be blooming in the gardens, and that I shall see the wind stir
into restless beauty the swaying gold of the one, and make the other toss
the pale purple of its plumes, so that all the air shall be Arabia for
me.  Linnaeus fell on his knees and wept for joy when he saw for the
first time the long heath of some English upland made yellow with the
tawny aromatic brooms of the common furze; and I know that for me, to
whom flowers are part of desire, there are tears waiting in the petals of
some rose.  It has always been so with me from my boyhood.  There is not
a single colour hidden away in the chalice of a flower, or the curve of a
shell, to which, by some subtle sympathy with the very soul of things, my
nature does not answer.  Like Gautier, I have always been one of those
'pour qui le monde visible existe.'

Still, I am conscious now that behind all this beauty, satisfying though
it may be, there is some spirit hidden of which the painted forms and
shapes are but modes of manifestation, and it is with this spirit that I
desire to become in harmony.  I have grown tired of the articulate
utterances of men and things.  The Mystical in Art, the Mystical in Life,
the Mystical in Nature this is what I am looking for.  It is absolutely
necessary for me to find it somewhere.

All trials are trials for one's life, just as all sentences are sentences
of death; and three times have I been tried.  The first time I left the
box to be arrested, the second time to be led back to the house of
detention, the third time to pass into a prison for two years.  Society,
as we have constituted it, will have no place for me, has none to offer;
but Nature, whose sweet rains fall on unjust and just alike, will have
clefts in the rocks where I may hide, and secret valleys in whose silence
I may weep undisturbed.  She will hang the night with stars so that I may
walk abroad in the darkness without stumbling, and send the wind over my
footprints so that none may track me to my hurt: she will cleanse me in
great waters, and with bitter herbs make me whole.








CHIP, OF THE FLYING U

By B. M. Bower (B. M. Sinclair)


AUTHOR OF “The Lure of the Dim Trails,” “Her Prairie Knight,” “The
Lonesome Trail,” etc.

Illustrations by CHARLES M. RUSSELL



LIST OF CONTENTS


     I      The Old Man's Sister
     II     Over the “Hog's Back”
      III    Silver
     IV     An Ideal Picture
     V      In Silver's Stall
     VI     The Hum of Preparation
     VII    Love and a Stomach Pump
     VIII   Prescriptions
     IX     Before the Round-up
     X      What Whizzer Did
     XI     Good Intentions
     XII    “The Last Stand”
      XIII   Art Critics
     XIV    Convalescence
     XV     The Spoils of Victory
     XVI    Weary Advises
     XVII   When a Maiden Wills
     XVIII  Dr Cecil Granthum
     XIX    Love Finds Its Hour


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Came down with not a joint in his legs and turned a somersault

“The Last Stand.”

Throwing herself from the saddle she slid precipitately into the
washout, just as Denver thundered up




CHAPTER I. -- The Old Man's Sister.



The weekly mail had just arrived at the Flying U ranch. Shorty, who had
made the trip to Dry Lake on horseback that afternoon, tossed the bundle
to the “Old Man” and was halfway to the stable when he was called back
peremptorily.

“Shorty! O-h-h, Shorty! Hi!”

Shorty kicked his steaming horse in the ribs and swung round in the
path, bringing up before the porch with a jerk.

“Where's this letter been?” demanded the Old Man, with some excitement.
James G. Whitmore, cattleman, would have been greatly surprised had
he known that his cowboys were in the habit of calling him the Old Man
behind his back. James G. Whitmore did not consider himself old, though
he was constrained to admit, after several hours in the saddle, that
rheumatism had searched him out--because of his fourteen years of
roughing it, he said. Also, there was a place on the crown of his head
where the hair was thin, and growing thinner every day of his life,
though he did not realize it. The thin spot showed now as he stood in
the path, waving a square envelope aloft before Shorty, who regarded it
with supreme indifference.

Not so Shorty's horse. He rolled his eyes till the whites showed,
snorted and backed away from the fluttering, white object.

“Doggone it, where's this been?” reiterated James G., accusingly.

“How the devil do I know?” retorted Shorty, forcing his horse nearer.
“In the office, most likely. I got it with the rest to-day.”

“It's two weeks old,” stormed the Old Man. “I never knew it to fail--if
a letter says anybody's coming, or you're to hurry up and go somewhere
to meet somebody, that letter's the one that monkeys around and comes
when the last dog's hung. A letter asking yuh if yuh don't want to get
rich in ten days sellin' books, or something, 'll hike along out here in
no time. Doggone it!”

“You got a hurry-up order to go somewhere?” queried Shorty, mildly
sympathetic.

“Worse than that,” groaned James G. “My sister's coming out to spend the
summer--t'-morrow. And no cook but Patsy--and she can't eat in the mess
house--and the house like a junk shop!”

“It looks like you was up against it, all right,” grinned Shorty. Shorty
was a sort of foreman, and was allowed much freedom of speech.

“Somebody's got to meet her--you have Chip catch up the creams so he can
go. And send some of the boys up here to help me hoe out a little. Dell
ain't used to roughing it; she's just out of a medical school--got her
diploma, she was telling me in the last letter before this. She'll be
finding microbes by the million in this old shack. You tell Patsy I'll
be late to supper--and tell him to brace up and cook something ladies
like--cake and stuff. Patsy'll know. I'd give a dollar to get that
little runt in the office--”

But Shorty, having heard all that it was important to know, was
clattering down the long slope again to the stable. It was supper time,
and Shorty was hungry. Also, there was news to tell, and he was curious
to see how the boys would take it. He was just turning loose the horse
when supper was called. He hurried back up the hill to the mess house,
performed hasty ablutions in the tin wash basin on the bench beside the
door, scrubbed his face dry on the roller towel, and took his place at
the long table within.

“Any mail for me?” Jack Bates looked up from emptying the third spoon of
sugar into his coffee.

“Naw--she didn't write this time, Jack.” Shorty reached a long arm for
the “Mulligan stew.”

“How's the dance coming on?” asked Cal Emmett.

“I guess it's a go, all right. They've got them coons engaged to play.
The hotel's fixing for a big crowd, if the weather holds like this.
Chip, Old Man wants you to catch up the creams, after supper; you've got
to meet the train to-morrow.”

“Which train?” demanded Chip, looking up. “Is old Dunk coming?”

“The noon train. No, he didn't say nothing about Dunk. He wants a bunch
of you fellows to go up and hoe out the White House and slick it up for
comp'ny--got to be done t'-night. And Patsy, Old Man says for you t' git
a move on and cook something fit to eat; something that ain't plum full
uh microbes.”

Shorty became suddenly engaged in cooling his coffee, enjoying the
varied emotions depicted on the faces of the boys.

“Who's coming?”

“What's up?”

Shorty took two leisurely gulps before he answered:

“Old Man's sister's coming out to stay all summer--and then some, maybe.
Be here to-morrow, he said.”

“Gee whiz! Is she pretty?” This from Cal Emmett.

“Hope she ain't over fifty.” This from Jack Bates.

“Hope she ain't one of them four-eyed school-ma'ams,” added Happy
Jack--so called to distinguish him from Jack Bates, and also because of
his dolorous visage.

“Why can't some one else haul her out?” began Chip. “Cal would like that
job--and he's sure welcome to it.”

“Cal's too dangerous. He'd have the old girl dead in love before he got
her over the first ridge, with them blue eyes and that pretty smile of
his'n. It's up to you, Splinter--Old Man said so.”

“She'll be dead safe with Chip. HE won't make love to her,” retorted
Cal.

“Wonder how old she is,” repeated Jack Bates, half emptying the syrup
pitcher into his plate. Patsy had hot biscuits for supper, and Jack's
especial weakness was hot biscuits and maple syrup.

“As to her age,” remarked Shorty, “it's a cinch she ain't no spring
chicken, seeing she's the Old Man's sister.”

“Is she a schoolma'am?” Happy Jack's distaste for schoolma'ams dated
from his tempestuous introduction to the A B C's, with their daily
accompaniment of a long, thin ruler.

“No, she ain't a schoolma'am. She's a darn sight worse. She's a doctor.”

“Aw, come off!” Cal Emmett was plainly incredulous.

“That's right. Old Man said she's just finished taking a course uh
medicine--what'd yuh call that?”

“Consumption, maybe--or snakes.” Weary smiled blandly across the table.

“She got a diploma, though. Now where do you get off at?”

“Yeah--that sure means she's a doctor,” groaned Cal.

“By golly, she needn't try t' pour any dope down ME,” cried a short, fat
man who took life seriously--a man they called Slim, in fine irony.

“Gosh, I'd like to give her a real warm reception,” said Jack Bates, who
had a reputation for mischief. “I know them Eastern folks, down t' the
ground. They think cow-punchers wear horns. Yes, they do. They think
we're holy terrors that eat with our six-guns beside our plates--and
the like of that. They make me plum tired. I'd like to--wish we knew her
brand.”

“I can tell you that,” said Chip, cynically. “There's just two bunches
to choose from. There's the Sweet Young Things, that faint away at sight
of a six-shooter, and squawk and catch at your arm if they see a garter
snake, and blush if you happen to catch their eye suddenly, and cry if
you don't take off your hat every time you see them a mile off.” Chip
held out his cup for Patsy to refill.

“Yeah--I've run up against that brand--and they're sure all right. They
suit ME,” remarked Cal.

“That don't seem to line up with the doctor's diploma,” commented Weary.

“Well, she's the other kind then--and if she is, the Lord have mercy on
the Flying U! She'll buy her some spurs and try to rope and cut out and
help brand. Maybe she'll wear double-barreled skirts and ride a man's
saddle and smoke cigarettes. She'll try to go the men one better in
everything, and wind up by making a darn fool of herself. Either kind's
bad enough.”

“I'll bet she don't run in either bunch,” began Weary. “I'll bet she's
a skinny old maid with a peaked nose and glasses, that'll round us up
every Sunday and read tracts at our heads, and come down on us with both
feet about tobacco hearts and whisky livers, and the evils and devils
wrapped up in a cigarette paper. I seen a woman doctor, once--she was
stopping at the T Down when I was line-riding for them--and say, she was
a holy fright! She had us fellows going South before a week. I stampeded
clean off the range, soon as my month was up.”

“Say,” interrupted Cal, “don't yuh remember that picture the Old Man got
last fall, of his sister? She was the image of the Old Man--and mighty
near as old.”

Chip, thinking of the morrow's drive, groaned in real anguish of spirit.

“You won't dast t' roll a cigarette comin' home, Chip,” predicted Happy
Jack, mournfully. “Yuh want t' smoke double goin' in.”

“I don't THINK I'll smoke double going in,” returned Chip, dryly. “If
the old girl don't like my style, why the walking isn't all taken up.”

“Say, Chip,” suggested Jack Bates, “you size her up at the depot, and,
if she don't look promising, just slack the lines on Antelope Hill. The
creams 'll do the rest. If they don't, we'll finish the job here.”

Shorty tactfully pushed back his chair and rose. “You fellows don't
want to git too gay,” he warned. “The Old Man's just beginning to forget
about the calf-shed deal.” Then he went out and shut the door after him.
The boys liked Shorty; he believed in the old adage about wisdom being
bliss at certain times, and the boys were all the better for his
living up to his belief. He knew the Happy Family would stop inside the
limit--at least, they always had, so far.

“What's the game?” demanded Cal, when the door closed behind their
indulgent foreman.

“Why, it's this. (Pass the syrup, Happy.) T'morrow's Sunday, so we'll
have time t' burn. We'll dig up all the guns we can find, and catch
up the orneriest cayuses in our strings, and have a real, old lynching
bee--sabe?”

“Who yuh goin' t' hang?” asked Slim, apprehensively. “Yuh needn't think
I'LL stand for it.”

“Aw, don't get nervous. There ain't power enough on the ranch t' pull
yuh clear of the ground. We ain't going to build no derrick,” said Jack,
witheringly. “We'll have a dummy rigged up in the bunk house. When Chip
and the doctor heave in sight on top of the grade, we'll break loose
down here with our bronks and our guns, and smoke up the ranch in style.
We'll drag out Mr. Strawman, and lynch him to the big gate before they
get along. We'll be 'riddling him with bullets' when they arrive--and
by that time she'll be so rattled she won't know whether it's a man or a
mule we've got strung up.”

“You'll have to cut down your victim before I get there,” grinned Chip.
“I never could get the creams through the gate, with a man hung to the
frame; they'd spill us into the washout by the old shed, sure as fate.”

“That'd be all right. The old maid would sure know she was out West--we
need something to add to the excitement, anyway.”

“If the Old Man's new buggy is piled in a heap, you'll wish you had cut
out some of the excitement,” retorted Chip.

“All right, Splinter. We won't hang him there at all. That old
cottonwood down by the creek would do fine. It'll curdle her blood like
Dutch cheese to see us marching him down there--and she can't see the
hay sticking out of his sleeves, that far off.”

“What if she wants to hold an autopsy?” bantered Chip.

“By golly, we'll stake her to a hay knife and tell her to go after him!”
 cried Slim, suddenly waking up to the situation.

The noon train slid away from the little, red depot at Dry Lake and
curled out of sight around a hill. The only arrival looked expectantly
into the cheerless waiting room, gazed after the train, which seemed the
last link between her and civilization, and walked to the edge of the
platform with a distinct frown upon the bit of forehead visible under
her felt hat.

A fat young man threw the mail sack into a weather-beaten buggy and
drove leisurely down the track to the post office. The girl watched
him out of sight and sighed disconsolately. All about her stretched the
rolling grass land, faintly green in the hollows, brownly barren on the
hilltops. Save the water tank and depot, not a house was to be seen, and
the silence and loneliness oppressed her.

The agent was dragging some boxes off the platform. She turned and
walked determinedly up to him, and the agent became embarrassed under
her level look.

“Isn't there anyone here to meet me?” she demanded, quite needlessly.
“I am Miss Whitmore, and my brother owns a ranch, somewhere near here.
I wrote him, two weeks ago, that I was coming, and I certainly expected
him to meet me.” She tucked a wind-blown lock of brown hair under her
hat crown and looked at the agent reproachfully, as if he were to blame,
and the agent, feeling suddenly that somehow the fault was his, blushed
guiltily and kicked at a box of oranges.

“Whitmore's rig is in town,” he said, hastily. “I saw his man at dinner.
The train was reported late, but she made up time.” Grasping desperately
at his dignity, he swallowed an abject apology and retreated into the
office.

Miss Whitmore followed him a few steps, thought better of it, and paced
the platform self-pityingly for ten minutes, at the end of which the
Flying U rig whirled up in a cloud of dust, and the agent hurried out
to help with the two trunks, and the mandolin and guitar in their canvas
cases.

The creams circled fearsomely up to the platform and stood quivering
with eagerness to be off, their great eyes rolling nervously. Miss
Whitmore took her place beside Chip with some inward trepidation mingled
with her relief. When they were quite ready and the reins loosened
suggestively, Pet stood upon her hind feet with delight and Polly lunged
forward precipitately.

The girl caught her breath, and Chip eyed her sharply from the corner
of his eye. He hoped she was not going to scream--he detested screaming
women. She looked young to be a doctor, he decided, after that lightning
survey. He hoped to goodness she wasn't of the Sweet Young Thing order;
he had no patience with that sort of woman. Truth to tell, he had no
patience with ANY sort of woman.

He spoke to the horses authoritatively, and they obeyed and settled to
a long, swinging trot that knew no weariness, and the girl's heart
returned to its normal action.

Two miles were covered in swift silence, then Miss Whitmore brought
herself to think of the present and realized that the young man beside
her had not opened his lips except to speak once to his team. She turned
her head and regarded him curiously, and Chip, feeling the scrutiny,
grew inwardly defiant.

Miss Whitmore decided, after a close inspection, that she rather liked
his looks, though he did not strike her as a very amiable young man.
Perhaps she was a bit tired of amiable young men. His face was thin,
and refined, and strong--the strength of level brows, straight nose
and square chin, with a pair of paradoxical lips, which were curved
and womanish in their sensitiveness; the refinement was an intangible
expression which belonged to no particular feature but pervaded the
whole face. As to his eyes, she was left to speculate upon their color,
since she had not seen them, but she reflected that many a girl would
give a good deal to own his lashes.

Of a sudden he turned his eyes from the trail and met her look squarely.
If he meant to confuse her, he failed--for she only smiled and said to
herself: “They're hazel.”

“Don't you think we ought to introduce ourselves?” she asked,
composedly, when she was quite sure the eyes were not brown.

“Maybe.” Chip's tone was neutrally polite.

Miss Whitmore had suspected that he was painfully bashful, after the
manner of country young men. She now decided that he was not; he was
passively antagonistic.

“Of course you know that I'm Della Whitmore,” she said.

Chip carefully brushed a fly off Polly's flank with the whip.

“I took it for granted. I was sent to meet a Miss Whitmore at the train,
and I took the only lady in sight.”

“You took the right one--but I'm not--I haven't the faintest idea who
you are.”

“My name is Claude Bennett, and I'm happy to make your acquaintance.”

“I don't believe it--you don't look happy,” said Miss Whitmore, inwardly
amused.

“That's the proper thing to say when you've been introduced to a lady,”
 remarked Chip, noncommittally, though his lips twitched at the corners.

Miss Whitmore, finding no ready reply to this truthful statement,
remarked, after a pause, that it was windy. Chip agreed that it was, and
conversation languished.

Miss Whitmore sighed and took to studying the landscape, which had
become a succession of sharp ridges and narrow coulees, water-worn and
bleak, with a purplish line of mountains off to the left. After several
miles she spoke.

“What is that animal over there? Do dogs wander over this wilderness
alone?”

Chip's eyes followed her pointing finger.

“That's a coyote. I wish I could get a shot at him--they're an awful
pest, out here, you know.” He looked longingly at the rifle under his
feet. “If I thought you could hold the horses a minute--”

“Oh, I can't! I--I'm not accustomed to horses--but I can shoot a
little.”

Chip gave her a quick, measuring glance. The coyote had halted and was
squatting upon his haunches, his sharp nose pointed inquisitively toward
them. Chip slowed the creams to a walk, raised the gun and laid it
across his knees, threw a shell into position and adjusted the sight.

“Here, you can try, if you like,” he said. “Whenever you're ready I'll
stop. You had better stand up--I'll watch that you don't fall. Ready?
Whoa, Pet!”

Miss Whitmore did not much like the skepticism in his tone, but she
stood up, took quick, careful aim and fired.

Pet jumped her full length and reared, but Chip was watching for some
such performance and had them well under control, even though he was
compelled to catch Miss Whitmore from lurching backward upon her baggage
behind the seat--which would have been bad for the guitar and mandolin,
if not for the young woman.

The coyote had sprung high in air, whirled dizzily and darted over the
hill.

“You hit him,” cried Chip, forgetting his prejudice for a moment. He
turned the creams from the road, filled with the spirit of the chase.
Miss Whitmore will long remember that mad dash over the hilltops and
into the hollows, in which she could only cling to the rifle and to
the seat as best she might, and hope that the driver knew what he was
about--which he certainly did.

“There he goes, sneaking down that coulee! He'll get into one of those
washouts and hide, if we don't head him off. I'll drive around so you
can get another shot at him,” cried Chip. He headed up the hill again
until the coyote, crouching low, was fully revealed.

“That's a fine shot. Throw another shell in, quick! You better kneel on
the seat, this time--the horses know what's coming. Steady, Polly, my
girl!”

Miss Whitmore glanced down the hill, and then, apprehensively, at the
creams, who were clanking their bits, wild-eyed and quivering. Only
their master's familiar voice and firm grip on the reins held them there
at all. Chip saw and interpreted the glance, somewhat contemptuously.

“Oh, of course if you're AFRAID--”

Miss Whitmore set her teeth savagely, knelt and fired, cutting the
sentence short in his teeth and forcing his undivided attention to the
horses, which showed a strong inclination to bolt.

“I think I got him that time,” said she, nonchalantly, setting her hat
straight--though Chip, with one of his quick glances, observed that she
was rather white around the mouth.

He brought the horses dexterously into the road and quieted them.

“Aren't you going to get my coyote?” she ventured to ask.

“Certainly. The road swings back, down that same coulee, and we'll
pass right by it. Then I'll get out and pick him up, while you hold the
horses.”

“You'll hold those horses yourself,” returned Miss Whitmore, with
considerable spirit. “I'd much rather pick up the coyote, thank you.”

Chip said nothing to this, whatever he may have thought. He drove up to
the coyote with much coaxing of Pet and Polly, who eyed the gray object
askance. Miss Whitmore sprang out and seized the animal by its coarse,
bushy tail.

“Gracious, he's heavy!” she exclaimed, after one tug.

“He's been fattening up on Flying U calves,” remarked Chip, his foot
upon the brake.

Miss Whitmore knelt and examined the cattle thief curiously.

“Look,” she said, “here's where I hit him the first time; the bullet
took a diagonal course from the shoulder back to the other side. It must
have gone within an inch of his heart, and would have finished him in a
short time, without that other shot--that penetrated his brain, you see;
death was instantaneous.”

Chip had taken advantage of the halt to roll a cigarette, holding the
reins tightly between his knees while he did so. He passed the loose
edge of the paper across the tip of his tongue, eying the young woman
curiously the while.

“You seem to be pretty well onto your job,” he remarked, dryly.

“I ought to be,” she said, laughing a little. “I've been learning the
trade ever since I was sixteen.”

“Yes? You began early.”

“My Uncle John is a doctor. I helped him in the office till he got
me into the medical school. I was brought up in an atmosphere of
antiseptics and learned all the bones in Uncle John's 'Boneparte'--the
skeleton, you know--before I knew all my letters.” She dragged the
coyote close to the wheel.

“Let me get hold of the tail.” Chip carefully pinched out the blaze of
his match and threw it away before he leaned over to help. With a quick
lift he landed the animal, limp and bloody, squarely upon the top of
Miss Whitmore's largest trunk. The pointed nose hung down the side, the
white fangs exposed in a sinister grin. The girl gazed upon him proudly
at first, then in dismay.

“Oh, he's dripping blood all over my mandolin case--and I just know it
won't come out!” She tugged frantically at the instrument.

“'Out, damned spot!'” quoted Chip in a sepulchral tone before he turned
to assist her.

Miss Whitmore let go the mandolin and stared blankly up at him, and
Chip, offended at her frank surprise that he should quote Shakespeare,
shut his lips tightly and relapsed into silence.






CHAPTER II. -- Over the “Hog's Back.”



“That's Flying U ranch,” volunteered Chip, as they turned sharply to the
right and began to descend a long grade built into the side of a steep,
rocky bluff. Below them lay the ranch in a long, narrow coulee. Nearest
them sprawled the house, low, white and roomy, with broad porches and
wide windows; further down the coulee, at the base of a gentle slope,
were the sheds, the high, round corrals and the haystacks. Great, board
gates were distributed in seemingly useless profusion, while barbed wire
fences stretched away in all directions. A small creek, bordered with
cottonwoods and scraggly willows, wound aimlessly away down the coulee.

“J. G. doesn't seem to have much method,” remarked Miss Whitmore, after
a critical survey. “What are all those log cabins scattered down the
hill for? They look as though J. G. had a handful that he didn't want,
and just threw them down toward the stable and left them lying where
they happened to fall.”

“It does, all right,” conceded Chip. “They're the bunk house--where
us fellows sleep--and the mess house, where we eat, and then come the
blacksmith shop and a shack we keep all kinds of truck in, and--”

“What--in--the world--”

A chorus of shouts and shots arose from below. A scurrying group of
horsemen burst over the hill behind the house, dashed half down the
slope, and surrounded the bunk house with blood-curdling yells. Chip
held the creams to a walk and furtively watched his companion. Miss
Whitmore's eyes were very wide open; plainly, she was astonished beyond
measure at the uproar. Whether she was also frightened, Chip could not
determine.

The menacing yells increased in volume till the very hills seemed to
cower in fear. Miss Whitmore gasped when a limp form was dragged from
the cabin and lifted to the back of a snorting pony.

“They've got a rope around that man's neck,” she breathed, in a
horrified half whisper. “Are--they--going to HANG him?”

“It kinda looks that way, from here,” said Chip, inwardly ashamed. All
at once it struck him as mean and cowardly to frighten a lady who had
traveled far among strangers and who had that tired droop to her mouth.
It wasn't a fair game; it was cheating. Only for his promise to the
boys, he would have told her the truth then and there.

Miss Whitmore was not a stupid young woman; his very indifference told
her all that she needed to know. She tore her eyes from the confused
jumble of gesticulating men and restive steeds to look sharply at Chip.
He met her eyes squarely for an instant, and the horror oozed from her
and left only amused chagrin that they should try to trick her so.

“Hurry up,” she commanded, “so I can be in at the death. Remember, I'm a
doctor. They're tying him to his horse--he looks half dead with fright.”

Inwardly she added: “He overacts the part dreadfully.”

The little cavalcade in the coulee fired a spectacular volley into the
air and swept down the slope like a dry-weather whirlwind across a patch
of alkali ground. Through the big gate and up the road past the stables
they thundered, the prisoner bound and helpless in their midst.

Then something happened. A wide-open River Press, flapping impotently in
the embrace of a willow, caught the eye of Banjo, a little blaze--faced
bay who bore the captive. He squatted, ducked backward so suddenly that
his reins slipped from Slim's fingers and lowered his head between his
white front feet. His rider seemed stupid beyond any that Banjo had ever
known--and he had known many. Snorting and pitching, he was away
before the valiant band realized what was happening in their midst. The
prisoner swayed drunkenly in the saddle. At the third jump his hat flew
off, disclosing the jagged end of a two-by-four.

The Happy Family groaned as one man and gave chase.

Banjo, with almost human maliciousness, was heading up the road straight
toward Chip and the woman doctor--and she must be a poor doctor
indeed, and a badly frightened one, withal, if she failed to observe a
peculiarity in the horse thief's cranium.

Cal Emmett dug his spurs into his horse and shot by Slim like a
locomotive, shouting profanity as he went.

“Head him into the creek,” yelled Happy Jack, and leaned low over the
neck of his sorrel.

Weary Willie stood up in his stirrups and fanned Glory with his hat.
“Yip, yee--e-e! Go to it, Banjo, old boy! Watch his nibs ride, would
yuh? He's a broncho buster from away back.” Weary Willie was the only
man of them all who appeared to find any enjoyment in the situation.

“If Chip only had the sense to slow up and give us a chance--or spill
that old maid over the bank!” groaned Jack Bates, and plied whip and
spur to overtake the runaway.

Now the captive was riding dizzily, head downward, frightening Banjo
half out of his senses. What he had started as a grim jest, he now
continued in deadly earnest; what was this uncanny semblance of a
cow-puncher which he could not unseat, yet which clung so precariously
to the saddle? He had no thought now of bucking in pure devilment--he
was galloping madly, his eyes wild and staring.

Of a sudden, Chip saw danger lurking beneath the fun of it. He leaned
forward a little, got a fresh grip on the reins and took the whip.

“Hang tight, now--I'm going to beat that horse to the Hog's Back.”

Miss Whitmore, laughing till the tears stood in her eyes, braced herself
mechanically. Chip had been laughing also--but that was before Banjo
struck into the hill road in his wild flight from the terror that rode
in the saddle.

A smart flick of the whip upon their glossy backs, and the creams sprang
forward at a run. The buggy was new and strong, and if they kept the
road all would be well--unless they met Banjo upon the narrow ridge
between two broad-topped knolls, known as the Hog's Back. Another tap,
and the creams ran like deer. One wheel struck a cobble stone, and the
buggy lurched horribly.

“Stop! There goes my coyote!” cried Miss Whitmore, as a gray object slid
down under the hind wheel.

“Hang on or you'll go next,” was all the comfort she got, as Chip braced
himself for the struggle before him. The Hog's Back was reached, but
Banjo was pounding up the hill beyond, his nostrils red and flaring, his
sides reeking with perspiration. Behind him tore the Flying U boys in a
vain effort to head him back into the coulee before mischief was done.

Chip drew his breath sharply when the creams swerved out upon the broad
hilltop, just as Banjo thundered past with nothing left of his rider but
the legs, and with them shorn of their plumpness as the hay dribbled out
upon the road.

A fresh danger straightway forced itself upon Chip's consciousness.
The creams, maddened by the excitement, were running away. He held
them sternly to the road and left the stopping of them to Providence,
inwardly thanking the Lord that Miss Whitmore did not seem to be the
screaming kind of woman.

The “vigilantes” drew hastily out of the road and scudded out of sight
down a gully as the creams lunged down the steep grade and across the
shallow creek bed. Fortunately the great gate by the stable swung wide
open and they galloped through and up the long slope to the house,
coming more under control at every leap, till, by a supreme effort, Chip
brought them, panting, to a stand before the porch where the Old Man
stood boiling over with anxiety and excitement. James G. Whitmore was
not a man who took things calmly; had he been a woman he would have been
called fussy.

“What in--what was you making a race track out of the grade for,” he
demanded, after he had bestowed a hasty kiss beside the nose of his
sister.

Chip dropped a heavy trunk upon the porch and reached for the guitar
before he answered.

“I was just trying those new springs on the buggy.”

“It was very exciting,” commented Miss Whitmore, airily. “I shot a
coyote, J. G., but we lost it coming down the hill. Your men were
playing a funny game--hare and hounds, it looked like. Or were they
breaking a new horse?”

The Old Man looked at Chip, intelligence dawning in his face. There was
something back of it all, he knew. He had been asleep when the uproar
began, and had reached the door only in time to see the creams come down
the grade like a daylight shooting star.

“I guess they was breaking a bronk,” he said, carelessly; “you've got
enough baggage for a trip round the world, Dell. I hope it ain't all
dope for us poor devils. Tell Shorty I want t' see him, Chip.”

Chip took the reins from the Old Man's hands, sprang in and drove back
down the hill to the stables.


The “reception committee,” as Chip sarcastically christened them,
rounded up the runaway and sneaked back to the ranch by the coulee
trail. With much unseemly language, they stripped the saddle and a
flapping pair of overalls off poor, disgraced Banjo, and kicked him out
of the corral.

“That's the way Jack's schemes always pan out,” grumbled Slim. “By
golly, yuh don't get me into another jackpot like that!”

“You might explain why you let that” (several kinds of) “cayuse get
away from you!” retorted Jack, fretfully. “If you'd been onto your job,
things would have been smooth as silk.”

“Wonder what the old maid thought,” broke in Weary, bent on preserving
peace in the Happy Family.

“I'll bet she never saw us at all!” laughed Cal. “Old Splinter gave
her all she wanted to do, hanging to the rig. The way he came down that
grade wasn't slow. He just missed running into Banjo on the Hog's Back
by the skin of the teeth. If he had, it'd be good-by, doctor--and Chip,
too. Gee, that was a close shave!”

“Well,” said Happy Jack, mournfully, “if we don't all get the bounce for
this, I miss my guess. It's a little the worst we've done yet.”

“Except that time we tin-canned that stray steer, last winter,” amended
Weary, chuckling over the remembrance as he fastened the big gate behind
them.

“Yes, that was another of Jack's fool schemes,” put in Slim. “Go and
tin-can a four-year-old steer and let him take after the Old Man and
put him on the calf shed, first pass he made. Old Man was sure hot about
that--by golly, it didn't help his rheumatism none.”

“He'll sure go straight in the air over this,” reiterated Happy Jack,
with mournful conviction.

“There's old Splinter at the bunk house--drawing our pictures, I'll bet
a dollar. Hey, Chip! How you vas, already yet?” sung out Weary, whose
sunny temper no calamity could sour.

Chip glanced at them and went on cutting the leaves of a late magazine
which he had purloined from the Dry Lake barber. Cal Emmett strode up
and grabbed the limp, gray hat from his head and began using it for a
football.

“Here! Give that back!” commanded Chip, laughing. “DON'T make a dish rag
of my new John B. Stetson, Cal. It won't be fit for the dance.”

“Gee! It don't lack much of being a dish rag, now, if I'm any
judge. Now! Great Scott!” He held it at arm's length and regarded it
derisively.

“Well, it was new two years ago,” explained Chip, making an ineffectual
grab at it.

Cal threw it to him and came and sat down upon his heels to peer over
Chip's arm at the magazine.

“How's the old maid doctor?” asked Jack Bates, leaning against the door
while he rolled a cigarette.

“Scared plum to death. I left the remains in the Old Man's arms.”

“Was she scared, honest?” Cal left off studying the “Types of Fair
Women.”

“What did she say when we broke loose?” Jack drew a match sharply along
a log.

“Nothing. Well, yes, she said 'Are they going to H-A-N-G that man?'”
 Chip's voice quavered the words in a shrill falsetto.

“The deuce she did!” Jack indulged in a gratified laugh.

“What did she say when you put the creams under the whip, up there? I
don't suppose the old girl is wise to the fact that you saved her neck
right then--but you sure did. You done yourself proud, Splinter.” Cal
patted Chip's knee approvingly.

Chip blushed under the praise and hastily answered the question.

“She hollered out: 'Stop! There goes my COYOTE!'”

“Her COYOTE?”

“HER coyote?”

“What the devil was she doing with a COYOTE?”

The Happy Family stood transfixed, and Chip's eyes were seen to laugh.

“HER COYOTE. Did any of you fellows happen to see a dead coyote up on
the grade? Because if you did, it's the doctor's.”

Weary Willie walked deliberately over and seized Chip by the shoulders,
bringing him to his feet with one powerful yank.

“Don't you try throwing any loads into THIS crowd, young man. Answer me
truly-s'help yuh. How did that old maid come by a coyote--a dead one?”

Chip squirmed loose and reached for his cigarette book. “She shot it,”
 he said, calmly, but with twitching lips.

“Shot it!” Five voices made up the incredulous echo.

“What with?” demanded Weary when he got his breath.

“With my rifle. I brought it out from town today. Bert Rogers had left
it at the barber shop for me.”

“Gee whiz! And them creams hating a gun like poison! She didn't shoot
from the rig, did she?”

“Yes,” said Chip, “she did. The first time she didn't know any
better--and the second time she was hot at me for hinting she was
scared. She's a spunky little devil, all right. She's busy hating me
right now for running the grade--thinks I did it to scare her, I guess.
That's all some fool women know.”

“She's a howling sport, then!” groaned Cal, who much preferred the Sweet
Young Things.

“No--I sized her up as a maverick.”

“What does she look like?”

“How old is she?”

“I never asked her age,” replied Chip, his face lighting briefly in a
smile. “As to her looks, she isn't cross-eyed, and she isn't four-eyed.
That's as much as I noticed.” After this bald lie he became busy with
his cigarette. “Give me that magazine, Cal. I didn't finish cutting the
leaves.”






CHAPTER III. -- Silver.



Miss Della Whitmore gazed meditatively down the hill at the bunk house.
The boys were all at work, she knew. She had heard J. G. tell two of
them to “ride the sheep coulee fence,” and had been consumed with
amazed curiosity at the order. Wherefore should two sturdy young men be
commanded to ride a fence, when there were horses that assuredly needed
exercise--judging by their antics--and needed it badly? She resolved to
ask J. G. at the first opportunity.

The others were down at the corrals, branding a few calves which
belonged on the home ranch. She had announced her intention of going
to look on, and her brother, knowing how the boys would regard her
presence, had told her plainly that they did not want her. He said it
was no place for girls, anyway. Then he had put on a very dirty pair of
overalls and hurried down to help for he was not above lending a hand
when there was extra work to be done.

Miss Della Whitmore tidied the kitchen and dusted the sitting room,
and then, having a pair of mischievously idle hands and a very feminine
curiosity, conceived an irrepressible desire to inspect the bunk house.

J. G. would tell her that, also, was no place for girls, she supposed,
but J. G. was not present, so his opinion did not concern her. She had
been at the Flying U ranch a whole week, and was beginning to feel that
its resources for entertainment--aside from the masculine contingent,
which held some promising material--were about exhausted. She had
climbed the bluffs which hemmed the coulee on either side, had selected
her own private saddle horse, a little sorrel named Concho, and had made
friends with Patsy, the cook. She had dazzled Cal Emmett with her wiles
and had found occasion to show Chip how little she thought of him; a
highly unsatisfactory achievement, since Chip calmly over-looked her
whenever common politeness permitted him.

There yet remained the unexplored mystery of that little cabin down the
slope, from which sounded so much boylike laughter of an evening. She
watched and waited till she was positive the coast was clear, then
clapped an old hat of J. G.'s upon her head and ran lightly down the
hill.

With her hand upon the knob, she ran her eye critically along the outer
wall and decided that it had, at some remote date, been treated to a
coat of whitewash; gave the knob a sudden twist, with a backward
glance like a child stealing cookies, stepped in and came near falling
headlong. She had not expected that remoteness of floor common to cabins
built on a side hill.

“Well!” She pulled herself together and looked curiously about her. What
struck her at first was the total absence of bunks. There were a couple
of plain, iron bedsteads and two wooden ones made of rough planks. There
was a funny-looking table made of an inverted coffee box with legs of
two-by-four, and littered with a characteristic collection of bachelor
trinkets. There was a glass lamp with a badly smoked chimney, a pack of
cards, a sack of smoking tobacco and a box of matches. There was a tin
box with spools of very coarse thread, some equally coarse needles and a
pair of scissors. There was also--and Miss Whitmore gasped when she saw
it--a pile of much-read magazines with the latest number of her favorite
upon the top. She went closer and examined them, and glanced around
the room with doubting eyes. There were spurs, quirts, chaps and
queer-looking bits upon the walls; there were cigarette stubs and
burned matches innumerable upon the rough, board floor, and here in
her hand--she turned the pages of her favorite abstractedly and a paper
fluttered out and fell, face upward, on the floor. She stooped and
recovered it, glanced and gasped.

“Well!”

It was only a pencil sketch done on cheap, unruled tablet paper, but
her mind dissolved into a chaos of interrogation marks and exclamation
points--with the latter predominating more and more the longer she
looked.

It showed blunt-topped hills and a shallow coulee which she remembered
perfectly. In the foreground a young woman in a smart tailored costume,
the accuracy of which was something amazing, stood proudly surveying
a dead coyote at her feet. In a corner of the picture stood a
weather-beaten stump with a long, thin splinter beside it on the ground.
Underneath was written in characters beautifully symmetrical: “The old
maid's credential card.”

There was no gainsaying the likeness; even the rakish tilt of the jaunty
felt hat, caused by the wind and that wild dash across country, was
painstakingly reproduced. And the fanciful tucks on the sleeve of the
gown--“and I didn't suppose he had deigned so much as a glance!” was her
first coherent thought.

Miss Whitmore's soul burned with resentment. No woman, even at
twenty-three, loves to be called “the old maid”--especially by a
keen-witted young man with square chin and lips with a pronounced curve
to them. And whoever supposed the fellow could draw like that--and
notice every tiny little detail without really looking once? Of course,
she knew her hat was crooked, with the wind blowing one's head off,
almost, but he had no business: “The old maid's credential card!”--“Old
maid,” indeed!

“The audacity of him!”

“Beg pardon?”

Miss Whitmore wheeled quickly, her heart in the upper part of her
throat, judging by the feel of it. Chip himself stood just inside the
door, eying her coldly.

“I was not speaking,” said Miss Whitmore, haughtily, in futile denial.

To this surprising statement Chip had nothing to say. He went to one of
the iron beds, stooped and drew out a bundle which, had Miss Whitmore
asked him what it was, he would probably have called his “war sack.” She
did not ask; she stood and watched him, though her conscience assured
her it was a dreadfully rude thing to do, and that her place was up at
the house. Miss Whitmore was frequently at odds with her conscience;
at this time she stood her ground, backed by her pride, which was her
chiefest ally in such emergencies.

When he drew a huge, murderous-looking revolver from its scabbard and
proceeded calmly to insert cartridge after cartridge, Miss Whitmore was
constrained to speech.

“Are you--going to--SHOOT something?”

The question struck them both as particularly inane, in view of his
actions.

“I am,” replied he, without looking up. He whirled the cylinder into
place, pushed the bundle back under the bed and rose, polishing the
barrel of the gun with a silk handkerchief.

Miss Whitmore hoped he wasn't going to murder anyone; he looked keyed up
to almost any desperate deed.

“Who--what are you going to shoot?” Really, the question asked itself.

Chip raised his eyes for a fleeting glance which took in the pencil
sketch in her hand. Miss Whitmore observed that his eyes were much
darker than hazel; they were almost black. And there was, strangely
enough, not a particle of curve to his lips; they were thin, and
straight, and stern.

“Silver. He broke his leg.”

“Oh!” There was real horror in her tone. Miss Whitmore knew all about
Silver from garrulous Patsy. Chip had rescued a pretty, brown colt from
starving on the range, had bought him of the owner, petted and cared for
him until he was now one of the best saddle horses on the ranch. He was
a dark chestnut, with beautiful white, crinkly mane and tail and white
feet. Miss Whitmore had seen Chip riding him down the coulee trail only
yesterday, and now--Her heart ached with the pity of it.

“How did it happen?”

“I don't know. He was in the little pasture. Got kicked, maybe.” Chip
jerked open the door with a force greatly in excess of the need of it.

Miss Whitmore started impulsively toward him. Her eyes were not quite
clear.

“Don't--not yet! Let me go. If it's a straight break I can set the bone
and save him.”

Chip, savage in his misery, regarded her over one square shoulder.

“Are you a veterinary surgeon, may I ask?”

Miss Whitmore felt her cheeks grow hot, but she stood her ground.

“I am not. But a broken bone is a broken bone, whether it belongs to a
man--or some OTHER beast!”

“Y--e-s?”

Chip's way of saying yes was one of his chief weapons of annihilation.
He had a peculiar, taunting inflection which he could give to it, upon
occasion, which caused prickles of flesh upon the victim. To say that
Miss Whitmore was not utterly quenched argues well for her courage. She
only gasped, as though treated to an unexpected dash of cold water, and
went on.

“I'm sure I might save him if you'd let me try. Or are you really eager
to shoot him?”

Chip's muscles shrank. Eager to shoot him--Silver, the only thing that
loved and understood him?

“You may come and look at him, if you like,” he said, after a breath or
two.

Miss Whitmore overlooked the tolerance of the tone and stepped to his
side, mechanically clutching the sketch in her fingers. It was Chip,
looking down at her from his extra foot of height, who called her
attention to it.

“Are you thinking of using that for a plaster?”

Miss Whitmore started and blushed, then, with an uptilt of chin:

“If I need a strong irritant, yes!” She calmly rolled the paper into a
tiny tube and thrust it into the front of her pink shirt-waist for want
of a pocket--and Chip, watching her surreptitiously, felt a queer grip
in his chest, which he thought it best to set down as anger.

Silently they hurried down where Silver lay, his beautiful, gleaming
mane brushing the tender green of the young grass blades. He lifted his
head when he heard Chip's step, and neighed wistfully. Chip bent over
him, black agony in his eyes. Miss Whitmore, looking on, realized
for the first time that the suffering of the horse was a mere trifle
compared to that of his master. Her eyes wandered to the loaded revolver
which bulged his pocket behind, and she shuddered--but not for Silver.
She went closer and laid her hand upon the shimmery mane. The horse
snorted nervously and struggled to rise.

“He's not used to a woman,” said Chip, with a certain accent of pride.
“I guess this is the closest he's ever been to one. You see, he's never
had any one handle him but me.”

“Then he certainly is no lady's horse,” said Miss Whitmore,
good-naturedly. Somehow, in the last moment, her attitude toward Chip
had changed considerably. “Try and make him let me feel the break.”

With much coaxing and soothing words it was accomplished, and it did not
take long, for it was a front leg, broken straight across, just above
the fetlock. Miss Whitmore stood up and smiled into the young man's
eyes, conscious of a desire to bring the curve back into his lips.

“It's very simple,” she declared, cheerfully. “I know I can cure him. We
had a colt at home with his leg broken the same way, and he was entirely
cured--and doesn't even limp. Of course,” she added, honestly, “Uncle
John doctored him--but I helped.”

Chip drew the back of his gloved hand quickly across his eyes and
swallowed.

“Miss Whitmore--if you could save old Silver--”

Miss Whitmore, the self-contained young medical graduate, blinked
rapidly and found urgent need of tucking in wind-blown, brown locks,
with her back to the tall cow-puncher who had unwittingly dropped his
mask for an instant. She took off J. G.'s old hat, turned it clean
around twice and put it back exactly as it was before; unless the tilt
over her left ear was a trifle more pronounced. Show me the woman who
can set a hat straight upon her head without aid of a mirror!

“We must get him up from there and into a box stall. There is one, isn't
there?”

“Y--e-s--” Chip hesitated. “I wouldn't ask the Old--your brother, for
the use of it, though; not even for Silver.”

“I will,” returned she, promptly. “I never feel any compunction about
asking for what I want--if I can't get it any other way. I can't
understand why you wanted to shoot--you must have known this bone could
be set.”

“I didn't WANT to--” Chip bent over and drove a fly from Silver's
shoulder. “When a horse belonging to the outfit gets crippled like that,
he makes coyote bait. A forty-dollar cow-puncher can't expect any better
for his own horse.”

“He'll GET better, whatever he may expect. I'm just spoiling for
something to practice on, anyway--and he's such a beauty. If you can get
him up, lead him to the stable while I go and tell J. G. and get some
one to help.” She started away.

“Whom shall I get?” she called back.

“Weary, if you can--and Slim's a good hand with horses, too.”

“Slim--is that the tall, lanky man?”

“No--he's the short, fat one. That bean-pole is Shorty.”

Miss Whitmore fixed these facts firmly in her memory and ran swiftly to
where rose all the dust and noise from the further corral. She climbed
up until she could look conveniently over the top rail. The fence seemed
to her dreadfully high--a clear waste of straight, sturdy poles.

“J. G--e-e-e!”

“Baw--h-h-h!” came answer from a wholly unexpected source as a big,
red cow charged and struck the fence under her feet a blow which nearly
dislodged her from her perch. The cow recoiled a few steps and lowered
her head truculently.

“Scat! Shoo, there! Go on away, you horrid old thing you! Oh, J.
G--e-e-e!”

Weary, who was roping, had just dragged a calf up to the fire and was
making a loop to catch another when the cow made a second charge at the
fence. He dashed in ahead of her, his horse narrowly escaping an ugly
gash from her long, wicked horns. As he dodged he threw his rope with
the peculiar, back-hand twist of the practiced roper, catching her by
the head and one front foot. Straight across the corral he shot to
the end of a forty-foot rope tied fast to the saddle horn. The red cow
flopped with a thump which knocked all desire for trouble out of her for
the time. Shorty slipped the rope off and climbed the fence, but the cow
only shook her aching sides and limped sullenly away to the far side of
the corral. J. G. and the boys had shinned up the fence like scared cats
up a tree when the trouble began, and perched in a row upon the top. The
Old Man looked across and espied his sister, wide-eyed and undignified,
watching the outcome.

“Dell! What in thunder the YOU doing on that fence?” he shouted across
the corral.

“What in thunder are you doing on the fence, J. G.?” she flung back at
him.

The Old Man climbed shamefacedly down, followed by the others. “Is that
what you call 'getting put in the clear'?” asked she, genially. “I see
now--it means clear on the top rail.”

“You go back to the house and stay there!” commanded J. G., wrathfully.
The boys were showing unmistakable symptoms of mirth, and the laugh was
plainly against the Old Man.

“Oh, no,” came her voice, honey-sweet and calm. “Shoo that cow this way
again, will you, Mr..Weary? I like to watch J. G. shin up the fence.
It's good for him; it makes one supple, and J. G.'s actually getting
fat.”

“Hurry along with that calf!” shouted the Old Man, recovering the
branding iron and turning his back on his tormentor.

The boys, beyond grinning furtively at one another, behaved with quite
praiseworthy gravity. Miss Whitmore watched while Weary dragged a
spotted calf up to the fire and the boys threw it to the ground and held
it until the Old Man had stamped it artistically with a smoking U.

“Oh, J. G.!”

“Ain't you gone yet? What d'yuh want?”

“Silver broke his leg.”

“Huh. I knew that long ago. Chip's gone to shoot him. You go on to the
house, doggone it! You'll have every cow in the corral on the fight.
That red waist of yours--”

“It isn't red, it's pink--a beautiful rose pink. If your cows don't like
it, they'll have to be educated up to it. Chip isn't either going to
shoot that horse, J. G. I'm going to set his leg and cure him--and I'm
going to keep him in one of your box stalls. There, now!”

Cal Emmett took a sudden fit of coughing and leaned his forehead weakly
against a rail, and Weary got into some unnecessary argument with his
horse and bolted across to the gate, where his shoulders were seen to
shake--possibly with a nervous chill; the bravest riders are sometimes
so affected. Nobody laughed, however. Indeed, Slim seemed unusually
serious, even for him, while Happy Jack looked positively in pain.

“I want that short, fat man to help” (Slim squirmed at this blunt
identification of himself) “and Mr. Weary, also.” Miss Whitmore might
have spoken with a greater effect of dignity had she not been clinging
to the top of the fence with two dainty slipper toes thrust between the
rails not so very far below. Under the circumstances, she looked like a
pretty, spoiled little schoolgirl.

“Oh. You've turned horse doctor, have yuh?” J. G. leaned suddenly upon
his branding iron and laughed. “Doggone it, that ain't a bad idea. I've
got two box stalls, and there's an old gray horse in the pasture--the
same old gray horse that come out uh the wilderness--with a bad case uh
string-halt. I'll have some uh the boys ketch him up and you can start a
horsepital!”

“Is that supposed to be a joke, J. G.? I never can tell YOUR jokes by
ear. If it is, I'll laugh. I'm going to use whatever I need and you can
do without Mr.--er--those two men.”

“Oh, go ahead. The horse don't belong to ME, so I'm willing you should
practice on him a while. Say! Dell! Give him that truck you've been
pouring down me for the last week. Maybe he'll relish the taste of the
doggone stuff--I don't.”

“I suppose you've labeled THAT a 'Joke--please laugh here,'” sighed Miss
Whitmore, plaintively, climbing gingerly down.






CHAPTER IV. -- An Ideal Picture.



“I guess I'll go down to Denson's to-day,” said J. G. at the breakfast
table one morning. “Maybe we can get that grass widow to come and keep
house for us.”

“I don't want any old grass widow to keep house,” protested Della. “I'm
getting along well enough, so long as Patsy bakes the bread, and meat,
and cake, and stuff. It's just fun to keep house. The only trouble is,
there isn't half enough to keep me busy. I'm going to get a license to
practice medicine, so if there's any sickness around I can be of some
use. You say it's fifty miles to the nearest doctor. But that needn't
make a grass widow necessary. I can keep house--it looks better than
when I came, and you know it.” Which remark would have hurt the feelings
of several well-meaning cow-punchers, had they overheard it.

“Oh, I ain't finding fault with your housekeeping--you do pretty well
for a green hand. But Patsy'll have to go with the round-up when it
starts, and what men I keep on the ranch will have to eat with us.
That's the way I've been used to fixing things; I was never so good I
couldn't eat at the same table with my men; if they wasn't fit for my
company I fired 'em and got fellows that was. I've had this bunch a good
long while, now. You can do all right with just me, but you couldn't
cook for two or three men; you can't cook good enough, even if it wasn't
too much work.” J. G. had a blunt way of stating disagreeable facts,
occasionally.

“Very well, get your grass widow by all means,” retorted she with much
wasted dignity.

“She's a swell cook, and a fine housekeeper, and shell keep yuh from
getting lonesome. She's good company, the Countess is.” He grinned when
he said it “I'll have Chip ketch up the creams, and you get ready and go
along with us. It'll give you a chance to size up the kind uh neighbors
yuh got.”

There was real pleasure in driving swiftly over the prairie land,
through the sweet, spring sunshine, and Miss Whitmore tingled with
enthusiasm till they drove headlong into a deep coulee which sheltered
the Denson family.

“This road is positively dangerous!” she exclaimed when they reached a
particularly steep place and Chip threw all his weight upon the brake.

“We'll get the Countess in beside yuh, coming back, and then yuh won't
rattle around in the seat so much. She's good and solid--just hang onto
her and you'll be all right,” said J. G.

“If I don't like her looks--and I know I won't--I'll get into the front
seat and you can hang onto her yourself, Mr. J. G. Whitmore.”

Chip, who had been silent till now, glanced briefly over his shoulder.

“It's a cinch you'll take the front seat,” he remarked, laconically.

“J. G., if you hire a woman like that--”

“Like what? Doggone it, it takes a woman to jump at conclusions! The
Countess is all right. She talks some--”

“I'd tell a man she does!” broke in Chip, tersely.

“Well, show me the woman that don't! Don't you be bluffed so easy, Dell.
I never seen the woman yet that Chip had any time for. The Countess is
all right, and she certainly can cook! I admit she talks consider'ble--”

Chip laughed grimly, and the Old Man subsided.

At the house a small, ginger-whiskered man came down to the gate to
greet them.

“Why, how--de-do! I couldn't make out who 't was comin', but Mary, she
up an' rek'nized the horses. Git right out an' come on in! We've had our
dinner, but I guess the wimmin folks can scare ye up a bite uh suthin'.
This yer sister? We heard she was up t' your place. She the one that
set one uh your horse's leg? Bill, he was tellin' about it. I dunno as
wimmin horse doctors is very common, but I dunno why not. I get a horse
with somethin' the matter of his foot, and I dunno what. I'd like t'
have ye take a look at it, fore ye go. 'Course, I expect t' pay ye.”

The Old Man winked appreciatively at Chip before he came humanely to
the rescue and explained that his sister was not a horse doctor, and Mr.
Denson, looking very disappointed, reiterated his invitation to enter.

Mrs. Denson, a large woman who narrowly escaped being ginger-whiskered
like her husband, beamed upon them from the doorway.

“Come right on in! Louise, here's comp'ny! The house is all tore up--we
been tryin' t' clean house a little. Lay off yer things an' I'll git yuh
some dinner right away. I'm awful glad yuh come over--I do hate t' see
folks stand on cer'mony out here where neighbors is so skurce. I guess
yuh think we ain't been very neighborly, but we been tryin' t' clean
house, an' me an' Louise ain't had a minute we could dast call our own,
er we'd a been over t' seen yuh before now. Yuh must git awful lonesome,
comin' right out from the East where neighbors is thick. Do lay off yer
things!”

Della looked appealingly at J. G., who again came to the rescue. Somehow
he made himself heard long enough to explain their errand, and to
emphasize the fact that they were in a great hurry, and had eaten dinner
before they started from home. In his sister's opinion he made one
exceedingly rash statement. He said that he wished to hire Mrs. Denson's
sister for the summer. Mrs. Denson immediately sent a shrill call for
Louise.

Then appeared the Countess, tall, gaunt and muscular, with sallow skin
and a nervous manner.

“The front seat or walk!” declared Miss Whitmore, mentally, after a
brief scrutiny and began storing up a scathing rebuke for J. G.

“Louise, this is Miss Whitmore,” began Mrs. Denson, cheerfully,
fortified by a fresh lungful of air. “They're after yuh t' go an'
keep house for 'em, an' I guess yuh better go, seein' we got the house
cleaned all but whitewashin' the cellar an' milk room an' kals'minin'
the upstairs, an' I'll make Bill do that, an' 't won't hurt him a mite.
They'll give yuh twenty-five dollars a month an' keep yuh all summer,
an' as much longer as his sister stays. I guess yuh might as well go,
fer they can't git anybody else that'll keep things up in shape an' be
comp'ny fer his sister, an' I b'lieve in helpin' a neighbor out when yuh
can. You go right an' pack up yer trunk, an' don't worry about me--I'll
git along somehow, now the house-cleanin's most done.”

Louise had been talking also, but her sister seemed to have a stronger
pair of lungs, for her voice drowned that of the Countess, who retreated
to “pack up.”

The minutes dragged by, to the tune of several chapters of family
history as voluminously interpreted by Mrs. Denson. Miss Whitmore had
always boasted the best-behaved of nerves, but this day she developed a
genuine case of “fidgets.” Once she saw Chip's face turned inquiringly
toward the window, and telegraphed her state of mind--while Mrs.
Denson's back was turned--so eloquently that Chip was swept at once into
sympathetic good-fellowship. He arranged the cushion on the front seat
significantly, and was rewarded by an emphatic, though furtive, nod
and smile. Whereupon he leaned comfortably back, rolled a cigarette and
smoked contentedly, at peace with himself and the world--though he did
not in the least know why.

“An' as I told Louise, folks has got t' put up with things an' not be
huntin' trouble with a club all the time, if they expect t' git any
comfort out uh this life. We ain't had the best uh luck, seems t' me,
but we always git along somehow, an' we ain't had no sickness except
when--”

A confused uproar arose in the room above them, followed, immediately by
a humpety bump and a crash as a small, pink object burst open a door and
rolled precipitately into their midst. It proved to be one of the little
Densons, who kicked feebly with both feet and then lay still.

“Mercy upon us! Ellen, who pushed Sary down them stairs? She's kilt!”

Della sprang up and lifted the child in her arms, passing her hand
quickly over the head and plump body.

“Bring a little cold water, Mrs. Denson. She's only stunned, I think.”

“Well, it does beat all how handy you go t' work. Anybody c'd see t' you
know your business. I'm awful glad you was here--there, darlin', don't
cry--Ellen, an' Josephine, an' Sybilly, an' Margreet, you come down here
t' me!”

The quartet, snuffling and reluctant, was dragged ignominiously to
the middle of the floor and there confessed, 'mid tears and much
recrimination, that they had been peeping down at the “comp'ny” through
various knot-holes in the chamber floor; that, as Sary's knot-hole was
next the wall, her range of vision was restricted to the thin spot upon
the crown of J. G.'s head, and the back of his neck. Sary longed for
sight of the woman horse doctor, and when she essayed to crowd in and
usurp Ellen's point of vantage, there ensued a war of extermination
which ended in the literal downfall of Sary.

By the time this checked-apron court of inquiry adjourned, Louise
appeared and said she believed she was ready, and Miss Whitmore escaped
from the house far in advance of the others--and such were Chip's
telepathic powers that he sprang down voluntarily and assisted her to
the front seat without a word being said by either.

Followed a week of dullness at the ranch, with the Countess scrubbing
and dusting and cleaning from morning till night. The Little Doctor, as
the bunk house had christened her, was away attending the State Medical
Examination at Helena.

“Gee-whiz!” sighed Cal on Sunday afternoon. “It seems mighty queer
without the Little Doctor around here, sassing the Old Man and putting
the hull bunch of us on the fence about once a day. If it wasn't for Len
Adams--”

“It wouldn't do you any good to throw a nasty loop at the Little
Doctor,” broke in Weary, “'cause she's spoken for, by all signs and
tokens. There's some fellow back East got a long rope on her.”

“You got the papers for that?” jeered Cal. “The Little Doctor don't
act the way I'd want my girl t' act, supposin' I was some thousand or
fifteen hundred miles off her range. She ain't doing no pining, I tell
yuh those.”

“She's doing a lot of writing, though. I'll bet money, if we called
the roll right here, you'd see there's been a letter a week hittin' the
trail to one Dr. Cecil Granthum, Gilroy, Ohio.”

“That's what,” agreed Jack Bates. “I packed one last week, myself.”

“I done worse than that,” said Weary, blandly. “I up and fired a shot at
her, after the second one she handed me. I says, as innocent: 'I s'pose,
if I lost this, there'd be a fellow out on the next train with blood in
his eye and a six-gun in both hands, demanding explanations'--and she
flashed them dimples on me and twinkled them big, gray eyes of hers, and
says: 'It's up to you to carry it safe, then,' or words to that effect.
I took notice she didn't deny but what he would.”

“Two doctors in one family--gee whiz!” mused Cal. “If I hadn't got
the only girl God ever made right, I'd give one Dr. Cecil Granthum, of
Gilroy, Ohio, a run for his money, I tell yuh those. I'd impress it upon
him that a man's taking long chances when he stands and lets his best
girl stampede out here among us cow-punchers for a change uh grass. That
fellow needs looking after; he ain't finished his education. Jacky, you
ain't got a female girl yanking your heart around, sail in and show us
what yuh can do in that line.”

“Nit,” said Jack Bates, briefly. “My heart's doing business at the old
stand and doing it satisfactory and proper. I don't want to set it to
bucking--over a girl that wouldn't have me at any price. Let Slim. The
Little Doctor's half stuck on him, anyhow.”

While the boys amused themselves in serious debate with Slim, Chip put
away his magazine and went down to visit Silver in the box stall. He was
glad they had not attempted to draw him into the banter--they had never
once thought to do so, probably, though he had been thrown into the
company of the Little Doctor more than any of the others, for several
good reasons. He had broken the creams to harness, and always drove
them, for the Old Man found them more than he cared to tackle. And there
was Silver, with frequent discussions over his progress toward recovery
and some argument over his treatment--for Chip had certain ideas of his
own concerning horses, and was not backward about expressing them upon
occasion.

That the Little Doctor should write frequent letters to a man in the
East did not concern him--why should it? Still, a fellow without a
home and without some woman who cares for him, cannot escape having his
loneliness thrust upon him at times. He wondered why he should care.
Surely, ten years of living his life alone ought to kill that latent
homesickness which used to hold him awake at nights. Sometimes even of
late years, when he stood guard over the cattle at night, and got to
thinking--oh, it was hell to be all alone in the world!

There were Cal and Weary, they had girls who loved them--and they were
sure welcome to them. And Jack Bates and Happy Jack had sisters and
mothers--and even Slim had an old maid aunt who always knit him a red
and green pair of wristlets for Christmas. Chip, smoothing mechanically
the shimmery, white mane of his pet, thought he might be contented if he
had even an old maid aunt--but he would see that she made his wristlets
of some other color than those bestowed every year upon Slim.

As for the Little Doctor, it would be something strange if she had gone
through life without having some fellow in love with her. Probably, if
the truth was known, there had been more than Dr. Cecil Granthum--bah,
what a sickening name! Cecil! It might as well be Adolphus or Regie
or--what does a man want to pack around a name like that for? Probably
he was the kind of man that the name sounded like; a dude with pink
cheeks.

Chip knew just how he looked. Inspiration suddenly seizing upon him, he
sat down upon the manger, drew his memorandum book out of his inner
coat pocket, carefully sharpened a bit of lead pencil which he found in
another pocket, tore a leaf from the book, and, with Silver looking over
his shoulder, drew a graphic, ideal picture of Dr. Cecil Granthum.






CHAPTER V. -- In Silver's Stall.



“Oh, are YOU here? It's a wonder you don't have your bed brought down
here, so you can sleep near Silver. How has he been doing since I left?”

Chip simply sat still upon the edge of the manger and stared. His gray
hat was pushed far back upon his head and his dark hair waved and curled
upon his forehead, very much as a girl's might have done. He did not
know that he was a very good-looking young man, but perhaps the Little
Doctor did. She smiled and came up and patted Silver, who had forgotten
that he ever had objected to her nearness. He nickered a soft welcome
and laid his nose on her shoulder.

“You've been drawing a picture. Who's the victim of your satirical
pencil this time?” The Little Doctor, reaching out quickly, calmly
appropriated the sketch before Chip had time to withdraw it, even if he
had cared to do so. He was busy wondering how the Little Doctor came to
be there at that particular time, and had forgotten the picture, which
he had not quite finished labeling.

“Dr. Cecil--” Miss Whitmore turned red at first, then broke into
laughter. “Oh--h, ha! ha! ha! Silver, you don't know how funny this
master of yours can be! Ha! ha!” She raised her head from Silver's neck,
where it had rested, and wiped her eyes.

“How did you know about Cecil?” she demanded of a very discomfited young
man upon the manger.

“I didn't know--and I didn't WANT to know. I heard the boys talking and
joshing about him, and I just drew--their own conclusions.” Chip grinned
a little and whittled at his pencil, and wondered how much of the
statement was a lie.

Miss Whitmore tamed red again, and ended by laughing even more heartily
than at first.

“Their conclusions aren't very complimentary,” she said. “I don't
believe Dr. Cecil would feel flattered at this. Why those bowed legs,
may I ask, and wherefore that long, lean, dyspeptic visage? Dr. Cecil,
let me inform you, has a digestion that quails not at deviled crabs and
chafing-dish horrors at midnight, as I have abundant reason to know. I
have seen Dr. Cecil prepare a welsh rabbit and--eat it, also, with much
relish, apparently. Oh, no, their conclusions weren't quite correct.
There are other details I might mention--that cane, for instance--but
let it pass. I shall keep this, I think, as a companion to 'The old
maid's credential card.'”

“Are you in the habit of keeping other folk's property?” inquired Chip,
with some acerbity.

“Nothing but personal caricatures--and hearts, perhaps,” returned the
Little Doctor, sweetly.

“I hardly think your collection of the last named article is very
large,” retorted Chip.

“Still, I added to the collection to-day,” pursued Miss Whitmore,
calmly. “I shared my seat in the train with J. G.'s silent partner (I
did not find him silent, however), Mr. Duncan Whitaker. He hired a
team in Dry Lake and we came out together, and I believe--please don't
mention Dr. Cecil Granthum to him, will you?”

Chip wished, quite savagely, that she wouldn't let those dimples dodge
into her cheeks, and the laugh dodge into her eyes, like that. It made a
fellow uncomfortable. He was thoroughly disgusted with her--or he would
be, if she would only stop looking like that. He was in that state of
mind where his only salvation, seemingly, lay in quarreling with some
one immediately.

“So old Dunk's come back? If you've got his heart, you must have gone
hunting it with a microscope, for it's a mighty small one--almost as
small as his soul. No one else even knew he had one. You ought to have
it set in a ring, so you won't lose it.”

“I don't wear phony jewelry, thank you,” said Miss Whitmore, and Chip
thought dimples weren't so bad after all.

The Little Doctor was weaving Silver's mane about her white fingers and
meditating deeply. Chip wondered if she were thinking of Dr. Cecil.

“Where did you learn to draw like that?” she asked, suddenly, turning
toward him. “You do much better than I, and I've always been learning
from good teachers. Did you ever try painting?”

Chip blushed and looked away from her. This was treading close to his
deep-hidden, inner self.

“I don't know where I learned. I never took a lesson in my life, except
from watching people and horses and the country, and remembering the
lines they made, you know. I always made pictures, ever since I can
remember--but I never tried colors very much. I never had a chance,
working around cow-camps and on ranches.”

“I'd like to have you look over some of my sketches and things--and I've
paints and canvas, if you ever care to try that. Come up to the house
some evening and I'll show you my daubs. They're none of them as good as
'The Old Maid.'”

“I wish you'd tear that thing up!” said Chip, vehemently.

“Why? The likeness is perfect. One would think you were designer for a
fashion paper, the way you got the tucks in my sleeve and the braid on
my collar--and you might have had the kindness to TELL me my hat was on
crooked, I think!”

There was a rustle in the loose straw, a distant slam of the stable
door, and Chip sat alone with his horse, whittling abstractedly at his
pencil till his knife blade grated upon the metal which held the eraser.






CHAPTER VI. -- The Hum of Preparation.



Miss Whitmore ran down to the blacksmith shop, waving an
official-looking paper in her hand.

“I've got it, J. G.!”

“Got what--smallpox?” J. G. did not even look up from the iron he was
welding.

“No, my license. I'm a really, truly doctor now, and you needn't laugh,
either. You said you'd give a dance if I passed, and I did. Happy Jack
brought it just now.”

“Brought the dance?” The Old Man gave the bellows a pull which sent a
shower of sparks toward the really, truly doctor.

“Brought the license,” she explained, patiently. “You can see for
yourself. They were awfully nice to me--they seemed to think a girl
doctor is some kind of joke out here. They didn't make it any easier,
though; they acted as if they didn't expect me to pass--but I did!”

The Old Man rubbed one smutty hand down his trousers leg and extended it
for the precious document. “Let me have a look at it,” he said, trying
to hide his pride in her.

“Well, but I'll hold it. Your hands are dirty.” Dr. Whitmore eyed the
hands disapprovingly.

The Old Man read it slowly through, growing prouder every line.

“You're all right, Dell--I'll be doggoned if you ain't. Don't you worry
about the dance--I'll see't yuh get it. You go tell the Countess to bake
up a lot of cake and truck, and I'll send some uh the boys around t'
tell the neighbors. Better have it Friday night, I guess--I'm goin t'
start the round-up out early next week. Doggone it! I've gone and burned
that weldin'. Go on and stop your botherin' me!”

In two minutes the Little Doctor was back, breathless.

“What about the music, J. G.? We want GOOD music.”

“Well, I'll tend t' that part. Say! You can rig up that room off the
dining room for your office--I s'pose you'll have to have one. You make
out a list of what dope you want--and be sure yuh get a-plenty. I look
for an unhealthy summer among the cow-punchers. If I ain't mistook in
the symptoms, Dunk's got palpitation uh the heart right now--an' got it
serious.”

The Old Man chuckled to himself and went back to his welding.

“Oh, Louise!” The Little Doctor hurried to where the Countess was
scrubbing the kitchen steps with soft soap and sand and considerable
energy. “J. G. says I may have a dance next Friday night, so we must
hurry and fix the house--only I don't see much fixing to be done;
everything is SO clean.”

“Oh, there ain't a room in the house fit fer comp'ny t' walk into,”
 expostulated the Countess while she scrubbed. “I do like t' see a house
clean when folks is expected that only come t' be critical an' make
remarks behind yer back the minit they git away. If folks got anything
t' say I'd a good deal ruther they said it t' my face an' be done with
it. 'Yuh can know a man's face but yuh can't know his heart,' as the
sayin' is, an' it's the same way with women--anyway, it's the same way
with Mis' Beckman. You can know her face a mile off, but yuh never know
who she's goin' t' rake over the coals next. As the sayin' is: 'The
tongue of a woman, at last it biteth like a serpent an' it stingeth
like an addle,' an' I guess it's so. Anyway, Mis' Beckman's does. I do
b'lieve on my soul--what's the matter, Dell? What yuh laughin' at?”

The Little Doctor was past speech for the moment, and the Countess stood
up and looked curiously around her. It never occurred to her that she
might be the cause of that convulsive outburst.

“Oh--he--never mind--he's gone, now.”

“Who's gone?” persisted the Countess.

“What kinds of cake do you think we ought to have?” asked the Little
Doctor, diplomatically.

The Countess sank to her knees and dipped a handful of amber, jelly-like
soap from a tin butter can.

“Well, I don't know. I s'pose folks will look for something fancy,
seein' you're givin' the dance. Mis' Beckman sets herself up as a
shinin' example on cake, and she'll come just t' be critical an' find
fault, if she can. If I can't bake all around her the best day she ever
seen, I'll give up cookin' anything but spuds. She had the soggiest kind
uh jelly roll t' the su'prise on Mary last winter. I know it was hern,
fer I seen her bring it in, an' I went straight an' ondone it. I guess
it was kinda mean uh me, but I don't care--as the sayin' is: 'What's
sass fer the goose is good enough sass fer anybody'--an' she done the
same trick by me, at the su'prise at Adamses last fall. But she couldn't
find no kick about MY cake, an' hers--yuh c'd of knocked a cow down with
it left-handed! If that's the best she c'n do on cake I'd advise 'er to
keep the next batch t' home where they're used to it. They say't 'What's
one man's meat 's pizen t' the other feller,' and I guess it's so
enough. Maybe Mame an' the rest uh them Beckman kids can eat sech truck
without comin' down in a bunch with gastakutus, but I'd hate t' tackle
it myself.”

The Little Doctor gurgled. This was a malady which had not been
mentioned at the medical college.

“Where shall we set the tables, if we dance in the dining room?” she
asked, having heard enough of the Beckmans for the present.

“Why, we won't set any tables. Folks always have a lap supper at ranch
dances. At the su'prise on Mary--”

“What is a lap supper?”

“Well, my stars alive! Where under the shinin' sun was you brought up if
yuh never heard of a lap supper? A lap supper is where folks set around
the walls--or any place they can find--and take the plates on their laps
and yuh pass 'em stuff. The san'wiches--”

“You do make such beautiful bread!” interrupted the Little Doctor, very
sincerely.

“Well, I ain't had the best uh luck, lately, but I guess it does taste
good after that bread yuh had when I come. Soggy was no name for--”

“Patsy made that bread,” interposed Miss Whitmore, hastily. “He had bad
luck, and--”

“I guess he did!” sniffed the Countess, contemptuously. “As I told Mary
when I come--”

“I wonder how many cakes we'll need?” Miss Whitmore, you will observe,
had learned to interrupt when she had anything to say. It was the only
course to pursue with anyone from Denson coulee.

The Countess, having finished her scrubbing, rose jerkily and upset the
soap can, which rolled over and over down the steps, leaving a yellow
trail as it went.

“Well, there, if that wasn't a bright trick uh mine? They say the more
yuh hurry the less yuh'll git along, an' that's a sample. We'd ought t'
have five kinds, an' about four uh each kind. It wouldn't do t' run out,
er Mis' Beckman never would let anybody hear the last of it. Down t'
Mary's--”

“Twenty cakes! Good gracious! I'll have to order my stock of medicine,
for I'll surely have a houseful of patients if the guests eat twenty
cakes.”

“Well, as the sayin' is: 'Patience an' perseverance can git away with
most anything,'” observed the Countess, naively.

The Little Doctor retired behind her handkerchief.

“My stars alive, I do b'lieve my bread's beginnin' t' scorch!” cried the
Countess, and ran to see. The Little Doctor followed her inside and sat
down.

“We must make a list of the things we'll need, Louise. You--”

“Dell! Oh-h. Dell!” The voice of the Old Man resounded from the parlor.

“I'm in the kitchen!” called she, remaining where she was. He tramped
heavily through the house to her.

“I'll send the rig in, t'morrow, if there's anything yuh want,” he
remarked. “And if you'll make out a list uh dope, I'll send the order
in t' the Falls. We've got plenty uh saws an' cold chisels down in the
blacksmith shop--you can pick out what yuh want.” He dodged and grinned.
“Got any cake, Countess?”

“Well, there ain't a thing cooked, hardly. I'm going t' bake up
something right after dinner. Here's some sponge cake--but it ain't fit
t' eat, hardly. I let Dell look in the oven, 'cause my han's was all
over flour, an' she slammed the door an' it fell. But yuh can't expect
one person t' know everything--an' too many han's can't make decent
soup, as the sayin' is, an' it's the same way with cake.”

The Old Man winked at the Little Doctor over a great wedge of feathery
delight. “I don't see nothing the matter with this--only it goes down
too easy,” he assured the Countess between mouthfuls. “Fix up your list,
Dell, and don't be afraid t' order everything yuh need. I'll foot the--”

The Old Man, thinking to go back to his work, stepped into the puddle of
soft soap and sat emphatically down upon the top step, coasting rapidly
to the bottom. A carpet slipper shot through the open door and landed
in the dishpan; the other slipper disappeared mysteriously. The wedge of
cake was immediately pounced upon by an investigative hen and carried in
triumph to her brood.

“Good Lord!” J. G. struggled painfully to his feet. “Dell, who in
thunder put that stuff there? You're a little too doggoned anxious for
somebody t' practice on, seems t' me.” A tiny trickle of blood showed in
the thin spot on his head.

“Are you hurt, J. G.? We--I spilled the soap.” The Little Doctor gazed
solicitous, from the doorway.

“Huh! I see yuh spilled the soap, all right enough. I'm willin' to
believe yuh did without no affidavit. Doggone it, a bachelor never has
any such a man-trap around in a fellow's road. I've lived in Montana
fourteen years, an' I never slipped up on my own doorstep till you got
here. It takes a woman t' leave things around--where's my cake?”

“Old Specie took it down by the bunk house. Shall I go after it?”

“No, you needn't. Doggone it, this wading through ponds uh soft soap
has got t' stop right here. I never had t' do it when I was baching,
I notice.” He essayed, with the aid of a large splinter, to scrape the
offending soap from his trousers.

“Certainly, you didn't. Bachelors never use soap,” retorted Della.

“Oh, they don't, hey? That's all you know about it. They don't use
this doggoned, slimy truck, let me tell yuh. What d'yuh want, Chip? Oh,
you've got t' grin, too! Dell, why don't yuh do something fer my head?
What's your license good f er, I'd like t' know? You didn't see Dell's
license, did yuh, Chip? Go and get it an' show it to him, Dell. It's
good fer everything but gitting married--there ain't any cure for that
complaint.”






CHAPTER VII. -- Love and a Stomach Pump.



An electrical undercurrent of expectation pervaded the very atmosphere
of Flying U ranch. The musicians, two supercilious but undeniably
efficient young men from Great Falls, had arrived two hours before and
were being graciously entertained by the Little Doctor up at the house.
The sandwiches stood waiting, the coffee was ready for the boiling
water, and the dining-room floor was smooth as wax could make it.

For some reason unknown to himself, Chip was “in the deeps.” He even
threatened to stop in the bunk house and said he didn't feel like
dancing, but was brought into line by weight of numbers. He hated Dick
Brown, anyway, for his cute, little yellow mustache that curled up at
the ends like the tail of a drake. He had snubbed him all the way out
from town and handled Dick's guitar with a recklessness that invited
disaster. And the way Dick smirked when the Old Man introduced him to
the Little Doctor--a girl with a fellow in the East oughtn't to let her
eyes smile that way at a pin-headed little dude like Dick Brown, anyway.
And he--Chip--had given, her a letter postmarked blatantly: “Gilroy,
Ohio, 10:30 P. M.”--and she had been so taken up with those cussed
musicians that she couldn't even thank him, and only just glanced at the
letter before she stuck it inside her belt. Probably she wouldn't
even read it till after the dance. He wondered if Dr. Cecil Granthum
cared--oh, hell! Of COURSE he cared--that is, if he had any sense at
all. But the Little Doctor--she wasn't above flirting, he noticed. If HE
ever fell in love with a girl--which the Lord forbid--he'd take mighty
good care she didn't get time to make dimples and smiles for some other
fellow to go to heaven looking at.

There, that was her, laughing like she always laughed--it reminded him
of pines nodding in a canyon and looking wise and whispering things
they'd seen and heard before you were born, and of water falling over
rocks, somehow. Queer, maybe--but it did. He wondered if Dick Brown had
been trying to say something funny. He didn't see, for the life of him,
how the Little Doctor could laugh at that little imitation man. Girls
are--well, they're easy pleased, most of them.

Down in the bunk house the boys were hurrying into their “war
togs”--which is, being interpreted, their best clothes. There was a
nervous scramble over the cracked piece of a bar mirror--which had a
history--and cries of “Get out!” “Let me there a minute, can't yuh?” and
“Get up off my coat!” were painfully frequent.

Happy Jack struggled blindly with a refractory red tie, which his face
rivaled in hue and sheen--for he had been generous of soap.

Weary had possessed himself of the glass and was shaving as leisurely as
though four restive cow-punchers were not waiting anxiously their turn.

“For the Lord's sake, Weary!” spluttered Jack Bates. “Your whiskers grow
faster'n you can shave 'em off, at that gait. Get a move on, can't yuh?”

Weary turned his belathered face sweetly upon Jack. “Getting in a hurry,
Jacky? YOUR girl won't be there, and nobody else's girl is going to have
time to see whether you shaved to-day or last Christmas. You don't want
to worry so much about your looks, none of you. I hate to say it, but
you act vain, all of you kids. Honest, I'm ashamed. Look at that gaudy
countenance Happy's got on--and his necktie's most as bad.” He stropped
his razor with exasperating nicety, stopping now and then to test its
edge upon a hair from his own brown head.

Happy Jack, grown desperate over his tie and purple over Weary's
remarks, craned his neck over the shoulder of that gentleman and leered
into the mirror. When Happy liked, he could contort his naturally plain
features into a diabolical grin which sent prickly waves creeping along
the spine of the beholder.

Weary looked, stared, half rose from his chair.

“Holy smithereens! Quit it, Happy! You look like the devil by
lightning.”

Happy, watching, seized the hand that held the razor; Cal, like a cat,
pounced upon the mirror, and Jack Bates deftly wrenched the razor from
Weary's fingers.

“Whoopee, boys! Some of you tie Weary down and set on him while I
shave,” cried Cal, jubilant over the mutiny. “We'll make short work of
this toilet business.”

Whereupon Weary was borne to the floor, bound hand and foot with silk
handkerchiefs, carried bodily and laid upon his bed.

“Oh, the things I won't do to you for this!” he asserted, darkly.
“There won't nary a son-of-a-gun uh yuh get a dance from my little
schoolma'am--you'll see!” He grinned prophetically, closed his eyes and
murmured: “Call me early, mother dear,” and straightway fell away into
slumber and peaceful snoring, while the lather dried upon his face.

“Better turn Weary loose and wake him up, Chip,” suggested Jack Bates,
half an hour later, shoving the stopper into his cologne bottle and
making for the door. “At the rate the rigs are rolling in, it'll take
us all to put up the teams.” The door slammed behind him as it had done
behind the others as they hurried away.

“Here!” Chip untied Weary's hands and feet and took him by the shoulder.
“Wake up, Willie, if you want to be Queen o' the May.”

Weary sat up and rubbed his eyes. “Confound them two Jacks! What time is
it?”

“A little after eight. YOUR crowd hasn't, come yet, so you needn't
worry. I'm not going up yet for a while, myself.”

“You're off your feed. Brace up and take all there is going, my son.”
 Weary prepared to finish his interrupted beautification.

“I'm going to--all the bottles, that is. If that Dry Lake gang comes
loaded down with whisky, like they generally do, we ought to get hold of
it and cache every drop, Weary.”

Weary turned clear around to stare his astonishment.

“When did the W. C. T. U. get you by the collar?” he demanded.

“Aw, don't be a fool, Weary,” retorted Chip. “You can see it wouldn't
look right for us to let any of the boys get full, or even half shot,
seeing this is the Little Doctor's dance.”

Weary meditatively scraped his left jaw and wiped the lather from the
razor upon a fragment of newspaper.

“Splinter, we've throwed in together ever since we drifted onto the
same range, and I'm with you, uh course. But--don't overlook Dr. Cecil
Granthum. I'd hate like the devil to see you git throwed down, because
it'd hurt you worse than anybody I know.”

Chip calmly sifted some tobacco into a cigarette paper. His mouth was
very straight and his brows very close together.

“It's a devilish good thing it was YOU said that, Weary. If it had been
anyone else I'd punch his face for him.”

“Why, yes--an' I'd help you, too.” Weary, his mouth very much on one
side of his face that he might the easier shave the other, spoke in
fragments. “You don't take it amiss from--me, though. I can see--”

The door slammed with extreme violence, and Weary slashed his chin
unbecomingly in consequence, but he felt no resentment toward Chip.
He calmly stuck a bit of paper on the cut to stop the bleeding and
continued to shave.


A short time after, the Little Doctor came across Chip glaring at Dick
Brown, who was strumming his guitar with ostentatious ease upon an
inverted dry-goods box at one end of the long dining room.

“I came to ask a favor of you,” she said, “but my courage oozed at the
first glance.”

“It's hard to believe your courage would ooze at anything. What's the
favor?”

The Little Doctor bent her head and lowered her voice to a confidential
undertone which caught at Chip's blood and set it leaping.

“I want you to come and help me turn my drug store around with its face
to the wall. All the later editions of Denson, Pilgreen and Beckman have
taken possession of my office--and as the Countess says: 'Them Beckman
kids is holy terrors--an' it's savin' the rod an' spoilin' the kid that
makes 'em so!'”

Chip laughed outright. “The Denson kids are a heap worse, if she only
knew it,” he said, and followed her willingly.

The Little Doctor's “office” was a homey little room, with a couch, a
well-worn Morris rocker, two willow chairs and a small table for the not
imposing furnishing, dignified by a formidable stack of medical books
in one corner, and the “drug store,” which was simply a roomy bookcase
filled with jars, bottles, boxes and packages, all labeled in a neat
vertical hand.

The room fairly swarmed with children, who seemed, for the most part, to
be enjoying themselves very much. Charlotte May Pilgreen and Sary Denson
were hunched amicably over one of the books, shuddering beatifically
over a pictured skeleton. A swarm surrounded the drug store, the glass
door of which stood open.

The Little Doctor flew across to the group, horror white.

“Sybilly got the key an' unlocked it, an' she give us this candy, too!”
 tattled a Pilgreen with very red hair and a very snub nose.

“I didn't, either! It was Jos'phine!”

“Aw, you big story-teller! I never tetched it!”

The Little Doctor clutched the nearest arm till the owner of it
squealed.

“How many of you have eaten some of these? Tell the truth, now.” They
quailed before her sternness--quailed and confessed. All told, seven
had swallowed the sweet pellets, in numbers ranging from two to a dozen
more.

“Is it poison?” Chip whispered the question in the ear of the perturbed
Little Doctor.

“No--but it will make them exceedingly uncomfortable for a time--I'm
going to pump them out.”

“Good shot! Serves 'em right, the little--”

“All of you who have eaten this--er--candy, must come with me. The rest
of you may stay here and play, but you must NOT touch this case.”

“Yuh going t' give 'em a lickin'?” Sary Denson wetted a finger copiously
before turning a leaf upon the beautiful skeleton.

“Never mind what I'm going to do to them--you had better keep out of
mischief yourself, however. Mr. Bennett, I wish you would get some
fellow you can trust--some one who won't talk about this afterward--turn
this case around so that it will be safe, and then come to the back
bedroom--the one off the kitchen. And tell Louise I want her, will you,
please?”

“I'll get old Weary. Yes, I'll send the Countess--but don't you think
she's a mighty poor hand to keep a secret?”

“I can't help it--I need her. Hurry, please.”

Awed by the look in her big, gray eyes and the mysterious summoning of
help, the luckless seven were marched silently through the outer door,
around the house, through the coal shed and so into the back bedroom,
without being observed by the merrymakers, who shook the house to its
foundation to the cheerful command: “Gran' right 'n' left with a double
ELBOW-W!” “Chasse by yer pardner--balance--SWING!”

“What under the shinin' sun's the matter, Dell?” The Countess,
breathless from dancing, burst in upon the little group.

“Nothing very serious, Louise, though it's rather uncomfortable to be
called from dancing to administer heroic remedies by wholesale. Can you
hold Josephine--whichever one that is? She ate the most, as nearly as I
can find out.”

“She ain't gone an' took pizen, has she? What was it--strychnine?
I'll bet them Beckman kids put 'er up to it. Yuh goin' t' give 'er an
anticdote?”

“I'm going to use this.” The Little Doctor held up a fearsome thing to
view. “Open your mouth, Josephine.”

Josephine refused; her refusal was emphatic and unequivocal, punctuated
by sundry kicks directed at whoever came within range of her stout
little shoes.

“It ain't no use t' call Mary in--Mary can't handle her no better'n I
can--an' not so good. Jos'phine, yuh got--”

“Here's where we shine,” broke in a cheery voice which was sweet to the
ears, just then. “Chip and I ain't wrassled with bronks all our lives
for nothing. This is dead easy--all same branding calves. Ketch hold of
her heels, Splinter--that's the talk. Countess, you better set your back
against that door--some of these dogies is thinking of taking a sneak on
us--and we'd have t' go some, to cut 'em out uh that bunch out there and
corral 'em again. There yuh are, Doctor--sail in.”

Upheld mentally by the unfailing sunniness of Weary and the calm
determination of Chip, to whom flying heels and squirming bodies were as
nothing, or at most a mere trifle, the Little Doctor set to work with
a thoroughness and dispatch which struck terror to the hearts of the
guilty seven.

It did not take long--as Weary had said, it was very much like branding
calves. No sooner was one child made to disgorge and laid, limp and
subdued, upon the bed, than Chip and Weary seized another dexterously
by heels and head. The Countess did nothing beyond guarding the door and
acting as chaperon to the undaunted Little Doctor; but she did her duty
and held her tongue afterward--which was a great deal for her to do.

The Little Doctor sat down in a chair, when it was all over, looking
rather white. Chip moved nearer, though there was really nothing that
he could do beyond handing her a glass of water, which she accepted
gratefully.

Weary held a little paper trough of tobacco in his fingers and drew the
tobacco sack shut with his teeth. His eyes were fixed reflectively upon
the bed. He placed the sack absently in his pocket, still meditating
other things.

“She answered: 'We are seven,'” he quoted softly and solemnly, and the
Little Doctor forgot her faintness in a hearty laugh.

“You two go back to your dancing now,” she commanded, letting the
dimples stand in her cheeks in a way that Chip dreamed about afterward.
“I don't know what I should have done without you--a cow-puncher seems
born to meet emergencies in just the right way. PLEASE don't tell
anyone, will you?”

“Never. Don't you worry about us, Doctor. Chip and I don't set up nights
emptying our brains out our mouths. We don't tell our secrets to nobody
but our horses--and they're dead safe.”

“You needn't think I'll tell, either,” said the Countess, earnestly.
“I ain't forgot how you took the blame uh that sof' soap, Dell. As the
sayin' is--”

Weary closed the door then, so they did not hear the saying which seemed
to apply to this particular case. His arm hooked into Chip's, he led the
way through the kitchen and down the hill to the hay corral. Once safe
from observation, he threw himself into the sweetly pungent “blue-joint”
 and laughed and laughed.

Chip's nervous system did not demand the relief of cachinnation. He
went away to Silver's stall and groped blindly to the place where two
luminous, green moons shone upon him in the darkness. He rubbed the
delicate nose gently and tangled his fingers in the dimly gleaming mane,
as he had seen HER do. Such pink little fingers they were! He laid his
brown cheek against the place where he remembered them to have rested.

“Silver horse,” he whispered, “if I ever fall in love with a girl--which
isn't likely!--I'll want her to have dimples and big, gray eyes and a
laugh like--”






CHAPTER VIII. -- Prescriptions.



It was Sunday, the second day after the dance. The boys were scattered,
for the day was delicious--one of those sweet, soft days which come to
us early in May. Down in the blacksmith shop Chip was putting new rowels
into his spurs and whistling softly to himself while he worked.

The Little Doctor had gone with him to visit Silver that morning, and
had not hurried away, but had leaned against the manger and listened
while he told her of the time Silver, swimming the river when it was
“up,” had followed him to the Shonkin camp when Chip had thought to
leave him at home. And they had laughed together over the juvenile seven
and the subsequent indignation of the mothers who, with the exception of
“Mary,” had bundled up their offspring and gone home mad. True, they
had none of them thoroughly understood the situation, having only the
version of the children, who accused the Little Doctor of trying to make
them eat rubber--“just cause she was mad about some little old candy.”
 The mystification of the others among the Happy Family, who scented a
secret with a joke to it but despaired of wringing the truth from either
Weary or Chip, was dwelt upon with much enjoyment by the Little Doctor.

It was a good old world and a pleasant, and Chip had no present quarrel
with fate--or with anybody else. That was why he whistled.

Then voices reached him through the open door, and a laugh--HER laugh.
Chip smiled sympathetically, though he had not the faintest notion of
the cause of her mirth. As the voices drew nearer, the soft, smooth,
hated tones of Dunk Whitaker untangled from the Little Doctor's laugh,
and Chip stopped whistling. Dunk was making a good, long stay of it this
time; usually he came one day and went the next, and no one grieved at
his departure.

“You find them an entirely new species, of course. How do you get on
with them?” said Dunk.

And the Little Doctor answered him frankly and distinctly: “Oh, very
well, considering all things. They furnish me with some amusement, and I
give them something quite new to talk about, so we are quits. They are a
good-hearted lot, you know--but SO ignorant! I don't suppose--”

The words trailed into an indistinct murmur, punctuated by Dunk's
jarring cackle.

Chip did not resume his whistling, though he might have done so if he
had heard a little more, or a little less. As a matter of fact, it
was the Densons, and the Pilgreens, and the Beckmans that were under
discussion, and not the Flying U cowboys, as Chip believed. He no longer
smiled sympathetically.

“We furnish her with some amusement, do we? That's good! We're a
good-hearted lot, but SO ignorant! The devil we are!” He struck the
rivet such a blow that he snapped one shank of his spur short off.
This meant ten or twelve dollars for a new pair--though the cost of it
troubled him little, just then. It was something tangible upon which
to pour profanity, however, and the atmosphere grew sulphurous in the
vicinity of the blacksmith shop and remained so for several minutes,
after which a tall, irate cow-puncher with his hat pulled low over angry
eyes left the shop and strode up the path to the deserted bunk house.

He did not emerge till the Old Man called to him to ride down to
Benson's after one of the Flying U horses which had broken out of the
pasture.

Della was looking from the window when Chip rode up the hill upon the
“coulee trail,” which passed close by the house. She was tired of the
platitudes of Dunk, who, trying to be both original and polished,
fell far short of being either and only succeeded in being extremely
tiresome.

“Where's Chip going, J. G.?” she demanded, in a proprietary tone.

“Down t' Benson's after a horse.” J. G. spoke lazily, without taking his
pipe from his mouth.

“Oh, I wish I could go--I wonder if he'd care.” The Little Doctor spoke
impulsively as was her habit.

“'Course he wouldn't. Hey, Chip! Hold on a minute!” The Old Man stood
waving his pipe in the doorway.

Chip jerked his horse to a stand-still and half turned in the saddle.

“What?”

“Dell wants t' go along. Will yuh saddle up Concho for 'er? There's no
hurry, anyhow, you've got plenty uh time. Dell's afraid one uh the kids
might fall downstairs ag'in, and she'd miss the case.”

“I'm not, either,” said the Little Doctor, coming to stand by her
brother; “it's too nice a day to stay inside, and my muscles ache for a
gallop over the hills.”

Chip did not look up at her; he did not dare. He felt that, if he met
her eyes--with the laugh in them--he should do one of two undesirable
things: he should either smile back at her, weakly overlooking the
hypocrisy of her friendliness, or sneer in answer to her smile, which
would be very rude and ungentlemanly.

“If you had mentioned wanting a ride I should have been glad to
accompany you,” remarked Dunk, reproachfully, when Chip had ridden,
somewhat sullenly, back to the stable.

“I didn't think of it before--thank you,” said the Little Doctor,
lightly, and hurried away to put on her blue riding habit with its
cunning little jockey cap which she found the only headgear that would
stay upon her head in the teeth of Montana wind, and which made her
look-well, kissable. She was standing on the porch drawing on her
gauntlets when Chip returned, leading Concho by the bridle.

“Let me help you,” begged Dunk, at her elbow, hoping till the last that
she would invite him to go with them.

The Little Doctor, not averse to hiding the bitter of her medicine under
a coating of sugar, smiled sweetly upon him, to the delectation of Dunk
and the added bitterness of Chip, who was rapidly nearing that state of
mind which is locally described as being “strictly on the fight.”

“I expect she thinks I'll amuse her some more!” he thought, savagely, as
they galloped away through the quivering sunlight.

For the first two miles the road was level, and Chip set the pace--which
was, as he intended it should be, too swift for much speech. After that
the trail climbed abruptly out of Flying U coulee, and the horses
were compelled to walk. Then it was that Chip's native chivalry and
self-mastery were put to test.

He was hungry for a solitary ride such as had, before now, drawn much of
the lonely ache out of his heart and keyed him up to the life which
he must live and which chafed his spirit more than even he realized.
Instead of such slender comfort, he was forced to ride beside the
girl who had hurt him--so close that his knee sometimes brushed her
horse--and to listen to her friendly chatter and make answer, at times,
with at least some show of civility.

She was talking reminiscently of the dance.

“J. G. showed splendid judgment in his choice of musicians, didn't he?”

Chip looked straight ahead. This was touching a sore place in his
memory. A vision of Dick Brown's vapid smile and curled up mustache rose
before him.

“I'd tell a man,” he said, with faint irony.

The Little Doctor gave him a quick, surprised look and went on.

“I liked their playing so much. Mr. Brown was especially good upon the
guitar.”

“Y--e-s?”

“Yes, of course. You know yourself, he plays beautifully.”

“Cow-punchers aren't expected to know all these things.” Chip hated
himself for replying so, but the temptation mastered him.

“Aren't they? I can't see why not.”

Chip closed his lips tightly to keep in something impolite.

The Little Doctor, puzzled as well as piqued, went straight to the
point.

“Why didn't you like Mr. Brown's playing?”

“Did I say I didn't like it?”

“Well, you--not exactly, but you implied that you did not.”

“Y--e-s?”

The Little Doctor gave the reins an impatient twitch.

“Yes, yes--YES!”

No answer from Chip. He could think of nothing to say that was not more
or less profane.

“I think he's a very nice, amiable young man”--strong emphasis upon the
second adjective. “I like amiable young men.”

Silence.

“He's going to come down here hunting next fall. J. G. invited him.”

“Yes? What does he expect to find?”

“Why, whatever there is to hunt. Chickens and--er--deer--”

“Exactly.”

By this they reached the level and the horses broke, of their own
accord, into a gallop which somewhat relieved the strain upon the mental
atmosphere. At the next hill the Little Doctor looked her companion over
critically.

“Mr. Bennett, you look positively bilious. Shall I prescribe for you?”

“I can't see how that would add to your amusement.”

“I'm not trying to add to my amusement.”

“No?”

“If I were, there's no material at hand. Bad-tempered young men are
never amusing, to me. I like--”

“Amiable young men. Such as Dick Brown.”

“I think you need a change of air, Mr. Bennett.”

“Yes? I've felt, lately, that Eastern airs don't agree with my
constitution.”

Miss Whitmore grew red as to cheeks and bright as to eyes.

“I think a few small doses of Eastern manners would improve you very
much,” she said, pointedly.

“Y--e-s? They'd have to be small, because the supply is very limited.”

The Little Doctor grew white around the mouth. She held Concho's rein so
tight he almost stopped.

“If you didn't want me to come, why in the world didn't you have the
courage to say so at the start? I must say I don't admire people whose
tempers--and manners--are so unstable. I'm sorry I forced my presence
upon you, and I promise you it won't occur again.” She hesitated, and
then fired a parting shot which certainly was spiteful in the extreme.
“There's one good thing about it,” she smiled, tartly, “I shall have
something interesting to write to Dr. Cecil.”

With that she turned astonished Concho short around in the trail--and as
Chip gave Blazes a vicious jab with his spurs at the same instant, the
distance between them widened rapidly.

As Chip raced away over the prairie, he discovered a new and puzzling
kink in his temper. He had been angry with the Little Doctor for coming,
but it was nothing to the rage he felt when she turned back! He did not
own to himself that he wanted her beside him to taunt and to hurt with
his rudeness, but it was a fact, for all that. And it was a very surly
young man who rode into the Denson corral and threw a loop over the head
of the runaway.






CHAPTER IX. -- Before the Round-up.



“The Little Doctor wants us all to come up t' the White House this
evening and have some music,” announced Cal, bursting into the bunk
house where the boys were sorting and packing their belongings ready to
start with the round-up wagon in the morning.

Jack Bates hurriedly stuffed a miscellaneous collection of socks and
handkerchiefs into his war bag and made for the wash basin.

“I'll just call her bluff,” he said, determinedly.

“It ain't any bluff; she wants us t' come, er you bet she wouldn't say
so. I've learned that much about her. Say, you'd a died to seen old
Dunk look down his nose! I'll bet money she done it just t' rasp his
feelin's--and she sure succeeded. I'd go anyway, now, just t' watch him
squirm.”

“I notice it grinds him consider'ble to see the Little Doctor treat us
fellows like white folks. He's workin' for a stand-in there himself. I
bet he gets throwed down good and hard,” commented Weary, cheerfully.

“It's a cinch he don't know about that pill-thrower back in Ohio,” added
Cal. “Any of you fellows going to take her bid? I'll go alone, in a
minute.”

“I don't think you'll go alone,” asserted Jack Bates, grabbing his hat.

Slim made a few hasty passes at his hair and said he was ready. Shorty,
who had just come in from riding, unbuckled his spurs and kicked them
under his bed.

“It'll be many a day b'fore we listen t' the Little Doctor's mandolin
ag'in,” croaked Happy Jack.

“Aw, shut up!” admonished Cal.

“Come on, Chip,” sang out Weary. “You can spoil good paper when you
can't do anything else. Come and size up the look on Dunk's face when
we take possession of all the best chairs and get t' pouring our incense
and admiration on the Little Doctor.”

Chip took the cigarette from his lips and emptied his lungs of smoke.
“You fellows go on. I'm not going.” He bent again to his eternal
drawing.

“The dickens you ain't!” Weary was too astounded to say more.

Chip said nothing. His gray hat-brim shielded his face from view, save
for the thin, curved lips and firm chin. Weary studied chin and lips
curiously, and whatever he read there, he refrained from further
argument. He knew Chip so much better than did anyone else.

“Aw, what's the matter with yuh, Splinter! Come on; don't be a chump,”
 cried Cal, from the doorway.

“I guess you'll let a fellow do as he likes about it, won't you?”
 queried Chip, without looking up. He was very busy, just then, shading
the shoulders of a high-pitching horse so that one might see the tense
muscles.

“What's the matter? You and the Little Doctor have a falling out?”

“Not very bad,” Chip's tone was open to several interpretations. Cal
interpreted it as a denial.

“Sick?” He asked next.

“Yes!” said Chip, shortly and falsely.

“We'll call the doctor in, then,” volunteered Jack Bates.

“I don't think you will. When I'm sick enough for that I'll let you
know. I'm going to bed.”

“Aw, come on and let him alone. Chip's able t' take care of himself, I
guess,” said Weary, mercifully, holding open the door.

They trooped out, and the last heard of them was Cal, remarking:

“Gee whiz! I'd have t' be ready t' croak before I'd miss this chance uh
dealing old Dunk misery.”

Chip sat where they had left him, staring unseeingly down at the
uncompleted sketch. His cigarette went out, but he did not roll a fresh
one and held the half-burned stub abstractedly between his lips, set in
bitter lines.

Why should he care what a slip of a girl thought of him? He didn't
care; he only--that thought he did not follow to the end, but started
immediately on a new one. He supposed he was ignorant, according to
Eastern standards. Lined up alongside Dr. Cecil Granthum--damn him!--he
would cut a sorry figure, no doubt. He had never seen the outside of a
college, let alone imbibing learning within one. He had learned some of
the wisdom which nature teaches those who can read her language, and he
had read much, lying on his stomach under a summer sky, while the cattle
grazed all around him and his horse cropped the sweet grasses within
reach of his hand. He could repeat whole pages of Shakespeare, and of
Scott, and Bobbie Burns--he'd like to try Dr. Cecil on some of them and
see who came out ahead. Still, he was ignorant--and none realized it
more keenly and bitterly than did Chip.

He rested his chin in his hand and brooded over his comfortless past and
cheerless future. He could just remember his mother--and he preferred
not to remember his father, who was less kind to him than were
strangers. That was his past. And the future--always to be a
cow-puncher? There was his knack for drawing; if he could study and
practice, perhaps even the Little Doctor would not dare call him
ignorant then. Not that he cared for what she might say or might not
say, but a fellow can't help hating to be reminded of something that he
knows better than anyone else--and that is not pleasant, however you may
try to cover up the unsightliness of it.

If Dr. Cecil Granthum--damn him!--had been kicked into the world
and made to fight fate with tender, childish little fists but lately
outgrown their baby dimples, as had been HIS lot, would he have amounted
to anything, either? Maybe Dr. Cecil would have grown up just common and
ignorant and fit for nothing better than to furnish amusement to girl
doctors with dimples and big, gray eyes and a way of laughing. He'd like
to show that little woman that she didn't know all about him yet. It
wasn't too late--he was only twenty-four--he would study, and work, and
climb to where she must look up, not down, to him--if she cared enough
to look at all. It wasn't too late. He would quit gambling and save his
money, and by next winter he'd have enough to go somewhere and learn to
make pictures that amounted to something. He'd show her!

After reiterating this resolve in several emphatic forms, Chip's spirits
grew perceptibly lighter--so much so that he rolled a fresh cigarette
and finished the drawing in his hands, which demonstrated the manner in
which a particularly snaky broncho had taken a fall out of Jack Bates in
the corral that morning.


Next day, early in the afternoon, the round-up climbed the grade and
started on its long trip over the range, and, after they had gone,
the ranch seemed very quiet and very lonely to the Little Doctor, who
revenged herself by snubbing Dunk so unmercifully that he announced
his intention of taking the next train for Butte, where he lived in the
luxury of rich bachelorhood. As the Little Doctor showed no symptoms of
repenting, he rode sullenly away to Dry Lake, and she employed the rest
of the afternoon writing a full and decidedly prejudiced account to Dr.
Cecil of her quarrel with Chip, whom, she said, she quite hated.





CHAPTER X. -- What Whizzer Did.



“I guess Happy lost some of his horses, las' night,” said Slim at the
breakfast table next morning. Slim had been kept at the ranch to look
after the fences and the ditches, and was doing full justice to the
expert cookery of the Countess.

“What makes yuh think that?” The Old Man poised a bit of tender, broiled
steak upon the end of his fork.

“They's a bunch hangin' around the upper fence, an' Whizzer's among 'em.
I'd know that long-legged snake ten miles away.”

The Little Doctor looked up quickly. She had never before heard of a
“long-legged snake”--but then, she had not yet made the acquaintance of
Whizzer.

“Well, maybe you better run 'em into the corral and hold 'em till Shorty
sends some one after 'em,” suggested the Old Man.

“I never c'd run 'em in alone, not with Whizzer in the bunch,” objected
Slim. “He's the orneriest cayuse in Chouteau County.”

“Whizzer'll make a rattlin' good saddle horse some day, when he's broke
gentle,” argued the Old Man.

“Huh! I don't envy Chip the job uh breakin' him, though,” grunted Slim,
as he went out of the door.

After breakfast the Little Doctor visited Silver and fed him his
customary ration of lump sugar, helped the Countess tidy the house, and
then found herself at a loss for something to do. She stood looking out
into the hazy sunlight which lay warm on hill and coulee.

“I think I'll go up above the grade and make a sketch of the ranch,” she
said to the Countess, and hastily collected her materials.

Down by the creek a “cotton-tail” sprang out of her way and kicked
itself out of sight beneath a bowlder. The Little Doctor stood and
watched till he disappeared, before going on again. Further up the bluff
a striped snake gave her a shivery surprise before he glided sinuously
away under a sagebush. She crossed the grade and climbed the steep bluff
beyond, searching for a comfortable place to work.

A little higher, she took possession of a great, gray bowlder jutting
like a giant table from the gravelly soil. She walked out upon it and
looked down--a sheer drop of ten or twelve feet to the barren, yellow
slope below.

“I suppose it is perfectly solid,” she soliloquized and stamped one
stout, little boot, to see if the rock would tremble. If human emotions
are possible to a heart of stone, the rock must have been greatly amused
at the test. It stood firm as the hills around it.

Della sat down and looked below at the house--a doll's house; at the toy
corrals and tiny sheds and stables. Slim, walking down the hill, was
a mere pigmy--a short, waddling insect. At least, to a girl unused to
gazing from a height, each object seemed absurdly small. Flying U
coulee stretched away to the west, with a silver ribbon drawn carelessly
through it with many a twist and loop, fringed with a tender green of
young leaves. Away and beyond stood the Bear Paws, hazily blue, with
splotches of purple shadows.

“I don't blame J. G. for loving this place,” thought the Little Doctor,
drinking in the intoxication of the West with every breath she drew.

She had just become absorbed in her work when a clatter arose from the
grade below, and a dozen horses, headed by a tall, rangy sorrel she
surmised was Whizzer, dashed down the hill. Weary and Chip galloped
close behind. They did not look up, and so passed without seeing her.
They were talking and laughing in very good spirits--which the Little
Doctor resented, for some inexplicable reason. She heard them call to
Slim to open the corral gate, and saw Slim run to do their bidding. She
forgot her sketching and watched Whizzer dodge and bolt back, and Chip
tear through the creek bed after him at peril of life and limb.

Back and forth, round and round went Whizzer, running almost through
the corral gate, then swerving suddenly and evading his pursuers with an
ease which bordered closely on the marvelous. Slim saddled a horse and
joined in the chase, and the Old Man climbed upon the fence and shouted
advice which no one heard and would not have heeded if they had.

As the chase grew in earnestness and excitement, the sympathies of
the Little Doctor were given unreservedly to Whizzer. Whenever a
particularly clever maneuver of his set the men to swearing, she clapped
her hands in sincere, though unheard and unappreciated, applause.

“Good boy!” she cried, approvingly, when he dodged Chip and whirled
through the big gate which the Old Man had unwittingly left open. J.
G. leaned perilously forward and shook his fist unavailingly. Whizzer
tossed head and heels alternately and scurried up the path to the very
door of the kitchen, where he swung round and looked back down the hill
snorting triumph.

“Shoo, there!” shrilled the Countess, shaking her dish towel at him.

“Who--oo-oof-f,” snorted he disdainfully and trotted leisurely round the
corner.

Chip galloped up the hill, his horse running heavily. After him came
Weary, liberally applying quirt and mild invective. At the house they
parted and headed the fugitive toward the stables. He shot through
the big gate, lifting his heels viciously at the Old Man as he passed,
whirled around the stable and trotted haughtily past Slim into the
corral of his own accord, quite as if he had meant to do so all along.

“Did you ever!” exclaimed the Little Doctor, disgustedly, from her
perch. “Whizzer, I'm ashamed of you! I wouldn't have given in like
that--but you gave them a chase, didn't you, my beauty?”

The boys flung themselves off their tired horses and went up to the
house to beg the Countess for a lunch, and Della turned resolutely to
her sketching again.

She was just beginning to forget that the world held aught but soft
shadows, mellow glow and hazy perspective, when a subdued uproar reached
her from below. She drew an uncertain line or two, frowned and laid her
pencil resignedly in her lap.

“It's of no use. I can't do a thing till those cow-punchers take
themselves and their bronchos off the ranch--and may it be soon!” she
told herself, disconsolately and not oversincerely. The best of us are
not above trying to pull the wool over our own eyes, at times.

In reality their brief presence made the near future seem very flat and
insipid to the Little Doctor. It was washing all the color out of the
picture, and leaving it a dirty gray. She gazed moodily down at the
whirl of dust in the corral, where Whizzer was struggling to free
himself from the loop Chip had thrown with his accustomed, calm
precision. Whatever Chip did he did thoroughly, with no slurring of
detail. Whizzer was fain to own himself fairly caught.

“Oh, he's got you fast, my beauty!” sighed the Little Doctor, woefully.
“Why didn't you jump over the fence--I think you COULD--and run, run, to
freedom?” She grew quite melodramatic over the humiliation of the horse
she had chosen to champion, and glared resentfully when Chip threw
his saddle, with no gentle hand, upon the sleek back and tightened the
cinches with a few strong, relentless yanks.

“Chip, you're an ugly, mean-tempered--that's right, Whizzer! Kick him if
you can--I'll stand by you!” This assertion, you understand, was
purely figurative; the Little Doctor would have hesitated long before
attempting to carry it out literally.

“Now, Whizzer, when he tries to ride you, don't you let him! Throw him
clear-over-the STABLE--so there!”

Perhaps Whizzer understood the command in some mysterious, telepathic
manner. At any rate, he set himself straightway to obey it, and there
was not a shadow of doubt but that he did his best--but Chip did not
choose to go over the stable. Instead of doing so, he remained in the
saddle and changed ends with his quirt, to the intense rage of the
Little Doctor, who nearly cried.

“Oh, you brute! You fiend! I'll never speak to you again as long as I
live! Oh, Whizzer, you poor fellow, why do you let him abuse you so? Why
DON'T you throw him clean off the ranch?”

This is exactly what Whizzer was trying his best to do, and Whizzer's
best was exceedingly bad for his rider, as a general thing. But Chip
calmly refused to be thrown, and Whizzer, who was no fool, suddenly
changed his tactics and became so meek that his champion on the bluff
felt tempted to despise him for such servile submission to a tyrant in
brown chaps and gray hat--I am transcribing the facts according to the
Little Doctor's interpretation.

She watched gloomily while Whizzer, in whose brain lurked no thought
of submission, galloped steadily along behind the bunch which Slim made
haste to liberate, and bided his time. She had expected better--rather,
worse--of him than that. She had not dreamed he would surrender so
tamely. As they crossed the Hog's Back and climbed the steep grade just
below her, she eyed him reproachfully and said again:

“Whizzer, I'm ashamed of you!”

It did certainly seem that Whizzer heard and felt the pricking of pride
at the reproof. He made a feint at being frightened by a jack rabbit
which sprang out from the shade of a rock and bounced down the hill like
a rubber ball. As if Whizzer had never seen a jack rabbit before!--he
who had been born and reared upon the range among them! It was a feeble
excuse at the best, but he made the most of it and lost no time seeking
a better.

He stopped short, sidled against Weary's horse and snorted. Chip, in
none the best humor with him, jerked the reins savagely and dug him with
his spurs, and Whizzer, resenting the affront, whirled and bounded
high in the air. Back down the grade he bucked with the high, rocking,
crooked jumps which none but a Western cayuse can make, while Weary
turned in his saddle and watched with sharp-drawn breaths. There was
nothing else that he could do.

Chip was by no means passive. For every jump that Whizzer made the
rawhide quirt landed across his flaring nostrils, and the locked rowels
of Chip's spurs raked the sorrel sides from cinch to flank, leaving
crimson streams behind them.

Wild with rage at this clinging cow-puncher whom he could not dislodge,
who stung his sides and head like the hornets in the meadow, Whizzer
gathered himself for a mighty leap as he reached the Hog's Back. Like a
wire spring released, he shot into the air, shook himself in one last,
desperate hope of victory, and, failing, came down with not a joint in
his legs and turned a somersault.

A moment, and he struggled to his feet and limped painfully away,
crushed and beaten in spirit.

Chip did not struggle. He lay, a long length of brown chaps,
pink-and-white shirt and gray hat, just where he had fallen.

The Little Doctor never could remember getting down that bluff, and her
sketching materials went to amuse the jack rabbits and the birds. Fast
as she flew, Weary was before her and had raised Chip's head upon one
arm. She knelt beside him in the dust, hovering over the white face
and still form like a pitying, little gray angel. Weary looked at her
impersonally, but neither of them spoke in those first, breathless
moments.

The Old Man, who had witnessed the accident, came puffing laboriously up
the hill, taking the short cut straight across from the stable.

“Is he--DEAD?” he yelled while he scrambled.

Weary turned his head long enough to look down at him, with the same
impersonal gaze he had bestowed upon the Little Doctor, but he did
not answer the question. He could not, for he did not know. The Little
Doctor seemed not to have heard.

The Old Man redoubled his exertions and reached them very much out of
breath.

“Is he dead, Dell?” he repeated in an awestruck tone. He feared she
would say yes.

The Little Doctor had taken possession of the brown head. She looked up
at her brother, a very unprofessional pallor upon her face, and down at
the long, brown lashes and at the curved, sensitive lips which held no
hint of red. She pressed the face closer to her breast and shook her
head. She could not speak, just then, for the griping ache that was in
her throat.

“One of the best men on the ranch gone under, just when we need help the
worst!” complained the Old Man. “Is he hurt bad?”

“J. G.,” began the Little Doctor in a voice all the fiercer for being
suppressed, “I want you to kill that horse. Do you hear? If you don't do
it, I will!”

“You won't have to, if old Splinter goes down and out,” said Weary, with
quiet meaning, and the Little Doctor gave him a grateful flash of gray
eyes.

“How bad is he hurt?” repeated the Old Man, impatiently. “You're
supposed t' be a doctor--don't you know?”

“He has a scalp wound which does not seem serious,” said she in an
attempt to be matter-of-fact, “and his left collar bone is broken.”

“Doggone it! A broken collar bone ain't mended overnight.”

“No,” acquiesced the Little Doctor, “it isn't.”

These last two remarks Chip heard. He opened his eyes and looked
straight up into the gray ones above--a long, questioning, rebellious
look. He tried then to rise, to free himself from the bitter ecstasy of
those soft, enfolding arms. Only a broken collar bone! Good thing it was
no worse! Ugh! A spasm of pain contracted his features and drew beads
of moisture to his forehead. The spurned arms once more felt the dead
weight of him.

“What is it?” The Little Doctor's voice called to him from afar.

Must he answer? He wanted to drift on and on--“Can you tell me where
the pain is?”

Pain? Oh, yes, there had been pain--but he wanted to drift. He opened
his eyes again reluctantly; again the pain clutched him.

“It's--my--foot.”

For the first time the eyes of the Little Doctor left his face and
traveled downward to the spurred boots. One was twisted in a horrible
unnatural position that told the agonizing truth--a badly dislocated
ankle. They returned quickly to the face, and swam full of blinding
tears--such as a doctor should not succumb to. He was not drifting into
oblivion now; his teeth were not digging into his lower lip for nothing,
she knew.

“Weary,” she said, forgetting to call him properly by name, “ride to
the house and get my medicine case--the little black one. The Countess
knows--and have Slim bring something to carry him home on. And--RIDE!”

Weary was gone before she had finished, and he certainly “rode.”

“You'll have another crippled cow-puncher on yer hands, first thing
yuh know,” grumbled the Old Man, anxiously, as he watched Weary race
recklessly down the hill.

The Little Doctor did not answer. She scarcely heard him. She was
stroking the hair back from Chip's forehead softly, unconsciously,
wondering why she had never before noticed the wave in it--but then, she
had scarcely seen him with his hat off. How silky and soft it felt!
And she had called him all sorts of mean names, and had wanted Whizzer
to--she shuddered and turned sick at the memory of the thud when they
struck the hard road together.

“Dell!” exclaimed the Old Man, “you're white's a rag. Doggone it, don't
throw up yer hands at yer first case--brace up!”

Chip looked up at her curiously, forgetting the pain long enough
to wonder at her whiteness. Did she have a heart, then, or was it a
feminine trait to turn pale in every emergency? She had not turned so
very white when those kids--he felt inclined to laugh, only for that
cussed foot. Instead he relaxed his vigilance and a groan slipped out
before he knew.

“Just a minute more and I'll ease the pain for you,” murmured the girl,
compassionately.

“All right--so long as you--don't--use--the stomach pump,” he retorted,
with a miserable makeshift of a laugh.

“What's that?” asked the Old Man, but no one explained.

The Little Doctor was struggling with the lump in her throat that he
should try to joke about it.

Then Weary was back and holding the little, black case out to her. She
seized it eagerly, slipping Chip's head to her knees that she might use
her hands freely. There was no halting over the tiny vials, for she had
decided just what she must do.

She laid something against Chip's closed lips.

“Swallow these,” she said, and he obeyed her. “Weary--oh, you knew what
to do, I see. There, lay the coat down there for a pillow.”

Relieved of her burden, she rose and went to the poor, twisted foot.

Weary and the Old Man watched her go to work systematically and disclose
the swollen, purpling ankle. Very gently she did it, and when she had
administered a merciful anaesthetic, the enthusiasm of the Old Man
demanded speech.

“Well, I'll be eternally doggoned! You're onto your job, Dell, doggoned
if yuh ain't. I won't ever josh yuh again about yer doctorin'!”

“I wish you'd been around the time I smashed MY ankle,” commented Weary,
fishing for his cigarette book; he was beginning to feel the need of a
quieting smoke. “They hauled me forty miles, to Benton.”

“That must have been torture!” shuddered the Little Doctor. “A
dislocated ankle is a most agonizing thing.”

“Yes,” assented Weary, striking a match, “it sure is, all right.”






CHAPTER XI. -- Good Intentions.



“Mr. Davidson, have you nerve enough to help me replace this ankle? The
Countess is too nervous, and J. G. is too awkward.”

Chip was lying oblivious to his surroundings or his hurt in the sunny,
south room which Dunk Whitaker chose to call his.

“I've never been accused of wanting nerve,” grinned Weary. “I guess
I can stand it if you can.” And a very efficient assistant he proved
himself to be.

When the question of a nurse arose, when all had been done that could be
done and Weary had gone, the Little Doctor found herself involved in an
argument with the Countess. The Countess wanted them to send for Bill.
Bill just thought the world and all of Chip, she declared, and would
just love to come. She was positive that Bill was the very one they
needed, and the Little Doctor, who had conceived a violent dislike for
Bill, a smirky, self-satisfied youth addicted to chewing tobacco, red
neckties and a perennial grin, was equally positive he was the very
one they did not want. In despair she retrenched herself behind the
assertion that Chip should choose for himself.

“I just know he'll choose Bill,” crowed the Countess after the flicker
of the doctor's skirts.

Chip turned his head rebelliously upon the pillow and looked up at
her. Something in his eyes brought to mind certain stormy crises in the
headstrong childhood of the Little Doctor-crises in which she was forced
to submission very much against her will. It was the same mutinous
surrender to overwhelming strength, the same futile defiance of fate.

“I came to ask you who you would rather have to nurse you,” she said,
trying to keep the erratic color from crimsoning her cheeks. You see,
she had never had a patient of her very own before, and there were
certain embarrassing complications in having this particular young man
in charge.

Chip's eyes wandered wistfully to the window, where a warm, spring
breeze flapped the curtains in and out.

“How long have I got to lie here?” he asked, reluctantly.

“A month, at the least--more likely six weeks,” she said with kind
bluntness. It was best he should know the worst at once.

Chip turned his face bitterly to the wall for a minute and traced an
impossible vine to its breaking point where the paper had not been
properly matched. Twenty miles away the boys were hurrying through their
early dinner that they might catch up their horses for the afternoon's
work. And they had two good feet to walk on, two sound arms to subdue
restless horseflesh and he was not there! He could fairly smell the
sweet, trampled sod as the horses circled endlessly inside the rope
corral, and hear them snort when a noose swished close. He wondered who
would get his string to ride, and what they would do with his bed.

He didn't need it, now; he would lie on wire springs, instead of on the
crisp, prairie grass. He would be waited on like a yearling baby and--
“The Countess just knows you will choose Bill,” interrupted a whimsical
girl voice.

Chip said something which the Little Doctor did not try to hear
distinctly. “Don't she think I've had enough misery dealt me for once?”
 he asked, without taking his eyes from the poor, broken vine. He rather
pitied the vine--it seemed to have been badly used by fate, just as
he had been. He was sure it had not wanted to stop right there on that
line, as it had been forced to do. HE had not wanted to stop, either.
He--“She says Bill would just love to come,” said the voice, with a bit
of a laugh in it.

Chip, turning his head back suddenly, looked into the gray eyes and felt
inexplicably cheered. He almost believed she understood something of
what it all meant to him. And she mercifully refrained from spoken pity,
which he felt he could not have borne just then. His lips took back some
of their curve.

“You tell her I wouldn't just love to have him,” he said, grimly.

“I'd never dare. She dotes on Bill. Whom DO you want?”

“When it comes to that, I don't want anybody. But if you could get
Johnny Beckman to come--”

“Oh, I will--I'll go myself, to make sure of him. Which one is Johnny?”

“Johnny's the red-headed one,” said Chip.

“But--they're ALL--”

“Yes, but his head is several shades redder than any of the others,”
 interrupted he, quite cheerfully.

The Little Doctor, observing the twinkle in his eyes, felt her spirits
rise wonderfully. She could not bear that hurt, rebellious, lonely look
which they had worn.

“I'll bring him--but I may have to chloroform the Countess to get
him into the house. You must try to sleep, while I'm gone--and don't
fret--will you? You'll get well all the quicker for taking things
easily.”

Chip smiled faintly at this wholesome advice, and the Little Doctor laid
her hand shyly upon his forehead to test its temperature, drew down the
shade over the south window, and left him in dim, shadowy coolness to
sleep.

She came again before she started for Johnny, and found him wide awake
and staring hungrily at the patch of blue sky visible through the window
which faced the East.

“You'll have to learn to obey orders better than this,” she said,
severely, and took quiet possession of his wrist. “I told you not to
fret about being hurt. I know you hate it--”

Chip flushed a little under her touch and the tone in which she spoke
the last words. It seemed to mean that she hated it even more than he
did, having him helpless in the house with her. It hadn't been so long
since she had told him plainly how little she liked him. He was not
going to forget, in a hurry!

“Why don't you send me to the hospital?” he demanded, brusquely. “I
could stand the trip, all right.”

The Little Doctor, the color coming and going in her cheeks, pressed her
cool fingers against his forehead.

“Because I want you here to practice on. Do you think I'd let such a
chance escape?”

After she was gone, Chip found some things to puzzle over. He felt that
he was no match for the Little Doctor, and for the first time in his
life he deeply regretted his ignorance of woman nature.

When the dishes were done, the Countess put her resentment behind her
and went in to sit with Chip, with the best of intentions. The most
disagreeable trait of some disagreeable people is that their intentions
are invariably good. She had her “crochy work,” and Chip groaned
inwardly when he saw her settle herself comfortably in a rocking-chair
and unwind her thread. The Countess had worked hard all her life, and
her hands were red and big-jointed. There was no pleasure in watching
their clever manipulation of the little, steel hook. If it had been the
Little Doctor's hands, now--Chip turned again to the decapitated, pale
blue vine with its pink flowers and no leaves. The Countess counted
off “chain 'leven” and began in a constrained tone, such as some
well-meaning people employ against helpless sick folk.

“How're yuh feelin' now? Yuh want a drink, or anything?”

Chip did not want a drink, and he felt all right, he guessed.

The Countess thought to cheer him a little.

“Well, I do think it's too bad yuh got t' lay here all through this
purty spring weather. If it had been in the winter, when it's cold and
stormy outside, a person wouldn't mind it s' much. I know yuh must feel
purty blew over it, fer yuh was always sech a hand t' be tearin' around
the country on the dead run, seems like. I always told Mary 't you'n
Weary always rode like the sheriff wa'nt more'n a mile b'hind yuh. An'
I s'pose you feel it all the more, seein' the round-up's jest startin'
out. Weary said yuh was playin' big luck, if yuh only knew enough t'
cash in yer chips at the right time, but he's afraid yuh wouldn't be
watching the game close enough an' ud lose yer pile. I don't know what
he was drivin' at, an' I guess he didn't neither. It's too bad, anyway.
I guess yuh didn't expect t' wind up in bed when yuh rode off up the
hill. But as the sayin' is: 'Man plans an' God displans,' an' I guess
it's so. Here yuh are, laid up fer the summer, Dell says--the las' thing
on earth, I guess, that yuh was lookin' fer. An' yuh rode buckin' bronks
right along, too. I never looked fer Whizzer t' buck yuh off, I must
say--yuh got the name uh bein' sech a good rider, too. But they say
't the pitcher 't's always goin' t' the well is bound t' git busted
sometime, an' I guess your turn come t' git busted. Anyway--”

“I didn't get bucked off,” broke in Chip, angrily. A “bronch fighter” is
not more jealous of his sweetheart than of his reputation as a rider. “A
fellow can't very well make a pretty ride while his horse is turning a
somersault.”

“Oh, well, I didn't happen t' se it--I thought Weary said 't yuh got
throwed off on the Hog's Back. Anyway, I don't know's it makes much
difference how yuh happened t' hit the ground--”

“I guess it does make a difference,” cried Chip, hotly. His eyes took on
the glitter of fever. “It makes a whole heap of difference, let me tell
you! I'd like to hear Weary or anybody else stand up and tell me that
I got bucked off. I may be pretty badly smashed up, but I'd come pretty
near showing him where he stood.”

“Oh, well, yuh needn't go t' work an' git mad about it,” remonstrated
the Countess, dropping her thread in her perturbation at his excitement.
The spool rolled under the bed and she was obliged to get down upon her
knees and claw it back, and she jarred the bed and set Chip's foot to
hurting again something awful.

When she finally secured the spool and resumed her chair, Chip's eyes
were tightly closed, but the look of his mouth and the flush in his
cheeks, together with his quick breathing, precluded the belief that
he was asleep. The Countess was not a fool--she saw at once that fever,
which the Little Doctor had feared, was fast taking hold of him. She
rolled her half yard of “edging” around the spool of thread, jabbed the
hook through the lump and went out and told the Old Man that Chip was
getting worse every minute--which was the truth.

The Old Map knocked the ashes out of his pipe and went in to look at
him.

“Did Weary say I got bucked off?” demanded the sick man before the Old
Man was fairly in the room. “If he did, he lied, that's all. I didn't
think Weary'd do me dirt like that--I thought he'd stand by me if
anybody would. He knows I wasn't throwed. I--”

“Here, young fellow,” put in the Old Man, calmly, “don't yuh git t'
rampagin' around over nothin'! You turn over there an' go t' sleep.”

“I'll be hanged if I will!” retorted Chip. “If Weary's taken to lying
about me I'll have it out with him if I break all the rest of my bones
doing it. Do you think I'm going to stand a thing like that? I'll see--”

“Easy there, doggone it. I never heard Weary say't yuh got bucked off.
Whizzer turned over on his head, 's near as I c'd make out fer dust. I
took it he turned a summerset.”

Chip's befogged brain caught at the last word.

“Yes, that's just what he did. It beats me how Weary could say, or even
think, that I--it was the jack rabbit first--and I told her the supply
was limited--and if we do furnish lots of amusement--but I guess I made
her understand I wasn't so easy as she took me to be. She--”

“Hey?” The Old Man could hardly be blamed for losing the drift of Chip's
rapid utterances.

“If we want to get them rounded up before the dance, I'll--it's a good
thing it wasn't poison, for seven dead kids at once--”

The Old Man knew something about sickness himself. He hurried out,
returning in a moment with a bowl of cool water and a fringed napkin
which he pilfered from the dining-room table, wisely intending to bathe
Chip's head.

But Chip would have none of him or his wise intentions. He jerked the
wet napkin from the Old Man's fingers and threw it down behind the bed,
knocked up the bowl of water into the Old Man's face and called him
some very bad names. The Countess came and looked in, and Chip hurled a
pillow at her and called her a bad name also, so that she retreated to
the kitchen with her feelings very much hurt. After that Chip had the
south room to himself until the Little Doctor returned with Johnny.

The Old Man, looking rather scared, met her on the porch. The Little
Doctor read his face before she was off her horse.

“What's the matter? Is he worse?” she demanded, abruptly.

“That's fer you t' find out. I ain't no doctor. He got on the fight, a
while back, an' took t' throwin' things an' usin' langwidge. He can't
git out uh bed, thank the Lord, or we'd be takin' t' the hills by now.”

“Then somebody has it to answer for. He was all right when I left him,
two hours ago, with not a sign of fever. Has the Countess been pestering
him?”

“No,” said the Countess, popping her head out of the kitchen window and
speaking in an aggrieved tone, “I hope I never pester anybody. I went
an' done all I could t' cheer 'im up, an' that's all the thanks I
git fer it. I must say some folks ain't overburdened with gratitude,
anyhow.”

The Little Doctor did not wait to hear her out. She went straight to the
south room, pulling off her gloves on the way. The pillow on the floor
told her an eloquent tale, and she sighed as she picked it up and patted
some shape back into it. Chip stared at her with wide, bright eyes from
the bed.

“I don't suppose Dr. Cecil Granthum would throw pillows at anybody!” he
remarked, sarcastically, as she placed it very gently under his head.

“Perhaps, if the provocation was great enough. What have they been doing
to you?”

“Did Weary say I got bucked off?” he demanded, excitedly.

The Little Doctor was counting his pulse, and waited till she had
finished. It was a high number--much higher than she liked.

“No, Weary didn't. How could he? You didn't, you know. I saw it all from
the bluff, and I know the horse turned over upon you. It's a wonder you
weren't killed outright. Now, don't worry about it any more--I expect it
was the Countess told you that. Weary hated dreadfully to leave you. I
wonder if you know how much he thinks of you? I didn't, till I saw how
he looked when you--here, drink this, all of it. You've got to sleep,
you see.”


There was a week when the house was kept very still, and the south
room very cool and shadowy, and Chip did not much care who it was that
ministered to him--only that the hands of the Little Doctor were always
soft and soothing on his head and he wished she would keep them there
always, when he was himself enough to wish anything coherently.






CHAPTER XII. -- “The Last Stand.”



To use a trite expression and say that Chip “fought his way back to
health” would be simply stating a fact and stating it mildly. He went
about it much as he would go about gentling a refractory broncho, and
with nearly the same results.

His ankle, however, simply could not be hurried or bluffed into
premature soundness, and the Little Doctor was at her wits' end to keep
Chip from fretting himself back into fever, once he was safely pulled
out of it. She made haste to explain the bit of overheard conversation,
which he harped on more than he dreamed, when his head went light in
that first week, and so established a more friendly feeling between
them.

Still, there was a certain aloofness about him which she could not
conquer, try as she might. Just so far they were comrades--beyond, Chip
walked moodily alone. The Little Doctor did not like that overmuch.
She preferred to know that she fairly understood her friends and was
admitted, sometimes, to their full confidence. She did not relish
bumping her head against a blank wall that was too high to look over or
to climb, and in which there seemed to be no door.

To be sure, he talked freely, and amusingly, of his adventures and of
the places he had known, but it was always an impersonal recital, and
told little of his real self or his real feelings. Still, when she
asked him, he told her exactly what he thought about things, whether his
opinion pleased her or not.

There were times when he would sit in the old Morris chair and smoke
and watch her make lacey stuff in a little, round frame. Battenberg, she
said it was. He loved to see her fingers manipulate the needle and the
thread, and take wonderful pains with her work--but once she showed him
a butterfly whose wings did not quite match, and he pointed it out to
her. She had been listening to him tell a story of Indians and cowboys
and with some wild riding mixed into it, and--well, she used the wrong
stitch, but no one would notice it in a thousand years. This, her
argument.

“You'll always know the mistake's there, and you won't get the
satisfaction out of it you would if it was perfect, would you?” argued
Chip, letting his eyes dwell on her face more than was good for him.

The Little Doctor pouted her lips in a way to tempt a man all he could
stand, and snipped out the wing with her scissors and did it over.

So with her painting. She started a scene in the edge of the Bad Lands
down the river. Chip knew the place well. There was a heated discussion
over the foreground, for the Little Doctor wanted him to sketch in some
Indian tepees and some squaws for her, and Chip absolutely refused to
do so. He said there were no Indians in that country, and it would spoil
the whole picture, anyway. The Little Doctor threatened to sketch them
herself, drawing on her imagination and what little she knew of Indians,
but something in his eyes stayed her hand. She left the easel in disgust
and refused to touch it again for a week.

She was to spend a long day with Miss Satterly, the schoolma'am, and
started off soon after breakfast one morning.

“I hope you'll find something to keep you out of mischief while I'm
gone,” she remarked, with a pretty, authoritative air. “Make him take
his medicine, Johnny, and don't let him have the crutches. Well, I think
I shall hide them to make sure.”

“I wish to goodness you had that picture done,” grumbled Chip. “It
seems to me you're doing a heap of running around, lately. Why don't you
finish it up? Those lonesome hills are getting on my nerves.”

“I'll cover it up,” said she.

“Let it be. I like to look at them.” Chip leaned back in his chair and
watched her, a hunger greater than he knew in his eyes. It was most
awfully lonesome when she was gone all day, and last night she had been
writing all the evening to Dr. Cecil Granthum--damn him! Chip always
hitched that invective to the unknown doctor's name, for some reason he
saw fit not to explain to himself. He didn't see what she could find to
write about so much, for his part. And he did hate a long day with no
one but Johnny to talk to.

He craned his neck to keep her in view as long as possible, drew a long,
discontented breath and settled himself more comfortably in the chair
where he spent the greater part of his waking hours.

“Hand me the tobacco, will you, kid?”

He fished his cigarette book from his pocket. “Thanks!” He tore a narrow
strip from the paper and sifted in a little tobacco.

“Now a match, kid, and then you're done.”

Johnny placed the matches within easy reach, shoved a few magazines
close to Chip's elbow, and stretched himself upon the floor with a book.

Chip lay back against the cushions and smoked lazily, his eyes half
closed, dreaming rather than thinking. The unfinished painting stood
facing him upon its easel, and his eyes idly fixed upon it. He knew
the place so well. Jagged pinnacles, dotted here and there with scrubby
pines, hemmed in a tiny basin below--where was blank canvas. He went
mentally over the argument again, and from that drifted to a scene he
had witnessed in that same basin, one day--but that was in the winter.
Dirty gray snow drifts, where a chinook had cut them, and icy side hills
made the place still drearier. And the foreground--if the Little Doctor
could get that, now, she would be doing something!--ah! that foreground.
A poor, half-starved range cow with her calf which the round-up had
overlooked in the fall, stood at bay against a steep cut bank. Before
them squatted five great, gaunt wolves intent upon fresh beef for their
supper. But the cow's horns were long, and sharp, and threatening, and
the calf snuggled close to her side, shivering with the cold and the
fear of death. The wolves licked their cruel lips and their eyes gleamed
hungrily--but the eyes of the cow answered them, gleam for gleam. If it
could be put upon canvas just as he had seen it, with the bitter, biting
cold of a frozen chinook showing gray and sinister in the slaty sky--
“Kid!”

“Huh?” Johnny struggled reluctantly back to Montana.

“Get me the Little Doctor's paint and truck, over on that table, and
slide that easel up here.”

Johnny stared, opened his mouth to speak, then wisely closed it and did
as he was bidden. Philosophically he told himself it was Chip's funeral,
if the Little Doctor made a kick.

“All right, kid.” Chip tossed the cigarette stub out of the window. “You
can go ahead and read, now. Lock the door first, and don't you bother
me--not on your life.”

Then Chip plunged headlong into the Bad Lands, so to speak.

A few dabs of dirty white, here and there, a wholly original
manipulation of the sky--what mattered the method, so he attained the
result? Half an hour, and the hills were clutched in the chill embrace
of a “frozen chinook” such as the Little Doctor had never seen in her
life. But Johnny, peeping surreptitiously over Chip's shoulder, stared
at the change; then, feeling the spirit of it, shivered in sympathy with
the barren hills.

“Hully gee,” he muttered under his breath, “he's sure a corker t'
paint cold that fair makes yer nose sting.” And he curled up in a chair
behind, where he could steal a look, now and then, without fear of
detection.

But Chip was dead to all save that tiny basin in the Bad Lands--to the
wolves and their quarry. His eyes burned as they did when the fever held
him; each cheek bone glowed flaming red.

As wolf after wolf appeared with what, to Johnny, seemed uncanny
swiftness, and squatted, grinning and sinister, in a relentless half
circle, the book slipped unheeded to the floor with a clatter that
failed to rouse the painter, whose ears were dulled to all else than the
pitiful blat of a shivering, panic-stricken calf whose nose sought his
mother's side for her comforting warmth and protection.

The Countess rapped on the door for dinner, and Johnny rose softly and
tiptoed out to quiet her. May he be forgiven the lies he told that
day, of how Chip's head ached and he wanted to sleep and must not be
disturbed, by strict orders of the Little Doctor. The Countess, to whom
the very name of the Little Doctor was a fetich, closed all intervening
doors and walked on her toes in the kitchen, and Johnny rejoiced at the
funeral quiet which rested upon the house.

Faster flew the brush. Now the eyes of the cow glared desperate
defiance. One might almost see her bony side, ruffled by the cutting
north wind, heave with her breathing. She was fighting death for herself
and her baby--but for how long? Already the nose of one great, gray
beast was straight uplifted, sniffing, impatient. Would they risk a
charge upon those lowered horns? The dark pines shook their feathery
heads hopelessly. A little while perhaps, and then--Chip laid down the
brush and sank back in the chair. Was the sun so low? He could do no
more--yes, he took up a brush and added the title: “The Last Stand.”

He was very white, and his hand shook. Johnny leaned over the back of
the chair, his eyes glued to the picture.

“Gee,” he muttered, huskily, “I'd like t' git a whack at them wolves
once.”

Chip turned his head until he could look at the lad's face. “What do you
think of it, kid?” he asked, shakily.

Johnny did not answer for a moment. It was hard to put what he felt into
words. “I dunno just how t' say it,” he said, gropingly, at last, “but
it makes me want t' go gunnin' fer them wolves b'fore they hamstring
her. It--well--it don't seem t' me like it was a pitcher, somehow. It
seems like the reel thing, kinda.”

Chip moved his head languidly upon the cushion.

“I'm dead tired, kid. No, I'm not hungry, nor I don't want any
coffee, or anything. Just roll this chair over to the bed, will you?
I'm--dead-tired.”

Johnny was worried. He did not know what the Little Doctor would say,
for Chip had not eaten his dinner, or taken his medicine. Somehow there
had been that in his face that had made Johnny afraid to speak to him.
He went back to the easel and looked long at the picture, his heart
bursting with rage that he could not take his rifle and shoot those
merciless, grinning brutes. Even after he had drawn the curtain before
it and stood the easel in its accustomed place, he kept lifting the
curtain to take another look at that wordless tragedy of the West.






CHAPTER XIII. -- Art Critics.



It was late the next forenoon when the Little Doctor, feeling the spirit
of artistic achievement within her, gathered up brushes and paints for
a couple hours' work. Chip, sitting by the window smoking a cigarette,
watched her uneasily from the tail of his eye. Looking back to
yesterday's “spasm,” as he dubbed it mentally, he was filled with a
great and unaccountable shyness. What had seemed so real to him then he
feared to-day to face, as trivial and weak.

He wanted to cry “Stop!” when she laid hand to the curtain, but he
looked, instead, out across the coulee to the hills beyond, the blood
surging unevenly through his veins. He felt when she drew the cloth
aside; she stopped short off in the middle of telling him something Miss
Satterly had said--some whimsical thing--and he could hear his heart
pounding in the silence which followed. The little, nickel alarm clock
tick-tick-ticked with such maddening precision and speed that Chip
wanted to shy a book at it, but his eyes never left the rocky bluff
opposite, and the clock ticked merrily on.

One minute--two--the silence was getting unbearable. He could not
endure another second. He looked toward her; she stood, one hand full of
brushes, gazing, white-faced, at “The Last Stand.” As he looked, a tear
rolled down the cheek nearest him and compelled him to speech.

“What's the matter?” His voice seemed to him rough and brutal, but he
did not mean it so.

The Little Doctor drew a long, quivering breath.

“Oh, the poor, brave thing!” she said, in a hushed tone. She turned
sharply away and sat down.

“I expect I spoiled your picture, all right--but I told you I'd get into
mischief if you went gadding around and left me alone.”

The Little Doctor stealthily wiped her eyes, hoping to goodness Chip had
not seen that they had need of wiping.

“Why didn't you tell me you could paint like that?” She turned upon him
fiercely. “Here you've sat and looked on at me daubing things up--and
if I'd known you could do better than--” Looking again at the canvas she
forgot to finish. The fascination of it held her.

“I'm not in the habit of going around the country shouting what I don't
know,” said Chip, defensively. “You've taken heaps of lessons, and I
never did. I just noticed the color of everything, and--oh, I don't
know--it's in me to do those things. I can't help trying to paint and
draw.”

“I suppose old Von Heim would have something to say of your way of doing
clouds--but you got the effect, though--better than he did, sometimes.
And that cow--I can see her breathe, I tell you! And the wolves--oh,
don't sit there and smoke your everlasting cigarettes and look so
stoical over it! What are you made of, anyway? Can't you feel proud? Oh,
don't you know what you've done? I--I'd like to shake you--so now!”

“Well, I don't much blame you. I knew I'd no business to meddle. Maybe,
if you'll touch it up a little--”

“I'll not touch a brush to THAT. I--I'm afraid I might kill the cow.”
 She gave a little, hysterical laugh.

“Don't you think you're rather excitable--for a doctor?” scoffed Chip,
and her chin went up for a minute.

“I'd like t' kill them wolves,” said Johnny, coming in just then.

“Turn the thing around, kid, so I can see it,” commanded Chip, suddenly.
“I worked at it yesterday till the colors all ran together and I
couldn't tell much about it.”

Johnny turned the easel, and Chip, looking, fell silent. Had HIS hand
guided the brush while that scene grew from blank canvas to palpitating
reality? Verily, he had “builded better than he knew.” Something in his
throat gripped, achingly and dry.

“Did anybody see it yesterday?” asked the Little Doctor.

“No--not unless the kid--” “I never said a word about it,” denied
Johnny, hastily and vehemently. “I lied like the dickens. I said you had
headache an' was tryin' t' sleep it off. I kep' the Countess teeterin'
around on her toes all afternoon.” Johnny giggled at the memory of it.

“Well, I'm going to call them all in and see what they say,” declared
she, starting for the door.

“I don't THINK you will,” began Chip, rebelliously, blushing over his
achievement like a girl over her graduation essay. “I don't want to
be--”

“Well, we needn't tell them you did it,” suggested she.

“Oh, if you're willing to shoulder the blame,” compromised Chip, much
relieved. He hated to be fussed over.

The Little Doctor regarded him attentively a moment, smiled queerly to
herself and stood back to get a better view of the painting.

“I'll shoulder the blame--and maybe claim the glory. It was mine in the
first place, you know.” She watched him from under her lashes.

“Yes, it's yours, all right,” said Chip, readily, but something went
out of his face and lodged rather painfully in the deepest corner of his
heart. He ignored it proudly and smiled back at her.

“Do such things really happen, out here?” she asked, hurriedly.

“I'd tell a man!” said Chip, his eyes returning to the picture. “I was
riding through that country last winter, and I came upon that very cow,
just as you see her there, in that same basin. That's how I came
to paint it into your foreground; I got to thinking about it, and I
couldn't help trying to put it on canvas. Only, I opened up on the
wolves with my six-shooter, and I got two; that big fellow ready to
howl, there, and that one next the cut-bank. The rest broke out down the
coulee and made for the breaks, where I couldn't follow. They--”

“Say? Old Dunk's comin',” announced Johnny, hurrying in. “Why don't yuh
let 'im see the pitcher an' think all the time the Little Doctor done
it? Gee, it'd be great t' hear 'im go on an' praise it up, like he
always does, an' not know the diffrunce.”

“Johnny, you're a genius,” cried she, effusively. “Don't tell a soul
that Chip had a brush in his hand yesterday, will you? He--he'd rather
not have anyone know he did anything to the painting, you see.”

“Aw, I won't tell,” interrupted Johnny, gruffly, eying his divinity with
distrust for the first time in his short acquaintance with her. Was she
mean enough to claim it really? Just at first, as a joke, it would be
fun, but afterward, oh, she wouldn't do a thing like that!

“Don't you bring Dunk in here,” warned Chip, “or things might happen.
I don't want to run up against him again till I've got two good feet to
stand on.”

Their relation was a thing to be watched over tenderly, since Chip's
month of invalidism. Dunk had notions concerning master and servant, and
concerning Chip as an individual. He did not fancy occupying the back
bedroom while Chip reigned in his sunny south room, waited on, petted
(Dunk applied the term petted) and amused indefatigably by the Little
Doctor. And there had been a scene, short but exceeding “strenuous,”
 over a pencil sketch which graphically portrayed an incident Dunk fain
would forget--the incident of himself as a would-be broncho fighter,
with Banjo, of vigilante fame, as the means of his downfall--physical,
mental and spiritual. Dunk might, in time, have forgiven the crippled
ankle, and the consequent appropriation of his room, but never would he
forgive the merciless detail of that sketch.

“I'll carry easel and all into the parlor, and leave the door open so
you can hear what they all say,” said the Little Doctor, cheerfully.
“I wish Cecil could be here to-day. I always miss Cecil when there's
anything especial going on in the way of fun.”

“Yes?” answered Chip, and made himself another cigarette. He would be
glad when he could hobble out to some lonely spot and empty his soul
of the profane language stored away opposite the name of Dr. Cecil
Granthum. There is so little comfort in swearing all inside, when one
feels deeply upon a subject.

“It's a wonder you wouldn't send for him if you miss him that bad,”
 he remarked, after a minute, hoping the Little Doctor would not find
anything amiss with his tone, which he meant should be cordial and
interested--and which evinced plenty of interest, of a kind, but was
curiously lacking in cordiality.

“I did beg, and tease, and entreat--but Cecil's in a hospital--as a
physician, you understand, not as a patient, and can't get off just yet.
In a month or two, perhaps--”

Dinner, called shrilly by the Countess, interrupted her, and she flitted
out of the room looking as little like a lovelorn maiden as she did like
a doctor--which was little indeed.

“She begged, and teased, and entreated,” repeated Chip, savagely to
himself when the door closed upon her, and fell into gloomy meditation,
which left him feeling that there was no good thing in this wicked
world--no, not one--that was not appropriated by some one with not sense
enough to understand and appreciate his blessing.

After dinner the Little Doctor spoke to the unsuspecting critics.

“That picture which I started a couple of weeks ago is finished at last,
and I want you good people to come and tell me what you think of it.
I want you all--you, Slim, and Louise, you are to come and give your
opinion.”

“Well, I don't know the first thing about paintin',” remonstrated the
Countess, coming in from the kitchen.

The Old Man lighted his pipe and followed her into the parlor with the
others, and Slim rolled a cigarette to hide his embarrassment, for the
role of art critic was new to him.

There was some nervousness in the Little Doctor's manner as she set the
easel to her liking and drew aside the curtain. She did not mean to be
theatrical about it, but Chip, watching through the open door, fancied
so, and let his lip curl a trifle. He was not in a happy frame of mind
just then.

A silence fell upon the group. The Old Man took his pipe from his mouth
and stared.

The cheeks of the Little Doctor paled and grew pink again. She laughed a
bit, as though she would much rather cry.

“Say something, somebody, quick!” she cried, when her nerves would bear
no more.

“Well, I do think it's awfully good, Dell,” began the Countess.

“By golly, I don't see how you done that without seein' it happen,”
 exclaimed Slim, looking very dazed and mystified.

“That's a Diamond Bar cow,” remarked J. G., abstractedly. “That outfit
never does git half their calves. I remember the last time I rode
through there last winter, that cow--doggone it, Dell, how the dickens
did you get that cow an' calf in? You must a had a photograph t' work
from.”

“By golly, that's right,” chimed in Slim. “That there's the cow I had
sech a time chasin' out uh the bunch down on the bottom. I run her
till I was plum sick, an' so was she, by golly. I'd know her among a
thousand. Yuh got her complete--all but the beller, an', by golly, yuh
come blame near gittin' that, too!” Slim, always slow and very much in
earnest, gradually became infused with the spirit of the scene. “Jest
look at that ole gray sinner with his nose r'ared straight up in the air
over there! By golly, he's callin' all his wife's relations t' come an'
help 'em out. He's thinkin' the ole Diamon' Bar's goin' t' be one too
many fer 'em. She shore looks fighty, with 'er head down an' 'er eyes
rollin' all ways t' oncet, ready fer the first darn cuss that makes a
crooked move! An' they know it, too, by golly, er they wouldn't hang
back like they're a-doin'. I'd shore like t' be cached behind that ole
pine stub with a thirty--thirty an' a fist full uh shells--I'd shore
make a scatteration among 'em! A feller could easy--”

“But, Slim, they're nothing but paint!” The Little Doctor's eyes were
shining.

Slim turned red and grinned sheepishly at the others.

“I kinda fergot it wasn't nothin' but a pitcher,” he stammered,
apologetically.

“That is the gist of the whole matter,” said Dunk. “You couldn't ask
for a greater compliment, or higher praise, than that, Miss Della. One
forgets that it is a picture. One only feels a deep longing for a good
rifle. You must let me take it with me to Butte. That picture will make
you famous among cattlemen, at least. That is to say, out West, here.
And if you will sell it I am positive I can get you a high price for
it.”

The eyes of the Little Doctor involuntarily sought the Morris chair in
the next room; but Chip was looking out across the coulee, as he had a
habit of doing lately, and seemed not to hear what was going on in the
parlor. He was indifference personified, if one might judge from his
outward appearance. The Little Doctor turned her glance resentfully to
her brother's partner.

“Do you mean all that?” she demanded of him.

“I certainly do. It is great, Miss Della. I admit that it is not
quite like your other work; the treatment seems different, in places,
and--er--stronger. It is the best picture of the kind that I have ever
seen, I think. It holds one, in a way--”

“By golly, I bet Chip took a pitcher uh that!” exclaimed Slim, who had
been doing some hard thinking. “He was tellin' us last winter about
ridin' up on that ole Diamon' Bar cow with a pack uh wolves around her,
an' her a-standin' 'em off, an' he shot two uh the wolves. Yes, sir;
Chip jest about got a snap shot of 'em.”

“Well, doggone it! what if he did?” The Old Man turned jealously upon
him. “It ain't everyone that kin paint like that, with nothin' but a
little kodak picture t' go by. Doggone it! I don't care if Dell had a
hull apurn full uh kodak pictures that Chip took--it's a rattlin' good
piece uh work, all the same.”

“I ain't sayin' anything agin' the pitcher,” retorted Slim. “I was jest
wonderin' how she happened t' git that cow down s' fine, brand 'n all,
without some kind uh pattern t' go by. S' fur 's the pitcher goes,
it's about as good 's kin be did with paint, I guess. I ain't ever seen
anything in the pitcher line that looked any natcherler.”

“Well, I do think it's just splendid!” gurgled the Countess. “It's
every bit as good 's the one Mary got with a year's subscription t' the
Household Treasure fer fifty cents. That one's got some hounds chasin'
a deer and a man hidin' in 'the bushes, sost yuh kin jest see his head.
It's an awful purty pitcher, but this one's jest as good. I do b'lieve
it's a little bit better, if anything. Mary's has got some awful nice,
green grass, an' the sky's an awful purty blue--jest about the color uh
my blue silk waist. But yuh can't expect t' have grass an' sky like that
in the winter, an' this is more of a winter pitcher. It looks awful cold
an' lonesome, somehow, an' it makes yuh want t' cry, if yuh look at it
long enough.”

The critics stampeded, as they always did when the Countess began to
talk.

“You better let Dunk take it with him, Dell,” was the parting advice of
the Old Man.






CHAPTER XIV. -- Convalescence.



“You don't mind, do you?” The Little Doctor was visibly uneasy.

“Mind what?” Chip's tone was one of elaborate unconsciousness. “Mind
Dunk's selling the picture for you? Why should I? It's yours, you know.”

“I think you have some interest in it yourself,” she said, without
looking at him. “You don't think I mean to--to--”

“I don't think anything, except that it's your picture, and I put in a
little time meddling with your property for want of something else to
do. All I painted doesn't cover one quarter of the canvas, and I guess
you've done enough for me to more than make up. I guess you needn't
worry over that cow and calf--you're welcome to them both; and if you
can get a bounty on those five wolves, I'll be glad to have you. Just
keep still about my part of it.”

Chip really felt that way about it, after the first dash of wounded
pride. He could never begin to square accounts with the Little Doctor,
anyhow, and he was proud that he could do something for her, even if it
was nothing more than fixing up a picture so that it rose considerably
above mediocrity. He had meant it that way all along, but the suspicion
that she was quite ready to appropriate his work rather shocked him,
just at first. No one likes having a gift we joy in bestowing calmly
taken from our hands before it has been offered. He wanted her to
have the picture for her very own--but--but--He had not thought of
the possibility of her selling it, or of Dunk as her agent. It was
all right, of course, if she wanted to do that with it, but--There was
something about it that hurt, and the hurt of it was not less, simply
because he could not locate the pain.

His mind fidgeted with the subject. If he could have saddled Silver and
gone for a long gallop over the prairie land, he could have grappled
with his rebellious inner self and choked to death several unwelcome
emotions, he thought. But there was Silver, crippled and swung
uncomfortably in canvas wrappings in the box stall, and here
was himself, crippled and held day after day in one room and one
chair--albeit a very pleasant room and a very comfortable chair--and a
gallop as impossible to one of them as to the other.

“I do wish--” The Little Doctor checked herself abruptly, and hummed a
bit of coon song.

“What do you wish?” Chip pushed his thoughts behind him, and tried to
speak in his usual manner.

“Nothing much. I was just wishing Cecil could see 'The Last Stand.'”

Chip said absolutely nothing for five minutes, and for an excellent
reason. There was not a single thought during that time which would
sound pretty if put into words, and he had no wish to shock the Little
Doctor.

After that day a constraint fell upon them both, which each felt
keenly and neither cared to explain away. “The Last Stand” was tacitly
dismissed from their conversation, of which there grew less and less as
the days passed.

Then came a time when Chip strongly resented being looked upon as an
invalid, and Johnny was sent home, greatly to his sorrow.

Chip hobbled about the house on crutches, and chafed and fretted, and
managed to be very miserable indeed because he could not get out and
ride and clear his brain and heart of some of their hurt--for it had
come to just that; he had been compelled to own that there was a hurt
which would not heal in a hurry.

It was a very bitter young man who, lounging in the big chair by the
window one day, suddenly snorted contempt at a Western story he had been
reading and cast the magazine--one of the Six Leading--clean into the
parlor where it sprawled its artistic leaves in the middle of the floor.
The Little Doctor was somewhere--he never seemed to know just where,
nowadays--and the house was lonesome as an isolated peak in the Bad
Lands.

“I wish I had the making of the laws. I'd put a bounty on all the darn
fools that think they can write cowboy stories just because they rode
past a roundup once, on a fast train,” he growled, reaching for his
tobacco sack. “Huh! I'd like to meet up with the yahoo that wrote that
rank yarn! I'd ask him where he got his lack of information. Huh! A
cow-puncher togged up like he was going after the snakiest bronk in the
country, when he was only going to drive to town in a buckboard! 'His
pistol belt and dirk and leathern chaps'--oh, Lord; oh, Lord! And spurs!
I wonder if he thinks it takes spurs to ride a buckboard? Do they think,
back East, that spurs grow on a man's heels out here and won't come off?
Do they think we SLEEP in 'em, I wonder?” He drew a match along the
arm of the chair where the varnish was worn off. “They think all a
cow-puncher has to do is eat and sleep and ride fat horses. I'd like to
tell some of them a few things that they don't--”

“I've brought you a caller, Chip. Aren't you glad to see him?” It was
the Little Doctor at the window, and the laugh he loved was in her voice
and in her eyes, that it hurt him to meet, lately.

The color surged to his face, and he leaned from the window, his thin,
white hand outstretched caressingly.

“I'd tell a man!” he said, and choked a little over it. “Silver, old
boy!”

Silver, nickering softly, limped forward and nestled his nose in the
palm of his master.

“He's been out in the corral for several days, but I didn't tell you--I
wanted it for a surprise,” said the Little Doctor. “This is his longest
trip, but he'll soon be well now.”

“Yes; I'd give a good deal if I could walk as well as he can,” said
Chip, gloomily.

“He wasn't hurt as badly as you were. You ought to be thankful you can
walk at all, and that you won't limp all your life. I was afraid for a
while, just at first--”

“You were? Why didn't you tell me?” Chip's eyes were fixed sternly upon
her.

“Because I didn't want to. It would only have made matters worse,
anyway. And you won't limp, you know, if you're careful for a while
longer. I'm going to get Silver his sugar. He has sugar every day.”

Silver lifted his head and looked after her inquiringly, whinnied
complainingly, and prepared to follow as best he could.

“Silver--oh, Silver!” Chip snapped his fingers to attract his attention.
“Hang the luck, come back here! Would you throw down your best friend
for that girl? Has she got to have you, too?” His voice grew wistfully
rebellious. “You're mine. Come back here, you little fool--she doesn't
care.”

Silver stopped at the corner, swung his head and looked back at Chip,
beckoning, coaxing, swearing under his breath. His eyes sought for sign
of his goddess, who had disappeared most mysteriously. Throwing up his
head, he sent a protest shrilling through the air, and looked no more at
Chip.

“I'm coming, now be still. Oh, don't you dare paw with your lame leg!
Why didn't you stay with your master?”

“He's no use for his master, any more,” said Chip, with a hurt laugh. “A
woman always does play the--mischief, somehow. I wonder why? They look
innocent enough.”

“Wait till your turn comes, and perhaps you'll learn why,” retorted she.

Chip, knowing that his turn had come, and come to tarry, found nothing
to say.

“Beside,” continued the Little Doctor, “Silver didn't want me so
much--it was the sugar. I hope you aren't jealous of me, because I know
his heart is big enough to hold us both.”

She stayed a long half hour, and was so gay that it seemed like old
times to listen to her laugh and watch her dimples while she talked.
Chip forgot that he had a quarrel with fate, and he also forgot Dr.
Cecil Granthum, of Gilroy, Ohio--until Slim rode up and handed the
Little Doctor a letter addressed in that bold, up-and-down writing that
Chip considered a little the ugliest specimen of chirography he had ever
seen in his life.

“It's from Cecil,” said the Little Doctor, simply and unnecessarily, and
led Silver back down the hill.

Chip, gazing at that tiresome bluff across the coulee, renewed his
quarrel with fate.






CHAPTER XV. -- The Spoils of Victory.



“I wish, while I'm gone, you'd paint me another picture. Will you,
PLEASE?”

When a girl has big, gray eyes that half convince you they are not gray
at all, but brown, or blue, at times, and a way of using them that makes
a fellow heady, like champagne, and a couple of dimples that will
dodge into her cheeks just when a fellow is least prepared to resist
them--why, what can a fellow do but knuckle under and say yes,
especially when she lets her head tip to one side a little and says
“please” like that?

Chip tried not to look at her, but he couldn't help himself very well
while she stood directly in front of him. He compromised weakly instead
of refusing point-blank, as he told himself he wanted to do.

“I don't know--maybe I can't, again.”

“Maybe you can, though. Here's an eighteen by twenty-four canvas, and
here are all the paints I have in the house, and the brushes. I'll
expect to see something worth while, when I return.”

“Well, but if I can't--”

“Look here. Straight in the eye, if you please! Now, will you TRY?”

Chip, looking into her eyes that were laughing, but with a certain
earnestness behind the laugh, threw up his hands--mentally, you know.

“Yes, I'll try. How long are you going to be gone?”

“Oh, perhaps a week,” she said, lightly, and Chip's heart went heavy.

“You may paint any kind of picture you like, but I'd rather you did
something like 'The Last Stand'--only better. And put your brand, as you
call it, in one corner.”

“You won't sell it, will you?” The words slipped out before he knew.

“No--no, I won't sell it, for it won't be mine. It's for yourself this
time.”

“Then there won't be any picture,” said Chip, shortly.

“Oh, yes, there will,” smiled the Little Doctor, sweetly, and went away
before he could contradict her.

Perhaps a week! Heavens, that was seven days, and every day had at least
sixteen waking hours. How would it be when it was years, then? When
Dr. Cecil Granthum--(er--no, I won't. The invective attached to that
gentleman's name was something not to be repeated here.) At any rate, a
week was a long, long time to put in without any gray eyes or any laugh,
or any dimples, or, in short, without the Little Doctor. He could not
see, for his part, why she wanted to go gadding off to the Falls with
Len Adams and the schoolma'am, anyway. Couldn't they get along without
her? They always had, before she came to the country; but, for that
matter, so had he. The problem was, how was he going to get along
without her for the rest of his life? What did they want to stay a week
for? Couldn't they buy everything they wanted in a day or so? And the
Giant Spring wasn't such great shakes, nor the Rainbow Falls, that
they need to hang around town a week just to look at them. And the
picture--what was he such a fool for? Couldn't he say no with a pair of
gray eyes staring into his? It seemed not. He supposed he must think up
something to daub on there--the poorer the better.

That first day Chip smoked something like two dozen cigarettes, gazed
out across the coulee till his eyes ached, glared morosely at the canvas
on the easel, which stared back at him till the dull blankness of it
stamped itself upon his brain and he could see nothing else, look where
he might. Whereupon he gathered up hat and crutches, and hobbled slowly
down the hill to tell Silver his troubles.

The second day threatened to be like the first. Chip sat by the window
and smoked; but, little by little, the smoke took form and substance
until, when he turned his eyes to the easel, a picture looked back at
him--even though to other eyes the canvas was yet blank and waiting.

There was no Johnny this time to run at his beckoning. He limped about
on his crutches, collected all things needful, and sat down to work.

As he sketched and painted, with a characteristic rapidity that was
impatient of the slightest interruption yet patient in its perfectness
of detail, the picture born of the smoke grew steadily upon the canvas.

It seemed, at first, that “The Last Stand” was to be repeated. There
were the same jagged pinnacles and scrubby pines, held in the fierce
grip of the frozen chinook. The same? But there was a difference, not
to be explained, perhaps, but certainly to be felt. The Little Doctor's
hills were jagged, barren hills; her pines were very nice pines indeed.
Chip's hills were jagged, they were barren--they--were desolate; his
pines were shuddering, lonely pines; for he had wandered alone among
them and had caught the Message of the Wilderness. His sky was the cold,
sinister sky of “The Last Stand”--but it was colder, more sinister, for
it was night. A young moon hung low in the west, its face half hidden
behind a rift of scurrying snow clouds. The tiny basin was shadowy and
vague, the cut-bank a black wall touched here and there by a quivering
shaft of light.

There was no threatening cow with lowered horns and watchful eye; there
was no panic-stricken calf to whip up her flagging courage with its
trust in her.

The wolves? Yes, there were the wolves--but there were more of them.
They were not sitting in a waiting half circle--they were scattered,
unwatchful. Two of them in the immediate foreground were wrangling over
a half-gnawed bone. The rest of the pack were nosing a heap pitifully
eloquent.

As before, so now they tricked the eye into a fancy that they lived.
One could all but hear the snarls of the two standing boldly in the
moonlight, the hair all bristly along the necks, the white fangs
gleaming between tense-drawn lips. One felt tempted to brace oneself for
the rush that was to come.

For two days Chip shut himself in his room and worked through the long
hours of daylight, jealous of the minutes darkness stole from him.

He clothed the feast in a merciful shade which hid the repugnance
and left only the pathos--two long, sharp horns which gleamed in the
moonlight but were no longer threatening.

He centered his energy upon the two wolves in the foreground, grimly
determined that Slim should pray for a Gatling gun when he saw them.

The third day, when he was touching up the shoulders of one of the
combatants, a puff of wind blew open the door which led to the parlor.
He did not notice it and kept steadily at work, painting his “brand”
 into a corner. Beneath the stump and its splinter he lettered his
name--a thing he had never done before.

“Well--I'll be--doggoned!”

Chip jumped half out of his chair, giving his lame ankle a jolt which
made him grind his teeth.

“Darn it, Chip, did YOU do that?”

“It kind of looks that way, don't it?” Chip was plainly disconcerted,
and his ankle hurt.

“H--m-m.” The Old Man eyed it sharply a minute. “It's a wonder you
wouldn't paint in a howl or two, while you're about it. I suppose that's
a mate to--doggone you, Chip, why didn't yuh tell us you painted that
other one?”

“I didn't,” said Chip, getting red and uncomfortable, “except the cow
and--”

“Yes, except the part that makes the picture worth the paint it's done
with!” snorted the Old Man. “I must say I never thought that uh Dell!”

“Thought what?” flared Chip, hotly, forgetting everything but that the
Little Doctor was being censured. “It was her picture, she started it
and intended to finish it. I painted on it one day when she was gone,
and she didn't know it. I told her not to tell anyone I had anything to
do with it. It wasn't her fault.”

“Huh!” grunted the Old Man, as if he had his own opinion on that matter.
“Well, it's a rattling good picture--but this one's better. Poor ole
Diamond Bar--she couldn't come through with it, after all. She put up a
good fight, out there alone, but she had t' go under--her an' her calf.”
 He stood quiet a minute, gazing and gazing. “Doggone them measly wolves!
Why in thunder can't a feller pump lead into 'em like he wants t'?”

Chip's heart glowed within him. His technique was faulty, his colors
daring, perhaps--but his triumph was for that the greater. If men could
FEEL his pictures--and they did! That was the joy of it--they did!

“Darn them snarlin' brutes, anyway! I thought it was doggone queer if
Dell could dab away all her life at nice, common things that you only
think is purty, an' then blossom out, all of a sudden, with one like
that other was--that yuh felt all up an' down yer back. The little
cheat, she'd no business t' take the glory uh that'n like she done. I'll
give her thunder when she gits back.”

“You won't do anything of the kind,” said Chip, quietly--too quietly not
to be menacing. “I tell you that was my fault--I gave her all I did to
the picture, and I told her not to say anything. Do you think I don't
know what I owe to her? Do you think I don't know she saved Silver's
life--and maybe mine? Forty pictures wouldn't square me with the Little
Doctor--not if they were a heap better than they are, and she claimed
every darned one. I'm doing this, and I'll thank you not to buy in where
you're not wanted. This picture is for her, too--but I don't want the
thing shouted from the housetops. When you go out, I wish you'd shut the
door.”

The Old Man, thoroughly subdued, took the hint. He went out, and he shut
the door.






CHAPTER XVI. -- Weary Advises.



“I have a short article here which may interest you, Miss Della,” said
Dunk, coming out on the porch a few days later with a Butte paper in his
hand. The Little Doctor was swinging leisurely in the hammock.

“It's about the picture,” he added, smiling.

“The picture? Oh, let me see!” The Little Doctor stopped the hammock
with her toe and sat up. The wind had tumbled her hair about her face
and drawn extra color to her cheeks, and she looked very sweet, Dunk
thought. He held out the paper, pointing a well-kept finger at the place
he wished her to read. There was a rather large headline, for news was
scarce just then and every little thing was made the most of. The eyes
of the Little Doctor clung greedily to the lines.

“It is reported that 'The Last Stand' has been sold. The painting, which
has been on exhibition in the lobby of the Summit Hotel, has attracted
much attention among art lovers, and many people have viewed it in
the last week. Duncan Gray Whitaker, the well-known mine owner and
cattleman, who brought the picture to Butte, is said to have received an
offer which the artist will probably accept. Mr. Whitaker still declines
to give the artist's name, but whoever he is, he certainly has a
brilliant future before him, and Montana can justly feel proud of him.
It has been rumored that the artist is a woman, but the best critics are
slow to believe this, claiming that the work has been done with a power
and boldness undoubtedly masculine. Those who have seen 'The Last Stand'
will not easily forget it, and the price offered for it is said to be
a large one. Mr. Whitaker will leave the city to-morrow to consult the
unknown artist, and promises, upon his return, to reveal the name of the
modest genius who can so infuse a bit of canvas with palpitating life.”

“What do you think of that? Isn't the 'modest genius' rather proud of
the hit she has made? I wish you could have seen the old stockmen stand
around it and tell wolf stories to one another by the hour. The women
came and cried over it--they were so sorry for the cow. Really, Miss
Della, she's the most famous cow in Butte, just now. I had plenty of
smaller offers, but I waited till Senator Blake came home; he's a crank
on Western pictures, and he has a long pocketbook and won't haggle over
prices. He took it, just as I expected, but he insists that the artist's
name must be attached to it; and if you take his offer, he may bring the
picture down himself--for he's quite anxious to meet you. I am to wire
your decision at once.”

The Little Doctor watched a pale green “measuring worm” loop its way
hurriedly along the floor of the porch. She was breathing rather quickly
and unevenly, and she seemed to be thinking very fast. When the worm,
reaching the end, doubled out of sight, she started the hammock swinging
and leaned back upon her cushions.

“You may tell him to come--I should like very much to see him,” she
said. “And I am very much obliged to you for the service you have
performed.” She became very much interested in a magazine, and seemed to
dismiss Dunk and the picture entirely from her mind. Dunk, after waiting
till he was convinced she had no intention of saying more, went off to
the stables to find a messenger for the telegram, telling himself on the
way that Miss Della Whitmore was a very cool young person, and not as
grateful as he would like her to be.

The Little Doctor went immediately to find Chip, but that young man,
who had been just inside the window and had heard every word, was not so
easily found. He was down in the bunk house, thinking things. And when
she did find him, near supper time, he was so utterly unapproachable
that her courage and her patience failed together, and she did not
mention the picture at all.


“Hello, Doctor!” It was a heartening voice, sounding very sweet to the
ears of the Little Doctor just then. She turned eagerly, her arms still
clasping Silver's neck. She had come down to the corral to feed him
sugar and tell him what a very difficult young man his master was, and
how he held her at arm's length with his manner, and yet was nice and
friendly and sunny enough--like the sun shining on an iceberg. But human
sympathy was within reach of her hand, and it was much more satisfying
than the mute sympathy of a horse.

“Weary Willy Davidson, you don't know how glad I am to see you! As the
sayin' is: 'Yuh think of angels an' their opposets ain't fur off.' I AM
glad to see you.”

“Dirt and all?” grinned Weary, for he had ridden far in the heat, and
was dust-grimed and travelworn. He pulled the saddle off Glory, also,
travelworn and sweat-grimed, and gave him an affectionate slap of
dismissal.

“I'd chance money you wasn't thinking of me,” he said, pointedly. “How
is the old ranch, anyhow? Splinter up, yet?”

“You must think I'm a feeble excuse for a doctor,” retorted she. “Of
course he's up. He walks all around the house and yard with a cane; I
promoted him from crutches yesterday.”

“Good shot! That was sure a bad foot he had on him, and I didn't
know--What's he been putting in the time at? Making pictures--or love?”

“Pictures,” said the Little Doctor, hastily, laying her cheek against
Silver's mane. “I'd like to see him making love!”

“Yuh would?” said Weary, innocently, disregarding the irony of her tone.
“Well, if yuh ever do, I tell yuh right now you'll see the real thing.
If he makes love like he does other things, there won't any female girl
dodge his loop, that's straight. What about the pictures?”

“Well, he drew a picture of J. G. sliding down the kitchen steps, before
he was out of bed. And he made a picture of Dunk, that time Banjo bucked
him off--you saw that happen, I suppose--and it was great! Dunk was
standing on his head in front of his horse, but I can't show you it,
because it blew out of the window and landed at Dunk's feet in the path,
and he picked it up and tore it into little bits. And he doesn't play in
Chip's yard any more.”

“He never did,” grinned Weary. “Dunk's a great hand to go around
shooting off his mouth about things he's no business to buy into, and
old Splinter let him down on his face once or twice. Chip can sure give
a man a hard fall when he wants to, and not use many words, either. What
little he does say generally counts.”

The Little Doctor's memory squirmed assentingly. “It's the tone he
uses,” she said, reflectively. “The way he can say 'yes,' sometimes--”

“You've bumped into that, huh? Bert Rogers lit into him with a tent peg
once, for saying yes at him. They sure was busy for a few minutes. I
just sat in the shade of a wagon wheel and laughed till I near cracked a
rib. When they got through they laughed, too, and they played ten
games uh pool together that night, and got--” Weary caught himself up
suddenly. “Pool ain't any gambling game,” he hastened to explain. “It's
just knocking balls into the pockets, innocent like, yuh see.”

“Mr. Davidson, there's something I'd like to tell you about. Will you
wait a few minutes more for your supper?”

“Sure,” said Weary; wonderingly, and sat down upon the edge of the
watering trough.

The Little Doctor, her arms still around Silver's neck, told him all
about “The Last Stand,” and “The Spoils of Victory,” and Chip, and Dunk,
and herself. And Weary listened silently, digging little trenches in
the hard soil with the rowels of his spurs, and, knowing Chip as he did,
understanding the matter much better than did the Little Doctor.

“And he doesn't seem to know that I never meant to claim the picture as
my work, and I can't explain while he acts so--oh, you know how he
can act. And Dunk wouldn't have sold the picture if he had known Chip
painted it, and it was wrong, of course, but I did so want Chip to have
some real encouragement so he would make that his life work. YOU know
he is fitted for something better than cow-punching. And now the picture
has made a hit and brought a good price, and he must own it. Dunk will
be furious, of course, but that doesn't matter to me--it's Chip that I
can't seem to manage.”

Weary smiled queerly down at his spurs.

“It's a cinch you could manage him, easy enough, if you took the right
way to do it,” he said, quietly.

“Probably the right way would be too much trouble,” said the Little
Doctor, with her chin well up. “Once I get this picture deal settled
satisfactorily, I'm quite willing to resign and let him manage himself.
Senator Blake is coming to-morrow, and I'm so glad you will be here to
help me.”

“I'd sure like to see yuh through with the deal. Old Blake won't be hard
to throw--I know him, and so does Chip. Didn't he tell yuh about it?”

“Tell me!” flashed the Little Doctor. “I told him Senator Blake was
coming, and that he wanted to buy the picture, and he just made him
a cigarette and said, 'Ye--e-es?' And after that there wasn't any
conversation of any description!”

Weary threw back his head and laughed.

“That sure sounds just like him,” he said, and at that minute Chip
himself hobbled into the corral, and the Little Doctor hastened to leave
it and retreat to the house.






CHAPTER XVII. -- When a Maiden Wills.



It was Dunk who drove to meet the train, next day, and it was an
extremely nervous young woman who met Senator Blake upon the porch. Chip
sprawled in the hammock on the east porch, out of sight.

The senator was a little man whose coat did not fit, and whose hair was
sandy and sparse, and who had keen, twinkling blue eyes which managed to
see a great deal more than one would suspect from the rest of his face.
He pumped the Little Doctor's hand up and down three times and called
her “My dear young lady.” After the first ten minutes, the Little
Doctor's spirits rose considerably and her heart stopped thumping so she
could hear it. She remembered what Weary had told her--that “Old Blake
won't be hard to throw.” She no longer feared the senator, but
she refused to speculate upon what Chip might do. He seemed more
approachable to-day, but that did not count--probably he was only
reflecting Weary's sunshine, and would freeze solid the minute--“And
so you are the mysterious genius who has set the Butte critics by the
ears!” chuckled the senator. “They say your cloud treatment is all
wrong, and that your coloring is too bold--but directly they forget all
that and wonder which wolf will make the first dash, and how many the
cow will put out of business before she goes under herself. Don't be
offended if I say that you look more capable of portraying woolly white
lambs at play than ravening wolves measuring the strength of their
quarry. I must confess I was looking for the--er MAN behind that brush.”

“I told the senator coming out that it was a lady he would have to make
terms with. He would hardly believe it,” smiled Dunk.

“He needn't believe it,” said the Little Doctor, much more calmly
than she felt. “I don't remember ever saying that I painted 'The Last
Stand.'”

Dunk threw up his head and looked at her sharply.

“Genius is certainly modest,” he said, with a laugh that was not nice to
hear.

“In this case, the genius is unusually modest,” assented she, getting
rather white. “Unfortunately for myself, senator, I did not paint the
'ravening wolves' which caught your fancy. It would be utterly beyond my
brush.”

A glimmering of the truth came to Dunk, and his eyes narrowed.

“Who did paint it for you? Your friend, Chip?”

The Little Doctor caught her breath at the venomous accent he employed,
and the Old Man half rose from his chair. But Della could fight her own
battles. She stood up and faced Dunk, tight-lipped and proud.

“Yes, Mr. Whitaker, my friend, Mr. Bennett, of whose friendship I am
rather proud, painted the best part of 'The Last Stand.'”

“Senator Blake must forgive my being misled by your previous statement
that the picture was yours,” sneered Dunk.

“I made no previous statement, Mr. Whitaker.” The Little Doctor's tone
was sweetly freezing. “I said that the picture which I had begun was
finished, and I invited you all to look at it. It was your misfortune
that you took too much for granted.”

“It's a mistake to take anything for granted where a woman is concerned.
At the same time I shouldn't be blamed if I take it for granted Chip--”

“Suppose you say the rest to me, Dunk,” suggested Chip from the doorway,
where he leaned heavily upon his cane. “It begins to look as though I
held a hand in this game.”

Dunk wheeled furiously upon him.

“You're playing a high hand for a forty-dollar man,” he grated, “and
you've about reached your limit. The stakes are beyond your reach, my
friend.”

Chip went white with anger at the thrust, which struck deeper than Dunk
knew. But he stood his ground.

“Ye--es? Wait till the cards are all turned.” It turned him sick,
though, the emptiness of the boast. It was such a pitiful, ghastly
bluff--for the cards were all against him, and he knew it. A man in
Gilroy, Ohio, would take the trick which decided the game. Hearts were
trumps, and Dr. Cecil Granthum had the ace.

The little senator got out of his chair and faced Chip tactfully.

“Kid Bennett, you rascal, aren't you going to shake hands?” His own was
outstretched, waiting.

Chip crowded several hot words off his tongue, and gave up his hand for
a temporary pump handle.

“How do you do, Blake? I didn't think you'd remember me.”

“You didn't? How could I help it? I can feel the cold of the water yet,
and your rope settling over my shoulders. You never gave me a chance to
say 'God bless you' for that; you just coiled up your rope--swearing all
the time you did it, because it was wet--and rode off, dripping like a
muskrat. What did you do it for?”

“I was in a hurry to get back to camp,” grinned Chip, sinking into a
chair. “And you weren't a senator then.”

“It would have been all the same if I had been, I reckon,” responded
the senator, shaking Chip's hand again. “Well, well! So you are the
genius--that sounds more likely. No offense, Miss Whitmore. Do you
remember that picture you drew with charcoal on a piece of pine board?
It stands on the mantel in my library, and I always point it out to my
friends as the work of a young man with a future. And you painted 'The
Last Stand!' Well, well! I think I'll have to send the price up another
notch, just to get even with you for swearing at me when my lungs were
so full of water I couldn't swear back!”

While he talked he was busy unwrapping the picture which he had brought
with him, and he reminded the Little Doctor of a loquacious peddler
opening his pack. He was much more genial and unpretentious since Chip
entered the room, and she wondered why. She wanted to ask about that
reference to the water, but he stood the painting against the wall, just
then, and she forgot everything but that.

Chip's eyes clung to the scene greedily. After all, it was his--and he
knew in his heart that it was good. After a minute he limped into his
room and brought “The Spoils of Victory,” and stood it beside “The Last
Stand.”

“A--h-h!” The senator breathed the word deep in his throat and fell
silent. Even the Old Man leaned forward in his chair that he might see
the better. The Little Doctor could not see anything, just then, but no
one noticed anything wrong with her eyes, for they were all down in the
Bad Lands, watching an old range cow defend her calf.

“Bennett, do the two go together?” asked the senator, at last.

“I don't know--I painted it for Miss Whitmore,” said Chip, a dull glow
in his cheeks.

The Little Doctor glanced at him quickly, rather startled, if the truth
be known.

“Oh, that was just a joke, Mr. Bennett. I would much rather have you
paint me another one--this one makes me want to cry--and a doctor must
forego the luxury of tears. I have no claim upon either of them, Mr.
Blake. It was like this. I started 'The Last Stand,' but I only had the
background painted, and one day while I was gone Mr. Bennett finished it
up--and it is his work that makes the picture worth anything. I let
it pass as mine, for the time, but I never intended to wear the laurel
crown, really. I only borrowed it for a little while. I hope you can
make Mr. Bennett behave himself and put his brand on it, for if he
doesn't it will go down to posterity unsigned. This other--'The Spoils
of Victory'--he cannot attempt to disown, for I was away at Great Falls
when he painted it, and he was here alone, so far as help of any kind is
concerned. Now do make him be sensible!”

The senator looked at Chip, then at the Little Doctor, chuckled and sat
down on the couch.

“Well, well! Kid Bennett hasn't changed, I see. He's just as ornery as
he ever was. And you're the mysterious, modest genius! How did you come
out after that dip into the old Missouri?” he asked, abruptly. “You
didn't take cold, riding in those wet clothes, I hope?”

“I? No, I was all right. I stopped at that sheep camp and borrowed some
dry clothes.” Chip was very uncomfortable. He wished Blake wouldn't keep
bringing up that affair, which was four years old and quite trivial, in
his opinion. It was a good thing Dunk pulled out when he saw he'd got
the worst of it, or there'd have been trouble, most likely. And Blake--
The senator went on, addressing the others.

“Do you know what this young fellow did, four years ago this last
spring? I tried to cross the river near my place in a little boat, while
the water was high. Bennett, here, came along and swore that a man with
no more sense than I had ought to drown--which was very true, I admit.
I had just got out a nice little distance for drowning properly, when a
tree came bobbing along and upset my boat, and Kid Bennett, as we called
him then, rode in as far as he could--which was a great deal further
than was safe for him--and roped me, just as he would have roped a
yearling. Ha! ha! I can see him yet, scowling at me and whirling the
loop over his head ready to throw. A picture of THAT, now! When he had
dragged me to the bank he used some rather strong language--a cowboy
does hate to wet his rope--and rode off before I had a chance to thank
him. This is the first time I've seen him since then.”

Chip got very red.

“I was young and foolish, those days, and you weren't a senator,” he
repeated, apologetically.

“My being a senator wouldn't have mattered at all. They've been changing
your name, over this side the river, I see. How did that happen?”

Again Chip was uncomfortable.

“We've got a cook that is out of sight when it comes to Saratoga chips,
and I'm a fiend for them, you see. The boys got to calling me Saratoga
Chip, and then they cut it down to Chip and stuck to it.”

“I see. There was a fellow with you over there--Davidson. What has
become of him?”

“Weary? He works here, too. He's down in the bunk house now, I guess.”

“Well, well! Let's go and hunt him up--and we can settle about the
pictures at the same time. You seem to be crippled. How did that happen?
Some dare-devil performance, I expect.”

The senator smiled reassuringly at the Little Doctor and got Chip out of
the house and down in the bunk house with Weary, and whatever means he
used to make Chip “behave himself,” they certainly were a success. For
when he left, the next day, he left behind him a check of generous size,
and Chip was not so aloof as he had been with the Little Doctor, and
planned with her at least a dozen pictures which he meant to paint some
time.

There was one which he did paint at once, however--though no one saw it
but Della. It was the picture of a slim young woman with gray eyes and
an old felt hat on her head, standing with her fingers tangled in the
mane of a chestnut horse.

If there was a heartache in the work, if the brush touched the slim
figure caressingly and lingered wistfully upon the face, no one knew but
Chip, and Chip had learned long ago to keep his own counsel. There were
some thoughts which he could not whisper into even Silver's ear.






CHAPTER XVIII. -- Dr. Cecil Granthum.



The Little Doctor leaned from the window and called down the hill to her
recovered patient--more properly, her nearly recovered patient; for Chip
still walked with the aid of a cane, though by making use of only one
stirrup he could ride very well. He limped up the hill to her, and sat
down on the top step of the porch.

“What's the excitement now?” he asked, banteringly.

“I've got the best, the most SPLENDID news--you couldn't guess what in a
thousand years!”

“Then I won't try. It's too hot.” Chip took off his hat and fanned
himself with it.

“Well, can't you LOOK a little bit excited? Try and look the way I feel!
Anybody as cool as you are shouldn't suffer with the heat.”

“I don't know--I get pretty hot, sometimes. Well, what is the most
splendid news? Can't you tell a fellow, after calling him up here in the
hot sun?”

“Well, listen. The Gilroy hospital--you know, where Cecil is”--Chip
knew--“has a case of blighted love and shattered hopes”--Chip's foolish,
man-heart nearly turned a somersault. Was it possible?--“and it's the
luckiest thing ever happened.”

“Yes?” Chip wished to goodness she would get to the point. She could be
direct enough in her statements when what she said was going to hurt a
fellow. His heart was thumping so it hurt him.

“Yes. A doctor there was planning to get married and go away on his
honeymoon, you know--”

Chip nodded, half suffocated with crowding, incredulous hopes.

“Well, and now he isn't. His ladylove was faithless and loves another,
and his honeymoon is indefinitely postponed. Do you see now where the
good news comes in?”

Chip shook his head once and looked away up the grade. Funny, but
something had gone wrong with his throat. He was half choked.

“Well, you ARE dull! Now that fellow isn't going to have any vacation,
so Cecil can come out, right away! Next week! Think of it!”

Chip tried to think of it, but he couldn't think of anything, just then.
He was only conscious of wishing Whizzer had made a finish of the job,
up there on the Hog's Back that day. His heart no longer thumped--it was
throbbing in a tired, listless fashion.

“Why can't you look a little bit pleased?” smiled the torturer from the
window. “You sit there like a--an Indian before a cigar store. You've
just about the same expression.”

“I can't help it. I never was fierce to meet strangers, somehow.”

“Judging from my own experience, I think you are uncommonly fierce at
The principle that neutrals shall also in time of war enjoy the
freedom of the seas extends only to neutral vessels, not to neutral
persons on board enemy ships, since the belligerents are admittedly
justified in hampering enemy traffic at sea as far as lies in their
power. Granted the necessary military power, they can, if deemed
necessary to their ends, forbid enemy merchant vessels to sail the
sea, on pain of instant destruction, as long as they make their
purpose known beforehand so that all, whether enemy or neutral, _are
enabled to avoid risking their lives_. But even where there is doubt
as to the justification of such proceeding, and possible reprisals
threatened by the opposing side, the question would remain one to be
decided between the belligerents themselves alone, they being
admittedly allowed the right of making the high seas a field for their
military operations, of suppressing any interruption of such
operations and supremely determining what measures are to be taken
against enemy ships. The neutrals have in such case no legitimate
claims beyond that of demanding that due notice be given them of
measures contemplated against the enemy, in order that they may
refrain from entrusting their persons or goods to enemy vessels.

The Austrian Government may presumably take it for granted that the
Washington Cabinet agrees with the foregoing views, which the Austrian
Government is fully convinced are altogether unassailable. To deny the
correctness of these views would imply--and this the Union Government
can hardly intend--that neutrals have the right of interfering in the
military operations of the belligerents; indeed, ultimately to
constitute themselves the judges as to what methods may or may not be
employed against an enemy. It would also seem a crying injustice for a
neutral Government, in order merely to secure for its subjects the
right of passage on enemy ships when they might just as well, or
indeed with far greater safety, travel by neutral vessels, to grasp at
the arm of a belligerent Power, fighting perhaps for its very
existence. Not to mention the fact that it would open the way for all
kinds of abuses if a belligerent were forced to lay down arms at the
bidding of any neutral whom it might please to make use of enemy ships
for business or pleasure. No doubt has ever been raised as to the fact
that subjects of neutral states are themselves responsible for any
harm they may incur _by their presence in any territory on land where
military operations are in progress_. Obviously, there is no ground
for establishing another standard for naval warfare, particularly
since the second Peace Conference expressed the wish that, pending the
agreement of rules for naval warfare, the rules observed in warfare
upon land should be applied as far as possible at sea.

From the foregoing it appears that the rule as to warning being given
to the vessel itself before such vessel is sunk is subject to
exceptions of various kinds under certain circumstances, as, for
instance, the cases cited by the Union Government of flight and
resistance, the vessel may be sunk without any warning; in others
warning should be given before the vessel sails. The Austrian
Government may then assert that it is essentially in agreement with
the Union Government as to the protection of neutrals against risk of
life, whatever may be the attitude of the Washington Cabinet towards
some of the separate questions here raised. The Austrian Government
has not only put into practice throughout the war the views it holds
in this respect, but has gone even farther, regulating its actions
with the strictest care according to the theory advanced by the
Washington Cabinet, although its assurance as published only stated
that was "essentially in agreement" with the Union Government's views.
The Austrian Government would be extremely satisfied if the Washington
Cabinet should be inclined to assist it in its endeavours, which are
inspired by the warmest feelings of humanity, to save American
citizens from risk at sea by instructing and warning its subjects in
this direction.

Then, as regards the circular verbal note of February 10 of this year
concerning the treatment of armed enemy merchant vessels, the Austrian
Government must in any case declare itself to be, as indicated in the
foregoing, of the opinion that the arming of trading ships, even when
only for the purpose of avoiding capture, is not justified in modern
international law. The rules provide that a warship is to approach an
enemy merchant vessel in a peaceable manner; it is required to stop
the vessel by means of certain signals, to interview the captain,
examine the ship's papers, enter the particulars in due form and,
where necessary, make an inventory, etc. But in order to comply with
these requirements it must obviously be understood that the warship
has full assurance that the merchant vessel will likewise observe a
peaceable demeanour throughout. And it is clear that no such assurance
can exist when the merchant vessel is so armed as to be capable of
offering resistance to a warship. A warship can hardly be expected to
act in such a manner under the guns of an enemy, whatever may be the
purpose for which the guns were placed on board. Not to speak of the
fact that the merchant vessels of the Entente Powers, despite all
assurances to the contrary, have been proved to be armed for offensive
purposes, and make use of their armament for such purposes. It would
also be to disregard the rights of humanity if the crew of a warship
were expected to surrender to the guns of an enemy without resistance
on their own part. No State can regard its duty to humanity as less
valid in respect of men defending their country than in respect of the
subjects of a foreign Power.

The Austrian Government is therefore of opinion that its former
assurance to the Washington Cabinet could not be held to apply to
armed merchant vessels, since these, according to the legal standards
prevailing, whereby hostilities are restricted to organised military
forces, must be regarded as privateers (freebooters) which are liable
to immediate destruction. History shows us that, according to the
_general_ law of nations, merchant vessels have never been justified
in resisting the exercise by warships of the right of taking prizes.
But even if a standard to this effect could be shown to exist, it
would not mean that the vessels had the right to provide themselves
with guns. It should also be borne in mind that the arming of merchant
ships must necessarily alter the whole conduct of warfare at sea, and
that such alteration cannot correspond to the views of those who seek
to regulate maritime warfare according to the principles of humanity.
As a matter of fact, since the practice of privateering was
discontinued, until a few years back no Power has ever thought of
arming merchant vessels. Throughout the whole proceedings of the
second Peace Conference, which was occupied with all questions of the
laws of warfare at sea, not a single word was ever said about the
arming of merchant ships. Only on one occasion was a casual
observation made with any bearing on this question, and it is
characteristic that it should have been by a British naval officer of
superior rank, who impartially declared: "Lorsqu'un navire de guerre
se propose d'arrêter et de visiter un vaisseau marchand, le
commandant, avant de mettre une embarcation à la mer, fera tirer un
coup de canon. Le coup de canon est la meilleure garantie que l'on
puisse donner. _Les navires de commerce n'ont pas de canons à bord._"
(When a warship intends to stop and board a merchant vessel the
commander, before sending a boat, will fire a gun. The firing of a gun
is the best guarantee that can be given. _Merchant vessels do not
carry guns._)

Nevertheless, Austria-Hungary has in this regard also held by its
assurance; in the circular verbal note referred to neutrals were
cautioned beforehand against entrusting their persons or their goods
on board any armed ship; moreover, the measures announced were not put
into execution at once, but a delay was granted in order to enable
neutrals already on board armed ships to leave the same. And, finally,
the Austro-Hungarian warships are instructed, even in case of
encountering armed enemy merchant vessels, to give warning and to
provide for the safety of those on board, provided it seems possible
to do so in the circumstances.

The statement of the American Ambassador, to the effect that the armed
British steamers _Secondo_ and _Welsh Prince_ were sunk without
warning by Austrian submarines, is based on error. The Austrian
Government has in the meantime received information that no
Austro-Hungarian warships were at all concerned in the sinking of
these vessels.

The Austrian Government has, as in the circular verbal note already
referred to--reverting now to the question of aggravated submarine
warfare referred to in the memorandum--also in its declaration of
January 31 of this year issued a warning to neutrals with
corresponding time limit; indeed, _the whole of the declaration itself
is, from its nature, nothing more or less than a warning to the effect
that no merchant vessel may pass the area of sea expressly defined
therein_. Nevertheless, the Austrian warships have been instructed as
far as possible to warn such merchant vessels as may be encountered in
the area concerned and provide for the safety of passengers and crew.
And the Austrian Government is in the possession of numerous reports
stating that the crews and passengers of vessels destroyed in these
waters have been saved. But the Austrian Government cannot accept any
responsibility for possible loss of human life which may after all
occur in connection with the destruction of armed vessels or vessels
encountered in prohibited areas. Also it may be noted that the
Austro-Hungarian submarines operate only in the Adriatic and
Mediterranean Seas, and there is thus hardly any question as to any
action affecting American interests on the part of Austro-Hungarian
warships.

After all that has been said in the preamble to this Memorandum, it
need hardly be said that the declaration of the waters in question as
a prohibited area is in no way intended as a measure aiming at the
destruction of human life, or even to endangering the same, but that
its object--apart from the higher aims of _relieving humanity from
further suffering by shortening the war_, is only to place Great
Britain and its Allies, who have--without establishing any legally
effective blockade of the coasts of the Central Powers--hindered
traffic by sea between neutrals and these Powers in a like position of
isolation, and render them amenable to a peace with some guarantee of
permanency. That Austria-Hungary here makes use of other methods of
war than her opponents is due mainly to circumstances beyond human
control. But the Austrian Government is conscious of having done all
in its power to avoid loss of human life. _The object aimed at in the
blockading of the Western Powers would be most swiftly and certainly
attained if not a single human life were lost or endangered in those
waters._

To sum up, the Austrian Government may point out that the assurance
given to the Washington Cabinet in the case of the _Ancona_, and
renewed in the case of the _Persia_, is neither withdrawn nor
qualified by its statements of February 10, 1916, and January 31,
1917. Within the limits of this assurance the Austrian Government
will, together with its Allies, continue its endeavours to secure to
the peoples of the world a share in the blessings of peace. If in the
pursuit of this aim--which it may take for granted has the full
sympathy of the Washington Cabinet itself--it should find itself
compelled to impose restrictions on neutral traffic by sea in certain
areas, it will not need so much to point to the behaviour of its
opponents in this respect, which appears by no means an example to be
followed, but rather to the fact that Austria-Hungary, through the
persistence and hatred of its enemies, who are determined upon its
destruction, is brought to a state of self-defence in so desperate
extreme as is unsurpassed in the history of the world. The Austrian
Government is encouraged by the knowledge that the struggle now being
carried on by Austria-Hungary tends not only toward the preservation
of its own vital interests, but also towards the realisation of the
idea of equal rights for all states; and in this last and hardest
phase of the war, which unfortunately calls for sacrifices on the part
of friends as well, it regards it as of supreme importance to confirm
in word and deed the fact that it is guided equally by the laws of
humanity and by the dictates of respect for the dignity and interests
of neutral peoples.


3

=Speech by Dr. Helfferich, Secretary of State, on the Submarine
Warfare=

The _Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung_ of May 1, 1917, gives the
following speech by Dr. Helfferich, Secretary of State, on the
economic effects of the submarine warfare delivered in the principal
committee of the Reichstag on April 28. The speech is here given
verbatim, with the exception of portions containing confidential
statements:

"In the sitting of yesterday a member rightly pointed out that the
technical and economic results of the submarine warfare have been
estimated with caution. In technical respects the caution observed in
estimating the results is plain; the sinkings have, during the first
month, exceeded by nearly a quarter, in the second by nearly half, the
estimated 600,000 tons, and for the present month also we may fairly
cherish the best expectations. The technical success guarantees the
economic success with almost mathematical exactitude. True, the
economic results cannot be so easily expressed numerically and set
down in a few big figures as the technical result in the amount of
tonnage sunk. The economic effects of the submarine warfare are
expressed in many different spheres covering a wide area, where the
enemy seeks to render visibility still more difficult by resorting, so
to speak, to statistical smoke-screens.

"The English statistics to-day are most interesting, one might almost
say, in what they wisely refrain from mentioning. The Secretary of
State for the Navy pointed out yesterday how rapidly the pride of the
British public had faded. The English are now suppressing our reports
on the successes of our submarines and our statements as to submarine
losses; they dare not make public the amount of tonnage sunk, but
mystify the public with shipping statistics which have given rise to
general annoyance in the English Press itself. The English Government
lets its people go on calmly trusting to the myth that instead of six
U-boats sunk there are a hundred at the bottom of the sea. It conceals
from the world also the true course of the entries and departures of
tonnage in British ports since the commencement of unrestricted
submarine warfare. And more than all, the English Government has since
February suppressed most strictly all figures tending to throw light
on the position of the grain market. In the case of the coal exports,
the country of destination is not published. The monthly trade report,
which is usually issued with admirable promptness by the tenth of the
next month or thereabouts, was for February delayed and incomplete;
and for March it has not yet appeared at all. It is to be regretted
that this sudden withdrawal of information makes it more difficult for
us to estimate the effect of our submarine operations, but there is a
gratifying side to the question after all. It is not to be supposed
that England should suddenly become reticent in order to avoid
revealing its strength.

"For the rest, what can be seen is still sufficient to give us an
idea.

"I will commence with the tonnage. You are aware that in the first two
months of the unrestricted submarine warfare more than 1,600,000 tons
were sunk, of which probably considerably over one million tons sailed
under the British flag.

"The estimates as to the quantity of English tonnage at present
available are somewhat divergent; in any case, whether we take the
higher or the lower figures, a loss of more than a million tons in two
months is a thing that England cannot endure for long. And to replace
it, even approximately, by new building, is out of the question. In
the year 1914 England's newly-built ships gave a tonnage increment of
1,600,000; in 1915 it was 650,000 tons, in 1916 only 580,000, despite
all efforts. And the normal loss of the British merchant fleet in
peace time amounts to between 700,000 and 800,000 tons. It is hopeless
to think of maintaining equilibrium by urging on the building of new
vessels.

"The attempts which are made to enlist the neutral tonnage in British
service by a system of rewards and punishments may here and there, to
the ultimate disadvantage of the neutrals themselves, have met with
some success, but even so, the neutrals must consider the need for
preserving a merchant fleet themselves for peace time, so that there
is a narrow limit to what can be attained in this manner. Even in
January of this year about 30 per cent. of the shipping entries into
British ports were under foreign flags. I have heard estimates brought
up to 80 per cent. in order to terrify the neutrals; if but 50 per
cent. of this be correct it means a decrease in British shipping
traffic of roughly one-sixth. Counting tonnage sunk and tonnage
frightened off, the arrivals at British ports have been reduced, at a
low estimate, by one-fourth, and probably by as much as one-third, as
against January. In January arrivals amounted to 2.2 million net tons.
I may supplement the incomplete English statistics by the information
that in March the arrivals were only 1.5 to 1.6 million tons net, and
leave it to Mr. Carson to refute this. The 1.5 to 1.6 million tons
represent, compared with the average entries in peace time, amounting
to 4.2 millions, not quite 40 per cent. This low rate will be further
progressively reduced. Lloyd George at the beginning of the war
reckoned on the last milliard. Those days are now past. Then he based
his plans on munitions. England has here, with the aid of America,
achieved extraordinary results. But the Somme and Arras showed that,
even with those enormous resources, England was not able to beat us.
Now, in his greeting to the American Allies, Lloyd George cries out:
'Ships, ships, and yet more ships.' And this time he is on the right
tack; it is on ships that the fate of the British world-empire will
depend.

"The Americans, too, have understood this. They propose to build a
thousand wooden vessels of 3,000 tons. But before these can be brought
into action they will, I confidently hope, have nothing left to save.

"I base this confidence upon the indications which are visible,
despite the English policy of suppression and concealment.

"Take the total British trade. The figures for March are still not yet
available, but those for February tell us enough.

"British imports amounted in January of this year to 90 million pounds
sterling, in February to only 70 million; the exports have gone down
from 46 to 37 millions sterling--imports and exports together showing
a decline of over 20 per cent. in the first month of the submarine
warfare. And again, the rise in prices all round has, since the
commencement of the U-boat war, continued at a more rapid rate, so
that the decline in the import quantity from one month to another may
fairly be estimated at 25 per cent. The figures for imports and
exports, then, confirm my supposition as to the decrease of tonnage in
the traffic with British ports.

"The British Government has endeavoured, by the strictest measures
rigorously prohibiting import of less important articles, to ward off
the decline in the quantity of vital necessaries imported. The attempt
can only partially succeed.

"In 1916, out of a total import quantity of 42 million tons, about 31
millions fall to three important groups alone, viz., foodstuffs and
luxuries, timber, and iron ore; all other goods, including important
war materials, such as other ores and metals, petroleum, cotton and
wool, rubber, only 11 million tons, or roughly one-fourth. A decline
of one-fourth, then, as brought about by the first month of
unrestricted submarine warfare, must affect articles indispensable to
life and to the purposes of war.

"The decline in the imports in February, 1917, as against February,
1916, appears as follows:

"Wool 17 per cent., cotton 27 per cent., flax 38 per cent., hemp 48
per cent., jute 74 per cent., woollen materials 83 per cent., copper
and copper ore 49 per cent., iron and steel 59 per cent. As to the
imports of iron ore I will give more detailed figures:

"Coffee 66 per cent., tea 41 per cent., raw sugar 10 per cent.,
refined sugar 90 per cent., bacon 17 per cent., butter 21 per cent.,
lard 21 per cent., eggs 39 per cent., timber 42 per cent.

"The only increases worth noting are in the case of leather, hides,
rubber and tin.

"As regards the group in which we are most interested, the various
sorts of grain, no figures for quantities have been given from
February onwards.

"The mere juxtaposition of two comparable values naturally gives no
complete idea of the facts. It should be borne in mind that the
commencement of the unrestricted U-boat campaign came at a time when
the economical position of England was not normal, but greatly
weakened already by two and a half years of war. A correct judgment
will, then, only be possible when we take into consideration the
entire development of the imports during the course of the war.

"I will here give only the most important figures.

"In the case of iron ore, England has up to now maintained its
position better than in other respects.

"Imports amounted in 1913 to 7.4 million tons.

"In 1916 to 6.9 million tons.

"January, 1913, 689,000 tons; February, 1913, 658,000 tons.

"January, 1916, 526,000 tons; February, 1916, 404,000 tons.

"January, 1917, 512,000 tons; February, 1917, 508,000 tons.

"Here again comparison with the peace year 1913 shows for the months
of January and February a not inconsiderable decrease, though the
imports, especially in February, 1917, were in excess of those for the
same month in 1916.

  "Timber imports, 1913, 10.1 million loads.
     "       "     1916,  5.9    "      "
     "   February, 1913, 406,000 loads.
     "       "     1916, 286,000   "
     "       "     1917, 167,000   "

"As regards mining timber especially, the import of which fell from
3.5 million loads in 1913 to 2.0 million in 1916, we have here
December, 1916, and January, 1917, with 102,000 and 107,000 loads as
the lowest import figures given since the beginning of 1913; a
statement for the import of mining timber is missing for February.

"Before turning to the import of foodstuffs a word may be said as to
the export of coal.

"The total export of coal has decreased from 78 million tons in 1913
to 461/2 million tons in 1915; in 1916 only about 42 million tons were
exported. In December, 1916, the export quantity fell for the first
time below 3 million tons, having remained between 3.2 and 3.9 million
tons during the months from January to November, 1916. In January,
1917, a figure of 3.5 million tons was again reached; it is the more
significant, therefore, that the coal export, which from the nature of
the case exhibits only slight fluctuations from month to month, falls
again in February, 1917, to 2.9 million tons (as against 3.4 million
tons in February of the year before), thus almost reaching once more
to the lowest point hitherto recorded--that of December, 1916. And it
should be remembered that here, as in the case of all other exports,
sunk transports are included in the English statistics.

"Details as to the destination of exported coal have since the
beginning of this year been withheld. England is presumably desirous
of saving the French and Italians the further distress of reading for
the future in black and white the calamitous decline in their coal
supply. The serious nature of this decline, even up to the end of
1916, may be seen from the following figures:

"England's coal export to France amounted in December, 1916, to only
1,128,000 tons, as against 1,269,000 tons in January of the same year;
the exports to Italy in December, 1916, amounted only to 278,000 tons,
as against 431,000 tons in January, and roughly 800,000 tons monthly
average for the peace year 1913.

"As to the further development since the end of February, I am able to
give some interesting details. Scotland's coal export in the first
week of April was 103,000 tons, as against 194,000 tons the previous
year; from the beginning of the year 1,783,000 tons, as against
2,486,000 tons the previous year. From this it is easy to see how the
operations of the U-boats are striking at the root of railway and war
industries in the countries allied with England.

"Lloyd George, in a great speech made on January 22 of this year,
showed the English how they could protect themselves against the
effects of submarine warfare by increased production in their own
country. The practicability and effectiveness of his counsels are more
than doubtful. He makes no attempt, however, to instruct his Allies
how they are to protect themselves against the throttling of the coal
supply.

"I come now to the most important point: _the position of England with
regard to its food supply_.

"First of all I would give a few brief figures by way of calling to
mind the degree to which England is dependent upon supplies of
foodstuffs from overseas.

"The proportion of imports in total British consumption averaged
during the last years of peace as follows:

"Bread-corn, close on 80 per cent.

"Fodder-grain (barley, oats, maize), which can be utilised as
substitutes for, and to supplement, the bread-corn, 50 per cent.;
meat, over 40 per cent.; butter, 60-65 per cent. The sugar
consumption, failing any home production at all, must be entirely
covered by imports from abroad.

"I would further point out that our U-boats, inasmuch as concerns the
food situation in England, are operating under quite exceptionally
favourable conditions; the world's record harvest of 1915 has been
followed by the world's worst harvest of 1916, representing a loss of
45-50 million tons of bread and fodder-grain. The countries hardest
hit are those most favourably situated, from the English point of
view, in North America. The effects are now--the rich stocks from the
former harvest having been consumed--becoming more evident every day
and everywhere. The Argentine has put an embargo on exports of grain.
As to the condition of affairs in the United States, this may be seen
from the following figures:

"The Department of Agriculture estimates the stocks of wheat still in
the hands of the farmer on March 1, 1917, at 101 million bushels, or
little over 21/2 million tons. The stocks for the previous year on that
date amounted to 241 million bushels. Never during the whole of the
time I have followed these figures back have the stocks been so low or
even nearly so. The same applies to stocks of maize. Against a supply
of 1,138,000 bushels on March 1, 1916, we have for this year only
789,000 bushels.

"The extraordinary scarcity of supplies is nearing the panic limit.
The movement of prices during the last few weeks is simply fantastic.
Maize, which was noted in Chicago at the beginning of January, 1917,
at 95 cents, rose by the end of April to 127 cents, and by April 25
had risen further to 148 cents. Wheat in New York, which stood at 871/4
cents in July, 1914, and by the beginning of 1917 had already risen to
1911/2 cents, rose at the beginning of April to 229 cents, and was noted
at no less than 281 on April 2. This is three and a half times the
peace figure! In German currency at normal peace time exchange, these
281 cents represent about 440 marks per ton, or, at present rate of
exchange for dollars, about 580 marks per ton.

"That, then, is the state of affairs in the country which is to help
England in the war of starvation criminally begun by itself!

"In England no figures are now made public as to imports and stocks of
grain. I can, however, state as follows:

"On the last date for which stocks were noted, January 13, 1917,
England's visible stocks of wheat amounted to 5.3 million quarters, as
against 6.3 and 5.9 million quarters in the two previous years. From
January to May and June there is, as a rule, a marked decline in the
stocks, and even in normal years the imports during these months do
not cover the consumption. In June, 1914 and 1915, the visible stocks
amounted only to about 2 million quarters, representing the
requirements for scarcely three weeks.

"We have no reason to believe that matters have developed more
favourably during the present year. This is borne out by the import
figures for January--as published. The imports of bread-corn and
fodder-grain--I take them altogether, as in the English regulations
for eking out supplies--amounted only to 12.6 million quarters, as
against 19.8 and 19.2 in the two previous years.

"For February the English statistics show an increase in the import
value of unstated import quantity of all grain of 50 per cent., as
against February, 1916. This gives, taking the distribution among the
various sorts of grain as similar to that of January, and reckoning
with the rise in prices since, about the same import quantity as in
the previous year. But in view of the great decrease in American grain
shipments and the small quantity which can have come from India and
Australia the statement is hardly credible. We may take it that March
has brought a further decline, and that to-day, when we are nearing
the time of the three-week stocks, the English supplies are lower than
in the previous years.

"The English themselves acknowledge this. Lloyd George stated in
February that the English grain supplies were lower than ever within
the memory of man. A high official in the English Ministry of
Agriculture, Sir Ailwyn Fellowes, speaking in April at an agricultural
congress, added that owing to the submarine warfare, which was an
extremely serious peril to England, the state of affairs had grown far
worse even than then.

"Captain Bathurst, of the British Food Controller's Department
(_Kriegsernährungsamt_), stated briefly on April 19 that the then
consumption of breadstuffs was 50 per cent. in excess of the present
_and prospective_ supplies. It would be necessary to reduce the
consumption of bread by fully a third in order to make ends meet.

"Shortly before, Mr. Wallhead, a delegate from Manchester, at a
conference of the Independent Labour Party in Leeds had stated that,
according to his information, England would in six to eight weeks be
in a complete state of famine.

"The crisis in which England is placed--and we can fairly call it a
crisis now--is further aggravated by the fact that the supplies of
other important foodstuffs have likewise taken an unfavourable turn.

"The import of meat in February, 1917, shows the lowest figures for
many years, with the single exception of September, 1914.

"The marked falling off in the butter imports--February, 1917, showing
only half as much as in the previous year--is not nearly
counterbalanced by the margarine which England is making every effort
to introduce.

"The import of lard also, most of which comes from the United States,
shows a decline, owing to the poor American crops of fodder-stuffs.
The price of lard in Chicago has risen from 151/2 cents at the beginning
of January, 1917, to 211/2 cents on April 25, and the price of pigs in
the same time from 9.80 to 16.50 dollars.

"Most serious of all, however, is the shortage of potatoes, which at
present is simply catastrophic. The English crop was the worst for a
generation past. The imports are altogether insignificant. Captain
Bathurst stated on April 19 that in about four weeks the supplies of
potatoes in the country would be entirely exhausted.

"The full seriousness of the case now stares English statesmen in the
face. Up to now they have believed it possible to exorcise the danger
by voluntary economies. Now they find themselves compelled to have
recourse to compulsory measures. I believe it is too late."

The Secretary of State then gives a detailed account of the measures
taken up to date in England for dealing with the food question, and
thereafter continues:

"On March 22 again the English food dictator, Lord Devonport, stated
in the House of Lords that a great reduction in the consumption of
bread would be necessary, but that it would be _a national disaster_
if England should have to resort to compulsion.

"His representative, Bathurst, stated at the same time: 'We do not
wish to introduce _so un-English a system_. In the first place,
because we believe that the patriotism of the people can be trusted to
assist us in our endeavours towards economy, and, further, because, as
we can see from the example of Germany, the compulsory system promises
no success; finally, because such a system would necessitate a too
complicated administrative machinery and too numerous staffs of men
and women whose services could be better employed elsewhere.'

"Meantime the English Government has, on receipt of the latest
reports, decided to adopt this un-English system which has proved a
failure in Germany, declaring now that the entire organisation for the
purpose is in readiness.

"I have still something further to say about the vigorous steps now
being taken in England to further the progress of agriculture in the
country itself. I refrain from going into this, however, as the
measures in question cannot come to anything by next harvest time, nor
can they affect that harvest at all. The winter deficiency can hardly
be balanced, even with the greatest exertions, by the spring. Not
until the 1918 crop, if then, can any success be attained. And between
then and now lies a long road, a road of suffering for England, and
for all countries dependent upon imports for their food supply.

"Everything points to the likelihood that the universal failure of the
harvest in 1916 will be followed by a like universal failure in 1917.
In the United States the official reports of acreage under crops are
worse than ever, showing 63.4, against 78.3 the previous year. The
winter wheat is estimated at only 430 million bushels, as against 492
million bushels for the previous year and 650 million bushels for
1915.

"The prospects, then, for the next year's harvest are poor indeed, and
offer no hope of salvation to our enemies.

"As to our own outlook, this is well known to those present: short,
but safe--for we can manage by ourselves. And to-day we can say that
the war of starvation, that crime against humanity, has turned against
those who commenced it. We hold the enemy in an iron grip. No one can
save them from their fate. Not even the apostles of humanity across
the great ocean, who are now commencing to protect the smaller nations
by a blockade of our neutral neighbours through prohibition of
exports, and seeking thus to drive them, under the lash of starvation,
into entering into the war against us.

"Our enemies are feeling the grip of the fist that holds them by the
neck. They are trying to force a decision. England, mistress of the
seas, is seeking to attain its end by land, and driving her sons by
hundreds of thousands to death and mutilation. Is this the England
that was to have sat at ease upon its island till we were starved into
submission, that could wait till their big brother across the Atlantic
arrived on the scene with ships and million armies, standing fast in
crushing superiority until the last annihilating battle?

"No, gentlemen, our enemies have no longer time to wait. Time is on
our side now. True, the test imposed upon us by the turn of the
world's history is enormous. What our troops are doing to help, what
our young men in blue are doing, stands far above all comparison. But
they will attain their end. For us at home, too, it is hard; not so
hard by far as for them out there, yet hard enough. Those at home must
do their part as well. If we remain true to ourselves, keeping our own
house in order, maintaining internal unity, then we have won existence
and the future for our Fatherland. Everything is at stake. The German
people is called upon now, in these weeks heavy with impending
decision, to show that it is worthy of continued existence."


4

=Speech by Count Czernin to the Austrian Delegation, January 24,
1918.=

"Gentlemen, it is my duty to give you a true picture of the peace
negotiations, to set forth the various phases of the results obtained
up to now, and to draw therefrom such conclusions as are true, logical
and justifiable.

"First of all it seems to me that those who consider the progress of
the negotiations too slow cannot have even an approximate idea of the
difficulties which we naturally had to encounter at every step. I will
in my remarks take the liberty of setting forth these difficulties,
but would like first to point out a cardinal difference existing
between the peace negotiations in Brest-Litovsk and all others which
have ever taken place in the history of the world. Never, so far as I
am aware, have peace negotiations been conducted with open windows. It
would be impossible that negotiations of the depth and extent of the
present could from the start proceed smoothly and without opposition.
We are faced with nothing less than the task of building up a new
world, of restoring all that the most merciless of all wars has
destroyed and cast down. In all the peace negotiations we know of the
various phases have been conducted more or less behind closed doors,
the results being first declared to the world when the whole was
completed. All history books tell us, and indeed it is obvious enough,
that the toilsome path of such peace negotiations leads constantly
over hill and dale, the prospects appearing often more or less
favourable day by day. But when the separate phases themselves, the
details of each day's proceedings, are telegraphed all over the world
at the time, it is again obvious that nervousness prevailing
throughout the world must act like an electric current and excite
public opinion accordingly. We were fully aware of the disadvantage of
this method of proceeding. Nevertheless we at once agreed to the wish
of the Russian Government in respect of this publicity, desiring to
meet them as far as possible, and also because we had nothing to
conceal on our part, and because it would have made an unfavourable
impression if we had stood firmly by the methods hitherto pursued, of
secrecy until completion. _But the complete publicity in the
negotiations makes it insistent that the great public, the country
behind, and above all the leaders, must keep cool._ The match must be
played out in cold blood, and the end will be satisfactory if the
peoples of the Monarchy support their representatives at the
conference.

"It should be stated beforehand that the basis on which
Austria-Hungary treats with the various newly-constituted Russian
states is that of 'no indemnities and no annexations.' That is the
programme which a year ago, shortly after my appointment as Minister,
I put before those who wished to talk of peace, and which I repeated
to the Russian leaders on the occasion of their first offers of peace.
And I have not deviated from that programme. Those who believe that I
am to be turned from the way which I have set myself to follow are
poor psychologists. I have never left the public in the slightest
doubt as to which way I intended to go, and I have never allowed
myself to be turned aside so much as a hair's breadth from that way,
either to right or left. And I have since become far from a favourite
of the Pan-Germans and of those in the Monarchy who follow the
Pan-German ideas. I have at the same time been hooted as an inveterate
partisan of war by those whose programme is peace at any price, as
innumerable letters have informed me. Neither has ever disturbed me;
on the contrary, the double insults have been my only comfort in this
serious time. I declare now once again that I ask not a single
kreuzer, not a single square metre of land from Russia, and that if
Russia, as appears to be the case, takes the same point of view, then
peace must result. Those who wish for peace at any price might
entertain some doubt as to my 'no-annexation' intentions towards
Russia if I did not tell them to their faces with the same complete
frankness that I shall never assent to the conclusion of a peace going
beyond the lines just laid down. If the Russian delegates demand any
surrender of territory on our part, or any war indemnity, then I shall
continue the war, despite the fact that I am as anxious for peace as
they, or I would resign if I could not attain the end I seek.

"This once said, and emphatically asserted, that there is no ground
for the pessimistic anticipation of the peace falling through, since
the negotiating committees are agreed on the basis of no annexations
or indemnities--and nothing but new instructions from the various
Russian Governments, or their disappearance, could shift that basis--I
then pass to the two great difficulties in which are contained the
reasons why the negotiations have not proceeded as quickly as we all
wished.

"The first difficulty is this: that we are not dealing with _a single_
Russian peace delegation, but with various newly-formed Russian
states, whose spheres of action are as yet by no means definitely
fixed or explained among themselves. We have to reckon with the
following: firstly, the Russia which is administered from St.
Petersburg; secondly, our new neighbour proper, the great State of
Ukraine; thirdly, Finland; and, fourthly, the Caucasus.

"With the first two of these states we are treating directly; that is
to say, face to face; with the two others it was at first in a more or
less indirect fashion, as they had not sent any representative to
Brest-Litovsk. We have then four Russian parties, and four separate
Powers on our own side to meet them. The case of the Caucasus, with
which we ourselves have, of course, no direct questions to settle, but
which, on the other hand, is in conflict with Turkey, will serve to
show the extent of the matter to be debated.

"The point in which we ourselves are most directly interested is that
of the great newly-established state upon our frontiers, Ukraine. In
the course of the proceedings we have already got well ahead with this
delegation. We are agreed upon the aforementioned basis of no
indemnities and no annexations, and have in the main arrived at a
settlement on the point that trade relations are to be re-established
with the new republic, as also on the manner of so doing. But this
very case of the Ukraine illustrates one of the prevailing
difficulties. While the Ukraine Republic takes up the position of
being entirely autonomous and justified in treating independently with
ourselves, the Russian delegation insists that the boundaries between
their territory and that of the Ukraine are not yet definitely fixed,
and that Petersburg is therefore able to claim the right of taking
part in our deliberations with the Ukraine, which claim is not
admitted by the members of the Ukraine delegation themselves. This
unsettled state of affairs in the internal conditions of Russia,
however, gave rise to very serious delays. We have got over these
difficulties, and I hope that in a few days' time we shall be able
once more to resume negotiations.

"As to the position to-day, I cannot say what this may be. I received
yesterday from my representative at Brest-Litovsk the following two
telegrams:

"'Herr Joffe has this evening, in his capacity as President of the
Russian Delegation, issued a circular letter to the delegations of the
four allied Powers in which he states that the Workers' and Peasants'
Government of the Ukrainian Republic has decided to send two delegates
to Brest-Litovsk with instructions to take part in the peace
negotiations on behalf of the central committee of the workers',
soldiers' and peasants' councils of Pan-Ukraine, but also to form a
supplementary part of the _Russian_ delegation itself. Herr Joffe adds
with regard to this that the Russian delegation is prepared to receive
these Ukrainian representatives among themselves. The above statement
is supplemented by a copy of a "declaration" dated from Kharkov,
addressed to the President of the Russian Peace Delegation at Brest,
and emanating from the Workers' and Peasants' Government of the
Ukrainian Republic, proclaiming that the Central Rada at Kiev only
represents the propertied classes, and is consequently incapable of
acting on behalf of the entire Ukrainian people. The Ukrainian
Workers' and Peasants' Government declares that it cannot acknowledge
any decisions arrived at by the delegates of the Central Rada at Kiev
without its participation, but has nevertheless decided to send
representatives to Brest-Litovsk, there to participate as a
supplementary fraction of the Russian Delegation, which they recognise
as the accredited representatives of the Federative Government of
Russia.'

"Furthermore: 'The German translation of the Russian original text of
the communication received yesterday evening from Herr Joffe regarding
the delegates of the Ukrainian Government at Kharkov and the two
appendices thereto runs as follows:

"'To the President of the Austro-Hungarian Peace Delegation.

"'Sir,--In forwarding you herewith a copy of a declaration received by
me from the delegates of the Workers' and Peasants' Government of the
Ukrainian Republic, W.M. Schachrai and J.G. Medwjedew, and their
mandates, I have the honour to inform you that the Russian Delegation,
in full agreement with its frequently repeated acknowledgment of the
right of self-determination among all peoples--including naturally the
Ukrainian--sees nothing to hinder the participation of the
representatives of the Workers' and Peasants' Government of the
Ukrainian Republic in the peace negotiations, and receives them,
according to their wish, among the personnel of the Russian Peace
Delegation, as accredited representatives of the Workers' and
Peasants' Government of the Ukrainian Republic. In bringing this to
your knowledge, I beg you, sir, to accept the expression of my most
sincere respect.--The President of the Russian Peace Delegation:
A. JOFFE.'

"'Appendix 1. To the President of the Peace Delegation of the Russian
Republic. Declaration.

"'We, the representatives of the Workers' and Peasants' Government of
the Ukrainian Republic, People's Commissary for Military Affairs, W.M.
Schachrai, and the President of the Pan-Ukrainian Central Executive
Committee of the Council of the Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants'
Deputation, J.G. Medwjedew, delegated to proceed to Brest-Litovsk for
the purpose of conducting peace negotiations with the representatives
of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey, in full agreement
with the representatives of the Workers' and Peasants' Government of
the Russian Federative Republic, thereby understood the Council of
People's Commissaries, hereby declare as follows: The General
Secretariat of the Ukrainian Central Rada can in no case be
acknowledged as representing the entire Ukrainian people. In the name
of the Ukrainian workers, soldiers and peasants, we declare
categorically that all resolutions formed by the General Secretariat
without our assent will not be accepted by the Ukrainian people,
cannot be carried out, and can in no case be realised.

"'In full agreement with the Council of People's Commissaries, and
thus also with the Delegation of the Russian Workers' and Peasants'
Government, we shall for the future undertake the conduct of the peace
negotiations with the Delegation of the four Powers, together with the
Russian Peace Delegation.

"'And we now bring to the knowledge of the President the following
resolution, passed by the Central Executive Committee of the
Pan-Ukrainian Council of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Deputies,
on the 30th December, 1917/12th January, 1918:

"'The Central Committee has decided: To delegate Comrade Medwjedew,
President of the Central Executive Committee, and People's Secretary
Satonski and Commissary Schachrai, to take part in the peace
negotiations, instructing them at the same time to declare
categorically that all attempts of the Ukrainian Central Rada to act
in the name of the Ukrainian people are to be regarded as _arbitrary
steps_ on the part of the bourgeois group of the Ukrainian population,
against the will and interests of the working classes of the Ukraine,
and that no resolutions formed by the Central Rada will be
acknowledged either by the Ukrainian Soviet Government or by the
Ukrainian people; that the Ukrainian Workers' and Peasants' Government
regards the Council of People's Commissaries as representatives of the
Pan-Russian Soviet Government, and as accordingly entitled to act on
behalf of the entire Russian Federation; and that the delegation of
the Ukrainian Workers' and Peasants' Government, sent out for the
purpose of exposing the arbitrary steps of the Ukrainian Central Rada,
will act together with and in full agreement with the Pan-Russian
Delegation.

"'Herewith: The mandate issued by the People's Secretariat of the
Ukrainian Workers' and Peasants' Republic, 30th December, 1917.

"'Note: People's Secretary for Enlightenment of the People, Wladimir
Petrowitch Satonski, was taken ill on the way, and did not therefore
arrive with us.

"'January, 1918.

"'The President of the Central Executive Committee of the Ukrainian
Council of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Deputies, E. Medwjedew.

"'The People's Commissary for Military Affairs, Schachrai.

"'A true copy of the original.

"'The Secretary of the Peace Delegation, Leo Karachou.'

"Appendix 2.

"'On the resolution of the Central Executive Committee of the Council
of Workers', Peasants' and Soldiers' Deputies of Ukraina, the People's
Secretariat of the Ukrainian Republic hereby appoints, in the name of
the Workers' and Peasants' Government of Ukraina, the President of the
Central Executive Committee of the Council of Workers', Soldiers' and
Peasants' Deputies of Ukraina, Jesim Gregoriewitch Medwjedew, the
People's Secretary for Military Affairs, Wasili Matwjejewitch
Schachrai, and the People's Secretary for Enlightenment of the People,
Wladimir Petrowitch Satonski, in the name of the Ukrainian People's
Republic, to take part in the negotiations with the Governments of
Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria as to the terms of peace
between the mentioned states and the Russian Federative Republic. With
this end in view the mentioned deputies, Jesim Gregoriewitch
Medwjedew, Wasili Matwjejewitch Schachrai and Wladimir Petrowitch
Satonski are empowered, in all cases where they deem it necessary, to
issue declarations and to sign documents in the name of the Workers'
and Peasants' Government of the Ukrainian Republic. The accredited
representatives of the Ukrainian Workers' and Peasants' Government are
bound to act throughout in accordance with the actions of the
accredited representatives of the Workers' and Peasants' Government of
the Russian Federative Republic, whereby is understood the Council of
People's Commissaries.

"'In the name of the Workers' and Peasants' Government of the
Ukrainian People's Republic, the People's Secretary for International
Affairs, for Internal Affairs, Military Affairs, Justice, Works,
Commissariat.

"'The Manager of the Secretariat.

"'Kharkov, 30th December, 1917/12th January, 1918.

"'In accordance with the copy.

"'The President of the Russian Peace Delegation, A. Joffe.'

"This is at any rate a new difficulty, since we cannot and will not
interfere in the internal affairs of Russia.

"This once disposed of, however, there will be no further difficulties
to encounter here; we shall, in agreement with the Ukrainian Republic
determine that _the old boundaries between Austria-Hungary and the
former Russia will also be maintained as between ourselves and the
Ukraine._


=Poland=

"As regards Poland, the frontiers of which, by the way, have not yet
been exactly determined, _we want nothing at all from this new state_.
Free and uninfluenced, the population of Poland shall choose its own
fate. For my part I attach no great weight to the _form_ of the
people's vote in this respect; _the more surely it expresses the
general wish of the people, the better I shall be pleased_. For I
desire only the _voluntary_ attachment of Poland; only in the express
_wish_ of Poland itself toward that end can I see any guarantee for
lasting harmony. It is my unalterable conviction that _the Polish
question must not be allowed to delay the signing of peace by a single
day_. If, after peace is arrived at, Poland should wish to approach
us, we will not reject its advances--_the Polish question must not and
shall not endanger the peace itself_.

"I should have been glad if _the Polish Government had been able to
take part in the negotiations_, since in my opinion Poland is _an
independent state_. The Petersburg Government, however, takes the
attitude that the present Polish Government is not entitled to speak
in the name of the country, and does not acknowledge it as competent
to represent the country, and we therefore gave way on this point in
order to avoid possible conflict. The question is certainly one of
importance, but it is more important still in my opinion _to set aside
all difficulties likely to delay the negotiations_.


=German-Russian Differences as to the Occupied Areas=

"The second difficulty to be reckoned with, and one which has been
most widely echoed in the Press, is the _difference of opinion between
our German allies and the Petersburg Government_ anent the
interpretation of _the right of self-determination among the Russian
peoples_; that is to say, in the areas occupied by German troops.
Germany maintains that it _does not aim at any annexation of territory
by force_ from Russia, but, briefly stated, the difference of opinion
is a double one.

"In the first place, Germany rightly maintains that _the numerous
expressions of desire for independence_ on the part of _legislative
corporations, communal representations_, etc., in the occupied areas
should be taken as the _provisional_ basis for the will of the people,
to be _later_ tested by _plebiscite on a broader foundation_, a point
of view which the Russian Government at first was indisposed to agree
to, as it did not consider the existing administrations in Courland
and Lithuania entitled to speak for those provinces any more than in
the case of Poland.

"In the second place, Russia demands that this plebiscite shall take
place _after all German troops and officials have been withdrawn from
the occupied provinces_, while Germany, in reply to this, points out
that if this principle were carried to its utmost limits it would
create a vacuum, which could not fail to bring about at once a state
of complete anarchy and the utmost misery. It should here be noted
that everything in these provinces which to-day renders possible the
life of a state at all is _German property_. Railways, posts and
telegraphs, the entire industry, and moreover the entire
administrative machinery, police, law courts, all are in German hands.
The sudden withdrawal of all this apparatus would, in fact, create a
condition of things which seems _practically impossible to maintain_.

"In both cases it is a question of finding a _middle way_, which
moreover _must be found_.

"_The differences between these two points of view are in my opinion
not great enough to justify failure of the negotiations_.

"But such negotiations cannot be settled from one day to another; they
take time.

"_If once we have attained peace with Russia, then in my opinion the
general peace cannot be long delayed_, despite all efforts on the part
of the Western Entente statesmen. I have learned that some are unable
to understand why I stated in my first speech after the resumption of
negotiations that it was not now a question at Brest of a general
peace, but of a _separate peace with Russia_. This was the necessary
recognition of a plain fact, which Herr Trotski also has admitted
without reserve, and it was necessary, since the negotiations would
have been on a different footing--that is to say, _in a more limited
sphere_--if treating with Russia alone than if it were a case of
treating for a general peace.

"Though I have no illusions in the direction of expecting the fruit of
general peace to ripen in a single night, I am nevertheless convinced
that the fruit _has begun to ripen_, and that it is now only a
question of holding out whether we are to obtain a general honourable
peace or not.


=Wilson's Message=

"I have recently been confirmed in this view by the offer of peace put
forward by the President of the United States of America to the whole
world. This is _an offer of peace_, for in fourteen points Mr. Wilson
sets forth the principles upon which he seeks to establish a general
peace. Obviously, an offer of this nature cannot be expected to
furnish a scheme acceptable in every detail. If that were the case,
then negotiations would be superfluous altogether, and peace could be
arrived at by a simple acceptance, a single assent. This, of course,
is not so.

"_But I have no hesitation in declaring that these last proposals on
the part of President Wilson seem to me considerably nearer the
Austro-Hungarian point of view_, and that there are among his
proposals some which we can even agree to _with great pleasure_.

"If I may now be allowed to go further into these proposals, I must,
to begin with, point out two things:

"So far as the proposals are concerned with _our Allies_--mention is
made of the German possession of _Belgium_ and of the _Turkish
Empire_--I declare that, in fulfilment of our duty to our Allies, I am
firmly determined _to hold out in defence of our Allies to the very
last. The pre-war possessions of our Allies we will defend equally
with our own_. This standpoint is that of all four Allies in complete
reciprocity with ourselves.

"In the second place, I have to point out that I must _politely but
definitely decline_ to consider the Point dealing with our internal
Government. We have in Austria _a parliament elected by general,
equal, direct and secret ballot_. There is not a more democratic
parliament in the world, and this parliament, together with the other
constitutionally admissible factors, has the sole right to decide upon
matters of _Austrian internal affairs_. I speak of _Austria_ only,
because I do not refer to _Hungarian_ internal affairs in the
_Austrian Delegation_. I should not consider it constitutional to do
so. _And we do not interfere in American affairs; but, on the other
hand, we do not wish for any foreign guidance from any state
whatever._ Having said this, I may be permitted, with regard to the
remaining Points, to state as follows:

"As to the Point dealing with the abolition of 'secret diplomacy' and
the introduction of full openness in the negotiations, I have nothing
to say. From my point of view I have _no objection to such public
negotiations so long as full reciprocity_ is the basis of the same,
though I do entertain _considerable doubt_ as to whether, all things
considered, _it is the quickest and most practical method_ of arriving
at a result. Diplomatic negotiations are simply a matter of business.
But it might easily be imagined that in the case, for instance, of
commercial treaties between one country and another it would not be
advisable _to publish incomplete results beforehand_ to the world. In
such negotiations both parties naturally commence by setting their
demands as high as possible in order to climb down gradually, using
this or that expressed demand as matter for _compensation in_ other
ways until finally an _equilibrium of the opposing interests is
arrived at_, a point which must necessarily be reached if agreement is
to be come to at all. If such negotiations were to be carried on with
full publicity, nothing could prevent the general public from
passionately defending every separate clause involved, regarding any
concession as a defeat, even when such clauses had only been advanced
_for tactical reasons_. And when the public takes up any such point
with particular fervour, ultimate agreement may be thereby rendered
impossible or the final agreement may, if arrived at, be regarded as
in itself _a defeat_, possibly by both sides. And this would not
conduce to peaceable relations thereafter; it would, on the contrary,
_increase the friction_ between the states concerned. And as in the
case of commercial treaties, so also with _political_ negotiations,
which deal with political matters.

"If the abolition of secret diplomacy is to mean that _no secret
compacts are to be made_, that no agreements are to be entered upon
without the public knowledge, then I have no objection to the
introduction of this principle. As to how it is to be realised and
adherence thereto ensured, I confess I have no idea at all. Granted
that the governments of two countries are agreed, they will always be
able to make a secret compact without the public being aware of the
fact. These, however, are minor points. I am not one to stick by
formalities, and _a question of more or less formal nature will never
prevent me from coming to a sensible arrangement_.

"Point 1, then, is one that can be discussed.

"Point 2 is concerned with the _freedom of the seas_. In this
postulate the President speaks from the hearts of all, and I can here
_fully and completely share America's desire_, the more so as the
President adds the words, 'outside territorial waters'--that is to
say, we are to understand the freedom of _the open sea_, and there is
thus, of course, no question of any interference by force in the
sovereign rights of our faithful _Turkish_ Allies. Their standpoint in
this respect will be ours.

"Point 3, which is definitely directed against any _future economic
war_, is so right, so sensible, and has so often been craved by
ourselves that I have here again nothing to remark.

"Point 4, which demands _general disarmament_, sets forth in
particularly clear and lucid form the necessity of reducing after this
present war the free competition in armaments to a footing sufficient
for the _internal security_ of states. Mr. Wilson states this frankly
and openly. In my speech at Budapest some months back I ventured to
express the same idea; it forms _part of my political creed_, and I
am most happy to find any other voice uttering the same thought.

"As regards the _Russian clause_, we are already showing in deeds that
we are endeavouring to bring about friendly relations with our
neighbours there.

"With regard to _Italy, Serbia, Roumania and Montenegro_, I can only
repeat my statement already made in the Hungarian Delegation.

"I am not disposed to effect any insurance on the war ventures of our
enemies.

"I am not disposed to make any one-sided concessions to our enemies,
who still obstinately adhere to the standpoint of fighting on until
the final victory; to prejudice permanently the Monarchy by such
concessions, which would give the enemy the invaluable advantage of
being able to carry on the war indefinitely without risk.
(_Applause._)

"Let Mr. Wilson use the great influence he undoubtedly possesses among
his Allies to persuade them on their part to declare _on what
conditions they are willing to treat_; he will then have rendered the
enormous service of having set on foot the _general peace
negotiations_. I am here replying openly and freely to Mr. Wilson, and
I will speak as openly and freely to any who wish to speak for
themselves, but it must necessarily be understood that _time, and the
continuation of the war, cannot but affect the situations here
concerned_.

"I have already said this once before; Italy is a striking example.
Italy had the opportunity before the war of making great territorial
acquisitions without firing a shot. It declined this and entered into
the war; it has lost hundreds of thousands of lives, milliards in war
expenses and values destroyed; it has brought want and misery upon its
own population, and all this _only to lose for ever an advantage which
it might have won_.

"Finally, as regards Point 13, it is an open secret that we are
adherents to the idea of establishing 'an independent Polish State to
include the areas undoubtedly occupied by Polish inhabitants.' On this
point also we shall, I think, soon agree with Mr. Wilson. And if the
President crowns his proposals with the idea of a universal _League of
Nations_ he will hardly meet with any opposition thereto on the part
of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy.

"As will be seen from this comparison of my views with those of Mr.
Wilson, we are not only _agreed in essentials as to the great
principles_ for rearrangement of the world after this war, but _our
ideas as to several concrete questions bearing on the peace are
closely allied_.

"The differences remaining do not appear to me so great but that a
discussion of these points might lead to a clearer understanding and
bring us closer still.

"The situation, then, seems to be this: Austria-Hungary on the one
hand, and the United States of America on the other, are the two Great
Powers in the hostile groups of states whose interests are least
opposed one to the other. It seems reasonable, then, to suppose that
_an exchange of opinion between these two Powers might form the
natural starting point for a conciliatory discussion_ between all
those states which have not yet entered upon peace negotiations.
(_Applause._) So much for Wilson's proposals.


=Petersburg and the Ukraine=

"And now, gentlemen, I hasten to conclude. But this conclusion is
perhaps the most important of all I have to say; I am endeavouring to
bring about peace between the Ukraine and Petersburg.

"The conclusion of peace with Petersburg alters nothing in our
definitive situation. Austro-Hungarian troops are nowhere opposed to
the Petersburg Government--we have the Ukrainian against us--and it is
impossible to export anything from Petersburg, since they have nothing
there themselves but _revolution and anarchy, goods which the
Bolshevists, no doubt, would be glad to export, but which I must
politely decline to receive_.

"In spite of this, I wish to make peace with Petersburg as well, since
this, like any other cessation of hostilities, brings us nearer to the
_general peace_.

"It is otherwise with Ukraine. For the Ukraine has supplies of
provisions which they will export if we can agree on commercial terms.
The question of food is to-day a matter of anxiety throughout the
world; among our opponents, and also in the neutral countries, it is a
burning question. I wish to profit by the conclusion of peace with
those Russian states which have food to export, in order to help our
own population. _We could and would hold out without this assistance._
But I know my duty, and my duty bids me do all that can be done to
lighten the burden of our suffering people, and I will not, therefore,
from any hysterical nervousness about getting to final peace a few
days or a few weeks earlier, throw away this possible advantage to our
people. Such a peace takes time and cannot be concluded in a day. For
such a peace must definitely state whether, what and how the Russian
party will deliver to us, for the reason that the Ukraine on its part
wishes to close the business not after, but at the signing of peace.

"I have already mentioned that the unsettled conditions in this newly
established state occasion great difficulty and naturally considerable
delay in the negotiations.


=Appeal to the Country=

"_If you fall on me from behind, if you force me to come to terms at
once in headlong fashion, we shall gain no economic advantage at all_,
and our people will then be forced to renounce the alleviation which
they should have gained from the peace.

"A surgeon conducting a difficult operation with a crowd behind him
standing watch in hand may very likely complete the operation in
record time, but in all probability the patient would not thank him
for the manner in which it had been carried out.

"If you give our present opponents the impression that we must have
_peace at once, and at any price_, we shall not get so much as a
single measure of grain, and the result will be more or less platonic.
It is no longer by any means a question principally of terminating the
war on the Ukrainian front; neither we nor the Ukrainians themselves
intend to continue the war now that we are agreed upon the
no-annexation basis. It is a question--I repeat it once again--not of
'imperialistic' annexation plans and ideas, but of securing for our
population at last the merited reward of their endurance, and
procuring them those supplies of food for which they are waiting. Our
partners in the deal are good business men and are closely watching to
see _whether you are forcing me to act or not_.

"_If you wish to ruin the peace_, if you are anxious to renounce the
supply of grain, then it would be logical enough to force my hand by
speeches and resolutions, strikes and demonstrations, but not
otherwise. And there is not an atom of truth in the idea that we are
now at such a pass that we must prefer a bad peace without economic
gain rather than a good peace with economic advantages to-morrow.

"The difficulties in the matter of food of late are not due solely to
lack of actual provisions; it is the crises in coal, transport and
organisation which are increasing. _When you at home get up strikes
you are moving in a vicious circle; the strikes increase and aggravate
the crises concerned and hinder the supplies of food and coal._ You
are cutting your own throats in so doing, and all who believe that
peace is accelerated thereby are terribly mistaken.

"It is believed that men in the country have been circulating rumours
to the effect that the Government is instigating the strikes. I leave
to these men themselves to choose whether they are to appear as
_criminal slanderers or as fools_.

"If you had a Government desirous of concluding a peace different
from that desired by the majority of the population, if you had a
Government seeking to prolong the war for purposes of conquest, one
might understand a conflict between the Government and the country.
_But since the Government desires precisely the same as the majority
of the people--that is to say, the speedy settlement of an honourable
peace without annexationist aims--then it is madness to attack that
Government from behind, to interfere with its freedom of action and
hamper its movements._ Those who do so are fighting, not against the
Government, they are fighting blindly against the people they pretend
to serve and against themselves.

"As for yourselves, gentlemen, it is not only your right, but your
duty, to choose between the following alternatives: either you trust
me to proceed with the peace negotiations, and in that case you must
help me, or you do not trust me, and in that case you must depose me.
I am confident that I have the support of the majority of the
Hungarian delegation. The Hungarian Committee has given me a vote of
confidence. If there is any doubt as to the same here, then the matter
is clear enough. The question of a vote of confidence must be brought
up and put to the vote; if I then have the majority against me I shall
at once take the consequences. No one of those who are anxious to
secure my removal will be more pleased than myself; indeed far less
so. Nothing induces me now to retain my office but the sense of duty,
which constrains me to remain as long as I have the confidence of the
Emperor and the majority of the delegations. A soldier with any sense
of decency does not desert. But no Minister for Foreign Affairs could
conduct negotiations of this importance unless he knows, and all the
world as well, that he is endowed with the confidence of the majority
among the constitutional representative bodies. There can be no half
measures here. You have this confidence or you have not. You must
assist me or depose me; there is no other way. I have no more to say."


5

=Report of the Peace Negotiations at Brest-Litovsk=

The Austro-Hungarian Government entered upon the peace negotiations at
Brest-Litovsk with the object of arriving as quickly as possible at a
peace compact which, if it did not, as we hoped, lead to a general
peace, should at least secure order in the East. The draft of a
preliminary peace was sent to Brest containing the following points:

1. Cessation of hostilities; if general peace should not be
concluded, then neither of the present contracting parties to afford
any support to the enemies of the other.

2. No surrender of territory; Poland, Lithuania and Courland retaining
the right of determining their own destiny for the future.

3. No indemnity for costs of war or damages due to military
operations.

4. Cessation of economic war and reparation of damages sustained by
private persons through the economic war.

5. Resumption of commercial intercourse and the same provisionally on
the basis of the old commercial treaty and twenty years' preference
subject to restriction in respect of any Customs union with
neighbouring countries.

6. Mutual assistance in raw materials and industrial articles.

A further point was contemplated, dealing with the evacuation of the
occupied areas, but the formulation of this had to be postponed until
after consultation with the German Supreme Military Command, whose
co-operation was here required owing to the mingling of German and
Austro-Hungarian troops on the Russian front. The Army Command has
indicated a period of at least six months as necessary for the
evacuation.

In discussing this draft with the German delegates two points in
particular were found to present great difficulty. One was that of
evacuation. The German Army Command declared categorically that no
evacuation of the occupied districts could be thought of until after
conclusion of the general peace. The second difficulty arose in
connection with the question as to treatment of the occupied
districts. Germany insisted that in the peace treaty with Russia it
should be simply stated that Russia had conceded to the peoples within
its territory the right of self-determination, and that the nations in
question had already availed themselves of that right. The plain
standpoint laid down in our draft we were unable to carry through,
although it was shared by the other Allies. However, in formulating
the answer sent on December 25, 1916, to the Russian peace proposals a
compromise was, after persistent efforts on our part, ultimately
arrived at which at least prevented the full adoption of the divergent
German point of view on these two points. In the matter of evacuation
the Germans agreed that the withdrawal of certain bodies of troops
before the general peace might be discussed.

In the matter of annexations a satisfactory manner of formulating this
was found, making it applicable only in the event of general peace.
Had the Entente then been disposed to make peace the principle of "no
annexations" would have succeeded throughout.

Even allowing for the conciliatory form given through our endeavours
to this answer by the four Powers to the Russian proposals, the German
Headquarters evinced extreme indignation. Several highly outspoken
telegrams from the German Supreme Command to the German delegates
prove this. The head of the German Delegation came near to being
recalled on this account, and if this had been done it is likely that
German foreign policy would have been placed in the hands of a firm
adherent of the sternest military views. As this, however, could only
have had an unfavourable effect on the further progress of the
negotiations, we were obliged to do all in our power to retain Herr
Kühlmann. With this end in view he was informed and invited to advise
Berlin that if Germany persisted in its harsh policy Austria-Hungary
would be compelled to conclude a separate peace with Russia. This
declaration on the part of the Minister for Foreign Affairs did not
fail to create a certain impression in Berlin, and was largely
responsible for the fact that Kühlmann was able to remain.

Kühlmann's difficult position and his desire to strengthen it rendered
the discussion of the territorial questions, which were first
officially touched upon on December 27, but had been already taken up
in private meetings with the Russian delegates, a particularly awkward
matter. Germany insisted that the then Russian front was not to be
evacuated until six months after the general peace. Russia was
disposed to agree to this, but demanded on the other hand that the
fate of Poland was not to be decided until after evacuation. Against
this the Germans were inclined to give up its original standpoint to
the effect that the populations of occupied territories had already
availed themselves of the right of self-determination conceded, and
allow a new inquiry to be made among the population, but insisted that
this should be done during the occupation. No solution could be
arrived at on this point, though Austria-Hungary made repeated efforts
at mediation. The negotiations had arrived at this stage when they
were first interrupted on December 29.

On resuming the negotiations on January 6 the situation was little
changed. Kühlmann's position was at any rate somewhat firmer than
before, albeit only at the cost of some concessions to the German
military party. In these circumstances the negotiations, in which
Trotski now took part as spokesman for the Russians, led only to
altogether fruitless theoretical discussions and the right of
self-determination, which could not bring about any lessening of the
distance between the two firmly maintained points of view. In order to
get the proceedings out of this deadlock further endeavours were made
on the part of Austria to arrive at a compromise between the German
and Russian standpoints, the more so as it was generally, and
especially in the case of Poland, desirable to solve the territorial
question on the basis of complete self-determination. Our proposals to
the German delegates were to the effect that the Russian standpoint
should so far be met as to allow the plebiscite demanded by the
Russians, this to be taken, as the Germans insisted should be the
case, during the German occupation, but with extensive guarantees for
free expression of the will of the people. On this point we had long
discussions with the German delegates, based on detailed drafts
prepared by us.

Our endeavours here, however, were again unsuccessful. Circumstances
arising at the time in our own country were responsible for this, as
also for the result of the negotiations which had in the meantime been
commenced with the Ukrainian delegates. These last had, at the first
discussion, declined to treat with any Polish representatives, and
demanded the concession of the entire Cholm territory, and, in a more
guarded fashion, the cession of Eastern Galicia and the Ukrainian part
of North-Eastern Hungary, and in consequence of which the negotiations
were on the point of being broken off. At this stage a food crisis
broke out in Austria to an extent of which the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs was hitherto unaware, threatening Vienna in particular with
the danger of being in a few days devoid of flour altogether. Almost
immediately after this came a strike movement of threatening
proportions. These events at home weakened the position of the Foreign
Minister both as regards his attitude towards the German Allies and
towards the opposing parties in the negotiations--with both of which
he was then in conflict--and this, at a most critical moment, to a
degree that can hardly be appreciated from a distance. He was required
to exert pressure upon Germany, and was now forced, not merely to ask,
but to entreat Germany's aid in sending supplies of food, or Vienna
would within a few days be in the throes of a catastrophe. With the
enemy, on the other hand, he was forced, owing to the situation at
home, to strive for a settlement of peace that should be favourable to
Austria, in spite of the fact that our food situation and our labour
troubles were well known to that enemy.

This complete alteration of the position changed the whole basis and
tactics of the Foreign Minister's proceedings. He had to obtain the
supplies of grain asked for from Germany and thus to diminish
political pressure on that country; but at the same time he had to
persuade the Soviet delegates to continue negotiations, and finally to
arrive at a settlement of peace under the most acceptable conditions
possible with the Ukraine, which would put an end to the still serious
difficulties of the food situation.

In these circumstances it was impossible now to work on the German
delegates by talking of Austria-Hungary's concluding a separate peace
with Russia, as this would have imperilled the chance of food supplies
from Germany--the more so as the representative of the German Army
Command had declared that it was immaterial whether Austria-Hungary
made peace or not. Germany would in any case march on Petersburg if
the Russian Government did not give way. On the other hand, however,
the Foreign Minister prevailed on the leader of the Russian delegation
to postpone the carrying out of the intentions of his Government--to
the effect that the Russian delegation, owing to lack of good faith on
the part of German-Austro-Hungarian negotiators, should be recalled.

At the same time the negotiations with the Ukrainian delegation were
continued. By means of lengthy and wearisome conferences we succeeded
in bringing their demands to a footing which might just possibly be
acceptable, and gaining their agreement to a clause whereby Ukraine
undertook to deliver at least 1,000,000 tons of grain by August, 1918.
As to the demand for the Cholm territory, which we had wished to have
relegated to the negotiations with Poland, the Ukrainian delegates
refused to give way on this point, and were evidently supported by
General Hoffmann. Altogether the German military party seemed much
inclined to support Ukrainian demands and extremely indisposed to
accede to Polish claims, so that we were unable to obtain the
admission of Polish representatives to the proceedings, though we had
frequently asked for this. A further difficulty in the way of this was
the fact that Trotski himself was unwilling to recognise the Polish
party as having equal rights here. The only result obtainable was that
the Ukrainians should restrict their claims on the Cholm territory to
those parts inhabited by Ukrainian majority and accept a revision of
the frontier line, as yet only roughly laid down, according to the
finding of a mixed commission and the wishes of the population, i.e.
the principle of national boundaries under international protection.
The Ukrainian delegates renounced all territorial claims against the
Monarchy, but demanded from us on the other hand a guarantee as to the
autonomous development of their co-nationals in Galicia. With regard
to these two weighty concessions, the Foreign Minister declared that
they could only be granted on the condition that the Ukraine fulfilled
the obligation it had undertaken as to delivery of grain, the
deliveries being made at the appointed times; he further demanded that
the obligations on both sides should be reciprocal, i.e. that the
failure of one party to comply therewith should release the other.
The formulation of these points, which met with the greatest
difficulties on the part of Ukraine, was postponed to a later date.

At this stage of the proceedings a new pause occurred to give the
separate delegates time to advise their Governments as to the results
hitherto attained and receive their final instructions. The Foreign
Minister returned to Vienna and reported the state of the negotiations
to the proper quarters. In the course of these deliberations his
policy of concluding peace with Russia and Ukraine on the basis of the
concessions proposed was agreed to. Another question dealt with at the
same time was whether the Monarchy should, in case of extreme
necessity, conclude a separate peace with Russia if the negotiations
with that state should threaten to come to nothing on account of
Germany's demands. This question was, after full consideration of all
grounds to the contrary, answered _in thesi_ in the affirmative, as
the state of affairs at home apparently left no alternative.

On resuming the negotiations at Brest-Litovsk further endeavours were
made to persuade Germany to give way somewhat by pointing out what
would be the consequence of its obstinate attitude. In the course of
the deliberations on this point with Herr Kühlmann we succeeded after
great difficulty in obtaining the agreement of the German delegates to
a final attempt at compromise, to be undertaken by the Foreign
Minister. The proposals for this compromise were based on the
following considerations:

For months past conflicting views had been expressed as to:

1. Whether in the territories where constitutional alterations were to
be made owing to the war the right of self-determination should be
taken as already exercised, or whether a plebiscite should be taken
first;

2. Whether such plebiscite, if taken, should be addressed to a
constituent body or in the form of a referendum to the people direct;

3. Whether this should be done before or after evacuation; and

4. In what manner it was to be organised (by general franchise, by a
vote of the nobles, etc.). It would be advisable, and would also be in
accordance with the principles adopted by Russia, to leave the
decision on all these points to the people themselves, and deliver
them over to the "temporary self-administrative body," which should,
also according to the Russian proposal (Kameneff), be introduced at
once. The whole of the peace negotiations could then be concentrated
upon a single point: the question as to the composition of this
temporary body. Here, however, a compromise could be arrived at, as
Russia could agree that the already existent bodies set in the
foreground by Germany should be allowed to express a part of the will
of the people, Germany agreeing that these bodies should, during the
occupation, be supplemented by elements appointed, according to the
Russian principles, by free election.

On February 7, immediately after Herr Kühlmann had agreed to mediation
on this basis, the Foreign Minister saw the leader of the Russian
delegation, Trotski, and had a series of conversations with him. The
idea of compromise on the lines just set forth was little to Trotski's
taste, and he declared that he would in any case protest against the
handling of the self-determination question by the Four Powers. On the
other hand, the discussion did lead to some result, in that a new
basis for disposing of the difficulties which had arisen was now
found. There was to be no further continuance of the conflict as to
whether the territorial alterations involved by the peace should be
termed "annexations," as the Russian delegates wished, or "exercise of
the right of self-determination," as Germany wished; the territorial
alterations were to be simply noted in the peace treaty ("Russia notes
that ..."). Trotski, however, made his acquiescence to the conclusion
of such a compact subject to two conditions: one being that the Moon
Sound Islands and the Baltic ports should remain with Russia; the
other that Germany and Austria-Hungary should not conclude any
separate peace with the Ukrainian People's Republic, whose Government
was then seriously threatened by the Bolsheviks and, according to some
reports, already overthrown by them. The Foreign Minister was now
anxious to arrive at a compromise on this question also, in which he
had to a certain degree the support of Herr von Kühlmann, while
General Hoffmann most vehemently opposed any further concession.

All these negotiations for a compromise failed to achieve their end
owing to the fact that Herr Kühlmann was forced by the German Supreme
Army Command to act promptly. Ludendorff declared that the
negotiations with Russia must be concluded within three days, and when
a telegram from Petersburg was picked up in Berlin calling on the
German Army to rise in revolt Herr von Kühlmann was strictly ordered
not to be content with the cessions already agreed to, but to demand
the further cession of the unoccupied territories of Livonia and
Esthonia. Under such pressure the leader of the German delegation had
not the power to compromise. We then arrived at the signing of the
treaty with Ukraine, which had, after much trouble, been brought to an
end meanwhile. It thus appeared as if the efforts of the Foreign
Minister had proved fruitless. Nevertheless he continued his
discussions with Trotski, but these still led to no result, owing to
the fact that Trotski, despite repeated questioning, persisted in
leaving everything vague till the last moment as to whether he would,
in the present circumstances, conclude any peace with the Four Powers
at all or not. Not until the plenary session of February 10 was this
cleared up; Russia declared for a cessation of hostilities, but signed
no treaty of peace.

The situation created by this declaration offered no occasion for
further taking up the idea of a separate peace with Russia, since
peace seemed to have come _via facta_ already. At a meeting on
February 10 of the diplomatic and military delegates of Germany and
Austria-Hungary to discuss the question of what was now to be done it
was agreed unanimously, save for a single dissentient, that the
situation arising out of Trotski's declarations must be accepted. The
one dissentient vote--that of General Hoffmann--was to the effect that
Trotski's statement should be answered by declaring the Armistice at
an end, marching on Petersburg, and supporting the Ukraine openly
against Russia. In the ceremonial final sitting, on February 11, Herr
von Kühlmann adopted the attitude expressed by the majority of the
peace delegations, and set forth the same in a most impressive speech.
Nevertheless, a few days later, as General Hoffmann had said, Germany
declared the Armistice at an end, ordered the German troops to march
on Petersburg, and brought about the situation which led to the
signing of the peace treaty. Austria-Hungary declared that we took no
part in this action.


6

=Report of the Peace Negotiations at Bucharest=

The possibility of entering upon peace negotiations with Roumania was
considered as soon as negotiations with the Russian delegations at
Brest-Litovsk had commenced. In order to prevent Roumania itself from
taking part in these negotiations Germany gave the Roumanian
Government to understand that it would not treat with the present King
and the present Government at all. This step, however, was only
intended to enable separate negotiations to be entered upon with
Roumania, as Germany feared that the participation of Roumania in the
Brest negotiations would imperil the chances of peace. Roumania's idea
seemed then to be to carry on the war and gain the upper hand. At the
end of January, therefore, Austria-Hungary took the initiative in
order to bring about negotiations with Roumania. The Emperor sent
Colonel Randa, the former Military Attaché to the Roumanian
Government, to the King of Roumania, assuring him of his willingness
to grant Roumania honourable terms of peace.

In connection with the peace negotiations a demand was raised in
Hungarian quarters for a rectification of the frontier line, so as to
prevent, or at any rate render difficult, any repetition of the
invasion by Roumania in 1916 over the Siebenbürgen, despite opposition
on the part of the Minister for Foreign Affairs. The strategical
frontier drawn up by the Army Command, which, by the way, was
influenced by considerations not conducive to peace, followed a line
involving the cession to Hungary of Turnu-Severin, Sinaia and several
valuable petroleum districts in Moldavia. Public opinion in Hungary
voiced even further demands. The Hungarian Government was of opinion
that the Parliament would offer the greatest hindrances to any peace
not complying with the general desire in this respect, and leading
Hungarian statesmen, even some among the Opposition parties, declared
the rectification of the frontier to be a condition of peace _sine qua
non_. Wekerle and Tisza in particular took this view. Despite this
serious difference of opinion, the Foreign Minister, in entire
agreement with the Emperor, even before the commencement of the
negotiations in the middle of February, took up the position that
demands connected with the frontier line should not offer any obstacle
to the conclusion of peace. The rectification of the frontier should
only seriously be insisted on as far as could be done on the basis of
a loyal and, for the future, amicable relations with Roumania. Hungary
regarded this lenient attitude on the part of the Foreign Minister
with increasing disapproval. We pointed out that a frontier line
conceding cities and petroleum districts to Hungary would be
unfortunate in every respect. From the point of view of internal
politics, because the number of non-Hungarian inhabitants would be
thereby increased; from the military point of view, because it would
give rise to frontier conflicts with unreliable Roumanian factions;
and, finally, from the point of view of foreign policy, because it
would mean annexations and the transference of population this way and
that, rendering friendly relations with Roumania an impossibility.
Nevertheless, it would be necessary for a time to hold fast by the
frontier line as originally conceived, so that the point could be used
to bring about the establishment in Roumania of a régime amicably
disposed toward the Central Powers. The Foreign Minister was
particularly anxious to see a Marghiloman Cabinet formed, inaugurating
a policy friendly to ourselves. He believed that with such a Cabinet
it would be easier to arrive at a peace of mutual understanding, and
was also resolved to render possible such a peace by extensive
concessions, especially by giving his diplomatic support in the
Bessarabian question. He informed Marghiloman also in writing that he
would be prepared to grant important concessions to a Cabinet of which
he, Marghiloman, was the head, in particular as regards the cession of
inhabited places such as Turnu-Severin and Ocna, on which points he
was willing to give way. When the Marghiloman Cabinet was formed the
Austro-Hungarian demands in respect of the frontier line would,
despite active opposition on the part of the Hungarian Government, be
reduced almost by half. The negotiations with Roumania were
particularly difficult in regard to the question of two places, Azuga
and Busteni. On March 24 Count Czernin prepared to terminate these
negotiations, declaring that he was ready to renounce all claim to
Azuga and Busteni and halve his demands as to the much-debated Lotru
district, provided Marghiloman were willing to arrange the frontier
question on this basis. Marghiloman declared himself satisfied with
this compromise. On the next day, however, it was nevertheless
rejected by the Hungarian Government, and not until after further
telegraphic communication with the Emperor and Wekerle was the assent
of all competent authorities obtained. This had, indeed, been widely
considered in Hungarian circles as an impossibility.

Another Austro-Hungarian demand which played some part in the
Bucharest negotiations was in connection with the plan of an
economical alliance between Austria-Hungary and Roumania. This was of
especial interest to the Austrian Government, whereas the frontier
question, albeit in some degree affecting Austria as well, was a
matter of indifference to this Government, which, as a matter of fact,
did not sympathise with the demands at all. The plan for an economical
alliance, however, met with opposition in Hungary. Immediately before
the commencement of the Bucharest negotiations an attempt was made to
overcome this opposition on the part of the Hungarian Government and
secure its adherence to the idea of an economical alliance with
Roumania--at any rate, conditionally upon the conclusion of a customs
alliance with Germany as planned. It proved impossible, however, at
the time to obtain this assent. The Hungarian Government reserved the
right of considering the question later on, and on March 8 instructed
their representatives at Bucharest that they must dissent from the
plan, as the future economical alliance with Germany was a matter
beyond present consideration. Consequently this question could play no
part at first in the peace negotiations, and all that could be done
was to sound the leading Roumanian personages in a purely private
manner as to the attitude they would adopt towards such a proposal.
The idea was, generally speaking, well received by Roumania, and the
prevalent opinion was that such an alliance would be distinctly
advisable from Roumania's point of view. A further attempt was
therefore made, during the pause in the peace negotiations in the
East, to overcome the opposition of the Hungarian Government; these
deliberations were, however, not concluded when the Minister for
Foreign Affairs resigned his office.

Germany had, even before the commencement of negotiations in
Bucharest, considered the question of imposing on Roumania, when
treating for peace, a series of obligations especially in connection
with the economical relations amounting to a kind of indirect war
indemnity. It was also contemplated that the occupation of Wallachia
should be maintained for five or six years after the conclusion of
peace. Roumania should then give up its petroleum districts, its
railways, harbours and domains to German companies as their property,
and submit itself to a permanent financial control. Austria-Hungary
opposed these demands from the first on the grounds that no friendly
relations could ever be expected to exist with a Roumania which had
been economically plundered to such a complete extent; and
Austria-Hungary was obliged to maintain amicable relations with
Roumania.

This standpoint was most emphatically set forth, and not without some
success, on February 5 at a conference with the Reichskansler. In the
middle of February the Emperor sent a personal message to the German
Emperor cautioning him against this plan, which might prove an obstacle
in the way of peace. Roumania was not advised of these demands until
comparatively late in the negotiations, after the appointment of
Marghiloman. Until then the questions involved gave rise to constant
discussion between Germany and Austria-Hungary, the latter throughout
endeavouring to reduce the German demands, not only with a view to
arriving at a peace of mutual understanding, but also because, if
Germany gained a footing in Roumania on the terms originally
contemplated, Austro-Hungarian economical interests must inevitably
suffer thereby. The demands originally formulated with regard to the
Roumanian railways and domains were then relinquished by Germany, and
the plan of a cession of the Roumanian harbours was altered so as to
amount to the establishment of a Roumanian-German-Austro-Hungarian
harbour company, which, however, eventually came to nothing. The
petroleum question, too, was reduced from a cession to a ninety years'
tenure of the state petroleum districts and the formation of a
monopoly trading company for petroleum under German management.
Finally, an economic arrangement was prepared which should secure the
agricultural products of Roumania to the Central Powers for a series of
years. The idea of a permanent German control of the Roumanian finances
was also relinquished owing to Austro-Hungarian opposition. The
negotiations with Marghiloman and his representatives on these
questions made a very lengthy business. In the economic questions
especially there was great difference of opinion on the subject of
prices, which was not disposed of until the last moment before the
drawing up of the treaty on March 28, and then only by adopting the
Roumanian standpoint. On the petroleum question, where the differences
were particularly acute, agreement was finally arrived at, in face of
the extreme views of the German economical representative on the one
hand and the Roumanian Foreign Minister, Arion, on the other, by a
compromise, according to which further negotiations were to be held in
particular with regard to the trade monopoly for petroleum, and the
original draft was only to apply when such negotiations failed to lead
to any result.

The German demands as to extension of the period of occupation for
five to six years after the general peace likewise played a great part
at several stages of the negotiations, and were from the first stoutly
opposed by Austria-Hungary. We endeavoured to bring about an
arrangement by which, on the conclusion of peace, Roumania should have
all legislative and executive power restored, being subject only to a
certain right of control in respect of a limited number of points, but
not beyond the general peace. In support of this proposal the Foreign
Minister pointed out in particular that the establishment of a
Roumanian Ministry amicably disposed towards ourselves would be an
impossibility (the Averescu Ministry was then still in power) if we
were to hold Roumania permanently under our yoke. We should far rather
use every endeavour to obtain what could be obtained from Roumania
through the medium of such politicians in that country as were
disposed to follow a policy of friendly relations with the Central
Powers. The main object of our policy to get such men into power in
Roumania, and enable them to remain in the Government, would be
rendered unattainable if too severe measures were adopted. We might
gain something thereby for a few years, but it would mean losing
everything in the future. And we succeeded also in convincing the
German Secretary of State, Kühlmann, of the inadvisability of the
demands in respect of occupation, which were particularly voiced by
the German Army Council. As a matter of fact, after the retirement of
Averescu, Marghiloman declared that these demands would make it
impossible for him to form a Cabinet at all. And when he had been
informed, from German sources, that the German Supreme Army Command
insisted on these terms, he only agreed to form a Cabinet on the
assurance of the Austrian Foreign Minister that a solution of the
occupation problem would be found. In this question also we did
ultimately succeed in coming to agreement with Roumania.

One of the decisive points in the conclusion of peace with Roumania
was, finally, the cession of the Dobrudsha, on which Bulgaria insisted
with such violence that it was impossible to avoid it. The ultimatum
which preceded the preliminary Treaty of Buftea had also to be altered
chiefly on the Dobrudsha question, as Bulgaria was already talking of
the ingratitude of the Central Powers, of how Bulgaria had been
disillusioned, and of the evil effects this disillusionment would have
on the subsequent conduct of the war. All that Count Czernin could do
was to obtain a guarantee that Roumania, in case of cession of the
Dobrudsha, should at least be granted a sure way to the harbour of
Kustendje. In the main the Dobrudsha question was decided at Buftea.
When, later, Bulgaria expressed a desire to interpret the wording of
the preliminary treaty by which the Dobrudsha "as far as the Danube"
was to be given up in such a sense as to embrace the whole of the
territory up to the northernmost branch (the Kilia branch) of the
Danube, this demand was most emphatically opposed both by Germany and
Austria-Hungary, and it was distinctly laid down in the peace treaty
that only the Dobrudsha as far as the St. George's branch was to be
ceded. This decision again led to bad feeling in Bulgaria, but was
unavoidable, as further demands here would probably have upset the
preliminary peace again.

The proceedings had reached this stage when Count Czernin resigned his
office.


7

=Wilson's Fourteen Points=

I. Open covenants of peace openly arrived at, after which there shall
be no private international understandings of any kind, but diplomacy
shall proceed always frankly and in the public view.

II. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas outside territorial
waters alike in peace and in war except as the seas may be closed in
whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of
international covenants.

III. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the
establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations
consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its
maintenance.

IV. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will
be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety.

V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all
colonial claims based upon a strict observance of the principle that
in determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the
populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims
of the Government whose title is to be determined.

VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory, and such a settlement of
all questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest
co-operation of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an
unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity for the independent
determination of her own political development and national policy,
and assure her of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations
under institutions of her own choosing; and more than a welcome
assistance also of every kind that she may need and may herself
desire. The treatment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the
months to come will be the acid test of their good will, of their
comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their own interests,
and of their intelligent and unselfish sympathy.

VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and
restored without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys
in common with all other free nations. No other single act will serve
as this will serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws
which they have themselves set and determined for the government of
their relations with one another. Without this healing act the whole
structure and validity of international law is for ever impaired.

VIII. All French territory should be freed, and the invaded portions
restored, and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871 in the
matter of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace of the world
for nearly 50 years, should be righted in order that peace may once
more be made secure in the interests of all.

IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along
clearly recognisable lines of nationality.

X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we
wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the first
opportunity of autonomous development.

XI. Roumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated, occupied
territories restored, Serbia accorded free and secure access to the
sea, and the relations of the several Balkan States to one another
determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of
allegiance and nationality, and international guarantees of the
political and economic independence and territorial integrity of the
several Balkan States should be entered into.

XII. The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman Empire should be
assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are
now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life
and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development,
and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to
the ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees.

XIII. An independent Polish State should be erected which should
include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations,
which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose
political and economic independence and territorial integrity should
be guaranteed by international covenant.

XIV. A general association of nations must be formed under specific
covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political
independence and territorial integrity to great and small States
alike.


8

=Ottokar Czernin on Austria's Policy During the War=

_Speech delivered December 11, 1918_

GENTLEMEN,--In rising now to speak of our policy during the war it is
my hope that I may thereby help to bring the truth to light. We are
living in a time of excitement. After four years of war, the bloodiest
and most determined war the world has ever seen, and in the midst of
the greatest revolution ever known, this excitement is only too easily
understood. But the result of this excitement is that all those rumours
which go flying about, mingling truth and falsehood together, end by
misleading the public. It is unquestionably necessary to arrive at a
clear understanding. The public has a right to know what has really
happened, it has the right to know why we did not succeed in attaining
the peace we had so longed for, it has a right to know whether, and if
so where, any neglect can be pointed out, or whether it was the
overwhelming power of circumstances which has led our policy to take
the course it did. The new arrangement of relations between ourselves
and Germany will make an end of all secret proceedings. The day will
come then when, fortunately, all that has hitherto been hidden will be
made clear. As, however, I do not know when all this will be made
public, I am grateful for the opportunity of lifting the veil to-day
from certain hitherto unknown events. In treating of this theme I will
refrain from touching upon those constitutional factors which once
counted for so much, but which do so no longer. I do so because it
seems to me unfair to import into the discussion persons who are now
paying heavily for what they may have done and who are unable to defend
themselves. And I must pay this honourable tribute to the
Austro-Hungarian Press, that it has on the whole sought to spare the
former Emperor as far as possible. There are, of course,
exceptions--_exceptiones firmant regulam_. There are in Vienna, as
everywhere else, men who find it more agreeable to attack, the less if
those whom they are attacking are able to defend themselves. But,
believe me, gentlemen, those who think thus are not the bravest, not
the best, nor the most reliable; and we may be glad that they form so
insignificant a minority.

But, to come to the point. Before passing on to a consideration of the
various phases of the work for peace, I should like to point out two
things: firstly, that since the entry of Italy and Roumania into the
war, and especially since the entry of America, a "victorious peace"
on our part has been a Utopian idea, a Utopia which, unfortunately,
was throughout cherished by the German military party; and, secondly,
that we have never received any offer of peace from the Entente. On
several occasions peace feelers were put forward between
representatives of the Entente and our own; unfortunately, however,
these never led to any concrete conditions. We often had the
impression that we might conclude a separate peace without Germany,
but we were never told the concrete conditions upon which Germany, on
its part, could make peace; and, in particular, we were never informed
that Germany would be allowed to retain its possessions as before the
war, in consequence of which we were left in the position of having to
fight a war of defence for Germany. We were compelled by our treaty to
a common defence of the pre-war possessions, and since the Entente
never declared its willingness to treat with a Germany which wished
for no annexations, since the Entente constantly declared its
intention of annihilating Germany, we were forced to defend Germany,
and our position in Berlin was rendered unspeakably more difficult.
We ourselves, also, were never given any assurance that we should be
allowed to retain our former possessions; but in our case the desire
for peace was so strong that we would have made territorial
concessions if we had been able thereby to secure general peace. This,
however, was not the case. Take Italy, for instance, which was
primarily at war with ourselves and not with Germany. If we had
offered Italy concessions however great, if we had offered all that
Italy has now taken possession of, even then it could not have made
peace, being bound by duty to its Allies and by circumstances not to
make peace until England and France made peace with Germany.

When, then, peace by sacrifice was the only peace attainable,
obviously, as a matter of principle, there were two ways of reaching
that end. One, a general peace, i.e. including Germany, and the other,
a separate peace. Of the overwhelming difficulties attending the
former course I will speak later; at present a few words on the
question of separate peace.

I myself would never have made a separate peace. I have never, not
even in the hour of disillusionment--I may say of despair at my
inability to lead the policy of Berlin into wiser channels--even in
such hours, I say, I have never forgotten that our alliance with the
German Empire was no ordinary alliance, no such alliance as may be
contracted by two Emperors or two Governments, and can easily be
broken, but an alliance of blood, a blood-brotherhood between the ten
million Austro-Germans and the seventy million of the Empire, which
could not be broken. And I have never forgotten that the military
party in power at that time in Germany were not the German people, and
that we had allied ourselves with the German people, and not with a
few leading men. But I will not deny that in the moments when I saw my
policy could not be realised I did ventilate the idea of suggesting to
the Emperor the appointment, in my stead, of one of those men who saw
salvation in a separation from Germany. But again and again I
relinquished this idea, being firmly convinced that separate peace was
a sheer impossibility. The Monarchy lay like a great block between
Germany and the Balkans. Germany had great masses of troops there from
which it could not be cut off, it was procuring oil and grain from the
Balkans; if we were to interpose between it and the Balkans we should
be striking at its most sensitive vital nerve. Moreover, the Entente
would naturally have demanded first of all that we joined in the
blockade, and finally our secession would automatically have involved
also that of Bulgaria and Turkey. Had we withdrawn, Germany would have
been unable to carry on the war. In such a situation there can be no
possibility of doubt but that the German Army Command would have flung
several divisions against Bohemia and the Tyrol, meting out to us the
same fate which had previously befallen Roumania. The Monarchy,
Bohemia in particular, would at once have become a scene of war. But
even this is not all. Internally, such a step would at once have led
to civil war. The Germans of Austria would never have turned against
their brothers, and the Hungarians--Tisza's Hungarians--would never
have lent their aid to such a policy. _We had begun the war in common,
and we could not end it save in common._ For us there was no way out
of the war; we could only choose between fighting with Germany against
the Entente, or fighting with the Entente against Germany until
Germany herself gave way. A slight foretaste of what would have
happened was given us through the separatist steps taken by Andrassy
at the last moment. This utterly defeated, already annihilated and
prostrate Germany had yet the power to fling troops toward the Tyrol,
and had not the revolution overwhelmed all Germany like a
conflagration, smothering the war itself, I am not sure but that the
Tyrol might at the last moment have been harried by war. And,
gentlemen, I have more to say. The experiment of separate peace would
not only have involved us in a civil war, not only brought the war
into our own country, but even then the final outcome would have been
much the same. The dissolution of the Monarchy into its component
national parts was postulated throughout by the Entente. I need only
refer to the Conference of London. But whether the State be dissolved
by way of reward to the people or by way of punishment to the State
makes little difference; the effect is the same. In this case also a
"German Austria" would have arisen, and in such a development it would
have been hard for the German-Austrian people to take up an attitude
which rendered them allies of the Entente. In my own case, as Minister
of the Imperial and Royal Government, it was my duty also to consider
dynastic interests, and I never lost sight of that obligation. But I
believe that in this respect also the end would have been the same. In
particular the dissolution of the Monarchy into its national elements
by legal means, against the opposition of the Germans and Hungarians,
would have been a complete impossibility. And the Germans in Austria
would never have forgiven the Crown if it had entered upon a war with
Germany; the Emperor would have been constantly encountering the
powerful Republican tendencies of the Czechs, and he would have been
in constant conflict with the King of Serbia over the South-Slav
question, an ally being naturally nearer to the Entente than the
Habsburgers. And, finally, the Hungarians would never have forgiven
the Emperor if he had freely conceded extensive territories to Bohemia
and to the South-Slav state; I believe, then, that in this confusion
the Crown would have fallen, as it has done in fact. _A separate peace
was a sheer impossibility._ There remained the second way: to make
peace jointly with Germany. Before going into the difficulties which
rendered this way impossible I must briefly point out wherein lay our
great dependence upon Germany. First of all, in military respects.
Again and again we were forced to rely on aid from Germany. In
Roumania, in Italy, in Serbia, and in Russia we were victorious with
the Germans beside us. We were in the position of a poor relation
living by the grace of a rich kinsman. But it is impossible to play
the mendicant and the political adviser at the same time, particularly
when the other party is a Prussian officer. In the second place, we
were dependent upon Germany owing to the state of our food supply.
Again and again we were here also forced to beg for help from Germany,
because the complete disorganisation of our own administration had
brought us to the most desperate straits. We were forced to this by
the hunger blockade established, on the one hand, by Hungary, and on
the other by the official authorities and their central depots. I
remember how, when I myself was in the midst of a violent conflict
with the German delegates at Brest-Litovsk, I received orders from
Vienna to bow the knee to Berlin and beg for food. You can imagine,
gentlemen, for yourselves how such a state of things must weaken a
Minister's hands. And, thirdly, our dependence was due to the state of
our finances. In order to keep up our credit we were drawing a hundred
million marks a month from Germany, a sum which during the course of
the war has grown to over four milliards; and this money was as
urgently needed as were the German divisions and the German bread.
And, despite this position of dependence, the only way to arrive at
peace was by leading Germany into our own political course; that is to
say, persuading Germany to conclude a peace involving sacrifice. _The
situation all through was simply this: that any momentary military
success might enable us to propose terms of peace which, while
entailing considerable loss to ourselves, had just a chance of being
accepted by the enemy._ The German military party, on the other hand,
increased their demands with every victory, and it was more hopeless
than ever, after their great successes, to persuade them to adopt a
policy of renunciation. I think, by the way, that there was a single
moment in the history of this war when such an action would have had
some prospect of success. I refer to the famous battle of Görlitz.
Then, with the Russian army in flight, the Russian forts falling like
houses of cards, many among our enemies changed their point of view.
I was at that time still our representative in Roumania. Majorescu was
then not disinclined to side with us actively, and the Roumanian army
moved forward toward Bessarabia, could have been hot on the heels of
the flying Russians, and might, according to all human calculations,
have brought about a complete débâcle. It is not unlikely that the
collapse which later took place in Russia might have come about then,
and after a success of that nature, with no "America" as yet on the
horizon, we might perhaps have brought the war to an end. Two things,
however, were required: in the first place, the Roumanians demanded,
as the price of their co-operation, a rectification of the Hungarian
frontier, and this first condition was flatly refused by Hungary; the
second condition, which naturally then did not come into question at
all, would have been that we should even then, after such a success,
have proved strong enough to bear a peace with sacrifice. We were not
called upon to agree to this, but the second requirement would
undoubtedly have been refused by Germany, just as the first had been
by Hungary. I do not positively assert that peace would have been
possible in this or any other case, but I do positively maintain that
during my period of office _such a peace by sacrifice was the utmost
we and Germany could have attained_. The future will show what
superhuman efforts we have made to induce Germany to give way. That
all proved fruitless was not the fault of the German people, nor was
it, in my opinion, the fault of the German Emperor, but that of the
leaders of the German military party, which had attained such enormous
power in the country. Everyone in Wilhelmstrasse, from Bethmann to
Kühlmann, wanted peace; but they could not get it simply because the
military party got rid of everyone who ventured to act otherwise than
as they wished. This also applies to Bethmann and Kühlmann. The
Pan-Germanists, under the leadership of the military party, could not
understand that it was possible to die through being victorious, that
victories are worthless when they do not lead to peace, that
territories held in an iron grasp as "security" are valueless
securities as long as the opposing party cannot be forced to redeem
them. There were various shades of this Pan-Germanism. One section
demanded the annexation of parts of Belgium and France, with an
indemnity of milliards; others were less exorbitant, but all were
agreed that peace could only be concluded with an extension of German
possessions. It was the easiest thing in the world to get on well with
the German military party so long as one believed in their fantastic
ideas and took a victorious peace for granted, dividing up the world
thereafter at will. But if anyone attempted to look at things from
the point of view of the real situation, and ventured to reckon with
the possibility of a less satisfactory termination of the war, the
obstacles then encountered were not easily surmounted. We all of us
remember those speeches in which constant reference was always made to
a "stern peace," a "German peace," a "victorious peace." For us, then,
the possibility of a more favourable peace--I mean a peace based on
mutual understanding--I have never believed in the possibility of a
victorious peace--would only have been acute in the case of Poland and
the Austro-Polish question. But I cannot sufficiently emphasise the
fact that the Austro-Polish solution never was an obstacle in the way
of peace and could never have been so. There was only the idea that
Austrian Poland and the former Russian Poland might be united and
attached to the Monarchy. It was never suggested that such a step
should be enforced against the will of Poland itself or against the
will of the Entente. There was a time when it looked as if not only
Poland but also certain sections among the Entente were not
disinclined to agree to such a solution.

But to return to the German military party. This had attained a degree
of power in the State rarely equalled in history, and the rarity of
the phenomenon was only exceeded by the suddenness of its terrible
collapse. The most striking personality in this group was General
Ludendorff. Ludendorff was a great man, a man of genius, in
conception, a man of indomitable energy and great gifts. But this man
required a political brake, so to speak, a political element in the
Wilhelmstrasse capable of balancing his influence, and this was never
found. It must fairly be admitted that the German generals achieved
the gigantic, and there was a time when they were looked up to by the
people almost as gods. It may be true that all great strategists are
much alike; they look to victory always and to nothing else. Moltke
himself, perhaps, was nothing more, but he had a Bismarck to maintain
equilibrium. We had no such Bismarck, and when all is said and done it
was not the fault of Ludendorff, or it is at any rate an excuse for
him, that he was the only supremely powerful character in the whole of
Germany, and that in consequence the entire policy of the country was
directed into military channels. Ludendorff was a great patriot,
desiring nothing for himself, but seeking only the happiness of his
country; a military genius, a hard man, utterly fearless--and for all
that a misfortune in that he looked at the whole world through Potsdam
glasses, with an altogether erroneous judgment, wrecking every attempt
at peace which was not a peace by victory. Those very people who
worshipped Ludendorff when he spoke of a victorious peace stone him
now for that very thing; Ludendorff was exactly like the statesmen of
England and France, who all rejected compromise and declared for
victory alone; in this respect there was no difference between them.
The peace of mutual understanding which I wished for was rejected on
the Thames and on the Seine just as by Ludendorff himself. I have said
this already. According to the treaty it was our undoubted duty to
carry on a defensive war to the utmost and reciprocally to defend the
integrity of the State. It is therefore perfectly obvious that I could
never publicly express any other view, that I was throughout forced to
declare that we were fighting for Alsace-Lorraine just as we were for
Trentino, that I could not relinquish German territory to the Entente
so long as I lacked the power to persuade Germany herself to such a
step. But, as I will show, the most strenuous endeavours were made in
this latter direction. And I may here in parenthesis remark that our
military men throughout refrained from committing the error of the
German generals, and interfering in politics themselves. It is
undoubtedly to the credit of our Emperor that whenever any tendency to
such interference appeared he quashed it at once. But in particular I
should point out that the Archduke Frederick confined his activity
solely to the task of bringing about peace. He has rendered most
valuable service in this, as also in his endeavours to arrive at
favourable relations with Germany.

Very shortly after taking up office I had some discussions with the
German Government which left those gentlemen perfectly aware of the
serious nature of the situation. In April, 1917--eighteen months
ago--I sent the following report to the Emperor Charles, which he
forwarded to the Emperor William with the remark that he was entirely
of my opinion.

[This report is already printed in these pages. See p. 146.]

This led to a reply from the German Government, dated May 9, again
expressing the utmost confidence in the success of the submarine
campaign, declaring, it is true, their willingness in principle to
take steps towards peace, but reprehending any such steps as might be
calculated to give an impression of weakness.

As to any territorial sacrifice on the part of Germany, this was not
to be thought of.

As will be seen from this report, however, we did not confine
ourselves to words alone. In 1917 we declared in Berlin that the
Emperor Charles was prepared to permit the union of Galicia with
Poland, and to do all that could be done to attach that State to
Germany in the event of Germany making any sacrifices in the West in
order to secure peace. But we were met with a _non possumus_ and the
German answer that territorial concessions to France were out of the
question.

The whole of Galicia was here involved, but I was firmly assured that
if the plan succeeded Germany would protect the rights of the Ukraine;
and consideration for the Ukrainians would certainly not have
restrained me had it been a question of the highest value--of peace
itself.

When I perceived that the likelihood of converting Berlin to our views
steadily diminished I had recourse to other means. The journey of the
Socialist leaders to Stockholm will be remembered. It is true that the
Socialists were not "sent" by me; they went to Stockholm of their own
initiative and on their own responsibility, but it is none the less
true that I could have refused them their passes if I had shared the
views of the Entente Governments and of numerous gentlemen in our own
country. Certainly, I was at the time very sceptical as to the
outcome, as I already saw that the Entente would refuse passes to
their Socialists, and consequently there could be nothing but a "rump"
parliament in the end. But despite all the reproaches which I had to
bear, and the argument that the peace-bringing Socialists would have
an enormous power in the State to the detriment of the monarchical
principle itself, I never for a moment hesitated to take that step,
and I have never regretted it in itself, only that it did not succeed.
It is encouraging to me now to read again many of the letters then
received criticising most brutally my so-called "Socialistic
proceedings" and to find that the same gentlemen who were then so
incensed at my policy are now adherents of a line of criticism which
maintains that I am too "narrow-minded" in my choice of new means
towards peace.

It will be remembered how, in the early autumn of 1917, the majority
of the German Reichstag had a hard fight against the numerically
weaker but, from their relation to the German Army Command, extremely
powerful minority on the question of the reply to the Papal Note. Here
again I was no idle spectator. One of my friends, at my instigation,
had several conversations with Südekum and Erzberger, and encouraged
them, by my description of our own position, to pass the well known
peace resolution. It was owing to this description of the state of
affairs here that the two gentlemen mentioned were enabled to carry
the Reichstag's resolution in favour of a peace by mutual
understanding--the resolution which met with such disdain and scorn
from the Pan-Germans and other elements. I hoped then, for a moment,
to have gained a lasting and powerful alliance in the German Reichstag
against the German military plans of conquest.

And now, gentlemen, I should like to say a few words on the subject of
that unfortunate submarine campaign which was undoubtedly the beginning
of the end, and to set forth the reasons which in this case, as in many
other instances, forced us to adopt tactics not in accordance with our
own convictions. Shortly after my appointment as Minister the idea of
unrestricted submarine warfare began to take form in German minds. The
principal advocate of this plan was Admiral Tirpitz. To the credit of
the former _Reichskansler_, Bethmann-Hollweg, be it said that he was
long opposed to the idea, and used all means and every argument to
dissuade others from adopting so perilous a proceeding. In the end he
was forced to give way, as was the case with all politicians who came
in conflict with the all-powerful military party. Admiral Holtzendorff
came to us at that time, and the question was debated from every point
of view in long conferences lasting for hours. My then ministerial
colleagues, Tisza and Clam, as well as myself were entirely in
agreement with Emperor Charles in rejecting the proposal, and the only
one who then voted unreservedly in favour of it was Admiral Haus. It
should here be noted that the principal German argument at that time
was not the prospect of starving England into submission, but the
suggestion that the Western front could not be held unless the American
munition transports were sunk--that is to say, the case for the
submarine campaign was then based chiefly on a point of _technical
military importance_ and nothing else. I myself earnestly considered
the question then of separating ourselves from Germany on this point;
with the small number of U-boats at our disposal it would have made but
little difference had we on our part refrained. But another point had
here to be considered. If the submarine campaign was to succeed in the
northern waters it must be carried out at the same time in the
Mediterranean. With this latter water unaffected the transports would
have been sent via Italy, France and Dover to England, and the northern
U-boat campaign would have been paralysed. But in order to carry
on submarine war in the Adriatic we should have to give the Germans
access to our bases, such as Pola, Cattaro and Trieste, and by so doing
we were _de facto_ partaking in the submarine campaign ourselves. If we
did not do it, then we were attacking Germany in the rear by hindering
their submarine campaign--that is to say, it would bring us into direct
conflict with Germany. Therefore, albeit sorely against our will, we
agreed, not convinced by argument, but unable to act otherwise.

And now, gentlemen, I hasten to conclude. I have but a few words to
say as to the present. From time to time reports have appeared in the
papers to the effect that certain gentlemen were preparing
disturbances in Switzerland, and I myself have been mentioned as one
of them. I am doubtful whether there is any truth at all in these
reports; as for myself, I have not been outside this country for the
last nine months. As, however, my contradiction on this head itself
appears to have given rise to further misunderstandings, I will give
you my point of view here briefly and, as I hope, clearly enough. I am
most strongly opposed to any attempt at revolt. I am convinced that
any such attempt could only lead to civil war--a thing no one would
wish to see. I am therefore of opinion that the Republican Government
must be maintained untouched until the German-Austrian people as a
whole has taken its decision. But this can only be decided by the
German people. Neither the Republic nor the Monarchy is in itself a
dogma of democracy. The Kingdom of England is as democratic as
republican Switzerland. I know no country where men enjoy so great
freedom as in England. But it is a dogma of democracy that the people
itself must determine in what manner it will be governed, and I
therefore repeat that the final word can only be spoken by the
constitutional representative body. I believe that I am here entirely
at one with the present Government. There are two methods of
ascertaining the will of the people: either each candidate for the
representative body stands for election on a monarchical or a
republican platform, in which case the majority of the body itself
will express the decision; or the question of Monarchy or Republic can
be decided by a plebiscite. It is matter of common knowledge that I
myself have had so serious conflicts with the ex-Kaiser that any
co-operation between us is for all time an impossibility. No one can,
therefore, suspect me of wishing on personal grounds to revert to the
old régime. But I am not one to juggle with the idea of democracy, and
its nature demands that the people itself should decide. I believe
that the majority of German-Austria is against the old régime, and
when it has expressed itself to this effect the furtherance of
democracy is sufficiently assured.

And with this, gentlemen, I have finished what I proposed to set
before you. I vainly endeavoured to make peace together with Germany,
but I was not unsuccessful in my endeavours to save the
German-Austrians from ultimately coming to armed conflict with
Germany. I can say this, and without exaggeration, that I have
defended the German alliance as if it had been my own child, and I do
not know what would have happened had I not done so. Andrassy's "extra
turn" at the last moment showed the great mass of the public how
present a danger was that of war with Germany. Had the same
experiment been made six months before it would have been war with
Germany; would have made Austria a scene of war.

There are evil times in store for the German people, but a people of
many millions cannot perish and will not perish. The day will come
when the wounds of this war begin to close and heal, and when that day
comes a better future will dawn.

The Austrian armies went forth in the hour of war to save Austria.
They have not availed to save it. But if out of this ocean of blood
and suffering a better, freer and nobler world arise, then they will
not have died in vain, all those we loved who now lie buried in cold
alien earth; they died for the happiness, the peace and the future of
the generations to come.

FOOTNOTES:

[11] Translated from the German text given by Count Czernin, no English
text being available.




INDEX


Adler, Dr. Victor, a discussion with, 27
  and the Socialist Congress at Stockholm, 168
  and Trotski, 234, 235

Adrianople, cession of, 268

Aehrenthal, Franz Ferdinand and, 40
  policy of expansion, 5

Air-raids on England, cause of, 16
  their effect, 167

Albania, and the Peace of Bucharest, 6
  Queen Elizabeth of Roumania and, 92

Albrecht von Würtemberg, 39

Alsace-Lorraine, Bethmann on, 74
  cession of, demanded by Entente, 165
  conquest of, a curse to Germany, 15
  Emperor Charles's offer to Germany, 75
  France insists on restoration of, 170
  Germany and, 71, 158, 159

Ambassadors and their duties, 97, 110

America and the U-boat campaign, 116, 119, 120
  enters the war, 17, 148
  rupture with Germany, 127
  shipbuilding programme of, 291
  unpreparedness for war, 122
  (_Cf._ United States)

American Government, Count Czernin's Note to, 279 _et seq._

Andrassy, Count, and Roumanian peace negotiations, 260
  declares a separate peace, 24, 25
  German Nationalist view of his action, 25

Andrian at Nordbahnhof, 219

Anti-Roumanian party and its leader, 77

Arbitration, courts of, 171, 176, 177

Arion, Roumanian Foreign Minister, 322

Armaments, pre-war fever for, 3

Armand-Revertera negotiations, the, 164, 169

Asquith, a warlike speech by, 181

Austria-Hungary, a rejected proposal decides fate of, 2
  and Albania, 6
  and cession of Galicia, 145
  and question of separate peace, 27, 164, 170
  and the U-boat campaign, 124, 125, 149, 334
  ceases to exist, 179
  consequences of a separate peace, 24
  death-blow to Customs dues, 168
  declaration on submarine warfare, 279
  democratic Parliament of, 306
  enemy's secret negotiations for peace, 141, 162
  food troubles and strikes in, 238, 239, 241, 314
  her army merged into German army, 21
  her position before and after the ultimatum, 13
  heroism of her armies, 336
  impossibility of a separate peace for, 19, 21 _et seq._
  maritime trade obstructed by blockade, 280
  mobilisation and its difficulties, 8, 9
  obstinate attitude after Sarajevo tragedy, 8
  parlous position of, in 1917, 188
  peace negotiations with Roumania, 259, 318
  peace terms to, 179
  policy during war, Count Czernin on, 325
  racial problems in, 190
  separatist tactics in, 164
  Social Democracy in, 21, 31
  terms on which she could make peace, 29
  the Archdukes, 22
  views on a "tripartite solution" of Polish question, 201

Austrian Delegation, Count Czernin's speech to, 298 _et seq._

Austrian Government and the Ukrainian question, 242, 245

Austrian Navy, the, Franz Ferdinand and, 50

Austrian Ruthenians, leader of, 247

Austro-Hungarian demands at Bucharest negotiations, 319

Austro-Hungarian army, General Staff of, 22
  inferiority of, 21

Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, the, and foreign policy, 134
  peace idea of, 174

Austro-Polish question, the, and the Ukrainian demands, 242
  no bar to peace, 331
  solution of, 200 _et seq._

Avarescu, interview with, 263
  retirement of, 323


=B=

Baernreither, his views of a separate peace, 230

Balkan Wars, the, 6

Balkans, the, troubles in: attitude of German Emperor, 68

_Baralong_ episode, the, 133

Bathurst, Captain, and consumption of breadstuffs, 295
  on an "un-English" system, 296

Bauer, Dr., German-Austrian Secretary of State, 18

Bauer, Herr, houses Trotski's library, 235

Bavarian troops enter into the Tyrol, 27

Belgian neutrality violated by Germany, 14

Belgian question, the, Germany ready for negotiations with England on, 180

Belgium, England's promise to, 14
  German entry into, 14
  Germany's views regarding, 157, 158

Belgium, invasion of, changes England's policy, 2

Benckendorff, Count, at London Conference, 275

Benedict XV, Pope, Austria's answer to peace Note of, 175
  German reply to, 333
  proposals for peace by, 167, 177

Berchtold, Count, and Franz Ferdinand, 43, 44
  and the Roumanian question, 77
  criticised by pro-war party at Vienna, 33
  ultimatum to Serbia, 7
  vacillation of, 10

Berlin, Byzantine atmosphere of, 62, 66
  the English Ambassador demands his passport, 14

Bessarabia, Bolshevism in, 265

Bethmann-Hollweg, and Austria's willingness to cede Galicia, 146
  and the Supreme Military Command, 156
  draws up a peace proposal, 139
  opposes U-boat warfare, 115, 334
  optimistic view of U-boat campaign, 151 _et seq._
  replies to author's _exposé_, 150
  requests Vienna Cabinet to accept negotiations, 8
  visits Western front, 73

Bilinski, Herr von, and the future of Poland, 205

Bismarck, Prince, and the invincibility of the army, 17
  and William II., 52
  dealings with William I., 65
  heritage of, becomes Germany's curse, 15
  his policy of "blood and iron," 15

Bizenko, Madame, murders General Sacharow, 220

Blockade, enemies feeling the grip of, 297
  of Germany, 280
  why established by Great Britain, 281

Bohemia as a possible theatre of war: author's reflections on, 24

Bolsheviks and the Kieff Committee, 245

Bolsheviks, dastardly behaviour of, 249
  destruction wrought in Ukraine, 252
  enter Kieff, 248, 249

Bolshevism, Czernin on, 216, 221
  in Bessarabia, 265
  in Russia, 211, 216, 229
  terrorism of, 226
  the Entente and, 273

Bosnia, as compensation to Austria, 207

Bozen, proposals for cession of, 170, 173

Bratianu, a tactless proceeding by, 112
  apprises author of Sarajevo tragedy, 86
  collapse of, 99
  Ministry of, 88
  on Russia, 263
  reproaches author, 96

"Bread peace," origin of the term, 257

Brest-Litovsk, a dejected Jew at, 225
  a victory for German militarism, 193
  answer to Russian peace proposals, 224
  arrival of Trotski at, 232
  conflict with Ukrainians at, 235
  episode of Roumanian peace, 260
  evacuation of occupied areas: difficulties of, 312
  first peace concluded at, 249
  frontier question, 208
  further Ukrainian representation at, 300
  heated discussions at, 228
  object of negotiations at, 305
  peace negotiations at, 218 _et seq._, 311
  Russians threaten to withdraw from, 227
  territorial questions at, 235, 236, 245
  Ukrainian delegation and their claims, 208, 231, 314

Briand, peace negotiations with, 182

Brinkmann, Major, transmits Petersburg information to German
  delegation, 230

British losses by submarines, 290
  trade, and result of submarine warfare, 291

Bronstein and Bolshevism, 211

_Brotfrieden_ ("Bread peace"), 257

Bucharest, fall of, 99
  report of peace negotiations at, 318
  Zeppelin attacks on, 101 et seq.

Bucharest, Peace of, 6, 82, 100, 258 _et seq._, 270

Budapest, author's address to party leaders at, 174
  demonstrations against Germany in, 233

Buftea, Treaty of, 323

Bulgaria, a dispute with Turkey, 268
  and the Dobrudsha question, 263, 323
  her relations with America, 125
  humiliation of, 6
  negotiations with the Entente, 162, 163, 269
  question of her neutrality, 10
  secession of, 183

Bulgarian representatives at Brest, 223

Bülow, Prince, exposes William II., 54

Burian, Count, 106, 200
  and the division of Galicia, 244
  draws up a peace proposal, 139
  his Red Book on Roumania, 98, 114
  succeeded by author, 114
  visits German headquarters, 210

Busche, von dem, and territorial concessions, 107


=C=

Cachin, his attitude at French Socialist Congress, 214

Cambon, M., attends the London Conference, 275

Capelle and U-boats, 132

Carmen Sylva (_see_ Elizabeth, Queen of Roumania)

Carol, King, a fulfilled prophecy of, 88
  and Serbia, 12
  last days of, 90
  peculiar policy of Government of, 81
  tactfulness of, 79
  Tsar's visit to, 88
  urges acceptance of ultimatum, 90
  visited by Franz Ferdinand, 79

Carp, 82, 87, 94

Catarau, and the crime at Debruzin, 89

Central-European question, the, 209
  the terror of the Entente, 172

Central Powers and the Bratianu Ministry, 97
  enemy blockade of, 132
  favourable news in 1917, 143
  why they adopted submarine warfare, 281 _et seq._

Charles VIII., Emperor, and Franz Ferdinand, 41
  and problem of nationality, 192
  and the principle of ministerial responsibility, 56
  and the Ukrainian question, 244
  apprised by author of critical condition of food supply, 237, 239
  cautions the Kaiser, 321
  communicates with King Ferdinand on Roumanian peace, 260
  confers a title on eldest son of Franz Ferdinand, 45
  correspondence with Prince Sixtus, 164
  frequent absences from Vienna, 61
  his ever friendly demeanour, 57, 58
  invites Crown Prince to Vienna, 75
  opposes U-boat warfare, 334
  reinstates Archduke Joseph Ferdinand, 61
  rejoices at peace with Ukraine, 249
  submits author's _exposé_ to William II., 146, 332
  suggests sacrifices for ending World War, 75
  visits South Slav provinces, 59

Clam-Martinic, Count, and the customs question, 168
  and U-boat campaign, 121
  attends conference on Polish question, 206
  opposes submarine warfare, 334

Clemenceau, M., and Germany, 182
  and the Peace of Versailles, 272
  dominant war aim of, 184, 186

Colloredo-Mannsfield, Count, at Brest-Litovsk, 236
  attends conference on U-boat question, 121
  meets author, 219

Compulsory international arbitration, 171, 176, 177

Conrad, Chief of the General Staff, 44

Constantinople, an Entente group in, 163

Corday, Charlotte, cited, 227

Cossacks, the, 212

Courland demanded by Germany, 249

Crecianu, Ambassador Jresnea, house damaged in Zeppelin attack
  on Bucharest, 103

Csatth, Alexander, mortally wounded, 89

Csicserics, Lieut. Field-Marshal, 219
  at Brest-Litovsk, 236

Czechs, the, attitude of, regarding a separate peace, 24

Czernin, Count Ottokar, a candid chat with Franz Ferdinand, 43
  a hostile Power's desire for peace, 141
  a scene at Konopischt, 39
  abused by a braggart and brawler, 83
  acquaints Emperor of food shortage, 237, 239
  activities for peace with Roumania, 258 _et seq._
  ambassador to Roumania, 7
  an appeal for confidence, 310
  and American intervention, 123
  and the reinstatement of Archduke Joseph Ferdinand, 61
  and the Ukrainian question (_see_ Ukrainian)
  answers explanation of an American request, 128
  appeals to Germany for food, 238, 239, 329
  appointed Ambassador to Bucharest, 77
  apprises Berchtold of decision of Cabinet Council, 12
  attends conference on U-boat warfare, 121
  avoided by Pan-Germans, 160
  becomes Minister for Foreign Affairs, 114
  breakfasts with Kühlmann, 230
  confers with Tisza, 27, 28
  conflicts with the Kaiser, 335
  conversation with Trotski, 248
  converses with Crown Prince, 74
  criticises Michaelis, 160
  decorated by King Carol, 88
  disapproves of U-boat warfare, 115
  dismissal of, 183, 194, 266
  extracts bearing on a trip to Western front, 72
  friction with the Emperor, 210, 215
  his hopes of a peace of understanding, 20 _et seq._, 174,
    209, 217, 331, 333
  imparts peace terms to Marghiloman, 266
  informs Emperor of proceedings at Brest, 229
  interviews King Ferdinand, 264
  issues passports for Stockholm Conference, 168, 333
  journeys to Brest-Litovsk, 218
  learns of the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, 86
  loss of a dispatch-case, 98
  loyalty to Germany, 327
  lunches with Prince of Bavaria, 222
  meets the Emperor William II., 54
  misunderstandings resulting from a speech by, 19, 23
  nominated to the Herrenhaus, 46
  note to American Government, 279
  obtains a direct statement from William II., 57
  on a separate peace, 327
  on Austria's policy during war, 325
  on Bolshevism, 216, 221
  on President Wilson's programme, 192
  on U-boat warfare, 148, 179, 334
  passages of arms with Ludendorff, 247
  peace programme of, 299
  persecution of, 208
  Polish leaders and, 205
  President Wilson on, 193
  private talk with the Emperor, 124
  sends in his resignation, 23
  sets interned prisoners at liberty, 95, 96
  speech to Austrian Delegation, 298 _et seq._
  threatens a separate peace with Russia, 228
  unfounded charges against, 162
  urges sacrifice of Alsace-Lorraine, 71
  William II.'s gift to, 64
  with Emperor Charles visits Eastern front, 57


=D=

Danube Monarchy, the, a vital condition for existence of
  Hungarian State, 202
  dangers of a political structure for, 202

Debruzin, sensational crime at, 88

Declaration of London, the, 280

D'Esperey, General Franchet, and Karolyi, 260

Deutsch, Leo, and the Marxian Social Democrats, 211

Devonport, Lord, on the food question, 296

Disarmament, negotiations respecting, 4
  international, 171, 176, 177, 308
  question of, 181

Divorces in Roumania, 85

Dobrudsha, the, acquisition of, 82
  assigned to Bulgaria, 268, 269
  cession of, at peace with Roumania, 323
  King Ferdinand and, 265
  Marghiloman's view on, 266
  question discussed with Avarescu, 263
  Turkish attitude concerning, 268

Dualism, the curse of, 137


=E=


East Galicia, cession of, demanded by Ukrainians, 240 _et seq._

"Echinstvo" group, the, 211

Edward VII., King, and Emperor Francis Joseph, 1, 2
  and William II., 63
  encircling policy of, 1, 63

Elizabeth, Queen of Roumania, a word-picture by, 91
  an operation for cataract, 93
  her devotion to King Carol, 92

Ellenbogen, Dr., and Socialist Conference at Stockholm, 168
  plain speaking by, 26

England, an effort at _rapprochement_ with Germany and its failure, 180
  and dissolution of military power in Germany, 184
  and the elder Richthofen, 246
  attitude of, at beginning of World War, 15, 16
  blockade of, by U-boats, 142, 151
  bread shortage in, 295
  declares war on Germany, 14
  discards Declaration of London, 280
  distress in, from U-boat warfare, 145
  distrust of Germany's intentions in, 185
  dread of gigantic growth of Germany in, 1
  Flotow's tribute to, 120
  food supply of, 293
  freedom in, 335
  her desire to remain neutral at opening of war, 2
  negotiates with Germany on naval disarmament, 4
  public opinion in, after Sarajevo tragedy, 8
  refusal to restore German colonies, 166, 170
  shortage of potatoes in, 296
  the Pacifist party in, 167
  "unbending resolve" of, to shatter Germany, 31, 32, 71

English mentality, a typical instance of, 4

English Socialists, 214

Entente, the, adheres to Pact of London, 209, 217
  and arming of merchant vessels, 286
  and Italy, 27
  and the trial of William II., 66
  answers President Wilson, 118, 120
  as instruments in a world revolution, 273
  Austria pressed to join, 2
  demands abolition of German militarism, 165, 170, 171, 173
  desire of final military victory, 164
  exterminates Prussian militarism, 273
  impression on, of author's speech at Budapest, 178
  mine-laying by, 130
  peace proposals to, 19, 20
  rejects first peace offer, 115
  suspicious of Germany's plans, 3
  their "unbending resolve" to shatter Germany, 31, 326
  views as to peace, 170

Enver Pasha, his influence in Turkey, 233, 269

Erzberger, Herr, agrees with "Czernin scheme", 185, 333
  and author's secret report to the Emperor, 155 (note)

Espionage in Roumania, 97

Esterhazy succeeds Tisza, 136

Esthonia demanded by Germany, 249, 317

Eugen, Archduke, 22

Europe after the war, 175

European tension, beginnings of, 1


=F=

Fasciotti, Baron, and Austro-Hungarian action in Belgrade, 12

Fellowes, Sir Ailwyn, admits success of U-boats, 295

Ferdinand, King of Roumania, author's interview with, 264
  German opinion of, 260
  Queen Elizabeth's fondness for, 93

Ferdinand of Bulgaria, King, anti-Serbian policy of, 51

Filippescu, Nikolai, a proposal by, 80

Fleck, Major, at Nordbahnhof, 219

Flotow, Baron, interview with Hohenlohe, 117
  reports on German attitude on U-boat warfare, 118

Fourteen Points, Wilson's, 190 _et seq._, 271, 305, 306, 323 _et seq._

France, and Austria: effect of Vienna troubles, 250
  Bethmann's tribute to, 153
  distrust of Germany's intentions in, 185
  insists on restoration of Alsace-Lorraine, 170
  opening of war a surprise to, 2
  the Pacifist party in, 167

Francis Joseph, Emperor, a tribute to, 47
  advised to accept negotiations, 8
  and Franz Ferdinand, 42, 46
  and the principle of ministerial responsibility, 56
  author's audience with, 12
  death of, 48
  gives audience to author, 47
  King Edward VII. and, 1, 2
  on the Peace of Bucharest, 6
  opposes Filippescu's scheme, 81

Franz Ferdinand, Archduke, a fortune-teller's prediction concerning, 44
  anti-Magyar point of view of, 38, 50
  antipathy to Hungary, 35, 37, 38
  as gardener, 35
  as husband and father, 44, 45
  dislike for the Germans of, 50
  false rumours concerning, 43
  fearlessness of, 45
  friendships of, 39
  Goluchowski and, 36
  Great-Austrian programme of, 41, 49
  his high opinion of Pallavicini, 5
  his sense of humour, 41
  makes advances to the Kaiser, 42
  marriage of, 41, 44
  mentality of, 35
  personality of, 34
  pro-Roumanian proclivities of, 77, 78, 79
  tragic end of, 49 (_see also_ Sarajevo tragedy)
  views on foreign policy of, 51

Freedom of the seas, 177
  attacked by Entente, 280, 281
  neutrals and, 284
  President Wilson on, 281, 307

French Socialistic Congress, 214

Freyburg, Baron von, attends conference on U-boat question, 121

Friedrich, Archduke, a tribute to, 22
  tact of, 72

Frontier rectifications, Hungary and, 258, 266, 319, 330

Fürstenberg, Karl, a request of, refused at Vienna, 112
  report on Roumanian question by, 77


=G=

Galicia, proposed cession of, 20, 75, 145, 159, 173, 332
  partition of, 209
  Tisza and, 135

Gas attacks, reason for Germany's use of, 16

Gautsch, Baron, a code telegram from, 229
  at Nordbahnhof, 219

George, Lloyd, admits grave state of grain supplies, 295
  and the Peace of Versailles, 272
  author in agreement with, 177-8
  confers with Orlando, 164
  Dr. Helfferich's allusions to, 290
  his desire to crush Germany, 186
  influence of, 184
  on disarmament, 184

George V., King, his telegram to Prince Henry of Prussia, 9

German army, the General Staff, 22

German-Austria, 179
  population of, 31

German Empire, the, creation of, 15, 66

German Government, _versus_ German Diplomacy, 10

German mentality, a typical instance of, 4
  military party refuse peace, 32

German Nationalists and Count Andrassy, 25, 26

German policy founders on heritage left by Bismarck, 15

German-Russian differences as to occupied areas, 304

German Supreme Command and evacuation question, 312

Germans and a friendly attitude towards America, 122
  at Brest conference, 224
  attitude of, towards Poland, 203
  inferior mentality of, 69
  "insatiable appetite" of, 267
  Lenin and, 216
  oppose peace negotiations with Roumania, 260
  refuse to renounce occupied territory, 226
  the dynastic fidelity of, 52

Germany, a moral coalition against, 3
  advocates unrestricted U-boat warfare, 115 _et seq._
  and Alsace-Lorraine, 71
  and Austro-Hungarian military action in Ukraine, 254
  answers the Papal Note, 177
  blind faith in invincibility of her army, 17
  blockade of, and her retaliatory measures, 16
  confident of victory, 23, 71
  culpability of, in matter of peace, 185
  decides on U-boat campaign, 124
  declares Armistice with Russia at an end, 318
  disillusionment of, 31
  dissatisfaction in, over peace resolution in Reichstag, 156
  England declares war on, 14
  evil times in store for, 336
  her dream of a victorious peace, 326, 331
  her hopes of food shortage in England, 145
  Michaelis on internal economic and political situation in, 157
  military party of, 19, 327, 330, 331
  negotiations respecting naval disarmament, 4
  post-war intentions of, 185
  restricts building of U-boats, 131
  revolution in, 328
  rupture with America, 127
  unsuccessful effort at _rapprochement_, 180
  violates neutrality of Belgium, 14

Goluchowski, Count, vacillation of, 36

Görlitz, battle of, 96, 107, 329

Gratz, Dr., a good suggestion by, 248
  author's discussion with, 219
  on Austro-Polish solution of Polish question, 244

Great-Roumania, question of, 80

Great War, the, psychology of various cities, 197
  (_See_ World War)

Grey, Sir Edward, an interview with Lichnowsky, 7
  at London Conference, 275
  proposes negotiations, 8


=H=

Habsburgs, Empire of, the Treaty of London and, 21, 29, 33

Hadik, apathetic attitude of, 238

Hague Convention, the, 280

Haus, Admiral, favours submarine warfare, 334
  in Vienna, 121

Hauser, and the question of separate peace, 230

Hebel, appointment for, 154

Helfferich, Dr., disclosures by, 161 (note)
  on attitude of William II. during Balkan troubles, 68
  speech on submarine warfare, 151, 288 _et seq._

Henry of Prussia, Prince, a telegram
     from King George to, 9

Hertling, Count, advised to suppress "Der Kaiser im Felde," 64
  becomes Imperial Chancellor, 198
  President Wilson on, 193
  succeeds Michaelis, 161

Herzegovina as compensation to Austria, 207

Hindenburg, Field-Marshal, modesty of, 126
  popularity of, in Germany, 17

Hoffmann, General, an unfortunate speech by, 237
  and plans for outer provinces, 226
  high words with Kühlmann, 235
  received by the Kaiser, 230
  receives a telegram from Petersburg, 229
  visited by author, 219

Hohenberg, Duchess of, 41
  welcomed in Roumania, 79

Hohendorf, General Conrad von, and his responsibility for
  the war, 18 (note)

Hohenlohe, Prince, and settlement of Wedel's request, 127
  free speech with William II., 65
  report on U-boat campaign, 116, 126

Holtzendorff, Admiral, and submarine campaign, 149
  arrives in Vienna, 121
  guarantees results of U-boat campaign, 122, 334

Hungarian Ruthenians, Wekerle on, 243
  Social Democrats, 168

Hungary and cession of her territory, 106
  and Roumanian intervention, 77, 106, 107
  and the alliance with Roumania, 77 _et seq._
  demands of, at Bucharest, 319
  frontier rectification question, 258, 266, 319, 330
  her influence on the war, 138
  indignation in, at author's appointment to Bucharest, 77
  "just punishment" of, 97
  opposes economical alliance with Roumania, 266, 320
  question of a separate peace, 27
  repellent attitude of, 107
  struggle for liberty in, 202
  why her army was neglected, 22


=I=

Imperiali, Marchese, points submitted to London Conference by, 275

International arbitration (_see_ Arbitration)

International disarmament, 171, 176, 177

International law, Germany's breach of, in adoption of U-boat
  warfare, 280, 281

Internationalists, Russian, 211

Ischl, an audience with Emperor Francis Joseph at, 12

Iswolsky, 11

Italy, Allied defeat in, 183
  and Albania, 6
  and the Peace of Versailles, 272
  Czernin on, 308
  declares a blockade, 281
  points submitted to London Conference, 275
  stands in way of a peace of understanding, 188
  ultimatum to, 12
  why she entered the war, 3


=J=

Jaczkovics, Vicar Michael, tragic death of, 89

Jagow, Herr von, a frank disclosure by, 14

Joffe, Herr, a circular letter to Allies, 300
  conversation with, at Brest, 220
  criticisms on the Tsar, 227

Jonescu, Take, and the Sarajevo tragedy, 86

Joseph Ferdinand, Archduke, 22
  appointed Chief of Air Force, 62
  reinstatement of, 61
  relinquishes his command, 62
  the Luck episode, 61


=K=

Kameneff at Brest, 220, 316

Karachou, Leo, secretary of Peace Delegation, 303

Karl, Emperor, peace proposals to the Entente, 20

Karl of Schwarzenberg, Prince, Franz Ferdinand and, 39, 40

Karolyi and Roumanian peace negotiations, 260
  his attitude before the Roumanian declaration of war, 28

Kerenski and the offensive against Central Powers, 211
  newspaper report of condition of his health, 212

Kiderlen-Waechter, a satirical remark by, 63

Kieff, a mission to, 251
  entered by Bolsheviks, 248, 249
  in danger of a food crisis, 252
  peace conditions at, 208

Kieff Committee and the Bolsheviks, 245

Kiel Week, the, 62

_Kienthaler_ (Internationalists), 211

Konopischt and its history, 34 _et seq._

Kreuznach, a conference at, 145

Kriegen, Dr. Bogdan, a fulsome work by, 64

Kühlmann, Dr., and the food shortage, 238, 239
  author's talk with, 222
  difficult position of, 313
  high words with Hoffman, 235
  his influence, 198, 199
  informed of Roumanian peace overtures, 260
  on the Kaiser, 228
  returns to Brest, 230


=L=

Lamezan, Captain Baron, at Brest-Litovsk, 233

Landwehr, General, and the food shortage, 238, 240

Lansdowne, Lord, conciliatory attitude of, 184

Larin and Menshevik Socialists, 211

League of Nations, the, 308

Lenin, author on, 216
  opposed to offensive against Central Powers, 211

Leopold of Bavaria, Prince, a day's shooting with, 231
  chats with author, 219

Lewicky, M., 240

Lichnowsky interviews Sir Edward Grey, 7

Liége taken by Ludendorff, 22

Lithuania, Germany and, 249

Livonia demanded by Germany, 249, 317

London, Declaration of, discarded by England, 280

London, Pact of, 20, 170, 172, 179, 328
  desired amendments to, 146
  text of, 21, 275 _et seq._

Lublin, German demand for evacuation of, 204, 205, 206

Luck episode, the, 22, 106
  Archduke Joseph Ferdinand and, 61

Ludendorff and Belgium, 186
  and the Polish question, 207
  candid admission by, 247
  compared with enemy statesmen, 19
  confident of success of U-boat warfare, 126
  congratulates Hoffmann, 237
  displays "a gleam of insight", 230
  dominating influence of, 79, 115, 126
  German hero-worship of, 17
  his independent nature, 60
  how he captured Liége, 22
  personality of, 331

Lueger and Franz Ferdinand, 50

Luxembourg, German invasion of, 16


=M=

Mackensen, a fleet of Zeppelins at Bucharest, 101
  failure at Maracesci, 261
  headquarters at Bucharest, 105

Magyars, the, and Franz Ferdinand, 38, 50
  author and, 78

Majorescu and Austria's policy, 330
  and territorial concessions, 97, 206
  forms a Ministry, 81

Mandazescu, arrest and extradition of, 89

Maracesci, attack on, 261

Marghiloman and co-operation of Roumania, 106
  forms a Cabinet, 266, 320

Marie, Queen of Roumania, English sympathies of, 98, 99

Marne, the, first battle of, 17

Martow and the Menshevik party, 211

Martynoz, and the Russian Internationalists, 211

Medwjedew, J.G., Ukrainian delegate to Brest, 301

Mennsdorff, Ambassador, interviews General Smuts, 169

Menshevik party, the, 211

Meran, the Entente's proposals regarding, 170, 173

Merchant vessels, arming of, author on, 285

Merey meets Czernin at Brest, 219

Michaelis, Dr., appointed Imperial Chancellor, 156
  defines Germany's views regarding Belgium, 157
  on peace proposals, 157
  Pan-Germanism of, 160

"Might before Right," Bismarckian principle of, 15

Miklossy, Bishop Stephan, marvellous escape of, 89

Militarism, German faith in, 17
  England's idea of German, 166

Monarchists _v._ Republicans, 52

Monarchs, hypnotic complacency of, 58 _et seq._

Moutet, attitude of, at French Socialist conference, 214


=N=

Nationality, problem of, 190
  Franz Ferdinand and, 191

Naval disarmament, negotiations on, 4

Nicholas, Grand Duke, and the military party in Russia, 2

Nicolai, Tsar, Joffe on, 227

North Sea, the, blockade of, 280

Noxious gas, why used by Germany, 16


=O=

Odessa, in danger of a food crisis, 252

Orlando confers with Ribot and Lloyd George, 164

Otto, Archduke, brother of Franz Ferdinand, 36


=P=

Pallavicini, Markgraf, discusses the political situation with author, 5

Pan-Germans, 330
  conditions on which they would conclude peace, 160

Pan-Russian Congress, the, 212, 213, 214

Papal Note, the, 167, 177
  Austria's reply to, 175
  German reply to, 333

Paris, negotiations _in camera_ at, 271

Peace by sacrifice, 327

Peace Congress at Brest-Litovsk, 218 _et seq._

Peace movement, real historical truth concerning, 186

Peace negotiations, Count Czernin on, 298 _et seq._
  deadlock in, 182
  the Pope's proposals, 167, 175, 177, 333

Peace resolution, a, and its consequences, 156

Penfield, Mr., American Ambassador to Vienna, 131

People's Socialists, the, 212

Peschechonow, Minister of Food, 212

Petersburg and the Ukraine, 309

Plechanow, Georgei, and the Russian Social Patriots, 211

Poklewski, Russian Ambassador to Roumania, 86

Poland, a conference on question of, 205
  becomes a kingdom, 200
  conquest of, 106
  Count Czernin on, 304
  Emperor Charles's offer regarding, 75
  future position of, 203
  German standpoint on, 203
  Michaelis on, 159
  re-organisation of, 145
  the German demands, 244
  unrepresented at Brest, and the reason, 304, 315

Poles, the, and Brest-Litovsk negotiations, 208
  party divisions among, 204

Polish question, and the Central-European project, 209
  difficulties of, 200

Popow, Bulgarian Minister of Justice, 223

Pro-Roumanian party and its head, 77

Prussian militarism, England's idea of, 166
  extermination of, 273
  fear of, 174
  (_See also_ German military party)


=Q=


Quadruple Alliance, the, dissension in, 250
  Germany as shield of, 183
  peace terms to Roumania, 262


=R=

Radek, a scene with a chauffeur, 237

Radoslawoff, ignorant of negotiations with Entente, 162

Randa, Lieut.-Col. Baron, a telling remark by, 104
  and Roumanian peace overtures, 260, 262, 319

Reichstag, the, a peace resolution passed in, 156
  demands peace without annexation, 156, 160

Renner and the Stockholm Congress, 168

Republicans _v._ Monarchists, 52

Ressel, Colonel, 264

Revertera negotiates for peace, 164, 169

Revolution, danger of, 147

Rhondda, Lord, British Food Controller, 151

Ribot confers with Orlando, 164
  statement by, 152

Richthofen brothers, the, 246

Rosenberg meets author at Brest, 219

Roumania, 77 _et seq._
  a change of Government in, 81
  a land of contrasts, 84
  affairs in, after Sarajevo tragedy, 86
  and the Peace of Bucharest, 6
  author's negotiations for peace, 258
  between two stools, 261
  declares war, 100, 279
  espionage in, 97
  freedom of the Press in, 84
  Germany and, 262, 267
  her treachery to Central Powers, 262
  how news of Sarajevo tragedy was received in, 86
  Marghiloman forms a Cabinet, 266
  negotiations for peace, 318
  out of action, 23
  peace concluded with, 323
  question of annexations of, 159, 207
  question of her neutrality, 12, 95
  Russian gold in, 111
  social conditions in, 85
  ultimatum to, 12, 262
  why she entered the war, 3

Roumanian invasion of Transylvania, 108

Roumanians, mistaken views of strength of, 261
  their love of travel, 85

Rudolf, Crown Prince, and Franz Ferdinand, 37

Russia, a contemplated peace with, 211
  abdication of the Tsar, 142
  an appeal to German soldiers, 249
  begins military operations without a declaration of war, 3
  Bolshevism in, 211, 216, 229
  declares for cessation of hostilities, 318
  differences of opinion in, as to continuance of war, 211 _et seq._
  enters the war, 7
  Francis Joseph's inquiry as to a possible revolution in, 105
  her responsibility for Great War, 10
  incites German army to revolt, 317
  negotiations for peace, 298
  out of action, 23
  peace treaty signed, 318
  prepared for war, 112
  the military party in, 2, 9
  ultimatum to Roumania, 262

Russian Revolution, the, 142, 147, 211 _et seq._

Russians, their fear of Trotski, 237

Ruthenian districts of Hungary, Ukrainian demands, 242


=S=

Sacharow, General, murder of, 220

St. Mihiel, author at, 73

St. Privat, reminiscences of, 74

Salzburg negotiations, the, 210

Sarajevo, the tragedy of, 6, 49
  sounds death knell of the Monarchy, 32

Sassonoff, a momentous statement by, 88
  attitude of, after declaration of war, 8
  visits Bucharest, 112

Satonski, Wladimir Petrowitch, 302

Schachrai, W.M., at Brest, 301

Schonburg, Alvis, and the Emperor Charles, 61

Schönerer, Deputy, Franz Ferdinand and, 50

Secret diplomacy, abolition of: author's views, 306-7

Sedan, a house with a history at, 74

Seidler, Dr. von, a _faux pas_ by, 56
  and the food shortage, 240
  and the partition of Galicia, 209
  and the Ukrainian question, 208, 242, 243
  apathetic attitude of, 238, 239
  author's meeting with, 230
  visits South Slav provinces, 59

Seitz, and the Stockholm Conference, 168

Serbia, arrogance of, 6
  ultimatum to, 7

Sewrjuk, M., 240

Sixtus, Prince, letters from Emperor Charles to, 164

Skobeleff and the Mensheviks, 211

Skrzynski, Herr von, 250

Slapowszky, Johann, tragic death of, 89

Slav provinces, a visit by the Emperor to, 59

Smuts, General, interview with Mennsdorff, 170

Social Democrats and the question of peace, 26, 30
  and the Stockholm Conference, 168, 333
  Hungarian, 243
  opposed to sacrifice of Alsace-Lorraine, 71

"Social Patriots," Russian, 211

Social Revolutionary Party, the, 212

Socialists and offensive against Central Powers, 211

Spanish reports of war-weariness in England and France, 143

Stirbey, Prince, 263

Stockholm, a Socialist Conference at, 168, 333
  Russians ask for a conference at, 229

Stockholm Congress, negative result of, 169

Strikes and their danger, 310

Stumm, von, on Ukrainian claims, 241

Sturdza, Lieut.-Col., extraordinary behaviour of, 83

Stürgkh, Count, 18 (note)
  recollections of, 46

Submarine warfare, author's note to American Government on, 279
  Czernin on, 334
  destruction without warning justified, 283
  enemy losses in, 290
  enemy's "statistical smoke-screens" as to, 289
  question of safety of passengers and crew, 282
  speech by Dr. Helfferich on, 288
  why adopted by Central Powers, 281 _et seq._
  (_See also_ U-boats)

Südekum, Herr, and Austria-Hungary's peace proposals, 155, 333

Supreme Military and Naval Command, conditions of, for peace
  negotiations, 159

Switzerland, reported disturbances in: author's disclaimer, 335

Sycophancy in high places, 58, 60, 62, 63, 64

Sylvester, Dr., and the German-Austrian National Assembly, 26


=T=

Talaat Pasha arrives at Brest, 233
  influence of, 143
  threatens to resign, 269

Talleyrand, a dictum of, 174

Tarnowski, Count, author's opinion of, 110
  German Ambassador to Washington, 127

Thomas, M., war speech on Russian front, 214

Tisza, Count Stephen, 18 (note)
  a characteristic letter from, 200
  advocates unrestricted U-boat warfare, 115, 334
  and American intervention, 123
  and author's appointment to Bucharest, 78
  and cession of Hungarian territory, 135
  and control of foreign policy, 134
  and the Stockholm Conference, 168
  assassination of, 137
  at a U-boat campaign conference, 121
  author's conference with, 27, 28
  defends Count Czernin, 108
  dismissal of, 136, 203
  Franz Ferdinand and, 38
  his influence in Hungary, 27
  leads anti-Roumanian party, 77
  lively correspondence with author, 128
  on dangers of pessimism, 154
  on the Treaty of London, 28
  opposes annexation of Roumania, 207
  opposes the war, 10
  opposes U-boat warfare, 131, 334
  peace proposal of, 139
  _pro-memoria_ of, on Roumanian peace negotiations, 258
  question of frontier rectifications, 319
  refuses cession of Hungarian territory, 107
  speech at conference on Polish question, 206
  tribute to, 137
  views regarding Poland, 200
  visits the Southern Slavs, 30

Transylvania, 173
  opposition to cession of, 107
  proposed cession of, 28, 50
  Roumanian invasion of, 108

Trentino, the, offered to Italy, 75

Trieste, Entente proposals regarding, 170, 173

"Tripartite solution" of Polish question, Tisza on, 201

Trnka and the Customs dues, 168

Trotski, a tactical blunder by, 236
  accepts the German-Austria ultimatum, 235
  and the Internationalist party, 211
  arrives at Brest, 232
  declines to sign, 250
  his brother-in-law Kameneff, 220
  his library, 235, 236
  negotiations with, 247
  opposed to ill-treatment of war prisoners, 236
  ultimatum to, 234

Trudoviks, the, 212

Tscheidse, and the Mensheviks, 211, 213

Tschernow, speaks at Peasants' Congress, 212

Tschirsky, Herr von, a momentous communication to Berchtold, 7
  and a telegram from King George, 9
  his desire for war, 32
  untactful diplomacy of, 10

Tseretelli and the Menshevik party, 211

Turkey, a dispute with Bulgaria, 268
  asks for munitions, 95
  how the Sultan was deposed, 233
  probable secession of, 269

Turkish Grand Vizier arrives at Brest, 233

Turks, a reported advance by a hostile Power for a separate peace, 143
  at Brest Conference, 223

Tyrol, the, German troops in, 24


=U=

U-boat warfare, 114 _et seq._
  a conference in Vienna on, 121
  "a terrible mistake", 126
  and America's entry into the war, 126
  and why adopted by Germany, 16
  Czernin on, 148
  political arguments against, 117, 118
  what it achieved, 178
  (_See also_ Submarine warfare)

Ugron, Herr von, and the "tripartite" solution of Polish question, 201

Ukraine and Petersburg, 309
  Bolshevik destruction in, 252
  food supplies from, 251 _et seq._, 315
  military action in, and the consequences, 253
  peace concluded with, 249
  revolution in, 253
  survey of imports from, 255
  treaty signed, 317

Ukrainian Army General Committee appointed, 214
  delegates at Brest, 231, 300
  Workers' and Peasants' Government, a declaration from, 301

Ukrainians and their demands, 208, 240, 314
  dictatorial attitude of, 241
  negotiations with, 315

United States, the, scarcity of supplies in, 294
  (_See also_ America)


=V=

Versailles, opening of Peace Congress at, 196
  the Council of Four at, 271
  the Peace of, 18, 19, 271
  terrible nature of, 273
  triumph of Entente at, 186

Vienna, a council in, 121
  differences of opinion in, 77
  disastrous effects of troubles in, 250
  disturbances in, 58
  food shortage and strikes in, 238, 239, 241, 314
  politicians' views on peace proposals, 230
  psychology of, 197
  warlike demonstrations at, after Sarajevo tragedy, 33

Vredenburch, Herr von, Dutch Ambassador to Roumania, 104


=W=

Wales, Prince of (_see_ Edward VII., King)

Wallachia, occupation of, 99, 105

Wallhead, Mr., 295

Washington Cabinet, and Austria-Hungary's attitude to submarine
  warfare, 279

Wassilko, Nikolay, leader of Austrian Ruthenians, 247, 249

Wedel, Count, calls on Count Czernin, 127
  disclosures of, 161 (note)
  revelations of, 155 (note)

Weisskirchner, Burgemeister, coins the term "bread peace," 257

Wekerle, Dr., and the Polish question, 203
  author and, 136, 230
  on the Ukrainian question, 242
  standpoint of, on Roumanian peace negotiations, 260, 319

Western front, an Entente break-through on, 183

Western Powers, the, and Germany's ambitions, 2

Wiesner, Ambassador, von, and a Pan-German, 161
  at Brest-Litovsk, 236
  author discusses Russian peace with, 219

Wilhelm, Crown Prince, and Franz Ferdinand, 43
  anxious for peace, 72
  author's conversation with, 74
  his quarters at Sedan, 74

William I. and Bismarck, 65

William II., Emperor, and Bismarck, 52
  and Franz Ferdinand, 42
  and the German Supreme Military Command, 17
  as _causeur_, 66
  as the "elect of God," 52, 53
  cause of his ruin, 62 _et seq._
  demonstrations against, in the Reichstag, 54
  desires to help deposed Tsar, 70
  difficulties of his political advisers, 60
  fails to find favour in England, 63
  his projected division of the world, 67
  impending trial of: author's protest, 66
  informed of serious nature of situation for Allies, 332
  instructions to Kühlmann, 249
  long years of peaceful government, 68
  longs for peace, 70
  on food troubles in England, 145
  on impending attack on Italian front, 71
  presents author with "Der Kaiser im Felde," 64
  Prince Hohenlohe and, 65
  question of his abdication, 75
  the Press and, 65
  warlike speeches of, 68

Wilson, President, advantages of his "Fourteen Points," 188
  as master of the world, 192
  author on his Message, 305
  Count Andrassy's Note to, 25
  Count Czernin on, 192
  Entente's reply to his peace proposal, 118, 120, 123
  his Fourteen Points and the Peace of Versailles, 271
  on the freedom of the seas, 281
  ready to consider peace, 250
  reopens hopes of a peace of understanding, 189
  speech to Congress, 193
  text of the Fourteen Points, 323

Wolf, K.H., a scene in the "Burg," 169

World-domination, Germany's dream of, 1, 2

World organization, a new, principles of, 174 _et seq._

World War, the, an important phase of, 107
  attempts at peace, 134 _et seq._
  author's impressions and reflections on, 195 _et seq._, 271 _et seq._
  by whom started, 18 (note)
  causes of, 3
  President Wilson and, 188 _et seq._
  questions of responsibility for outbreak of, 2

World War, the, U-boat warfare in, 114 _et seq._
  (_see also_ Submarine warfare and U-boat)
  violent measures adopted by Germany in, 16


=Z=

Zeppelin raids on Bucharest, 100

Zimmermann, Herr, and author's peace proposals, 146
  opposes unrestricted U-boat warfare, 115, 120

_Zimmerwalder_ (Russian Internationalists), 211



PRINTED BY CASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED, LA BELLE SAUVAGE, LONDON, E.C. 4

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   | Typographical errors corrected in text:                          |
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Amateurs may produce the plays in this volume without charge.
Professional actors _must_ apply for acting rights to the author, in
care of the publishers.



PREFACE


The one-act plays for young people contained in this volume can be
produced separately, or may be used as links in the chain of episodes
which go to make up outdoor or indoor pageants. There are full
directions for simple costumes, dances, and music. Each play deals with
the _youth_ of some American hero, so that the lad who plays George
Washington or Benjamin Franklin will be in touch with the emotions of a
patriot of his own years, instead of incongruously portraying an adult.
Much of the dialogue contains the actual words of Lincoln, Washington,
and Franklin, so that in learning their lines the youthful players may
grasp something of the hardihood and sagacity of Washington, the
perseverance of Franklin, and the honesty and dauntlessness of Lincoln,
and of those salient virtues that went to the up-building of America--a
heritage from the time "when all the land was young."

The plays are suitable for schools, summer camps, boys' clubs, historic
festivals, patriotic societies, and social settlements and playgrounds.
The outdoor plays are especially adapted for a "Safe and Sane Fourth."
All the plays have stood the test of production.

"The Pageant of Patriots"--the first children's patriotic pageant ever
given in America--was produced in Prospect Park, Brooklyn, N. Y., under
the auspices of Brooklyn's ten Social Settlements, May, 1911. The
Hawthorne Pageant was first produced on Arbor Day, May, 1911, by the
Wadleigh High School, New York City; Pocahontas was given as a separate
play at Franklin Park, Boston, by Lincoln House, and some of the other
plays have been given at various schools in New York City.

Thanks are due to _The Woman's Home Companion_, _The Delineator_, _The
Designer_, _The Normal Instructor_, and _The Popular Educator_ for
their kind permission to reprint these plays.



CONTENTS


PATRIOTIC PLAYS: THEIR USE AND VALUE

PAGEANTS

PAGEANTS OF PATRIOTISM

The outdoor arrangement can be produced by a whole school or group of
schools, by groups of social settlements, communities, and cities, in
parks, armories, woodland spaces or meadows on such occasions as the
Fourth of July, Decoration Day, Bunker Hill Day, Labor Day, during Old
Home Week, or for any special city or town celebration. The indoor
arrangement of the same pageant is also suitable for whole schools, or
groups of schools, groups of settlements, communities, villages,
cities: in armories, school halls, assembly rooms, or small theaters on
Columbus Day, Lincoln's Birthday, Washington's Birthday, or some day of
special celebration.

PAGEANT OF PATRIOTS (Outdoor)
  Prologue by the Spirit of Patriotism
  Princess Pocahontas
  Pilgrim Interlude
  Ferry Farm Episode
  George Washington's Fortune
  Daniel Boone: Patriot
  Benjamin Franklin Episode
  Abraham Lincoln Episode
  Liberty Dance
  Pageant Directions

PAGEANT OF PATRIOTS  (Indoor)
  Prologue by the Spirit of Patriotism
  Dramatic Silhouette: Lords of the Forest
  The Coming of the White Man: Tableau
  Princess Pocahontas
  Priscilla Mullins Spinning: Tableau
  Benjamin Franklin: Journeyman
  George Washington's Fortune
  The Boston Tea Party
  Dramatic Silhouette: The Spirit of '76
  Abraham Lincoln: Rail-Splitter
  Directions for Indoor Arrangement

THE HAWTHORNE PAGEANT

Can be produced in park or woodland in its outdoor arrangement. Is
suitable for co-educational schools, girls' schools, girls' Summer
camps. Is appropriate for Hawthorne's Birthday (July 4), Arbor Day, May
Day, or any day during Spring and Summer. In its indoor form it can be
given in school halls or in a small theater. In this form it is
appropriate for co-educational schools, girls' schools, settlements. It
can be given any time during the Autumn, Winter, or Spring.

HAWTHORNE PAGEANT (For Outdoor or Indoor Production)
  Chorus of Spirits of the Old Manse
  Prologue by the Muse of Hawthorne
  In Witchcraft Days (First Episode)
  Dance Interlude
  Merrymount (Second Episode)
  Pageant Directions

LIST OF SEPARATE ONE-ACT PLAYS

ABRAHAM LINCOLN: RAIL-SPLITTER (Indoor)
Can be produced in school, home, or small theater. Is suitable for
schools, settlements, clubs, patriotic societies, and debating
societies. Can be appropriately produced any time between September and
March. Is especially appropriate for Lincoln's Birthday.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN: JOURNEYMAN (Indoor)
Can be produced in a school, home, or small theater. Is suitable for
schools, clubs, settlements, patriotic societies and clubs. Can
appropriately be produced any time between September and June. Is
particularly suited to Franklin's Birthday.

THE BOSTON TEA PARTY (Indoor)
Can be produced in school, home, or small theater. Is suitable for
boys' schools, Boy Scouts, settlements, clubs, and patriotic societies.
Can be produced on any holiday. Is particularly appropriate for Fall
and Winter months--especially the month of December.

DANIEL BOONE: PATRIOT (Outdoor)
Can be produced in park, woodland, or village green. Can be given by
boys' schools, clubs, settlements, and patriotic societies. Also by the
"Sons of Daniel Boone" and the Boy Scouts. Is appropriate for any day
during Spring, Summer, or Autumn. Can be given on the Fourth of July.

GEORGE WASHINGTON'S FORTUNE (Outdoor)
Can be produced in park, lawn, or woodland. Is suitable for schools,
clubs, patriotic societies, and settlements. Is appropriate for any day
during Spring, Summer, or Autumn, and is particularly appropriate for
the Fourth of July. An indoor arrangement can easily be made for George
Washington's Birthday.

IN WITCHCRAFT DAYS (Outdoor)
Can be given in park, lawn, or village green or woodland. Suitable for
co-educational schools, girls' schools, girls' Summer camps, patriotic
societies, settlements, and clubs. Appropriate for Arbor Day, May Day,
or any day during Spring, Summer, or early Autumn. An indoor
arrangement can be given for Thanksgiving in school halls.

MERRYMOUNT (Outdoor)
Can be produced in park or woodland. Is suitable for co-educational
schools, girls' schools, girls' Summer camps, and for clubs,
settlements, and patriotic societies. Is appropriate for Arbor Day, May
Day, or any day in Spring and Summer. An indoor version of it can also
be given.

PRINCESS POCAHONTAS (Outdoor)
Can be given in park, in woodland, or on lawn. Is suitable for schools,
clubs, and patriotic societies. Can be given on the Fourth of July, or
any day during Spring and Summer. Indoor production is also possible.



PATRIOTIC PLAYS AND PAGEANTS



PATRIOTIC PLAYS: THEIR USE AND VALUE


The primary value of the patriotic play lies in its appeal to the love
of country, and its power to revitalize the past. The Youth of To-Day
is put in touch with the Patriots of Yesterday. Historic personages
become actual, vivid figures. The costumes, speech, manners, and ideas
of bygone days take on new significance. The life of trail and wigwam,
of colonial homestead and pioneer camp, is made tangible and realistic.
And the spirit of those days--the integrity, courage, and vigor of the
Nation's heroes, their meager opportunities, their struggle against
desperate odds, their slow yet triumphant upward climb--can be
illumined by the acted word as in no other way. To read of the home
life of America's beginnings is one thing; to portray it or see it
portrayed is another. And of the two experiences the latter is the less
likely to be forgotten. To the youthful participants in a scene which
centers about the campfire, the tavern table, or the Puritan
hearthstone will come an intimate knowledge of the folk they represent:
they will find the old sayings and maxims of the Nation-Builders as
pungent and applicable to the life of to-day as when they were first
spoken.

The patriotic play has manifold uses. It combines both pleasure and
education. It is both stimulating and instructive. In its indoor form
it may be the basis of a winter afternoon's or evening's entertainment,
in its outdoor form it may take whole communities and schools into the
freedom of the open. It should rouse patriotic ardor, and be of benefit
ethically, esthetically, and physically. It should wake in its
participants a sense of rhythm, freedom, poise, and plastic grace. It
should bear its part in developing clear enunciation and erectness of
carriage. To those taking part it should bring the exercise of memory,
patience, and inventiveness. It should kindle enthusiasm for the things
of America's past. In what way can national hero-days and festivals be
more fittingly commemorated than by giving a glimpse of the hero for
whom the day is named? Thus the patriotic play is equally adaptable for
Fourth of July, Washington's Birthday, Lincoln's Birthday, Columbus
Day, and the hundreds of other days--not holidays--that lie in between.

If the patriotic play is produced in the right way it should contain
the very essence of democracy--_efficient team-work, a striving
together for the good of the whole_. It should lead to the ransacking
of books and libraries; the planning of scene-setting, whether indoor
or outdoor; the fashioning of simple and accurate costumes by the young
people taking part; the collecting of suitable stage properties such as
hearthbrooms, Indian pipes, and dishes of pewter. The greater the
research, the keener the stimulus for imagination and ingenuity, two
things that go to the making of every successful production.
Fortunately, the patriotic play is inherently simple, its appeal is
along broad general lines, so that it requires no great amount of money
or energy to adequately produce it. And, as history is made up not of
one event, but of a series of events, so an historical pageant is a
logical sequence of one-act patriotic plays or episodes. The one-act
patriotic play shows one hero or one event; the pageant shows, through
one-act plays used in chronological order, the development and
upbuilding of America through the lives of her heroes.

In its pageant form, the patriotic play, with dances, songs, pantomime,
and spoken speech, lends itself to schools, communities, and city use,
in park, in armory, and on village green: in its one-act form it lends
itself to both indoor and outdoor production by schools, patriotic
societies, clubs and settlements, and, last, but not least, the home
circle. And in the hope of assisting teachers and producers to fit
appropriate plays to appropriate occasions notes on the subject have
been added to the individual plays in the table of contents.



THE PAGEANT OF PATRIOTS
(Outdoor)


THE PAGEANT OF PATRIOTS

EPISODES

1. PROLOGUE BY THE SPIRIT OF PATRIOTISM
2. PRINCESS POCAHONTAS
3. PILGRIM INTERLUDE
4. FERRY FARM EPISODE
5. GEORGE WASHINGTON'S FORTUNE
6. DANIEL BOONE: PATRIOT
7. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN EPISODE
   Scene 1. Benjamin Franklin and the Crystal Gazer (1720)
            The Dream Begins
   Scene 2. Benjamin Franklin at the Court of France (1781)
            The Dream Ends
8. ABRAHAM LINCOLN EPISODE
9. FINAL TABLEAU
10. MARCH OF PLAYERS


PROLOGUE
_Spoken by The Spirit of Patriotism_

People of --------, ye who come to see
Enacted here some hours of Pageantry,
Lend us your patience for each simple truth,
And see portrayed for you the Nation's Youth.
Spirit of Patriotism I. Behold
How at my word time's curtain is uprolled,
And all the past years live, unvanquished
As are the laurels of the mighty dead.
I am the spirit of the hearth and home!
For me are flags unfurled and bugles blown.
For me have countless thousands fought and died;
For me the name of "Liberty" is cried!
I am the leader where the battle swings,
I bring the memory of all high things.
And so to-day I come to bid you look
At scenes deep-written in the Nation's book.
The youth of all the heroes you shall see--
What lads they were, what men they grew to be.
How honor, thrift, and courage made them rise
By steps that you can learn if you be wise.
First, Pocahontas in a woodland green;
Then life among the Pilgrim folk is seen--
Thrifty Priscilla, Maid o' Plymouth Town,
In Puritanic cap and somber gown!
For the next scene comes life in Southern climes--
The Ferry Farm of past Colonial times.
Then Washington encamped before a blaze
O' fagots, swiftly learning woodland ways.
Then Boone with Rigdon in the wilderness
Dauntlessly facing times of strife and stress.
Crossing the Common in the morning sun
Young Benjamin Franklin comes: about him hung
Symbols of trade and hope--kite, candles, book.
The crystal gazer enters, bids him look
At all the guerdon that the years will bring.
The Vision next: Trianon in the Spring,
And Franklin honored by the Queen of France
With courtly minuet and festal dance.
Lastly, a cabin clearing in the West,
Where on a holiday with mirth and zest
Lincoln's companions take their simple cheer.
These are the scenes to be enacted here,
Shown to you straightway in a simple guise.
Youthful the scenes that we shall here devise
On which the beads of history are strung.
Remember that our players, too, are young.
All critic-knowledge, then, behind you leave,
And in the spirit of the day receive
What we would give, and let there come to you
The Joy of Youth, with purpose high and true.

COSTUME

THE SPIRIT OF PATRIOTISM. The Spirit of Patriotism should wear a long
white robe, with flowing Grecian lines, made either of white
cheesecloth, or white cashmere. It should fall from a rounded neck.
Hair worn flowing, and chapleted with a circlet of gold stars. White
stockings and sandals. Carries a staff from which floats the Stars and
Stripes.


PRINCESS POCAHONTAS


CHARACTERS

PRINCESS POCAHONTAS
CHIEF POWHATAN
CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH
Eight Young Indian Braves
Eight Young Indian Maidens
Two Indian Women
Two old and withered Squaws
Six or seven little Indian children
Other followers of Powhatan

TIME: _Mid-afternoon on a mild day in 1609._
PLACE: _Virginia._
SCENE: _An open glade showing a small Indian encampment._

[Transcriber's note: All stage directions appear in italics in the
original]

At the opening of the scene the glade is deserted, the men of the tribe
being engaged in a skirmish with the white men, while the women and
children have gone foraging. There are two teepees, one at right, and
one at left, their doors closed. By the side of teepee at left a pile
of fagots, and a wooden block.

Further front, facing audience, a great war-drum, gaily painted. A
skin-covered drum-stick. At right, towards front, the smoldering
remains of a fire. The whole appearance of the camp shows that it is
not permanent--a mere pausing-place.

The space between the teepees is absolutely unobstructed, but there are
trees and bushes at the back and sides.

By degrees the Indians who have been foraging begin to return. One of
the Indian women enters carrying fagots. One of the older squaws
rekindles the fire. Next come the children, with merry shouts, carrying
their little bows and arrows. The Indian maidens enter gaily, carrying
reeds for weaving. They move silently, swiftly, gracefully. Two of
their number begin to grind maize between stones. Two others plait
baskets. An old medicine-man, with a bag of herbs, comes from the
background, and seats himself near the drum, at left, taking an Indian
flute from his deerskin belt, and fingering it lovingly. An Indian
woman, arriving later than the others, unstraps from her back a small
papoose, and hangs it to the limb of a tree. The Indian children stand
towards the front of the greensward, shoot in a line their feathered
arrows, run and pick up the arrows, and acclaim in pantomime the one
who shot the best. Then they go towards background, doing a childish
imitation of a war-dance. The mother of the papoose, having finished
her duties in setting one of the teepees to rights, now takes down the
papoose from the tree where it swings, and seating herself in the
center of the greensward, croons an Indian lullaby. The Indian maidens
group themselves about her, seated in a semicircle on the ground,
swaying rhythmically. At the back of the stage one of the little Indian
boys sees an Indian maiden approaching, clad in white doeskin. Cries
aloud delightedly: _"Pocahontas!"_

The Indian maidens and the squaws rise and fall back before the
entrance of Pocahontas with gestures of salutation and respect.

ALL
(clearly and enthusiastically).
Pocahontas!

[Pocahontas comes down center with a basket filled with branches that
bear small red berries. The children and two of the maidens gather
about her, and then fall back as she begins speaking, so that she has
the center of the stage. Greatest interest is evinced in all she does.

POCAHONTAS
(speaking slowly, as one does in an unfamiliar tongue, yet clearly and
deliberately).
I--Pocahontas--daughter of Powhatan, great chief,--speak--language
of--paleface. Powhatan teach me. (Points to way from which she has
come.) Yonder--I--went. Prayed to River God.

[Makes gesture of worship, raising basket above her head. The
semicircle about her widens respectfully. A maiden then approaches and
takes basket. Pocahontas smiles in sudden childlike delight, and
holding out chain of beads that fall from her neck to her waist, says
with pretty intonation:

Beads. Jamestown.

[Watches them for a moment as they glimmer in the sun. Then with sudden
laugh seizes the Indian maiden nearest her, and by gesture summons the
other Indian maidens. One of the very old squaws with a half-wry,
half-kindly smile begins a swift tapping on the drum that has in it the
rhythm of dance music. The Indian children withdraw to the doors of the
teepees, and Pocahontas and the Indian maidens dance. The old
medicine-man adds his flute-notes to the rhythm of the war-drum.

The Indians being a notably silent people, this scene must be given
mostly in pantomime.

From the forest at right comes the faint sound of a crackling branch.
Instant attention on the part of all. The dance stops. The Indian
maidens stand poised, listening. The women shade their eyes with their
hands. A small Indian boy lays his ear to the ground, and then cries:
_"Powhatan!"_ Two expectant semicircles are formed. All look to wards
right. Powhatan enters, Pocahontas runs to meet him. Tableau.

Powhatan then indicates that others are coming from right. Young braves
enter with John Smith in their midst. His hands are bound behind him,
his face is white and drawn. Children at sight of him scamper to
teepees. The rest show signs of curiosity. Pocahontas stands with
clasped hands and startled eyes, regarding Smith most earnestly. A
brave bears Smith's weapons. Smith is led to right foreground. Block of
wood is brought him for a seat.

The Indian women, maidens, and children retreat to the extreme
background, where they sit in a semicircle, watching. Then Powhatan and
braves withdraw to left, where they form a circle and confer, one brave
at a time addressing the rest in pantomime, with many gestures, some
towards Smith, some towards the path by which they brought him.
Occasionally the words _"Algonquin," "Chickahominy," "Jamestown,"
"Opeckankano," "W'ashunsunakok"_ are spoken. When Powhatan speaks in
pantomime the others listen with occasional grunts of satisfaction and
approval. It is evident that the prisoner and the fate awaiting him are
under discussion.

Pocahontas alone remains near the center of interest. She glances first
at her father and the braves, sees they are deep in discussion, and
then crosses to John Smith, with every sign of interest and awakening
pity. She brings him water in a wooden bowl. He drinks thirstily. She
then goes to one of the teepees, and brings him a cup of milk. This she
holds for him to drink from, as his hands are bound.

POCAHONTAS
(gravely, as she puts down the cup).
How!

SMITH
(with equal gravity).
How!

POCAHONTAS(touching herself lightly).
Pocahontas. Daughter of Powhatan.

[Touches Smith questioningly.

SMITH
(answering her).
Smith. John Smith.

POCAHONTAS
(repeating it after him).
John Smith.

SMITH.
From Jamestown.

POCAHONTAS
(nods, says slowly).
Pocahontas _likes_ paleface.

[Meantime the pantomimic discussion held by Powhatan and his braves is
drawing near its close. There comes a shout of triumphant acclaim "Wah!
Wah! Wah!" hoarse and loud. Powhatan, having in pantomime rendered his
decision, now stands with arms folded, at left. Braves to right, and
take Smith to center. Powhatan stands at the extreme left. The braves
form a semicircle about Smith. The women and children in the background
rise silently, and peer forward. Smith is forced to one knee. A brave
holds aloft the hatchet.

POCAHONTAS
(looking from Smith to her father, and then running towards the latter
with a cry).
No! No!

[Powhatan regards his daughter gravely, yet unrelentingly. Pocahontas,
center, stretches out her arms in pleading. Powhatan shakes his head.
Pocahontas then goes towards Smith, and again with animated pantomime,
indicating first Smith and then the way by which he has come, pleads
for him. Powhatan shakes his head. He is obdurate. Pocahontas bows her
head dejectedly. Turns to go back to where she has been standing. Then
changes her mind, runs to her father, and with every evidence of
pleading and humility, falls on her knees before him, arms
outstretched. For a moment they are still as statues. Then Pocahontas
takes from her neck her string of beads, and, by gesture, offers it as
a ransom for Smith.

POCAHONTAS
(speaking slowly).
Pocahontas, daughter of Great Chief, asks of Great Chief John Smith's
life.

[Tense pause. Powhatan, with arms folded, considers deeply. Then makes
sign of assent, but gives back necklace to Pocahontas, who rises with
pantomime of joy. Powhatan makes sign to braves to release Smith. Smith
is unbound. His weapons are given back to him. He chafes his wrists and
presents his compass to Powhatan.

SMITH.
Great Chief! (Turns first to Powhatan, and then to Pocahontas.) Great
Princess! John Smith grateful!

[Powhatan touches him on shoulder.

POWHATAN
(grunting).
Umph!

[Indicates by gesture peace-pipe which has been lit at fire. All braves
sit in semicircle facing audience, and pass it (not too slowly!) from
one to another, including Smith and Powhatan. Then all rise.

SMITH
(standing center).
John Smith goes to Jamestown. John Smith friend of great chief,
Powhatan. Palefaces always remember Powhatan! Always remember
Pocahontas!

BRAVES
(all together).
Wah! Wah! Wah!

[Exit Smith, right. Smith is watched by the Indians in silence deep and
respectful.

POCAHONTAS
(to Powhatan).
Great Chief safely returned. Captive set free. Shall we go yonder?
(Points.) Pray to River God?

[Powhatan nods gravely. He and Pocahontas exeunt left. The braves
follow next. The Indian maidens, women, and children form the end of
the procession. The stage is thus left empty, and the scene ends.


COSTUMES

POCAHONTAS. Pocahontas should wear the traditional costume of "white
doeskin with a scarlet mantle flecked with gold sequins." A great chain
of pearls should be about her neck. Another chain which reaches to her
waist should be of white and blue beads--large beads that will catch
glitter from the sun. About her head a band of tan, and a white quill.
The embroidery about the neck of her Indian robe is of pearls. The
basket which she carries should be white, with a motif of rich blue and
scarlet. She wears a tan (dressed deerskin) girdle, heavily embroidered
in red beads. Her stockings and moccasins are tan-colored also, the
moccasins embroidered in scarlet. The ends of her braids are bound in
scarlet and gold. White canton flannel, skilfully slashed for fringing,
will make the Indian dress, which should fall in straight lines from a
square neck. It should reach to about three inches above the ankle, and
should be heavily fringed. The robe, worn fastened at the shoulders,
should be of scarlet cloth. The deerskin belt is of cotton khaki. The
moccasins can be made of the same material, cut sandal fashion. Or low
canvas ties without heels, bead-embroidered.

CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH. Tan-colored costume of the seventeenth century. The
coat of tattered, weather-stained brown velvet, the puffed sleeves
slashed with tan satin that is soiled and frayed. Great tan boots
coming to the knee. A white lace collar at neck, much the worse for
wear. A brown leather girdle.

POWHATAN. Indian dress of tan (dressed deerskin), the neck and breast
of it gorgeously painted with blue, green, and scarlet. Great chains of
shells and beads. A huge head-dress of black feathers that hangs down
his back almost to his knees. It should be the largest and most
magnificent of all the Indian head-dresses, as it is the insignia of
chiefdom. Tan stockings and tan moccasins. The material of his costume
may be cotton khaki. (The imitation khaki is best, as the real material
is too heavy.)

THE MEDICINE-MAN. The medicine-man is old. He wears a wig of long,
white, coarse hair. His costume is of cotton khaki, decorated with
beads, bits of looking-glass, and feathers. He wears no feathers on his
head. A piece of fur is fastened to his shoulders. His blanket is
black, with white cabalistic signs. It can be made of canton flannel.

INDIAN BRAVES. The braves who follow Powhatan should wear costumes
resembling those of the chief, save that they are less gorgeously
painted, and wear fewer strings of beads and shells. Their
head-dresses, too, are shorter. They should be of gray, black, and
brown feathers. Their faces are, of course, stained brown, their arms
and necks likewise. Red and black warpaint should also be on their
faces. Unless wigs of long hair are to be worn, the boys wearing the
feathered head-dresses should be careful to see that their lack of long
hair is concealed from view. Often the Indian braves wore their long
matted locks braided; and black cheesecloth cut into strips and then
braided and fastened to a tight black cap will make a splendid wig of
this sort--the braids of hair should hang in front of the ears. The
Indian braves should carry bows, arrows, and tomahawks.

THE INDIAN MAIDENS. The Indian maidens should wear tan fringed dresses,
of the same length and fashion as that of Pocahontas. Necklaces and
bracelets of shells. The necks of the dresses embroidered in beads and
shells. They wear their long black hair in two braids, the ends of the
braids bound either with scarlet, corn-yellow, or vivid blue. They have
moccasins and tan-colored stockings. Their bead' embroidered footgear
should be in striking color on a tan background. But their chief glory
is their blankets. These should be barbarically glowing, since it is
partly in their wild flare of color that the beauty of the Blanket
Dance lies. The following designs for them are taken from the Indian
motifs and colorings studied from the collections in various museums of
natural history, and however startling they may seem at first, their
color-scheme should be faithfully carried out, as much of the success
of the scene depends on them. The material used may be canton flannel
throughout. They should be the size of the average, every-day blanket.

1. Blanket made of equal halves of deep royal purple and pale turquoise
blue.

2. Blanket of deep cobalt blue. Fastened in the center a great oval of
orange.

3. Blanket made of equal halves of pale lemon and black.

4. Blanket made of equal halves of very dark green and very pale green.

5. Blanket made of equal halves of deep violet and white.

6. White blanket with disks of scarlet at each of its four corners.

7. Blanket of equal halves of royal purple and pale lavender.

8. Blanket of very pale green, with large white disk in center.

Each Indian maiden should wear a band of gay-colored cheesecloth, red,
green, or blue, bound about her forehead. This band should match the
color that fastens her braids. In the back of the head-band should be
fastened a quill of contrasting shade. It need hardly be added that the
Indian maidens wear neither feather head-dresses nor war-paint. Their
arms, necks, and faces should be stained light brown. The tan-colored
stockings are to simulate bare skin.

SQUAWS. The squaws wear the same cotton khaki costumes as the Indian
maidens, save that their blanket are of more somber colors, and their
headgear is either omitted altogether, or consists of black, bronze, or
dull green.

THE LITTLE INDIAN BOYS. They should drew in exact imitation of the
older braves, save that they wear no war-paint.

PROPERTIES. For either an indoor or outdoor representation of this
scene where it is impossible to have a real fire, have a pile of fagots
and unionist them place large bunches of joss-sticks bound together
with thread. These will burn easily and safely, and the blue smoke from
them will simulate a waft from woodland embers.

The log can be made of two small vinegar barrels fastened together,
covered with brown burlap, and then flecked with green and brown paint.
The teepees should be of canvas, unbleached cotton, or burlap fastened
over three slender, strong poles, stuck into the ground. They should be
equal to bearing the weight of the canvas or burlap, and yet light
enough to be removed and carried off the scene by the young Indian
braves as they leave in the direction of the river when the scene ends.

DANCES. At the place indicated in the scene, the Indian maidens give
one or more characteristic Indian dances. "The Blanket Dance," one of
the most widely known and picturesque of the Indian dances, follows
somewhat the lines of a Virginia Reel. The Indian maidens stand in a
line facing each other, their blankets wrapped about them. The head
couple, facing each other, spread wide their blankets behind them like
great butterfly wings. Then they dance forward and back, forward and
back, beckoning, retreating, gesturing, and finally dance off, with one
blanket wrapped about two pairs of shoulders. Then the next couple, and
so on. All sorts of fantastic steps, gestures, bendings, and swayings
can be introduced. A wide space should be left between the dancers, so
that all they do can be clearly seen. Dancing in great circles, like a
mild war-dance, yet without the whoops and wild gestures of the latter,
is another form that lends itself to the out-of-doors. Another dance is
the Eagle Dance; with arms spread wide, holding their blankets at
wing-like angles, the dancers circle about each other, the dance
growing wilder and wilder. Still another dance is the symbolical one of
the Four Winds--North, South, East, West--done by four Indian maidens.
The South Wind gentle and swaying; the West Wind fantastic, with arms
upraised; the East Wind with streaming hair and rain-drops shining on
finger tips; the North Wind wilder than them all, and finally driving
them all before her.

MUSIC. Piano: MacDowell's "An Indian Idyl," "From an Indian Lodge."
These can be had orchestrated. For a band: "Tomahawk Dance," by Andrew
Herman. "Indian War Dance," by Bellstedt. "The Sun Dance," by Leo
Friedman.


PILGRIM INTERLUDE


PILGRIM CHANT

(Tune: Oxford. To be sung off stage by the Puritan maidens before they
enter to take part in the episode.)

Gone is now the sullen winter,
  Gone the famine and the snow;
In the forest, like a promise,
  See the first white mayflowers blow.

Fresh hope thrills us with their coming,
  They, too, braved the winter long;
Then at Springtime took new leafage,
  Frail yet steadfast, small but strong.

Cling we thus to our new country,
  Let us struggle and endure;
We have found a land of Freedom,
  And our heritage is sure.


THE SPINNING LESSON
(A Pilgrim Interlude)


CHARACTERS

PRISCILLA MULLINS
Lads of Plymouth Town
    JOHN BILLINGTON
    DEGORY MARTIN
Youthful Pilgrim Maidens
    RUTH
    PATIENCE
    MIRIAM
    LETTICE
    ANNE
STAR-OF-SPRING, an Indian maiden
NATIQUA, a squaw, her mother
FOREST FLOWER, another Indian maiden
HERON'S WING, a young Indian brave

SCENE: A grassy glade at Plymouth in the Spring of 1621, Trees right,
left, and background. At the beginning of the scene the grassy stage is
deserted. There presently enters from background Anne, a young Pilgrim
maid of about fourteen, whose somber garb shows out darkly against the
green background. She looks quickly about her, right and left,
shielding her eyes with her hand. Then she calls back over her shoulder
to her companions, Diantha and Lettice.

ANNE
(calling).
Come quickly, Diantha. Here is a fair spot for our corn-shelling, and
not a prowling Indian in sight.

[Diantha, slender, dark, and somewhat older than Anne, enters with
Lettice. They carry between them an Indian basket of capacious size, in
which are dried ears of corn.

DIANTHA
(clearly).
Nay, we need have no fear; for on one side Captain Miles Standish keeps
watch, and on the other John Alden; so as for Indians----

LETTICE
(as they come to center).
One Indian only have I seen this day, and to see him is ever a sign of
good omen.

DIANTHA.
That means that Squanto is in Plymouth Town, our good, true Indian
friend. He it was who taught us how to shell the corn, so many months
agone; he it was who taught us, this Spring, the manner of sowing it.

LETTICE
(holding up Indian basket).
And here is one of the Indian corn-baskets that Captain Standish found
buried in a strange wilderness spot when he first explored these
forests.

ANNE
(drawing near to Lettice).
These forests--! Oh, my heart! As night draws on how dark and fearsome
they appear! And now that Spring is in the land it sets me longing for
English hedgerows.

[Sits on ground, left, and begins to shell corn.

LETTICE
(joining Anne in her work).
Do you remember the Spring in Leyden, Diantha?

DIANTHA
(looking upward as she stands).
Why, even here the Spring is very fair! Do not the sunlight, the blue
sky, and the budding trees make your heart sing with joy?

ANNE.
Sit, then, Diantha, and let us have a quiet hour.

DIANTHA
(standing behind them, half-gay, half-mocking).
A quiet hour--! Hither come Patience and Miriam and Ruth, the greatest
clatter-tongues in Plymouth. See! They have been gathering wild plum
blossoms!

[Enter Miriam, Patience, and Ruth from background. They hasten towards
Diantha. The exquisite white of the blossoms they carry makes them look
like heralds of the Spring.

MIRIAM
(excitedly).
Diantha, what dost think! Priscilla Mullins hath declared herself weary
of spinning in her own door-yard, and since Squanto hath told us that
we need not fear the Indians she hath besought Degory Martin and John
Billington to bring hither her spinning-wheel.

PATIENCE
(wide-eyed).
Was ever the like known in Plymouth!

RUTH
(as all look eagerly towards background).
Hither she comes!

PRISCILLA
(clearly in distance).
Have a care, Degory.

DEGORY.
Aye, Mistress Priscilla.

PRISCILLA
(as they emerge from background).
Stumble not, John Billington.

JOHN BILLINGTON
(sturdily).
Not while I bear such a burden.

[They set down the spinning-wheel, center.

PRISCILLA.
I thank you. Will you come for me when the shadows o' the pines grow
long across my doorway?

[The Pilgrim lads nod, and exeunt, left background.

PRISCILLA
(to Pilgrim maidens).
Well, and have you no word of greeting? Why, they are dumb with
astonishment! And is it so strange a thing to bring one's wheel
outdoors? 'Twas out of doors that this wood first grew! (Touches
wheel.) All day I have longed to be out in these wide spaces--and yet
there was work to do. But see--now I weld heart's desire and work
together!

[She begins to spin. Meantime Pilgrim maidens group about her. Tableau.

MIRIAM.
You are ever one to see the bright side of things, Priscilla,
and------Look, Priscilla--an Indian!

[At sound of that dread word all the maidens draw near to Priscilla.
From the woods in right background appears Star-of-Spring, the little
Indian maiden. She carries a basket of shell-fish on her head,
steadying it with her hand. She is so intent on walking carefully that
she does not see the group of Pilgrims until she is nearly upon them.
There ensues a period of unflagging pantomime. Star-of-Spring, upon
seeing the group of dark-clad maidens, starts back, half terrified.
Priscilla rises, and as an overture of peace and good-will, takes a few
steps towards her. Star-of-Spring retreats still further towards right.
Priscilla returns to her wheel.

Star-of-Spring, emboldened, takes a step towards the Pilgrim maidens.
Pilgrim maidens, quite as wary of Star-of-Spring as she is of them,
retreat a little way to left. At this Star-of-Spring's last fears
vanish. She wishes to be friends. With pretty pleading she holds out to
them her basket of shell-fish. Places it on the ground and then steps
back, bowing, with arms wide and outstretched palms.

PRISCILLA.
She means we should accept it. Is that not truly generous!

DIANTHA
(reassured).
It must be Star-of-Spring, the little Indian maid of whom Squanto has
so often told us.

[Diantha takes up basket. Pantomime of delight on part of
Star-of-Spring. She draws near to Anne, and with a quaint grace touches
Anne's cap and kerchief. Tries on Anne's cap, and looks at herself in a
barbaric bit of looking-glass that dangles from one of her many chains
of beads. Then laughs, gives back the cap, and is in turn fascinated at
the sight of Priscilla when she begins spinning. Star-of-Spring
approaches the wheel with pantomime indicating awe and delighted
curiosity. She first inspects it, and then begins to talk in dumbshow
with quick, animated gestures. The Pilgrim maidens are somewhat
bewildered.

DIANTHA
(as the meaning of the scene dawns on her).
Priscilla! She wishes to spin!

ANNE.
Thou hast done many strange things in this new land, Priscilla; but I
doubt not that the strangest of all is to give an Indian maiden her
first lesson in spinning!

[Priscilla rises. Star-of-Spring seats herself. Business of Priscilla's
teaching her to spin. Haltingly and somewhat fumblingly she does at
length manage to compass the first rudiments of her lesson. The Pilgrim
maidens stand grouped about her. Tableau.
DEGORY
(from background).
The shadows of the pines lengthen across your door-sill, Priscilla!

[At sound of the new voice Star-of-Spring rises, and hastily retreats,
right. Degory Martin and John Billington enter from background.

DIANTHA.
Only think, Degory, Star-of-Spring, an Indian maid, hath had a spinning
lesson!

DEGORY.
The shadows are lengthening. Twilight comes apace here in the forest.
'Tis time you all came home.

[The maidens of Plymouth follow him as he and John Billington take the
spinning-wheel and spinning-stool with them. They make their exit at
center background. Star-of-Spring, who has lingered at edge of trees,
right, steals out to look after her departing playmates. Stands at
place where spinning-wheel was. Again shakes her head, as if in
perplexity over the strange arts of the palefaces. Finds on grass part
of a skein of flax. Tosses it lightly in the air. Catches it again as
it falls. Begins a characteristic dance, swaying, tossing skein,
catching it. Each step of the dance takes her further into background.
Then she comes down center again, like a tossing bough or a blown
flame. She does not perceive the group entering from left. Her mother
(Natiqua), Forest Flower, and Heron's Wing. They also are so occupied
with portage that they do not perceive Star-of-Spring until they are
almost up to her. Heron's Wing and Forest Flower carry between them a
birch-bark canoe. Behind them trudges Natiqua, bent beneath a double
pile of fagots. They pass, in picturesque silhouette, back of the spot
where Priscilla had been seated with her spinning-wheel. Then they and
Star-of-Spring become aware of each other. They stop. Natiqua frowns.
Star-of-Spring points to place where Priscilla sat with her
spinning-wheel, and by animated gestures portrays what has taken place.
But neither Natiqua, Forest Flower, nor Heron's Wing is in the least
interested. Natiqua shakes her head and frowns. It is evident that the
wonders of the palefaces are not to her mind. She lets slip from her
back her double pile of fagots, then replaces one, and Star-of-Spring
takes up the other. Then, in Indian file, they cross the scene to
right, and slowly disappear from view.


COSTUMES

PILGRIM MAIDENS. The Pilgrim maidens should wear plain black dresses
ankle length, with white cuffs and Puritan caps, and white kerchiefs.
These dresses may be made of black cambric, worn with the glazed side
turned in.

THE PILGRIM LADS. The Pilgrim lads wear black suits, with full
knee-breeches, black stockings, and low black shoes with silver
buckles. Their hair comes to their ears, and they have white collars
turned down on their coats, and deep white cuffs on their sleeves.

THE INDIANS. The Indians wear costumes of cotton khaki, the necks gaily
painted with Indian designs. Strings of beads and shells. Natiqua has a
green and scarlet blanket. She and the Indian maidens wear their hair
in braids. They also have a gay strip of cheesecloth--red, green, or
yellow--bound about their brows, and a quill stuck upright in the back.
Heron's Wing has a head-dress of blue-gray heron's feathers. All wear
moccasins. (See description of Indian costumes in "Princess
Pocahontas.")


FERRY FARM EPISODE

CHARACTERS

LORD FAIRFAX
MARY BALL WASHINGTON
GEORGE WASHINGTON
Plantation hands
    AUNT RACHEL
    SAMBO
    LUCY
    DINAH
    PETER
    NELLY
    SUSY
    UNCLE NED

SCENE: The lawn of Ferry Farm, 1748. A wide expanse of green. Trees
right, left, and background. The trees in background supposedly screen
the Colonial house from view. At the left the estate supposedly
stretches to the highway. At the right, behind the trees, it is given
over to flower and vegetable gardens.

At the beginning of the scene the grassy space is deserted, but from
the distance, right, comes the sound of singing. The sound swells
louder and louder in the rhythm of one of the oldest of African songs,
"Mary and Martha just gone 'long to ring those charming bells." The
first verse is sung before the singers appear. With the second verse
those who have been at work in the fields come into view, their gay and
colorful costumes bright against the green background.

Two of the children run into sight first; then comes a group of nine or
ten young people. Some carry between them baskets heaped quite high
with fruit and vegetables. One boy holds a hoe. A girl carries a rake.
Another an armful of dried corn on the ear. Two more a low basket
heaped with cotton. In the center of this group hobbles old Aunt
Rachel, turbaned, and leaning on a cane. By her side walks Lucy,
carrying a great bunch of pink "Winter Roses."

The third verse is sung as this group emerges into full view of the
audience. The children stand looking at Aunt Rachel as they sing, as if
they were catching some of the words from her. She beats time with her
finger to see that they learn correctly. Other voices take up the song
in right background, swelling it higher and higher. Uncle Ned, with his
fiddle under his arm, comes slowly from right to join the group in
foreground. The baskets are set down. The boy leans on his hoe, the
girl on her wooden rake, rapt and happy. All are given over to the
rhythmic joy of the music.
"Since that day when we spoke on the staircase we have only been alone
together once, for a moment. I asked her then if I should tell her
mother, and she said 'Not yet.' Excepting that, we have never exchanged
a word that you and her mother might not have heard, nor a glance that
you might not have seen. We both knew that we were waiting for you to
get well, and we have waited."

Guido looked at him with a sort of wonder.

"That was like you," he said quietly.

"You understand, now," Lamberti continued. "You and I met her on the
same day at your aunt's, and when I saw her, I felt as if I had always
known her and loved her. No one can explain such things. Then by a
strange coincidence we dreamt the same dream, on the same night."

"Was it she whom you met in the Forum, and who ran away from you?" asked
Guido, in astonishment.

"Yes. That is the reason why we always avoided each other, and why I
would not go to their house till you almost forced me to. We had never
spoken alone together till the garden party. It was then that we found
out that our dreams were alike, and after that I kept away from her more
than ever, but I dreamt of her every night."

"So that was your secret, that afternoon!"

"Yes. We had dreamt of each other and we had met in the Forum in the
place we had dreamt of, and she ran away without speaking to me. That
was the whole secret. She was afraid of me, and I loved her, and was
beginning to know it. I thought there was something wrong with my head
and went to see a doctor. He talked to me about telepathy, but seemed
inclined to consider that it might possibly be a mere train of
coincidences. I think I have told you everything."

For a long time they sat side by side in silence, each thinking his own
thoughts.

"Is there anything you do not understand?" Lamberti asked at last.

"No," Guido answered thoughtfully. "I understand it all. It was rather a
shock at first, but I am glad you have told me. Perhaps I do not quite
understand why she wishes to see me."

"We both wish to be sure that you bear us no ill-will. I am sure she
does, and I know that I do."

There was a pause again.

"Do you think I am that kind of friend?" Guido asked, with a little
sadness. "After what you have done, too?"

"I am afraid my mere existence has broken up your life, after all,"
Lamberti answered.

"You must not think that. Please do not, my friend. There is only one
thing that could hurt me now that it is all over."

"What is that?"

"I am not afraid that it will happen. You are not the kind of man to
break her heart."

"No," Lamberti answered very quietly. "I am not."

"It was only a dream for me, after all," Guido said, after a little
while. "You have the reality. She used to talk of three great questions,
and I remember them now as if I heard her asking them: 'What can I know?
What is it my duty to do? What may I hope?' Those were the three."

"And the answers?"

"Nothing, nothing, nothing. Those are my answers. Unless----"

He stopped.

"Unless--what?" Lamberti asked.

Guido smiled a little.

"Unless there is really something beyond it all, something essentially
true, something absolute by nature."

Lamberti had never known his friend to admit such a possibility even
under a condition.

"At all events," Guido added, "our friendship is true and absolute.
Shall we go home? I feel a little tired."

Lamberti helped him to the carriage and drew the light cover over his
knees before getting in himself. Then they drove down towards the city,
by the long and beautiful drive, past the Acqua Paola and San Pietro in
Montorio.

"You must go and see her this evening," Guido said gently, as they came
near the Palazzo Farnese. "Will you tell her something from me? Tell
her, please, that it would be a little hard for me to talk with her now,
but that she must not think I am not glad that she is going to marry my
best friend."

"Thank you. I will say that." Lamberti's voice was less steady than
Guido's.

"And tell her that I will write to her from the Tyrol."

"Yes."

It was over. The two men knew that their faithful friendship was
unshaken still, and that they should meet on the morrow and trust each
other more than ever. But on this evening it was better that each should
go his own way, the one to his solitude and his thoughts, the other to
the happiest hour of his life.




                             CHAPTER XXVIII


On the following afternoon Lamberti waited for Cecilia at the Villa
Madama, and she came not long after him, with Petersen. He had been to
the Palazzo Massimo in the evening, and a glance and a sign had
explained to her that all was well. Then they had sat together awhile,
talking in a low tone, while the Countess read the newspaper. When
Lamberti had given Guido's brave message, they had looked earnestly at
each other, and had agreed to tell her mother the truth at once, and to
meet on the morrow at the villa, which was Cecilia's own house, after
all. For they felt that they must be really alone together, to say the
only words that really mattered.

The head gardener had admitted Lamberti to the close garden, by the
outer steps, but had not let him into the house, as he had received no
orders. When Cecilia came, he accompanied her with the keys and opened
wide the doors of the great hall. Cecilia and Lamberti did not look at
each other while they waited, and when the man was gone away Cecilia
told Petersen to sit down in the court of honour on the other side of
the little palace. Petersen went meekly away and left the two to
themselves.

They walked very slowly along the path towards the fountain, and past
it, to the parapet at the other end, where they had talked long ago. But
as they passed the bench, they glanced at it quietly, and saw that it
was still in its place. Cecilia had not been at the villa since the
afternoon before Guido fell ill, and Lamberti had never come there since
the garden party in May.

They stood still before the low wall and looked across the shoulder of
the hill. Saving commonplace words at meeting, they had not spoken yet.
Cecilia broke the silence at last, looking straight before her, her lids
low, her face quiet, almost as if she were in a dream.

"Have we done all that we could do, all that we ought to do for him?"
she asked. "Are you sure?"

"We can do nothing more," Lamberti answered gravely.

"Tell me again what he said. I want the very words."

"He said, 'Tell her that it would be a little hard for me to talk with
her now, but that she must not think I am not glad that she is going to
marry my best friend.' He said those words, and he said he would write
to you from the Tyrol. He leaves to-morrow night."

"He has been very generous," Cecilia said softly.

"Yes. He will be your best friend, as he is mine."

She knew that it was true.

"We have done what we can," Lamberti continued presently. "He has given
all he has, and we have given him what we could. The rest is ours."

He took her hand and drew her gently, turning back towards the fountain.

"It was like this in the dream," she said, scarcely breathing the words
as she walked beside him.

They stood still before the falling water, quite alone and out of sight
of every one, in the softening light, and suddenly the girl's heart beat
hard, and the man's face grew pale, and they were facing each other,
hands in hands, look in look, thought in thought, soul in soul; and they
remembered that day when each had learned the other's secret in the
shadowy staircase of the palace, and each dreamt again of a meeting long
ago in the House of the Vestals; but only the girl knew what she had
felt of mingled joy and regret when she had sat alone at night weeping
on the steps of the Temple.

There was no veil between them now, as their eyes drew them closer
together by slow and delicious degrees. It was the first time, though
every instant was full of memories, all ending where this was to begin.
Their lips had never met, yet the thrill of life meeting life and the
blinding delight of each in the other were long familiar, as from ages,
while fresh and untasted still as the bloom on a flower at dawn.

Then, when they had kissed once, they sat down in the old place,
wondering what words would come, and whether they should ever need words
at all after that. And somehow, Cecilia thought of her three questions,
and they all were answered as youth answers them, in one way and with
one word; and the answer seemed so full of meaning, and of faith and
hope and charity, that the questions need never be asked again, nor any
others like them, to the end of her life; nor did she believe that she
could ever trouble her brain again about _Thus spake Zarathushthra_, and
the Man who had killed God, and the overcoming of Pity, and the Eternal
Return, and all those terrible and wonderful things that live in
Nietzsche's mazy web, waiting to torment and devour the poor human moth
that tries to fly upward.

But as for Kant's Categorical Imperative, in order to act in such a
manner that the reasons for her actions might be considered a universal
law, it was only necessary to realise how very much she loved the man
she had chosen, and how very much he loved her; for how indeed could it
then be possible not to live so as to deserve to be happy?

She had thought of these things during the night and had fallen asleep
very happy in realising the perfect simplicity of all science,
philosophy, and transcendental reasoning, and vaguely wondering why
every one could not solve the problems of the universe as she had.

"Is it all quite true?" she asked now, with a little fluttering wonder.
"Shall I wake and hear the door shutting, and be alone, and frightened
as I used to be?"

Lamberti smiled.

"I should have waked already," he said, "when we were standing there by
the fountain. I always did when I dreamt of you."

"So did I. Do you think we really met in our dreams?" She blushed
faintly.

"Do you know that you have not told me once to-day that you care for me,
ever so little?" he asked.

"I have told you much more than that, a thousand times over, in a
thousand ways."

"I wonder whether we really met!"




                                MARIETTA

                            A MAID OF VENICE

                          By F. MARION CRAWFORD

                     _Author of "Saracinesca," etc._

                           Cloth. 12 mo. $1.50


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                        66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK




                     WRITINGS OF F. MARION CRAWFORD

                              12 mo. Cloth


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                                CORLEONE

                            A TALE OF SICILY
                The last of the famous Saracinesca Series

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                               MR. ISAACS

"It is lofty and uplifting. It is strongly, sweetly, tenderly written.
It is in all respects an uncommon novel."--_The Literary World._


                              DR. CLAUDIUS

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and the author's ideas on social and political subjects are often
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recreation of the student or thinker."--_Living Church._



                             A ROMAN SINGER

"A powerful story of art and love in Rome."--_The New York Observer._



                         AN AMERICAN POLITICIAN

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                               TO LEEWARD

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                               ZOROASTER

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with which the story begins, or the death-scene with which it
closes."--_The Christian Union_ (now _The Outlook_).


                        A TALE OF A LONELY PARISH

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                            MARZIO'S CRUCIFIX

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                               PAUL PATOFF

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                             PIETRO GHISLERI

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                        THE CHILDREN OF THE KING

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surroundings, the beautiful Sorrento and the Gulf of Salerno, with the
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whole the book is strong and beautiful through its simplicity."--_Public
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                              MARION DARCHE

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                          KATHERINE LAUDERDALE

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                              THE RALSTONS

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                            LOVE IN IDLENESS

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                              CASA BRACCIO

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                                TAQUISARA

"A charming story this is, and one which will certainly be liked by all
admirers of Mr. Crawford's work."--_New York Herald._


              ADAM JOHNSTONE'S SON and A ROSE OF YESTERDAY

"It is not only one of the most enjoyable novels that Mr. Crawford has
ever written, but is a novel that will make people think."--_Boston
Beacon._

"Don't miss reading Marion Crawford's new novel, 'A Rose of Yesterday.'
It is brief, but beautiful and strong. It is as charming a piece of pure
idealism as ever came from Mr. Crawford's pen."--_Chicago Tribune._


                             SARACINESCA

"The work has two distinct merits, either of which would serve to make
it great: that of telling a perfect story in a perfect way, and of
giving a graphic picture of Roman society.... The story is exquisitely
told, and is the author's highest achievement, as yet, in the realm of
fiction."--_The Boston Traveler._


                              SANT' ILARIO

                        A SEQUEL TO SARACINESCA

"A singularly powerful and beautiful story.... It fulfils every
requirement of artistic fiction. It brings out what is most impressive
in human action, without owing any of its effectiveness to
sensationalism or artifice. It is natural, fluent in evolution,
accordant with experience, graphic in description, penetrating in
analysis, and absorbing in interest."--_The New York Tribune._


                               DON ORSINO

                A SEQUEL TO SARACINESCA AND SANT' ILARIO

"Offers exceptional enjoyment in many ways, in the fascinating
absorption of good fiction, in the interest of faithful historic
accuracy, and in charm of style. The 'New Italy' is strikingly revealed
in 'Don Orsino.'"--_Boston Budget._


                           WITH THE IMMORTALS

"The strange central idea of the story could have occurred only to a
writer whose mind was very sensitive to the current of modern thought
and progress, while its execution, the setting it forth in proper
literary clothing, could be successfully attempted only by one whose
active literary ability should be fully equalled by his power of
assimilative knowledge both literary and scientific, and no less by his
courage, and so have a fascination entirely new for the habitual reader
of novels. Indeed, Mr. Crawford has succeeded in taking his readers
quite above the ordinary plane of novel interest."--_The Boston
Advertiser._


                              GREIFENSTEIN

"... Another notable contribution to the literature of the day. Like all
Mr. Crawford's work, this novel is crisp, clear, and vigorous, and will
be read with a great deal of interest."--_New York Evening Telegram._


                 A CIGARETTE-MAKER'S ROMANCE and KHALED

"It is a touching romance, filled with scenes of great dramatic
power."--_Boston Commercial Bulletin._

"It abounds in stirring incidents and barbaric picturesqueness; and the
love struggle of the unloved Khaled is manly in its simplicity and noble
in its ending."--_The Mail and Express._


                          THE WITCH OF PRAGUE

"The artistic skill with which this extraordinary story is constructed
and carried out is admirable and delightful.... Mr. Crawford has scored
a decided triumph, for the interest of the tale is sustained
throughout.... A very remarkable, powerful, and interesting
story."--_New York Tribune._













[Illustration: Cover art]




MY BRAVE and GALLANT GENTLEMAN


A Romance of British Columbia


BY

ROBERT WATSON




McCLELLAND, GOODCHILD & STEWART

PUBLISHERS :: :: :: :: TORONTO




_Copyright, 1918,_

_By George H. Doran Company_


_Printed in the United States of America_




TO A LADY CALLED NAN




CONTENTS

CHAPTER

     I  THE SECOND SON
    II  ANOTHER SECOND SON
   III  JIM THE BLACKSMITH
    IV  VISCOUNT HARRY, CAPTAIN OF THE GUARDS
     V  TOMMY FLYNN, THE HARLFORD BRUISER
    VI  ABOARD THE COASTER
   VII  K. B. HORSFAL, MILLIONAIRE
  VIII  GOLDEN CRESCENT
    IX  THE BOOZE ARTIST
     X  RITA OF THE SPANISH SONG
    XI  AN INFORMATIVE VISITOR
   XII  JOE CLARK, BULLY
  XIII  A VISIT, A DISCOVERY AND A KISS
   XIV  THE COMING OF MARY GRANT
    XV  "MUSIC HATH CHARMS--"
   XVI  THE DEVIL OF THE SEA
  XVII  GOOD MEDICINE
 XVIII  A MAID, A MOOD AND A SONG
   XIX  THE "GREEN-EYED MONSTER" AWAKES
    XX  FISHING!
   XXI  THE BEACHCOMBERS
  XXII  JAKE STOPS THE DRINK FOR GOOD
 XXIII  THE FIGHT IN THE WOODS
  XXIV  TWO MAIDS AND A MAN
   XXV  THE GHOUL
  XXVI  "HER KNIGHT PROVED TRUE"




MY BRAVE AND GALLANT GENTLEMAN


CHAPTER I

The Second Son

Lady Rosemary Granton!  Strange how pleasant memories arise, how
disagreeable nightmares loom up before the mental vision at the sound
of a name!

Lady Rosemary Granton!  As far back as I could remember, that name had
sounded familiar in my ears.  As I grew from babyhood to boyhood, from
boyhood to youth, it was drummed into me by my father that Lady
Rosemary Granton, some day, would wed the future Earl of Brammerton and
Hazelmere.  This apparently awful calamity did not cause me any mental
agony or loss of sleep, for the reason that I was merely The Honourable
George, second son of my noble parent.

I was rather happy that morning, as I sat in an easy chair by the
library window, perusing a work by my favourite author,--after a
glorious twenty-mile gallop along the hedgerows and across country.  I
was rather happy, I say, as I pondered over the thought that something
in the way of a just retribution was at last about to be meted out to
my elder, haughty, arrogant and extremely aristocratic rake of a
brother, Harry.

My mind flashed back again to the source of my vagrant thoughts.  Lady
Rosemary Granton!  To lose the guiding hand of her mother in her
infancy; to spend her childhood in the luxurious lap of New York's
pampered three hundred; to live six years more among the ranchers, the
cowboys and, no doubt, the cattle thieves of Wyoming, in the care of an
old friend of her father, to wit, Colonel Sol Dorry; then to be
transferred for refining and general educational purposes for another
spell of six years to the strict discipline of a French Convent; to
flit from city to city, from country to country, for three years with
her father, in the stress of diplomatic service--what a life! what an
upbringing for the future Countess of Brammerton!  Finally, by way of
culmination, to lose her father and to be introduced into London
society, with a fortune that made the roués of every capital in Europe
gasp and order a complete new wardrobe!

As I thought what the finish might be, I threw up my hands, for it was
a most interesting and puzzling speculation.

Lady Rosemary Granton!  Who had not heard the stories of her conquests
and her daring?  They were the talk of the clubs and the gossip of the
drawing-rooms.  Masculine London was in ecstasies over them and voted
Lady Rosemary a trump.  The ladies were scandalised, as only jealous
minded ladies can be at lavishly endowed and favoured members of their
own sex.

Personally, I preferred to sit on the fence.  Being a lover of the open
air, of the agile body, the strong arm and the quick eye, I could not
but admire some of this extraordinary young lady's exploits.  But,--the
woman who was conceded the face of an angel, the form of a Venus de
Milo; who was reported to have dressed as a jockey and ridden a horse
to victory in the Grand National Steeplechase; who, for a wager, had
flicked a coin from the fingers of a cavalry officer with a revolver at
twenty paces; lassooed a cigar from between the teeth of the Duke of
Kaslo and argued on the Budget with a Cabinet Minister, all in one
week; who could pray with the piety of a fasting monk; weep at will and
look bewitching in the process; faint to order with the grace, the
elegance and all the stage effect of an early Victorian Duchess: the
woman who was styled a golden-haired goddess by those on whom she
smiled and dubbed a saucy, red-haired minx by those whom she
spurned;--was too, too much of a conglomeration for such a humdrum
individual, such an ordinary, country-loving fellow as I,--George
Brammerton.

And now, poor old Hazelmere was undergoing a process of renovation such
as it had not experienced since the occasion of a Royal visit some
twenty years before: not a room in the house where one could feel
perfectly safe, save the library: washing, scrubbing, polishing and
oiling in anticipation of a rousing week-end House Party in honour of
this wonderful, chameleon-like, Lady Rosemary's first visit; when her
engagement with Harry would be formally announced to the inquisitive,
fashionable world of which she was a spoiled child.

Why all this fuss over a matter which concerned only two individuals, I
could not understand.  Had I been going to marry the Lady
Rosemary,--which, Heaven forbid,--I should have whipped her quietly
away to some little, country parsonage, to the registrar of a small
country town; or to some village blacksmith, and so got the business
over, out of hand.  But, of course, I had neither the inclination, nor
the intention, let alone the opportunity, of putting to the test what I
should do in regard to marrying her, nor were my tastes in any way akin
to those of my most elegant, elder brother, Viscount Harry, Captain of
the Guards,--egad,--for which two blessings I was indeed truly thankful.

As I was thus ruminating, the library door opened and my noble sire
came in, spick and span as he always was, and happier looking than
usual.

"'Morning, George," he greeted.

"Good morning, dad."

He rubbed his hands together.

"Gad, youngster! (I was twenty-four) everything is going like
clockwork.  The house is all in order; supplies on hand to stock an
hotel; all London falling over itself in its eagerness to get here.
Harry will arrive this afternoon and Lady Rosemary to-morrow."

I raised my eyebrows, nodded disinterestedly and started in again to my
reading.  Father walked the carpet excitedly, then he stopped and
looked down at me.

"You don't seem particularly enthusiastic over it, George.  Nothing
ever does interest you but boxing bouts, wrestling matches, golf and
books.  Why don't you brace up and get into the swim?  Why don't you
take the place that belongs to you among the young fellows of your own
station?"

"God forbid!" I answered fervently.

"Not jealous of Harry, are you?  Not smitten at the very sound of the
lady's name,--like the young bloods, and the old ones, too, in the
city?"

"God forbid!" I replied again.

"Hang it all, can't you say anything more than that?" he asked testily.

"Oh, yes! dad,--lots," I answered, closing my book and keeping my
finger at the place.  "For one thing--I have never met this Lady
Rosemary Granton; never even seen her picture--and, to tell you the
truth, from what I have heard of her, I have no immediate desire to
make the lady's acquaintance."

There was silence for a moment, and from my father's heavy breathing I
could gather that his temper was ruffling.

"Look here, you young barbarian, you revolutionary,--what do you mean?
What makes you talk in that way of one of the best and sweetest young
ladies in the country?  I won't have it from you, sir, _this_ Lady
Rosemary Granton, _this_ Lady indeed."

"Oh! you know quite well, dad, what I mean," I continued, a little
bored.  "Harry is no angel, and I doubt not but Lady Rosemary is by far
too good for him.  But,--you know,--you cannot fail to have heard the
stories that are flying over the country of her cantrips;--some of
them, well, not exactly pleasant.  And, allowing fifty percent for
exaggeration, there is still a lot that would be none the worse of
considerable discounting to her advantage."

"Tuts, tush and nonsense!  Foolish talk most of it!  The kind of stuff
that is garbled and gossiped about every popular woman.  The girl is
up-to-date, modern, none of your drawing-room dolls.  I admit that she
has go in her, vim, animal spirits, youthful exuberance and all that.
She may love sport and athletics, but, but,--you, yourself, spend most
of your time in pursuit of these same amusements.  Why not she?"

"Why! father, these are the points I admire in her,--the only ones, I
may say.  But, oh! what's the good of going over it all?  I know, you
know,--everybody knows;--her flirtations, her affairs; every rake in
London tries to boast of his acquaintance with her and bandies her name
over his brandy and soda, and winks."

"Look here, George," put in my father angrily, "you forget yourself.
These stories are lies, every one of them!  Lady Rosemary is the
daughter of my dearest, my dead friend.  Very soon, she will be your
sister."

"Yes!  I know,--so let us not say any more about it.  It is Harry and
she for it, and, if they are pleased and an old whim of yours
satisfied,--what matters it to an ordinary, easy-going, pipe-loving,
cold-blooded fellow like me?"

"Whim, did you say?  Whim?" cried my father, flaring up and clenching
his hands excitedly.  "Do you call the vow of a Brammerton a whim?  The
pledged word of a Granton a whim?  Whim, be damned."

For want of words to express himself, my father dropped into a chair
and drummed his agitated fingers on the arms of it.

I rose and went over to him, laying my hand lightly on his shoulder.

Poor old dad!  I had not meant to hurt his feelings.  After all, he was
the dearest of old-fashioned fellows and I loved his haughty,
mid-Victorian ways.

"There, there, father,--I did not mean to say anything that would give
offence.  I take it all back.  I am sorry,--indeed I am."

He looked up at me and his face brightened once more.

"'Gad, boy,--I'm glad to hear you say it.  I know you did not mean
anything by your bruskness.  You are an impetuous, headstrong young
devil though,--with a touch of your mother in you,--and, 'gad, if I
don't like you the more for it.

"But, but," he went on, looking in front of him, "you must remember
that although Granton and I were mere boys at the time our vow was
made,--he was a Granton and I a Brammerton, whose vows are made to
keep.  It seems like yesterday, George; it was a few hours after he
saved my life in the fighting before Sevastopol.  We were sitting by
the camp-fire.  The chain-shot was still flying around.  The cries of
the wounded were in our ears.  The sentries were challenging
continually and drums were rolling in the distance.

"I clasped Fred's hand and I thanked him for what he had done for me
that day, right in the teeth of the Russian guns.

"'Freddy, old chap, you're a trump,' I said, 'and, if ever I be blessed
with an heir to Brammerton and Hazelmere, I would wish nothing better
than that he should marry a Granton.'

"'And nothing would please me so much, Harry, old boy,--as that a maid
of Granton should wed a Brammerton,' he answered earnestly.

"'Then it's a go,' said I, full of enthusiasm.

"'It's a go, Harry.'

"And we raised our winecups, such as they were.

"'Your daughter, Fred!'

"'Your heir, Harry!'

"'The future Earl and Countess of Brammerton and Hazelmere,' we chimed
together.

"Our winecups clinked and the bond was made;--made for all time,
George."

My father's eyes lit up and he seemed to be back in the Crimea.  He
shook his head sadly.

"And now, poor old Fred is gone.  Ah, well! our dream is coming true.
In a month, the maid of Granton weds the future Earl of Brammerton.

"'Gad, George, my boy,--Rosemary may be skittish and lively, but were
she the most mercurial woman in Christendom, she has never forgotten
that she is first of all a Granton, and, as a Granton, she has kept a
Granton's pledge."

For a moment I caught the contagion of my father's earnestness.  My
eyes felt damp as I thought how important, after all, this union was to
him.  But, even then, I could not resist a little more questioning.

"Does Harry love her, dad?"

"Love her!" He smiled.  "Why! my boy, he's madly in love with her."

"Then, why doesn't he mend a bit? give over his mad chasing after,--to
put it mildly,--continual excitement; and demonstrate that he is
thoroughly in earnest.  You know, falling madly in love is a habit of
Harry's."

"Don't you worry your serious head about that, George.  You talk of
Harry as if he were a baby.  You talk as if you were his grandfather,
instead of his younger brother and a mere boy."

"Does Lady Rosemary love Harry?" I asked, ignoring his admonition.

"Of course, she loves him.  Why shouldn't she?  He's a good fellow;
well bred and well made; he is a soldier; he is in the swim; he has
plenty to spend; he is the heir to Brammerton;--why shouldn't she love
him?  She is going to marry him, isn't she?  She may not be of the
gushing type, George, but she'll come to it all in good time.  She will
grow to love him, as every good wife does her husband.  So, don't let
that foolish head of yours give you any more trouble."

I turned to leave.

"George!"

"Yes, dad!"

"You will be on hand this week-end.  I want you at home.  I need you to
keep things going.  No skipping off to sporting gatherings or athletic
conventions.  I wish you to meet your future sister."

"Well,--I had not thought of that, dad.  Big Jim Darrol, Tom Tanner and
I have entered for a number of events at the Gartnockan Games on
Saturday.  I am also on the lists as a competitor for the Northern
Counties Golf Championship on Monday."

My father looked up at me in a strange way.

"However," I went on quickly, "much as I dislike the rush, the gush and
the clatter of house parties, I shall be on hand."

"Good!  I knew you would, my boy," replied my father quietly.  "Where
away now, lad?"

"Oh! down to the village to tell Jim and Tom not to count on me for
their week-end jaunt."




CHAPTER II

Another Second Son

I strolled down the avenue, between the tall trees and on to the broad,
sun-baked roadway leading to the sleepy little village of Brammerton,
which lay so snugly down in the hollow.  Swinging my stout stick and
whistling as I went, I felt at peace with the good old world.  My head
was clear, my arm was strong; rich, fresh blood was dancing in my
veins; I was young, single, free;--so what cared I?

As I walked along, I saw ahead of me a thin line of blue-grey smoke
curling up from the roadside.  As I drew nearer, I made out the back of
a ragged man, leaning over a fire.  His voice, lusty and clear as a
bell, was ringing out a strange melody.  I went over to him.

I was looking over his shoulder, yet he seemed not to have heard me, so
intent was he on his song and in his work.

He was toasting the carcass of a poached rabbit, the wet skin of which
lay at his side.  He was a dirty, ragged rascal, but he seemed happy
and his voice was good.  The sentiment of his song was not altogether
out of harmony with my own feelings.

  "A carter swore he'd love always
    A skirt, some rouge, a pair of stays.
  After his vow, for days and days,
    He thought himself the smarter."


The singer bit a piece of flesh from the leg of his rabbit, to test its
tenderness, then he resumed his toasting and his song.

  "But, underneath the stays and paint
    He found the usual male complaint:
  A woman's tongue, with Satan's taint;
    A squalling, brawling tartar.

  "She scratches, bites and blacks his eye.
    His head hangs low; he heaves a sigh;
  He longs for single days, gone by.
    He's doomed to die a martyr."


The peculiar fellow stopped, opened a red-coloured handkerchief, took
out a hunk of bread and set it down by his side with slow deliberation.
It was quite two minutes ere he started off again.

  "Now, friends, beware, take my advice;
    When eating sugar, think of spice;
  Before you marry, ponder twice:
    Remember Ned the carter."


From the words, it seemed to me that he had finished the song, but,
judging from the tune, it was never-ending.

"A fine song, my good fellow," I remarked from behind.

The rascal did not turn round.

"Oh!--it's no' so bad.  It's got the endurin' quality o' carrying a
moral," he answered.

"You seem to be clear in the conscience yourself," said I.

"It'll be clearer when I get outside o' this rabbit," he returned,
still not deigning to look at me.

"But you did not seem to be startled when I spoke to you," I remarked
in surprise.

"What way should I?  I never saw the man yet that I was feart o'.
Forby,--I kent you were there."

"But, how could you know?  I did not make a noise or display my
presence in any way."

"No!--but the wind was blawin' from the back, ye see; and when ye came
up behind the smoke curled up a bit further and straighter than it did
before; then there was just the ghost o' a shadow."

I laughed.  "You are an observant customer."

"Oh, ay!  I'm a' that.  Come round and let me see ye."

I obeyed, and he seemed satisfied with his inspection.

"Sit doon,--oot o' the smoke," he said.

I did so.

"You are Scotch?" I ventured.

"Ay!  From Perth, awa'.

"A Scotch tinker?"

"Just that; a tinker from Perth, and my name's Robertson.  I'm a
Struan, ye ken.  The Struans,--the real Struans,--are a' tinkers or
pipers.  In oor family, my elder brother fell heir to my father's
pipes, so I had just to take to the tinkering.  But we're joint heirs
to my father's fondness for a dram.  Ye havena a wee drop on ye?"

"Not a drop," I remarked.

"That's a disappointment.  I was kind o' feart ye wouldna, when I asked
ye."

"How so?"

"Oh! ye don't look like a man that wasted your substance.  More like a
seller o' Bibles, or maybe a horse doctor."

I laughed at the queer comparison, and he looked out at me from under
his shaggy, red eyebrows.

"Have a bite o' breakfast wi' me.  I like to crack to somebody when I'm
eatin'.  It helps the digestion."

"No, thank you," I said.  "I have breakfasted already."

"It's good meat, man.  The rabbit's fresh.  I can guarantee it, for it
was runnin' half an hour ago.  Try a leg."

I refused, but, as he seemed crestfallen, I took the drumstick in my
hand and ate the meat slowly from it; and never did rabbit taste so
good.

"What makes ye smile?" asked my tattered companion.  "Do ye no' like
the taste o' it?"

"Oh! the rabbit is all right," I said, "but I was just thinking that
had it lived its children might have belonged to a brother of mine some
day."

"How's that?  Is he a keeper?  Od sake!" he went on, scratching his
head, as it seemed to dawn on him, "ye don't happen to belong to the
big hoose up there?"

"I live there," said I.

He leaned over to me quickly.  "Have another leg, man,--have it;--dod!
it's your ain, anyway."

"I haven't finished the first yet.  Go ahead yourself."

He ate slowly, eying me now and again through the smoke.

"So you're a second son, eh?" he pondered.  "Man, ye have my sympathy.
I had the same ill-luck.  That's how my brother Angus got the pipes and
I'm a tinker.  Although, I wouldna mind being the second son o' a Laird
or a Duke."

"Well, my friend," said I; "that's just where our opinions differ.
Now, I'd sooner be the second son of a rag-and-bone man; a--Perthshire
piper of the name of Robertson; ay! of the devil himself,--than the
second son of an Earl."

"Do ye tell me that now!" he put in, with a cock of his towsled head,
picking up another piece of rabbit.

"You see,--you and these other fellows can do as you like; go where you
like when you like.  An Earl's second son has to serve his House.  He
has to pave the way and make things smooth for the son and heir.  He is
supposed to work the limelight that shines on his elder brother.  He is
tolerated, sometimes spoiled and petted, because,--well, because he has
an elder brother who, some day, will be an Earl; but he counts for
little or nothing in the world's affairs.

"Be thankful, sir, you are only the second son of a highland piper."

The tramp reflected for a while.

"Ay, ay!" he philosophised at last, "no doot,--maybe,--just that.  I
can see you have your ain troubles and I'm thinkin', maybe, I'm just as
weel the way I am.  But it's a queer thing; we aye think the other man
is gettin' the best o' what's goin'.  It's the way o' the world."

He was quiet a while.  He negotiated the rabbit's head and I watched
him with interest as he extracted every bit of meat from the maze of
bone.

"And you would be the Earl when your father dies, if it wasna for your
brother?" he added.

"Yes!" I answered.

"Man, it must be a dreadful temptation."

"What must be?"

"Och! to keep from puttin' something in his whisky; to keep from
flinging him ower the window or droppin' a flower pot on his heid,
maybe.  If my ain father had been an Earl, Angus Robertson would never
have lived to blow the pipes.  As it was, it was touch and go wi'
Angus;--for they were the bonny pipes,--the grand, bonny pipes."

"Do you mean to tell me, you would have murdered your brother for a
skirling, screeching bagpipes?" I asked in horror.

"Och! hardly that, man.  Murder is no' a bonny name for it.  I would
just kind o' quietly have done awa' wi' him.  It's maybe a pity my
conscience was so keen, for he's no' much good, is Angus; he's a
through-other customer: no' steady and law-abidin' like mysel'."

"Well, my friend," I said finally----

"Donald! that's my name."

"Well, Donald, I must be on my way."

"What's a' the hurry, man?"

"Business."

"Oh! weel; give me your hand on it.  You've a fine face.  The face o' a
man that, if he had a dram on him, he would give me a drop o' it."

"That I would, Donald."

"It's a pity.  But ye don't happen to have the price o' the dram on ye?"

"Maybe I have, Donald."

I handed him a sixpence.

"Thank ye.  I'm never wrong in the readin' o' face character."

As I made to go from him, he started off again.

"You don't happen to be a married man, wi' a wife and bairns?" he asked.

"No, Donald.  Thank goodness!  What made you ask that?"

"Oh!  I thought maybe you were and that was the way you liked the words
o' my bit song."

I left the tinker finishing his belated breakfast and hurried down the
road toward the village.

The sun was getting high in the heavens, birds were singing and the
spring workers were busy in the fields.  I took the side track down the
rough pathway leading to Modley Farm.

My good friend, big, brawny, bluff Tom Tanner,--who was standing under
the porch,--hailed me from a distance, with his usual merry shout.

"Where away, George?  Feeling fit for our trip?" he asked as I got up
to him.

"I am sorry, old boy, but, so far as I am concerned, the trip is off.
I just hurried down to tell you and Jim.

"You see, Tom, there is going to be a House Party up there this
week-end and my dad's mighty anxious to have me at home; so much so,
that I would offend him if I went off.  Being merely George Brammerton,
I must bow to the paternal commands, although I would rather, a hundred
times, be at the games."

Tom's face fell, and I could see he was disappointed.  I knew how much
he enjoyed those week-end excursions of ours.

"The fact is," I explained, "there is going to be a marriage up there
pretty soon, and, naturally, I am wanted to meet the lady."

"Great Scott!  George,--you are not trying to break it gently to me?
You are not going to get married, are you?" he asked in consternation.

I laughed loudly.  "Lord, no!  Not for a kingdom.  It is my big brother
Harry."

Tom seemed relieved.  He even sighed.

"I'm glad to hear you say it, George, for there's a lot of fine
athletic meetings coming on during the next three or four months and it
would be a pity to miss them for, for,----  Oh! hang it all!  you know
what I mean.  You're such a queer, serious, determined sort of
customer, that it's hard to say what you will do next."

He looked so solemn over the matter that I laughed again.

His kind-hearted old mother, who had been at work in the kitchen and
had overheard our conversation, came to the doorway and placed her arms
lovingly around our broad shoulders.

"Lots of time yet to think about getting married.  And, let me whisper
something into your ears.  It's an old woman's advice, and it's
good:--when you do think of marrying, be sure you get a wife with a
pleasant face and a good figure; a wife that other wives' men will turn
round and admire; for, you know, you can never foretell what kind of
temper a woman has until you have lived with her.  A maid is always on
her best behaviour before her lover.  And, just think what it would
mean if you married a plain, shapeless lass and she proved to have a
temper like a termagant!  Now, a handsome lass, even if she has a
temper, is always--a handsome lass and something to rouse envy of you
in other men.  And, after all, we measure and treasure what we have in
proportion as other people long for it.  So, whatever you do, young
men, make sure she is handsome!"

"Good, sensible advice, Mrs. Tanner; and I mean to take it," said I.
"But I would be even more exacting.  In addition to being sweet
tempered and fair of face and form, she must have curly, golden hair
and golden brown eyes to match."

"And freckles?" put in Mrs. Tanner with a wry face.

"No! freckles are barred," I added.

"But, golden hair and brown eyes are mighty rare to find in one
person," said Tom innocently.

"Of course they are; and the combination such as I require is so
extremely rare that my quest will be a long one.  I am likely therefore
to enjoy my bachelorhood for many days to come."

"Good-bye, Mrs. Tanner.  Good-bye, Tom; I am going down to the smithy
to see Jim."

I strolled away from my happy, contented friends, on to the main road
again and down the hill to the village, little dreaming how long it
would be ere I should have an opportunity of talking with them again.




CHAPTER III

Jim the Blacksmith

The village of Brammerton seemed only half awake.  A rumbling cart was
slowly wending its way up the hill, three or four old men were standing
yarning at the inn corner; now and again, a busy housewife would appear
at her door and take a glimpse of what little was going on and
disappear inside just as quickly as she had shown herself.  The sound
of the droning voices of children conning their lessons came through
the open window of the old schoolhouse.

These were the only signs and sounds of life that forenoon in
Brammerton.  Stay!--there was yet another.  Breaking in on the general
quiet of the place, I could hear distinctly the regular thud of hard
steel on soft, followed by the clear double-ring of a small hammer on a
mellow-toned anvil.

One man, at any rate, was hard at work,--Jim Darrol,--big, honest,
serious giant that he was.

Light of heart and buoyant in body, I turned down toward the smithy.  I
looked in through the grimy, broken window and admired the brawny giant
he looked there in the glare of the furnace, with his broad back to me,
his huge arms bared to the shoulders.  Little wonder, thought I, Jim
Darrol can whirl the hammer and put the shot farther than any man in
the Northern Counties.

How the muscles bulged, and wriggled, and crawled under his dark, hairy
skin!  What a picture of manliness he portrayed!  And, best of all,--I
knew his heart was as good and clean as his body was sound.

I tiptoed cautiously inside and slapped him between the shoulders.  He
wheeled about quickly.  He always was a solemn-looking owl, but this
morning his face was clouded and grim.  As he recognised me, a terrible
anger seemed to blaze up in his black eyes.  I could see the muscles
tighten in his arms and his fingers close firmly over the shaft of the
hammer he held.  I could see a new-born, but fierce hatred burning in
every inch of his enormous frame.

"Hello, Jim, old man!  Who has been rubbing you the wrong way?" I cried.

His jaws set.  He raised his left hand and pointed with his finger to
the open doorway.

"Get out!" he growled, in a deep, hoarse voice.

I stood dumbfounded for a brief moment, then I replied roughly and
familiarly: "Oh, you go to the devil!  Keep your anger for those who
have caused it."

"Get out, will you!" he cried again, taking a step nearer to me, his
brows lowered, his lips drawn to a thin line.

I had seen these danger signals in Jim before, but never with any ill
intent toward me.  I was so astounded I could scarcely think aright.
What could he mean?  What was the matter?

"Jim, Jim," I soothed, "don't talk that way to old friends."

"You're no friend of mine," he shouted.  "Will you get out of here?"

In some respects, I was like Jim Darrol: I did not like to be ordered
about.

"No!  I will not get out," I snapped back at him.  "I mean to remain
here until you grow sensible."

I went over to his anvil, set my leg across it and looked straight at
him.

He raised his hammer high, as if to strike me; and I felt then that if
I had taken my eyes from Jim's for the briefest flash of time, my last
minute on earth would have arrived.

With an oath,--the first I ever heard him utter,--he cast the hammer
from him, sending it clattering into a corner among the old horse shoes.

"Damn you,--I hate you and all your cursed aristocratic breed," he
snarled.  And, with the spring of a tiger, he had me by the throat,
with those great, grabbing hands of his, his fingers closing cruelly on
my windpipe as he tried to shake the life out of me.

I had always been able to account for Jim when it came to fisticuffs,
but never at close quarters.  This time, his attack was violent as it
was unexpected.  I did not have the ghost of a chance.  I staggered
back against the furnace wall, still in his devilish clutch.  Not a
gasp of air entered or left my body from the moment he clutched me.

He shook me as a terrier does a rat.

Soon my strength began to go; my eyes bulged; my head felt as if it
were bursting; dancing lights and awful darknesses flashed and loomed
alternately before and around me.  Then the lights became scarcer and
the darknesses longer and more intense.  As the last glimmer of
consciousness was leaving me, when black gloom had won and there was no
more light, I felt a sudden release, painful and almost unwelcome to
the oblivion to which I had been hurling.  The lights came flashing
back to me again and out of the whirling chaos I began to grasp the
tangible once more.  As I leaned against the side of the furnace,
pulling at my throat where those terrible fingers had
been,--gasping,--gasping,--for glorious life-giving, life-sustaining
air, I gradually began to see as through a haze.  Before long, I was
almost myself again.

Jim was standing a few paces away, his chest heaving, his shaggy head
bent and his great hands clenched against his thighs.

I gazed at him, and as I gazed something wet glistened in his eyes,
rolled down his cheeks and splashed on the back of his hand, where it
dried up as if it had fallen on a red-hot plate.

I took an unsteady step toward him and held out my hand.

"Jim," I murmured, "my poor old Jim!"

His head remained lowered.

"Strike me," he groaned huskily.  "For God's sake strike me, for the
coward I am!"

"I want your hand, Jim," I answered.  "Tell me what is wrong?  What is
all this about?"

At last he looked into my eyes.  I could see a hundred conflicting
emotions working in his expressive face.

"You would be friends after what I have done?" he asked.

"I want your hand, Jim," I said again.

In a moment, both his were clasped over mine, in his vicelike grip.

"George,--George!" he cried.  "We've always been friends,--chums.  I
have always known you were not like the rest of them."

He drew his forearm across his brow.  "I am not myself, George.  You'll
forgive me for what I did, won't you?"

"Man, Jim,--there is nothing done that requires forgiving;--only, you
have the devil's own grip.  I don't suppose I shall be able to swallow
decently for a week.

"But you are in trouble: what is it, Jim?  Tell me; maybe I can help."

"Ay,--it's trouble enough,--God forbid.  It's Peggy, George,--my dear
little sister, Peggy, that has neither mother nor father to guide
her;--only me, and I'm a blind fool.  Oh!--I can't speak about it.
Come over with me and see for yourself."

I followed him slowly and silently out of the smithy, down the lane and
across the road to his little, rose-covered cottage.  We went round to
the back of the house.  Jim held up his hand for caution, as he peeped
in at the kitchen window.  He turned to me again, and beckoned, his big
eyes blind with tears.

"Look in there," he gulped.  "That's my little sister, my little Peggy;
she who never has had a sorrow since mother left us.  She's been like
that for four hours and she gets worse when I try to comfort her."

I peered in.

Peggy was sitting on the edge of a chair and bending across the table.
Her arms were spread out in front of her and her face was buried in
them.  Her brown, curly hair rippled over her neck and shoulders like a
mountain stream.  Great sobs seemed to be shaking her supple body.  I
listened, and my ears caught the sound of a breaking heart.  There was
a fearful agony in her whole attitude.

I turned away without speaking and followed Jim back to the smithy.
When we got there, something pierced me like a knife, although all was
not quite clear to my understanding.

"Jim,--Jim," I cried, "surely you never fancied I--I was in any way to
blame for this.  Why!  Jim,--I don't even know yet what it is all
about."

He laughed unpleasantly.  "No, George, no!--Oh!  I can't tell you.
Here----"

He went to his coat which hung from a hook in the wall.  He pulled a
letter from his inside pocket.  "Read that," he said.

I unfolded the paper, as he stood watching me keenly.

The note was in handwriting with which I was well familiar.


"My DEAR LITTLE PEGGY,

I am very, very sorry,--but surely you know that what you ask is
impossible.  I shall try to find time to run out and see you at the
usual place, Friday night at nine o'clock.  Do not be afraid, little
woman; everything will come out all right.  You know I shall see that
you are well looked after; that you do not want for anything.

Burn this after you read it.  Keep our secret, and bear up, like the
good little girl you are.  Yours affectionately,

H----"


As I read, my blood chilled in my veins, was,--there could be no
mistaking it.

"My God!  Jim," I cried, "this is terrible.  Surely,--surely----"

"Yes!  George," he said, in a tensely subdued voice, "your brother did
that.  Your brother,--with his glib tongue and his masterful way.
Oh!--well I know the breed.  They are to be found in high and low
places; they are generally not much for a man to look at, but they are
the kind no woman is safe beside; the kind that gets their soft side
whether they be angels or she-devils.  Why couldn't he leave her alone?
Why couldn't he stay among his own kind?

"And now, he has the gall to think that his accursed money can smooth
it over.  Damn and curse him for what he is."

I had little or nothing to say.  My heart was too full for words and a
great anger was surging within me against my own flesh and blood.

"Jim,--does this make any difference between you and me?" I asked,
crossing over to him on the spongy floor of hoof parings and steel
filings.  "Does it, Jim?"

He caught me by the shoulders, in his old, rough way, and looked into
my face.  Then he smiled sadly and shook his head.

"No, George, no!  You're different: you always were different; you are
the same straight, honest George Brammerton to me;--still the same."

"Then, Jim, you will let me try to do something here?  You will promise
me not to get into personal contact with Harry,--at least until I have
seen him and spoken with him.  Not that he does not deserve a dog's
hiding, but I should like to see him and talk with him first."

"Why should I promise that?" he asked sharply.

"For one thing,--because, doubtless, Harry is home now.  And again,
there is going to be a week-end House Party at our place.  Harry's
engagement of marriage with Lady Rosemary Granton is to be announced;
and Lady Rosemary will be there.

"It would only mean trouble for you, Jim;--and, God knows, this is
trouble enough."

"What do I care for trouble?" he cried defiantly.  "What trouble can
make me more unhappy than I now am?"

"You must avoid further trouble for Peggy's sake," I interposed.
"Jim,--let me see Harry first.  Do what you like afterwards.  Promise
me, Jim."

He swallowed his anger.

"God!--it will be a hard promise to keep if ever I come across him.
But I do promise, just because I like you, George, as I hate him."

"May I keep this meantime?" I asked, holding up Harry's letter to Peggy.

"No!  Give it to me.  I might need it."

"But I might find greater use for it, Jim.  Won't you let me have it,
for a time at least?"

"Oh! all right, all right," he answered, spreading his hands over his
leather apron.

I left him there amid the roar of the fire and the odour of sizzling
hoofs, and wended my way slowly up the dust-laden hill, back home,
having forgotten entirely, in the great sorrow that had fallen, to tell
Jim my object in calling on him that day.




CHAPTER IV

Viscount Harry, Captain of the Guards

On nearing home, I noticed the "Flying Dandy," Harry's favourite horse,
standing at the front entrance in charge of a groom.

"Hello, Wally," I shouted in response to the groom's salute and broad
grin.  "Is Captain Harry home?"

"Yes, sir!  Three hours agone, sir.  'E's just agoing for a canter,
sir, for the good of 'is 'ealth."

I went inside.

"Hi!  William," I cried to the retreating figure of our portly and
aristocratic butler.  "Where's Harry?"

"Captain Harry, sir, is in the armoury.  Any message, sir?"

"No! it is all right, William.  I shall go along in and see him."

I went down the corridor, to the most ancient part of Hazelmere House;
the old armoury, with its iron-studded oaken doors and its suggestion
of spooks and goblins.  I pushed in to that sombre-looking place, which
held so many grim secrets of feudal times.  How many drinking orgies
and all-night card parties had been held within its portals, I dared
not endeavour to surmise.  As to how many plots had been hatched behind
its studded doors, how many affairs of honour had been settled for all
time under its high-panelled roof,--there was only a meagre record; but
those we knew of had been bloody and not a few.

Figures, in suits of armour, stood in every corner; two-edged swords,
shields of brass and cowhide, blunderbusses and breech-loading pistols
hung from the walls, while the more modern rifles and fowling pieces
were ranged in orderly fashion along the far side.

The light was none too good in there, and I failed, at first, to
discover the object of my quest.

"How do, farmer Giles?" came that slow, drawling, sarcastic voice which
I knew so well.

I turned suddenly, and,--there he was, seated on a brass-studded oak
chest almost behind the heavy door, swinging one leg and toying with a
seventeenth century rapier.  Through his narrow-slitted eyes, he was
examining me from top to toe in apparent disgust: tall, thin, perfectly
groomed, handsome, cynical, devil-may-care.

I tried to speak calmly, but my anger was greater than I could properly
control.  Poor little Peggy Darrol was uppermost in my thoughts.

"'Gad, George,--you look like a tramp.  Why don't you spruce up a bit?
Hobnailed boots, home-spun breeches; ugh! it's enough to make your
noble ancestors turn in their coffins and groan.

"Don't you know the Brammerton motto is, 'Clean,--within and without.'"

He bent the blade of his rapier until it formed a half hoop, then he
let it fly back with a twang.

"And some of us have degenerated so," I answered, "that we apply the
motto only in so far as it affects the outside."

"While some of us, of course, are so busy scrubbing and polishing at
our inwards," he put in, "that we have no time to devote to the parts
that are seen.  But that seems to me deuced like cant; and a cheap
variety of it at that.

"So you have taken to preaching, as well as farming.  Fine combination,
little brother!  However, George,--dear boy,--we shall let it go at
that.  There is something you are anxious to unload.  Get it out of
your system, man."

"I have just been hearing that you are going to marry Lady Rosemary
Granton soon."

"Why, yes! of course.  You may congratulate me, for I have that
distinguished honour," he drawled.

"And you _do_ consider it an honour?" I asked, pushing my hands deep
into my pockets and spreading my legs.

He leaned back and surveyed me tolerantly.

"'Gad!--that's a beastly impertinent question, George.  Why shouldn't
it be an honour, when every gentleman in London will be biting his
finger-tips with envy?"

I nodded and went on.

"You consider also that she will be honoured in marrying a Brammerton?"

"Look here," he answered, a little irritated, "what's all this damned
catechising for?"

"I am simply asking questions, Harry; taking liberties seeing I am a
Brammerton and your little brother," I retorted calmly.

"And nasty questions they are, too;--but, by Jove! since you ask, and,
as I am a Brammerton, and it is I she is going to marry,--why!  I
consider she _is_ honoured.  The honour will be,--ah! on both sides,
George.  Now,--dear fellow,--don't worry about my feelings.  If you
have anything more to ask, why! shoot it over, now that I am in the
mood for answering," he continued dryly.  "I have a hide like a rhino'."

I looked him over coldly.

"Yes, Harry,--Lady Rosemary _will_ come to you as a Granton, fulfilling
the pledge made by her father.  She will come to you with her honour
bright and unsullied."

He bent forward and frowned at me.

"Do you doubt it?" he shot across.

I shook my head.  "No!"

He resumed his old position.

"Glad to hear you say so.  Now,--what else?  Blest if this doesn't make
me feel quite a devil, to be lectured and questioned by my young
brother,--my own, dear, little, preaching, farmer, kid of a brother."

"You will go to her a Brammerton, fulfilling the vow made by a
Brammerton, with a Brammerton's honour, unstained,
unblemished,--'Clean,--within and without'?"

He rose slowly from the chest and faced me squarely.

There was nothing of the coward in Harry.

His eye glistened with a cruel light.  "Have a care, little brother,"
he said between his regular, white teeth.  "Have a care."

"Why, Harry," I remonstrated in feigned surprise, "what's the matter?
What have I said amiss?"

He had always played the big, patronising, bossing brother with me and
I had suffered it from him, although, from a physical standpoint, the
suffering of late had been one of good-natured tolerance.  To-day,
there was something in my manner that told him he had reached the end
of it.

"Tell me what you mean?" he snarled.

"If you do not know what I mean, brother mine, sit down and I will tell
you."

"No!" he answered.

"Oh, well!--I'll tell you anyway."

I went up close to him.  "What are you going to do about Peggy Darrol?"
I demanded.

The shot hit hard; but he was almost equal to it.  He sat down on the
chest again and toyed once more with the point of the rapier.  Then,
without looking up, he answered:

"Peggy Darrol,--eh, George!  Peggy Darrol, did you say?  Who the devil
is she?  Oh,--ah,--eh,--oh, yes! the blacksmith's sister,--um,--nice
little wench, Peggy:--attractive, fresh, clinging, strawberries and
cream and all that sort of thing.  Bit of a dreamer, though!"

"Who set her dreaming?" I asked, pushing my anger back.

"Hanged if I know; born in her I suppose.  It is part of every woman's
make-up.  Pretty little thing, though; by Gad! she is."

"Yes! she is pretty; and she was good as she is pretty until she got
tangled up with you."

Harry sprang up and menaced me.

"What do you mean, you,--you?----  What are you driving at?  What's
your game?"

"Oh! give over this rotten hypocrisy," I shouted, pushing him back.
"Hit you on the raw, did it?"

He drew himself up.

"No! it didn't.  But I have had more than enough of your impertinences.
I would box your ears for the unlicked pup you are, if I could do it
without soiling my palms."

I smiled.

"Those days are gone, Harry,--and you know it, too.  Let us cut this
evasion and tom-foolery.  You have got that poor girl into a scrape.
What are you going to do about getting her out of it?"

"_I_ have got her into trouble?  How do you know _I_ have?  Her word
for it, I suppose?  A fine state of affairs it has come to, when any
girl who gets into trouble with her clod-hopper sweetheart, has simply
to accuse some one in a higher station than she, to have all her
troubles ended."

He flicked some dust from his coat-sleeve.  "'Gad,--we fellows would
never be out of the soup."

"No! not her word," I retorted.  "Little Peggy Darrol is not that sort
of girl and well you know it.  I have your own word for it,--in
writing."

His face underwent a change in expression; his cheeks paled slightly.

I drew his letter from my pocket.

"Damn her for a little fool," he growled.  He held out his hand for it.

"Oh, no!  Harry,--I am keeping this meantime."  And I replaced it.
"Tell me now,--what are you going to do about Peggy?" I asked
relentlessly.

"Oh!" he replied easily, "don't worry.  I shall have her properly
looked after.  She needn't fear.  Probably I shall make a settlement on
her; although the little idiot hardly deserves that much after giving
the show away as she has done."

"Of course, you will tell Lady Rosemary of this before any announcement
is made of your marriage, Harry?  A Brammerton must, in all things, be
honourable, 'Clean,--within and without.'"

He looked at me incredulously, and smiled almost in pity for me and my
strange ideas.

"Certainly not!  What do you take me for?  What do you think Lady
Rosemary is that I should trouble her with these petty matters?"

"Petty matters," I cried.  "You call this petty?  God forgive you,
Harry.  Petty! and that poor girl crying her heart out; her whole
innocent life blasted; her future a disgrace!  Petty!--my God!;--and
you a Brammerton!

"But I tell you," I blazed, "you shall let Lady Rosemary know."

"And I tell you,--I shall not," he replied.

"Then, by God!--I'll do it myself," I retorted.  "I give you two hours
to decide which of us it is to be."

I made toward the door.  But Harry sprang for his rapier, picked it up
and stood with his back against my exit, the point of his weapon to my
breast.

There was a wicked gleam in his narrow eyes.

"Damn you!  George Brammerton, for a sneaking, prying, tale-bearing
lout;--you dare not do it!"

He took a step forward.

"Now, sir,--I will trouble you for that letter."

I looked at him in astonishment.  There was a strange something in his
eyes I had never seen there before; a mad, irresponsible something that
cared not for consequences; a something that makes heroes of some men
and murderers of others.  I stood motionless.

Slowly he pushed the point of his rapier through my coat-sleeve.  It
pricked into my arm and I felt a few drops of warm blood trickle.  I
did not wince.

"Stop this infernal fooling," I cried angrily.

He bent forward, in the attitude of fence with which he was so familiar.

"Fooling, did you say?  'Gad! then, is this fooling?"

He turned the rapier against my breast, ripping my shirt and lancing my
flesh to the bone.  I staggered back with a gasp.

It was the act of a madman; and I knew in that moment that I was face
to face with death by violence for the second time in a few hours.  I
slowly backed from him, but he followed me, step for step,

As I came up against and sought the wall behind me for support, my hand
came in contact with something hard.  I closed my fingers over it.  It
was the handle of an old highland broadsword and the feel of it was not
unpleasant.  It lent a fresh flow to my blood.  I tore the sword from
its fastenings, and, in a second, I was standing facing my brother on a
more equal, on a more satisfactory footing, determined to defend
myself, blow for blow, against his inhuman, insane conduct.

"Ho! ho!" he yelled.  "A duel in the twentieth century.  'Gad! wouldn't
this set London by the ears?  The Corsican Brothers over again!

"Come on, with your battle-axe, farmer Giles, Let's see what stuff
you're made of--blood or sawdust."

Twice he thrust at me and twice I barely avoided his dextrous
onslaughts.  I parried as he thrust, not daring to venture a return.
Our strange weapons rang out and re-echoed, time and again, in the
dread stillness of the isolated armoury.

My left arm was smarting from the first wound I had received, and a few
drops of blood trickled down over the back of my hand, splashing on the
floor.

"You bleed!--just like a human being, George.  Who would have thought
it?" gloated Harry with a taunt.

He came at me again.

My broadsword was heavy and, to me, unwieldy, while Harry's rapier was
light and pliable.  I could tell that there could be only one ending,
if the unequal contest were prolonged,--I would be wounded badly, or
killed outright.  At that moment, I had no very special desire for
either happening.

Harry turned and twisted his weapon with the clever wrist movement for
which he was famous in every fencing club in Britain; and every time I
wielded my heavy weapon to meet his light one I thought I should never
be in time to meet his counter-stroke, his recovery was so very much
quicker than mine.

He played with me thus for a time which seemed an eternity.  My breath
began to come in great gasps.  Suddenly he lunged at me with all his
strength, throwing the full weight of his body recklessly behind his
stroke, so sure was he, evidently, that it would find its mark.  I
sprang aside just in time, bringing my broadsword down on his rapier
and sending six inches of the point of it clattering to the floor.

"Damn the thing!" he blustered, taking a firmer grip of what steel
remained in his hand.

"Aren't you satisfied?  Won't you stop this madness?" I panted, my
voice sounding loud and hollow in the stillness around us.

For answer he grazed my cheek with his jagged steel, letting a little
more blood and hurting sufficiently to cause me to wince.

"Got you again, you see," he chuckled, pushing up his sleeves and
pulling his tie straight.  "George, dear boy, I'll have you in
mincemeat before I get at any of your well-covered vitals."

A blind fury seized me.  I drove in on him.  He turned me aside with a
grin and thrust heavily at me in return.  I darted to the left, making
no endeavour to push aside his weapon with my own but relying only on
the agility of my body.  With an oath, he floundered forward, and
before he could recover I brought the flat of my heavy broadsword
crashing down on the top of his head.  His arm went up with a nervous
jerk and his rapier flew from his hand, shattering against a high
window and sending the broken glass rattling on to the cement walk
below.

Harry sagged to the floor like a sack of flour and lay motionless on
his face, his arms and legs spread out like a spider's.

I was bending down to turn him over, when I heard my father's voice on
the other side of the door.

"Stand back!  I'll see to this," he cried, evidently addressing the
frightened servants.

I turned round.  The door swung on its immense hinges and my father
stood there, with staring eyes and pallid face, taking in the situation
deliberately, looking from me to Harry's inert body beside which I
knelt.  Slowly he came into the centre of the room.

Full of anxiety, I looked at him.  But there was no opening in that
stern, old face for any explanations.  He did not assail me with a
torrent of words nor did he burst into a paroxysm of grief and anger.
His every action was calculated, methodical, remorseless.

He turned to the open door.

"Go!" he commanded sternly.  "Leave us,--leave Brammerton.  I never
wish to see you again.  You are no son of mine."

His words seared into me.  I held out my hands.

"Go!" he repeated quietly, but, if anything, more firmly.

"Good God! father,--won't you hear what I have to say in explanation?"
I cried in vexatious desperation.

He did not answer me except with his eyes--those eyes which could say
so much.

My anger was still hot within me.  My inborn sense of fairness deeply
resented this conviction on less than even circumstantial evidence;
and, at the back of all that, I,--as well as he, as well as Harry,--was
a Brammerton, with a Brammerton's temperament.

"Do you mean this, father?" I asked.

"Go!" he reiterated.  "I have nothing more to say to such an unnatural
son, such an unnatural brother as you are."

I bowed, pulled my jacket together with a shrug and buttoned it up.
After all,--what mattered it?  I was in the right and I knew it.

"All right, father!  Some day, I know you will be sorry."

I turned on my heel and left the armoury.

The servants were clustering at the end of the corridor, with
frightened eyes and pale faces.  They opened up and shuffled uneasily
as I passed through.

"William," I said to the butler, "you had better go in there.  You may
be needed."

"Yes, sir! yes, sir!" he answered, and hurried to obey.

Upstairs, in my own room, my knapsack was lying in a corner, ready for
my proposed week-end tour.  Beside it, stood my golf clubs.  These will
do, I found myself thinking: a knapsack with a change of linen and a
bag of golf clubs,--not a bad outfit to start life with.

I opened my purse:--fifty pounds and a few shillings.  Not much, but
enough!  In fact, nothing would have been plenty.

Suddenly I remembered that, before I went, I had a duty to perform.
From my inside pocket, I took the letter which Harry had written to
little, forlorn Peggy Darrol.  I went to my writing desk and addressed
an envelope to Lady Rosemary Granton.  I inserted Harry's letter and
sealed the envelope.  As to the bearer of my message, that was easy.  I
pushed the button at my bedside and, in a second, sweet little Maisie
Brant came to the door.

Maisie always had been my special favourite, and, on account of my
having pulled her out of the river when she was only seven years old, I
was hers.  She had never forgotten.  I cried to her in an easy,
bantering way in order to reassure her.

  "Neat little Maisie, sweet little Maisie;
  Only fifteen and as fresh as a Daisy."


She smiled, but behind her smile was a look of concern.

"I am going away, Maisie," I said.

"Going away, sir?" she repeated anxiously, as she came bashfully
forward.

"I won't be back again, Maisie.  I am going for good."

She looked up at me in dumb disquiet.

"Maisie, Lady Rosemary Granton will be here this week-end."

"Yes, sir!" she answered.  "I am to have the honour of looking after
her rooms."

I laid my hand gently on her shoulder.

"I want you to do something for me, Maisie.  I want you to give her
this letter,--see that she gets it when she is alone.  It is more
important to her than you can ever dream of.  She must have it within a
few hours of her arrival.  No one else must set eyes on it between now
and then.  Do you understand, Maisie?"

"Oh, yes, sir!  You can trust me for that."

"I know I can, Maisie.  You are a good girl."

I gave her the letter and she placed it in the safest, the most secret,
place she knew,--her bosom.  Then her eyes scanned me over.

"Oh! sir," she cried, in sudden alarm, "you are hurt.  You are
bleeding."

I put my hand to my cheek, but then I remembered I had already wiped
away the few drops of blood from there with my handkerchief.

"Your arm, sir," she pointed.

"Oh!--just a scratch, Maisie."

"Won't you let me bind it for you, sir, before you go?" she pleaded.

"It isn't worth the trouble, Maisie."

Tears came to those pretty eyes of hers; so, to please her, I consented.

"All right," I cried, "but hurry, for I have no more business in here
now than a thief would have."

She did not understand my meaning, but she left me and was back in a
moment with a basin of hot water, a sponge, balsam and bandages.

I slipped off my coat and rolled up my sleeve, then, as Maisie's gentle
fingers sponged away the congealed blood and soothed the throb, I began
to discover, from the intense relief, how painful had been the hurt,
mere superficial thing as it was.

She poured on some balsam and bound up the cut; all gentleness, all
tenderness, like a mother over her babe.

"There is a little jag here, Maisie, that aches outrageously now that
the other has been lulled to sleep."  I pointed to my breast.

She undid my shirt, and, as she surveyed the damage, she cried out in
anxiety.

It was a raw, jagged, angry-looking wound, but nothing to occasion
concern.

She dealt with it as she had done the other, then she drew the edges of
the cut together, binding them in place with strips of sticking
plaster.  When it was all over, I slipped into my jacket, swung my
knapsack across my shoulders, took my golf-bag under my left arm,--and
I was ready.

Maisie wiped her eyes with the corner of her apron.

"Never mind, little woman," I sympathised.

"Must you really go away, sir?" she sobbed.

"Yes!--I must.  Good-bye, little girl."

I kissed her on the trembling curve of her red, pouting lips, then I
went down the stairs, leaving her weeping quietly on the landing.

As I turned at the front door for one last look at the inside of the
old home, which I might never see again, I saw the servants carrying
Harry from the armoury.  I could hear his voice swearing and
complaining in almost healthy vigour, so I was pleasantly confirmed in
what I already had surmised,--his hurt was as temporary as the flat of
a good, trusty, highland broad-sword could make it.




CHAPTER V

Tommy Flynn, The Harlford Bruiser

I hurried down the avenue to where it joined the dusty roadway.

I stood for a few moments in indecision.  To my left, down in the
hollow, the way led through the village.  To my right, it stretched far
on the level until it narrowed to a grey point piercing a semi-circle
of green; but I knew that miles beyond, at the end of that grey line,
was the busy town of Grangeborough, with its thronging people, its
railways and its steamships.  That was the direction for me.

I waved my hand to sleepy little Brammerton and I swung to the right,
for Grangeborough and the sea.

Soon the internal tumult, caused by what I had just gone through, began
to subside, and my spirits rose attune to the glories of the afternoon.

Little I cared what my lot was destined to be--a prince in a palace or
a tramp under a hedge.  Although, to say truth, the tramp's existence
held for me the greater fascination.

I was young, my lungs were sound and my heart beat well.  I was big and
endowed with greater strength than is allotted the average man.

Glad to be done with pomp, show and convention, my life was now my very
own to plan and make, or to warp and spoil, as fancy, fortune and fate
decreed.

I hankered for the undisturbed quiet of some small village by the sea,
with work enough,--but no more,--to keep body nourished and covered;
with books in plenty and my pipe well filled; with an open door to
welcome the sunshine, the scented breeze, the salted spray from the
ocean and my congenial fellow-man.

But, if I should be led in the paths of grubbing men, 'mid bustle,
strife and quarrel, where the strong and the crafty alone survived,
where the weaklings were thrust aside, I was ready and willing to take
my place, to take my chance, to pit brawn against brawn, brain against
brain, to strike blow for blow, to fail or to succeed, to live or die,
as the gods might decree.

As I filled my lungs, I felt as if I had relieved myself of some great
burden in cutting myself adrift from Brammerton,--dear old spot as it
was.  And I whistled and hummed as I trudged along, trying to reach the
point of grey at the rim of the semi-circle of green.  On, on I went,
on my seemingly unending endeavour.  But I knew that ultimately the
road would end, although merely to open up another and yet another path
over which I would have to travel in the long journey of life which lay
before me.

As I kept on, I saw the sun go down in a display of blood-red
pyrotechnics.  I heard the chatter of the birds in the hedgerows as
they settled to rest.  Now and again, I passed a tired toiler, with
bent head and dragging feet,--his drudgery over for the day, but
weighted with the knowledge that it must begin all over again on the
morrow and on each succeeding morrow till the crash of his doom.

The night breeze came up and darkness gathered round me.  A few hours
more, and the twinkling lights of Grangeborough came into view.  They
were welcome lights to me, for the pangs of a healthy hunger were
clamouring to be appeased.

As it had been with the country some hours before, so was it now with
Grangeborough.  The town was settling down for the night.  It was late.
Most of the shops were closing, or already closed.  Business was over
for the day.  People hurried homeward like shadows.

I looked about me for a place to dine, but failed, at first, in my
quest.  Down toward the docks there were brighter lights and
correspondingly deeper darknesses.  I went along a broad thoroughfare,
turned down a narrower one until I found myself among lanes and alleys,
jostled by drunken sailors and accosted by wanton women, as they
staggered, blinking, from the brightly lighted saloons.

My finer sensibilities rose and protested within me, but I had no
choice.  If I wished to quell my craving for food, there was nothing
left for me to do but to brave the foul air and the rough element of
one of these sawdust-floored, glass-ornamented whisky palaces, where a
snack and a glass of ale, at least, could be purchased.

I looked about me and pushed into what seemed the least disreputable
one of its kind.  I made through the haze of foul air and tobacco smoke
to the counter, and stood idly by until the bar-tender should find it
convenient to wait upon me.

The place was crowded with sea-faring men and the human sediment that
is found in and around the docks of all shipping cities; it resounded
with a babel of coarse, discordant voices.

The greater part of this coterie was gathered round a huge individual,
with enormous hands and feet, a stubbly, blue chin,--set, round and
aggressive; a nose with a broken bridge spoiled the balance of his
podgy face.  He had beady eyes and a big, ugly mouth with stained,
irregular teeth.  From time to time, he laughed boisterously, and his
laugh had an echo of hell in it.

He and his followers appeared to be enjoying some good joke.  But
whenever he spoke every one else became silent.  Each coarse jest he
mouthed was laughed at long and uproariously.  He had a hold on his
fellows.  Even I was fascinated; but it was by the great similarity of
some of the mannerisms of this uncouth man to those I had observed in
the lower brute creation.

My attention was withdrawn from him, however, by the sound of the
rattling of tin cans in another corner which was partly partitioned
from the main bar-room.  I followed the new sound.

A tattered individual was seated there, his feet among a cluster of
pots and pans all strung together.  His head was in his hands and his
red-bearded face was a study of dejection and misery.

There was something strangely familiar in the appearance of the man.

Suddenly I remembered, and I laughed.

I went over and sat down opposite him, setting my golf clubs by my
side.  He ignored my arriving.  That same old trick of his!

"Donald,--Donald Robertson!" I exclaimed, laughing again.

Still he did not look across.

Suddenly he spoke, and in a voice that knew neither hope nor gladness.

"Ye laugh,--ye name me by my Christian name,--but ye don't say,
'Donald, will ye taste?'"

I leaned over and pulled his hands away from his head.  He flopped
forward, then glared at me.  His eyes opened wide.

"It's,--it's you,--is it?  The second son come to me in my hour o'
trial."

"Why!  Donald,--what's the trouble?" I asked.

"Trouble,--ye may well say trouble.  Have ye mind o' the sixpence ye
gied me on the roadside this mornin'."

"Yes!"

"For thirteen long, unlucky hours I saved that six-pence against my
time o' need.  I tied it in the tail o' my sark for safety.  I came in
here an hour ago.  I ordered a glass o' whisky and a tumbler o' beer.
I sat doon here for a while wi' them both before me, enjoying the sight
o' them and indulgin' in the heavenly joy o' anteecipation.  Then I
drank the speerits and was just settlin' doon to the beer,--tryin' to
make it spin oot as long as I could; for, ye ken, it's comfortable in
here,--when an emissary o' the deevil, wi' hands like shovels and a
leer in his e'e, came in and picked up the tumbler frae under my very
nose and swallowed the balance o' your six-pence before I could say
squeak."

I laughed at Donald's rueful countenance and his more than rueful tale.

"Did the man have a broken nose and a heavy jaw?" I asked.

"Ay, ay!" said Donald, lowering his voice.  "Do ye happen to ken him?"

"No!--but he is still out there and he thinks it a fine joke that he
played on you."

"So would I," said Donald, "if I had drunk his beer."

"What did you do when he swallowed off your drink?" I asked.

"Do!--what do ye think I did?  I remonstrated wi' a' the vehemence that
a Struan Robertson in anger is capable o'.  But the vehemence o' the
Lord himsel' couldna bring the beer back."

"Why didn't you fight, man?  Why didn't you knock the bully down?" I
asked, pitying his wobegone appearance.

"Mister,--whatever your name is,--I'm a man o' peace; and, forby I'm
auld enough to ken it's no' wise to fight on an empty stomach.  I
havena had a bite since I saw ye last."

"Never mind, Donald,--cheer up.  I am going to have some bread and
cheese, and a glass of ale, so you can have some with me, at my
expense."

His face lit up like a Roman candle.

"Man,--I'm wi' ye.  You're a man o' substance, and I'm fonder o'
substantial bread and cheese and beer than I am o' the metapheesical
drinks I was indulgin' in for ten minutes before ye so providentially
came."

I could not help wondering at some of the remarks of this wise, yet
good-for-little, old customer; but I did not press him for more
enlightenment.

I thumped the hand-bell on the table, and was successful in obtaining
more prompt attention from the bar-tender than I had been able to do
across the counter.

When the food and drink were placed between us and paid for, Donald
stuffed all but one slice of his bread and cheese inside his waistcoat,
and he sighed contentedly as he contemplated the sparkling ale.

But, all at once, he startled me by springing to his feet, seizing his
tumbler in his hand and emptying the contents down his gullet at two
monstrous gulps.

"No, no!--ye thievin' deevil," he shouted, as he regained his breath,
"ye canna do that twice wi' Donald Robertson."

I looked toward the opening in the partition.  Donald's recent
enemy,--the man whom I had been studying at the other end of the
bar-room,--was shouldering himself into our company.  Behind him, in a
semi-circle, a dozen faces grinned in anticipation of some more fun at
Donald's expense.

The big bully glared down at me as I sat.

"That there is uncommon good beer, young un," he growled, "and that
there is most uncommon good bread and cheese."

I glanced at him with half-shut eyelids, then I broke off another piece
of bread.

"Maybe you didn't 'ear me?" he shouted again, "I said that was uncommon
good beer."

"I shall be better able to judge of that, my man, after I have tasted
it," I replied.

"Not that beer, little boy,--you ain't going to taste that," he
thundered, "because I 'appens to want it,--see!  I 'appens to 'ave a
most aggrawating thirst in my gargler."

A burst of laughter followed this ponderous attempt at humour.

"'And it over, sonny,--I wants it."

I merely raised my head and ran my eyes over him.

He was an ugly brute, and no mistake.  A man of tremendous girth.

Although I had no real fear of him,--for, already I had been schooled
to the knowledge that fear and its twin brother worry are man's worst
opponents.--I was a little uncertain as to what the outcome would be if
I got him thoroughly angered.  However, I was in no mind to be
interfered with.

He thumped his heavy fist on the table.

"'And that over,--quick," he roared.

His great jaws clamped together and his thick, discoloured lips became
compressed.

"Why!--certainly, my friend," I remarked easily, rising with slow
deliberation.  "Which will you have first:--the bread and cheese, or
the ale?"

"'Twere the ale I arst and it's th' ale I wants,--and blamed quick
about it or I'll know the reason w'y."

"Stupid of me!" I remarked.  "I should have known you wanted the ale
first.  Here you are, my good, genial, handsome fellow."

I picked up the foaming tumbler and offered it to him.  When he
stretched out his great, grimy paw to take it, I tossed the stuff smack
into his face, sending showers of the liquid into the gaping
countenances of his supporters.

He staggered back among them, momentarily blinded, and, as he
staggered, I sent the tumbler on the same errand as the ale.  It
smashed in a hundred pieces on the side of his broken nose, opening up
an old gash there and sending a stream of blood oozing down over his
mouth.

There was no more laughter, nor grinning.  The place was as quiet as a
church during prayer.  I pushed into the open saloon, with the
remonstrating Donald at my heels.  Then the bull began to roar.  He
pulled off his coat, while half a dozen of his own kind endeavoured
with dirty handkerchiefs and rags to mop the blood from his face.

"Shut the door.  Don't let 'im away from 'ere," he shouted.  "I'll push
his windpipe into his boots, I will.  Watch me!"

As I stood with my back against the partition, the bar-tender slipped
round the end of the counter.

"Look here, guv'nor," he whispered with good intent, "the back door's
open,--run like the devil."

I turned to him in mild surprise.

"Don't be an ijit," he went on.  "Git.  Why!  he's Tommy Flynn, the
champion rib cracker and face pusher of Harlford, here on his holidays."

"Tommy Flynn," I answered, "Tommy Rot fits him better."

"You ain't a-going to stand up and get hit, are you?"

"What else is there for me to do?" I asked.

He threw up his arms despairingly.

"Lor' lumme!--then I bids you good-bye and washes my hands clean of
you."  And he went round behind the counter in disgust, spitting among
the sawdust.

By this time, Tommy Flynn, the champion rib cracker and face pusher,
was rolling up his sleeves businesslike and thrusting off his numerous
seconds in his anxiety to get at me.

"'Ere, Splotch," he cried to a one-eyed bosom friend of his, "'old my
watch, while I joggles the puddins out of this kid with a left 'ander.
My heye!--'e won't be no blooming golfing swell in another 'alf minute."

He grinned at me a few times in order to hypnotise me with his beauty
and to instil in me the necessary amount of frightfulness, before he
got to work in earnest.  Then, by way of invitation, he thrust forward
his jaw almost into my face.  I took advantage of his offer somewhat
more quickly than he anticipated.  I struck him on the chin with my
left and drew my right to his body.  But his chin was hard as flint and
it bruised my knuckles; while his great body was podgy and of an
india-rubberlike flexibility.

For my pains, he brushed my ear and drew a little blood, with the grin
of an ape on his brutish face.

He threw up his arms to guard, feinted at me, and rushed in.

I parried his blows successfully, much to his surprise, for I could see
his eyes widening and a wrinkle in his brow.

"Careful, Tommy!--careful," cautioned Splotch of the one eye.  "He's a
likely looking young bloke."

"Likely be blowed," said Tommy shortly, as he toyed with me.  "Watch
this!"

I saw that it would be for my own good, the less I let my antagonist
know of my ability at his own game, and I knew also I would have to
play caution with my strength all the way, owing to the trying ordeals
I had already gone through that day.

Once, my antagonist tried to draw me as he would draw a novice.  I
ignored the body bait he opened up for me and, instead, I swung in
quickly with my right on to his bruised nose, with all the energy I
could muster.  He staggered and reeled like a drunken man.  In fact,
had he not been half-besotted by dear-only-knows how many days of
debauchery, it might have gone hard with me, but now he positively
howled with pain.

I had hit on his most vulnerable part, right at the beginning.

Something inside of me chuckled, for, if there was one special place in
any man's anatomy that I always had been able to reach, it was his nose.

Flynn rushed on me again and again.  I was lucky indeed in beating back
his onslaughts.

Once, a spent blow got me on the cheek; yet, spent as it was, it made
me numb and dizzy for the moment.  Once, he caught me squarely on the
chest right over the wound my brother had given me.  The pain of that
was like the cut of a red-hot knife, but it passed quickly.  I
staggered and reeled several times, as flashes of weakness seemed to
pass over me.  I began to fear that my strength would give out.

I pulled myself together with an effort.  Then,
once,--twice,--thrice,--in a succession bewildering to myself, I
smashed that broken nose of Flynn's, sending him sick and wobbling
among his following.

He became maddened with rage.  His companions commenced to voice
cautions and instructions.  He swore back at them in a muddy torrent of
abuse.

Already, the fight was over;--I could feel it in my bones;--over, far
sooner and more satisfactory to me than I had expected.  And, more by
good luck than by ability, I was, to all intents and purposes,
unscathed.

Tommy Flynn could fight.  But he was not the fighter he would have been
had he been away from drink and in strict training, as I was.  It was
my good fortune to meet him when he was out of condition.  He spat out
a mouthful of blood and returned to the conflict, defending his nose
with all the ferocity of a lioness defending her whelps.

"Look out!  Take care!" a timely voice whispered on my left.

Something flashed in my opponent's hands in the gaslight.  I backed to
the partition.  We had a terrible mix-up just then.  Blow and
counterblow rained.  He broke down my guard once and drove with fierce
force for my face.  I ducked, just in time, for he missed me by a mere
hair's-breadth.  His fist smashed into a metal bolt in the woodwork.
Sparks flew and there was a loud ring of metal against metal.

"You cowardly brute!" I shouted, breaking away as it dawned on me that
he had attacked me with heavy knuckle-dusters.  My blood fairly danced
with madness.  I sprang in on him in a positive frenzy.  He became a
child in my hands.  Never had I been roused as I was then.  I struck
and struck again at his hideous face until it sagged away from me.

He was blind with his own blood.  I followed up, raining punch upon
punch,--pitilessly,--relentlessly.  His feet slipped in the slither of
bloody sawdust.  I struck again and he crashed to the floor, striking
his head against the iron pedestal of a round table in the corner.

He lay all limp and senseless, with his mouth wide open and his breath
coming roaring and gurgling from his clotted throat.

As his friends endeavoured to raise him, as I stood back against the
counter, panting, I heard a battering at the main door of the saloon
which had been closed at the commencement of the scuffle.

"Here, sir,--quick!" cried the sympathetic bartender to me.  "The cops!
Out the back door like hell!"

I had no desire to be mixed up in a police affair, especially in the
company of such scum as I was then among.  I picked up my golf bag and
swung my knapsack on to my back once more.  Then I remembered about
Donald.  I could not leave him.  I searched in corners and under the
tables.  He was nowhere in sight.

"Is it the tinker?" asked the bar-tender excitedly.

"Yes, yes!"

"He's gone.  He slunk out with his tin cans, through the back way, as
soon as you got started in this scrap."

I did not wait for anything more, for some one was unlocking the front
door.  I darted out the back exit and into the lane.  Down the lane, in
the darkness, I tore like a hurricane, then along the waterfront until
there was a mile between me and the scene of my late encounter.

I slowed up at a convenient horse-trough, splashed my hands and face in
the cooling water and adjusted my clothing as best I could, then I
strolled into the shipping shed, where stevedores and dock labourers
were busy, by electric light, completing the loading of a smart-looking
little cargo boat.

A notion seized me.  It was a coaster, so I knew I could not be going
very far away.

I walked up the gang-plank, and aboard.




CHAPTER VI

Aboard the Coaster

An ordinary seaman, then the second officer of the little steamer
passed me on the deck, but both were busy and paid no more attention to
my presence than if I had been one of themselves.

I strolled down the narrow companionway, into a cosy, but somewhat
cramped, saloon.

After standing for a time in the hope of seeing some signs of life, I
pushed open the door of a stateroom on the starboard side.  The room
had two berths.  I tossed my knapsack and clubs into the lower one.  As
I turned to the door again, I espied a diminutive individual, no more
than four and a half feet tall,--or, as I should say, small,--in the
full, gold-braided uniform of a ship's chief steward.

He was a queer-looking little customer, grizzled, weather-beaten and,
apparently, as hard as nails.  He was absolutely self-possessed and,
despite his stature, there was "nothing small about him," as an
American friend of mine used to put it.

He touched his cap, and smiled.  His smile told me at once that he was
an Irishman, for only an Irishman could smile as he did.  It was a
smile with a joke, a drink, a kiss and a touch of the devil himself in
it.

"I saw ye come down, sor.  Ye'll be makin' for Glasgow?"

Glasgow!  I cogitated, yes!--Glasgow as a starting point would suit me
as well as anywhere else.

"Correct first guess," I answered.  "But, tell me,--how did you know
that that was my destination?"

He showed his teeth.

"Och! because it's the only port we're callin' at, sor.  Looks like a
fine trip north," he went on.  "The weather's warm and there's just
enough breeze to make it lively.  Nothin' like the sea, sor, for
keepin' the stomach swate and the mind up to the knocker."

I yawned, for I was dog-weary.

"When ye get to Glasgow, if ye are on the lookout for a place to
slape,--try Barney O'Toole's in Argyle Street.  The place is nothin' to
look at, but it's a hummer inside, sor."

I yawned drowsily once more, but the hint did not stop him.

"If you'll excuse my inquisitiveness, sor,--or rather, what ye might
call my natural insight,--I judge you're on either a moighty short
tour, or a devil av a long one got up in a hurry."

The little clatterbag's uncanny guessing harried me.

"How do you arrive at your conclusions?" I asked, taking off my jacket
and hanging it up.

"Och! shure it's by the size av your wardrobe.  No man goes on a
well-planned, long trip with a knapsack and a bag av golfsticks."

"Well,--it is likely to be long enough," I laughed ruefully.

"Had a row with the old man and clearin' out?" he sympathised.  "Well,
good luck to yer enterprise.  I did the same meself when I was
thirteen; after gettin' a hidin' with a bit av harness for doin'
somethin' I never did at all.  I've never seen the old man since and
never want to.  Bad cess to him.

"Would ye like a bite before ye turn in, sor?  It's past supper-time,
but I can find ye a scrapin' av something."

"A bite and a bath,--if I may?" I put in.  "I'm sticky all over."

"A bath!  Right ye are.  I knew ye was a toff the minute I clapped my
blinkers on ye."

In ten minutes my talkative friend announced that my bath was in
readiness.  For ten minutes more he rattled on to me at intervals,
through the bathroom door, poking into my past and arranging my future
like a clairvoyant.

Notwithstanding, he had a nice, steaming-hot supper waiting for me when
I returned to my stateroom.

As I fell-to, he stood by, enjoying the relish I displayed in the
appeasing of my hunger.

"If I was a young fellow av your age, strong build and qualities, do ye
know where I would make for?" he ventured.

"Where?" I asked, uninterestedly.

He lowered his eyebrows.  "Out West,--Canada," he said, with a decided
nod of his head.  "And, the farther west the better.  The Pacific Coast
has a climate like home, only better.  For the main part, ye're away
from the long winters;--it's a new country;--a young man's
country:--it's wild and free:--and,--it's about as far away as ye can
get from--from,--the trouble ye're leavin' behind."

I looked across at him.

"Oh! bhoy,--I've been there.  I know what I'm talkin' about."

He sighed.  "But I'm gettin' old and I've been too long on the sea to
give it up."

He pulled himself together suddenly.  Owing to his stature, that was
not a very difficult task.

"Man!--ye're tired.  I'll be talkin' no more to you.  Tumble in and
sleep till we get to Glasgow."

As he cleared away the dishes, I approached him regarding my fare.

"Look here, steward,--I had not time to book my berth or pay my
passage.  What's the damage?"

"Ten and six, sor, exclusive av meals," he answered, taking out his
ticket book in a business-like way.

"What name, sor?"

"Name!--oh, yes! name!" I stammered.  "Why!--George Bremner."

He looked at me and his face fell.  I am sure his estimation of me fell
with it.  I was almost sorry I had not obliged him by calling myself
Algernon something-or-other.

I paid him.

"When do you expect to arrive in Glasgow?" I asked.

"Eight o'clock to-morrow morning, sor.  And," he added, "there's a boat
leaves for Canada to-morrow night."

"The devil it does," I grunted.

He gave me another of his infectious smiles.

"Would ye like another bath in the mornin', sor, before breakfast?" he
inquired, as he was leaving.

I could not bear to disappoint the little fellow any more.

"Yes," I replied.

Quarter of an hour later, I was lying on my back in the upper berth,
gazing drowsily into the white-enamelled ceiling two feet overhead;
happy in the reborn sensations of cleanliness, relaxation and
satisfaction; loving my enemies as well, or almost as well, as I loved
my friends.  I could not get the little steward's advice out of my
head.  In a jumbled medley, "Out West,--out West,--out West," kept
floating before my brain.  "The Pacific Coast.--Home climate, only
better.--A new country.--A young man's country.--Wild and free.--It's
about as far away as ye can get,--as ye can get,--can get,--can get."

The rumbling of the cargo trucks, the hoarse "lower away" of the
quartermaster, the whirr of the steam winch and the lapping of the
water against the boat,--all intermingled, then died away and still
farther away, until only the quietest of these sounds remained,--the
lapping of the sea and "Canada,--Canada,--Canada."  They kept up their
communications with me, sighing and singing, the merest murmurings of
the wind in a sea shell:--soothing accompaniments to my unremembered
dreams.




CHAPTER VII

K. B. Horsfal, Millionaire

When I awoke, the sun was streaming through the porthole upon my face.
It was early morning,--Saturday morning I remembered.

From the thud, thud, of the engines and the steady rise and fall, I
knew we were still at sea.  I stretched my limbs, feeling as a god must
feel balancing on the topmost point of a star; so refreshed, so
invigorated, so buoyant, so much in harmony with the rising sun and the
freshness of the early day, that, to be exact, I really had no feeling.

I sprang to the floor of my cabin and dressed hurriedly in my anxiety
to be on deck; but, at the door, I encountered my little Irish steward.
He eyed me suspiciously, as if I had had intentions of evading my
morning ablution,--so I swallowed my impatience, grabbed a towel and
made leisurely for the bathroom, where I laved my face and hands in the
cold water, remained inside for a sufficiently respectable time, then
ran off the water and, finally, made my exit and clambered on deck.

As I paced up and down, enjoying the beauties of the fast narrowing
firth, I no longer felt in doubt as to my ultimate destination.  My
subconscious self, aided and abetted by the Irish steward, had already
decided that for me:--it was Canada, the West, the Pacific.

Soon after I had breakfasted, we reached the Tail of the Bank, and so
impatient was I to be on my long journey that I bade good-bye to my
little Irishman at Greenock, leaving him grinning and happy in the
knowledge that I was taking his advice and was bound for the Pacific
Coast.

In forty minutes more, I left the train at Glasgow and started in to a
hurried and moderate replenishing of my wardrobe, finishing up with the
purchase of a travelling bag, a good second-hand rifle and a little
ammunition.

I dispensed with my knapsack by presenting it to a newsboy, who held it
up in disgust as if it had been a dead cat.  Despite the fact that I
was now on my own resources and would have to work, nothing could
induce me to part with my golf clubs.  They were old and valued
friends.  Little did I imagine then how useful they would ultimately
prove.

At the head office of the steamship company, I inquired as to the best
class of travelling when the traveller wished to combine cheapness with
rough comfort; and I was treated to the cheering news that there was a
rate war on between the rival Trans-Atlantic Steamship Companies and I
could purchase a second-cabin steamboat ticket for six pounds, while a
further eight pounds, thirteen shillings and four-pence would carry me
by Colonist, or third class, three thousand miles, from the East to the
Far West of Canada.

I paid for my ticket and booked my berth then and there, counted out my
remaining wealth,--ten pounds and a few coppers,--and my destiny was
settled.

With so much to tell of what befell me later, I have neither the time
nor the inclination to detail the pleasures and the discomforts of a
twelve days' trip by slow steamer across a storm-swept Atlantic,
battened down for days on end, like cattle in the hold of a
cross-channel tramp; of a six days' journey across prairie lands, in a
railway car with its dreadful monotony of unupholstered wooden seats
and sleeping boards, its stuffiness, its hourly disturbances in the
night-time in the shape of noisy conductors demanding tickets, incoming
and outgoing travellers and shrieking engines; its dollar meals in the
dining car, which I envied but could not afford; its well-nigh
unlightable cooking stoves and the canned beef and pork and beans with
which I had to regale myself en route.

Jaded, travel-weary and grimy, I reached the end of my journey.  It was
late in the evening.  I tumbled out of the train and into the first
hotel bus that yawned for me, and not once did I look out of the window
to see what kind of a city I had arrived at.

I came to myself at the entrance to a magnificent and palatial hotel;
too much so, by far, I fancied, for my scantily-filled purse.  But I
was past the minding stage, and I knew I could always make a change on
the morrow, if so be it a change were necessary.

And then I began to think,--what mattered it anyway?  What were a few
paltry sovereigns between one and poverty?  Comforting thought,--a man
could not have anything less than nothing.

I registered, ordered a bath, a shave, a haircut, a jolly good supper
and a bed; and, oh! how I enjoyed them all!  Surely this was the most
wonderful city in the world, for never did bath, or shave, or supper,
or bed feel so delicious as these did.

I swooned away at last from sheer pleasure.

The recuperative powers of youth are marvellously quick.  I was up and
out to view the city almost as soon as the sun was touching the
snow-tipped tops of the magnificent mountain peaks which were miles
away yet seemed to stand sentinels at the end of the street down which
I walked.  I was up and out long ere the sun had gilded the waters of
the broad inlet which separated Vancouver from its baby sister to the
north of it.

The prospect pleased me; there was freedom in the air, expanse,
vastness, but,--it was still a city with a city's artifices and,
consequently, not what I was seeking.  I desired the natural life; not
the roughness, the struggle, the matching of crafty wits, the throbbing
blood and the straining sinews,--but the solitude, the quiet, the
chance for thought and observation, the wilds, the woods and the sea.

As I returned to breakfast, I wondered if I should find them,--and
where.

In the dining-room, during the course of my breakfast,--the first real
breakfast I had partaken of in Canada,--my attention was diverted to a
tall, well-groomed, muscular-looking man, who sat at a table nearby.
He looked a considerable bit on the sunny side of fifty.  He was clean
shaven, his hair was black tinged with grey, and his eyes were keen and
kindly.

Every time I glanced in his direction, I found him looking over at me
in an amused sort of way.  I began to wonder if I were making some
breach of Canadian etiquette of which I was ignorant.  True, I had
eaten my porridge and cream without sprinkling the dish with a surface
of sugar as he had done; I had set aside the fried potatoes which had
been served to me with my bacon and eggs;--but these, surely, were
trivial things and of no interest to any one but myself.

At last, he rose and walked out, sucking a wooden toothpick.  With his
departure, I forgot his existence.

After I had breakfasted, I sought the lounge room in order to have a
look at the morning paper and, if possible, determine what I was going
to do for a living and how I was going to get what I wanted to do.

I was buried in the advertisements, when a genial voice with a nasal
intonation, at my elbow, unearthed me.

It was my observer of the dining-room.  He had seated himself in the
chair next to mine.

"Say! young man,--you'll excuse me; but was it you I saw come in last
night with the bag of golf clubs?"

I acknowledged the crime.

He laughed good-naturedly.

"Well,--you had courage anyway.  To sport a golfing outfit here in the
West is like venturing out with breeches, a walking cane and a monocle.
Nobody but an Englishman would dare do it.  Here, they think golf and
cricket should be bracketed along with hopscotch, dominoes and
tiddly-winks; just as I used to fancy baseball was a glorified kids'
game.  I know better now."

I looked at him rather darkly.

"Oh!--it's all right, friend,--it takes a man to play baseball, same as
it takes a man to play golf and cricket.  Golfing is about the only
vice I have left.  Why, now I come to think of it, my wife clipped a
lot of my vices off years ago, and since that my daughter has succeeded
in knocking off all the others,--all but my cigars, my cocktails and my
golf.  I'm just plumb crazy on the game and I play it whenever I can.
Maybe it's because I used to play it when I was a little chap, away
back in England years and years ago."

"I am glad you like the game," I put in.  "It is a favourite of mine."

"I play quite a bit back home in Baltimore," he continued, "that's when
I'm there.  My clubs arrived here by express yesterday.  You see, it's
like this;--I'm off to Australia at the end of the week, on a business
trip,--that is, if I get things settled up here by that time.  I am
crossing over from there to England, where I shall be for several
months.  England is some place for golf, so I'm going to golf some, you
bet.

"I'm not boring you, young friend?" he asked suddenly.

"Not a bit," I laughed.  "Go on,--I am as interested as can be."

"I believe there's a kind of a lay-out they call a golf course, in one
of the outlying districts round here.  What do you say to making the
day of it?  You aren't busy, are you?" he added.

"No! no!--not particularly," I answered.  I did not tell him that in a
few days, if I did not get busy at something or other, I should starve.

"Good!" he cried.  "Go to your room and get your sticks.  I'll find out
all about the course and how to get to it."

The brusk good-nature of the man hit me somehow; besides, I had not had
a game for over three weeks.  Think of it--three weeks!  And goodness
only knew when I should have the chance of another after this one.  As
for looking for work;--work was never to be compared with golf.  Surely
work could wait for one day!

"All right!--I'm game," I said, jumping up and entering into the spirit
of gaiety that lay so easily on my new acquaintance.

"Good boy!" he cried, getting up and holding out his hand.  "My name's
Horsfal,--K. B. Horsfal,--lumberman, meat-packer, and the man whose
name is on every trouser-suspender worth wearing.  What's yours?"

"George Bremner," I answered simply.

"All right, George, my boy,--see you in ten minutes.  But, remember, I
called this tune, so I pay the piper."

That was music in my ears and I readily agreed.

"Make it twenty minutes," I suggested.  "I have a short letter to
write."

I wrote my letter, gave it to the boy to deliver for me and presented
myself before my new friend right up to time.

In the half hour's run we had in the electric tram, I learned a great
deal about Mr. K. B. Horsfal.

He had migrated from the Midlands of England at the age of seventeen.
He had kicked,--or had been kicked,--about the United States for some
fifteen years, more or less up against it all the time, as he
expressively put it; when, by a lucky chance, in a poverty-stricken
endeavour to repair his broken braces, he hit upon a scheme that
revolutionised the brace business: was quick enough to see its
possibilities, patented his idea and became famous.

Not content to rest on his laurels,--or his braces,--he tackled the
lumbering industry in the West and the meat-packing industry in the
East, both with considerable success.  Now he had to sit down and do
some figuring when he wished to find out how many millions of dollars
he was worth.

His wife had died years ago and his only daughter was at home in
Baltimore.

Altogether, he was a new and delightful type to one like me,--a young
man fresh from his ancestral roof in the north of staid and
conventional old England.

He was healthy, vigorous, and as keen as the edge of a razor.

On and on he talked, telling me of himself, his work and his projects.

I got to wondering if he were merely setting the proverbial sprat; but
the sprat in his case proved the whale.  Every moment I expected him to
ask me for some confidences in return, but on this point Mr. K. B.
Horsfal was silent.

We discovered our golfing ground, which proved to be a fairly good,
little, nine-holed country course, rough and full of natural hazards.

K. B. Horsfal could play golf, that I soon found out.  He entered into
his game with the enthusiasm and grim determination which I imagined he
displayed in everything he took a hand in.

He seldom spoke, so intent was he on the proper placing of his feet and
the proper adjustment of his hands and his clubs.

Three times we went round that course and three times I had the
pleasure of beating him by a margin.  He envied me my full swing and my
powerful and accurate driving; he studied me every time I approached a
green and he scratched his head at some of my long putts; but, most of
all, he rhapsodised on my manner of getting out of a hole.

"Man,--if I only had that trick of yours in handling the mashie and the
niblick, I could do the round a stroke a hole better, for there isn't a
rut, or a tuft, or a bunker in any course that I seem to be able to
keep out of."

I showed him the knack of it as it had been taught me by an old
professional at Saint Andrews.  K. B. Horsfal was in ecstasies, if a
two-hundred-pound, keen, brusk, American business man ever allows
himself such liberties.

Nothing would please him but that we should go another round, just to
test out his new acquisition and give him the hang of the thing.

To his supreme satisfaction,--although I again beat him by the same
small margin,--he reduced his score for the round by eight strokes.

On our journey back to the city, he began to talk again, but on a
different tack this time.

"George,--you'll excuse me,--but, if I were you I would put that signet
ring you are wearing in your pocket."

I looked down at it and reddened, for my ring was manifestly old, as it
was manifestly strange in design and workmanship, and apt to betray an
identity.

I slipped it off my little finger and placed it in my vest pocket.

My companion laughed.

"'No sooner said than done,'" he quoted.  "You see, George,--any one
who saw you come in to the hotel last night could tell you had not been
travelling for pleasure.  The marks of an uncomfortable train journey,
in a colonist car, were sticking out all over you.  Now, golf clubs and
a signet ring like that which you were sporting are enough to tell any
man that you have been in the habit of travelling luxuriously and for
the love of it."

I could not help admiring my new friend's method of deduction, and I
thanked him for his kindly interest.

"Not a bit," he continued, "so long as you don't mind.  For, it's like
this,--I take it you have left home for some personal reason,--no
concern of mine,--you have come out here to start over, or rather, to
make a start.  Good!  You are right to start at the bottom of the hill.
But, from the look of you, I fancy you won't stick at anything that
doesn't suit you.  You are the kind of a fellow who, if you felt like
it, would tell a man to go to the devil, then walk off his premises.
You see, I don't tab you as a milksop kind of Englishman exactly.

"Well,--out here they don't like Britishers who receive remittances
every month from their mas or pas at home, for they have found that
that kind is generally not much good.  Hope you're not one, George?"

"No!" I laughed, rather ruefully, almost wishing I were.  "With me, it
is sink or swim.  And, I do not mind telling you, Mr. Horsfal, that it
will be necessary for me to leave the hotel to-morrow for less
pretentious apartments and to start swimming for all I am worth."

"Good!" he cried, as if it were a good joke.  "How do you propose
starting in?"

"I have already commenced keeping an eye on the advertisements, which
seem to be chiefly for real estate salesmen and partners with a little
capital," I said.

"But, the fact is, I have made an application this morning for
something I thought might suit me.  But, even if I am lucky enough to
be considered, the chances are there will be some flies in the
ointment:--there always are."

My friend looked at me, as I thought, curiously.

"To-morrow morning," I went on, "it is my intention to begin with the
near end of the business district and call on every business house, one
after another, until I happen upon something that will provide a start.

"I have no love for the grinding in an office, nor yet for the grubbing
in a warehouse, but, for a bit, it will be a case of 'needs must when
the devil drives,'--so I mean to take anything that I can get, to begin
with, and leave the matter of choice to a more opportune time."

"And what would be your choice, George?" he inquired.

"Choice!  Well, if you asked me what I thought I was adapted for, I
would say, green-keeper and professional golfer; gymnastic instructor;
athletic coach; policeman; or, with training and dieting, pugilist.  At
a pinch, I could teach school."

K. B. Horsfal grinned and looked out of the car window at the
apparently never-ending sea of charred tree stumps through which we
were passing.

"Not very ambitious, sonny!--eh!"

"No,--that is the worst of it," I answered.  "I do not seem to have
been planned for anything ambitious.  Besides, I have no desire to
amass millions at the sacrifice of my peace of mind.  Why!--a
millionaire cannot call his life his own.  He is at the beck and call
of everybody.  He is consulted here and harassed there.  He is dunned,
solicited and blackmailed; he is badgered and pestered until, I should
fancy, he wished his millions were at the bottom of the deep, blue sea."

"Lord, man!" exclaimed Mr. Horsfal, "but you have hit it right.  One
would almost think you had been through it yourself."

"I have not," I answered, "but I know most of the diseases that attack
the man of wealth."

"Now, you have given me an idea of what you might _have_ to do.  But to
get back to desire or choice;--what would it be then?" he inquired, as
the electric tram passed at last from the tree stumps and began to
draw, through signs of habitation, toward the city.

"If I had my desire and my choice, Mr. Horsfal, they would be: in such
a climate as we have here but away somewhere up the coast, with the sea
in front of me and the trees and the hills behind me; the open air, the
sunlight; contending with the natural,--not the artificial,--obstacles
of life; work, with a sufficiency of leisure; quiet, when quiet were
desired; and, in the evening as the sun went down into the sea or
behind the hills, a cosy fire, a good book and my pipe going good."

K. B. Horsfal, millionaire, patentee, lumberman and meat-packer, looked
at me, sighed and nodded his head.

"After all, my boy," he said, almost sadly, "I shouldn't wonder if that
isn't better than all the hellish wealth-hunting that ever was or ever
shall be.  Stick to your ideals.  Try them out if you can.  As for
me,--it's too late.  I am saturated with the money-getting mania; I am
in the maelstrom and I couldn't get out if I tried.  I'm in it for
good."

Our conversation was brought to an abrupt ending, as Mr. Horsfal had to
make a short call at one of the newspaper offices, on some business
matter.  We got out of the tram together.  I waited for him while he
made his call, then we walked back leisurely to the hotel; happy,
pleasantly tired and hungry as hunters.

I was regaled in the dining-room as the guest of my American friend.

"Are you going to be in for the balance of the evening?" he asked, as I
rose to leave him at the conclusion of our after-dinner smoke.

"Yes!"

"Good!" he ejaculated, rather abruptly.

And why he should have thought it "good," puzzled me not a little as I
went up in the elevator.




CHAPTER VIII

Golden Crescent

I had been sitting in my room for two hours, reading, and once in a
while, thinking over the strange adventures that had befallen me since
I had started out from home some three short weeks before.  I was
trying to picture to myself how it had all gone in the old home; I was
wondering if my father's heart had softened any to his absent son.

I reasoned whether, after all, I had done right in interfering between
my brother Harry and his fiancee; but, when I thought of poor little
Peggy Darrol and the righteous indignation and anger of her brother
Jim, I felt, that if I had to go through all of it again, I would do as
I had done already.

My telephone bell rang.  I answered.

It was the hotel exchange operator.

"Hello!--is that room 280?"

"Yes!" I answered.

"Mr. George Bremner?"

"Yes!"

"A gentleman in room 16 wishes to see you.  Right away, if you can,
sir!"

"What name?" I asked.

"No name given, sir."

"All right!  I'll go down at once.  Thank you!"

I laid aside my pipe and threw on my coat.  On reaching the right
landing, I made my way along an almost interminable corridor, until I
stood before the mysterious room 16.

As I entered, a respectably dressed, middle-aged man was coming out,
hat in hand.  Two others were sitting inside, apparently waiting an
interview, while a smart-looking young lady,--evidently a
stenographer,--was showing a fourth into the room adjoining.

It dawned on me that this request to call must be the outcome of the
letter I had written that morning in answer to the newspaper
advertisement.

I immediately assumed what I thought to be the correct, meek expression
of a man looking for work; with, I hope, becoming timidity and
nervousness, I whispered my name to the young lady.  Then I took a seat
alongside one of my fellow applicants, who eyed me askance and with
what I took to be amused tolerance.

Five minutes, and the young lady ushered out the man who had been on
the point of being interviewed as I had come in.

"Mr. Monaghan?" queried the lady.

Mr. Monaghan rose and followed her.

An interval of ten minutes, and Mr. Monaghan went after his predecessor.

"Mr. Rubenstein?" asked the lady.

Mr. Rubenstein, who, every inch of him, looked the part, went through
the routine of Mr. Monaghan, leaving me alone in the waiting room.

At last my turn came and I was ushered into the "sanctum."  I had put
my head only inside the door, when the bluff voice I had learned that
day to know shouted merrily:

"Hello!  George.  What do you know?  Come on in and sit down."

And there was Mr. Horsfal, as large as life, sitting behind a desk with
a pile of letters in front of him.

I was keenly disappointed and I fear I showed it.  Only this,--after
all my rising hopes,--the genial Mr. Horsfal wished to chat with me now
that he had got his business worries over.

"Why!--what's the matter, son?  You look crestfallen."

"I am, too," I answered.  "I was not aware which rooms you occupied
and, when I received the telephone message to come here and saw those
men waiting, I felt sure I had received an answer to my application for
a position I saw in the papers this morning."

Mr. Horsfal leaned back in his chair and surveyed me.

"Well,--no need to get crestfallen, George.  When you had that thought,
your thinking apparatus was in perfect working order."

My eyes showed surprise.  "You don't mean----"

"Yes!  George."

"What?--'wanted,--alert, strong, handy man, to supervise up-coast
property.  One who can run country store preferred.  Must be sober,'" I
quoted.

"The very same.  I've been interviewing men for a week now and I'm sick
of it.  I got your letter this evening.  But all day I have had it in
my mind that you were the very man I wanted, sent from the clouds right
to me."

"But,--but," I exclaimed.  "I am afraid I have not the experience a man
requires for such a job."

K. B. Horsfal thumped his desk.

"Lord sakes! man,--don't start running yourself down.  Boost,--boost
yourself for all you're worth."

"Oh, yes!  I know," I said.  "But this is different.  I have become
acquainted with you.  I cannot sail under false colours.  I have no
experience.  I am a simple baby when it comes to business."

He banged his desk again.

"George,--I'm the boss of this affair.  You must just sit back quiet
and listen, while I tell you about it; then you can talk as much as you
want.

"There's a thousand acres of property that I, or I should say, my
daughter Eileen owns some hundred miles up the coast from here.  The
place is called Golden Crescent Bay.  My wife took a fancy to it in the
early days, when she came with me on a trip one time I was looking over
a timber proposition.  I bought it for her for an old song and she grew
so fond of the place that she spent three months of every year, as long
as she lived, right on that very land.  She left it all to Eileen when
she died.

"As a business man, I should sell it, for its value has gone away up;
but, as a husband, as a father and as a sentimentalist, I just can't do
it.  It would be like desecration.

"There's two miles of water frontage to it; there's the house we put
up, also a little cabin where the present caretaker lives.  The only
other place within a couple of miles by water and four miles round by
land through the bush, is a cottage that stands on the property
abutting Eileen's, and close to her bungalow.  It has been boarded up
and unoccupied for quite a while.  Of course, up behind, over the
hills, there are ranches here and there, while, across the bay and all
up the coast, there are squatters, settlers, fishermen and ranchers for
a fare-you-well."

"You say there is a caretaker there already?" I put in.

"Yes!--I was just getting to that.  He's an old Klondike miner; came
out with a fortune.  Spent the most of it before he got sober.  Came
to, just in time.  Now he hoards what's left like an old skinflint.
Won't spend a nickel, unless it's on booze.  Drinks like a drowning man
and it never fizzes on him.  A good enough man for what he's been
doing, but no good for what I want now."

"You don't want me to do him out of his place, Mr. Horsfal?" I asked.

"I was coming to that, too,--only you're so darned speedy.

"He's all right as a caretaker with little or nothing to do, and he
will prove useful to you for odd jobs,--but, I have a salmon cannery
some miles north of this place and I am going to have half a dozen
lumber camps operating south, and further up, for the next few years.
Some of them are going full steam ahead now.

"They require a convenient store, where they can get supplies; grub,
oil, gasoline, hardware and such like.  I need a man who could look
after a proposition of that kind,--good.  The settlers would find a
store up there a perfect god-send.

"The property at Golden Crescent is easily got at and is the most
central to all my places.  Now, having an eye to business, and with
Eileen's consent, I have decided to convert the large front living-room
of her bungalow into a store.  It is plain, and can't be hurt.  It's
just suited for the purpose.  I have had some carpenters up there this
past week, putting in a counter and shelves and shutting the new store
off completely from the rest of the house.

"A stock of groceries, hardware, etc., has already been ordered from
the wholesalers and should be up there in a few days.

"Steamers pass Golden Crescent twice a week.  When they have anything
for you, they whistle and stand by out in the bay; when you want them,
you hoist a white flag on the pole, on the rock, at the end of the
little wharf; then you row out and meet them.

"These are the main features, George.  Oh, yes!  I'm paying one hundred
dollars a month and all-found to the right man."

He stopped and looked over at me a little anxiously.

"George!--will you take the job?"

"What about those other poor beggars who have applied?" I asked.

"There you are again," he exclaimed impatiently.  "They had the same
chance as you had.  Didn't I even keep you waiting out there till I had
seen them in turn.  Not one of them has the qualifications you have.  I
want a man with a brain as well as a body."

"But you don't know me, Mr. Horsfal.  I have no friends, no
testimonials; and I might be,--why!  I might be the biggest criminal
unhung."

"Testimonials be blowed!  Who wants testimonials?  Any dub can get
them.  As for the other part,--do you think K. B. Horsfal of Baltimore,
U. S. A., by this time, doesn't know a man after he has been a whole
day in his company?

"Sonny, take it from me,--there are mighty few American business men,
who have topped a million dollars, who don't know a man through and
through in less time than that, and without asking very many questions,
either.  Why, man!--that's their business; that's what makes their
millions."

There was no resisting K. B. Horsfal.

"Thanks!  I'll take the job," I said.  "And I'm mighty grateful to you."

"Good boy!  You're all right.  Leave it there!"  His two hands clasped
over mine.

"Gee! but I'm glad that's over at last."

"When do I start in?" I asked.

"Right now.  I'll phone for a launch to be ready to start up with us
to-morrow morning.  I'll show you over the proposition and leave you
there.  Phone for any little personal articles you may want.  I'll
attend to the bedding and all that sort of thing.  Have the boy call
you at six a. m. sharp."

Nothing was overlooked by the masterly mind of my new, my first
employer.

We breakfasted early.  An automobile was standing waiting for us at the
hotel entrance; while, at a down-town slip, a trig little launch,
already loaded up with our immediate necessities, was in readiness to
shoot out through the Narrows as soon as we got aboard.

This launch was named the _Edgar Allan Poe_, and, in consequence, I
felt as if she were an old friend.

As soon as the ropes were cast from the wharf, a glorious feeling of
exhilaration started to run through me; for it seemed that I was being
loosed from the old life and plunged into a new; a life I had been for
so long hungering; the life of the woods, the hills and the sea, the
quiet and freedom; the life of my dreams as well as of my waking
fancies.  Whether or not it would come up to my expectations was a
question of conjecture, but I was not in a mood to trouble conjecturing.

The swift little boat fought the tide rip in the Narrows like a lonely
explorer defending his life against a horde of surging savages; and,
gradually, she nosed her way through, past Prospect Point, then,
inclining to the north shore, but heading forward all the time, past
the lighthouse which stands sentinel on the rock at Point Atkinson; and
away up the coast, leaving the city, with its dizzying and
light-blotting sky-scrapers far and still farther behind, until nothing
of that busy terminal remained to the observer but a distant haze.

The _Edgar Allan Poe_ threaded her way rapidly and confidently among
the rocks and fertile little islands, up, up northward, ever northward,
amid lessening signs of life and habitation; through the beautiful
Strait of Georgia.

From eight o'clock in the morning till three o'clock in the afternoon
we sailed on, amid a prodigality of scenic beauty,--sea, mountains and
islands; islands, mountains and sea,--enjoying every mile of that
beautiful trip.  We conversed seldom, although there was much to
discuss and our time was short.

At last, we sped past a great looming rock, which stood almost sheer
out of the sea, then we ran into a glorious bay, where the sea danced
and glanced in a fairy ecstasy.

"Golden Crescent Bay," broke in Mr. Horsfal.  "How do you like it?"

"It is Paradise," I exclaimed, in breathless admiration.  And never
have I had reason to change that first impression and opinion.

We ran alongside a rocky headland close to the shore, on which stood
two little wooden sheds bearing the numbers one and two.  We clambered
up.

"Number one is for gasoline; two for oil," volunteered my ever
informing employer.

The rock was connected to the shore by a well-built, wooden wharf on
piles, which ran directly into what I rightly guessed had been the
summer home of Mrs. Horsfal.  It was a plainly built cottage and trim
as a warship.  It bore signs of having been recently painted, while,
all around, the grass was trim and tidy.

On the right of this, about fifty yards across, on the same cleared
area, but out on a separate rocky headland, stood another well-built
cottage, the windows of which were boarded up.

"My property starts ten yards to the south of the wharf here, George,
and runs around the bay as far, almost, as it goes, and back to the
hills quite a bit.  That over there is the other house I spoke to you
about.  It, and the property to the south, is owned by some one in the
Western States.

"But I wonder where the devil old Jake Meaghan is.  Folks could land
here and walk away with the whole shebang and he would never know of
it."

As he spoke, however, a small boat crept out from some little cove
about three hundred yards round the bay.  It contained a man, who rowed
it leisurely toward the wharf.  We leaned over the wooden rail and
waited.

The man ran the boat into the shingly beach, pulled in his oars,
climbed out and made toward us.  An Airedale dog, which had evidently
been curled up in the bottom of the boat, sprang out after him, keeping
close to him and eyeing us suspiciously and angrily.

In appearance the man reminded me of one of R. L. Stevenson's pirates,
or one of Jack London's 'longshoremen.

He wore heavy logging boots, brown canvas trousers kept up by a belt,
and a brown shirt, showing hairy brown arms and a bared, scraggy
throat.  A battered, sun-cast, felt hat lay on his head.  His face was
wrinkled and weather-beaten to the equivalent of tanned hide.  He wore
great, long, drooping moustaches snow white in colour.  His eyes were
limpid blue.

"It's you, Mr. Horsfal," he mumbled rather thickly, in a voice that
seemed to come from somewhere underground; "didn't know you in the
distance."

"Jake,--shake with Mr. George Bremner;--he's going to supervise the
place and the new store, same as I explained to you two weeks ago.
Hope you make friends.  He's to be head boss man, and his word goes;
but you'll find him twenty-four carat gold."

"That's darned fine gold, boss," grunted Jake.

He held out his horny hand and grasped mine, exclaiming heartily enough:

"Glad to meet you, George."

He pulled out a plug of tobacco from his hip pocket, brushed some of
the most conspicuous dirt and grime from it, bit off what appeared to
me to be a mouthful and began to look me over.

"He's new," he grunted, as if to himself; "but he's young and big.  He
looks tough; he's got the right kind of jaw."

Then he turned to Mr. Horsfal.  "Guess, when he gets the edges rubbed
off, he'll more than make it, boss," he said.

K. B. Horsfal laughed loudly.

"That's just what I thought myself, Jake.  Now, give us the keys to the
oil barns and the new store.  Go and help unload that baggage and truck
from the launch.  You can follow your usual bent after that, for I'll
be showing George over the place myself."

I found the prospective store just as it had been described: a large,
plain, front room, now fitted with shelves and a counter, and all
freshly painted.  Everything was in readiness to accommodate the stock,
most of which was due to arrive the next afternoon.  Where a door had
been, leading into the other parts of the house, it was now solidly
partitioned up, leaving only front and back entrances to the store.

We spent the afternoon in the open air, inspecting the property, which
was perfectly situated for scenic beauty, with plenty of cleared,
fertile land near the shore and rich in giant timber behind.

In the early part of the evening, after a cold lunch aboard the launch,
we went back to the house and, for the first time, Mr. Horsfal inserted
a key into the front door of the dwelling proper.

I had been not a little curious regarding this place and I was still
wondering where it was intended that I should take up my quarters.

Jake Meaghan seemed all right in his own Klondikish,
pork-and-beans-and-a-blanket way, but I hardly fancied him as a rooming
partner and a possible bedfellow.  To be candid, I never had had a
bedfellow in all my life and I had already made up my mind that, rather
than suffer one now, I would fix up one of the several empty barns
which were scattered here and there over the property, and thus retain
my beloved privacy.

My employer pushed his way into the house and invited me to follow him.

I found myself in a small, front room, neatly but plainly furnished.
The floor was varnished and two bearskin rugs supplied the only
carpeting.  It had a mahogany centre table, on which a large
oil-burning reading lamp was set.  Three wicker chairs, designed solely
for comfort, and a stove with an open front helped to complete its
comfortable appearance.  A number of framed photographs of Golden
Crescent and some water colour paintings decorated the plain, wooden
walls.  In the far corner, beside a small side window, there stood a
writing desk; while, all along that side of the wall, on a long curtain
pole, there was hung, from brass rings, a heavy green curtain.

I took in what I could in a cursory glance and I marvelled that there
could be so much apparent concentrated comfort so far away from city
civilisation; but, when my guide pulled aside the curtain on the wall
and disclosed rows and rows of books behind a glass front, books
ancient and modern, books of religion, philosophy, medicine, history,
fiction and poetry,--at least a thousand of them,--I gave up trying any
more to fathom what manner of a man he was.

My eyes sparkled and explained to K. B. Horsfal what my voice failed to
utter.

"Well,--what d'ye think of it all?" he asked at last.

"It is a delight,--a positive delight," I replied simply.

As I walked over to the front window, I wondered little that Mrs.
Horsfal should have loved the place; and, when I looked away out over
the dancing waters, upon the beauties of the bay in the changing light
of the lowering sun, upon the rocky, fir-dotted island a mile to sea,
and upon the lonely-looking homes of the settlers over there two miles
away on the far horn of Golden Crescent, with the great background of
mountains in purple velvet,--I wondered less.

"Yes!  George,--it's pretty near what heaven should be to look at.  But
I guess it's the same old story that the poet once sang:

"'Where every prospect pleases and only man is vile.'

"That poet kind of forgot that, if what he said was true, it was only
the vile man that the prospect could please, eh!

"You notice the house has been cleaned from top to toe.  I had that
done last week.  I see to that every time I come west."

He put his hand on my shoulder.  "George, boy,--no one but myself and
Eileen has slept under this roof since my wife died, but I want you to
make it your home."

I turned to remonstrate.

"Now,--don't say a word," he hurried on.  "You can't bluff me with your
self-defamatory remarks.  You are not a Jake Meaghan, or one of his
stamp.  You are of the kind that appreciates a home like this to the
extent of taking care of it.

"Come and have a look at the other apartments.

"This is the kitchen.  It has a pantry and a good cooking-stove.  There
are four bedrooms in the house.  This can be yours;--it's the one I
used to occupy.  This is a spare one.  This is Eileen's.  You won't
require it; and one never knows when Eileen might take it into her head
to come up here and live.

"This is my Helen's room,--my wife's.  It has not been changed since
she died."

He went in.  I remained respectfully in the adjoining apartment.  I
waited for five minutes.

When he returned, there were tears in his eyes.  He locked the door
with a sigh.

"George,--here are the keys to the whole she-bang.  There isn't much
more to keep me here.  You have signed the necessary papers in
connection with the trust account for $5,000 in the Commercial Bank of
Canada in Vancouver.  Draw your wages regularly.  Pay Jake his fifty a
month at the same time.  We find his grub for him.

"Run things at a profit if you can, for that's business.  Stand
strictly to the instructions I have given you regarding orders for
supplies from the various camps and from the cannery.  Use your own
judgment as to credit with the settlers.  I leave you a free hand up
here.

"Send your monthly reports, addressed to me care of my lawyers, Dow,
Cross & Sneddon of Vancouver.  They will forward them.

"If any question should arise regarding the property itself, get in
touch with the lawyers."

I walked with him down to the launch as he talked.

"Thanks to you, George,--I'll get to Vancouver in the small hours of
the morning and I will be able to pull out for Sydney in the afternoon
of to-morrow.

"Good-bye, boy.  All being well, I'll be back within a year."

In parting with him, as he shook me by the hand, I experienced a
tightening in my throat such as I had never felt when parting from any
other man either before or since.  Yet, I had only known him for two
days.  I could see that he, also, was similarly affected.  It was as if
something above and beyond us were making our farewell singularly
solemn.




CHAPTER IX

The Booze Artist

I stood watching until the tiny launch rounded the point; then, as the
light was still fairly good,--it being the end of the month of
May,--and as I had no inclination for sleep as yet, I got into the
smallest of the rowing boats that were tied up alongside the wharf,
loosed it and pulled leisurely up the bay, with the intention of making
myself a little better acquainted with the only living soul with whom I
was within hail,--Jake Meaghan.

As I ran the boat into his cove, I could hear his dog bark warningly.

The door of his barn,--for it was nothing else,--was closed, and it was
some time before I heard Meaghan's deep voice in answer to my knock,
inviting me to come in and bidding his dog to lie down.

Meaghan was sitting, presumably reading a newspaper, which was the only
kind of "literature" I ever saw him read.  His attitude appeared to me
to be assumed and I had a notion that, when the dog first barked at my
approach, he had been busy with the contents of a brass-bound, wooden
chest which now lay half under his bunk, in a recess in the far corner.

"Hello!  Thought you might come over.  Sit down," he greeted.  "Saw the
boss pull out half an hour ago.  I'm just sittin' down for my turn at
the newspaper.  They leave me a bundle off the steamer once in a while.
This one's from the old country;--the _Liverpool Monitor_.  It's two
months old, but what's the dif,--the news is just as good as if it was
yesterday's or to-morrow's."

I looked round Jake's shanty.  Considering it was a single-roomed place
and used for cooking, washing, sleeping and everything else, it was
wonderfully tidy, although, to say truth, there was little in it after
all to occasion untidiness: a stove, a pot, a frying-pan, an enamelled
tin teapot, some crockery, a table, an oil lamp, three chairs, the
brass-bound trunk, two wheat-flake boxes and Jake's bed,--with one
other addition,--a fifteen-gallon keg with a stopcock in it and set on
a wooden stand close to his bunk.

An odour of shell-fish pervaded the atmosphere, coming from some kind
of soup made from clams and milk, on which Jake had evidently been
dining.  The residue of it still sat in a pot on the stove.  This, I
discovered, was Jake's favourite dish.

He rose, took two breakfast cups from a shelf and went over to the keg
in the corner.  He filled up both of them to the brim.

"Have a drink, George?" he invited, offering me one of the cups.

"What is it?" I asked, thinking it might be a cider of some kind.

"What d'ye suppose, man?--ginger beer?  It's good rye whiskey."

From the odour, I had ascertained this for myself before he spoke.

"No, thanks, Jake, I don't drink."

"Holy mackinaw!" he exclaimed, almost dropping the cups in his
astonishment.  "If you don't drink, how in the Sam Hill are you going
to make it stick up here?  Why, man, you'll go batty in the winter
time, for it's lonely as hell."

"From all accounts, Jake, hell is not a very lonely place," I laughed.

"Aw!--you know what I mean," he put in.

"I'll have plenty of work to do in the store; enough to keep me from
feeling lonely."

"Not you.  Once it's goin', it'll be easy's rollin' off'n a log.
What'll you do o' nights, 'specially winter nights,--if you don't
drink?"

He sat down and began to empty his cup of liquor by the gulp.

His dog, which had been lying sullenly on the floor near the stove, got
up and ambled leisurely to Jake's feet.  It looked up at him as he
drank, then it put its two front paws on Jake's knees, as if to attract
his attention.

Meaghan stopped his imbibing and stroked the dog's head.

"Well,--well--Mike; and did I forget you?"

He poured a little liquor in a saucer and set it down on the floor
before the dog, who lapped it up with all the relish of a seasoned
toper.  Then it put its paws back on Jake's knees, as if asking for
more.

"No!  Mike.  Nothin' doin'.  You've had your whack.  Too much ain't
good for your complexion, old man."

In a sort of dreamy, contemplative mood the dog sat down on its
haunches between us.

"What'll you do o' nights if you don't drink?  You ain't told me that,
George," reiterated Jake, sucking some of the liquor from his drooping
moustaches.

"Oh!" I replied, "I'll read, and sometimes I'll sit out and watch the
stars and listen to the sea and the wind."

"And what after that?" he queried.

"I can always think, when I have nothing else to do."

"And what after that?" he asked again.

"Nothing, Jake,--nothing.  That's all."

"No it ain't.  No it ain't, I tell you;--after that,--it's the bughouse
for yours.  It's the thinking,--it's the thinking that does it every
time.  It's the last stage, George.  You'll be clean, plumb batty
inside o' six months."

The dog got up, after two unsuccessful attempts.

Never did I see such a strange sight in any animal.  He put out one paw
and staggered to the right.  He put out another and staggered to the
left.  All the time, his eyes were half closed.  He was quite
insensible of our presence, for he was as drunk as any waterfront
loafer.  Staggering, stumbling and balancing, he made his way back to
his place beside the stove, where, in a moment more, he was in a deep
sleep and snoring,--as a Westerner would put it,--to beat the cars.

Meaghan noticed my interest in the phenomenon.

"That's nothin'," he volunteered.  "Mike has his drink with me every
night, for the sake o' company.  Why not?  He doesn't see any fun in
lookin' at the stars and watching the tide come up o' nights.  Worst
is, he can't stand up to liquor.  It kind o' gets his goat; yet he's
been tipplin' for three years now."

Jake finished off his cup of whisky.

"Good Heavens, man!" I exclaimed in disgust and dismay, "don't you know
you will kill yourself drinking that stuff in that way?"

"Guess nit," he growled, but quite good-naturedly.  "I ain't started.
I've been drinkin' more'n that every night for ten years and I ain't
dead yet,--not by a damn sight.  No! nor I ain't never been drunk,
neither."

He took up the other cupful of whisky as he spoke and slowly drained it
off before my eyes.  He laid the empty cup on the table with a grunt of
satisfaction, pulling at his long moustaches in lazy pleasure.

"That's my nightcap, George.  Better'n seein' stars, too."

I could see his end.

"I'd much rather see stars than snakes," I remarked.  But Jake merely
laughed it off.

I rose in a kind of cold perspiration.  To me, this was
horrible;--drinking for no apparent reason.

He came with me to the door.  His voice was as steady as could be; so
were his legs.  The effects of the liquor he had consumed did not show
on him except maybe for a bloodshot appearance in the whites of his
baby-blue eyes.

I was worried.  I had known such another as Jake in the little village
of Brammerton; and I knew what the inevitable end had been and what
Jake's would be also.

"Don't be sore at me, George," he pleaded.  "It's the only friend I got
now."

"It is not any friend of yours, Jake."

"Well,--maybe it ain't, but I think it is and that's about the only way
we can reckon our friends.

"When you find I ain't doin' my share o' the work because o' the booze
or when you catch me drunk,--I'll quit it.  Good-night, George."

I wished him good-night gruffly, hurried over the beach, scrambled into
the boat and rowed quickly for my new home.

And, as I stood on the veranda for a long time before turning in, I
watched the moon rise and skim her way behind and above the clouds,
throwing, as she did so, great dark shadows and eerie lights on the sea.

In the vast, awesome stillness of the forest behind and the swishing
and shuffling of the incoming tide on the shingles on the beach, I
thought of what my good friend, K. B. Horsfal, had quoted:

"Where every prospect pleases and only man is vile."




CHAPTER X

Rita of the Spanish Song

Next morning I was awakened bright and early by the singing of birds.
For a few moments I imagined myself back in England; but the ceaseless
beat of the sea and the sustained, woody-toned, chattering, chirruping
squeak of an angry squirrel on my roof gave me my proper location.

I had heard once, in a London drawing-room, that there were no singing
birds in British Columbia; that the songsters of the East were unable
to get across the high, eternal cold and snow of the Rockies.  What a
fallacy!  They were everywhere around me, and in thousands.  How they
got there was of little moment to me.  They were there, much to my joy;
and the forests at my back door were alive with the sweetness of their
melodies.

Early as I was, I could see a thin column of smoke rising from the cove
where Jake was.  When I went to the woodpile at the rear of my
bungalow, I found more evidence of his early morning diligence.  A heap
of dry, freshly cut kindling was set out, while the chickens had
already been fed and let out to wander at their own sweet wills.

For the first time in my very ordinary life, I investigated the
eccentricities of a cook stove, overcame them and cooked myself a
rousing breakfast of porridge and bacon and eggs with toast.  How proud
I felt of my achievement and how delicious the food tasted!  Never had
woman cooked porridge and bacon and eggs to such a delightful turn.

I laughed joyously, for I felt sure I had stumbled across an important
truth that woman had religiously kept from the average man throughout
all the bygone ages: the truth that any man, if he only sets his mind
to it, can cook a meal perfectly satisfactory to himself.

After washing up the breakfast dishes without smashing any, sweeping
the kitchen floor and shovelling up--nothing; there was nothing left
for me to do, for the north-going steamer was not due until early in
the afternoon.  When she should arrive and give me delivery of the
freight which she was bringing, I knew I should have enough to occupy
my attention for some days to come, getting the cases opened up and the
goods checked over, priced and set out in the store; but, meantime, my
time was my own.

It was a glorious morning.  The sun was shining and the air was balmy
as a midsummer's day at home.  I opened the front door and gazed on the
loveliness; I stretched my arms and felt vigour running to my
finger-tips.  Then I longed, how I longed, for a swim!

And why not!  I slipped out of my shirt and trousers and got into my
bathing suit.  I ran down to the end of the wharf and out on to the
rocks.

The water was calm, and deep, and of a pale green hue.  I could see the
rock cod and little shiners down there, darting about on a breakfast
hunt.

Filling my lungs, I took a header in, coming up fifteen yards out and
shaking my head with a gurgling cry of pleasure.  I struck out,
overhand, growing stronger and more vigorous each succeeding moment, as
the refreshing sea played over my body.  On, on I went, turning upon my
breast sometimes, sometimes on my back, lashing the water into foam
with my feet and blowing it far into the air from my mouth.

Half a mile out and I was as near to the island, in the middle of the
Bay, as I was to the wharf.  I knew I could make it, although I had not
been in the water for several weeks.  I had an abundance of time, the
sea was warm, the island looked pretty,--so on I went.

I reached it at last, a trifle blown, but in good condition.

It had not been by any means a record swim for me.  I had not intended
that it should.  All the way, it had been a pleasure trip.

I made for a sandy beach, between two rocky headlands.  Soon, I got my
footing and waded ashore.  After a short rest, I set out to survey the
island.

All the childhood visions I had stored in my memory of "Coral Island,"
"Crusoe's Island," and "Treasure Island" became visualised and merged
into one,--the island I was exploring.

It was of fairy concept; only some four hundred yards long and about a
hundred yards in breadth, with rugged rocks and sandy beaches; secret
caves and strange caverns; fertile over all with small fir and arbutus
trees, shrubs, ferns and turfy patches of grass of the softest velvet
pile.  In the most unlikely places, I stumbled across bubbling springs
of fresh water forcing its way through the rocks.  How they originated,
was a mystery to me, for the island was separated from the mainland by
a mile, at least, of salt water.

What an ideal spot, I thought, for a picnic!  Would not some of my
eccentric acquaintances at home,--the Duke of Athlane, for
instance,--dearly love to take the whole thing up by the roots and
transplant it in the centre of some of the artificial lakes they had
schemed and contrived, in wild attempts to make more beautiful the
natural beauties of their estates?

By this time, the warm air had dried my body.  I climbed to the highest
point of the island,--a small plateau, covered with short turf; a
glorious place for the enjoyment of a sun bath.  I lay down and
stretched myself.

My only regret then was that I did not have a book with me to complete
my Paradise.

Pillowed on a slight incline, I dreamily watched the scudding clouds,
then my eyes travelled across to the mainland.  I could see the smoke
curl upward from my kitchen fire.  I saw old Jake get into his boat,
followed by the drunken rascal of a dog, Mike.  All was still and quiet
but for the seethe and shuffle of the sea.

Suddenly, on the other side of the water somewhere, but evidently far
away, a voice, untrained, but of peculiar sweetness, broke into my
drowsing.  I listened for a time, trying to catch the refrain.  As it
grew clearer, I tried to pick up the words, but they were in a tongue
foreign to me.  They were not French, nor were they Italian.  At last,
it struck me that they were Spanish words; the words of a Spanish
dancing song, which, when I was a gadding-about college boy, had been
popular among us.  I recalled having heard that it was sung by the
chorus of a famous Spanish dancer, who, at one time, had been the rage
of London and the Provinces, but who had mysteriously vanished from the
footlights with the same suddenness as she had appeared there.

It was a haunting little melody, catchy and childishly simple; and it
had remained in my memory all these years, as is so often the case with
choruses that we hear in our babyhood.

Naturally, I was more than curious to see the singer, so I crept to the
top of the grassy knoll and peered over, searching the far side of the
island and over the water.

Away out, I discerned a small boat making in the direction of the
island.  The oars were being plied by a woman, or a girl,--I could not
tell which, as her back was toward me and she was still a good way off.
She handled her oars as if she were a part of the boat itself and the
boat were a living thing.

She stopped every now and then, rose from her seat and busied herself
with something.  I wondered what she was doing.  I saw her haul
something into the boat.  As she examined it in her hand, the sun
flashed upon it.  I could hear her laugh happily as she tossed it into
the bottom of the boat.

She was trolling for fish and, evidently, getting a plentiful supply.

She rowed in as if intent upon fishing round the island.  But, all at
once, she changed her mind, turned the boat, pulled in her fishing line
and shot into a sandy beach, springing out and pulling the boat clear
of the tide.

She straightened herself as she turned and faced the plateau on the far
incline of which I lay hidden.  I saw at a glance that, though a mere
girl in years,--somewhere between sixteen and eighteen,--yet she was a
woman, maturing as a June rose, as a butterfly stretching its pretty
wings for the first time in the ecstasy of its new birth.  Of medium
height; her hair was the darkest shade of brown and hung in two long,
thick braids down to her neat waist.  She seemed not at all of the
countrified type I might have expected to encounter so far in the wilds.

She was dressed in a spotless white blouse, the sleeves of which were
rolled back almost to her shoulders; with a dark-coloured, serviceable
skirt, the hem of which hung high above a pair of small, bare feet and
neat, supple-looking ankles.  I could see her shoes and stockings,
brown in colour, lying in the bow of the boat.  She reached over,
picked them up, then sat on a rock by the water's edge and pulled them
on her feet.

But, after all, it was not her dress that held my attention; although
in the main this was pleasing to the eye, nor yet was it the girl's
features, for she was still rather far off for me to observe these
distinctly.  What riveted me was the light, agile rapidity of her every
action; and her evident abandonment of everything else for what, for
the moment, absorbed her.

As I watched, I became filled with conflicting thoughts.  Should I
remain where I was, or should I at once betray my presence?

I decided that the island was large enough for both of us.  She was not
interested in me, so why should I interrupt her in her lonely enjoyment?

I was perplexed more than a little in trying to place where she
rightfully belonged.  Naturally, I took her to be the daughter of one
of the settlers on the far side of Golden Crescent.  But there was a
something in her entire appearance that seemed to place her on a
different plane from that, a plane all by herself; while, again, there
was the Spanish song which I had heard her lilt out on the water.

She brought my conjecturing to rather an abrupt conclusion, for,
without any warning, she darted up over the rocks and through the ferns
to where I lay, and she had almost trodden upon me before I had time to
get out of her way.

She stepped back with an exclamation of surprise, but gave no sign to
indicate that she was afraid.

I sprang to my feet.

"I am very sorry,--miss," I said sincerely.

"Oh!--there ain't much to be sorry over.  This ain't my island.
Still,--girls don't much care about men watching them from behind
places," she replied, with a tone of displeasure.

"And I am sorry,--again," I answered.  "Please forgive me, for I could
hardly help it.  I was lying here when I heard you sing.  I became
curious.  When you landed, I intended making my presence known, but I
said to myself just what you have said now:--'It is not my island.'
However, I shall go now and leave you in possession."

"Where is your boat?"

"Didn't bring one with me."

"How did you get here then?"

Her blunt questioning was rather disconcerting.

"Oh!  I walked it," I answered lightly, with a grin.

Her voice changed.  "You're trying to be smart," she reprimanded.

"Sorry," I said, in a tone of contrition, "for I am not a bit smart in
spite of my trying.  Well,--I swam across from the wharf over there."

She looked up.  "Being smart some more."

"No!--it is true."

She measured the distance from the island to the wharf with her eye.

I remarked, some time ago, that her hair was of the darkest shade of
brown.  I was wrong;--there was a darker hue still, and that was in her
eyes; while her skin was of that attractive combination, olive and pink.

"Gee!--that was some swim.

"How are you going to get back?" she continued, in open friendliness.

"Swim!"

"Ain't you tired?"

"I was winded a bit when I got here, but I am all right again," I
answered.

"You're an Englishman?"

"How did you guess it?" I asked, as if I were giving her credit for
unearthing a great mystery.

Before answering, she sat down on the grass, clasping her hands over
her knees.  I squatted a short distance from her.

"Only Englishmen go swimming hereabouts in the morning."

"Do you often stumble across stray, swimming Englishmen?" I asked in
banter.

"No!--but three summers ago there were some English people staying in
that house at the wharf that's now closed up:--the one next Horsfal's,
and they were in the water so much, they hardly gave the fish a chance.
It was the worst year we ever had for fishing."

I laughed, and she looked up in surprise.

"Then we had an English surveyor staying with us for a month last year.
He was crazy for the water.  He went in for half an hour every morning
and before his breakfast, too.  You don't find the loggers or any of
the settlers doing silly stunts like that.  No, siree.

"Guess you're a surveyor?"

"No!"

"Or maybe a gentleman up for shooting and fishing?  Can't be though,
for there ain't any launches in the Bay.  Yes, you are, too, for I saw
a launch in yesterday."

"I hope I am always a gentleman," I said, "but I am not the kind of
gentleman you mean.  I have no launch and no money but what I can earn.
I am the new man who is to look after Mr. Horsfal's Golden Crescent
property.  I shall be more or less of a common country storekeeper
after to-day."

"Heard about that store from old Jake.  Granddad over home was talking
about it, too.  It'll be convenient for the Camps and a fine thing for
the settlers up here."

She jumped up.  "Well,--I guess I got to beat it, Mister----"

"George Bremner," I put in.

"My name's Rita;--Rita Clark.  I stay over at the ranch there, the one
with the red-roofed houses.  This island's named Rita, too."

"After you?"

"Ya!--guess so!"

She did not venture any more.

"Been here long?" I asked.

"Long's I can remember," she answered.

"Like it?"

"I love it.  It's all I got.  Never been away from it more'n three
times in my life."

There was something akin to longing in her voice.

"I love it all the same,--all but that over there."

As she spoke, she shivered and pointed away out to the great
perpendicular rock, with its jagged, devilish, shark-like teeth, which
rose sheer out of the water and stood black, forbidding and snarling,
even in the sunshine, to the right, at the entrance to the Bay, a
quarter of a mile or so from the far horn of Golden Crescent.

"You don't like rocks?"

"Some rocks," she whispered, "but not 'The Ghoul.'"

"The Ghoul," I repeated with a shudder.  "Ugh!--what a name.  Who on
earth saddled it with such a horrible name?"

"Nobody on earth.  Guess it must have been the devil in hell, for it's
a friend of his."

Her face grew pale and a nameless horror crept into her eyes.

"It ain't nice to look on now,--is it?"

"No!" I granted.

"You want to see it in the winter, when there's a storm tearing in,
with the sea crashing over it in a white foam and,--and,--people trying
to hang on to it.  Oh!--I tell you what it is,--it's hellish, that's
all.  It's well named The Ghoul,--it's a robber of the dead."

"Robber of the dead!--what do you mean?"

"Everybody but a stranger knows:--it robs them of a decent burial.
Heaps of men, and women too, have been wrecked out there, but only one
was ever known to come off alive.  Never a body has ever been found
afterwards."  She shivered and turned her head away.

For a while, I gazed at the horrible rock in fascination.  What a
reminder it was to the poor human that there is storm as well as calm;
evil as well as good; that turmoil follows in the wake of quiet; that
sorrow tumbles over joy; and savagery and death run riot among life and
happiness and love!

At last, I also turned my eyes away from The Ghoul, with a strong
feeling of anger and resentment toward it.  Already I loathed and hated
the thing as I hated nothing else.

I stood alongside the girl and we remained silent until the mood passed.

Then she raised her eyes to mine and smiled.  In an endeavour to
forget,--which, after all, was easy amid so much sunshine and
beauty,--I reverted to our former conversation.

"You said you were seldom away from here.  Don't you ever take a trip
to Vancouver?"

"Been twice.  We're not strong on trips up here.  Grand-dad goes to
Vancouver and Victoria once in a while.  Grandmother's been here twenty
years and never been five miles from the ranch, 'cept once, and she's
sorry now for that once.

"Joe's the one that gets all the trips.  You ain't met Joe.  Guess when
you do you and him won't hit it.  He always fights with men of your
size and build."

"Who is this Joe?" I asked.  "He must be quite a man-eater."

"I ain't going to tell you any more.  You'll know him when you see him.

"I'm going now.  Would you like some fish?  The trout were biting good
this morning.  I've got more'n we need."

We went down to the shore together.  There were between thirty and
forty beauties of sea-trout in the bottom of her boat.  She handed me
out a dozen.

"Guess that'll make a square meal for you and Jake."

Then she looked at me and laughed, showing her teeth.  "Clean forgot,"
she said.  "A swimming man ain't no good at carrying fish."

"Why not?" I asked.

I picked up some loose cord from her boat, strung the trout by the
gills and tied them securely round my waist.

She watched me archly and a thought went flashing through my mind that
it did not need the education of the city to school a woman in the art
of using her eyes.

"Guess I'll see you off the premises first, before I go."

"All right!" said I.

We crossed the Island once more, and I got on to a rock which dipped
sheer and deep into the sea.

She held out her hand and smiled in such a bewitching way that, had I
not been a well-seasoned bachelor of almost twenty-five years'
standing, I should have lost my heart to her completely.

"Good-bye!  Mister,--Mister Bremner.  Safe home."

"Good-bye!  Miss--Rita."

"Sure you can make it?" she asked earnestly.

"Yes!" I cried, and plunged in.

As I came up, I turned and waved my hand.  She waved in answer, and
when I looked again she was gone.

I struck swiftly for the wharf, allowing for the incoming tide.

When I was half-way across, I heard the sound of oars and, on taking a
backward glance, I saw Rita making toward me.

"Hello!" I cried, when she drew near.  "What's the matter?"

A little shame-faced, she bent over.  "I got scared," she said timidly,
"scared you mightn't make it.  Sure you don't want me to row you in?"

The boat was alluring, but my pride was touched.

"Quite sure," I answered.  "I'm as fresh as the trout round my waist.
Thanks all the same."

"All right!  Guess I was foolish.  You ain't a man; you're a porpoise."

With this half-annoyed sally, she swung the bow of the boat and rowed
away.




CHAPTER XI

An Informative Visitor

That afternoon, prompt at two o'clock, a whistle sounded beyond the
point and, shortly afterwards, the steamboat _Siwash_, north bound,
entered the Bay.

Jake and I were waiting at the end of the wharf, seated in a large,
wide-beamed, four-oared boat, with Mike, the dog,--still eyeing me
suspiciously,--crouching between his master's feet.

We had a raft and half a dozen small rowing boats of all shapes and
conditions, strung out, Indian file, from our stern.  Every available
thing in Golden Crescent Bay that could float, down to a canoe and an
old Indian dug-out, we borrowed or requisitioned for our work.  And,
with this long procession in tow, we pulled out and made for the
steamer, which came to a standby in the deep water, three hundred yards
from the shore.

The merchandise was let down by slings from the lower deck, and we had
to handle the freight as best we could, keeping closely alongside all
the while.

A dozen times, I thought one or another of the boats would be
overturned and its contents emptied into the Bay.  But luck was with
us.  Jake spat tobacco juice on his hands every few minutes and sailed
in like a nigger.  Our clothes were soon moist through and through, and
the perspiration was running over our noses long before our task was
completed.  But finally the last package was lowered and checked off by
the mate and myself, a clear receipt given; and we (Jake and I) pushed
for the shore, landing exhausted in body but without mishap to the
freight.

Jake fetched some fresh clams to my kitchen for convenience and, after
slapping half a plug of tobacco in his cheek, he started in and cooked
us a savoury concoction which he called "chowder," made with baked
clams mixed in hot milk, with butter and crumbled toast; all duly
seasoned:--while I smoked my pipe and washed enough dishes to hold our
food, and set the table for our meal.

Already, I had discovered that dish-washing was the bugbear of a
kitchen drudge's existence, be the kitchen drudge female or male.  I
had only done the job three or four times, but I had got to loathe and
abhor the operation.  Not that I felt too proud to wash dishes, but it
seemed such a useless, such an endless, task.  However, I suppose
everything in this old world carries with it more or less of these same
annoyingly bad features.

At any rate, I never could make up my mind to wash a dish until I
required it for my next and immediate meal.

We dined ravenously, and throughout the proceeding, Mike sat in the
doorway, keeping close watch that I did not interfere with the sacred
person of his lord and master, Jake Meaghan.

Rested and reinvigorated, we set-to with box-openers, hammers and
chisels, unpacking and unpacking until the thing became a boring
monotony.

Canned milk, canned beef, canned beans, canned salmon, canned crabs,
canned well-nigh-everything; bottled fruits, bottled pickles, bottled
jams and jellies, everything bottled that was not canned; bags of
sugar, flour, meal, potatoes, oats and chicken feed; hardware galore,
axes, hammers, wedges, peevies, cant hoops, picks, shovels, nails,
paints, brooms, brushes and a thousand other commodities and
contrivances the like of which I never saw before and hope never to see
again.

Never, in all my humble existence, did I feel so clerky as I did then.

I checked the beastly stuff off as well as I could, taking the
Vancouver wholesalers' word for the names of half the things, for I was
quite sure they knew better than I did about them.

With the assistance of Jake, as "hander-up," I set the goods in a
semblance of order on the shelves and about the store.

We worked and slaved as if it were the last day and our eternal
happiness depended on our finishing the job before the last trump
sounded its blast of dissolution.

By the last stroke of twelve, midnight, we had the front veranda swept
clean of straw, paper and excelsior, and all empty boxes cleared away;
just in time to welcome the advent of my first Sabbath day in the
Canadian West.

Throughout our arduous afternoon and evening, what a surprise old Jake
was to me!  Well I knew that he was hard and tough from years of
strenuous battling with the northern elements; but that he, at his age
and with his record for hard drinking, should be able to keep up the
sustained effort against a young man in his prime and that he should do
so cheerfully and without a word of complaint,--save an occasional
grunt when the steel bands around some of the boxes proved
recalcitrant, and an explosive, picturesque oath when the end of a
large case dropped over on his toes,--was, to me, little short of
marvellous.

Already, I was beginning to think that Mr. K. B. Horsfal had erred in
regard to his man and that it was Jake Meaghan who was twenty-four
carat gold.

If any man ever did deserve two breakfast cups brimful of whisky, neat,
before turning in, it was old, walrus-moustached, weather-battered,
baby-eyed, sour-dough Jake, in the small, early hours of that Sabbath
morning.

I slept that night like a dead thing, and the sun was high in the
heavens before I opened my eyes and became conscious again of my
surroundings.

I looked over at the clock.  Fifteen minutes past ten!  I threw my legs
over the side of the bed, ashamed of my sluggardliness.

Then I remembered,--it was Sunday morning.

Oh! glorious remembering!  Sunday,---with nothing to do but attend to
my own bodily comforts.

I pulled my legs back into the bed in order to start the day correctly.
I lay and stretched myself, then, very leisurely,--always remembering
that it was the Sabbath,--I put one foot out and then the other, until,
at last, I stood on the floor, really and truly up and awake.

Jake had been around.  I could see traces of him in the yard, though he
was nowhere visible in the  flesh.

After I had breakfasted and made my bed (I know little Maisie Brant,
who used to make my bed away back over in the old home--little Maisie
who had wept at my departure, would have laughed till she wept again,
had she seen my woful endeavours to straighten out my sheets and smooth
my pillow.  But then, she was not there to see and laugh and--I was
quite satisfied with my handiwork and satisfied that I would be able to
sleep soundly in the bed when the night should come again)--I hunted
the shelves for a book.

Stevenson, Poe, Scott, Hugo, Wells, Barrie, Dumas, Twain, Emerson,
Byron, Longfellow, Burns,--which should it be?

Back along the line I went, and chose--oh, well!--an old favourite I
had read many times before.

I hunted out a hammock and slung it comfortably from the posts on the
front veranda, where I could lie and smoke and read; also where I could
look away across the Bay and rest my eyes on the quiet scene when they
should grow weary.

Late in the afternoon, when I was beginning to grow tired of my
indolence, I heard the thud, thud of a gasoline launch as it came up
the Bay.  It passed between Rita's Isle and the wharf, and held on,
turning in to Jake Meaghan's cove.

I wondered who the visitor could be, then I went back to my reading.

Not long after, a shadow fell across my book and I jumped up.

"Pray, don't let me disturb you, my son," said a soft, well-modulated,
masculine voice.  "Stay where you are.  Enjoy your well-earned rest."

A little, frail-looking, pale-faced, elderly gentleman was at my elbow.

He smiled at me with the smile of an angel, and my heart went out to
him at once, so much so that I could have hugged him in my arms.

"My name is William Auld," he continued.  "I am the medical missionary.
What is yours, my son?"

He held out his hand to me.

"George Bremner," I replied, gripping his.  "Let me bring you a chair."

I went inside, and when I returned he was turning over the leaves of my
book.

"So you are a book lover?" he mused.  "Well, I would to God more men
were book lovers, for then the world would be a better place to live
in, or rather, the men in it would be better to live among.

"Victor Hugo,--'Les Miserables'!--" he went on.  "To my mind, the
greatest of all novelists and the greatest of all novels."

He laid the book aside, and sought my confidences, not as a preacher,
not as a pedagog, but as a friend; making no effort to probe my past,
seeking no secrets; but all anxiety for my welfare; keen to know my
ambitions, my aspirations, my pastimes and my habits of living; open
and frank in telling me of himself.  He was a man's man, with the
experience of men that one gets only by years of close contact.

"For twenty years it has been God's will to allow me to travel up and
down this beloved coast and minister to those who need me."

"You must like the work, sir," I ventured.

"Like it!--oh! yes, yes,---I would not exchange my post for the City
Temple of London, England."

"But such toil must be arduous, Mr. Auld, for you are not a young man
and you do not look altogether a robust one."

He paused in meditation.  "It is arduous, sometimes;--to-day I have
talked to the men at eight camps and I have visited fourteen families
at different points on my journey.  But, if I were to stop, who would
look after my beloved people in the ranches all up the coast; who would
care for my easily-led, simple-hearted brethren in the logging camps,
every one of whom knows me, confides in me and looks forward to my
coming; not one of whom but would part with his coat for me, not one
who would harm a hair of my head.  I shall not stop, Mr. Bremner,--I
have no desire to stop, not till God calls me.

"I see you have been making changes even in your short time here," he
said, pointing to the store.

"Yes!  I think Jake and I did fairly well yesterday," I answered, not a
little proudly.

"Splendidly, my boy!  And, do you know,--your coming here means a great
deal.  It is the commencement of a new departure, for your store is
going to prove a great boon to the settlers.  They have been talking
about it and looking forward to it ever since it was first mooted.

"But it will not be altogether smooth sailing for you, for you must
keep a close rein on your credit."

It struck me, as he spoke, that he was the very man I was desirous of
meeting regarding what I considered would prove my stumbling block.

"Can you spare me half an hour, sir, and have tea with me?" I asked.

"Yes! gladly, for my day's service is over,--all but one call, and a
cup of tea is always refreshing."

I showed him inside and set him in my cosiest chair.  While I busied
with the table things,--washing some dishes as a usual preliminary,--I
approached the subject.

"Mr. Auld,--I wished to ask your advice, for I am sure you can assist
me.  My employer, Mr. Horsfal, has given me a free hand regarding
credit to the settlers.  I know none of them and I am afraid that,
without guidance, I may offend some or land the business in trouble
with others.  Will you help me, sir?"

"Why--of course, I'll help."

He took a sheet of paper from his pocket and commenced to write,
talking to me as he did so.

"You know, if times are at all good, you can trust the average man who
owns the ranch he lives on to pay his grocery bills sooner or later.
Still, if I were you, I wouldn't let any of them get into debt more
than sixty or seventy dollars, for they do not require to, and, once
they get in arrears, they have difficulty in getting out.

"It is the floating population,--the here-to-day-and-away-to-morrow
people who should not be given credit.  And,--Mr. Bremner, if you
desire to act in kindness to the men themselves, do not allow the
loggers, who come in here, to run up bills for themselves personally.
Not that they are more dishonest than other people,--far from it.  I
find it generally the other way round,--but they are notoriously
improvident; inclined,--God bless them,--to live for the fleeting
moment.

"In many ways they are like children in their simplicity and their
waywardness,--and their lot is not one of roses and honeysuckle.  They
make good money and can afford to pay as they go.  If they cannot pay,
they can easily wait for what they want until they can, for they are
well fed and well housed while in the camps."

We sat down at the table together.

"There is a list, George.  May I call you George?  It is so much more
friendly."

I nodded in hearty approval.

"It is not by any means complete, but it contains the principal people
among your near-hand neighbours.  You can trust them to pay their last
cent: Neil Andrews, Semple, Smith, Johannson, Doolan, MacAllister and
Gourlay.

"Any others who may call,--make them pay; and I shall be glad to inform
you about them when I am this way again."

"How often do you come in here, Mr. Auld?"

"I try to make it, at least, once in two weeks, but I am not always
successful.  I like to visit Jake Meaghan.  Poor, old, faithful,
plodding Jake,--how I tried, at first, to extract the thorn from his
flesh--the accursed drink!  I talked to him, I scolded him, I
threatened him, but,--poor Jake,--he and his whisky are one, and
nothing but death will ever separate them."

Suddenly his face lit up and his eyes seemed to catch fire.

"And who are we to judge?" he said, as if denying some inward question.
"What right have we to think for a moment that this inherent weakness
shall deprive Jake Meaghan of eternal happiness?  He is honest; he does
good in his own little sphere; he harms no one but himself, for he
hasn't a dependent in the world.  He fills a niche in God's plan; he is
still God's child, no matter how erring he may be.  He is some mother's
son.  George,--I am fully persuaded that my God, and your God, will not
be hard on old Jake when his time comes; and, do you know, sometimes I
think that time is not very far off."

We sat silent for a while, then the minister spoke again:

"Tell me, George,--have you met any of your neighbours yet?"

"Only two," I said, "Jake, and Rita Clark."

He raised his white, bushy eyebrows.

"So you have met Rita!  She's a strange child; harboured in a strange
home."

He sighed at some passing thought.

"It's a queer world,--or rather, it's a good world with queer people in
it.  One would expect to find love and harmony in the home every time
away up here, but it does not always follow.  Old Margaret Clark is the
gentlest, dearest, most patient soul living.  Andrew Clark is a good
man in every way but one,--but in that one he is the Rock of Gibraltar
itself, or, to go nearer the place of his birth, Ailsa Craig, that old
milestone that stands defiantly between Scotland and Ireland.  Andrew
Clark is immovable.  He is hard, relentless, fanatical in his ideas of
right and wrong; cruel to himself and to the woman he vowed to love and
cherish.  Oh!--he sears my heart every time I think of him.  Yet, he is
living up to his idea of what is right."

The white-haired old gentleman,--bearer of the burdens of his
fellows,--did not confide in me as to the nature of Andrew Clark's
trouble, and it was not for me to probe.

"As for Rita," he pursued, "poor, little Rita!--she is no relative of
either Margaret or Andrew Clark.  She is a child of the sea.  Hers is a
pitiful story, and I betray no confidences in telling you of it, for it
is common property.

"Fourteen years ago a launch put into the Bay and anchored at the
entrance to Jake's cove.  There were several ladies and gentlemen in
her, and one little girl.  They picnicked on the beach and, in the
evening, they dined aboard, singing and laughing until after midnight.
Jake was the only one who saw or heard them, and he swears they were
not English-spoken.  Though they were gay and pleasure-loving, yet they
seemed to be of a superior class of people.

"He awoke before daylight, fancying he heard screams in the location of
The Ghoul Rock.  He got up and, so certain was he that he had not been
mistaken, he got into his boat and rowed out and round The Ghoul,--for
the night was calm,--but everything was quiet and peaceful out there.

"Next morning, while Joe Clark was scampering along the shore, he came
across the unconscious form of a little girl about four years old, clad
only in a nightdress and roped roughly to an unmarked life-belt.  Joe
carried her in to his grandfather, old Andrew, who worked over her for
more than an hour; and at last succeeded in bringing her round.

"All she could say then was, "Rita, Rita, Rita," although, about a year
afterwards, she started to hum and sing a little Spanish dancing song.
A peculiar reversion of memory, for she certainly never heard such a
song in Golden Crescent.

"Jake swears to this day that she belonged to the launch party, who
must have run sheer into The Ghoul Rock and gone down.

"Little boy Joe pleaded with his grandfather and grandmother to keep
the tiny girl the sea had given them, and they did not need much
coaxing, for she was pretty and attractive from the first.

"Inquiries were set afoot, but, from that day to this, not a clue has
been found as to her identity; so, Rita Clark she is and Rita Clark she
will remain until some fellow, worthy of her I hope, wins her and
changes her name.

"I thought at one time, Joe Clark would claim her and her name would
not be changed after all, but since Joe has seen some of the outside
world and has been meeting with all kinds of people, he has grown
patronising and changeable with women, as he is domineering and
bullying with men.

"He treats Rita as if he expected her to be continually at his call
should he desire her, and yet he were at liberty to choose when and
where he please."

"But, does Rita care for him?" I asked.

"Seems so at times," he answered, "but of late I have noticed a
coldness in her at the mention of his name; just as if she resented his
airs of one-sided proprietorship and were trying to decide with herself
to tolerate no more of it.

"I tried to veer round to the subject with Joe once, but he swore an
oath and told me to mind my own affairs.  What Joe Clark needs is
opposition.  Yet Joe is a good fellow, strong and daring as a lion and
aggressive to a degree."

I was deeply interested as the old minister told the story, and it was
like bringing me up suddenly when he stopped.  I had no idea how fast
the time had been passing.

Well I could understand now why this Rita Clark intuitively hated The
Ghoul Rock.  Who, in her place, would feel otherwise?

The Rev. William Auld rose from the table.

"I must go now, my son, for the way is long.  Thanks so much for the
rest and for your hospitality.  My only exhortation to you is, stand
firm by all the principles you know to be true; never lose hold of the
vital things because you are here in the wilds, for it is here the
vital things count, more than in the whirr of civilisation."

"Thank you, sir.  I'll try," I said.  "You will come again, I hope."

"Certainly I shall.  Even if you did not ask me, for that is my duty.

"If you accompany me as far as Jake's cove, where my launch is, I think
I can furnish you with a paper from your countryside.  I have friends
in the city, in the States and in England, who supply me, every week,
with American and Old Country papers.  There are so many men from both
lands in the camps and settled along the coast and they all so dearly
love a newspaper.  I generally try to give them what has been issued
nearest their own home towns."

I rowed Mr. Auld over to his launch and wished him good-bye, receiving
from his kindly old hands a copy of _The Northern Examiner_, dated
three days after I had left Brammerton.

It was like meeting with an old friend, whom I had expected never to
meet again.  I put it in my inside pocket for consideration when I
should get back to my bungalow with plenty of time to enjoy it.

I dropped in to Jake's shack, for I had not seen him all the sleepy
day.  I found him sitting in perfect content, buried up over the eyes
in a current issue of _The Northern Lights_,--a Dawson newspaper, which
had been in existence since the old Klondike days and was much relished
by old-timers.

The dog was curled up near the stove, sleeping off certain effects;
Jake was at his second cup of whisky.  I left them to the peace and
sanctity of their Sabbath evening and rowed back to "Paradise
Regained," as I had already christened my bungalow.

I sat down on the steps of the veranda, to peruse the home paper which
the minister had left with me, and it was not long before I was
startled by a flaring headline.  The blood rushed from my face to my
heart and seemed as if it would burst that great, throbbing organ:--


"SUDDEN DEATH OF THE EARL OF BRAMMERTON AND HAZELMERE."


My eyes scanned the notice.

"News has been telegraphed that the Earl of Brammerton and Hazelmere
died suddenly of heart failure at his country residence, Hazelmere.
His demise has caused a profound sensation, as it occurred on the eve
of a House Party, arranged in celebration of the engagement of his son,
Viscount Harry Brammerton, Captain of the Coldstream Guards, to the
beautiful Lady Rosemary Granton, daughter of the late General Frederick
Granton, who was the companion and dearest friend of the late Earl of
Brammerton in the early days of their campaigning in the Crimea and
India."

A long obituary notice followed, concluding with the following
paragraph:


"It is given out that the marriage of the present Earl with Lady
Granton has been postponed and that, after the necessary business
formalities have been attended to, Captain Harry will join his regiment
in Egypt for a short term.

"Lady Rosemary Granton has gone to New York, at the cabled invitation
of some old family friends."

"It is understood that the Hon. George Brammerton, second and only
other son of the late Earl, is presently on a long walking tour in
Europe.  His whereabouts are unknown and he is still in ignorance of
his father's death."


The pain of that sudden announcement, so soon after I had left home and
right on the eve of my new endeavours, no one shall ever know.

My dear old father!  Angry at my alleged eccentricities sometimes, but
ever ready to forgive,--was gone: doubtless, passing away with a
message of forgiveness to me on his lips.

And,--after the pain of it, came the conflict.

Had what I had done caused or in any way hastened my father's death?
Admitting that Harry's fault was great and unforgiveable, would it not
have been better had I allowed it to remain in obscurity, at least for
a time?  Was the keeping of the family name unsullied, was the
untarnished honour of our ancient family motto, "Clean,--within and
without," of greater importance than my father's life?  Was it my duty
to be an unintentional and silent partner to the keeping of vital
intelligence from the fair Lady Rosemary?

Over all,--had I done right or wrong?

What did duty now demand of me?  Should I hurry home and face the fresh
problems there which were sure to arise now that Harry had succeeded to
the titles and estates?  Should I remain by the post I had accepted
from the hands of Mr. K. B. Horsfal and test thoroughly this new and
exhilarating life which, so far, I had merely tasted?

I had no doubts as to what my inclinations and desires were.  But it
was not a question of inclinations and desires:--it was simply one of
duty.

All night long, I sat on the veranda steps with my elbows on my knees
and my head in my upturned hands, fighting my battle; until, at last,
when the grey was creeping up over the hills behind me and touching the
dark surface of the sea in front here and there with mellow lights, I
rose and went in to the house,--my conscience clear as the breaking
day, my mind at rest like the rose-coloured tops of the mountains.

I had no regrets.  I had done as a true Brammerton should.  I had done
the right.

I would not go back;--not yet.  I would remain here for a while in my
obscurity, testing out the new life and executing as faithfully as I
knew how the new duties I had voluntarily assumed.

Further,--for my peace of mind,--so long as I remained in Golden
Crescent, I decided I would not cast my eyes over the columns of any
newspaper coming from the British Isles.  If I were to be done with the
old life, I must be done with it in every way.




CHAPTER XII

Joe Clark, Bully

With the advent of Monday morning, the Golden Crescent Trading Company,
in charge of George Bremner, handyman, store-clerk, bookkeeper, buyer
and general superintendent,--opened its doors for business.

I was not overburdened with customers, for which I was not sorry, as I
had lots to do fixing the prices of my stock and setting it to rights.

But the arrival of the mail by the Tuesday steamer brought Neil
Andrews, Doolan, Gourlay and the stern, but honest-faced old Scot,
Andrew Clark, all at different times during the afternoon.  Not one of
them could resist the temptation and go away without making some
substantial purchases.

I held religiously to the Rev. William Auld's list, but I found, in
most cases, that my customers were prepared to pay for their first
orders, at any rate, in cash; and, of course, I did not discourage them.

On Wednesday, a launch, with three men in her, put in from No. 1 camp
at Susquahamma, bearing an order as long as my arm, duly endorsed in a
business-like way and all according to requirements.

It took me most of the afternoon to put that order up.  The men did not
seem to mind, as they reckoned the going and returning to camp a
well-nigh all-day job for them.  They made Jake's shack their
headquarters, spending all of the last two hours of their time in his
cabin.

Thursday brought another launch, this time from Camp No. 3, and the
same process was gone through as with No. 1, including the visit of the
visitors to Jake's shack.

In an ordinary case, I would have been beginning to fear that that
shack had become a common shebeen, but I knew Jake was not the man to
accept money from any of his fellow creatures in exchange for any
hospitality it might be in his power to offer.  A few days later came a
repeat order from No. 1 Camp, then a request from the Cannery, which I
was able to fill only in part, as many things required by them had not
been included in the original orders given to the Vancouver wholesalers.

I was beginning to wonder where Camp No. 2 was getting its supplies
from, when, one day, about two weeks after my opening, they showed up.

Two men came over in a fast-moving launch of a much better type than
those in use by the other camps.  The men were big and burly fellows.
One of them was unmistakably Irish; the other looked of Swedish
extraction.

"You the man that looks after this joint?" asked the Swede.

"I am," I answered.

He looked me up and down, for I was on the same side of the counter as
they.  Then he turned to his Irish companion with a grin.

"Say, mister,--where's your hoss?" he asked, addressing me.

Both laughed loudly.

At first I failed to see the point of hilarity.

"What is the joke?" I asked.

"Guess you are!" said the Swede.  And the two men laughed louder than
ever.

"Look here!" I cried, my blood getting up, "I want you two to
understand, first go off, that I am not in the habit of standing up to
be grinned at.  What do you want?  Speak out your business or get out
of here and tumble back into your boat."

"Ach!--it's all right, matey," put in the Irishman.  "Just a bit av fun
out av yer breeches and leggings.  We Canucks don't wear breeches and
leggings in grocery stores.  Do we, Jan?"

"Guess nit," said Jan.  And they both laughed again.

I cooled down, thinking if that were all their joke they were welcome
to it, for I had already found my breeches and leggings mighty handy
for getting through the bush with and for tumbling in and out of leaky
rowing boats.

I grinned.  "All right, fellows," I cried, "laugh all you want and I'll
leave you a legging each as a legacy when I die."

"Say, sonny,--you're all right!" he exclaimed.

Good humour returned all round.

"We're from No. 2 Camp at Cromer Bay and we want a bunch of stuff."

"Where is your list and I'll try to fill it?" I inquired.

The Swede handed over a long order, badly scrawled on the back of a
paper bag.  The order was unstamped and unsigned, and not on the
company's order form.

"This is not any good," I said.  "Where is the company's order?"

The Swede looked blankly at the Irishman, and the Irishman gazed
dreamily at the Swede.

"Guess that's good enough.  Ain't it, Dan?"

"Shure!" seconded Dan.

"It can't be done, boys," I said.  "Sorry,--but I have my instructions
and they must be followed out."

I handed back the list.

The Swede stared at it and then over at me.

"Ain't you goin' to fill this?"

"No!"

"Well, I'll be gosh-dinged!  Say! sonny,--there'll be a hearse here for
you to-morrow.  The boss wrote this."

"How am I to know that?" I retorted.

"Damned if I know," he returned, scratching his forelock.  "But it'll
be merry hell to pay if we go back without this bunch of dope."

"And it might be the devil to pay, if I gave you the goods without a
proper order," I followed up.

"Some of this stuff's for to-morrow's grubstake," put in the Swede,
"and most of the hardware's wanted for a job first crack out of the box
in the morning."

"Sorry to disoblige you, fellows," I said sincerely, "but your boss
should not have run so close to the wind.  Further, I am going to work
this store right and that from the very beginning."

"And you're not goin' to fill the boss's own caligeography, or whatever
you call it?" reiterated the Irishman.

"No!"

"Wouldn't that rattle ye?" exclaimed Dan to his friend.

"It do," conceded the Swede, who put his hand into his pocket and
tossed fifteen cents on to the counter.

"Well,--give us ten cents chewing tobacco, and a packet of gum."

I filled this cash order and immediately thereafter the two walked out
of the store and sailed away without another word or even a look behind
them.

I was worried over the incident, for I did not like to think myself in
any way instrumental in depriving the men of anything they might
require for their supper, and it was farthest from my desires to stop
or even hamper the work at Camp No. 2.  But I had been warned that
there was only one way to operate a business and that was on business
lines, according to plan, so my conscience would not permit of any
other course than the one I had taken.

Had the store been my own, I might have acted differently, but it was
merely held by me in trust, which was quite another matter.

Next forenoon, a tug blew her whistle and put into the Bay, coming-to
on the far side of Rita's Isle.  A little later, as I stood behind the
counter writing up some fresh orders to the wholesalers, to replenish
my dwindling stock, a dinghy, with one man at the oars and another
sitting in the stern, appeared round the Island and pointed straight
for the wharf.

The oarsman ran the nose of the boat on the beach and remained where he
was.  The man who had been sitting in the stern sprang out and came
striding in the direction of the store.

He stopped at the door and looked around him, ignoring my presence the
while.

What a magnificent specimen of a man he was!  Never in my life had I
seen such a man, and, with all the sight-seeing I have done since, I
have never met such another.

I fancied, with my five feet eleven inches, that I was of a good
height; but this giant stood six feet four inches, if he stood an inch.
He looked quite boyish; not a day older than twenty-two.  His hair was
very fair and wavy, and he had plenty of it.

He was cleanly shaven and cleanly and neatly dressed.  His eyes were
big and sky blue in colour.  They were eyes that could be warm or cold
at will.  Just then, they were passively cold.

His was a good face, reflecting strength and determination, while
honesty, straight-forwardness and absolute fearlessness lent a charm to
it that it otherwise would have lacked.

After all, it was the glory of his stature that attracted me, as he
stood, framed by the door, dressed in his high logging boots, with
khaki-coloured trousers and a shirt to match; a soft felt hat on the
back of his head set a little sportily to one side.

Myself an admirer of the human form, a lover of muscle and sinew,

And what a sense of contrast did the sight awaken in his mind.  The
vessel was probably one of the Union Company's mail steamships, coasting
round to Natal.  How plainly he would conjure up the scene upon her
decks, the passengers striving to while away the tediousness of their
floating captivity with chess and draughts--the latter of divers kinds--
with books and tobacco, with chat and flirtation; whereas, here he was,
at no very great distance either, undergoing, in this savage wilderness,
a captivity which was terribly real--a prisoner of war among a tribe of
sullen and partially crushed barbarians, with almost certain death, as a
sacrifice to their slain compatriots, staring him in the face, and a
strong probability of that death being a cruel and lingering one withal.
And the pure rays of the newly risen sun shone forth joyously upon that
blue surface, and a whiff of strong salt air seemed borne in upon them
from the bosom of the wide, free ocean.

For some minutes the Kafirs stood, talking, laughing like children as
they gazed upon the long, low form of the distant steamship, concerning
which many of their quaint remarks and conjectures would have been
amusing enough at any other time.  And, as if anything was wanting to
keep him alive to the peril of his position, Hlangani, stepping to the
prisoner's side, observed:

"The time has come to blind you, Ixeshane."

The words were grim enough in all conscience--frightful enough to more
than justify the start which Eustace could not repress, as he turned to
the speaker.  But a glance was enough to reassure him.  The chief
advanced toward him, holding nothing more formidable than a folded
handkerchief.

To the ordeal of being blindfolded Eustace submitted without a word.  He
recognised its force.  They were nearing their destination.  Even a
captive, probably foredoomed to death, was not to be allowed to take
mental notes of the approaches to the present retreat of the Paramount
Chief.  Besides, by insuring such ignorance, they would render any
chance of his possible escape the more futile.  But as he walked,
steered by one of his escort, who kept a hand on his shoulder, he
concentrated every faculty, short of the sight of which he was
temporarily deprived, upon observations relating to the lay of the
ground.  One thing he knew.  Wherever they might be they were at no
great distance from the sea coast.  That was something.

Suddenly a diversion occurred.  A long, loud, peculiar cry sounded from
some distance in front.  It was a signal.  As it was answered by the
returning warriors, once more the wild war-song was raised, and being
taken up all along the line, the forest echoed with the thunderous roar
of the savage strophe, and the clash of weapons beating time to the
weird and thrilling chant.  For some minutes thus they marched; then by
the sound Eustace knew that his escort was forming up in martial array
around him; knew moreover, from this circumstance, that the forest had
come to an end.  Then the bandage was suddenly removed from his eyes.

The abrupt transition from darkness to light was bewildering.  But he
made out that he was standing in front of a hut, which his captors were
ordering him to enter.  In the momentary glance which he could obtain he
saw that other huts were standing around, and beyond the crowd of armed
men which encompassed him he could descry the faces of women and
children gazing at him with mingled curiosity and wonder.  Then,
stooping, he crept through the low doorway.  Two of his guards entered
with him, and to his unspeakable gratification their first act was to
relieve him of the _reim_ which secured his arms.  This done, a woman
appeared bearing a calabash of curdled milk and a little reed basket of
stamped mealies.

"Here is food for you, _Umlungu_," said one of them.  "And now you can
rest until--until you are wanted.  But do not go outside," he added,
shortly, and with a significant grip of his assegai.  Then they went
out, fastening the wicker screen that served as a door behind them, and
Eustace was left alone.

The interior of the hut was cool, if a trifle grimy, and there were
rather fewer cockroaches than usual disporting themselves among the
domed thatch of the roof--possibly owing to the tenement being of recent
construction.  But Eustace was dead tired and the shelter and solitude
were more than welcome to him just then.  The curdled milk and mealies
were both refreshing and satisfying.  Having finished his meal he
lighted his pipe, for his captors had deprived him of nothing but his
weapons, and proceeded to think out the situation.  But nature asserted
herself.  Before he had taken a dozen whiffs he fell fast asleep.

How long he slept he could not tell, but it must have been some hours.
He awoke with a start of bewilderment, for his slumber had been a heavy
and dreamless one: the slumber of exhaustion.  Opening his eyes to the
subdued gloom of the hut he hardly knew where he was.  The atmosphere of
that primitive and ill-ventilated tenement was stuffy and oppressive
with an effluvium of grease and smoke, and the cockroaches were running
over his face and hands.  Then the situation came back to him with a
rush.  He was a prisoner.

There was not much doing outside, to judge by the tranquillity that
reigned.  He could hear the deep inflections of voices carrying on a
languid conversation, and occasionally the shrill squall of an infant.
His watch had stopped, but he guessed it to be about the middle of the
afternoon.

He was about to make an attempt at undoing the door, but remembering the
parting injunction of his guard, he judged it better not.  At the same
time it occurred to him that he had not yet investigated the cause of
the saving of his life.  Here was a grand opportunity.

Cautiously, and with one ear on the alert for interruption, he took the
silver box from the inside pocket in which it was kept.  Removing the
chamois leather covering, which showed a clean cut an inch long, he
gazed with astonishment upon, the box itself.  The assegai had struck it
fair, and there in the centre of the lid its point, broken off flush,
remained firmly embedded.  He turned the box over.  The point had just
indented the other side but not sufficiently to show through.

For some minutes he sat gazing upon it, with a strange mixture of
feeling, and well he might.  This last gift of Eanswyth's had been the
means of saving his life--it and it alone.  It had lain over his heart,
and but for its intervention that sure and powerfully directed stroke
would have cleft his heart in twain.  That was absolutely a fact, and
one established beyond any sort of doubt.

Her hand had averted the death-stroke--the shield of her love had stood
between him and certain destruction.  Surely--surely that love could not
be so unlawful--so accursed a thing.  It had availed to save him--to
save him for itself.  Eustace was not a superstitious man, but even he
might, to a certain extent, feel justified in drawing a highly
favourable augury from the circumstance.  Yet he was not out of his
difficulties--his perils--yet.  They had, in fact, only just begun; and
this he knew.

So far his captors had not ill-treated him, rather the reverse.  But
this augured next to nothing either way.  The Gcalekas had suffered
severe losses.  Even now they were in hiding.  They were not likely to
be in a very merciful mood in dealing with a white prisoner, one of the
hated race which had shot down their righting men, driven them from
their country, and carried off most of their cattle.  The people would
clamour for his blood, the chiefs would hardly care to run counter to
their wish--he would probably be handed over to the witch-doctors and
put to some hideous and lingering death.

It was a frightful thought, coming upon him alone and helpless.  Better
that the former blow had gone home.  He would have met with a swift and
merciful death in the excitement of battle--whereas now?  And then it
crossed his mind that the interposition of the silver box might not have
been a blessing after all, but quite the reverse.  What if it had only
availed to preserve him for a death amid lingering torments?  But no, he
would not think that.  If her love had been the means of preserving him
thus far, it had preserved him for itself.  Yet it was difficult to feel
sanguine with the odds so terribly against him.

What would she do when she heard that Tom had been killed and himself
captured by the savages?  "Were anything to befall you, my heart would
be broken," had been almost her last words, and the recollection of them
tortured him like a red-hot iron, for he had only his own fool-hardiness
to thank that he was in this critical position at all.  Fortunately it
did not occur to him that he might be reported dead, instead of merely
missing.

His reflections were interrupted.  A great noise arose without--voices--
then the steady tramp of feet--the clash of weapons--and over and above
all, the weird, thrilling rhythmical chant of the war-song.  He had just
time to restore the silver box to its place, when the door of the hut
was flung open and there entered three Kafirs fully armed.  They ordered
him to rise immediately and pass outside.



CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.

THE PARAMOUNT CHIEF.

The spectacle which met Eustace's eyes, on emerging from the dark and
stuffy hut, struck him as grand and stirring in the extreme.

He saw around him an open clearing, a large natural amphitheatre,
surrounded by dense forest on three sides, the fourth being constituted
by a line of jagged rocks more or less bush-grown.  Groups of hastily
constructed huts, in shape and material resembling huge beehives, stood
around in an irregular circle, leaving a large open space in the centre.
And into this space was defiling a great mass of armed warriors.

On they came, marching in columns, the air vibrating to the roar of
their terrible war-song.  On they came, a wild and fierce array, in
their fantastic war dresses--the glint of their assegai blades dancing
in the sunlight like the ripples of a shining sea.  They were marching
round the great open space.

Into this muster of fierce and excited savages Eustace found himself
guided.  If the demeanour of his guards had hitherto been good-humoured
and friendly, it was so no longer.  Those immediately about him kept
turning to brandish their assegais in his face as they marched, going
through the pantomime of carving him to pieces, uttering taunts and
threats of the most blood-curdling character.

"_Hau umlungu_!  Are you cold?  The fire will soon be ready.  Then you
will be warm--warm, ha-ha!" they sang, rubbing their hands and spreading
them out before an imaginary blaze.  "The wood is hot--ah-ah!  It burns!
ah-ah!"  And then they would skip first on one foot, then on another, as
if trying to avoid a carpeting of glowing coals.  Or, "The fighting men
of the Ama-Gcaleka are thirsty.  But they will soon have to drink.
Blood--plenty of blood--the drink of warriors--the drink that shall make
their hearts strong.  _Hau_!"  And at this they would feign to stab the
prisoner--bringing their blades near enough to have frightened a nervous
man out of his wits.  Or again: "The ants are hungry.  The black ants
are swarming for their food.  It shall soon be theirs.  Ha-ha!  They
want it alive.  They want eyes.  They want brains.  They want blood!
Ha-ha!  The black, ants are swarming for their food."  Here the savages
would squirm and wriggle as in imitation of a man being devoured alive
by insects.  For this was an allusion to a highly popular barbarity
among these children of Nature; one not unfrequently meted out to those
who had incurred the envy or hostility of the chiefs and witch-doctors,
and had been "smelt out" accordingly.

When all were gathered within the open space the war chant ceased.  The
great muster of excited barbarians had formed up into crescent rank and
now dropped into a squatting posture.  To the open side of this,
escorted by about fifty warriors, the prisoner was marched.

As he passed through that sea of fierce eyes, all turned on him with a
bloodthirsty stare, between that great crowd of savage forms, squatted
around like tigers on the crouch, Eustace felt his pulses quicken.  The
critical time had arrived.

Even at that perilous moment he took in the place and its surroundings.
He noted the faces of women, behind the dark serried ranks of the
warriors, peering eagerly at him.  There were, however, but few, and
they wore a crushed and anxious look.  He noted, further, that the huts
were of recent and hasty construction, and that the cattle inclosure was
small and scantily stocked.  All this pointed to the conclusion that the
kraal was a temporary one.  The bulk of the women and cattle would be
stowed away in some more secure hiding place.  Only for a moment,
however, was he thus suffered to look around.  His thoughts were quickly
diverted to a far more important consideration.

His guards had fallen back a few paces, leaving him standing alone.  In
front, seated on the ground, was a group consisting of a dozen or
fourteen persons, all eyeing him narrowly.  These he judged to be the
principal chiefs and councillors of the Gcaleka tribe.  One glance at
the most prominent figure among these convinced him that he stood in the
presence of the Paramount Chief himself.

Kreli, or Sarili, as the name is accurately rendered--the former being,
however, that by which he was popularly, indeed, historically known--the
chief of the Gcalekas and the suzerain head of all the Xosa race, was at
that time about sixty years of age.  Tall and erect in person, dignified
in demeanour, despising gimcrack and chimney-pot hat counterfeits of
civilisation, he was every inch a fine specimen of the savage ruler.
His shrewd, massive countenance showed character in every line, and the
glance of his keen eyes was straight and manly.  His beard, thick and
bushy for a Kafir, was only just beginning to show a frost of grey among
its jetty blackness.  Such was the man before whom Eustace Milne stood--
so to speak--arraigned.

For some moments the august group sat eyeing the prisoner in silence.
Eustace, keenly observing those dark impassive faces, realised that
there was not one there which was known to him.  He had seen Hlangani's
gigantic form, resplendent or the reverse in the most wildly elaborate
war costume, seated among the fighting men.  Here in the group before
him all were strangers.

While some of his chiefs were arrayed in costumes of plumes and skins
and cow-tails exceeding fantastic, Kreli himself had eschewed all
martial adornments.  An ample red blanket swathed his person, and above
his left elbow he wore the thick ivory armlet affected by most Kafirs of
rank or position.  But there was that about his personality which marked
him out from the rest.  Eustace, gazing upon the arbiter of his fate,
realised that the latter looked every inch a chief--every inch a man.

"Why do you come here making war upon me and my people, _umlungu_!" said
the chief, shortly.

"There is war between our races," answered Eustace.  "It is every man's
duty to fight for his nation, at the command of his chief."

"Who ordered you to take up arms against us?  You are not a soldier, nor
are you a policeman."

This was hard hitting.  Eustace felt a trifle nonplussed.  But he
conceived that boldness would best answer his purpose.

"There were not enough regular troops or Police to stand against the
might of the Gcaleka nation," he replied.  "Those of us who owned
property were obliged to take up arms in defence of our property."

"Was your property on the eastern side of the Kei?  Was it on this side
of the Bashi?" pursued the chief.  "When a man's house is threatened
does he go four days' journey away from it in order to protect it?"  A
hum of assent--a sort of native equivalent for "Hear, hear," went up
from the councillors at this hard hit.

"Do I understand the chief to mean that we whose property lay along the
border were to wait quietly for the Gcaleka forces to come and `eat us
up' while we were unprepared?" said Eustace quietly.  "That because we
were not on your side of the Kei we were to do nothing to defend
ourselves; to wait until your people should cross the river?"

"Does a dog yelp out before he is kicked?"

"Does it help him, anyway, to do so after?" replied the prisoner, with a
slight smile over this new rendering of an old proverb.  "But the chief
cannot be talking seriously.  He is joking."

"_Hau_!" burst forth the _amapakati_ in mingled surprise and resentment.

"You are a bold man, _umlungu_," said Kreli, frowning.  "Do you know
that I hold your life in my hand?"

This was coming to the point with a vengeance.  Eustace realised that,
like Agag, he must "walk delicately."  It would not do to take up a
defiant attitude.  On the other hand to show any sign of trepidation
might prove equally disastrous.  He elected to steer as near as possible
a middle course.

"That is so," he replied.  "I am as anxious to live as most people.  But
this is war-time.  When a man goes to war he does not lock up his life
behind him at home.  What would the Great Chief gain by my death?"

"His people's pleasure," replied Kreli, with sombre significance, waving
a hand in the direction of the armed crowd squatted around.  Then
turning, he began conferring in a low tone with his councillors, with
the result that presently one of the latter directed that the prisoner
should be removed altogether beyond earshot.

Eustace accordingly was marched a sufficient distance from the debating
group, a move which brought him close to the ranks of armed warriors.
Many of the latter amused themselves by going through a wordless, but
highly suggestive performance illustrative of the fate they hoped
awaited him.  One would imitate the cutting out of a tongue, another the
gouging of an eye, etc., all grinning the while in high glee.

Even Eustace, strong-nerved as he was, began to feel the horrible strain
of the suspense.  He glanced towards the group of chiefs and _amapakati_
much as the prisoner in the dock might eye the door of the room where
the jury was locked up.  He began talking to his guards by way of
diversion.

"Who is that with Hlangani, who has just joined the _amapakati_?" he
asked.

"Ukiva."

He looked with new interest at the warrior in question, in whose name he
recognised that of a fighting chief of some note, and who was reported
to have commanded the enemy in the fight with Shelton's patrol.

"And the man half standing up--who is he?"

"Sigcau--the great chief's first son.  _Whau umlungu_!" broke off his
informant.  "You speak with our tongue even as one of ourselves.  Yet
the chiefs and principal men of the House of Gcaleka are unknown lo you
by sight."

"Those of the House of Gaika are not.  Tell me.  Which is Botmane?"

"Botmane?  Lo!" replied several of the Kafirs emphatically.  "He next to
the Great Chief."

Eustace looked with keen interest upon the man pointed out--an old man
with a grey head, and a shrewd, but kindly natured face.  He was Kreli's
principal councillor and at that time was reported to be somewhat in
disfavour by reason of having been strenuously opposed to a war with the
whites.  He was well-known to Eustace by name; in fact the latter had
once, to his considerable chagrin, just missed meeting him on the
occasion of a political visit he had made to the Komgha some months
previously.

Meanwhile the prisoner might well feel anxious as he watched the group
of _amapakati_, for they were debating nothing less than the question
whether he should be put to death or not.

The chief Kreli was by no means a cruel or bloodthirsty ruler--and he
was a tolerably astute one.  It is far from certain that he himself had
ever been in favour of making war at that time.  He was too shrewd and
far-seeing to imagine that success could possibly attend his arms in the
long run, but on the other hand he bore a deep and latent grudge against
the English by reason of the death at their hands of his father, Hintza,
who had been made a prisoner not altogether under circumstances of an
unimpeachable kind and shot while attempting to escape.  This had
occurred forty years earlier.

So when the young bloods of the tribe, thirsting for martial
distinction, had forced the hands of their elders and rulers, by
provoking a series of frictions with their Fingo neighbours then under
British protection, the old chief had exercised no very strenuous
opposition to their indulging themselves to the top of their bent.

Having, however, given way to the war spirit, he left no stone unturned
to insure success.  Runners were sent to the Gaika and Hlambi tribes
located in British Kaffraria, viz.: within the Colonial limits--but
although plenty of young men owning those nationalities drifted across
the Kei in squads to join his standard, the bulk of the tribes
themselves were slow to respond to his appeal.  Had it been otherwise,
the position of the border people would have been more serious.  With
the enemy at their very doors they would have found plenty of occupation
at home, instead of being free to pour their forces into the Transkei.
Things, however, had turned out differently.  The Gcaleka country had
been ravaged from end to end, and the old chief was at that moment
practically a fugitive.  It may readily be imagined, therefore, that he
was in rather an ugly humour, and not likely to show much clemency
towards the white prisoner in his power.

There was another consideration which militated against the said
clemency.  Although he had made no allusion to it, it must not be
supposed that Kreli was all this time unaware of the identity of his
prisoner.  The latter's friendship with many of the Gaika rulers was a
rank offence in the eyes of the Paramount Chief just then.  Had he not
sent his "word" to those chiefs, and had not his "word" fallen on ears
dull of hearing?  Instead of rising at his call they were yet "sitting
still."  What more likely than that white men, such as this one, were
influencing them--were advising them contrary to their allegiance to
him, the Paramount Chief?

Some of the _amapakati_ were in favour of sparing the prisoner at
present.  He might be of use to them hereafter.  He seemed not like an
ordinary white man.  He spoke their tongue and understood their customs.
There was no knowing but that he might eventually serve them materially
with his own people.  Others, again, thought they might just as well
give him over to the people to be put to death in their own way.  It
would please the fighting men--many of whom had lost fathers and
brothers at the hands of the whites.  Yet again, one or two more
originated another proposal.  They had heard something of this white man
being a bit of a wizard--that he owned a "charm" which had turned the
blade of a broad assegai from his heart.  Let him be handed over to
Ngcenika, the great witch-doctress.  Let her try whether his "charm" was
too strong for her.

This idea met with something like universal acceptance.  Shrewd and
intelligent as they are in ordinary matters, Kafirs are given to the
most childish superstitions, and, in adopting the above suggestion,
these credulous savages really did look forward to witnessing something
novel in the way of a competition in magic.  In their minds the
experiment was likely to prove a thing worth seeing.

"_Ewa!  Ewa_!"  ["Yes--yes"] they cried emphatically.  "Let Ngcenika be
called."

"So be it," assented Kreli.  "Let the witch-doctress be sought."

But almost before the words had left his lips--there pealed forth a
wild, unearthly shriek--a frightful yell--emanating from the line of
rugged and bush-grown rocks which shut in one side of the clearing.
Chiefs, _amapakati_, warriors--all turned towards the sound, an anxious
expression upon every face--upon many, one of apprehension, of fear.
Even to the white prisoner the interruption was sufficiently startling.
And then there bounded forth into their midst a hideous, a truly
appalling apparition.



CHAPTER THIRTY.

THE WITCH-DOCTRESS.

Man, woman, or demon--which was it?

A grim, massive face, a pair of fierce, rolling eyes, which seemed to
sparkle with a cruel and blood thirsty scintillation, a large, strongly
built trunk, whose conformation alone betrayed the sex of the creature.
Limbs and body were hung around thickly with barbarous "charms" in
hideous and disgusting profusion--birds' heads and claws, frogs and
lizards, snakes' skins, mingling with the fresh and bloody entrails of
some animal.  But the head of this revolting object was simply
demoniacal in aspect.  The hair, instead of being short and woolly, had
been allowed to attain some length, and hung down on each side of the
frightful face in a black, kinky mane, save for two lengths of it,
which, stiffened with some sort of horrid pigment, stood erect like a
couple of long red horns on each side of the wearer's ears.  Between
these "horns," and crowning the creature's head, grinned a human skull,
whose eyeless sockets were smeared round with a broad circle in dark
crimson.  And that nothing should be wanting to complete the diabolical
horror of her appearance, the repulsive and glistening coils of a live
serpent were folding and unfolding about the left arm and shoulder of
the sorceress.

Something like a shudder of fear ran through the ranks of the armed
warriors as they gazed upon this frightful apparition.  Brave men all--
fearless fighters when pitted against equal forces--now they quailed,
sat there in their armed might, thoroughly cowed before this female
fiend.  She would require blood--would demand a life, perhaps several--
that was certain.  Whose would it be?

The wild, beast-like bounds of the witch-doctress subsided into a kind
of half-gliding, half-dancing step--her demoniacal words into a weird
nasal sort of chant--as she approached the chief and his councillors.

"Seek not for Ngcenika, O son of Hintza, father of the children of
Xosa!" she cried in a loud voice, fixing her eyes upon Kreli.  "Seek not
for Ngcenika, O _amapakati_, wise men of the House of Gcaleka, when your
wisdom is defeated by the witchcraft of your enemies.  Seek not
Ngcenika, O ye fighting men, children of the Great Chief, your father,
when your blood is spilled in battle, and your bullets fly harmless from
the bodies of the whites because of the evil wiles of the enemy within
your ranks.  Seek her not, for she is here--here to protect you--here to
`smell out' the evil wizard in your midst.  She needs no seeking; she
needs no calling.  She is here!"

"Ha! ha!" ejaculated the warriors in a kind of gasping roar, for those
ominous words told but too truly what would presently happen.  Not a man
but dreaded that he might be the victim, and in proportion as each man
stood well in rank or possessions, so much the greater was his
apprehension.

"I hear the voices of the shadowy dead!" went on the sorceress, striking
an attitude of intense listening, and gazing upwards over the heads of
her audience.  "I hear their voices like the whispering murmur of many
waters.  I hear them in the air?  No.  I hear them in the roar of the
salt waves of yonder blue sea?  No.  I hear them in the whispering
leaves of the forest--in the echoing voices of the rocks?  No.  In the
sunshine?  No.  I am in the dark--in the dark!" she repeated, raising
her tone to a high, quavering shriek, while her features began to work,
her eyes to roll wildly.  "I am in the gloom of the far depths, and the
world itself is rolling above me.  The air is thick.  I choke.  I
suffocate.  I am in the tomb.  The rock walls close me in.  There are
faces around me--eyes--myriads of eyes--serpent eyes--hissing tongues.
They come about me in the black gloom.  They scorch--they burn.  Ah-ah!"

An awful change had come over the speaker.  Her features were working
convulsively--she foamed at the mouth--her eyes were turned literally
inward so that nothing but the white was visible.  Her body swayed to
and fro in short, irregular jerks, as though avoiding the attack of
unseen enemies.  The live serpent, which, grasped by the neck, she held
aloft in the air, writhed its sinuous length, and with hood expanded and
eyes scintillating, was hissing ferociously.  The effect upon the savage
audience was striking.  Not a word was uttered--not a finger moved.  All
sat motionless, like so many statues of bronze, every eye bent in
awesome entrancement upon the seer.  Even Eustace felt the original
contemptuous interest with which he had watched the performance deepen
into a blood-curdling sort of repulsion.  From the stage of mere
jugglery the case had entered upon one which began to look uncommonly
like genuine diabolical possession.

"I am in the gloom of the depths," shrieked the hideous sorceress, "even
the Home of the Immortal Serpents, which none can find save those who
are beloved of the spirits.  The air is black and thick.  It is shining
with eyes--eyes, eyes--everywhere eyes.  The ground is alive with
serpents, even the spirits of our valiant dead, and they speak.  They
speak but one word and that is `Blood!  Blood--blood--blood!'" repeated
the frightful monster.  "Blood must flow! blood! blood!"  And uttering a
series of deafening howls she fell prone to the earth in frightful
convulsions.

Not one of the spectators moved.  The hideous features working, the eyes
rolling till they seemed about to drop from their sockets, the foam
flying from the lips--the body of Ngcenika seeming to stiffen itself
like a corpse, bounded many feet in the air, and falling to the earth
with a heavy thud, bounded and rebounded again--the festoons of
barbarous and disgusting ornaments which adorned her person, twisting
and untwisting in the air like clusters of snakes.  The live
_rinkhaals_, which had escaped from her grasp, lay coiled in an attitude
of defence, its head reared threateningly.

For some minutes this appalling scene continued.  Then the horrible
contortions of the body ceased.  The witch-doctress lay motionless; the
swollen eyes, the terrible face, set and rigid, staring up to Heaven.
She might have been dead.  So, too, might have been the spectators, so
still, so motionless were they.

The suspense was becoming horrible, the silence crushing.  There was
just a whisper of air among the leaves of the surrounding forest,
causing a faint rustle, otherwise not a sound--not even the distant call
of a bird.  Eustace, gazing upon the motionless dark forms that
surrounded him and upon the immeasurably repulsive figure of the
prostrate demoniac, felt that he could stand it no longer--that he must
do something to break that awful silence even though it should cost him
his life, when an interruption occurred, so sudden, so startling in its
unexpectedness, that he could hardly believe his eyes.

The witch-doctress, who had seemed prone in the powerlessness of extreme
exhaustion for hours at least, suddenly sprang to her feet with a
blood-curdling yell.

"The white wizard!" she shrieked.  "The white wizard!"

"Ha!  The white wizard!  The white wizard!" echoed the warriors,
relieved that the storm had passed them by this time.  "Let us see.  Is
his charm too strong for Ngcenika?"

The time had come.  Though unarmed, Eustace was still unbound.
Instinctively and warily he glanced around, eager to grasp at some means
of doing battle for his life.  But no such means rewarded his glance.

Ngcenika walked up to one of the guards, and laid her hand on the bundle
of assegais which he carried.  The man surrendered it with alacrity,
striving to conceal the apprehension which came over his features as he
came face to face with the terrible witch-doctress.  She chose a
short-handled, broad-bladed stabbing assegai, examined it critically,
and returned to her former position.

Placing the weapon on the ground she proceeded to dance round it in a
circle, chanting a weird, droning incantation.  The prisoner watched her
keenly.  No attempt had been made to bind him.  At last her song ceased.
Grasping the assegai in her powerful right hand, she advanced towards
Eustace.

At a sign from Ngcenika the guards fell back some twenty yards.  Behind
them were the dense ranks of armed warriors, all craning eagerly forward
to watch what was to follow.  At about the same distance in front sat
the group of chiefs and councillors, so that the prisoner and the
sorceress were completely hemmed in.

"White wizard--white dog!" she began, standing within striking distance.
"Wizard indeed!  What is thy magic worth?  Dost thou not fear me?"

Eustace, seeing through the repulsive mass of gew-gaws which represented
the juggling line of business, realised that he had to deal with a
powerful, broadly built, middle-aged woman of about five foot ten.  She
looked hard and muscular, and as strong as any two men--in fact, no mean
antagonist, even had he been similarly armed, and he was unarmed.

"No, I do not fear you," he replied quietly, keeping his eyes upon hers,
like a skilful fencer.  The answer seemed rather to amuse than irritate
her.

"He does not fear me!" she repeated.  "Ha!  _Inyoka_, [Serpent], does he
fear thee!" she cried, darting the serpent's head within a couple of
inches of the prisoner's face.  The reptile hissed hideously, but
Eustace, who knew that it had been rendered harmless, and that it must
long since have spat its venom glands empty, did not allow himself to be
disconcerted by this.  A murmur of wonder arose from the spectators.

[The _rinkhaal_, a variety of cobra, has the faculty of being able, when
angry, to eject an acrid, venomous saliva, to a distance of about six
feet.]

"He is not afraid!  The white wizard is not afraid!" they cried.

"Dost thou dare to stand before me while I strike thee?  Is thy charm
potent enough, O white wizard?" said Ngcenika, raising the assegai in
the air.

"I dare."

"Present thy breast, then.  Give thy heart to my stroke.  Let thy
`charm' protect thee if it can."

A desperate plan had occurred to Eustace--to wrench the assegai from the
hag's hand and make a dash for the forest.  But even concurrently with
the idea, he realised the absolute impracticability of it.  He more,
than doubted his ability to disarm his adversary; he had no doubt at all
as to the certainty of his being seized long before he could accomplish
that feat.  No--he must stand up to the blow.  It was his only chance,
and at any rate his death would be a swift and painless one.

The dark, brawny arm of the sorceress was upraised, her muscular fingers
gripped the assegai haft a few inches from the blade.  The shining
spear-head gleamed aloft.

Not once did his glance wander from that cruel demon-face confronting
him.  Yet between it and him floated the sweet, oval contour of another
very different countenance.

"Love of my life--preserve that life once more for thyself!" he murmured
with the impassioned fervour of an invocation of faith.  His lips moved.

"Ha!  Thou repeatest thy charm, O white wizard," said Ngcenika.  "Is it
stronger than mine?  Is it stronger than mine?"

One might have heard a pin drop.  That fierce, excitable crowd, bending
forward, straining their eyes upon this unwonted scene, held their very
breath as they gazed.

The prisoner stood with chest expanded--erect--facing the
witch-doctress.  There was a flash of light through the air, and the
spear descended.  No writhing body, gushing with blood, sank to the
earth.  The prisoner stood, erect and smiling.

"_Hau_!" cried the warriors.  "The `charm' is too strong.  The white man
is unhurt--_Mawo_!"

Ngcenika could be seen examining the point of her assegai in scowling
concern.  It was completely flattened and turned.

It must not be supposed that Eustace was so simple as to imagine that
the sorceress would strike at the spot where she knew the impediment was
concealed--over his heart, to wit.  That cunning she-devil, as he well
knew, would aim just to the right of this, and would reckon infallibly
upon transfixing him.  Accordingly, while watching the stroke, with
incredible quickness and dexterity he timed himself to swerve slightly
in that direction thus actually catching the point of the weapon upon
the silver box.  Again had the love of Eanswyth stepped between himself
and death.

"Where is the man who owns this spear?" cried the witch-doctress,
suddenly.

With much inward trepidation a warrior stepped forward.

"Thy weapon is bewitched!" cried the hag, in a terrible voice.

The man made no reply.  He thought his doom was sealed.

"Yes, thy weapon is bewitched."  Then raising her voice: "Where is the
man who struck this white wizard in battle?"

A moment's hesitation--and there advanced from the ranks of the fighting
men a tall, powerful warrior.  He grasped in his hand a broad-bladed
assegai, with the point broken short off.

"I am Mfulini, the son of Mapute," he began, not waiting to be addressed
first.  "I am a fighting man of the race of Gcaleka!  I love war.
_Hau_!  I have struck more than one enemy, but have never struck him
twice.  _Hau_!  I struck this white man and my weapon broke, my strong
_umkonto_ [The broad headed close-quarter assegai] that has drunk the
heart's blood of five Fingo dogs.  The weapon is bewitched.  He who has
done this thing must be found.  The wizard must be found.  _Hau_!"

"_Ewa, Ewa_!" shouted the warriors.  "The wizard must be found.  The
great witch-doctress must find him.  Then will the white man's magic be
no longer too strong for her.  He must be killed!  Find him!  Find him!
He must be killed!"



CHAPTER THIRTY ONE.

THE "SMELLING OUT."

"He must be killed!  He must be killed!"

The cry was taken up.  The bloodthirsty shout rolled through the ranks
fiercer and fiercer till the wild roaring chorus was deafening.  That
crouching, armed multitude, a moment before so motionless and silent,
sprang erect, swaying to and fro, frenzied with uncontrollable
excitement; a legion of dark demons roaring and howling under the
promptings of superstition and ferocity; bellowing for blood--blood,
blood, no matter whose.  Weapons waved wildly in the air, and the
deep-throated shout volleyed forth.  "He must be killed!"

The warriors were seated in an immense double semicircle.  Gliding with
her half-dancing step to the upper end of this, the witch-doctress began
chanting an incantation in a high nasal key, an invocation to the great
_Inyoka_ [Serpent] who held the kraal and its inhabitants under its
especial favour.  As she commenced her round, the shouting of the
warriors was hushed.  All stood upright and silent.  Different emotions
held sway in each grim, dark countenance.  The hearts of many were
sinking with deadly fear, yet each strove to meet the eye of the
terrible witch-doctress boldly and without quailing.  They knew that
that fatal round would prove of deadly import to one or more of them ere
it was completed.

"Ho--_Inyoka 'nukulu_!"  [Great serpent] chanted the hag, with a
significant shake of the body of the hideous reptile, which she held by
the neck.  "Find the wizard!  Find the wizard!"

"Find the wizard!" echoed those whom she had already passed by as she
commenced her passage along the line.

"Find the wizard!" they shouted, rapping the ground with their sticks.
Those who had yet to undergo the ordeal kept stem silence.

The chorus grew in volume as the number qualified to swell it increased.
Not merely a lust for blood did that horrid shout represent--it
embodied also a delirious relief on the part of those already safe.

Suddenly Ngcenika made a half pause, raising her voice in the midst of
her yelling chant.  The serpent, its black coils writhing and twisting
around her arm, opened its jaws and hissed horribly.  Those still
expectant held their breaths; those already relieved shouted and
hammered with their sticks harder than ever.  Those directly opposite
the sorceress, at this ill-omened juncture, stood turned to stone.

"Find him, Inyoka!" snarled the hag.

"Find him!  Find him!" echoed the deep-toned chorus.

But the pause was only momentary.  Not yet was the victim singled out.
Ngcenika resumed her way, only to repeat the process further along the
line.  And this she would do at intervals, sometimes coming to a dead
stop in such significant and purpose-fraught fashion that the whole body
of spectators stood ready to hurl themselves like lightning upon the
unlucky one denounced.  The hellish hag was enjoying the terror she
inspired, and as strong men of tried bravery one after another quailed
before her she gloated over their fears to such a pitch that her voice
rose to a deafening shriek of demoniacal glee.

The other end of the great human crescent was nearly reached and still
no victim.  And now those who had escaped so far began to feel their
apprehensions return.  It would be no unprecedented affair were a second
trial to occur, or even a third.  The sorceress might elect to make her
fatal progress through the ranks again and again.  There were barely
fifty men left.  Unless the victim or victims should be found among
those, a second progress was inevitable.

The bloodthirsty chorus rose into a deafening roar.  The tension was
fearful to witness.  The hideous possession of the repulsive
witch-doctress had communicated itself in some degree to the mass of
excitable savages.  Many were foaming at the mouth and apparently on the
eve of convulsions.  Not satisfied with the shouting, the infuriated mob
beat time with their feet in addition to their sticks, as they joined in
the hell-hag's demoniacal incantations, and the perspiration streamed
from every pore till the very air was heavy with a sickening and musky
odour.  It was a repellent and appalling scene, and even the white
spectator, apart from the extreme peril of his own situation, felt his
blood curdle within him at this vision of what was very like a
diabolical power let loose.  But there was worse to follow.

Suddenly the sorceress was seen to halt.  Her voice rose to a frightful
yell, as with blazing eyes, and pouring forth a torrent of denunciation,
she raised the great black serpent aloft in such wise that its writhing
neck and hissing jaws made a dart straight at the face of a man in the
rear rank of the line and near the end of the latter.

"Thou hast found him, _Inyoka_!  Thou hast found him!  Show us the
wizard!" screeched the hideous witch-doctress.  The grinning skull and
the two devil-like horns of hair which surmounted her head quivered
convulsively.  Her eyes started from the sockets, and the weird and
barbaric amulets hung about her person rattled like castanets.  She was
once more the mouthing demoniac of a short half-hour ago.

The writhings and hisses of the serpent had become perfectly frantic.
Suddenly the reptile was seen to spring free of her grasp and to fling
itself straight at the man whose face it had first struck at.

"The wizard!  The wizard!" roared the warriors.  "_Hau_!  It is Vudana!
Vudana, the son of Sekweni, _Hau_!"

"Vudana, the wizard!  Seize him!" shrieked the sorceress.  "Seize him,
but slay him not.  He must confess!  He must confess!  On your lives,
slay him not!"

The first part of her mandate had already been obeyed.  Those in his
immediate neighbourhood had flung themselves upon the doomed man and
disarmed him almost before the words of denunciation had left the hag's
lips.  The second part was in no danger of being disobeyed now.  Better
for the victim if it had.

The latter was a man just past middle age, with a quiet and far from
unpleasing cast of features.  He was not a chief, but had a reputation
for shrewdness and foresight beyond that of many an accredited leader.

"Ha, Vudana!  Vudana, the wizard!" cried Ngcenika mockingly.  "Vudana,
who did not believe in the efficacy of my magic.  Vudana, who pretended
to manufacture `charms' as effective as mine.  Vudana, whose poor
attempts at magic have been effective to destroy mine in the case of all
who believed in them.  Call the names of those who fell," she cried,
addressing the crowd.  "They are all believers in Vudana, not in me!
Where are they now?  Ask the Amanglezi--even the Amafengu, before whose
bullets they fell.  Ask the jackal and the vulture, who have picked
their bones.  Ask Mfulini, the son of Mapute, whose weapon was turned by
the magic of the white man!  Was he a believer in Vudana's `charms'?"
she added in a menacing voice, rolling her eyes around.

"He was not," shouted the warrior named, springing forward.  "Where is
the man who bewitched my broad _umkonto_.  Let him confess and say how
he did it."

"It is well, Mfulini," said the witch-doctress grimly, knowing that the
other trembled for his personal safety now that she had dexterously
turned suspicion upon him.  "Thou shall be the man to make him confess."

"I have nothing to confess," said Vudana.  He lay on his bark, held
powerless by several men while waiting for a _reim_ to be brought
wherewith to bind him.  He knew that he was doomed--doomed not merely to
death, but to one of the differing forms of frightful torment meted out
to those accused of his offence.  He knew moreover that whether he
accused himself or not the result would be the same, and a warrior light
blazed from his eyes as he replied.

"If the Great Chief wants my cattle, my possessions, they are his; let
him take them.  If he wants my life, it too is his; let him take it.
But I will not accuse myself of that which I have never committed."

If Kreli had heard this appeal he made no sign.  Witchcraft was an
offence--theoretically at any rate--outside the secular province.
"Smelling out" was a good old custom which had its uses, and one not
lightly to be interfered with.  It was doubtful, however, whether he did
hear, for a shout of execration, led by the witch-doctress, drowned the
victim's words.

"He will not confess!  _Au_!  Where are the hot stones?  To the fire!
To the fire!" roared the crowd.  The witch-doctress uttered a fiendish
laugh.

"No.  To the ants!" she cried.

"_Ewa!  Ewa_!  To the ants!" they echoed.  "Bring him along.  _Hau_!
The ants are hungry!"

A noosed _reim_ was thrown round the doomed man's neck, and another made
fast to each of his wrists, and thus, with the whole crowd surging and
yelling around him, he was dragged into the adjoining forest.

"_Hamba-ke, umlungu_!"  ["Go on, white man"] said several of the
warriors guarding Eustace, motioning him to proceed.  "We are going to
show you a sight.  Quick, or we shall be late!"

By no means free from apprehension on his own account, Eustace obeyed.
When they arrived among the eager and excited crowd, the entertainment
had already begun.  All made way for the white prisoner and his guards,
and there was a fiendish leer on many a dark face which needed not a
muttered remark or two to explain.  The horrible scene he was about to
witness was extremely likely to be his own fate.

The doomed man lay spread eagled on his back; his hands and feet,
stretched to their utmost tension, were fastened to stout pegs driven
into the ground.  Two of the Kafirs were busily anointing his naked body
with a sticky compound, which was, in fact, a mixture of honey and
native beer.  This they smeared over him with bits of rag: ears, eyes,
nose, coming in for a plentiful share.  Already his flesh seemed alive
with moving objects, and then the cause became apparent.  The wretched
man was tied down right across a huge ant's nest, which had been broken
in order to receive his body.  Already the infuriated insects were
making their bites felt.  _He was to be devoured alive by black ants_.

"Confess, Vudana," cried Ngcenika.  "Confess thy witchcraft and how thy
`charms' were obtained.  The black ants bite hard.  Ha!"

"Confess?  Ha-ha!" jeered the sufferer, his eyes blazing.  "Not to thee,
vulture.  Not to thee, jackal.  Not to thee, spawn of a Fingo dog.  Ha!
That is the witch-doctress of the Amagcaleka!  Such a thing as that!
What magic can she make?  A cheat--a liar!  I can die--I can die as I
have lived--a man, a warrior."

"_Hau_!  A wizard!  A traitor!" vociferated the crowd.  "Confess thy
witchcraft, lest we put thee to the flaming torment.  The fire bites
deeper than the black ants.  _Hau_!"

"I laugh at the fire," roared the victim.  "I laugh at all that you can
do.  The fire is but a pleasant warmth.  The bite of the ants is but the
softest tickling.  Thou dog, Mfulini, were I free, I would whip thee
round the kraal."

"Is thy bed a comfortable one, Vudana?" replied the barbarian thus
apostrophised, with a sneer.  And picking up a handful of the venomous
insects he scattered them upon the tortured man's face with a brutal
laugh.

For all his defiant fortitude the latter was undergoing agonies.  The
ants were swarming all over his body, crawling into his nostrils and
ears, biting everywhere, eating the rims of his eyelids, his lips, his
throat, and he was powerless to move a hand or foot.  The spectators
crowded around, mocking and jeering at him.  A few minutes ago he was a
man of consideration--now all pushed and fought for the front places to
witness his sufferings, all heaped execrations upon him as they gloated
over the horrible punishment of one who had been denounced as a wizard.

"Whose magic is the greatest, Vudana--thine or mine?" jeered Ngcenika,
bending over her victim until her face was close to his.  But the
proximity of that repulsive countenance infuriated even the helpless
victim.  With a roar of rage he spat full into it, vociferating:

"Thou spawn of a Fingo dog!  Thine hour is come.  I have put my mark
upon thee.  Before many moons are dead thou too shalt die, and thy death
shall be even as mine.  I, Vudana, say it.  Hear ye my words all!"

"He has confessed," shouted the crowd.  "He is a wizard.  He has
confessed.  Let him die the death!"

With a yell of fury Ngcenika started back, and glared vengefully around
as if inquest of some means whereby to add to the sufferer's agony.
Then she remembered that it would hardly bear adding to under the
circumstances, and contented herself with a satanic laugh.

Nor would it.  In a short time the miserable man's body was black with
the repulsive insects.  They swarmed into his ears and nostrils.  His
struggles became fearful, as he writhed in the excruciating torment of
their poisonous bites.  He foamed at the mouth.  His eyeballs rolled and
strained in their sockets, and he shook his head and roared like a
beast.  It would be impossible to exaggerate the agonies he was
undergoing.  His frantic struggles availed not to shake off a single one
of the myriad insects swarming upon him.  Already his eyes were half
eaten away.

It was a fiendish and appalling spectacle.  The man was now raving mad.
He gnashed his teeth and howled.  His contortions were fearful to
witness.  Yet no spark of pity or compunction did the sight awaken in
the ferocious hearts of the spectators, many of whom were, up to the
moment of the fatal denunciation, his kindred and his friends.  But
since his treatment of the witch-doctress all were chary of venturing
too close.  Many of the superstitious barbarians had already began to
look upon Ngcenika with decreased respect.  Vudana, suffering as a
wizard, had spat in her face, accompanying the act with a prophecy and a
curse.  On no consideration would they run the risk of exposing
themselves to like treatment.

Eustace, forced to be a spectator of this blood-curdling scene, felt his
head swim with horror and disgust.  The chastened gloom of the forest,
the gibing crowd of armed savages, the weird shrill singing of the
witch-doctress, and the frightful contortions and beast-like roars of
the miserable victim, who was being literally devoured alive, made up a
picture likely to haunt a man in his dreams for the rest of his life, to
start him suddenly awake in a cold sweat of terror.  Still he remembered
that any exhibition of feeling would be in the highest degree dangerous,
and controlled himself accordingly.

All this had taken some time and now the frantic struggles of the
sufferer had subsided.  A convulsive shudder would now and then run
through his limbs, and his sightless eyeballs would roll in a manner
hideous to behold, and ever the disgusting insects swarmed over him in a
horrible moving mass, now red with blood, and smothered beneath gouts of
saliva which had flown from the maniac's lips.  Upon his violent
struggles had followed exhaustion--mercifully, the exhaustion of
approaching death.

"He is dying!" cried several, bending over the victim.  "_Hau_!  A man
like Vudana should have taken much longer to die."

This was said in a disappointed tone.  The barbarous appetite of these
savages was thoroughly roused--whetted for further atrocities.  A shout
arose.

"The white man!  The white man!  What shall we do with him?"

Well might Eustace start, in horror and dismay.  But a glance served to
show that the object of attention was not himself, but somebody at the
other end of the crowd, in which direction all heads were turned.  Then
as the crowd parted a moment he caught a glimpse of something--somebody
rather--which evoked a second start, this time one of very unequivocal
amazement.  Could he believe his eyes?



CHAPTER THIRTY TWO.

A STRANGE DUEL.

In the midst of the savage throng was another white man, also a
prisoner, who had been forced to assist at the barbarous scene just
detailed.  His lot, however, had been cast in far worse lines than that
of Eustace, for his hands were tightly fastened behind his back and a
_reim_ connected his ankles in such wise that he could only take short
steps--which painful fact he would every now and then forget, with the
result of just so many ignominious "croppers."  Whereat his dusky
tormentors would shout with gleeful laughter.

In addition to his bonds the unfortunate man appeared to have undergone
considerable maltreatment.  His hair and beard were matted with dust and
blood, and his head was rudely bandaged with rags of the filthiest
description.  He was clad in a greasy and tattered shirt, and trousers
to match--his own clothes having been impounded by his captors.
Moreover there were livid wales upon his face and hands, and such parts
of his person as were visible through his ragged apparel, which showed
that he had been unmercifully beaten.  Well might Eustace start in
amazement, absolute and unfeigned.  In this pitiable object he
recognised Tom Carhayes.

He gazed at him speechless--as at one who has risen from the dead.  If
ever he could have sworn to any man's death it would have been to that
of the man before him.  He had seen the assegais flash in the air and
descend--had heard the dull, sickening blows of the kerries which had
beaten the life out of his unfortunate cousin.  Yet, here stood the
latter--not exactly unhurt, but yet full of life.

"_Hau_, Umlilwane!" said Hlangani, who was standing beside the latter--
grinning hideously into his victim's face.  "You are not near enough to
see well.  The black ants bite--harder than the shot from your gun," he
went on, with grim meaning, beckoning to those who stood by to drag the
prisoner nearer to the body of the unfortunate Vudana, which lay, raw
and bloody, the veins exposed in many places by the bites of the myriad
swarming insects.  Carhayes gazed upon the horrid sight with a shudder
of disgust.  Then raising his eyes he encountered those of Eustace.  A
shout of astonishment escaped him.

"How did you get here?" he cried.  "Thought you were rubbed out if ever
any fellow was.  Suppose you thought the same of me.  Well, well.  It'll
come to that soon.  These damned black devils have bested me, just as I
reckoned I was besting them.  They've been giving me hell already.  But
I say, Eustace, you seem to be in clover," noticing the other's freedom
from bonds or ill-treatment.  Then he added bitterly, "I forgot; you
always did stand in well with them."

"That isn't going to help me much now, I'm afraid," answered Eustace.
"I've just made a fool of the witch-doctress and she won't let things
rest there, depend upon it.  My case isn't much more hopeful than yours.
Have you tried the bribery trick?"

"No.  How do you mean?"

"Offer some big-wig, like our particular friend there--I won't mention
names--a deuce of a lot of cattle to let you escape.  Try and work it--
only you must be thundering careful."

The Kafirs, who had been attentively listening to the conversation
between the two white men, here deemed that enough had been said.
Dialogue in an unknown tongue must represent just so much plotting,
argued their suspicious natures.  So they interposed.

"See there," said Hlangani, with a meaning glance at the fearfully
contorted features of the miserable victim of the witch-doctress.  "See
there, Umlilwane, and remember my `word' to you the day you shot my
white hunting dog and wounded me in the shoulder.  _You had better first
have cut off your right hand, for it is better to lose a hand than one's
mind.  Hau_!  You laughed then.  Who laughs now?"

To Eustace those words now stood out in deadly significance.  The
wretched Vudana had died raving mad.  This, then, was the promised
vengeance.  Whatever his own fate might be, that of his cousin was
sealed.  Nothing short of a miracle could save him.  Carhayes, noting
the deadly and implacable expression upon the dark countenance of his
enemy, realised something of this, and fearless as he habitually was, it
was all he could do to keep from betraying some misgiving.

At this juncture a mandate arrived from Kreli that the warriors should
once more assemble within the temporary kraal, and that the white
prisoners should again be brought before him.  Singing, chatting,
laughing, administering many a sly kick or cuff to poor Carhayes, the
savages swarmed back to the open space, dragging that unfortunate along
in rough, unceremonious fashion.  Soon the glade was empty, save for the
body of the miserable victim of their blindly superstitious ferocity.
It lay there, stark, mangled, and hideous.

The Paramount Chief and his councillors still sat in a group apart.
They had borne no part in, betrayed no interest in, the barbarous
tragedy which had just taken place.  Such a matter as the punishment of
a wizard was entirely beneath their notice--in theory at any rate.  They
still sat in grave and dignified impassiveness.

Eustace, noting the difference between his own treatment and that of his
cousin--the one bound with unnecessary rigour, hustled and kicked, the
other, though disarmed, treated with a certain amount of consideration--
began to entertain strong hopes on his own account.  But tending
materially to dash them was the fact that Ngcenika, standing before the
chief and the _amapakati_, was favouring that august assemblage with a
very fierce and denunciatory harangue.

There were two white men, she said--two prisoners.  One of these was a
man of some power, who had been able to oppose her magic with his own;
only for a time, however--the hag took care to add.  This man it might
be well to keep for a little while longer at any rate; there were
several experiments which she herself intended to try upon him.  But the
other--he had always been a bitter enemy of their race.  Many had fallen
at his hands.  Had he not cut a notch upon his gun-stock for every
fighting man of the race of Xosa whom he had slain?  There was the
gun-stock and there were the notches.  There were many of them, let the
Great Chief--let the _amapakati_ count.

At the production of this damning "_piece de conviction_," a shout of
fury rose from the ranks of the warriors.

"To the fire!" they cried.  "To the fire with him!"

The situation was appalling, yet Carhayes never quailed.  The desperate
pluck of the man bore him up even then.  He scowled contemptuously upon
the lines of dark and threatening faces, then turned erect and fearless
towards the chief.

For a few moments they confronted each other thus in silence.  The
Englishman, somewhat weak and unsteady from exhaustion and
ill-treatment, could still look the arbiter of his fate straight in the
eyes without blenching.  They might do their worst and be damned, he
said to himself.  He, Tom Carhayes, was not going to whine for mercy to
any nigger--even if that "nigger" was the Chief Paramount of all the
Amaxosa tribes.

The latter, for his part, was not without respect for the white man's
intrepidity, but he had no intention of sparing him for all that.  He
had been debating with his chiefs and councillors, and they had decided
that Carhayes ought to be sacrificed as an uncompromising and determined
enemy of their race.  The other it might be expedient to keep a little
longer and see how events would turn.

"What have you to say, _umlungu_?" said Kreli at length.

"Nothing.  Not a damn thing," broke in Carhayes, in a loud, harsh tone.

"Tom, for God's sake don't be such a fool," whispered Eustace, who was
near enough to be heard.  "Can't you be civil for once?"

"No, I can't; not to any infernal black scoundrel," roared the other
savagely.  "It's different with you, Eustace," changing his tone to a
bitter sneer.  "Damn it, man, you're about half a Kafir already.  Why
don't you ask old Kreli for a couple of his daughters and set up a kraal
here among them, eh?"

A sounding whack across the ear with the haft of an assegai choked the
words in his throat.  He stood, literally foaming with fury.

"Attend, thou white dog," cried a great deep-toned voice.  "Attend when
the Great Chief is talking to thee.  _Au_!"

An infuriated mastiff straining at his chain is a pretty good
exemplification of impotent wrath, but even he is nothing to the aspect
and demeanour of Carhayes as he turned to the perpetrator of this
indignity.  The veins rolled in his forehead as if they would burst.
The muscles stood out upon his neck like cords as he strove by a
superhuman effort to burst his bonds.  But Hlangani only sneered.

"Listen when the Great Chief is talking to thee, thou jackal, or I will
strike thee again," he said.

"God damn the Great Chief!" roared poor Tom, his voice rising to a
hurricane shriek of fury under this shameful indignity, which he was
powerless to resent.  "And you, Hlangani, you dog, if I stood unbound I
would kill you at this moment--kill you all unarmed as I am.  Coward!
Dare you try it!"

"What is this _indaba_?" interrupted Kreli sternly.  "This white man has
a very long tongue.  Perhaps it may be shortened with advantage."  A hum
of applause greeted this remark, and the chief went on.  "You are asked
a question, _umlungu_, and instead of answering you rave and bellow and
throw yourself about like a cow that has lost her calf.  And now what
have you to say?  You have invaded our country and shot our people with
your own hand.  If a man thrusts his head into a hornet's nest, whom
shall he blame but himself if he gets stung--if he treads upon a
serpent, how shall he complain if made to feel the reptile's fangs?"

"Well, you see, it's war-time," answered Carhayes bluntly, beginning to
think he might just as well say something to save his life, if words
could save it, that is.  "I have met your people in fair fight, and I
challenge any man, black or white, to deny that I have acted fair,
square, and above board.  And when we do take prisoners we don't treat
them as I have been treated since I was brought here.  They are taken
care of by the doctors if wounded, as I am; not tied up and starved and
kicked, as I have been."

"Their doctors are the Fingo dogs," interrupted the chief darkly, "their
medicine a sharp assegai.  Freeborn men of the House of Gcaleka to die
at the hand of a Fingo slave!  _Hau_!"

A roar of execration went up at this hit.  "To the fire with him!"
howled the savage crowd.  "Give him to us, Great Chief, that we may make
him die a hundred deaths!"

"That is the sort of healing my children get when they fall into the
hands of Amanglezi.  And you, _umlungu_, you have offered an insult to
the House of Gcaleka in the person of Hlangani, my herald, a man of the
House of Hintza, my father.  Was it war-time when you shed his blood?
Did you meet in fair fight when you shot him suddenly and at
close-quarters, he having no gun?"

"Was it war-time when Hlangani entered the Gaika location to stir up
strife?  Was it right that he should bring his dogs on to my farm to
hunt my bucks?" answered Carhayes fearlessly.  "Again, was it fair play
for four men, armed with assegais, to attack one, who had but two shots?
Or was it self-defence?  Listen to my words, Kreli, and you chiefs and
_amapakati_ of the House of Gcaleka," he went on, raising his voice till
it was audible to the whole assemblage.  "In the presence of you all I
proclaim Hlangani a coward.  He has struck and insulted me because I am
bound.  He dare not meet me free.  I challenge him to do so.  Loosen
these bonds.  I am weak and wounded.  I cannot escape--you need not
fear--and let him meet me if he dares, with any weapon he chooses.  I
challenge him.  If he refuses he is nothing but a cowardly dog, and
worse than the meanest Fingo.  If you, Kreli, refuse my request, it is
because you _know_ this bragging herald of yours to be a coward."

The fierce rapidity of this harangue, the audacity of the request
embodied within it, took away the auditors' breath.  Yet the idea
appealed to them--appealed powerfully to their ardently martial
sympathies.  The very novelty of such a duel as that proposed invested
it with a rare attractiveness.

"What does Hlangani say?" observed Kreli, with a partly amused glance at
his subordinate.

"This, O Great Chief of my father's house," replied the warrior, the
light of battle springing into his eyes.  "Of what man living was
Hlangani ever afraid?  What man ever had to call him twice?  Yet, O
Great Chief, the head of my father's house, I would ask a boon.  When I
have whipped this miserable white dog, I would claim possession of his
wretched carcase absolutely, alive or dead."

"It is granted, Hlangani," said the chief.

"And I?" cried Carhayes.  "What shall be given to me when I have sent
this cur, who strikes helpless men, howling to his hut?  My liberty, of
course?"

"No," replied Kreli, shortly.

"No?" echoed the prisoner.  "My life then?"

"No," answered the chief again.  "Be content, _umlungu_.  If you conquer
you shall have a swift and merciful death.  If you fail, Hlangani claims
you."

Carhayes stared at the chief for a moment, then, as he realised that he
had nothing to hope for, whether he won in the combat or not--an
expression of such deadly ferocity, such fell and murderous purpose
swept across his face, that many of those who witnessed it realised that
their countryman was going to snatch no easy victory.

The stout rawhide _reims_ which bound his hands behind him were
loosened--and that which secured his feet was removed.  He stood
swinging his arms and stamping to hasten the circulation--then he asked
for some water, which was brought him.

"_Ha, umlungu_!" jeered Ngcenika, addressing Eustace, as the two white
men stood talking together.  "Give this valiant fighter some white magic
to strengthen him.  He will need it."

"Well, Eustace, I'm going to kill that dog," said Carhayes.  "I'm going
to die fighting anyway, so that's all right.  Now--I'm ready.  What are
we going to fight with?"

"This," said one of the bystanders, handing him a pair of hard-wood
kerries.

Hlangani now made his appearance similarly armed.  The crescent
formation of warriors had narrowed their ranks, the chiefs and
councillors and Eustace and his guards composing the upper arc of the
circle.  The prisoner could not have broken through that dense array of
armed men which hemmed him in on every side, had he entertained the
idea.

Both the principals in that strange impromptu duel were men of splendid
physique.  The Kafir, nearly naked, looked like a bronze giant, towering
above his adversary in his magnificent height and straight and perfect
proportions.  The Englishman, thick-set, deep-chested, concentrated a
vast amount of muscular power within his five-foot-eight.  He had thrown
off his ragged shirt, and the muscles of his chest and arms stood out
like ropes.  He looked a terribly awkward antagonist, and moreover on
his side the conflict would be fought with all the ferocity of despair.
He was a man bent on selling his life dearly.

Hlangani, for his part, was confident and smiling.  He was going to
fight with his natural weapons, a pair of good, trusty kerries.  This
blundering white man, though he had the strength and ferocity of an
enraged bull, had more than that quadruped's stupidity.  He would knock
him out of shape in no time.

When blood is up, the spirit of Donnybrook is very strong among Kafirs.
The next best thing to taking part in a fight is to witness one--and
now, accordingly, every head was bent forward with the most eager
interest as the two combatants advanced towards each other in the open
space.  There was no "ring" proper, nor were there any recognised rules;
no "time" either.  Each man's business was to kill or disable the
other--as effectually as possible, and by any means in his power.

Now a smart Kafir, armed with two good kerries whose use he thoroughly
understands, is about as tough a customer to tackle as is a professional
pugilist to the average Briton who knows how to use his hands but
indifferently.  Of this Carhayes was perfectly aware.  Consequently his
plan was to meet his antagonist with extreme wariness; in fact, to stand
rather on the defensive, at any rate at first.  He was a fair single
stick player, which tended not a little to equalise the chances.

As they drew near each other and reached striking distance, they looked
straight into each other's eyes like a pair of skilful fencers.  The
savage, with one kerrie raised in the air, the other held horizontally
before his breast, but both with a nervous, supple grasp, ready to turn
any way with lightning rapidity--his glance upon that of his foe--his
active, muscular frame poised lightly on one foot, then on another, with
feline readiness, would have furnished a perfect subject for an
instantaneous photograph representing strength and address combined.
The Englishman, his bearded lips compressed, his blue eyes sparkling and
alert, shining with suppressed eagerness to come to close-quarters with
his crafty and formidable foe, was none the less a fine specimen of
courage and undaunted resolution.

Hlangani, a sneering laugh upon his thick lips, opened the ball by
making a judicious feint.  But his adversary never moved.  He followed
it up by another, then a series of them, whirling his striking kerrie
round the Englishman's head in the most startling proximity, now on this
side, now on that, holding his parrying one ready for any attack the
other might make upon him.  Still Carhayes stood strictly on the
defensive.  He knew the Kafir was trying to "draw him"--knew that his
enemy's quick eye was prepared for any opportunity.  He was not going to
waste energy gratuitously.

Suddenly, and with lightning-like celerity, Hlangani made a sweep at the
lower part of his adversary's leg.  It would have been the ruin of a
less experienced combatant, but Carhayes' kerrie, lowered just two
inches, met that of his opponent with a sounding crash just in time to
save his skull somewhere in the region of the ear.  It was a clever
feint, and a dexterous follow-up, but it had failed.  Hlangani began to
realise that he had met a foeman worthy of his steel--or, rather, of his
wood.  Still he knew the other's impetuous temper, and by wearing out
his patience reckoned on obtaining a sure and tolerably easy victory.

And it seemed as if he would gain the result of his reasoning even
sooner than he expected.  Bristling with rage, literally smarting with
the indignity recently put upon him, Carhayes abandoned the defensive.
With a sudden rush, he charged his antagonist, and for a few moments
nothing was heard but the clash of hard-wood in strike and parry.
Hlangani was touched on the shoulder, while Carhayes got a rap on the
knuckles, which in cold blood would have turned him almost sick with
pain.  But his blood was at boiling point now, and he was fighting with
the despairing ferocity of one who has no hope left in life.  He pressed
his gigantic adversary with such vigour and determination that the other
had no alternative but to give way.

The fun was waxing fast and furious now.  The warriors crowding in
nearer and nearer, pressed forward in breathless attention, encouraging
their champion with many a deep-toned hum of applause when he scored or
seemed likely to score a point.  The few women then in the kraal stood
on tiptoe, trying to peer over the heads and shoulders of the armed men.
Even the chiefs and councillors condescended to show considerable
interest in this impromptu tournament, while Eustace Milne, animated by
various motives, watched its progress narrowly.

For a few moments it really seemed that the white man would prove the
victor.  Before the impetuosity of his furious attacks Hlangani was
constrained to give way more and more.  A Beserk ferocity seemed to have
taken possession of Carhayes.  His eyes glared through the blood and
dust which clung to his unwashen visage.  Every hair of his beard seemed
to bristle and stand upright, like the mane of a wild boar.  His chest
heaved, and the dexterity with which he whirled his kerrie around his
adversary's ears--always quick to ward the latter's blows from himself--
was wonderful to behold.

Crash--scroosh!  The blow told.  A sound as of the crunching of bone.
Hlangani staggered back half a dozen paces, the blood pouring from a
wound in his skull.  It was a blow that would probably have shattered
the skull of a white man.

But before Carhayes could follow it up, the wily savage adopted a
different plan.  By a series of astonishing leaps and bounds, now
backward, now from side to side, he endeavoured to bewilder his enemy,
and very nearly succeeded.  Mad with rage, desperation, and a
consciousness of failing strength, Carhayes was fast losing control over
himself.  He roared like a wild animal.  He began to strike out wildly,
leaving his guard open.  This the cunning barbarian saw and encouraged.
Those looking on had no doubt now as to who held the winning cards; even
Eustace could see it, but his cousin was too far off now to hear a word
of warning or advice, which, however, was just as well for himself.

Again the combatants closed.  The splinters began to fly in all
directions as the hard-wood sticks whirled and crashed.  Then suddenly a
crushing blow on the wrist sent Carhayes' kerrie flying from his grasp
and almost simultaneously with it came a sickening "scrunch."  The white
man dropped like an ox at the shambles, the blood pouring from his head.

Echoing the mighty roar of exultation that went up from the spectators,
Hlangani stood with his foot on the chest of his prostrate adversary,
his kerrie raised to strike again.  But there was no necessity.  Poor
Tom lay like a corpse, stunned and motionless.  The ferocious triumph
depicted on the countenance of the savage was horrible to behold.

"He is mine," he cried, his chest heaving, his eyes blazing, "mine
absolutely.  The Great Chief has said it.  Bring _reims_."

In a trice a few stout rawhide thongs were procured, and Carhayes was
once more bound hand and foot.  Then acting under the directions of his
fierce conqueror--three or four stalwart Kafirs raised the insensible
form of the unfortunate settler and bore it away.

"He has only begun to taste the fury of Hlangani's revenge," said a
voice at Eustace's side.  Turning he beheld the witch-doctress,
Ngcenika.  The hag pointed to the retreating group with a mocking leer.

"He will wake," she went on.  "But he will never be seen again,
Ixeshane--never.  _Hau_!"

"Where will he wake, Ngcenika?" asked Eustace, in a voice which he
strove to render unconcerned.

"_Kwa, Zinyoka_," [At the Home of the Serpents] replied the hag with a
brutal laugh.

"And where is that?"

"Where is it?  Ha, ha!" mocked the witch-doctress.  "Thou art a
magician, too, Ixeshane.  Wouldst thou indeed like to know?"

"Perhaps."

"Invoke thy magic then, and see if it will tell thee.  But better not.
For they who look upon the Home of the Serpents are seen no more in
life.  Thou hast seen the last of yon white man, Ixeshane; thou and
these standing around here.  Ha, ha!  Better for him that he had never
been born."  And with a Satanic laugh she turned away and left him.

Strong-nerved as he was, Eustace felt his flesh creep.  The hag's
parting words hinted at some mysterious and darkly horrible fate in
store for his unfortunate cousin.  His own precarious position brought a
sense of this doubly home to him.  He remembered how jubilant poor Tom
had been over the outbreak of the war.  This, then, was to be the end of
it.  Instead of paying off old scores with his hated and despised foes,
he had himself walked blindfold into the trap, and was to be sacrificed
in some frightful manner to their vengeance.



CHAPTER THIRTY THREE.

"I WALK IN SHADOW."

Eanswyth was back again in her old home--living her old life, as in the
times that were past--but alone.

When she had announced her intention of returning to Anta's Kloof, her
friends had received the proposition with incredulity--when they saw
that she was determined, with dismay.

It was stark lunacy, they declared.  She to go to live on an
out-of-the-way farm, alone!  There was not even a neighbour for pretty
near a score of miles, all the surrounding stock-farmers having trekked
into _laager_.  The Gaikas were reported more restless than ever, nor
were symptoms wanting that they were on the eve of an outbreak.  The
Gcaleka campaign had fired their warlike spirits, but had failed to
convey its accompanying warning, and those "in the know" asserted that
the savages might rise any minute and make common cause with their
countrymen across the Kei.  And in the face of all this, here was
Eanswyth proposing to establish herself on a lonely farm bordering on
the very location of the plotting and disaffected tribesmen.  Why, it
was lunacy--rank suicide!

The worst of it was that nobody on earth had the power to prevent her
from doing as she chose.  Her own family were Western Province people
and lived far up in the Karroo.  Had they been ever so willing, it would
take them nearly three weeks to arrive--by which time it might be too
late.  But Eanswyth did not choose to send for any one.  She wanted to
be alone.

"You need not be in the least alarmed on my account," she had said to
the Hostes in answer to their reiterated expostulations.  "Even if the
Gaikas should rise, I don't believe they would do me the slightest harm.
The people on Nteya's location know me well, and the old chief and I
used to be great friends.  I feel as if I must go to my old home again--
and--don't think me ungracious, but it will do me good to be entirely
alone."

"That was how poor Milne used to argue," said Hoste gravely.  "But they
killed him all the same."

"Yes," she replied, mastering the quick sharp spasm which the allusion
evoked.  "But they were Gcalekas--not our people, who knew him."

Hoste shook his head.

"You are committing suicide," he said.  "And the worst of it is we have
no power on earth to prevent you."

"No, you haven't," she assented with the shadow of a smile.  "So let me
go my own way with a good grace.  Besides, with old Josane to look after
me, I can't come to much harm."

She had telegraphed to her late husband's manager at Swaanepoel's Hoek,
requesting him to send the old cattle-herd to her at once.  Three days
later Josane arrived, and having commissioned Hoste to buy her a few
cows and some slaughter sheep, enough to supply her modest household.
Eanswyth had carried out her somewhat eccentric plan.

The utter loneliness of the place--the entire absence of life--the empty
kraals and the silent homestead, all this is inexpressibly grateful to
her crushed and lacerated spirit.  And in the dead silence of those
uninhabited rooms she conjures up the sweetest, the holiest memories.
Her solitude, her complete isolation, conveys no terror--no spark of
misgiving, for it is there that her very life has been lived.  The dead
stillness of the midnight hour, the ghostly creaking of a board, the
hundred and one varying sounds begotten of silence and darkness, inspire
her with no alarm, for her imagination peoples these empty and deserted
rooms with life once more.

She can see him as she saw him in life, moving about the place on
different errands bent.  There is his favourite chair; there his place
at the table.  His personality seems still to pervade the whole house,
his spirit to hover around her, to permeate her whole being, here as it
could nowhere else.  But it was on first entering his room, which still
contained a few possessions too cumbersome or too worthless to carry
away--a trunk or two and a few old clothes--here it was that that awful
and vivid contrast struck her in overwhelming force.

What an expression there is in such poor and useless relics--a glove, a
boot, a hat, even an old pipe--when we know we shall never see the owner
again, parted perhaps by circumstances, by distance, by death.  Do not
such things seem verily to speak--and to speak eloquently--to bring
before our eyes, to sound within our ears, the vision, the voice of one
whom we shall never behold again?  Ah! do they not!

Standing for the first time alone in that room, Eanswyth felt as though
her heart had been broken afresh.  She fell prone among those poor and
worthless relics, pressing them passionately to her lips, while her
tears fell like rain.  If ever her lover's spirit could come back to
her, surely it would be in that room.

"O Eustace, my darling, my first and only love!" murmured the stricken
creature, lying face to the very floor in the agony of her grief.  "Come
to me from the shadowy spirit land!  O God, send him to me, that I may
look upon him once more!"

The shadows deepened within the room.  Raising her head she gazed
around, and the expression of pitiable eagerness on the white drawn face
was fearful to behold.

"Oh, dear Lord, if our love is so wicked are we not punished enough!  O
God, show him to me again if but for a moment!  The ghastliest terrors
of the grave are sweetness to me, if I may but see him once--my dear
dead love!  Eustace, Eustace!  You cannot come to me, but I shall soon
go to you!  Is it a loving God or a fiend that tortures us so?  Ah-ah!"

Her heart-broken paroxysm could go no further.  No apparition from
another world met her eyes as they strove to penetrate the deepening
shadows as though fully expecting one.  The exhaustion that supervened
was beneficial to a degree, in that it acted as a safety valve to her
fearfully overwrought brain.  Her very mind was in danger.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

For nearly a fortnight has Eanswyth thus dwelt, and so far from
beginning to tire of her solitude, she hugs it closer to her.  She has
received visits from the Hostes and other friends who, reckoning that a
couple of days of solitude would sicken her of it altogether, had come
with the object of inducing her to return to the settlement.  Besides,
Christmas was close at hand and, her bereavement notwithstanding, it did
not somehow seem good that she should spend that genial season alone and
in a position not altogether free from danger.  But their kindly efforts
proved futile; indeed, Eanswyth could hardly disguise the fact that
their visits were unwelcome.  She preferred solitude at such a time, she
said.  Then Mrs Hoste had undertaken to lecture her.  It could not be
right to abandon one's self so entirely, even to a great sorrow, purred
that complacent matron.  It seemed somehow to argue a want of Christian
resignation.  It was all very well up to a certain point, of course; but
beyond that, it looked like flying in the face of Providence.  And
Eanswyth had turned her great eyes with such a blank and bewildered look
upon the speaker's face, as if wondering what on earth the woman could
be talking about, that Mrs Hoste, good-hearted though shallow, had
dropped her role of preacher then and there.

One thing that struck Eanswyth as not a little strange was that hardly a
Kafir had been near the place, whereas formerly their dusky neighbours
had been wont to visit them on one pretext or another enough and to
spare, the latter especially, in poor Tom's opinion.  She had sent word
to Nteya, inviting him to visit her and have a talk, but the old chief
had made some excuse, promising, however, to come over and see her
later.  All this looked strange and, taken in conjunction with the fact
that there had been war-dancing again in Nteya's location, suspicious.
So thought at any rate Josane, who gave vent to his misgivings in no
uncertain tone.  But Eanswyth treated his warnings with perfect
unconcern.  She would not move, she declared.  She was afraid of nobody.
If Josane was, he might go if he liked.  To which the staunch old
fellow would reply that he feared no man, black or white; that he was
there to take care of her, and there he would stay, adding, with a
growl, that it might be bad for Nteya's, or anybody else's, people
should they attempt to molest her.

It wanted but a day or two to Christmas--but an hour to sunset.  It was
one of those marvellous evenings not uncommon in South Africa, as well
as in the southern parts of Europe--one of those evenings when sky and
earth alike are vivid with rich colouring, and the cloudless blue of the
heavens assumes a deeper azure still, and there is a dreamy enchantment
in the air, and every sight, every sound, toned and mellowed by
distance, blends in perfect harmony with the changing glories of the
dying day.  Then the sun goes down in a flaming rainbow of rare tints,
each more subtle than the other, each more gorgeous, and withal more
delicate than the last.

The enchantment of the hour was upon Eanswyth to the full--the
loneliness, the sense of absolute solitude, cut off from the outer
world, alone with her dead.  Wandering down to the gate of the now
tenantless ostrich camp she is going over the incidents of that last
day--that first and that last day, for it was that upon which they had
discovered to each other their great and all-absorbing love.  "The last
day we shall have together," he had said--and it was so.  She can
vividly conjure up his presence at her side now.  Every word he said,
every careless gesture even, comes back to her now.  Here was the gate
where they had stood feeding the great birds, idly chatting about
nothing in particular, and yet how full were both their hearts even
then.  And that long sweet embrace so startlingly interrupted!  Ah! what
a day that had been!  One day out of a whole lifetime.  Standing here on
this doubly hallowed spot, it seems to her that an eternity of
unutterable wretchedness would not be too great a price to pay for just
that one day over again.  But he is gone.  Whether their love had been
the most sacred that ever blessed the lot of mortal here below, or the
unhallowed, inexorably forbidden thing it really is, matters nothing
now.  Death has decided, and from his arbitration there is no appeal.

She throws herself upon the sward: there in the shade of the mimosa
trees where they had sat together.  All Nature is calm and at peace,
and, with the withdrawal of man, the wild creatures of the earth seem to
have reclaimed their own.  A little duiker buck steps daintily along
beneath the thorn fence of the ostrich camp, and the grating, metallic
cackle of the wild guinea-fowl is followed by the appearance of quite a
large covey of those fine game birds, pecking away, though ever with an
air of confirmed distrust, within two score yards of the pale, silent
mourner, seated there.  The half-whistling, half-twanging note of the
yellow thrush mingles with the melodious call of a pair of blue cranes
stalking along in the grass, and above the drowsy, measured hum of bees
storing sweetness from the flowering aloes, there arises the heavier
boom of some great scarabaeus winging his way in blundering, aimless
fashion athwart the balmy and sensuous evening air.

The sun sinks to the western ridge--the voices of animal and insect life
swell in harmonious chorus, louder and louder, in that last hour of
parting day.  His golden beams, now horizontal, sweep the broad and
rolling plains in a sea of fire, throwing out the rounded spurs of the
Kabousie Hills into so many waves of vivid green.  Then the flaming
chariot of day is gone.

And in the unearthly hush of the roseate afterglow, that pale,
heart-broken mourner wends her way home.  Home!  An empty house, where
the echo of a footfall sounds ghostly and startling; an abode peopled
with reminiscences of the dead--meet companionship for a dead and empty
heart.

Never so dead--never so empty--as this evening.  Never since the first
moment of receiving the awful news has she felt so utterly crushed, so
soul-weary as here to-night.  "How was it all to end?" had been their
oft-spoken thought--here on this very spot.  The answer had come now.
Death had supplied it.  But--how was _this_ to end?

The glories of departing day were breaking forth into ever varying
splendours.  The spurs of the mountain range, now green, now gold,
assumed a rich purple against the flaming red of the sky.  The deepening
afterglow flushed and quivered, as the scintillating eyes of heaven
sprang forth into the arching vault--not one by one, but in whole
groups.  Then the pearly shades of twilight and the cool, moist
fragrance of the falling night.

Why was the earth so wondrously lovely--why should eyes rest upon such
semi-divine splendour while the heart was aching and bursting? was the
unspoken cry that went up from that heart-weary mourner standing there
alone gazing forth into the depths of the star-gemmed night.

Stay!  What is that tongue of flame suddenly leaping forth into the
darkness?  Another and another--and lo! by magic, from a score of lofty
heights, red fires are gushing upward into the black and velvety gloom,
and as the ominous beacons gather in flaming volume roaring up to a
great height, the lurid glow of the dark firmament is reflected dully
upon the slumbering plains.

A weird, far-away chorus floats upon the stillness, now rising, now
falling.  Its boding import there is no mistaking.  It is the gathering
cry of a barbarian host.  The Gaika location is up in arms.  Heavens!
What is to become of this delicate woman here, alone and unprotected,
exposed to the full brunt of a savage rising--and all that it means?

Eanswyth is standing on the _stoep_, her eyes fixed upon the appalling
phenomenon, but in their glance is no shadow of fear.  Death has no
terrors for her now; at peril she can afford to laugh.  Her lips are
even curving into a sweet, sad smile.

"Just as it was that night," she exclaims.  "The parallel is complete.
Blaze on red signals of death--and when destruction does break forth let
it begin with me!  I will wait for it, welcome it, for I walk in shadow
now--will welcome it here on this spot where we stood that sweet and
blessed night--here where our hearts first met--here where mine is
breaking now!"

Her voice dies away in a sob.  She sinks to the ground.  The distant
glare of the war-fires of the savages falls fully upon that prostrate
figure lying there in the abandonment of woe.  It lights up a very
sacrifice.  The rough stones of the _stoep_ are those of an altar--the
sacrifice a broken heart.

"Here is where we stood that night together," she murmurs, pressing her
lips to the hard, cold stones.  "It is just as it was then.  Oh, my
love--my love, come back to me!  Come back--even from the cold grave!"

------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Eanswyth!"

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The word is breathed in a low, unsteady voice.  Every drop of blood
within her turns to ice.  It is answered at last, her oft-repeated
prayer.  She is about to behold him.  Does she not shrink from it?  Not
by a hair's-breadth.

"Let me see you, my love," she murmurs softly, not daring to move lest
the spell should be broken.  "Where--where are you?"

"Where our hearts first met--there they meet again.  Look up, my sweet
one.  I am here."

She does look up.  In the red and boding glare of those ominous
war-fires she sees him as she saw him that night.  She springs to her
feet--and a loud and thrilling cry goes forth upon the darkness.

"Eustace--Eustace!  Oh, my love!  Spirit or flesh--you shall not leave
me!  At last--at last!"



CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR.

FROM DEATH AND--TO DEATH.

She realised it at length--realised that this was no visitant from the
spirit-world conjured up in answer to her impassioned prayer, but her
lover himself, alive and unharmed.  She had thrown herself upon his
breast, and clung to him with all her strength, sobbing passionately--
clung to him as if even then afraid that he might vanish as suddenly as
he had appeared.

"My love, my love," he murmured in that low magnetic tone which she knew
so well, and which thrilled her to the heart's core.  "Calm those poor
nerves, my darling, and rest on the sweetness of our meeting.  We met--
our hearts met first on this very spot.  Now they meet once more, never
again to part."

Still her feeling was too strong for words; she could only cling to him
in silence, while he covered her face and soft hair with kisses.  A
moment ago she was mourning him as dead, was burying her heart in his
unknown and far-away grave, and lo, as by magic, he stood before her,
and she was safe in his embrace.  A moment ago life was one long vista
of blank, agonising grief; now the joys of heaven itself might pale
before the unutterable bliss of this meeting.

Unlawful or not as their love might be, there was something solemn,
almost sacred, in its intense reality.  The myriad eyes of heaven looked
down from the dark vault above, and the sullen redness of the war-fires
flashing from the distant heights shed a dull, threatening glow upon
those two, standing there locked in each other's embrace.  Then once
more the wild, weird war-cry of the savage hosts swelled forth upon the
night.  It was an awesome and fearful background to this picture of
renewed life and bliss.

Such a reunion can best be left to the imagination, for it will bear no
detailment.

"Why did you draw my very heart out of me like this, Eustace, my life?"
she said at last, raising her head.  "When they told me you were dead I
knew it would not be long before I joined you.  I could not have endured
this living death much longer."

There were those who pronounced Eanswyth Carhayes to be the most
beautiful woman they had ever beheld--who had started with amazement at
such an apparition on an out-of-the-way Kaffrarian farm.  A grand
creature, they declared, but a trifle too cold.  They would have
marvelled that they had ever passed such a verdict could they but have
seen her now, her splendid eyes burning into those of her lover in the
starlight as she went on:

"You are longing to ask what I am doing here in this place all alone and
at such a time.  This.  I came here as to a sanctuary: a sacred spot
which enshrined all the dearest memories of you.  Here in silence and in
solitude I could conjure up visions of you--could see you walking beside
me as on that last day we spent together.  Here I could kneel and kiss
the floor, the very earth which your feet had trod; and--O Eustace, my
very life, it was a riven and a shattered heart I offered up daily--
hourly--at the shrine of your dear memory."

Her tones thrilled upon his ear.  Never had life held such a delirious,
intoxicating moment.  To the cool, philosophical, strong-nerved man it
seemed as if his very senses were slipping away from him under the
thrilling love-tones of this stately, beautiful creature nestling within
his arms.  Again their lips met--met as they had met that first time--
met as if they were never again to part.

"Inkose!"

The sudden sonorous interruption caused Eanswyth to start as if she had
been shot, and well it might.  Her lover, however, had passed through
too many strange and stirring experiences of late to be otherwise than
slightly and momentarily disconcerted.

A dark figure stood at the lowest step of the _stoep_, one hand raised
in the air, after the dignified and graceful manner of native
salutation.

"Greeting, Josane," he replied.

"Now do mine eyes behold a goodly sight," went on the old Kafir with
animation, speaking in the pleasing figurative hyperbole of his race.
"My father and friend is safe home once more.  We have mourned him as
dead and he is alive again.  He has returned to gladden our hearts and
delight our eyes.  It is good--it is good."

"How did you know I had returned, Josane?"

Had there been light enough they would have detected the most whimsical
smile come over the old Kafir's face as he replied:

"Am I not the _Inkosikazi's_ watch-dog?  What sort of a watch-dog is it
that permits a footstep to approach from outside without his knowledge?"

"You are, indeed, a man, Josane--a man among men, and trust to those who
trust you," replied Eustace, in that tone of thorough friendship and
regard which had enabled him to win so effectually the confidence of the
natives.

The old cattle-herd's face beamed with gratification, which, however,
was quickly dashed with anxiety.

"Look yonder," he said.  "There is trouble in the Gaika location
to-night.  Take the _Inkosikazi_ and leave--this very night.  I know
what I say."  Then, marking the other's hesitation, "I know what I say,"
he repeated impressively.  "Am I not the _Inkosikazi's_ watch-dog?  Am I
not her eyes and ears?  Even now there is one approaching from Nteya's
kraal."

He had struck a listening attitude.  Eustace, his recent experiences
fresh in his mind, felt depressed and anxious, gazing expectantly into
the darkness, his hand upon the butt of his revolver.

"Halt!  Who comes there?" he cried in the Xosa tongue.

"A friend, Ixeshane!" came the prompt reply, as a dark form stepped into
view.

Now that life was worth living again, Eanswyth felt all her old
apprehensions return; but she had every confidence in her lover's
judgment and the fidelity of her trusted old retainer.

"_Hau_, Ixeshane!  You are here; it is good," said the new arrival in
the most matter-of-fact way, as though he were not wondering to
distraction how it was that the man who had been reported slain in the
Bomvana country by the hostile Gcalekas, should be standing there alive
and well before him.  "I am here to warn the _Inkosikazi_.  She must
leave, and at once.  The fire-tongues of the Amaxosa are speaking to
each other; the war-cry of the Ama Ngqika is cleaving the night."

"We have seen and heard that before, Ncanduku," answered Eustace,
recognising the new arrival at once.  "Yet your people would not harm
us.  Are we not friends?"

The Kafir shook his head.

"Who can be called friends in war-time?" he said.  "There are strangers
in our midst--strangers from another land.  Who can answer for them?  I
am Ncanduku, the brother of Nteya.  The chief will not have his friends
harmed at the hands of strangers.  But they must go.  Look yonder, and
lose no time.  Get your horses and take the _Inkosikazi_, and leave at
once, for the Ama Ngqika have responded to the call of their brethren
and the Paramount Chief, and have risen to arms.  _The land is dead_."

There was no need to follow the direction of the Kafir's indication.  A
dull, red glare, some distance off, shone forth upon the night; then
another and another.  Signal fires?  No.  These shone from no prominent
height, but from the plain itself.  Then Eustace took in the situation
in a moment.  The savages were beginning to fire the deserted homesteads
of the settlers.

"Inspan the buggy quickly, Josane," he said.  "And, Ncanduku, come
inside for a moment.  I will find _basela_ [Best rendered by the
familiar term `backshish'] for you and Nteya."  But the voice which had
conveyed such timely warning responded not.  The messenger had
disappeared.

The whole condition of affairs was patent to Eustace's mind.  Nteya,
though a chief whose status was not far inferior to that of Sandili
himself, was not all-powerful.  Those of his tribesmen who came from a
distance, and were not of his own clan, would be slow to give implicit
obedience to his "word," their instincts for slaughter and pillage once
fairly let loose, and so he had sent to warn Eanswyth.  Besides, it was
probable that there were Gcalekas among them.  Ncanduku's words,
"strangers from another land," seemed to point that way.  He put it to
Josane while harnessing the horses.  The old man emitted a dry laugh.

"There are about six hundred of the Gcaleka fighting men in Nteya's
location to-night," he replied.  "Every farmhouse in the land will be
burned before the morning.  _Whau_, Ixeshane!  Is there any time to lose
now?"

Eustace realised that assuredly there was not.  But inspanning a pair of
horses was, to his experienced hand, the work of a very few minutes
indeed.

"Who is their chief?" he asked, tugging at the last strap.  "Sigcau?"

"No.  Ukiva."

An involuntary exclamation of concern escaped Eustace.  For the chief
named had evinced a marked hostility towards himself during his recent
captivity; indeed, this man's influence had more than once almost turned
the scale in favour of his death.  No wonder he felt anxious.

Eanswyth had gone into the house to put a few things together, having,
with an effort, overcome her reluctance to let him out of her sight
during the few minutes required for inspanning.  Now she reappeared.  "I
am ready, Eustace," she said.

He helped her to her seat and was beside her in a moment.

"Let go, Josane!" he cried.  And the Kafir, standing away from the
horses' heads, uttered a sonorous farewell.

"What will become of him, dear?" said Eanswyth, as they started off at a
brisk pace.

"He is going to stay here and try and save the house.  I'm afraid he
won't be able to, though.  They are bound to burn it along with the
others.  And now take the reins a moment, dearest.  I left my horse
hitched up somewhere here, because I wanted to come upon you unawares.
I'll just take off the saddle and tie it on behind."

"But what about the horse?  Why not take him with us?"

"Josane will look after him.  I won't take him along now, because--well,
it's just on the cards we might have to make a push for it, and a led
horse is a nuisance.  Ah--there he is," as a low whinnying was heard on
their left front and duly responded to by the pair in harness.

In less than two minutes he had the saddle secured at the back of the
buggy and was beside her again.  It is to be feared Eustace drove very
badly that night.  Had the inquiry been made, candour would have
compelled him to admit that he had never driven so badly in his life.

Eanswyth, for her part, was quite overcome with the thrilling,
intoxicating happiness of the hour.  But what an hour!  They were
fleeing through the night--fleeing for their lives--their way lighted by
the terrible signal beacons of the savage foe--by the glare of flaming
homesteads fired by his ravaging and vengeful hand.  But then, he who
was dead is alive again, and is beside her--they two fleeing together
through the night.

"Darling," she whispered at last, nestling up closer to him.  "Why did
they try to kill me by telling me you were dead?"

"They had every reason to suppose so.  Now, what do you think stood
between me and certain death?"

"What?"

"Your love--not once, but twice.  The silver box.  See.  Here it is,
where it has ever been--over my heart.  Twice it turned the point of the
assegai."

"Eustace!"

"It is as I say.  Your love preserved me for yourself."

"Oh, my darling, surely then it cannot be so wicked--so unlawful!" she
exclaimed with a quiver in her voice.

"I never believed it could," he replied.

Up till then, poor Tom's name had not been mentioned.  Both seemed to
avoid allusion to it.  Now, however, that Eustace had to narrate his
adventures and escape, it could not well be avoided.  But in describing
the strange impromptu duel between the Gcaleka warrior and his
unfortunate cousin, he purposely omitted any reference to the latter's
probable hideous fate, leaving Eanswyth to suppose he had been slain
then and there.  It was impossible that she should have been otherwise
than deeply moved.

"He died fighting bravely, at any rate," she said at last.

"Yes.  Want of courage was never one of poor Tom's failings.  All the
time we were out he was keener on a fight than all the rest of the
command put together."

There was silence after this.  Then at last:

"How did you escape, Eustace, my darling?  You have not told me."

"Through paying ransom to that same Hlangani and paying pretty stiffly
too.  Four hundred and fifty head of good cattle was the figure.  Such a
haggle as it was, too.  It would have been impolitic to agree too
quickly.  Then, I had to square this witch-doctress, and I daresay old
Kreli himself will come in for some of the pickings.  From motives of
policy we had to carry out the escape as if it was a genuine escape and
not a put-up job--but they managed it all right--took me across the
river on some pretext or other and then gave me the opportunity of
leg-bail.  As soon as the war is over Hlangani will come down on me for
the cattle."

"How did you know I was back at Anta's Kloof, dearest?  Did the Hostes
tell you?" said Eanswyth at last.

"No.  I met that one-eyed fellow Tomkins just outside Komgha.  I only
waited while he called up two or three more to back his statement and
then started off here as hard as ever I could send my nag over the
ground."

The journey was about half accomplished.  The buggy bowled merrily
along--and its occupants--alone together in the warm balmy southern
night--began to wish the settlement was even further off.  They were
ascending a long rise.

"Hallo, what's up?" exclaimed Eustace suddenly, whipping up his horses,
which he had been allowing to walk up the hill.

The brow of the hill was of some altitude and commanded a considerable
view of the surrounding country.  But the whole of the latter was lit up
by a dull and lurid glow.  At intervals apart burned what looked like
several huge and distant bonfires.

"They mean business this time," said Eustace, reining in a moment to
breathe his horses on the brow of the rise.  "Look.  There goes Hoste's
place.  That's Bradfield's over there--and beyond that must be
Oesthuisen's.  Look at them all blazing merrily; and--by jingo--there
goes Draaibosch!"

Far and wide for many a mile the country was aglow with blazing
homesteads.  Evidently it was the result of preconcerted action on the
part of the savages.  The wild yelling chorus of the barbarous
incendiaries, executing their fierce war-dances around their work of
destruction, was borne distinctly upon the night.

"The sooner we get into Komgha the better now," he went on, sending the
buggy spinning down the long declivity which lay in front.  At the
bottom of this the road was intersected by a dry water course, fringed
with bush; otherwise the _veldt_ was for the most part open, dotted with
straggling clumps of mimosa.

Down went the buggy into the dry sandy drift.  Suddenly the horses shied
violently, then stopped short with a jerk which nearly upset the
vehicle.  A dark firm, springing panther-like, apparently from the
ground, had seized the reins.

Instinctively Eustace recognised that this was no time for parleying.
Quick as thought he drew his revolver and fired.  The assailant relaxed
his hold, staggered, spun round, then fell heavily to the earth.  The
horses, thus released, tore wildly onward, mad with terror.

A roar and a red, sheeting flash split the darkness behind.  The
missiles hummed overhead, one of them tearing a hole in the wide brim of
Eanswyth's hat.  This aroused all the demon in the blood of her
companion.  Standing up in his seat, regardless of prudence, he pointed
his revolver at the black onrushing mass discernible in the starlight,
and fired three shots in rapid succession.  A horrible, shrill, piercing
scream, showed that they had told with widespread and deadly effect.

"Ha!  _Bulala abelungu_!"  [Death to the whites] howled the exasperated
barbarians.  And dropping flat on the ground they poured another volley
into the retiring vehicle.

But the latter had gained some distance now.  The horses, panic-stricken
and well-nigh unmanageable, were tearing up the hill on the other side
of the drift, and it was all their driver could do in the darkness to
keep them in the track.  The buggy swayed fearfully, and twice catching
a wheel in an ant-heap was within an ace of turning over.

Suddenly one of the horses stumbled heavily, then fell.  All his
driver's efforts to raise him were useless.  The poor beast had been
struck by a bullet, and lay, feebly struggling, the blood pouring from a
jagged wound in his flank.

The black bolt of despair shot through Eustace's heart.  There was a
feeble chance of escape for Eanswyth, but a very feeble one.  Of himself
he did not think.  Quickly he set to work to cut loose the other horse.

But the traditional sagacity of that quadruped, as is almost invariably
the case, failed in an emergency.  He plunged and kicked in such wise as
to hinder seriously, if not defeat, every effort to disengage him from
the harness.  Eustace, his listening powers at their utmost tension,
caught the light pit-pat of the pursuers' footsteps racing up the hill
in the darkness.  They would be upon him before--

Ha!  The horse was loose.

"Quick, Eanswyth.  Mount!  It is your only chance!" he said, shortening
the reins into a bridle and holding them for her.

"I will not."

"Quick, quick!  Every moment lost is a life!"

"I will not.  We will die together.  I will not live without you," and
the heroic flash in the grand eyes was visible in the starlight.

The stealthy footsteps were now plainly audible.  They could not have
been two hundred yards distant.  Suddenly the horse, catching a renewed
access of panic, plucked the reins from Eustace's hand, and careered
wildly away into the _veldt_.  The last chance of escape was cut off.
They must die together now.  Facing round, crouching low behind the
broken-down vehicle, they listened for the approach of the pursuers.

All the bitterness of the moment was upon those two--upon him
especially--crouching there in the dark and lonely _veldt_.  Their
reunion was only to be a reunion in death.

The last dread act was drawing on.  The stealthy steps of the
approaching foe were now more distinctly audible.  With a deadly and
vengeful fire at his heart, Eustace prepared to sell their lives as
dearly as ever life was sold.

"We need not fear, my sweet one," whispered the heroine at his side.
"We are dying together."

Nearer--nearer, came those cat-like footfalls.  Then they ceased.  The
pulses of the two anxious listeners beat with an intense and surging
throb of expectation in the dead silence.

But instead of those stealthy feet, swift to shed blood, there was borne
upon the night the sound of horses' hoofs.  Then a crash of fire-arms,
and a ringing cheer.  No savage war-cry that, but a genuine British
shout.

"That you, Milne?" cried a familiar voice.  "All right: keep cool, old
man.  We shan't hit you by mistake.  How many are there?"

"I don't know.  Better not tackle them in the dark, Hoste.  Who is with
you?"

"Some Police.  But where are the niggers?"

Where indeed?  Savages have no stomach for facing unknown odds.  Their
late assailants had prudently made themselves scarce.

"We seem to be only just in time, anyway?" said Hoste, with a long
whistle of consternation as he realised the critical position of
affairs.  "Is Mrs Carhayes all right?" he added anxiously.

"Quite, thanks, Mr Hoste," replied Eanswyth.  "But you are, as you say,
only just in time."

Two of the Police horses were inspanned to the buggy, the men mounting
behind comrades, and the party set forth.  It would not do to linger.
The enemy might return in force at any moment.

Their escape had indeed been a narrow one.  It was only late in the
afternoon that Hoste had, by chance, learned from a trustworthy source
that the Gaikas meant to rise that night.  Horror-stricken, he had
rushed off to the officer in command of the Mounted Police to beg for
some troopers as a protective escort in order to bring Eanswyth away
from her lonely and perilous situation.  An experienced sergeant and
twenty-five men had been immediately ordered out--arriving in the very
nick of time, as we have seen.

"Well, we are all burnt out now, anyway," said Hoste as they journeyed
along as rapidly as possible.  "Look at my old place, what a flare-up
it's making.  And the hotel at Draaibosch!  It's making a bigger blaze
than all."

"That's McDonald's `Cape Smoke,'" [An inferior quality of Cape brandy is
thus popularly termed] laughed the police sergeant.

It was a weird and awesome sight.  The whole country was literally in a
blaze--the murk of the reddened smoke of burning homesteads obliterating
the stars.  And ever and anon the fierce, tumultuous thunder of a
distant war-dance was borne upon the air, with the vengeful shouts of
excited savages, beginning their orgy of torch and assegai.



CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE.

EUSTACE BECOMES UNPOPULAR.

The state of excitement prevailing in Komgha during the period of
hostilities within the Transkei, was as nothing to that which prevailed
now that the tide of war was rolling around the very outposts of the
settlement itself.

The once sleepy little village had become a vast armed camp, garrisoned
by regular troops, as well as being the halting place for numerous
bodies of irregulars--mounted burghers or Fingo levies--once more called
out or volunteering for active service, the latter with more zest this
time, inasmuch as the enemy was within their very gates.  It was the
headquarters of operations, and all day long--frequently all night too--
what with expeditions or patrols setting out, or returning, or
preparing; the arrival of reinforcements; the flash and trappings of the
military element; the exaggerated and conflicting rumours varying with
every half-hour that went by.  With all these things, we say, the
sojourners in that favoured settlement found things as lively as they
could wish.

There was no mistaking the position of affairs now.  The Gaikas, whose
locations occupied the whole northern half of British Kaffraria, the
Hlambi clans, who held the rugged country along the eastern slopes of
the Amatola Mountains, were all up in arms.  All, that is, save an
insignificant fraction, who applied to the Government for protection as
`loyals'; their loyalty consisting in taking no part in hostilities
themselves, but aiding with supplies and information those who did--as
well as affording a refuge in time of need to the women and cattle
belonging to their hostile countrymen.  Communication with the Colony
was practically cut off--for, except to strong parties, the King
Williamstown road was closed.  A strong escort, consisting of Police and
military, was attacked within a few miles of the settlement itself, only
getting through by dint of hard fighting; and ever in their bushy hiding
places, on the surrounding hills, hovered dark clouds of armed Savages
ready to swoop down upon lonely express-rider or waggon train
insufficiently guarded.  The smoke of ruined homesteads rose from the
fair plains of British Kaffraria, and by night the lurid signals of the
hostile barbarians flamed forth from many a lofty peak.

In the Transkei matters were rather worse than before the previous three
months of campaigning.  Very far from crushed, the Gcalekas swarmed back
into their oft-swept country, and with the aid of their new allies set
to work with redoubled ardour to make things as lively for the white man
as they possibly could.  This kept nearly all the forces then at the
front actively employed in that direction, leaving the field open to the
residue of the Gaikas and Hlambis to burn and pillage throughout British
Kaffraria at their own sweet will.  The destruction of property was
great and widespread.

Still, on the whole, men seemed rather to enjoy the prevailing state of
things than otherwise, even those who were severe losers, strange to
say.  The colonial mind, adventurous at bottom, dearly loves excitement,
once it has drunk at that enchanted fountain.  Perhaps one of the best
illustrations of this is to be found in the numbers who remained, and do
remain, on at Johannesburg after the collapse, in a state of
semi-starvation--rather than exchange the liveliness and stir of that
restless and mushroom town for the surer but more sober conditions of
life offered by the scenes of their birth.  In British Kaffraria, the
renewed outbreak of hostilities afforded plenty of excitement, which
went as a set-off against the aforesaid losses--for the time being at
any rate.  Those who had already taken part in the first campaign either
volunteered for the second or stayed at home and talked about both.
Though whether he had been out or not made no difference as regarded the
talking part of it, for every man jack you might meet in a day's
wandering was open to give you his opinion upon what had been done, and
what hadn't been done; above all upon what _should_ have been done; in a
word, felt himself entirely competent to direct the whole of the field
operations there and then, and without even the traditional minute's
notice.

But however enjoyable all this may have been to society at large, as
there represented, there was one to whom it was intolerably irksome, and
that one was Eustace Milne.  The reasons for this were diverse.  In the
first place, in the then crowded state of the community, he could hardly
ever obtain an opportunity of talking, with Eanswyth alone; which was
not wholly without advantage in that it enabled the latter to keep up
her _role_; for if her former sorrowing and heart-wrung condition had
now become the hollowest mockery, there was no reason why everybody
should be informed thereof, but very much the reverse.  He could not see
her alone in the house, for it was always full of people, and when it
was not, still, the walls were thin.  He could not take her for a ride
outside the settlement, for in those early days the enemy was daring,
and did not always keep at a respectful distance.  It would not do to
run any more risks.  In the next place, all the "talking big," and
indeed the talking at all, that went on, morning, noon, and night, on
the well-worn, and threadbare topic was wearisome to him.  The thing had
become, in fact, a bore of the first water.  But the most distasteful
side of it all was the notoriety which he himself had, all
involuntarily, attained.  A man who had been reported slain, and then
turned up safe and sound after having been held a prisoner for some
weeks by the savage and ordinarily ruthless enemy they were then
fighting, was sure to attract considerable attention throughout the
frontier community.  Friends, neighbours, intimates, people they had
never seen or heard of before, would call on the Hostes all day and
every day--literally in swarms, as the victim of these attentions put
it--in order to see Eustace, and haply, to extract a "yarn" as to his
late captivity.  If he walked through the township some effusive
individual was bound to rush at him with an "I say, Mister, 'scuse me,
but we're told you're the man that was taken prisoner by old Kreli.
Now, do us the favour to step round and have a drink.  We don't see a
man who has escaped from them black devils every day."  And then, under
pain of being regarded as churlish to a degree, he would find himself
compelled to join a group of jovial, but under the circumstances
excessively unwelcome, strangers, and proceed to the nearest bar to be
cross questioned within an inch of his life, and expected to put away
sundry "splits" that he did not want.  Or those in charge of operations,
offensive and defensive, would make his acquaintance and ask him to
dine, always with the object of eliciting useful information.  But to
these Eustace was very reticent and proved, in fact, a sore
disappointment.  He had been treated fairly well by his captors.  They
were savages, smarting under a sense of defeat and loss.  They might
have put him to death amid cruel torments; instead of which they had
given him his liberty.  For the said liberty he had yet to pay--to pay
pretty smartly, too, but this was only fair and might be looked upon in
the light of ransom.  He was not going to give any information to their
detriment merely because, under a doubtfully administered system of
organisation, they had taken up arms against the Colony.  Besides, as a
matter of fact, it was doubtful whether he had any information to give.

So his entertainers were disappointed.  Everyone who accosted him upon
the objectionable topic was disappointed.  He became unpopular.

The infinitesimal intellect of the community felt slighted.  The far
from infinitesimal sense of self-importance of the said community was
wounded to the core.  Here was a man who had passed through strange and
startling experiences which everyone else was dying to share--at second
hand.  Yet he kept them to himself.  Who was he, indeed, they would like
to know?  Other men, had they gone through the same experiences, would
have had them on tap all day long, for the benefit of all comers, good
measure and brimming over.  This one, on the contrary, was as close as
death itself.  Who was he that he should affect a singularity?

When a man is unpopular in a small community, he is pretty sure before
long to be made aware of that fact.  In this instance there were not
wanting individuals the ingenuity of whose inventive powers was equal to
the occasion.  No wonder Milne was reticent as to what he had gone
through--hinted these--for it was almost certainly not to his credit.
It was a singular thing that he should have emerged from the ordeal
unhurt and smiling, while poor Tom Carhayes had been mercilessly
butchered.  It looked, fishy--uncommonly so.  The more you looked at it,
the more it began to take on the aspect of a put-up job.  Indeed it
would not be surprising if it turned out that the expedition across the
Bashi was a cunningly devised trap, not originating with the Kafirs
either.  The escape of Hoste and Payne was part of the programme--no
motive existing why these two should be put out of the way.

Motive?  Motive for desiring Tom Carhayes' death?  Well, any fool could
see that, one might have thought.  Was there not a young and beautiful
widow in the case--who would succeed lo the dead man's extremely
comfortable possessions, and whom, by this time, any one could see with
half an eye, was desperately in love with the plotting and unscrupulous
cousin?  That was motive enough, one would think.

It was easy, moreover, now to see through the predilection of that
arch-schemer for their native neighbours and now enemies.  It was all
part of the plot.  Doubtless he was even no sending them secret
information and advice in return for what they had done for him.  It
would be surprising if he turned out anything better than a Kafir spy,
were the real truth known.

These amiable hints and innuendoes, sedulously buzzed around, were not
long in reaching the object of them.  But they affected his impenetrable
self-possession about as much as the discharge of a pea-shooter might
affect the back of the mail-plated armadillo.  His philosophical mind
saw no earthly reason for disturbing itself about any rumours which a
pack of spiteful idiots might choose to set afloat.  Hoste's advice to
him, to run two or three of these amiable gentry to earth and visit them
with a good sound kicking, only made him laugh.  Why should he mind what
anybody said?  If people chose to believe it they might--but if they
didn't they wouldn't, and that was all about it.

True, he was tempted, on one or two occasions, to follow his friend's
advice--and that was when Eanswyth was brought into the matter.  But he
remembered that you cannot strangle a widespread slander by force, and
that short of the direst necessity the association in an ordinary row of
any woman's name is justifiable neither by expediency nor good taste.
But he resolved to get her to move down to Swaanepoel's Hoek at the very
earliest opportunity.



CHAPTER THIRTY SIX.

A ROW IN THE CAMP.

There was just this much to bear out the ill-natured comments of the
scandal-mongers, in that the re-appearance of the missing cousin had
gone very far towards consoling the young widow for the loss of the dead
husband.

The fact was that where her strongest, deepest feelings were concerned,
Eanswyth, like most other women, was a bad actress.  The awful poignancy
of her suffering had been too real--the subsequent and blissful
revulsion too overpowering--for her to be able to counterfeit the one or
dissemble the other, with anything like a satisfactory result.  Those
who had witnessed the former, now shook their heads, feeling convinced
that they had then mistaken the object of it.  They began to look at
Eanswyth ever so little, askance.

But why need she care if they did?  She was independent, young and
beautiful.  She loved passionately, and her love was abundantly
returned.  A great and absorbing interest has a tendency to dwarf all
minor worries.  She did not, in fact, care.

Eustace, thanks to his cool and cautious temperament, was a better
actor; so good, indeed, that to those who watched them it seemed that
the affection was mainly, if not entirely, on one side.  Sometimes he
would warn her.

"For your own sake, dearest," he would say on such rare occasions when
they were alone together.  "For your own sake try and keep up
appearances a little longer; at any rate until we are out of this
infernal back-biting, gossipy little hole.  Remember, you are supposed
to be plunged in an abyss of woe, and here you are looking as absurdly
happy as a bird which has just escaped from a cage."

"Oh, darling, you are right as usual," she would reply, trying to look
serious.  "But what am I to do?  No wonder people think I have no
heart."

"And they think right for once, for you have given it away--to me.  Do
keep up appearances, that's all.  It won't be for much longer."

Eustace had secured a couple of rooms for his own use in one of the
neighbouring cottages.  The time not spent with Eanswyth was got through
strolling about the camp, or now and then taking a short ride out into
the _veldt_ when the _entourage_ was reported safe.  But this, in
deference to Eanswyth's fears, he did but seldom.

"Why on earth don't you go to the front again, Milne?" this or that
friend or acquaintance would inquire.  "You must find it properly slow
hanging on in this hole.  I know I do.  Why, you could easily get a
command of Fingo or Hottentot levies, or, for the matter of that, it
oughtn't to be difficult for a fellow with your record to raise a
command on your own account."

"The fact is I've had enough of going to the front," Eustace would
reply.  "When I was there I used often to wonder what business it was of
mine anyway, and when the Kafirs made a prisoner of me, my first thought
was that it served me devilish well right.  I give you my word it was.
And I tell you what it is.  When a man has got up every day for nearly a
month, not knowing whether he'd go to bed between his blankets that
night or pinned down to a black ants' nest, he's in no particular hurry
to go and expose himself to a repetition of the process.  It tells upon
the nerves, don't you know."

"By Jove, I believe you," replied the other.  "I never knew Jack Kafir
was such a cruel devil before, at least not to white men.  Well, if I'd
gone through what you have, I believe I'd give the front a wide berth,
too.  As it is, I'm off in a day or two, I hope."

"I trust you may meet with better luck," said Eustace.

One day a considerable force of mounted burghers started for the
Transkei--a good typical force--hardened, seasoned frontiersmen all,
well mounted, well armed; in fact, a thoroughly serviceable looking
corps all round.  There was the usual complement of spectators seeing
them off--the usual amount of cheering and hat-waving.  On the outskirts
of the crowd was a sprinkling of natives, representing divers races and
colours.

"_Au_!" exclaimed a tall Gaika, as the crowd dispersed.  "_That_ will be
a hard stone for Kreli to try and crush.  If it was the _Amapolise_
[Police] he could knock them to pieces with a stick.  Mere boys!"

"What's that you say, Johnny?" said a hard-fisted individual, turning
threateningly upon the speaker.

"Nothing.  I only made a remark to my comrade," replied the man in his
own language.

"Did you?" said the other walking up to the Kafir and looking him
straight in the eye.  "Then just keep your damned remarks to yourself,
Johnny, or we shall quarrel.  D'you hear?"

But the Kafir never quailed, never moved.  He was a tall, powerful
native and carried his head grandly.  The white man, though shorter,
looked tough and wiry as whip cord.  The crowd, which had been
scattering, gathered round the pair with the celerity of a mob of London
street-cads round a fallen cab-horse.

"What's the row?  A cheeky nigger?  Give him fits, Mister!  Knock him
into the middle of next week!" were some of the cries that burst from
the group of angry and excited men.

"I have committed no offence," said the Kafir.  "I made a remark to a
comrade, saying what a fine lot of men those were."

"Oh, yes?  Very likely!" shouted several ironically.

"See here now.  You get out of this," said the first man.  "Do you hear,
get out.  Don't say another word--or--"

He did not finish.  Stung by a contemptuous look in the Kafir's eyes, he
dashed his fist full into his face.

It was a crushing blow--but the native did not fall.  Like lightning he
aimed a blow at his assailant's head with his heavy kerrie--a blow which
would have shattered the skull like an egg shell.  But the other threw
up his arm in time, receiving nearly the full force of the blow on that
member, which dropped to his side completely paralysed.  Without
attempting to follow up his success the savage sprang back, whirling his
kerrie round his head.  The crowd, taken by surprise, scattered before
him.

Only for a moment, though.  Like a pack of hounds pressed back by a stag
at bay they gave way but to close up again.  In a trice the man's kerrie
was struck from his grasp, and he was thrown down, beaten, kicked, and
very roughly handled.

"Tie up the _schelm_!"

"Give him six dozen well-laid on!"  "Six dozen without counting!"
"Cheeky brute!" were some of the shouts that accompanied each kick and
blow dealt or aimed at the prostrate Kafir, who altogether seemed to be
having a pretty bad time of it.

"That's a damned shame!" exclaimed a voice behind them.

All started and turned their heads, some astonished--all angry--some
perhaps a little ashamed of themselves--towards the owner of the voice,
a horseman who sat calmly in his saddle some twenty yards away--an
expression of strong disgust upon his features.

"What have you got to say to it anyhow, I'd like to know?" cried the man
who had just struck the native.

"What I said before--that it's a damned shame," replied Eustace Milne
unhesitatingly.

"What's a shame, Mister?" sneered another.  "That one o' your precious
black kids is getting a hidin' for his infernal cheek?"

"That it should take twenty men to give it him, and that, too, when he's
down."

"I tell you what it is, friend," said the first speaker furiously.  "It
may take rather less than twenty to give you one, and that, too, when
you're up!" which sally provoked a blatant guffaw from several of the
hearers.

"I'm not much afraid of that," answered Eustace tranquilly.  "But now,
seeing that British love of fair play has been about vindicated by a
score of Englishmen kicking a prostrate Kafir, how would it be to let
him get up and go?"

The keen, biting sarcasm told.  The group, which mainly consisted of the
low element, actually did begin to look a trifle ashamed of itself.  The
better element composing it gave way and took itself off, as Eustace
deliberately walked his horse up to the fallen native.  There were a few
muttered jeers about "the nigger's friend" and getting into the Assembly
on the strength of "blanket votes," [The native franchise, derisively so
termed] and so forth, but none offered any active opposition except one,
however, and that was the man who had originated the disturbance.

"Look here," he shouted savagely.  "I don't know who you are and I don't
care.  But if you don't take yourself off out of this mighty quick, I'll
just about knock you into a jelly; you see if I don't."

"_Ja_, that's right.  Serve him as you did the nigger!" yelled the
bystanders, a lot of rowdy hobbledehoys and a contingent of town loafers
whom the prospect of an easy-going, devil-may-care life in the _veldt_
had drawn from the more sober avocations of bricklaying and
waggon-building within the Colony, and who, it may be added,
distinguished themselves at the seat of hostilities by such a line of
drunken mutinous insubordination as rendered them an occasion of
perennial detestation and disgust to their respective commanders.  These
now closed up around their bullying, swash-bucklering champion,
relieving their ardently martial spirits by hooting and cat's calls.  It
was only one man against a crowd.  They felt perfectly safe.

"Who sold his mate to the blanked niggers!" they yelled.  "Ought to be
tarred and feathered.  Come on, boys; let's do it.  Who's for tarring
and feathering the Kafir spy?"

All cordially welcomed this spicy proposal, but curiously enough, no one
appeared anxious to begin, for they still kept some paces behind the
original aggressor.  That worthy, however, seemed to have plenty of
fight in him, for he advanced upon Eustace unhesitatingly.

"Come now.  Are you going to clear?" he shouted.  "You're not?  All
right.  I'll soon make you."

A stirrup-iron, wielded by a clever hand, is a terribly formidable
weapon.  Backing his horse a pace or two Eustace wrenched loose his
stirrup.  Quick as lightning, it whirled in the air, and as his
assailant sprang wildly at him down it came.  The aggressive bully went
to earth like a felled ox.

"Any more takers for the tar-and-feather line of business?" said Eustace
quietly, but with the light of battle in his eyes.

The insulting jeers and the hooting still continued.  But no one
advanced.  No one seemed anxious to tackle that particularly resolute
looking horseman.

"Get out of this, you cowardly skunks!" sung out a voice behind him,
which voice proceeded from another horseman, who had ridden up unseen
during the _emeute_.  "Twenty to one!  Faugh!  For two pins we'll
sjambok the lot of you."

"Hallo, Errington!  Where have you dropped from?  Thought you were away
down in the Colony," said Eustace, turning to the new arrival, a fine
soldierly looking man of about his own age, in whom he recognised a
former Field-Captain in Brathwaite's Horse.  The crowd had already begun
to melt away before this new accession of force.

"Yer--send yer winder to be cleaned!  Stick it in yer breeches pocket!"
were some of the witticisms yelled back by the retreating rowdies, in
allusion to the eye-glass worn by the newcomer.

"By jove, Milne.  You seem to have been in the wars," said the latter
looking from one to the other of the injured parties.  "What's the row,
eh?"

"It speaks for itself.  Nothing much, though.  I've only been reminding
our valiant friends there that fair play is a jewel even when its only a
Kafir that's concerned."--"Which unsavoury Ethiop seems to have been
knocked about a bit, however," rejoined the other, sticking his glass
into his eye to examine the fallen native.

The Kafir, who had raised himself to a sitting posture, was now staring
stupidly about him as though half dazed.  Blood was issuing from his
nose and mouth, and one of his eyes was completely closed up.  His
assailants had all slunk away by now, the arrival upon the scene of this
unwelcome ally having turned the scale against any plan they might have
entertained of showing further unpleasantness toward the solitary
intervener.

Some three or four of the Gaika's countrymen, who had held aloof, now
came up to the assistance of their friend.  These gave their version of
the story.  Eustace listened attentively.

"It was a foolish thing to make any remark at such a time and in such a
place," he said.  "It was sure to provoke strife.  Go and get him a tot
of grog," throwing them a sixpence, "and then you'd better get away
home."

"I tell you what it is, Milne," said Errington in a low tone.  "I know
that fellow you floored so neatly.  He's one of the best bruisers in the
country, and I'm afraid you haven't seen the last of him.  You'd better
keep a bright lookout as long as you're in this part.  He's bound to
play you some dog's trick at the earliest opportunity."

"Is he?  Well I must try and be ready for him.  I suppose now we must
bring the poor devil round, eh?  He seems about stunned."

Errington had a flask in his pocket.  Dismounting he raised the fallen
man's head and poured some of the contents into his mouth.

The fellow revived--gradually, stupidly.  He had received a bad blow,
which only a thick slouch hat and a thicker skull had saved from being a
worse one.

"Who the hell are you?" he growled surlily, as he sat up.  "Oh, I know
you," he went on as his glance lit upon Eustace.  "All right, my fine
feller, wait a bit, till I'm all right again.  You'll be sorry yet for
that damned coward's whack you've given me.  See if you're not."

"You brought it upon yourself.  Why did you try and rush me?"

"I didn't rush you with a stirrup-iron, did I?"

"No.  But see here.  If I'm attacked I'm not going to leave the choice
of my means of defence to the enemy.  Not much.  How would that pan out
for an idea in fighting old Kreli, for instance?"

"Of course," struck in Errington.  "That's sound sense, and you know it
is, Jackson.  You and Milne have had a bit of a scrimmage and you've got
the worst of it.  It might easily have been the other way.  So don't let
us have any grudge-bearing over it.  Take another drink, man," pouring
out a liberal modicum of whiskey into the cup of the flask, "and shake
hands and make it up."

The man, who was not a bad fellow at bottom, gave a growl as he tossed
off the tendered potion.  Then he held out his hand to Eustace.

"Well, Mister, I don't bear no grudge.  If you'll jest say you're sorry
you hit me--"

"I'll say that with pleasure, Jackson," replied Eustace, as they shook
hands.  "And look here, if you still feel a bit groggy on your pins,
jump on my horse and ride home.  I'll walk."

"No, thanks.  I'm all right now.  Besides I ain't going your way.  My
waggon's outspanned yonder on the flat.  Good-night."

"I stand very much indebted to you, Errington, for two services
rendered," said Eustace as they rode towards the township.  "And I'm not
sure that the last isn't by far the most important."

"Pooh! not at all, my dear fellow.  That howling rabble wouldn't have
come within twenty yards of you."

"I don't know about that.  The vagabonds were rather beginning to
realise that twenty to one meant long odds in favour of the twenty, when
you came up.  But the deft way in which you smoothed down our friend
with the broken head was diplomatic to a degree.  I hate rows, and the
knowledge that some fellow is going about day and night seeking an
opportunity of fastening a quarrel upon you unawares is tiresome.
Besides, I'm nothing of a boxer, and if I were should hate a shindy just
as much."

"I quite agree with you," said the other, who _was_ something of a
boxer.  "To form the centre of attraction to a howling, yahooing rabble,
making an undignified exhibition of yourself bashing and being bashed by
some other fellow like a couple of butcher's boys in the gutter, is
bound to be a revolting process whichever way you look at it.  Even the
law of the pistol seems to be an improvement on it."

"I think so, too.  It puts men on better terms of equality.  Any man may
become a dead shot and a quick drawer, but not one man in ten can fulfil
all the conditions requisite to becoming a good boxer.  The fact is,
however, I hate rows of any kind, even when only a spectator.  When
fellows say they like them I never altogether believe them."

"Unless they are very young.  But the Berserk taint soon wears off as
you get on into life a bit," said Errington.

"Well now--I turn off here.  Good-evening."



CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN.

"IT IS THE VOICE OF AN ORACLE."

Swaanepoel's Hoek, poor Tom Carhayes' other farm, was situated in the
division of Somerset East, somewhere between the Great and Little Fish
Rivers.  It was rather an out-of-the-way place, lying in a mountainous
district, sparsely inhabited and only reached by rough wheel-tracks
through narrow, winding _poorts_.  But the scenery was wild and romantic
to a degree.  The bold sweep of bush-grown slopes, the lofty heights
culminating in red iron-bound _krantzes_ whose inaccessible hedges
afforded nesting place for colonies of _aasvogels_, the thunder of the
mountain torrent pent-up between black rocky walls where the maiden-hair
fern hung in solid festoons from every crack and cranny, the cheerful
and abundant sounds of bird and animal life--all this rendered the place
a wonderfully pleasant and attractive, if somewhat out-of-the-way,
residence.

To Eanswyth Carhayes, however, this very isolation constituted an
additional charm.  The solemn grandeur of the soaring mountains, the
hush of the seldom trodden valleys, conveyed to her mind, after the
bustle and turmoil of the crowded frontier settlement, the perfection of
peace.  She felt that she could spend her whole life on this beautiful
spot.  And it was her own.

She had only once before visited the place--shortly after her marriage--
and then had spent but three or four days there.  Its beauties had
failed at that time to strike her imagination.  Now it was different.
All the world was a Paradise.  It seemed that there was nothing left in
life for her to desire.

The house was a fair size, almost too large for the overseer and his
family.  That worthy had asked Eustace whether Mrs Carhayes would
prefer that they should vacate it.  There was a substantial outbuilding,
used--or rather only half of it was used--as a store, and a saddle and
harness room.  They could make themselves perfectly snug in that, if
Mrs Carhayes wished to have the house to herself.

"I can answer for it: Mrs Carhayes wishes nothing of the sort," he had
replied.  "In fact, we were talking over that very thing on the way
down."

"Sure the children won't disturb her, Mr Milne?"

"Well, it hasn't looked like it up till now.  Those youngsters of yours
don't seem particularly obstreperous, Bentley, and Mrs Carhayes appears
rather to have taken a fancy to them than otherwise."

"If there's a kind sweet lady in this world, Mr Milne, it's Mrs
Carhayes," said the overseer earnestly.  "I know the wife'll make her
right comfortable while she's here.  She'll save her all bother over
housekeeping or anything of that sort.  Excuse the question, but is she
likely to be making a long stay?"

"I shouldn't wonder.  You see, there's nowhere else for her to go, and
the quiet of this place suits her after all she has gone through.  And
she has gone through some pretty lively times, I need hardly tell you."

"I should think so.  Why, what a narrow escape she had that time you
were bringing her away from Anta's Kloof, when the trap broke down.
That was a frightful position for any lady to be in, in all conscience."

"Oh, you heard of that, did you?  Ah, I forgot.  It was in every paper
in the Colony--more or less inaccurately reported, of course," added
Eustace drily, and then the two men lit their pipes and chatted for an
hour or so about the war and its events.

"By the way, Bentley," said Eustace presently.  "Talking about that
outbuilding.  I've decided to knock out the partition--it's only a
wooden one--between the two rooms next to the storeroom, turn them into
one, and use it as a bedroom for myself.  The house is rather congested
with the lot of us in it, after all.  We might go to work at it this
afternoon."

"Certainly, Mr Milne, certainly," replied the overseer.  And forthwith
the tool-chest was laid under requisition, and in a couple of hours the
necessary alterations were effected.

This move did not altogether meet with Eanswyth's approval, and she
expostulated accordingly.

"Why should you be the one turned out in the cold," she said.  "There's
no earthly necessity for it.  You will be horribly uncomfortable over
there, Eustace, and in winter the nights will be quite bitter.  Then
again, the roof is a thatched one, and the first rain we get will start
it leaking like a sieve.  Besides, there's plenty of room in the house."

"It isn't that, you dear, thoughtful, considerate guardian angel," he
answered.  "It isn't quite that, though I put it that way for Bentley's
behoof.  It is something of a concession to Mother Grundy, for even here
that arch-hag can make her upas power felt, and I don't want to have all
the tongues in the district wagging like the tails of a pack of
foxhounds just unkennelled.  We had enough of that at Komgha.  So I've
arranged that at any rate we shan't be under the same roof.  See?"

"Yes; but it's ridiculous all the same.  As if we weren't relations,
too."

"And will be closer relations soon--in fact, the closest.  I suppose we
must wait a year--but that rests with you."

"I don't know.  It's an awfully long time," and she sighed.  Then rather
hesitatingly: "Darling, you have never yet shown me the little silver
box.  We are alone now, and--"

"And you are dying to see it.  Well, Eanswyth, it is really a most
remarkable coincidence--in fact, almost makes a man feel superstitious."

It was near sundown.  A soft, golden light rested upon the great slopes,
and the cooing of doves floated melodiously from the mealie lands in the
valley.  The mountain stream roared through its rocky bed at their feet,
and among the crannies and ledges of a profusion of piled up boulders
forming miniature cliffs around, a whole colony of bright eyed little
_dasjes_ [The "rock rabbit"--really a species of marmot] were disporting
themselves, scampering in and out with a boldness which augured volumes
in favour of the peaceable aspect of the two human intruders upon their
sequestered haunt.

"As you say, the time and place are indeed fitting," said Eustace,
sitting down upon a boulder and taking the box from its place of
concealment.  "Now, my darling, look at this.  The assegai point is
broken short off, driven with such force that it has remained embedded
in the lid."

It was even as he said.  Had the blade been driven with a powerful
hammer it could not have been more firmly wedged within the metal.

"That was the blow I received during the fight," he went on.  "The dent
at the side of it was done when I stood up to the witch-doctress.  It
did not penetrate much that time; not that the blow wasn't hard enough,
for it nearly knocked me down, but the assegai was a rotten one and made
of soft iron, and the point flattened out like a Snider bullet.
Heavens! but that was an ordeal--something of a nerve-tickler!" he
added, with a grave and meditative look in his eyes, as if he were
mentally re-enacting that trying and critical scene.

Eanswyth shuddered, but said nothing.  She nestled rather closer to his
side, as he continued:

"Now to open the box--a thing I haven't done since, partly from
superstitious motives--partly that I intended we should do so together--
if we ever were to be again together, that is."

He pressed the spring, but it was out of order.  It needed the wrench of
a strong knife blade before the lid flew open.

"Look at that.  The assegai point is so firmly wedged that it would take
a hammer to drive it out--but I propose to leave it in--use it as a
`charm' next war perhaps.  Now for the letter.  It has gone through and
through it--through the photograph too--and has just dinted the bottom
of the box."

He spread out the letter.  Those last tender, loving words, direct from
her overflowing heart, were pierced and lacerated by the point of the
murderous weapon.

"If this is not an oracle, there never was such a thing," he went on.
"Look at this"--reading--"`I dare not say "God bless you."  Coming from
me it would entail a curse, rather than a blessing...'  The point has
cut clean through the words `a curse'--Mfulini's assegai has made short
work of that malediction.  Is not that the voice of an oracle?"

She made no reply.  She was watching the development of the
investigation with rapt, eager attention.

"Here again--`Were anything to befall you--were you never to come back
to me my heart would be broken...'  As the paper is folded it has cut
through the word `heart'--And--by Jove, this is more than a coincidence!
Here again, it has gone clean through the same word.  Look at the end.
`_I want you in all your dangers and hardships to have, with you, these
poor little lines, coming, as they are, warm from my hand and heart_'...
And now for the photograph.  It is a sweetly lifelike representation of
you, my dearest--"

A cry from her interrupted him.  The portrait was a three parts length
cabinet one, cut round to enable it to fit the box, which it did
exactly.  Right through the breast of the portrait, the assegai point
had pierced.

"O Eustace--this is an oracle, indeed!" she cried.  "Do you not see?
The spear point has gone right through my `heart' again for the third
time.  My dearest love, thrice has my `heart' stood between you and
death--once in the portrait, twice in the letter.  At the same time it
has obliterated the word `curse.'  It is, indeed, an `oracle' and--What
if I had never given you that box at all?"

"I should be a lot of dry bones scattered about the _veldt_ in
Bomvanaland at this moment," he rejoined.  "Now you see how your love
has twice stood between me and death; has preserved my life for itself.
My sweet guardian angel, does not that look as if some Fate had always
intended us for each other from the very first!"



CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT.

AT SWAANEPOEL'S HOEK.

Several months had gone by.

The war was nearly over now.  Struck on all sides--decimated by the
terrible breech-loading weapons of the whites--harried even in their
wildest strongholds, their supplies running low, their crops destroyed,
and winter upon them--the insurgent tribes recognised that they were
irretrievably worsted.  They had no heart for further fighting--their
principal thought now was to make the best terms they could for
themselves.  So all along the frontier the disheartened savages were
flocking in to lay down their arms and surrender.  Those who belonged to
independent tribes in the Transkei were treated as belligerents--and
after being disarmed were located at such places as the Government
thought fit.  Those who were British subjects, and whose locations were
within the colonial boundaries, such as the Gaikas, Hlambis, and a
section of the Tembus, were treated as rebels and lodged in gaol until
such time as it should please the authorities to put them on their trial
for high treason, treason, felony, or sedition, according to their rank,
responsibilities, or deeds.  Still the unfortunate barbarians preferred
to discount the chances of the future against present starvation--and
continued to come in, in swarms.  The gaols were soon crammed to
overflowing; so, too, were the supplementary buildings hired for the
emergency.

Not all, however, had preferred imprisonment with plenty to liberty with
starvation.  There were still armed bands lurking in the forest recesses
of the Amatola, and in the rugged and bushy fastnesses beyond the Kei.
While most of the chiefs of the colonial tribes had either surrendered
or been slain, the head and Paramount Chief of all was still at large.
"Kreli must be captured or killed," was the general cry.  "Until this is
done the war can never be considered at an end."  But the old chief had
no intention of submitting to either process if he could possibly help
it.  He continued to make himself remarkably scarce.

Another character who was very particularly wanted was Hlangani, and for
this shrewd and daring leader the search was almost as keen as for Kreli
himself.  Common report had killed him over and over again, but somehow
there was no satisfactory evidence of his identification.  Then a wild
rumour got about that he had been sent by his chief on a mission to
invoke the aid of the Zulu King, who at that time was, rightly or
wrongly, credited with keeping South Africa in general, and the colony
of Natal in particular, in a state of uneasiness and alarm.  But,
wherever he was, like his chief, and the "bold gendarmes" of the
burlesque song, he continued to be "when wanted never there."

All these reports and many more reached Eustace Milne, who had taken no
active part in frontier affairs since we saw him last.  He had even been
sounded as to his willingness to undertake a post on behalf of the
Government which should involve establishing diplomatic relations with
the yet combatant bands, but this he had declined.  He intended to do
what he could for certain of the rebels later on, but meanwhile the time
had not yet come.

Moreover, he was too happy amid the peaceful idyllic life he was then
leading to care to leave it even for a time in order to serve a
potentially ungrateful country.  And it was idyllic.  There was quite
enough to do on the place to keep even his energetic temperament active.
The stock which had constituted the capital of their common partnership
and had been sent to Swaanepoel's Hoek at the outbreak of the war
required considerable looking after, for, owing to the change of
_veldt_, it did not thrive as well as could be wished.  And then the
place afforded plenty of sport; far more than Anta's Kloof had done.
Leopards, wild pigs, and bushbucks abounded in the bushy kloofs; indeed,
there were rather too many of the former, looking at it from the farming
point of view.  The valley bottoms and the water courses were full of
guinea-fowl and francolins, and high up on the mountain slopes, the vaal
rykbok might be shot for the going after, to say nothing of a plentiful
sprinkling of quail and now and then a bustard.  Eustace was often
constrained to admit to himself that he would hardly have believed it
possible that life could hold such perfect and unalloyed happiness.

He had, as we have said, plenty of wholesome and congenial work, with
sport to his heart's content, and enjoyed a complete immunity from care
or worry.  These things alone might make any man happy.  But there was
another factor in this instance.  There was the sweet companionship of
one whom he had loved passionately when the case was hopeless and she
was beyond his reach, and whom he loved not less absorbingly now that
all barriers were broken down between them, now that they would soon
belong to each other until their life's end.  This was the influence
that cast a radiant glow upon the doings and undertakings of everyday
life, encircling everything with a halo of love, even as the very peace
of Heaven.

Not less upon Eanswyth did the same influences fall.  The revulsion
following upon that awful period of heart-break and despair had given
her fresh life indeed.  In her grand beauty, in the full glow of health
and perfect happiness, no one would have recognised the white, stricken
mourner of that time.  She realised that there was nothing on earth left
to desire.  And then her conscience would faintly reproach her.  Had she
a right to revel in such perfect happiness in the midst of a world of
sorrow and strife?

But the said world seemed to keep very fairly outside that idyllic
abode.  Now and then they would drive or ride into Somerset East, or
visit or be visited by a neighbour--the latter not often.  The bulk of
the surrounding settlers were Boers, and beyond exchanging a few
neighbourly civilities from time to time they saw but little of them.
This, however, was not an unmixed evil.

Bentley had been as good as his word.  His wife was a capital
housekeeper and had effectively taken all cares of that nature off
Eanswyth's hands.  Both were thoroughly good and worthy people, of
colonial birth, who, by steadiness and trustworthy intelligence, had
worked their way up from a very lowly position.  Unlike too many of
their class, however, they were not consumed with a perennial anxiety to
show forth their equality in the sight of Heaven with those whom they
knew to be immeasurably their superiors in birth and culture, and to
whom, moreover, they owed in no small degree their own well-being.  So
the relations existing between the two different factors which composed
the household were of the most cordial nature.

There had been some delay in settling up Tom Carhayes' affairs--in fact,
they were not settled yet.  With a good sense and foresight, rather
unexpected in one of his unthinking and impulsive temperament, poor Tom
had made his will previous to embarking on the Gcaleka campaign.
Everything he possessed was bequeathed to his wife--with no restriction
upon her marrying again--and Eustace and a mutual friend were appointed
executors.

This generosity had inspired in Eanswyth considerable compunction, and
was the only defective spoke in the wheel of her present great
happiness.  Sometimes she almost suspected that her husband had guessed
at how matters really stood, and the idea cost her more than one
remorseful pang.  Yet, though she had failed in her allegiance, it was
in her heart alone.  She would have died sooner than have done so
otherwise, she told herself.

Twice had the executors applied for the necessary authority to
administer the estate.  But the Master of the Supreme Court professed
himself not quite satisfied.  The evidence as to the testator's actual
death struck him as inadequate--resting, as it did, upon the sole
testimony of one of the executors, who could not even be positive that
the man was dead when last seen by him.  He might be alive still, though
held a prisoner.  Against this view was urged the length of time which
had elapsed, and the utter improbability that the Gcaleka bands, broken
up and harried, as they were, from point to point, would hamper
themselves with a prisoner, let alone a member of that race toward which
they had every reason to entertain the most uncompromising and
implacable rancour.  The Supreme Court, however, was immovable.  When
hostilities were entirely at an end, they argued, evidence might be
forthcoming on the part of natives who had actually witnessed the
testator's death.  That fact incontestably established, letters of
administration could at once be granted.  Meanwhile the matter must be
postponed a little longer.

This delay affected those most concerned not one whit.  There was not
the slightest fear of Eanswyth's interests suffering in the able hands
which held their management.  Only, the excessive caution manifested by
the law's representatives would at times communicate to Eustace Milne a
vague uneasiness.  What if his cousin should be alive after all?  What
if he had escaped under circumstances which would involve perforce his
absence during a considerable period?  He might have gained the sea
shore, for instance, and been picked up by a passing ship bound to some
distant country, whose captain would certainly decline to diverge many
days out of his course to oblige one unknown castaway.  Such things had
happened.  Still, the idea was absurd, he told himself, for, even if it
was so, sufficient time had elapsed for the missing man, in these days
of telegraphs and swift mail steamers, to make known his whereabouts,
even if not to return in person.  He had not seen dim actually killed in
his conflict with Hlangani--indeed, the fact of that strange duel having
been fought with kerries, only seemed to point to the fact that no
killing was intended.  That he was only stunned and disabled when
dragged away out of sight Eustace could swear, but why should that
implacable savage make such a point of having the absolute disposal of
his enemy, if it were not to execute the most deadly ferocious vengeance
upon him which lay in his power?  That the wretched man had been
fastened down to be devoured alive by black ants, even as the pretended
wizard had been treated, Eustace entertained hardly any doubt--would
have entertained none, but that the witch-doctress's veiled hint had
pointed to a fate, if possible, even more darkly horrible.  No, after
all this time, his unfortunate cousin could not possibly be alive.  The
actual mode of his death might forever remain a mystery, but that he was
dead was as certain as anything in this world can be.  Any suspicion to
the contrary he resolved to dismiss effectually from his mind.

Eanswyth would often accompany her lover during his rides about the
_veldt_ looking after the stock.  She would not go with him, however,
when he was on sporting intent, she had tried it once or twice, but the
bucks had a horrid knack of screaming in the most heart-rending fashion
when sadly wounded and not killed outright, and Eustace's assurance that
this was due to the influence of fear and not of pain, entirely failed
to reconcile her to it.  [A fact.  The smaller species of antelope here
referred to, however badly wounded, will not utter a sound until seized
upon by man or dog, when it screams as described.  The same holds good
of the English hare.]  But when on more peaceful errand bent, she was
never so happy as when riding with him among the grand and romantic
scenery of their mountain home.  She was a first-rate horsewoman and
equally at home in the saddle when her steed was picking his way along
some dizzy mountain path on the side of a grass slope as steep as the
roof of a house with a series of perpendicular _krantzes_ below, or when
pursuing some stony and rugged bush track where the springy _spekboem_
boughs threatened to sweep her from her seat every few yards.

"We are partners now, you know, dearest," she would say gaily, when he
would sometimes urge the fatigue and occasionally even the risk of these
long and toilsome rides.  "While that law business still hangs fire the
partnership can't be dissolved, I suppose.  Therefore I claim my right
to do my share of the work."

It was winter now.  The clear mountain air was keen and crisp, and
although the nights were bitterly cold, the days were lovely.  The sky
was a deep, cloudless blue, and the sun poured his rays down into the
valleys with a clear, genial warmth which just rendered perceptible the
bracing exhilaration of the air.  Thanks to the predominating _spekboem_
and other evergreen bushes, the winter dress of Nature suffered but
little diminution in verdure; and in grand contrast many a stately
summit soared proudly aloft, capped with a white powdering of snow.

Those were days of elysium indeed, to those two, as they rode abroad
among the fairest scenes of wild Nature; or, returning at eve, threaded
the grassy bush-paths, while the crimson winged louris flashed from tree
to tree, and the francolins and wild guinea-fowl, startled by the
horses' hoofs, would scuttle across the path, echoing their grating note
of alarm.  And then the sun, sinking behind a lofty ridge, would fling
his parting rays upon the smooth burnished faces of the great red cliffs
until they glowed like molten fire.

Yes, those were indeed days to look back upon.



CHAPTER THIRTY NINE.

FROM THE DEAD!

Eustace and the overseer were sitting on the _stoep_ smoking a final
pipe together before going to bed.  It was getting on for midnight and,
save these two, the household had long since retired.

Tempted by the beauty of the night they sat, well wrapped up, for it was
winter.  But the whole firmament was ablaze with stars, and the broad
nebulous path of the Milky Way shone forth like the phosphoric trail in
the wake of a steamer.  The conversation between the two had turned upon
the fate of Tom Carhayes.

"I suppose we shall soon know now what his end really was," the overseer
was saying.  "Kafirs are as close as death over matters of that kind
while the war is actually going on.  But they are sure to talk
afterwards, and some of them are bound to know."

"Yes.  And but for this administration business it might be just as well
for us not to know," answered Eustace.  "Depend upon it, whatever it is,
it will be something more than ghastly, poor fellow.  Tom made a great
mistake in going to settle in Kafirland at all.  He'd have done much
better here."

"I suppose there isn't the faintest shadow of a chance that he may still
be alive, Mr Milne?"

The remark was an unfortunate one.  Cool-headed as he was, it awoke in
Eustace a vague stirring of uneasiness--chiming in, as it did, with the
misgivings which would sometimes pass through his own mind.

"Not a shadow of a chance, I should say," he replied, after a slight
pause.

Bentley, too, began to realise that the remark was not a happy one--for
of course he could not all this time have been blind to the state of
affairs.  He felt confused and relapsed into silence--puffing vigorously
at his pipe.

The silence was broken--broken in a startling manner.  A terrified
scream fell upon their ears--not very loud, but breathing unmistakable
tones of mortal fear.  Both men sprang to their feet.

"Heavens!" cried the overseer.  "That's Mrs Carhayes--"

But the other said not a word.  In about a half a dozen steps he was
through the sitting room and had gained the door which opened out of it.
This was Eanswyth's bedroom, whence the terrified cry had proceeded.

"What is wrong, Eanswyth?" he cried, tapping at the door.

It opened immediately.  She stood there wrapped in a long loose dressing
gown, the wealth of her splendid hair falling in masses.  But her face
was white as death, and the large eyes were dilated with such a pitiable
expression of fear and distress, as he certainly had never beheld there.

"What is it, my darling?  What has frightened you so?" he said tenderly,
moved to the core by this extraordinary manifestation of pitiable
terror.

She gave a quick flurried look over her shoulder.  Then clutching his
hands--and he noticed that hers were trembling and as cold as ice--she
gasped:

"Eustace--I have seen--him!"

"Who--in Heaven's name?"

"Tom."

"Darling, you must have dreamt it.  You have been allowing your thoughts
to run too much on the subject and--"

"No.  It was no dream.  I have not even been to bed yet," she
interrupted, speaking hurriedly.  "I was sitting there, at the table,
reading one of my little books.  I just happened to look up and--O
Eustace"--with a violent shudder--"I saw _his_ face staring in at the
window just as plainly as I can see you now."

Eustace followed her cowering glance.  The window, black and
uncurtained, looked out upon the _veldt_.  There were shutters, but they
were hardly ever closed.  His first thought, having dismissed the
nightmare theory, was that some loafer was hanging about, and seeing the
lighted window had climbed up to look in.  He said as much.

"No.  It was _him_," she interrupted decisively.  "There was no
mistaking him.  If it were the last word I breathed I should still say
so.  What does it mean?  Oh, what does it mean?" she repeated in tones
of the utmost distress.

"Hush, hush, my dearest!  Remember, Bentley will hear, and--"

"_There he is again_!"

The words broke forth in a shriek.  Quickly Eustace glanced at the
window.  The squares of glass, black against the outer night, showed
nothing in the shape of a human countenance.  A large moth buzzed
against them, and that was all.

Her terror was so genuine, as with blanched face and starting eyes she
glared upon the black glass, that ever so slight a thrill of
superstitious dread shot through him in spite of himself.

"Quick!" she gasped.  "Quick!  Go and look all round the house!  I am
not frightened to remain alone.  Mr Bentley will stay with me.  Go,
quick!"

The overseer, who had judiciously kept in the background, now came
forward.

"Certainly, Mrs Carhayes.  Better come into this room and sit down for
a bit.  Why, you must have been mistaken," he went on, cheerily placing
a chair at the sitting room fire, and kicking up the nearly dead logs.
"Nobody could get up at your window.  Why, its about fifteen feet from
the ground and there's nothing lying about for them to step on.  Not
even a monkey could climb up there--though--wait.  I did hear once of a
case where a baboon, a wild one out of the _veldt_, climbed up on to the
roof of a house and swung himself right into a room.  I don't say I
believe it, though.  It's a little too much of a Dutchman's yarn to be
readily swallowed."

Thus the good-natured fellow rambled on, intent on cheering her up and
diverting her thoughts.  The rooms occupied by himself and his family
were at the other end of the house and opened outside on the _stoep_,
hence the sound of her terrified shriek had not reached them.

Eustace, on investigation intent, had slipped round the outside of the
house with the stealth and rapidity of a savage.  But, as he had
expected, there was no sign of the presence of any living thing.  He put
his ear to the ground and listened long and intently.  Not a sound.  No
stealthy footfall broke the silence of the night.

But as he crouched there in the darkness, with every nerve, every
faculty at the highest tension, a horrible thought came upon him.  What
if Carhayes had really escaped--was really alive?  Why should he not
avow himself openly--why come prowling around like a midnight assassin?
And then the answer suggested itself.  Might it not be that his mind,
unhinged by the experiences of his captivity, was filled with the one
idea--to exact a deadly vengeance upon the wife who had so soon
forgotten him?  Such things had been, and to this man, watching there in
the darkness, the idea was horrible enough.

Stay!  There was one way of placing the matter beyond all doubt.  He
remembered that the soil beneath Eanswyth's window was loose dust--a
trifle scratched about by the fowls, but would give forth the print of a
human foot with almost the distinctness of snow.

Quickly he moved to the spot.  Striking a wax vesta, and then another,
he peered eagerly at the ground.  The atmosphere was quite still, and
the matches flamed like a torch.  His heart beat and his pulses
quickened as he carefully examined the ground--then a feeling of intense
relief came upon him.  _There was no sign of a human footprint_.

No living thing could have stood under that window, much less climbed up
to it, without leaving its traces.  There were no traces; ergo, no
living thing had been there, and he did not believe in ghosts.  The
whole affair had been a hallucination on the part of Eanswyth.  This was
bad, in that it seemed to point to a weak state of health or an
overloaded mind.  But it was nothing like so bad as the awful misfortune
involved by the reality would have been--at any rate, to him.

He did not believe in ghosts, but the idea crossed his mind that so far
as from allaying Eanswyth's fears, the utter impossibility of any living
being having approached her window without leaving spoor in the sandy,
impressionable soil, would have rather the opposite tendency.  Once the
idea got firmly rooted in her mind that the dead had appeared to her
there was no foreseeing the limits of the gravity of the results.  And
she had been rather depressed of late.  Very anxiously he re-entered the
house to report the utter futility of his search.

"At all events we'll soon make it impossible for you to get another
_schrek_ in the same way, Mrs Carhayes," said the overseer cheerily.
"We'll fasten the shutters up."

It was long before the distressed, scared look faded from her eyes.
"Eustace," she said--Bentley having judiciously left them together for a
while--"When _you_ were--when I thought you dead--I wearied Heaven with
prayers to allow me one glimpse of you again.  I had no fear then, but
now--O God! it is _his_ spirit that I have seen."

He tried to soothe her, to reassure her, and in a measure succeeded.  At
last, to the surprise of himself and the overseer, she seemed to shake
off her terror as suddenly as it had assailed her.  She was very
foolish, she declared.  She would go to bed now, and not keep them up
all night in that selfish manner.  And she actually did--refusing all
offers on the part of Eustace or the overseer to remain in the sitting
room in order to be within call, or to patrol around the house for the
rest of the night.

"No," she said, "I am ashamed of myself already.  The shutters are
fastened up and I shall keep plenty of light burning.  I feel quite safe
now."

It was late next morning when Eanswyth appeared.  Thoroughly refreshed
by a long, sound sleep, she had quite forgotten her fears.  Only as
darkness drew on again a restless uneasiness came over her, but again
she seemed to throw it off with an effort.  She seemed to have the
faculty of pulling herself together by an effort of will--even as she
had done that night beside the broken-down buggy, while listening for
the approaching footsteps of their savage enemies in the darkness.  To
Eustace's relief, however, nothing occurred to revive her uneasiness.

But he himself, in his turn, was destined to receive a rude shock.



CHAPTER FORTY.

A LETTER FROM HOSTE.

There was no postal delivery at Swaanepoel's Hoek, nor was there any
regular day for sending for the mails.  If anybody was driving or riding
into Somerset East on business or pleasure, they would call at the post
office and bring out whatever there was; or, if anything of greater or
less importance was expected, a native servant would be despatched with
a note to the postmaster.

Bentley had just returned from the township, bringing with him a batch
of letters.  Several fell to Eustace's share, all, more or less, of a
business nature.  All, save one--and before he opened this he recognised
Hoste's handwriting:

  My Dear Milne (it began): This is going to be an important
  communication.  So, before you go any further, you had better get into
  some sequestered corner by yourself to read it, for it's going to
  knock you out of time some, or I'm a Dutchman.

"That's a shrewd idea on the part of Hoste putting in that caution," he
said to himself.  "I should never have credited the chap with so much
gumption."

He was alone in the shearing-house when the overseer had handed him his
letters.  His coat was off, and he was doing one or two odd carpentering
jobs.  The time was about midday.  Nobody was likely to interrupt him
here.

  Something has come to my knowledge [went on the letter] which you, of
  all men, ought to be the one to investigate.  To come to the point,
  there is some reason to suppose that poor Tom Carhayes may still be
  alive.

  You remember that Kafir on whose behalf you interfered when Jackson
  and a lot of fellows were giving him beans?  He is my informant.  He
  began by inquiring for you, and when I told him you were far away, and
  not likely to be up here again, he seemed disappointed, and said he
  wanted to do you a good turn for standing his friend on that occasion.
  He said he now knew who you were, and thought he could tell you
  something you would like to know.

  Well, I told him he had better unburden himself to me, and if his
  information seemed likely to be of use, he might depend upon me
  passing it on to you.  This, at first, he didn't seem to see--you know
  what a suspicious dog our black brother habitually is--and took
  himself off.  But the secret seemed to weigh upon him, for, in a day
  or two, he turned up again, and then, in the course of a good deal of
  "dark talking," he gave me to understand that Tom Carhayes was still
  alive; and, in fact, he knew where he was.

  Milne, you may just bet your boots I felt knocked all out of time.  I
  hadn't the least suspicion what the fellow was driving at, at first.
  Thought he was going to let out that he knew where old Kreli was
  hiding, or Hlangani, perhaps.  So, you see, you must come up here at
  once, and look into the matter.  I've arranged to send word to
  Xalasa--that's the fellow's name--to meet us at Anta's Kloof directly
  you arrive.

  Don't lose any time.  Start the moment you get this.  Of course I've
  kept the thing as dark as pitch; but there's no knowing when an affair
  of this kind may not leak out and get into all the papers.

  Kind regards to Mrs Carhayes--and keep this from her at present.

  Yours ever, Percy F. Hoste.

Carefully Eustace read through every word of this communication; then,
beginning again, he read it through a second time.

"This requires some thinking out," he said to himself.  Then taking up
the letter he went out in search of some retired spot where it would be
absolutely impossible that he should be interrupted.

Wandering mechanically he found himself on the very spot where they had
investigated the silver box together.  That would do.  No one would
think of looking for him there.

He took out the letter and again studied every word of it carefully.
There was no getting behind its contents: they were too plain in their
fatal simplicity.  And there was an inherent probability about the
potentiality hinted at.  He would certainly start at once to investigate
the affair.  Better to know the worst at any rate.  And then how
heartily he cursed the Kafir's obtrusive gratitude, wishing a
thousand-fold that he had left that sable bird of ill-omen at the mercy
of his chastisers.  However, if there was any truth in the story, it was
bound to have come to light sooner or later in any case--perhaps better
now, before the mischief wrought was irreparable.  But if it should turn
out to be true--what then?  Good-bye to this beautiful and idyllic dream
in which they two had been living during all these months past.
Good-bye to a life's happiness: to the bright golden vista they had been
gazing into together.  Why had he not closed with Hlangani's hideous
proposal long ago?  Was it too late even now?

The man suffered agonies as he sat there, realising his shattered
hopes--the fair and priceless structure of his life's happiness levelled
to the earth like a house of cards.  Like Lucifer fallen from Paradise
he felt ready for anything.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Great was Eanswyth's consternation and astonishment when he announced
the necessity of making a start that afternoon.

"The time will soon pass," he said.  "It is a horrible nuisance,
darling, but there is no help for it.  The thing is too important.  The
fact is, something has come to light--something which may settle that
delayed administration business at once."

It might, indeed, but in a way very different to that which he intended
to convey.  But she was satisfied.

"Do not remain away from me a moment longer than you can help, Eustace,
my life!" she had whispered to him during the last farewell, she having
walked a few hundred yards with him in order to see the last of him.
"Remember, I shall only exist--not live--during these next few days.
This is the first time you have been away from me since--since that
awful time."

Then had come the sweet, clinging, agonising tenderness of parting.
Eanswyth, having watched him out of sight, returned slowly to the house,
while he, starting upon his strange venture, was thinking in the
bitterness of his soul how--when--they would meet again.  His heart was
heavy with a sense of coming evil, and as he rode along his thoughts
would recur again and again to the apparition which had so terrified
Eanswyth a few nights ago.  Was it the product of a hallucination on her
part after all, or was it the manifestation of some strange and dual
phase of Nature, warning of the ill that was to come?  He felt almost
inclined to admit the latter.



CHAPTER FORTY ONE.

XALASA'S REVELATION.

"You ought to consider yourself uncommonly fortunate, Milne," said
Hoste, as the two men drew near Anta's Kloof.  "You are the only one of
the lot of us not burnt out."

"That's a good deal thanks to Josane," replied Eustace, as the house
came into sight.  "He thought he could manage to save it.  I didn't.
But he was right."

"Ha-ha!  I believe the old scamp has been enjoying himself all this time
with the rebels.  I dare say he has been helping to do the faggot
trick."

"Quite likely."

Hoste eyed his companion with a curious glance.  The latter had been
rather laconic during their ride; otherwise he seemed to show no very
great interest one way or another in the object of it.  Yet there was
reason for believing that if Xalasa's tale should prove true it would
make every difference to the whole of Eustace Milne's future life.

The sun was just setting as they reached Anta's Kloof.  The Kafir had
stipulated that they should meet him at night.  He did not want to incur
potential pains and penalties at the hands of his compatriots as an
"informer" if he could possibly help it.  The house, as Hoste had said,
was the only one in the whole neighbourhood which had escaped the torch,
but that was all that could be said, for it was completely gutted.
Everything portable had been carried off, if likely to prove of any use
to the marauders, what was not likely so to prove being smashed or
otherwise destroyed.  Windows were broken and doors hung loose on their
hinges; in fact, the place was a perfect wreck.  Still it was something
that the fabric would not need rebuilding.

Hardly had they off-saddled their horses, and, knee-haltering them
close, turned them out to graze around the house, than the night fell.

"Xalasa should be here by now," remarked Hoste, rather anxiously.
"Unless he has thought better of it.  I always expected we should learn
something more about poor Tom when the war was over.  Kafirs will talk.
Not that I ever expected to hear that he was alive, poor chap--if he is,
that's to say.  But what had been the actual method of his death: that
was bound to leak out sooner or later."

Eustace made no reply.  The remark irritated him, if only that his
companion had made it, in one form or another, at least half a dozen
times already.  Then the sound of a light footstep was heard, and a
tall, dark figure stood before them in the gloom, with a muttered
salutation.

"Greeting, Xalasa!" said Eustace, handing the new arrival a large piece
of Boer tobacco.  "We will smoke while we talk.  The taste of the
fragrant plant is to conversation even as the oil unto the axles of a
heavily laden waggon."

The Kafir promptly filled his pipe.  The two white men did likewise.

"Have you been in the war, Xalasa?" went on Eustace, when the pipes were
in full blast.  "You need not be afraid of saying anything to us.  We
are not Government people."

"_Au_!" said the Gaika, with a quizzical grin upon his massive
countenance.  "I am a `loyal,' Ixeshane."

"The chiefs of the Ama Ngqika, Sandili and the rest of them, have acted
like children," replied Eustace, with apparent irrelevance.  "They have
allowed themselves to be dragged into war at the `word' of Kreli, and
against the advice of their real friends, and where are they now?  In
prison, with a lot of thieves and common criminals, threatened with the
death of a dog!"

The Kafir uttered an emphatic murmur of assent.  Hoste, who was
excusably wondering what the deuce the recent bad behaviour, and
eventual fate of Sandili and Co., had to do with that of Tom Carhayes,
could hardly restrain his impatience.  But Eustace knew what he was
about.  The Briton may, as he delights to boast, prefer plain and
straightforward talking in matters of importance--or he may not.  The
savage, of whatever race or clime, unequivocally does not.  He dearly
loves what we should call beating around the bush.  However important
the subject under discussion, it must be led up to.  To dash straight at
the point is not his way.  So after some further talk on the prospects
and politics of the Gaika nation, and of the Amaxosa race in general--
past, present, and to come--Eustace went on:

"You were not always a `loyal,' Xalasa?"

"_Whau_!" cried the man, bringing his hand to his mouth, in expressive
native fashion.  "When the fire trumpet first sounded in the midnight
sky, I answered its call.  While the chiefs of the Ama Ngqika yet sat
still, many of their children went forth to war at the `word' of the
Paramount Chief.  Many of us crossed into the Gcaleka country and fought
at the side of our brethren.  Many of us did not return.  _Hau_!"

"Then you became a `loyal'?"

"_Ihuvumente_ [The Government] was very strong.  We could not stand
against it.  Ha!  _Amasoja_--_Amapolisi_--_bonke_.  [Soldiers--police--
all] I thought of all the men who had crossed the Kei with me.  I
thought of the few who had returned.  Then I thought, `Art thou a fool,
Xalasa?  Is thy father's son an ox that he should give himself to be
slain to make strength for Sarili's fighting men?'  _Hau_!  I came home
again and resolved to `sit still.'"

"But your eyes and ears were open among the Ama-Gcaleka.  They saw--they
heard of my brother, Umlilwane?"

"Thy brother, Umlilwane, was alive at the time the white _Amagcagca_
[Rabble] knocked me down and kicked me.  He is alive still."

"How do you know he is alive still?" said Eustace, mastering his voice
with an effort, for his pulses were beating like a hammer as he hung
upon the other's reply.  It came--cool, impassive, confident:

"The people talk."

"Where is he, Xalasa?"

"Listen, Ixeshane," said the Kafir, glancing around and sinking his
voice to an awed whisper.  "Where is he!  _Au!  Kwa 'Zinyoka_."

"_Kwa 'Zinyoka_!  `The Home of the Serpents!'"  Well he remembered the
jeering, but ominous, words of the hideous witch-doctress at the time
his unfortunate cousin was being dragged away insensible under the
directions of his implacable foe, Hlangani.  "_He will wake.  But he
will never be seen again_."  And now this man's testimony seemed to bear
out her words.

"What is this `Home of the Serpents,' Xalasa?" he said.

"_Au_!" returned the Kafir, after a thoughtful pause, and speaking in a
low and apprehensive tone as a timid person in a haunted room might talk
of ghosts.  "It is a fearsome place.  None who go there ever return--
none--no, not one," he added, shaking his head.  "But they say your
magic is great, Ixeshane.  It may be that you will find your brother
alive.  The war is nearly over now, but the war leaves every man poor.
I have lost all I possessed.  When you find your brother you will
perhaps think Xalasa is a poor man, and I have too many cattle in my
kraal.  I will send four or five cows to the man who told me my brother
was alive."

In his heart of hearts Eustace thought how willingly he would send him a
hundred for precisely the opposite intelligence.

"Where is `The Home of the Serpents'?" he said.

"Where?  Who knows?  None save Ngcenika, who talks with the spirits.
None save Hlangani, who rejoices in his revenge as he sees his enemy
there, even the man who struck him, and drew the blood of the Great
Chief's herald.  Who knows?  Not I.  Those who go there never return,"
he added impressively, conveying the idea that in his particular
instance "ignorance is bliss."

Eustace's first instinct was one of relief.  If no one knew where the
place was, clearly no one could tell.  Then it struck him that this
rather tended to complicate matters than to simplify them.  There had
been quite enough insinuated as to himself, and though guiltless as to
his cousin's fate, yet once it got wind that the unfortunate man was
probably alive somewhere, it would devolve upon himself to leave no
stone unturned until that probability should become a certainty.  Public
opinion would demand that much, and he knew the world far too well to
make the blunder of treating public opinion, in a matter of this kind,
as a negligeable quantity.

"But if you don't know where the place is, Xalasa, how am I to find it?"
he said at length.  "I would give much to the man who would guide me to
it.  Think!  Is there no man you know of who could do so?"

But the Kafir shook his head.  "There is none!" he said.  "None save
Ngcenika.  _Whau_, Ixeshane!  Is not thy magic as powerful as hers?
Will it not aid thee to find it?  Now I must go.  Where the `Home of the
Serpents' is, thy brother is there.  That is all I can tell thee."

He spoke hurriedly now and in an altered tone--even as a man who has
said too much and is not free from misgiving as to the consequences.  He
seemed anxious to depart, and seeing that nothing more was to be got out
of him for the present, the two made no objection.

Hardly had he departed than Josane appeared.  He had noted the arrival
of Xalasa, though Xalasa was under the impression that he was many miles
distant.  He had waited until the _amakosi_ [Literally "chiefs."  In
this connection "masters"] had finished their _indaba_ [Talk] and here
he was.  He was filled with delight at the sight of Ixeshane and his
eyes felt good.  His "father" and his "friend" had been away for many
moons, but now he was back again and the night was lighter than the day.
His "father" could see, too, how he had kept his trust, the old man
went on.  Where were the houses of all the other white _amakosi_!  Heaps
of ashes.  The house of his "father" alone was standing--it alone the
torch had passed by.  As for the destruction which had taken place
within it, that could not be prevented.  The people "saw red."  It had
taxed the utmost effort of himself and Ncanduku to preserve the house.
Reft of hyperbole, his narrative was plain enough.  A marauding band had
made a descent upon the place on the very night they had quitted it,
and, although with difficulty dissuaded from burning it down, the
savages had wrecked the furniture and looted the stores, as we have
shown.  This, however, was comparatively a small evil.

Hoste, wearied with all this talk, which moreover he understood but
imperfectly, had waxed restive and strolled away.  No sooner was he out
of earshot than Josane, sinking his voice, remarked suddenly:

"Xalasa is a fool!"

Eustace merely assented.  He saw that something was coming, and prepared
to listen attentively.

"Do you want to find Umlilwane?" went on the old Kafir with ever so
slight an expression on the "want."

"Of course I do," was the unhesitating reply.  But for the space of half
a minute the white man and the savage gazed fixedly into each other's
faces in the starlight.

"_Au_!  If I had known that!" muttered Josane in a disappointed tone.
"If I had known that, I could have told you all that Xalasa has--_could
have told you many moons ago_."

"You knew it, then?"

"Yes."

"And is it true--that--that he is alive now?"

"Yes."

"But, Josane, how is it you kept your knowledge to yourself?  He might
have been rescued all this time.  Now it may be too late."

"_Whau_, Ixeshane!  Did _you_ want him rescued?" said the old fellow
shrewdly.  "Did the _Inkosikazi_ want him rescued?"

This was putting matters with uncomfortable plainness.  Eustace reddened
in the darkness.

"Whatever we `wanted,' or did not want, is nothing," he answered.  "This
is a matter of life and death.  He must be rescued."

"As you will," was the reply in a tone which implied that in the
speaker's opinion the white man was a lunatic.  And from his point of
view such was really the case.  The old savage was, in fact, following
out a thoroughly virtuous line of conduct according to his lights.  All
this while, in order to benefit the man he liked, he had coolly and
deliberately been sacrificing the man he--well, did not like.

"Where is `The Home of the Serpents,' Josane?  Do you know?"

"Yes.  I know?"

Eustace started.

"Can you guide me to it?" he said, speaking quickly.

"I can.  But it is a frightful place.  The bravest white man would take
to his heels and run like a hunted buck before he had gone far inside.
You have extraordinary nerve, Ixeshane--but--You will see."

This sounded promising.  But the old man's tone was quiet and confident.
He was not given to vapouring.

"How do you know where to find this place, Josane?" said Eustace, half
incredulously in spite of himself.  "Xalasa told us it was unknown to
everybody--everybody but the witch-doctress?"

"Xalasa was right.  I know where it is, because I have seen it.  _I was
condemned to it_."

"By Ngcenika?"

"By Ngcenika.  But my revenge is coming--my sure revenge is coming,"
muttered the old Gcaleka, crooning the words in a kind of ferocious
refrain--like that of a war-song.

As this juncture they were rejoined by Hoste.

"Well, Milne," he said.  "Had enough _indaba_?  Because, if so, we may
as well trek home again.  Seems to me we've had a lot of trouble for
nothing and been made mortal fools of down to the ground by that
_schelm_, Xalasa's, cock-and-bull yarns."

"You're wrong this time," replied Eustace.  "Just listen here a while
and you'll see that we're thoroughly on the right scent."

At the end of half an hour the Kafir and the two white men arose.  Their
plans were laid.  The following evening--at sundown--was the time fixed
on as that for starting upon their perilous and somewhat dimly
mysterious mission.

"You are sure three of us will be enough, Josane?" said Hoste.

"Quite enough.  There are still bands of the Gcaleka fighting men in the
forest country.  If we go in a strong party they will discover us and we
shall have to fight--_Au_!  `A fight is as the air we breathe,' you will
say, _Amakosi_," parenthesised the old Kafir, whimsically--"But it will
not help us to find `The Home of the Serpents.'  Still, there would be
no harm in having one more in the party."

"Who can we get?" mused Hoste.  "There's George Payne; but he's away
down in the Colony--Grahamstown, I believe.  It would take him days to
get here and even then he might cry off.  I have it; Shelton's the man,
and I think he'll go, too.  Depend upon it, Milne, Shelton's the very
man.  He's on his farm now--living in a Kafir hut, seeing after the
rebuilding of his old house.  We'll look him up this very night; we can
get there in a couple of hours."

This was agreed to, and having arranged where Josane was to meet them
the following evening, the two men saddled up and rode off into the
darkness.



CHAPTER FORTY TWO.

THE SEARCH PARTY.

Midwinter as it was, the heat in the valley of the Bashi that morning
was something to remember.

Not so much the heat as an extraordinary closeness and sense of
oppression in the atmosphere.  As the sun rose, mounting higher and
higher into the clear blue of the heavens, it seemed that all his rays
were concentrated and focussed down into this broad deep valley, whose
sides were broken up into a grand panorama of soaring krantzes and wild
rocky gorges, which latter, as also the great terraced slopes, were
covered with dense forest, where the huge and spreading yellow-wood, all
dangling with monkey trailers, alternated with the wild fig and the
mimosa, the _spekboem_ scrub and the _waacht-een-bietje_ thorn, the
spiky aloe and the plumed euphorbia, and where, in the cool dank shade,
flourished many a rare orchid, beginning to show sign of blossoming,
winter as it was.

But the four men riding there, making a path for themselves through this
well-nigh virgin forest, had little thought to give to the beauties of
Nature.  Seriousness and anxiety was absent from none of those
countenances.  For to-day would see the object of their quest attained.

So far their expedition had been in no wise unattended by danger.  Four
men would be a mere mouthful if discovered by any of the scattered bands
of the enemy, who still roamed the country in its wildest and most
rugged parts.  The ferocity of these savages, stimulated by a sullen but
vengeful consciousness of defeat, would render them doubly formidable.
Four men constituted a mere handful.  So the party had travelled by
circuitous ways, only advancing at night, and lying hidden during the
daytime in the most retired and sequestered spots.  Twice from such
judicious hiding places had they espied considerable bodies of the enemy
marching northward, and two or three times, patrols, or armed forces of
their own countrymen.  But these they were almost as careful to avoid as
the savage Gcalekas.  Four men advancing into the hostile country was an
uncommon sight.  They did not want their expedition talked about, even
among their own countrymen, just yet.  And now they were within two
hours of the object of their search.

The dangers they had gone through, and those which were yet to come,
were courted, be it remembered, not in search of treasure or riches, not
even out of love of adventure.  They were braved in order to rescue a
friend and comrade from an unknown fate, whose mysteriousness was
enhanced by vague hints at undefined horrors, on the part of the only
man qualified to speak, viz., their guide.

For Josane had proved extraordinarily reticent as to details; and all
attempts to draw him out during their journey had failed.  As they drew
near the dreaded spot this reticence had deepened to a remarkable
degree.  The old Gcaleka displayed an ominous taciturnity, a gloom even,
which was in no degree calculated to raise the spirits of the three
white men.  Even Eustace failed to elicit from him any definite facts.
He had been "smelt out" and condemned to "the Home of the Serpents" and
had escaped while being taken into it, and to do this he had almost had
to fly through the air.  But the place would try their nerves to the
uttermost; of that he warned them.  Then he would subside again into
silence, regardless of any further attempt to "draw" him.

There was one of the party whose motives, judged by ordinary human
standards, were little short of heroic, and that one was Eustace Milne.
He had nothing to gain by the present undertaking, nor had the others.
But then they had nothing to lose by it except their lives, whereas he
had not only that but everything that made life worth living into the
bargain.  Again and again he found himself cursing Xalasa's "gratitude,"
from the very depths of his soul.  Yet never for a moment did he swerve
in his resolve to save his unfortunate cousin if the thing were to be
done, although there were times when he marvelled over himself as a
strange and unaccountable paradox.  A silence was upon them all, as they
moved at a foot's pace through the dense and jungly tangle, mounting
ever upwards.  After an hour of this travelling they had reached a
considerable height.  Here in a sequestered glade Josane called a halt.

"We must leave the horses," he said.  "It is impossible to take them
where we are going.  _Whau_!" he went on, looking upwards and snuffing
the air like a stag.  "There will be plenty of thunder by and by.  We
have no time to lose."

Taking with them a long twisted rawhide rope, of amazing strength, which
might be necessary for climbing purposes, and a few smaller _reims_,
together with a day's provisions, and every available cartridge, they
started on foot, Josane leading the way.  Each was armed with a double
gun--one barrel rifled--and a revolver.  The Gcaleka carried three
small-bladed casting assegais, and a broad headed, close-quarter one, as
well as a kerrie.

They had struck into a narrow gorge in the side of the hill.  It was
hard work making any headway at all.  The dense bush, intertwined with
creepers, met them in places in an unbroken wall, but Josane would hack
away manfully with his broad-bladed assegai until he succeeded in
forcing a way.

"It seems as if we were going to storm the devil's castle," said
Shelton, sitting down to wipe his streaming brow.  "It's hot enough
anyway."

"Rather," assented Hoste.  "Milne, old chap, how do you feel?"

"Headachy.  There's a power of thunder sticking out--as Josane says--
against when we get out."

"If we ever do get out."

"That's cheerful.  Well, if we mean to get in, I suppose we'd better
make a move?  Eh, Josane!"  The Kafir emphatically agreed.  He had
witnessed their dilatoriness not without concern.  He appeared strangely
eager to get the thing over--contrary to the habits of his kind, for
savages, of whatever race, are never in a hurry.  A line of rocky
boulders in front, thickly grown with straight stemmed euphorbia, stiff
and regular like the pipes of an organ, precluded any view of the sort
of formation that lay beyond.  Right across their path, if path it might
be called, rose another impenetrable wall of thorns and creepers.  In
front of this Josane halted.



CHAPTER FORTY THREE.

"KWA 'ZINYOKA."

The brooding, oppressive stillness deepened.  Not a breath of air
stirred the sprays of the bush, which slept motionless as though carved
in stone.  Even the very bird voices were hushed.  Far below, the sound
of the river, flowing over its long stony reaches, came upwards in
plaintive monotonous murmur.

All of a sudden Josane turned.  He sent one keen searching glance
straight in front of him, and another from side to side.

"The Home of the Serpents is a horrible place," he said.  "I have warned
you that it is so.  It is not too late now.  The _Amakosi_ can yet turn
back."

The awed solemnity of his tone could not fail to impress his hearers,
especially two of them.  The boding sense of oppression in the
atmosphere, the utter wildness of the surroundings, the uneasy,
mysterious nature of their quest, and the tall gaunt figure of the old
Kafir standing in the semi-gloom beneath the funereal plumes of the
straight stemmed euphorbia, like an oracle of misfortune--all this
affected the imagination of two, at any rate, of these ordinarily
hard-headed and practical men in a fashion they could scarcely have
deemed possible.  The third, however, was impervious to such influences.
There was too much involved in the material side of the undertaking.
No thought had he to spare apart from this; no scope was there for
giving free rein to his imagination.

"I think I may say we none of us have the slightest idea of turning
back!" he answered.

"Certainly not," assented the other two.

Josane looked fixedly at them for a moment.  Then he said:

"It is good.  Follow me--carefully, carefully.  We do not want to leave
a broad spoor."

The undergrowth among the straight stiff stems of the euphorbia looked
dense and impenetrable as a wall.  To the astonishment of the
spectators, the old Kafir lay flat on his stomach, lifted the dense
tangle just enough to admit the passage of his body, for all the world
as though he were lifting a heavy curtain, and slipped through.

"Come," he whispered from the other side, for he had completely
disappeared from view.  "Come--as I did.  But do not rend the bushes
more than is absolutely necessary."

They followed, worming their way in the same fashion about a dozen
yards.  Then an ejaculation of amazement, not unmixed with alarm, broke
from the lips of Shelton, who was leading.  It found an echo on those of
the other two.  Their first instinct was to draw back.

They had emerged upon a narrow ledge, not of rock, or even earth; a
narrow ledge of soft, yielding, quaking moss.  And it overhung what had
the appearance of a huge natural well.

It literally overhung.  By peering cautiously outward they could see a
smooth perpendicular wall of red rock falling sheer and straight to a
depth of nearly two hundred feet.  Three sides of the hollow--itself not
that distance in width--were similarly constituted, the fourth being a
precipitous, well-nigh perpendicular slope, with a sparse growth of
stunted bushes jotting its rugged sides.  A strange, gruesome looking
hole, whose dismal depths showed not the smallest sign of life.  Could
this be the awesome, mysterious "Home of the Serpents?"

But Josane's next words disabused them on this point.

"Tarry not," he said.  "Follow me.  Do even as I do."

Right to the brink of this horrible abyss the bush grew in a dense
jungly wall, and it was the roots of this, overgrown with an
accumulation of moss and soil, that constituted the apology for a ledge
along which they were expected to make their way.  And there was a
distance of at least sixty or seventy yards of this precarious footway,
to miss which would mean a certain and terrible death.

It would have been something of an ordeal even had the foothold been
firm.  Now, however, as they made their way along this quivering,
quaking, ladder-like pathway of projecting roots interleaved with
treacherous moss, not one of the three was altogether free from a
nervous and shaky sensation about the knees as he moved slowly forward,
selecting the strongest-looking stems for hand-hold.  Once a root
whereon Hoste had put his foot gave way with a muffled crack, letting
his leg through the fearful pathway up to the thigh.  An involuntary cry
escaped him as, grasping a stem above him, he drew it forth with a
supreme effort, and his brown visage assumed a hue a good many shades
paler, as through the hole thus made he contemplated a little cloud of
leaves and sticks swirling away into the abyss.

"Great Heaven!" he ejaculated.  "Are we never coming to the end of this
ghastly place?"

"How would you like to cross it running at full speed, like a monkey, as
I was forced to do?  I told you I had to fly through the air," muttered
Josane, who had overheard.  "The horror of it has only just begun--just
begun.  _Hau_!  Did I not say it was going to be a horrible place?"

But they were destined to reach the end of it without mishap, and right
glad were they to find themselves crawling along a narrow ledge overhung
by a great rock, still skirting the abyss, but at any rate there was
hard ground under them; not a mere shaky network of more or less rotten
roots.

"Is this the only way, Josane?" said Eustace at length, as they paused
for a few minutes to recover breath, and, truth to say, to steady their
nerves a trifle.  Even he put the question with some diffidence, for as
they drew nearer and nearer to the locality of their weird quest the old
Gcaleka's manner had undergone a still further change.  He had become
morose and taciturn, gloomy and abstracted to a degree.

"It is not," he answered.  "It is the only way I know.  When I came here
my eyes were shut; when I went away they were open.  Then I approached
it from above; now we have approached from below.  The way by which I
left, is the way you have seen."

"O Lord!  I wouldn't travel the last infernal hundred yards again for a
thousand pounds," muttered Hoste ruefully.  "And now, I've got to do it
again for nothing.  I'd sooner run the gauntlet of the whole Gcaleka
tribe, as we did before."

"We may have to do that as well," remarked Shelton.  "But I think I
never did see such an utterly dismal and God-forsaken corner in my life.
Looks as if Old Nick had built it out of sheer devilment."

There was reason in what he said.  The immense funnel-like hole seemed
an extraordinary caprice of Nature.  Nothing grew at the bottom but
coarse herbage and a few stunted bushes.  It seemed absolutely lacking
in _raison d'etre_.  Occurring at the top of a mountain, it would at
once have suggested an ancient crater.  Occurring, as it did, in solid
ground on the steep slope of a lofty river bank that theory seemed not
to hold good.  On all sides, save the narrow defile they had come
through, it was shut in by lofty wooded heights breaking here and there
into a red iron-stone cliff.

Their guide resumed his way, advancing in a listening attitude, and with
intense caution.  The ledge upon which they crept, now on all-fours,
widened considerably.  The projecting rock overhead jutted out further
and further, till it overhung the abyss for a considerable distance.
Beneath its shade they were already in semi-gloom.  Crawling along,
toilsomely, laboriously, one behind the other, each man with all his
senses, all his faculties, on the alert, the fact that their guide had
stopped came upon them as a surprise.  Then, as they joined him, and
crouched there side by side--each man's heart beat quicker, each man's
face slightly changed colour.  For the overhanging rock had heightened--
the ledge had widened to an area of fifteen or twenty feet.  Flooring
and rock-roof no longer met.  At the bottom of this area, both yawned
away from each other in a black horizontal rift.

Save through this rift there was no getting any further.  Quickly each
mind grasped the solution.  The cave yawning in front of them was--

"Where does that hole lead to, Josane?" said Hoste.

"_Kwa 'zinyoka_," replied the Gcaleka, impressively.

Such creatures are we of the light and air, that it is safe to assert
that not even the boldest among us can undertake the most cursory
exploration into the bowels of the earth without a consciousness of ever
so slight a sobering influence, a kind of misgiving begotten of the idea
of darkness and weight--a feeling as though the cavern roof might crush
down upon us, and bury us there throughout the aeons of eternity.  It is
not surprising, therefore, that our three friends--all men of tried
courage--should sit down for a few minutes, and contemplate this yawning
black hole in dubious silence.

It was no reflection on their courage, either.  They had just dared and
surmounted a peril trying and frightful enough to tax the strongest
nerves--and now before them lay the entrance to an unknown _inferno_; a
place bristling with grim and mysterious terrors such as even their
stout-hearted guide--the only man who knew what they were--recoiled from
braving again.  They could hardly believe that the friend and
fellow-countrymen, whom all these months they had reckoned among the
slain, lay near them within that fearful place, alive, and perchance
unharmed.  It might be, however, that the cavern before them was but a
tunnel, leading to some hidden and inaccessible retreat like the curious
crater-like hollow they had just skirted.

"_Au_!" exclaimed Josane, with a dissatisfied shake of the head.  "We
cannot afford to _sleep_ here.  If we intend to go in we must do so at
once."

There was reason in this.  Their preparations were simple enough--and
consisted in seeing that their weapons were in perfect readiness.
Eustace, too, had lighted a strong bull's-eye lantern with a closing
slide.  Besides this, each man was plentifully supplied with candles,
which, however, it was decided, should only be used if a quantity of
light became absolutely necessary.

Be it remembered not one of the three white men had other than the
vaguest idea of the nature of the horrors which this gruesome place
might disclose.  Whether through motives of superstition or from
whatever cause, Josane had hitherto preserved a remarkable silence on
the subject.  Now he said, significantly:

"Hear my words, Amakosi.  Tread one behind the other, _and look neither
to the right nor to the left, nor above.  But look where you place your
steps, and look carefully_.  Remember my words, for I know that of which
I speak."

They compared their watches.  It was just half-past one.  They sent a
last long look at the sky and the surrounding heights.  As they did so
there rolled forth upon the heavy air a long, low boom of distant
thunder.  Then they fell into their places and entered the cavern, the
same unspoken thought in each man's mind--Would they ever behold the
fair light of day again?

And the distant, muttering thunder peal, hoarse, heavy, sullen, breaking
upon the sultry air, at the moment when they left the outer world,
struck them as an omen--the menacing voice of outraged Nature booming
the knell of those who had the temerity to seek to penetrate her
innermost mysteries.



CHAPTER FORTY FOUR.

INFERNO.

For the first forty yards the roof of the cave was so low that they had
to advance in a stooping posture.  Then it heightened and the tunnel
widened out simultaneously.  Eustace led the way, his bull's-eye lantern
strapped around him, throwing a wide disk of yellow light in front.
Behind him, but keeping a hand on his shoulder in order to guide him,
walked Josane; the other two following in single file.

A turn of the way had shut out the light from the entrance.  Eustace
closing the slide of the lantern for a moment, they were in black,
pitchy darkness.

A perceptible current of air blew into the cavern.  That looked as if
there should be an outlet somewhere.  Old Josane, while enjoining
silence upon the rest of the party, had, from the moment they had
entered, struck up a low, weird, crooning song, which sounded like an
incantation.  Soon a glimmer of light showed just in front.

"That is the other way in," muttered old Josane.  "That is the way I
came in.  The other is the way I came out.  _Hau_!"

An opening now became apparent--a steep, rock shaft, reaching away into
the outer air.  It seemed to take one or more turnings in its upward
passage, for the sky was not visible, and the light only travelled down
in a dim, chastened glimmer as though it was intercepted in its course.
An examination of this extraordinary feature revealed the fact that it
was a kind of natural staircase.

"This is the way I came in.  Ha!" muttered Josane again, with a glare of
resentment in his eyes as though recalling to mind some particularly
ignominious treatment--as he narrowly scrutinised the slippery, rocky
sides of the shaft.

"I suppose it'll be the best way for us to get out," said Hoste.
"Anything rather than that devil of a scramble again."

"The time to talk of getting out is not yet," rejoined the Kafir drily.
"We are not _in_ yet."

They resumed their way.  As they penetrated deeper, the cavern suddenly
slanted abruptly upwards.  This continued for some twenty or thirty
yards, when again the floor became level, though ever with a slight
upward bend.  Great slabs of rock projected from the sides, but the
width of the tunnel varied little, ranging between six and ten yards.
The same held good of its height.

As they advanced they noticed that the current of air was no longer
felt.  An extraordinary foetid and overpowering atmosphere had taken its
place.  Similarly the floor and sides of the cavern, which before they
reached the outlet had been moist and humid, now became dry and firm.

"Hand us your flask, Shelton," said Hoste.  "Upon my soul I feel as if I
was going to faint.  Faugh!"

The odour was becoming more and more sickening with every step.  Musky,
rank, acreous--it might almost be felt.  Each man required a pull at
something invigorating, if only to neutralise the inhalation of so
pestilential an atmosphere.  Smoking was suggested, but this Josane
firmly tabooed.

"It cannot be," he said.  "It would be madness.  Remember my words,
_Amakosi.  Look neither to the right nor to the left_--_only straight in
front of you, where you set down your steps_."

Then he resumed his strange wild chant, now sinking it to an awe-struck
whisper hardly above his breath.  It was a weird, uncanny sight, those
four shadowy figures advancing through the thick black darkness, the
fiery eye of the lantern darting forth its luminous column in front,
while the deep-toned, long-drawn notes of the wild, heathenish _rune_
died away in whispering echoes overhead.

"Oh! good Lord!  Look at that!"

The cry broke from Shelton.  All started, so great was the state of
tension that their nerves were undergoing.  Following his glance they
promptly discovered what it was that had evoked it.

Lying upon a great slab of rock, about on a level with their chests, was
an enormous puff-adder.  The bloated proportions of the hideous reptile
were disposed in a sinuous coil--shadowy, repulsive to the last degree,
in the light of the lantern.  A shudder ran through every one of the
three white men.

"Quick, Josane.  Hand me one of your kerries," said Shelton.  "I can get
a whack at him now."

But the Kafir, peremptorily, almost angrily refused.

"Why did you not listen to my words?" he said.  "Look neither to the
right nor to the left, was what I told you.  Then you would have seen
nothing.  Now let us move on."

But Shelton and Hoste stood, irresolutely staring at the horrid reptile
as though half fascinated.  It--as if resenting the intrusion--began to
unwind its sluggish folds, and raising its head, emitted a low, warning
hiss, at the same time blowing itself out with a sound as of a pair of
bellows collapsing, after the fashion which has gained for this most
repulsive of all serpents its distinctive name.

"You must not kill it," repeated the Kafir, in a tone almost of command.
"This is `The Home of the Serpents,' remember.  Did I not warn you?"

They saw that he was deadly in earnest.  Here in this horrible den,
right in the heart of the earth, the dark-skinned, superstitious savage
seemed the one to command.  It was perhaps remarkable that no thought of
disobeying him entered the mind of any one of the three white men; still
more so, that no resentment entered in either.  They resumed their way
without a murmur; not, however, without some furtive glances behind, as
though dreading an attack on the part of the deadly reptile they were
leaving in their rear.  More than once they thought to detect the sound
of that slow, crawling glide--to discern an indistinct and sinuous
shadow moving in the subdued light.

"This is `The Home of the Serpents'!" chanted Josane, taking up once
more his weird refrain.

"This is The Home of the Serpents, the abode of the Spirit-dead.  O
_Inyoka 'Nkulu_ [Great Serpent] do us no hurt!  O Snake of Snakes, harm
us not!

"The shades of thy home are blacker than blackest night.

"We tread the dark shades of thy home in search of the white man's
friend.

"Give us back the white man's friend, so may we depart in peace--

"In peace from The Home of the Serpents, the abode of the Spirit-dead.

"Into light from the awe-dealing gloom, where the shades of our fathers
creep.

"So may we return to the daylight in safety with him whom we seek.

  "Harm us not,
  O Snake of snakes!
  Do us no hurt,
  O _Inyoka 'Nkulu_!"

The drawn out notes of this lugubrious refrain were uttered with a
strange, low, concentrative emphasis which was indescribably thrilling.
Eustace, the only one of the party who thoroughly grasped its burden,
felt curiously affected by it.  The species of devil worship implied in
the heathenish invocation communicated its influence to himself.  His
spirits, up till now depressed and burdened as with a weight of brooding
evil, seemed to rise to an extraordinary pitch of exaltation, as though
rejoicing at the prospect of prompt admission into strange mysteries.
Far otherwise, however, were the other two affected by the surroundings.
Indeed, it is by no means certain that had their own inclinations been
the sole guide in the matter, they would there and then have turned
round and beat a hasty and ignominious retreat, leaving Tom Carhayes and
his potential fate to the investigation of some more enterprising party.

The atmosphere grew more foetid and pestilential.  Suddenly the cavern
widened out.  Great slabs of rock jutted horizontally from the sides,
sometimes so nearly meeting that there was only just room to pass in
single file between.  Then a low cry of horror escaped the three white
men.  They stopped short, as though they had encountered a row of fixed
bayonets, and some, at any rate, of the party were conscious of the very
hair on their heads standing erect.

For, lying about upon the rock slabs were numbers of shadowy, sinuous
shapes, similar to the one they had just disturbed.  Some were lying
apart, some were coiled up together in a heaving, revolting mass.  As
the light of the lantern flashed upon them, they began to move.  The
hideous coils began to separate, gliding apart, head erect, and hissing
till the whole area of the grisly cavern seemed alive with writhing,
hissing serpents.  Turn the light which way they would, there were the
same great wriggling coils, the same frightful heads.  Many, hitherto
unseen, were pouring their loathsome, gliding shapes down the rocks
overhead, and the dull, dragging heavy sound, as the horrible reptiles
crawled over the hard and stony surface, mingled with that of strident
hissing.  What a sight to come upon in the heart of the earth!

It is safe to assert that no object in Nature is held in more utter and
universal detestation by man than the serpent.  And here were these men
penned up within an underground cave in the very heart of the earth,
with scores, if not hundreds, of these frightful and most deadly
reptiles--some too, of abnormal size--around them; all on the move, and
so near that it was as much as they could do to avoid actual contact.
Small wonder that their flesh should creep and that every drop of blood
should seem to curdle within their veins.  It was a position to recur to
a man in his dreams until his dying day.

"Oh, I can't stand any more of this," said Hoste, who was walking last.
"Hang it.  Anything above ground, you know--but this--!  Faugh!  We've
got no show at all.  Ugh-h!"

Something cold had come in contact with his hand.  He started violently.
But it was only the clammy surface of a projecting rock.

And now the whole of the gloomy chamber resounded with shrill and angry
hissing, as the disturbed reptiles glided hither and thither--was alive
with waving necks and distended jaws, glimpsed shadowy on the confines
of the disk of light which shot into the remote corners of the frightful
den.  Curiously enough, not one of the serpents seemed to be lying in
the pathway itself.  All were on the ledges of rock which bordered it.

"Keep silence and follow close on my steps," said Josane shortly.  Then
he raised his voice and threw a marvellously strange, soft melodiousness
into the weird song, which he had never ceased to chant.  Eustace, who
was the first to recover to some extent his self-possession, and who
took in the state of affairs, now joined in with a low, clear, whistling
accompaniment.  The effect was extraordinary.  The writhing contortions
of the reptiles ceased with a suddenness little short of magical.  With
heads raised and a slight waving motion of the neck they listened,
apparently entranced.  It was a wonderful sight, terrible in its weird
ghastliness--that swarm of deadly serpents held thus spell-bound by the
eerie barbaric music.  It really looked as though there was more than
met the eye in that heathenish adjuration as they walked unharmed
through the deadly reptiles to the refrain of the long-drawn, lugubrious
chant.

  "Harm us not,
  O Snake of Snakes!
  Do us no hurt,
  _O Inyoka 'Nkulu_!"

  Thus they passed through that fearful chamber, sometimes within a
  couple
  of yards of two or three serpents lying on a level with their faces.
  Once it was all that even Eustace, the self-possessed, could do to
  keep
  himself from ducking violently as the head of a huge puff-adder
  noiselessly shot up horribly close to his ear, and a very marked
  quaver
  came into his whistling notes.

  As the cavern narrowed to its former tunnel-like dimensions the
  serpents
  grew perceptibly scarcer.  One or two would be seen to wriggle away,
  here
  and there; then no more were met with.  The sickening closeness of the
  air still continued, and now this stood amply accounted for.  It was
  due
  to the foetid exhalations produced by this mass of noisome reptiles
  congregated within a confined space far removed from the outer air.

  "Faugh!" ejaculated Hoste.  "Thank Heaven these awful brutes seem to
  have
  grown scarce again.  Shall we have to go back through them, Josane?"

  "It is not yet time to talk of going back," was the grim reply.  Then
  he
  had hardly resumed his magic song before he broke it off abruptly.  At
  the same time the others started, and their faces blanched in the
  semi-darkness.

  For, out of the black gloom in front of them, not very far in front
  either, there burst forth such a frightful diabolical howl as ever
  curdled the heart's blood of an appalled listener.



CHAPTER FORTY FIVE.

A FEARFUL DISCOVERY.

They stood there, turned to stone.  They stood there, strong men as they
were, their flesh creeping with horror.  The awful sound was succeeded
by a moment of silence, then it burst forth again and again, the grim
subterraneous walls echoing back its horrible import in ear-splitting
reverberation.  It sounded hardly human in its mingled intonation of
frenzied ferocity and blind despair.  It might have been the shriek of a
lost soul, struggling in the grasp of fiends on the brink of the
nethermost pit.

"Advance now, cautiously, _amakosi_," said Josane.  "Look where you are
stepping or you may fall far.  Keep your candles ready to light.  The
Home of the Serpents is a horrible place.  There is no end to its
terrors.  Be prepared to tread carefully."

His warning was by no means superfluous.  The ground ended abruptly
across their path.  Suddenly, shooting up, as it were, beneath their
very feet, pealed forth again that frightful, blood-curdling yell.

It was awful.  Starting backward a pace or two, the perspiration pouring
from their foreheads, they stood and listened.  On the Kafir no such
impression had the incident effected.  He understood the position in all
its grim significance.

"Look down," he said, meaningly.  "Look down, _amakosi_."

They did so.  Before them yawned an irregular circular hole or pit,
about thirty feet deep by the same in diameter.  The sides were smooth
and perpendicular; indeed, slightly overhanging from the side on which
they stood.  Opposite, the glistening surface of the rock rose into a
dome.  But with this hole the cavern abruptly ended, the main part of
it, that is, for a narrow cleft or "gallery" branched off abruptly at
right angles.  From this pit arose such a horrible effluvium that the
explorers recoiled in disgust.

"Look down.  Look down," repeated Josane.

The luminous disk from the lantern swept round the pit.  Upon its nearly
level floor crawled the loathsome, wriggling shapes of several great
serpents.  Human skulls strewn about, grinned hideously upwards, and the
whole floor of this ghastly hell-pit seemed literally carpeted with a
crackling layer of pulverised bones.  But the most awful sight of all
was yet to come.

Gathered in a heap, like a huge squatting toad, crouched a human figure.
Human?  Could it be?  Ah! it had been once.  Nearly naked, save for a
few squalid rags black with filth, this fearful object, framed within
the brilliantly defined circle of the bull's-eye, looked anything but
human.  The head and face were one mass of hair, and the long, bushy,
tangled beard screening almost the whole body in its crouching attitude
imparted to the creature the appearance of a head alone, supported on
two hairy, ape-like arms, half man, half tarantula.  The eyes were
glaring and blinking in the light with mingled frenzy and terror, and
the mouth was never still for a moment.  What a sight the grizzly
denizen of that appalling hell-pit--crouching there, mopping and mowing
among the gliding, noisome reptiles, among the indescribable filth and
the grinning human skulls!  No wonder that the spectators stood
spell-bound, powerless, with a nerveless, unconquerable repulsion.

Suddenly the creature opened its mouth wide and emitted that fearful
demoniacal howl which had frozen their blood but a few moments back.
Then leaping to its feet, it made a series of desperate springs in its
efforts to get at them.  Indeed it was surprising the height to which
these springs carried it, each failure being signalled by that
blood-curdling yell.  Once it fell back upon a serpent.  The reptile,
with a shrill hiss, struck the offending leg.  But upon the demoniac
those deadly fangs seemed to produce no impression whatever.  Realising
the futility of attempting to reach them, the creature sank back into a
corner, gathering itself together, and working its features in wild
convulsions.  Then followed a silence--a silence in its way almost as
horrible as the frightful shrieks which had previously broken it.

The spectators looked at each other with ashy faces.  Heavens! could
this fearful thing ever have been a man--a man with intellect and a
soul--a man stamped with the image of his maker?

"He is the last, _Amakosi_," said the grave voice of Josane.  "He is the
last, but not the first.  There have been others before him,"
designating the skulls which lay scattered about.  "Soon he will be even
as they--as I should have been had I not escaped by a quick stroke of
luck."

"Great Heaven, Josane!  Who is he?" burst from the horror-stricken lips
of Shelton and Hoste simultaneously.  Eustace said nothing, for at that
moment as he gazed down upon the mouldering skulls, there came back to
him vividly the witch-doctress's words, "They who look upon `The Home of
the Serpents' are seen no more in life."  Well did he understand them
now.

"The man whom you seek," was the grave reply.  "He whom the people call
Umlilwane."

An ejaculation of horror again greeted the Kafir's words.  This awful
travesty, this wreck of humanity, that this should be Tom Carhayes!  It
was scarcely credible.  What a fate!  Better had he met his death, even
amid torture, at the time they had supposed, than be spared for such an
end as this.

Then amid the deep silence and consternation of pity which this
lugubrious and lamentable discovery evoked, there followed an intense, a
burning desire for vengeance upon the perpetrators of this outrage; and
this feeling found its first vent in words.  Josane shook his head.

"It might be done," he muttered.  "It might be done.  Are you prepared
to spend several days in here, _Amakosi_?"

This was introducing a new feature into the affair--the fact being that
each of the three white men was labouring under a consuming desire to
find himself outside the horrible hole once more--again beneath the
broad light of day.  It was in very dubious tones, therefore, that
Shelton solicited an explanation.

"Even a maniac must eat and drink," answered Josane.  "Those who keep
Umlilwane here do not wish him to die--"

"You mean that some one comes here periodically to bring him food?"

"_Ewa_."

"But it may not be the persons who put him here; only some one sent by
them," they objected.

"This place is not known to all the Gcaleka nation," said Josane.
"There are but two persons known to me who would dare to come within a
distance of it.  Those are Ngcenika, the witch-doctress, and Hlangani,
who is half a witch-doctor himself."

"By lying in wait for them we might capture or shoot one or both of them
when they come to bring the poor devil his food, eh, Josane?" said
Shelton.  "When are they likely to come?"

"It may not be for days.  But there is another side to that plan.  What
if they should have discovered that we are in here and decide to lie in
wait for us?"

"Oh, by Jove!  That certainly is a reverse side to the medal," cried
Hoste, with a long whistle of dismay.  And indeed the idea of two such
formidable enemies as the redoubted Gcaleka warrior and the ferocious
witch-doctress lurking in such wise as to hold them entirely at their
mercy was not a pleasant one.  There was hardly a yard of the way where
one determined adversary, cunningly ambushed, would not hold their lives
in his hand.  No.  Any scheme for exacting reprisals had better keep
until they were once more in the light of day.  The sooner they rescued
their unfortunate friend and got quit of the place the better.

And even here they had their work fully cut out for them.  How were they
to get at the wretched maniac?  The idea of descending into that
horrible pit was not an alluring one; and, apart from this, what sort of
reception would they meet with from its occupant?  That the latter
regarded them in anything but a friendly light was manifest.  How, then,
were they ever to convey to the unfortunate creature that their object
was the reverse of hostile?  Tom Carhayes was well-known to be a man of
great physical power.  Tom Carr hayes--a gibbering, mouthing lunatic--a
furious demoniac--no wonder they shrank from approaching him.

"Silence!  Darken the light!"

The words, quick, low, peremptory--proceeded from Josane.  In an instant
Eustace obeyed.  The slide of the lantern was turned.

"I listen--I hear," went on the Kafir in the same quick whisper.  "There
are steps approaching."

Every ear was strained to the uttermost.  Standing in the pitchy
blackness and on the brink of that awful pit, no one dared move so much
as a foot.

And now a faint and far-away sound came floating through the darkness; a
strange sound, as of the soft bass of voices from the distant
spirit-world wailing weirdly along the ghostly walls of the tunnel.  It
seemed, too, that ever so faint a light was melting the gloom in the
distance.  The effect was indescribable in its awesomeness.  The
listeners held their very breath.

"Up here," whispered Josane, referring to the shaft already mentioned.
"No! show no light--not a glimmer.  Hold on to each other's shoulder--
you, Ixeshane, hold on to mine--Quick--_Hamba-ke_."  [Go on.]

This precaution, dictated by the double motive of keeping together in
the darkness, and also to avoid any one of the party accidentally
falling into the pit--being observed, the Kafir led the way some little
distance within the shaft.

"Heavens!" whispered Hoste.  "What about the snakes?  Supposing we tread
on one?"

In the excitement of the moment this consideration had been quite
overlooked.  Now it struck dismay into the minds of the three white men.
To walk along in pitch darkness in a narrow tunnel which you know to be
infested with deadly serpents, with more than an even chance of treading
upon one of the noisome reptiles at every step, is a position which
assuredly needs a powerful deal of excitement to carry it through.

"_Au_!  Flash one beam of light in front, Ixeshane," whispered the
guide.  "Not behind--for your life, not behind!"

Eustace complied, carefully shading the sides of the light with the
flaps of his coat.  It revealed that the cave here widened slightly, but
made a curve.  It further revealed no sign of the most dreaded enemy of
the human race.

Here, then, it was decided to lie in wait.  The lights carried by those
approaching would hardly reach them here, and they could lurk almost
concealed, sheltered by the formation of the tunnel.

The flash from Eustace's lantern had been but momentary.  And now, as
they crouched in the inky gloom, the sense of expectation became painful
in its intensity.  Nearer and nearer floated the wailing chant, and soon
the lurking listeners were able to recognise it as identical with the
wild, heathenish _rune_ intoned by their guide--the weird, mysterious
invocation of the Serpent.

  "Harm us not,
  O Snake of snakes!
  Do us no hurt
  _O Inyeka 'Nkulu_!"

The sonorous, open vowels rolled forth in long-drawn cadence, chanted by
two voices--both blending in wonderful harmony.  Then a cloud of
nebulous light filled up the entrance to their present hiding place,
hovering above the fearful hell-pit where the maniac was imprisoned,
throwing the brink into distinct relief.

The watchers held their very breath.  The song had ceased.  Suddenly
there was a flash of light in their eyes, as from a lantern.

Two dark figures were standing on the brink of the hole.  Each carried a
lantern, one of those strong, tin-rimmed concerns used by
transport-riders for hanging in their waggon-tents.  There was no lack
of light now.

"Ho, Umlilwane!" cried a deep, bass voice, which rumbled in hoarse
echoes beneath the domed roof, while the speaker held his lantern out
over the pit.  "Ho, Umlilwane!  It is the dog's feeding time again.  We
have brought the dog his bones.  Ho, ho!"

The wretched maniac who, until now, had kept silence, here broke forth
again into his diabolical howls.  By the sound the watchers could tell
that he was exhausting himself in a series of bull-dog springs similar
to those prompted by his frenzy on first discovering themselves.  At
each of these futile outbursts the two mocking fiends shouted and roared
with laughter.  But they little knew how near they were laughing for the
last time.  Three rifles were covering them at a distance of fifty
yards--three rifles in the hands of men who were dead shots, and whose
hearts were bursting with silent fury.  Josane, seeing this, took
occasion to whisper under cover of the lunatic's frenzied howls:

"The time is not yet.  The witch-doctress is for me--for me.  I will
lure her in here, and when I give the word--but not before--shoot
Hlangani.  The witch-doctress is for me."

The identity of the two figures was distinct in the light.  The hideous
sorceress, though reft of most of the horrid accessories and adornments
of her order, yet looked cruel and repulsive as a very fiend--fitting
figure to harmonise with the Styx-like gloom of the scene.  The huge
form of the warrior loomed truly gigantic in the sickly lantern light.
"Ho, Umlilwane, thou dog of dogs!" went on the latter.  "Art thou
growing tired of thy cool retreat?  Are not the serpents good
companions?  _Haul_ Thou wert a fool to part so readily with thy mind.
After so many moons of converse with the serpents, thou shouldst have
been a mighty soothsayer--a mighty diviner--by now.  How long did it
take thee to lose thy mind?  But a single day?  But a day and a night?
That was quick!  Ho, ho!"  And the great taunting laugh was echoed by
the shriller cackle of the female fiend.

"Thou wert a mighty man with thy fists, a mighty man with thy gun, O
Umlilwane!" went on the savage, his mocking tones now sinking to those
of devilish hatred.  "But now thou art no longer a man--no longer a man.
_Au_!  What were my words to thee?  `Thou hadst better have cut off thy
right hand before shedding the blood of Hlangani _for it is better to
lose a hand than one's mind_.'  What thinkest thou now of Hlangani's
revenge?  Hi!"

How plain now to one of the listeners were those sombre words, over
whose meaning he had so anxiously pondered.  This, then, was the fearful
vengeance promised by the Gcaleka warrior.  And for many months his
wretched victim had lain here a raving maniac--had lain here in a
darkness as of the very pit of hell--had lain among noisome serpents--
among crawling horrors untold--small wonder his reason had given way
after a single night of such, as his tormentor had just declared.  Small
wonder that he had indeed lost his mind!

A fiendish yell burst from the maniac.  Suddenly a great serpent was
thrown upward from the pit.  Petrified with horror, the watchers saw its
thick, writhing form fly through the air and light on the
witch-doctress's shoulder.  With a shrill laugh the hag merely seized
the wriggling, squirming reptile, which, with crest waving, was hissing
like a fury, and hurled it back into the pit again.  What sort of
devil's influence was protecting these people, that they could handle
the most deadly reptiles with absolute impunity?  Were they, indeed,
under some demoniac spell?  To one, however, among the white spectators,
the real solution of the mystery may have suggested itself.

"Here are thy bones, dog," resumed the great barbarian, throwing what
looked like a half-filled sack into the hole.  "Here is thy drink," and
he lowered a large calabash at the end of a string.  "Eat, drink, and
keep up thy strength.  Perhaps one day I may turn thee loose again.  Who
knows!  Then when thy people see thee coming they will cry: `Here comes
Hlangani's Revenge.'  And they will fly from thee in terror, as from the
approach of a fell disease."

The watchers looked at each other.  These last words, coupled with the
act of throwing down the food, seemed to point to the speedy conclusion
of the visit.  They could hear the miserable victim mumbling and
crunching what sounded like literally bones, and growling like a dog.
But Hlangani went on.

"Wouldst thou not rather have gone to feed the black ants, or have died
the death of the red-hot stones, Umlilwane?  Thou wouldst be at rest
now.  And now thou hast only just begun to live--alone in the darkness--
alone with the serpents--a man whose mind is gone.  Thou wilt never see
the light of day again.  _Whau_!  The sun is shining like gold outside.
And thy wife, Umlilwane--thy beautiful wife--tall and graceful, like the
stem of the budding _umbona_ [Maize]--dost thou never think of her?  Ha!
There is another who does--another who does.  I have seen him--I have
seen them both--him and thy beautiful wife--"

Eustace had nudged Josane in such wise as to make that individual
understand that the curtain must be rung down on this scene--and that at
once.  Simultaneously the "yap" of a puppy dog burst forth almost
beneath his feet.  Its effect upon the pair at the pit's brink was
electric.

"_Yau_!" cried Ngcenika, turning toward the sound.  "The little dog has
followed me in after all.  Ah, the little brute.  I will make him taste
the stick!"

"Or throw him down to Umlilwane," laughed her companion.  "He will do
for him to play with, two dogs together.  _Mawo_!"

Again the "yap" was heard, now several times in rapid succession.  So
perfect was the imitation that the watchers themselves were for a moment
taken in.

"_Iza, inja!  Injane, izapa_!"  ["Come, dog!  Little dog--come here!"]
cried the witch-doctress coaxingly, advancing into the lateral gallery,
holding her lantern in front of her.  Josane, with his mouth to the
ground was emitting a perfect chorus of yaps.

"Now," he whispered, under cover of the echoes produced, as the width of
the gallery left a clear chance at Hlangani, without endangering the
witch-doctress.  "Remember--the female beast, Ngcenika, is for me.
Shoot Hlangani--_Now_!"

Scarce had the word left his mouth than the shots crashed forth
simultaneously.



CHAPTER FORTY SIX.

THE END OF THE WITCH-DOCTRESS.

To convey anything like an adequate idea of what followed is well-nigh
impossible.  The stunning, deafening roar of the volley in that narrow
space was as though the very earth had exploded from its foundations.
Through it came the shivering crash of glass, as Hlangani's lantern fell
into the pit, but whether its owner followed it or not could not be
determined through the overpowering din.  Still holding the lantern, the
hideous witch-doctress was seen through the sulphurous smoke, standing
there as one turned to stone--then like lightning, a dark, lithe body
sprang through the spectators and with a growl like that of a wild beast
leaped upon the bewildered Ngcenika.  There was the gleam of an assegai
in the air--then darkness and the shatter of glass.  The lantern fell
from the sorceress' hand.

"Turn on the light, Milne; quick!" cried the other two.

"I'm trying to, but the infernal thing won't work.  The slide's jammed--
Oh!"

For he was swept off his feet.  Two heavy bodies rolled over him--
striving, cursing, struggling, stabbing--then half stumbled, half rolled
away into the gloom beyond.

The others bethought them of their candles, which, up till now, had been
kept unused.  Quickly two of them were produced and lighted.

The din of the scuffle seemed to be receding further and further; nor in
the faint and flickering impression cast upon the cavernous gloom by the
light of the candles could anything be seen of the combatants.  But that
the scuffle was a hard and fierce one was evident from the sounds.

Just then Eustace succeeded in opening the lantern slide, and now they
were able to advance boldly in the strong disk of light.  The latter
revealed the object of their search.

Rolling over and over each other were two dark bodies, one now
uppermost, now the other.  Both seemed equally matched; even if in point
of sheer physical strength the advantage did not lie slightly with the
witch-doctress, for Josane, though wiry and active, was a good deal
older than he looked.  Each firmly gripped the other's right wrist, for
the purpose of preventing the use of the broad-bladed, murderous assegai
with which the right hand of each was armed.  Victory would lie with
whoever could hold out the longest.

As soon as the light fell upon the two struggling bodies, the
witch-doctress threw all her energies into afresh and violent effort.
She seemed to divine that the new arrivals would refrain from shooting
at her for fear of injuring Josane.  So she redoubled her struggles and
kicked and bit and tore like one possessed.

"Keep her in that position a moment, Josane," sung out Hoste.  "I'll put
a hunk of lead through the devil's carcase.  There--so!"

But it was not to be.  With a supreme effort she wrenched her wrist free
from her opponent's grasp, and turning with the rapidity of a cat,
leaped out of sight in the darkness.  But a moment later she stumbled
over a boulder and sprawled headlong.  Before she could rise her pursuer
was upon her and had stabbed her twice through the body with his
assegai.

"Ha!  Spawn of a Fingo dog!" cried Josane, his voice assuming a fierce,
throaty growl in the delirious satiety of his vengeance.  "I am Josane--
whom thou wouldst have thrown to the serpents, as thou didst this white
man--ha! whom thou wouldst have given alive to feed the black ants, as
thou didst Vudana, my kinsman.  Ha!  I am Josane, who was eaten up at
thy accursed bidding.  Ha!  But I lived for revenge and it has come.
Ha!  How does this feel?--and this?--and this?"

With each ejaculation "ha!" he had plunged his assegai into the writhing
body of the prostrate witch-doctress.  To the white men his aspect was
that of a fiend--standing there in the cavernous gloom, his eyes rolling
in frenzy--literally digging with his spear into the body of his
vanquished enemy, out of which the red blood was squirting in a dozen
great jets.  Not until the corpse had entirely ceased to move did he
cease his furious stabs.

"The hell-hag is dead!" he cried, as he at length turned to leave.  "The
hell-hag is dead," he repeated, turning the words into a fierce chant of
exultation.  "The hell-hag bleeds, and my revenge is sweet.  Ha!
Revenge is brighter than the sun in the heavens, for it is red, blood
red.  Ha!  Mine enemy is dead!"

By this time they had returned to the brink of the pit.  But there was
no sign of Hlangani.  Something like dismay was on every face.  The
fragments of his shattered lantern lay strewn about at the bottom of the
hole, but of the savage himself there was no sign.  It was marvellous.
All three men were first-rate shots.  It was impossible that any one of
them could have missed him at that distance, let alone all three.  How
could he have got away with three bullets in his body?

Cautiously they hunted everywhere with increasing anxiety, but nothing
occurred to reward their search.  The latter led them almost back to the
great rock-chamber where the serpents swarmed.  Still no sign of
Hlangani.

This was serious in the extreme.  They would have their hands full
enough with the wretched maniac, even if they succeeded in bringing him
away at all; and the idea that the fierce Gcaleka, desperately wounded
perhaps, might be lying in wait, in some awkward place, ready to fall
upon them with all the reckless, despairing ferocity of a cornered
leopard, was anything but encouraging.  Or, what if he had escaped
altogether, and were to bring back a swarm of his countrymen to cut off
their retreat.

"I tell you what it is," said Hoste.  "The sooner we get this poor chap
out, and clear out ourselves, the better."

This was true enough; but how to act upon it was another thing.

Several candles were lighted and stuck about on the rocks, making the
black, gloomy cavern a trifle less sepulchral.  Then they advanced to
the pit's brink.  The lunatic, crouched on the ground gnawing a bone,
stared stupidly at them.

"Don't you know me, Tom?" said Eustace, speaking quietly.  "We are come
to get you away from here, old chap.  You know me?  Come now!"

But the poor wretch gave no sign of intelligence, as he went on munching
his revolting food.  Several times they tried him, each in different
ways, but always without success.  It was pitiable.

"We shall have to get him out by force," said Shelton.  "But how the
deuce we are going to do it beats me."

"We might lasso him with a _reim_, and haul him up that way," suggested
Hoste.

"I had thought of that," said Eustace.  "First of all, though, I'm going
to have another try at the _suaviter in modo_.  He may recognise me--
nearer."

"Nearer?  What?  How?  You are never going down there!" cried Shelton.

"That's just what I am going to do.  Where's that long _reim_, Josane?"

This was the long, stout rawhide rope they had brought with them in case
it might be wanted for climbing purposes.  Quickly Eustace had made a
running noose in it.

"I hope you're in good hard form, Milne," said Shelton gravely.  "The
poor chap may try and tear you to pieces.  I wouldn't risk it, if I were
you."

"And the snakes?" put in Hoste.  "What about the snakes?"

"I shall have to chance them," returned Eustace, having a shrewd
suspicion that the reptiles had been rendered harmless by the extraction
of their fangs, and were, in fact, kept there by the witch-doctress in
order to lend additional horror to this _inferno_, whither she consigned
her victims.  Even then the act of descending into that noisome pit,
with the almost certainty of a hand-to-hand struggle with a raging
lunatic of enormous strength, was an ordeal calculated to daunt the
stoutest of hearts.  Certain it is that neither of the other two would
have cared to undertake it.  More than ever, then, did they endeavour to
dissuade him.

"This is my idea," he said.  "I must try and get him round against this
side of the hole.  Then, while I hold his attention, Josane must drop
his blanket over his head.  Then I'll fling the noose round him, and you
must all man the _reim_, and haul him up like a sack.  Only it must be
done sharp.  Directly I sing out `_Trek_,' you must haul away for dear
life."

"But how about yourself, old chap?"

"Never mind about me.  I can wait down there until you're ready for me.
But when you have got him up here you must tie him up as tight as a log,
and sharp, too.  Now, Josane, is your blanket ready?"

The old Kafir, who had been knotting a small stone into each corner so
that the thing should fall quickly, answered in the affirmative.  In a
second the _reim_ was dropped over the side, and Eustace, sliding down,
stood at the bottom of the pit.

The indescribably fearful effluvium fairly choked him.  He felt dizzy
and faint.  The lunatic, still crouching at the other side, made no
aggressive movement, merely staring with lack-lustre eyes at the new
arrival.  Keeping his eye upon him, Eustace took advantage of this
welcome truce to feel for his flask and counteract his fast overpowering
nausea with a timely pull.

"Tom," he said, in a most persuasive tone, approaching the wretched
being.  "Tom--you know me, don't you?"

Then an awful change came into the maniac's countenance.  His eyes
glared through the tangle of his matted hair; the great bushy beard
began to bristle and quiver with rage.  He rose to his feet and, opening
his mouth, emitted that same horrible howl.  Those above held their
breath.

Well for Eustace was it that he never quailed.  Standing there in the
middle of the pit--at the mercy of this furious lunatic--he moved not a
muscle.  But his eyes held those of the demoniac with a piercing and
steady gaze.

The crisis was past.  Whimpering like a child, the wretched creature
sank to the ground, again covering his face with his hands.

This was good enough as a first triumph, but the maniac had to be coaxed
round to the other side of the hole.  Eustace dared not remove his
glance, even for the fraction of a second.  His foot struck against
something, which yielded suddenly and started away hissing.  His pulses
stood still with horror, yet he knew better than to remove his eyes from
his unhappy kinsman.

"Come, Tom," he said coaxingly, advancing a couple of steps.  "Get up,
man, and go and sit over there."

With an affrighted cry, the other edged away round the wall of his
prison, bringing himself much nearer the point where it was intended he
should be brought.  He cowered, with face averted, moaning like an
animal in pain.  Not to overdo the thing, Eustace waited a moment, then
advanced a step or two nearer.  It had the desired effect.  The madman
shuffled away as before.  He must be in the right place now.  Still
Eustace dared not look up.

"He's all right now, if you're ready," whispered a voice from above.

"Ready!" was the quick reply.

Something dropped.  The madman's head and shoulders disappeared under
the voluminous folds of old Josane's red blanket.  Quick as lightning
Eustace had sprung to his side and whipped the running noose round him.

"_Trek_!" he cried, with an energy sufficient to start a dozen spans of
oxen.

The body of Tom Carhayes swung into the air.  Kicking, struggling,
howling, he disappeared over the brink above.  Eustace, alone at the
bottom of the pit, could hear the sounds of a furious scuffle--sounds,
too, which seemed to be receding as though into distance.  What did it
all mean?  They seemed a long time securing the maniac.

Then, as he looked around this horrible dungeon, at the crawling shapes
of the serpents gliding hither and thither, hissing with rage over their
late disturbance, as he breathed the unspeakably noisome atmosphere, he
realised his own utter helplessness.  What if anything untoward should
occur to prevent his comrades from rescuing him?  Life was full of
surprises.  They might be attacked by a party of Kafirs, brought back
there by the missing Hlangani, for instance.  What if he had merely
exchanged places with his unfortunate kinsman and were to be left there
in the darkness and horror?  How long would he be able to keep his
reason?  Hardly longer than the other, he feared.  And the perspiration
streamed from every pore, as he began to realise what the miserable
maniac had undergone.

A silence had succeeded to the tumult above.  What did it mean?  Every
second seemed an hour.  Then, with a start of unspeakable relief, he
heard Hoste's voice above.

"Ready to come up, old chap?"

"Very much so.  Why have you taken so long?" he asked anxiously.

"We had to tie up poor Tom twice, you know; first with the big _reim_,
then with others.  Then we had to undo the big _reim_ again.  Here it
is," chucking it over.

Eustace slipped the noose under his armpits, and, having given the word
to haul away, a very few moments saw him among them all again.  The mad
man was securely bound and even gagged, only his feet being loosened
sufficiently to enable him to take short steps.

So they started on their return track, longing with a greater longing
than words can tell, to breathe the open air, to behold the light of day
again.
the armies of the Philistines, and fighting over again the battles of
Israel's kings! Many a tale he stored away in his busy brain to be
repeated to the children gathered around the public fountain in the cool
of the evening.

It mattered not what character he told them of,--priest or prophet,
judge or king,--the picture was painted in life-like colors by this
patriotic little hero-worshipper.

Here and at home he heard so many discussions about what was lawful and
what was not, that he was constantly in fear of breaking one of the many
rules, even in as simple a duty as washing a cup.

So he watched his host closely till the meal was over, finding that in
the observance of many customs, he failed to measure up to his uncle's
strict standard.

Phineas went back to his work after dinner. He was greatly interested in
Joel, and, while he sawed and hammered, kept a watchful eye on him. He
was surprised at the boy's knowledge. More than once he caught himself
standing with an idle tool in hand, as he listened to some story that
Joel was telling to Jesse.

After a while he laid down his work and leaned against the bench. "What
do you find to do all day, my lad?" he asked, abruptly.

"Nothing," answered Joel, "after I have recited my lessons to Rabbi
Amos."

"Does your aunt never give you any tasks to do at home?"

"No. I think she does not like to have me in her sight any more than she
is obliged to. She is always kind to me, but she doesn't love me. She
only pities me. I hate to be pitied. There is not a single one in the
world who really loves me."

His lips quivered, but he winked back the tears. Phineas seemed lost in
thought a few minutes; then he looked up. "You are a Levite," he said
slowly, "so of course you could always be supported without needing to
learn a trade. Still you would be a great deal happier, in my opinion,
if you had something to keep you busy. If you like, I will teach you to
be a carpenter. There are a great many things you might learn to make
well, and, by and by, it would be a source of profit to you. There is no
bread so bitter as the bread of dependence, as you may learn when you
are older."

"Oh, Rabbi Phineas!" cried Joel. "Do you mean that I may come here every
day? It is too good to be true!"

"Yes; if you will promise to stick to it until you have mastered the
trade. If you are as quick to learn with your hands as you have been
with your head, I shall have reason to be proud of such a pupil."

Joel's face flushed with pleasure, and he sprang up quickly, saying,
"May I begin right now? Oh, I'll try _so_ hard to please you!"

Phineas laid a soft pine board on the bench, and began to mark a line
across it with a piece of red chalk.

"Well, you may see how straight a cut you can make through this plank."

He picked up a saw, and ran his fingers lightly along its sharp teeth.
But he paused in the act of handing it to Joel, to ask, "You are sure,
now, that your uncle and aunt will consent to such an arrangement?"

"Yes indeed!" was the emphatic answer. "They will be glad enough to have
me out of the way, and learning something useful."

The saw cut slowly through the wood; for the weak little hand was a
careful one, and the boy was determined not to swerve once from the
line. He smiled with satisfaction as the pieces fell apart, showing a
clean, straight edge.

"Well done!" said Phineas, kindly. "Now let me see you drive a nail."
Made bold by his first success, Joel pounded away vigorously, but the
hammer slipped more than once, and his unpractised fingers ached with
the blows that he had aimed at the nail's head.

"You'll soon learn," said Phineas, with an encouraging pat on the boy's
shoulder. "Gather up those odds and ends under the bench. When you've
sawed them into equal lengths, I'll show you how to make a box."

Joel bent over his work with almost painful intensity. He fairly held
his breath, as he made the measurements. He gripped the saw as if his
life depended on the strength of his hold. Phineas smiled at his
earnestness.

"Be careful, my lad," he said. "You will soon wear out at that rate."

It seemed to Joel that there never had been such a short afternoon. He
had stopped to rest several times, when Phineas had insisted upon it;
but this new work had all the fascination of an interesting game. The
trees threw giant shadows across the grass, when he finally laid his
tools aside. His back ached with so much unusual exercise, and he was
very tired.

"Rabbi Phineas," he asked gently, after a long pause, "what makes you so
good to me? What makes you so different from other people? While I am
with you, I feel like I want to be good. Other people seem to rub me the
wrong way, and make me cross and hateful; then I feel like I'd rather
be wicked than not. Why this afternoon, I've scarcely thought of Rehum
at all. I forgot at times that I am lame. When you talk to me, I feel
like I did that day Dan took me out on the lake. It seemed a different
kind of a world,--all blue sky and smooth water. I felt if I could stay
out there all the time, where it was so quiet and comforting, that I
could not even hate Rehum as much as I do."

A surprised, pleased look passed over the man's face. "Do I really make
you feel that way, little one? Then I am indeed glad. Once when I was a
young boy living in Nazareth, I had a playmate who had that influence
over me and all the boys he played with. I never could be selfish and
impatient when he was with me. His very presence rebuked such
thoughts,--when we were children playing together, like my own two
little ones there, and when we were older grown, working at the same
bench. It has been many a long year since I left Nazareth, but I think
of him daily. Even now, after our long separation, the thought of his
blameless life inspires me to a higher living. Yes," he went on
musingly, more to himself than the boy, "it was like music. Surely no
white-robed priest in the holy temple ever offered up more acceptable
praise than the perfect harmony of his daily life."

Joel's lips trembled. "If I had ever had one real friend to care for
me--not just pity me, you know--maybe I would have been different. But I
have never had a single one since my father died."

Phineas smiled, and held out his hand. "You have one now, my lad, never
forget that."

The strong brown hand closed in a warm grasp, and Joel drew it, with a
grateful impulse, to his lips. Ruth came up with wondering eyes. She
could not understand what had passed; but Joel's eyes were full of
tears, and she vaguely felt that he needed comfort. She had a pet pigeon
in her arms, that she carried everywhere with her.

"Here," she lisped, holding out the snowy winged bird. "Boy, take it!
Boy, keep it!"

Joel looked up inquiringly at Phineas. "Take it," he said, in a low
tone. "Let it be the omen of a happier life commencing for you."

"I never had a pet of any kind before," said Joel, in delight, smoothing
the white wings folded contentedly against his breast. "But she loves
it so, I dislike to take it from her. How beautiful it is!"

"My little Ruth is a born comforter," said Phineas, tossing her up in
his arms. "Shall Joel take the pigeon home with him, little daughter?"

"Yes," she answered, nodding her head. "Boy cried."

"I'll name it 'Little Friend,'" said Joel, rising with it in his arms.
"I'll take it home with me, and keep it until after the Sabbath, to make
me feel sure that this day has not been just a dream; but I will bring
it back next time I come. I can see it here every day, and it will be
happier here. Oh, Rabbi Phineas, I can never thank you enough for this
day!"

It was a pitiful little figure that limped away homeward in the fading
light, with the white pigeon in his arms.

Looking anxiously up in the sky, Joel saw one star come twinkling out.
The Sabbath would soon begin, and then he must not be found carrying
even so much as this one poor little pigeon. The slightest burden would
be unlawful.

As he hurried on, the loud blast of a trumpet, blown from the roof of
the synagogue, signalled the laborers in the fields to stop all work.
He knew that very soon it would sound again, to call the town people
from their tasks; and at the third blast, the Sabbath lamp would be
lighted in every home.

Fearful of his uncle's displeasure at his tardiness, he hurried
painfully onward, to provide food and a resting-place for his "little
friend" before the second sounding of the trumpet.




CHAPTER II.


EARLY in the morning after the Sabbath, Joel was in his accustomed place
in the market, waiting for his friend Phineas. His uncle had given a
gruff assent, when he timidly asked his approval of the plan.

The good Rabbi Amos was much pleased when he heard of the arrangement.
"Thou hast been a faithful student," he said, kindly. "Thou knowest
already more of the Law than many of thy elders. Now it will do thee
good to learn the handicraft of Phineas. Remember, my son, 'the balm was
created by God before the wound.' Work, that is as old as Eden, has been
given us that we might forget the afflictions of this life that fleeth
like a shadow. May the God of thy fathers give thee peace!"

With the old man's benediction repeating itself like a solemn refrain in
all his thoughts, Joel stood smoothing the pigeon in his arms, until
Phineas had made his daily purchases. Then they walked on together in
the cool of the morning, to the little white house under the fig-trees.
Phineas was surprised at his pupil's progress. To be sure, the weak arms
could lift little, the slender hands could attempt no large tasks. But
the painstaking care he bestowed on everything he attempted, resulted in
beautifully finished work. If there was an extra smooth polish to be put
on some wood, or a delicate piece of joining to do, Joel's deft fingers
seemed exactly suited to the task.

Before the winter was over, he had made many pretty little articles of
furniture for Abigail's use.

"May I have these pieces of fine wood to use as I please?" he asked of
Phineas, one day.

"All but that largest strip," he answered. "What are you going to make?"

"Something for Ruth's birthday. She will be three years old in a few
weeks, Jesse says, and I want to make something for her to play with."

"What are you going to make her?" inquired Jesse, from under the
work-bench. "Let me see too."

"Oh, I didn't know you were anywhere near," answered Joel, with a start
of alarm.

"Tell me!" begged Jesse.

"Well, if you will promise to keep her out of the way while I am
finishing it, and never say a word about it--"

"I'll promise," said the child, solemnly. He had to clap his hand over
his mouth a great many times in the next few weeks, to keep his secret
from telling itself, and he watched admiringly while Joel carved and
polished and cut.

One of the neighbors had come in to talk with Abigail the day he
finished it, and as the children were down on the beach, playing in the
sand, he took it in the house to show to the women. It was a little
table set with toy dishes, that he had carved out of wood,--plates and
cups and platters, all complete.

The visitor held up her hands with an exclamation of delight. After
taking up each little highly polished dish to admire it separately, she
said, "I know where you might get a great deal of money for such work.
There is a rich Roman living near the garrison, who spends money like a
lord. No price is too great for him to pay for anything that pleases his
fancy. Why don't you take some up there, and offer them for sale?"

"I believe I will," said Joel, after considering the matter. "I'll go
just as soon as I can get them made."

Ruth spread many a little feast under the fig-trees; but after the first
birthday banquet, Jesse was her only guest. Joel was too busy making
more dishes and another little table, to partake of them.

The whole family were interested in his success. The day he went up to
the great house near the garrison to offer them for sale, they waited
anxiously for his return.

"He's sold them! He's sold them!" cried Jesse, hopping from one foot to
the other, as he saw Joel coming down the street empty-handed. Joel was
hobbling along as fast as he could, his face beaming.

"See how much money!" he cried, as he opened his hand to show a shining
coin, stamped with the head of Cæsar. "And I have an order for two more.
I'll soon have a fortune! The children liked the dishes so much,
although they had the most beautiful toys I ever saw. They had images
they called dolls. Some of them had white-kid faces, and were dressed as
richly as queens. I wish Ruth had one."

"The law forbids!" exclaimed Phineas. "Have you forgotten that it is
written, 'Thou shalt not make any likeness of anything in the heavens
above or the earth beneath, or the waters under the earth'? She is happy
with what she has, and needs no strange idols of the heathen to play
with."

Joel made no answer; but he thought of the merry group of Roman children
seated around the little table he had made, and wished again that Ruth
had one of those gorgeously dressed dolls.

Skill and strength were not all he gained by his winter's work; for some
of the broad charity that made continual summer in the heart of Phineas
crept into his own embittered nature. He grew less suspicious of those
around him, and smiles came more easily now to his face than scowls.

But the strong ambition of his life never left him for an instant. To
all the rest of the world he might be a friend; to Rehum he could only
be the most unforgiving of enemies.

The thought that had given him most pleasure when the wealthy Roman had
tossed him his first earnings, was not that his work could bring him
money, but that the money could open the way for his revenge.

That thought, like a dark undercurrent, gained depth and force as the
days went by. As he saw how much he could do in spite of his lameness,
he thought of how much more he might have accomplished, if he had been
like other boys. It was a constant spur to his desire for revenge.

One day Phineas laid aside his tools much earlier than usual, and
without any explanation to his wondering pupil, went up into the town.

When he returned, he nodded to his wife, who sat in the doorway
spinning, and who had looked up inquiringly as he approached.

"Yes, it's all arranged," he said to her. Then he turned to Joel to ask,
"Did you ever ride on a camel, my boy?"

"No, Rabbi," answered the boy, in surprise, wondering what was coming
next.

"Well, I have a day's journey to make to the hills in Upper Galilee. A
camel caravan passes near the place where my business calls me, as it
goes to Damascus. I seek to accompany it for protection. I go on foot,
but I have made arrangements for you to ride one of the camels."

"Oh, am I really to go, too?" gasped Joel, in delighted astonishment.
"Oh, Rabbi Phineas! How did you ever think of asking me?"

"You have not seemed entirely well, of late," was the answer. "I thought
the change would do you good. I said nothing about it before, for I had
no opportunity to see your uncle until this afternoon; and I did not
want to disappoint you, in case he refused his permission."

"And he really says I may go?" demanded the boy, eagerly.

"Yes, the caravan moves in the morning, and we will go with it."

There was little more work done that day. Joel was so full of
anticipations of his journey that he scarcely knew what he was doing.
Phineas was busy with preparations for the comfort of his little family
during his absence, and went into town again.

On his return he seemed strangely excited. Abigail, seeing something was
amiss, watched him carefully, but asked no questions. He took a piece of
timber that had been laid away for some especial purpose, and began
sawing it into small bits.

"Rabbi Phineas," ventured Joel, respectfully, "is that not the wood you
charged me to save so carefully?"

Phineas gave a start as he saw what he had done, and threw down his saw.

"Truly," he said, smiling, "I am beside myself with the news I have
heard. I just now walked ten cubits past my own house, unknowing where I
was, so deeply was I thinking upon it. Abigail," he asked, "do you
remember my friend in Nazareth whom I so often speak of,--the son of
Joseph the carpenter? Last week he was bidden to a marriage in Cana. It
happened, before the feasting was over, the supply of wine was
exhausted, and the mortified host knew not what to do. Six great jars of
stone had been placed in the room, to supply the guests with water for
washing. _He changed that water into wine!_"

"I cannot believe it!" answered Abigail, simply.

"But Ezra ben Jared told me so. He was there, and drank of the wine,"
insisted Phineas.

"He could not have done it," said Abigail, "unless he were helped by the
evil one, or unless he were a prophet. He is too good a man to ask help
of the powers of darkness; and it is beyond belief that a son of Joseph
should be a prophet."

To this Phineas made no answer. His quiet thoughts were shaken out of
their usual routine as violently as if by an earthquake.

Joel thought more of the journey than he did of the miracle. It seemed
to the impatient boy that the next day never would dawn. Many times in
the night he wakened to hear the distant crowing of cocks. At last, by
straining his eyes he could distinguish the green leaves of the vine on
the lattice from the blue of the half-opened blossoms. By that token he
knew it was near enough the morning for him to commence saying his first
prayers.

Dressing noiselessly, so as not to disturb the sleeping family, he
slipped out of the house and down to the well outside the city-gate.
Here he washed, and then ate the little lunch he had wrapped up the
night before. A meagre little breakfast,--only a hard-boiled egg, a bit
of fish, and some black bread. But the early hour and his excitement
took away his appetite for even that little.

Soon all was confusion around the well, as the noisy drivers gathered to
water their camels, and make their preparations for the start.

Joel shrunk away timidly to the edge of the crowd, fearful that his
friend Phineas had overslept himself.

In a few minutes he saw him coming with a staff in one hand, and a small
bundle swinging from the other.

Joel had one breathless moment of suspense as he was helped on to the
back of the kneeling camel; one desperate clutch at the saddle as the
huge animal plunged about and rose to its feet. Then he looked down at
Phineas, and smiled blissfully.

[Illustration: "HE LOOKED DOWN AT PHINEAS, AND SMILED BLISSFULLY"]

Oh, the delight of that slow easy motion! The joy of being carried along
without pain or effort! Who could realize how much it meant to the
little fellow whose halting steps had so long been taken in weariness
and suffering?

Swinging along in the cool air, so far above the foot-passengers, it
seemed to him that he looked down upon a new earth. Blackbirds flew
along the roads, startled by their passing. High overhead, a lark had
not yet finished her morning song. Lambs bleated in the pastures, and
the lowing of herds sounded on every hill-side.

Not a sight or sound escaped the boy; and all the morning he rode on
without speaking, not a care in his heart, not a cloud on his horizon.

At noon they stopped in a little grove of olive-trees where a cool
spring gurgled out from the rocks.

Phineas spread out their lunch at a little distance from the others; and
they ate it quickly, with appetites sharpened by the morning's travel.
Afterwards Joel stretched himself out on the ground to rest, and was
asleep almost as soon as his eyelids could shut out the noontide glare
of the sun from his tired eyes.

When he awoke, nearly an hour afterward, he heard voices near him in
earnest conversation. Raising himself on his elbow, he saw Phineas at a
little distance, talking to an old man who had ridden one of the
foremost camels.

They must have been talking of the miracle, for the old man, as he
stroked his long white beard, was saying, "But men are more wont to be
astonished at the sun's eclipse, than at his daily rising. Look, my
friend!"

He pointed to a wild grape-vine clinging to a tree near by. "Do you see
those bunches of half-grown grapes? There is a constant miracle. Day by
day, the water of the dew and rain is being changed into the wine of the
grape. Soil and sunshine are turning into fragrant juices. Yet you feel
no astonishment."

"No," assented Phineas; "for it is by the hand of God it is done."

"Why may not this be also?" said the old man. "Even this miracle at the
marriage feast in Cana?"

Phineas started violently. "What!" he cried. "Do you think it possible
that this friend of mine is the One to be sent of God?"

"Is not this the accepted time for the coming of Israel's Messiah?"
answered the old man, solemnly. "Is it not meet that he should herald
his presence by miracles and signs and wonders?"

Joel lay down again to think over what he had just heard. Like every
other Israelite in the whole world, he knew that a deliverer had been
promised his people.

Time and again he had read the prophecies that foretold the coming of a
king through the royal line of David; time and again he had pictured to
himself the mighty battles to take place between his down-trodden race
and the haughty hordes of Cæsar. Sometime, somewhere, a universal
dominion awaited them. He firmly believed that the day was near at hand;
but not even in his wildest dreams had he ever dared to hope that it
might come in his own lifetime.

He raised himself on his elbow again, for the old man was speaking.

"About thirty years ago," he said slowly, "I went up to Jerusalem to be
registered for taxation, for the emperor's decree had gone forth and no
one could escape enrolment. You are too young to remember the taking of
that census, my friend; but you have doubtless heard of it."

"Yes," assented Phineas, respectfully.

"I was standing just outside the Joppa gate, bargaining with a man for a
cage of gold finches he had for sale, which I wished to take to my
daughter, when we heard some one speaking to us. Looking up we saw
several strange men on camels, who were inquiring their way. They were
richly dressed. The trappings and silver bells on their camels, as well
as their own attire, spoke of wealth. Their faces showed that they were
wise and learned men from far countries.

"We greeted them respectfully, but could not speak for astonishment when
we heard their question:

"'Where is he that is born king of the Jews? For we have seen his star
in the East, and have come to worship him.' The bird-seller looked at
me, and I looked at him in open-mouthed wonder. The men rode on before
we could find words wherewith to answer them.

"All sorts of rumors were afloat, and everywhere we went next day,
throughout Jerusalem, knots of people stood talking of the mysterious
men, and their strange question. Even the king was interested, and
sought audience with them."

"Could any one answer them?" asked Phineas.

"Nay! but it was then impressed on me so surely that the Christ was
born, that I have asked myself all these thirty years, 'Where is he that
is born king of the Jews?' For I too would fain follow on to find and
worship him. As soon as I return from Damascus, I shall go at once to
Cana, and search for this miracle-worker."

The old man's earnest words made a wonderful impression on Joel. All the
afternoon, as they rose higher among the hills, the thought took
stronger possession of him. He might yet live, helpless little cripple
as he was, to see the dawn of Israel's deliverance, and a son of David
once more on its throne.

Ride on, little pilgrim, happy in thy day-dreams! The time is coming;
but weary ways and hopeless heart-aches lie between thee and that
to-morrow. The king is on his way to his coronation, but it will be with
thorns.

Ride on, little pilgrim, be happy whilst thou can!




CHAPTER III.


IT was nearly the close of the day when the long caravan halted, and
tents were pitched for the night near a little brook that came splashing
down from a cold mountain-spring.

Joel, exhausted by the long day's travel, crowded so full of new
experiences, was glad to stretch his cramped limbs on a blanket that
Phineas took from the camel's back.

Here, through half-shut eyes, he watched the building of the camp-fire,
and the preparations for the evening meal.

"I wonder what Uncle Laban would do if he were here!" he said to
Phineas, with an amused smile. "Look at those dirty drivers with their
unwashed hands and unblessed food. How little regard they have for the
Law. Uncle Laban would fast a lifetime rather than taste anything that
had even been passed over a fire of their building. I can imagine I see
him now, gathering up his skirts and walking on the tips of his sandals
for fear of being touched by anything unclean."

"Your Uncle Laban is a good man," answered Phineas, "one careful not to
transgress the Law."

"Yes," said the boy. "But I like your way better. You keep the fasts,
and repeat the prayers, and love God and your neighbors. Uncle Laban is
careful to do the first two things; I am not so sure about the others.
Life is too short to be always washing one's hands."

Phineas looked at the little fellow sharply. How shrewd and old he
seemed for one of his years! Such independence of thought was unusual in
a child trained as he had been. He scarcely knew how to answer him, so
he turned his attention to spreading out the fruits and bread he had
brought for their supper.

Next morning, after the caravan had gone on without them, they started
up a narrow bridle-path, that led through hillside-pastures where flocks
of sheep and goats were feeding.

The dew was still on the grass, and the air was so fresh and sweet in
this higher altitude that Joel walked on with a feeling of strength and
vigor unknown to him before.

"Oh, look!" he cried, clasping his hands in delight, as a sudden turn
brought them to the upper course of the brook whose waters, falling far
below, had refreshed them the night before.

The poetry of the Psalms came as naturally to the lips of this
beauty-loving little Israelite as the breath he drew.

Now he repeated, in a low, reverent voice, "'The Lord is my shepherd; I
shall not want.' Oh, Rabbi Phineas, did you ever know before that there
could be such green pastures and still waters?"

The man smiled at the boy's radiant, upturned face. "'Yea, the earth is
the Lord's and the fulness thereof,'" he murmured. "We have indeed a
goodly heritage."

Hushed into silence by the voice of the hills and the beauty on every
side, they walked on till the road turned again.

Just ahead stood a house unusually large for a country district;
everything about it bore an air of wealth and comfort.

"Our journey is at an end now," said Phineas. "Yonder lies the house of
Nathan ben Obed. He owns all those flocks and herds we have seen in
passing this last half hour. It is with him that I have business; and we
will tarry with him until after the Sabbath."

They were evidently expected, for a servant came running out to meet
them. He opened the gate and conducted them into a shaded court-yard.
Here another servant took off their dusty sandals, and gave them water
to wash their feet.

They had barely finished, when an old man appeared in the doorway; his
long beard and hair were white as the abba he wore.

Phineas would have bowed himself to the ground before him, but the old
man prevented it, by hurrying to take both hands in his, and kiss him on
each cheek.

"Peace be to thee, thou son of my good friend Jesse!" he said. "Thou art
indeed most welcome."

Joel lagged behind. He was always sensitive about meeting strangers; but
the man's cordial welcome soon put him at his ease.

He was left to himself a great deal during the few days following. The
business on which the old man had summoned Phineas required long
consultations.

One day they rode away together to some outlying pastures, and were gone
until night-fall. Joel did not miss them. He was spending long happy
hours in the country sunshine. There was something to entertain him,
every way he turned. For a while he amused himself by sitting in the
door and poring over a roll of parchment that Sarah, the wife of Nathan
ben Obed, brought him to read.

She was an old woman, but one would have found it hard to think so, had
he seen how briskly she went about her duties of caring for such a large
household.

After Joel had read for some little time, he became aware that some one
was singing outside, in a whining, monotonous way, and he laid down his
book to listen. The voice was not loud, but so penetrating he could not
shut it out, and fix his mind on his story again. So he rolled up the
parchment and laid it on the chest from which it had been taken; then
winding his handkerchief around his head, turban fashion, he limped out
in the direction of the voice.

Just around the corner of the house, under a great oak-tree, a woman sat
churning. From three smooth poles joined at the top to form a tripod, a
goat-skin bag hung by long leather straps. This was filled with cream;
she was slapping it violently back and forth in time to her weird song.

Her feet were bare, and she wore only a coarse cotton dress. But a gay
red handkerchief covered her black hair, and heavy copper rings hung
from her nose and ears.

The song stopped suddenly as she saw Joel. Then recognizing her master's
guest, she smiled at him so broadly that he could see her pretty white
teeth.

Joel hardly knew what to say at this unexpected encounter, but bethought
himself to ask the way to the sheep-folds and the watch-tower. "It is a
long way there," said the woman, doubtfully; Joel flushed as he felt her
black eyes scanning his misshapen form.

Just then Sarah appeared in the door, and the maid repeated the question
to her mistress.

"To be sure," she said. "You must go out and see our shepherds with
their flocks. We have a great many employed just now, on all the
surrounding hills. Rhoda, call your son, and bid him bring hither the
donkey that he always drives to market."

The woman left her churning, and presently came back with a boy about
Joel's age, leading a donkey with only one ear.

Joel knew what that meant. At some time in its life the poor beast had
strayed into some neighbor's field, and the owner of the field had been
at liberty to cut off an ear in punishment.

The boy that led him wore a long shirt of rough hair-cloth. His feet and
legs were brown and tanned. A shock of reddish sunburned hair was the
only covering for his head. There was a squint in one eye, and his face
was freckled.

He made an awkward obeisance to his mistress.

"Buz," she said, "this young lad is your master's guest. Take him out
and show him the flocks and herds, and the sheep-folds. He has never
seen anything of shepherd life, so be careful to do his pleasure. Stay!"
she added to Joel. "You will not have time to visit them all before the
mid-day meal, so I will give you a lunch, and you can enjoy an entire
day in the fields."

As the two boys started down the hill, Joel stole a glance at his
companion. "What a stupid-looking fellow!" he thought; "I doubt if he
knows anything more than this sleepy beast I am riding. I wonder if he
enjoys any of this beautiful world around him. How glad I am that I am
not in his place."

Buz, trudging along in the dust, glanced at the little cripple on the
donkey's back with an inward shiver.

"What a dreadful lot his must be," he thought. "How glad I am that I am
not like he is!"

It was not very long till the shyness began to wear off, and Joel found
that the stupid shepherd lad had a very busy brain under his shock of
tangled hair. His eyes might squint, but they knew just where to look in
the bushes for the little hedge-sparrow's nest. They could take unerring
aim, too, when he sent the smooth sling-stones whizzing from the sling
he carried.

"How far can you shoot with it?" asked Joel.

For answer Buz looked all around for some object on which to try his
skill; then he pointed to a hawk slowly circling overhead. Joel watched
him fit a smooth pebble into his sling; he had no thought that the boy
could touch it at such a distance. The stone whizzed through the air
like a bullet, and the bird dropped several yards ahead of them.

"See!" said Buz, as he ran to pick it up, and display it proudly. "I
struck it in the head."

Joel looked at him with increasing respect. "That must have been the
kind of sling that King David killed the giant with," he said, handing
it back after a careful examination.

"King David!" repeated Buz, dully, "seems to me I have heard of him,
sometime or other; but I don't know about the giant."

"Why where have you been all your life?" cried Joel, in amazement. "I
thought everybody knew about that. Did you never go to a synagogue?"

Buz shook his bushy head. "They don't have synagogues in these parts.
The master calls us in and reads to us on the Sabbath; but I always get
sleepy when I sit right still, and so I generally get behind somebody
and go to sleep. The shepherds talk to each other a good deal about such
things, I am never with them though. I spend all my time running
errands."

Shocked at such ignorance, Joel began to tell the shepherd king's life
with such eloquence that Buz stopped short in the road to listen.

Seeing this the donkey stood still also, wagged its one ear, and went to
sleep. But Buz listened, wider awake than he had ever been before in his
life.

The story was a favorite one with Joel, and he put his whole soul into
it.

"Who told you that?" asked Buz, taking a long breath when the
interesting tale was finished.

"Why I read it myself!" answered Joel.

"Oh, can you read?" asked Buz, looking at Joel in much the same way that
Joel had looked at him after he killed the hawk. "I do not see how
anybody can. It puzzles me how people can look at all those crooked
black marks and call them rivers and flocks and things. I looked one
time, just where Master had been reading about a great battle. And I
didn't see a single thing that looked like a warrior or a sword or a
battle-axe, though he called them all by name. There were several little
round marks that might have been meant for sling-stones; but it was more
than I could make out, how he could get any sense out of it."

Joel leaned back and laughed till the hills rang, laughed till the tears
stood in his eyes, and the donkey waked up and ambled on.

Buz did not seem to be in the least disturbed by his merriment, although
he was puzzled as to its cause. He only stooped to pick up more stones
for his sling as they went on.

It was not long till they came to some of the men,--great brawny fellows
dressed in skins, with coarse matted hair and tanned faces. How little
they knew of what was going on in the busy world outside their fields!
As Joel talked to them he found that Cæsar's conquests and Hero's
murders had only come to them as vague rumors. All the petty wars and
political turmoils were unknown to them. They could talk to him only of
their flocks and their faith, both as simple as their lives.

Joel, in his wisdom learned of the Rabbis, felt himself infinitely their
superior, child though he was. But he enjoyed his day spent with them.
He and Buz ate the ample lunch they had brought, dipped up water from
the brook in cups they made of oak-leaves, and both finally fell asleep
to the droning music of the shepherd's pipes, played softly on the
uplands.

A distant rumble of thunder aroused them, late in the afternoon; and
they started up to find the shepherds calling in their flocks. The gaunt
sheep dogs raced to and fro, bringing the straying goats together. The
shepherds brought the sheep into line with well-aimed sling-shots,
touching them first on one side, and then on the other, as oxen are
guided by the touch of the goad.

Joel looked up at the darkening sky with alarm. "Who would have thought
of a storm on such a day!" he exclaimed.

Buz cocked his eyes at the horizon. "I thought it might come to this,"
he said; "for as we came along this morning there were no spider-webs
on the grass; the ants had not uncovered the doors of their hills; and
all the signs pointed to wet weather. I thought though, that the time of
the latter rains had passed a week ago. I am always glad when the stormy
season is over. This one is going to be a hard one."

"What shall we do?" asked Joel.

Buz scratched his head. Then he looked at Joel. "You never could get
home on that trifling donkey before it overtakes us; and they'll be
worried about you. I'd best take you up to the sheep-fold. You can stay
all night there, very comfortably. I'll run home and tell them where you
are, and come back for you in the morning."

Joel hesitated, appalled at spending the night among such dirty men; but
the heavy boom of thunder, steadily rolling nearer, silenced his
half-spoken objection. By the time the donkey had carried him up the
hillside to the stone-walled enclosure round the watch-tower, the
shepherds were at the gates with their flocks.

Joel watched them go through the narrow passage, one by one. Each man
kept count of his own sheep, and drove them under the rough sheds put up
for their protection.

A good-sized hut was built against the hillside, where the shepherds
might find refuge. Buz pointed it out to Joel; then he turned the donkey
into one of the sheds, and started homeward on the run.

Joel shuddered as a blinding flash of lightning was followed by a crash
of thunder that shook the hut. The wind bore down through the trees like
some savage spirit, shrieking and moaning as it flew. Joel heard a
shout, and looked out to the opposite hillside. Buz was flying along in
break-neck race with the storm. At that rate he would soon be home. How
he seemed to enjoy the race, as his strong limbs carried him lightly as
a bird soars!

At the top he turned to look back and laugh and wave his arms,--a sinewy
little figure standing out in bold relief against a brazen sky.

Joel watched till he was out of sight. Then, as the wind swooped down
from the mountains, great drops of rain began to splash through the
leaves.

The men crowded into the hut. One of them started forward to close the
door, but stopped suddenly, with his brown hairy hand uplifted.

"Hark ye!" he exclaimed.

Joel heard only the shivering of the wind in the tree-tops; but the
man's trained ear caught the bleating of a stray lamb, far off and very
faint.

"I was afraid I was mistaken in my count; they jostled through the gate
so fast I could not be sure." Going to a row of pegs along the wall, he
took down a lantern hanging there and lit it; then wrapping his coat of
skins more closely around him, and calling one of the dogs, he set out
into the gathering darkness.

Joel watched the fitful gleam of the lantern, flickering on unsteadily
as a will-o'-the-wisp. A moment later he heard the man's deep voice
calling tenderly to the lost animal; then the storm struck with such
fury that they had to stand with their backs against the door of the hut
to keep it closed.

Flash after flash of lightning blinded them. The wind roared down the
mountain and beat against the house till Joel held his breath in terror.
It was midnight before it stopped. Joel thought of the poor shepherd out
on the hills, and shuddered. Even the men seemed uneasy about him, as
hour after hour passed, and he did not come.

Finally he fell asleep in the corner, on a pile of woolly skins. In the
gray dawn he was awakened by a great shout. He got up, and went to the
door. There stood the shepherd. His bare limbs were cut by stones and
torn by thorns. Blood streamed from his forehead where he had been
wounded by a falling branch. The mud on his rough garments showed how
often he had slipped and fallen on the steep paths.

Joel noticed, with a thrill of sympathy, how painfully he limped. But
there on the bowed shoulders was the lamb he had wandered so far to
find; and as the welcoming shout arose again, Joel's weak little cheer
joined gladly in.

"How brave and strong he is," thought the boy. "He risked his life for
just one pitiful little lamb."

The child's heart went strangely out to this rough fellow who stood
holding the shivering animal, sublimely unconscious that he had done
anything more than a simple duty.

Joel, who felt uncommonly hungry after his supperless night, thought he
would mount the donkey and start back alone. But just as he was about to
do so, a familiar bushy head showed itself in the door of the sheepfold.
Buz had brought him some wheat-cakes and cheese to eat on the way back.

Joel was so busy with this welcome meal that he did not talk much. Buz
kept eying him in silence, as if he longed to ask some question. At
last, when the cheese had entirely disappeared, he found courage to ask
it.

"Were you always like that?" he said abruptly, motioning to Joel's back
and leg. Somehow the reference did not wound him as it generally did. He
began to tell Buz about the Samaritan boy who had crippled him. He never
was able to tell the story of his wrongs without growing passionately
angry. He had worked himself into a white heat by the time he had
finished.

"I'd get even with him," said Buz, excitedly, with a wicked squint of
his eyes.

"How would you do it?" demanded Joel. "Cripple him as he did me?"

"Worse than that!" exclaimed Buz, stopping to take deliberate aim at a
leaf overhead, and shooting a hole exactly through the centre with his
sling. "I'd blind him as quick as that! It's a great deal worse to be
blind than lame."

Joel closed his eyes, and rode on a few moments in darkness. Then he
opened them and gave a quick glad look around the landscape. "My! What
if I never could have opened them again," he thought. "Yes, Buz, you're
right," he said aloud. "It _is_ worse to be blind; so I shall take
Rehum's eyesight also, some time. Oh, if that time were only here!"

Although the subject of the miracle at Cana had been constantly in the
mind of Phineas, and often near his lips, he did not speak of it to his
host until the evening before his departure.

It was just at the close of the evening meal. Nathan ben Obed rose
half-way from his seat in astonishment, then sank back.

"How old a man is this friend of yours?" he asked.

"About thirty, I think," answered Phineas. "He is a little younger than
I."

"Where was he born?"

"In Bethlehem, I have heard it said, though his home has always been in
Nazareth."

"Strange, strange!" muttered the man, stroking his long white beard
thoughtfully.

Joel reached over and touched Phineas on the arm. "Will you not tell
Rabbi Nathan about the wonderful star that was seen at that time?" he
asked, in a low tone.

"What was that?" asked the old man, arousing from his reverie.

When Phineas had repeated his conversation with the stranger on the day
of his journey, Nathan ben Obed exchanged meaning glances with his
wife.

"Send for the old shepherd Heber," he said. "I would have speech with
him."

Rhoda came in to light the lamps. He bade her roll a cushioned couch
that was in one corner to the centre of the room.

"This old shepherd Heber was born in Bethlehem," he said; "but since his
sons and grandsons have been in my employ, he has come north to live. He
used to help keep the flocks that belonged to the Temple, and that were
used for sacrifices. His has always been one of the purest of lives; and
I have never known such faith as he has. He is over a hundred years old,
so must have been quite aged at the time of the event of which he will
tell us."

Presently an old, old man tottered into the room, leaning on the
shoulders of his two stalwart grandsons. They placed him gently on the
cushions of the couch, and then went into the court-yard to await his
readiness to return. Like the men Joel had seen the day before, they
were dressed in skins, and were wild-looking and rough. But this aged
father, with dim eyes and trembling wrinkled hands, sat before them like
some hoary patriarch, in a fine linen mantle.

Pleased as a child, he saluted his new audience, and began to tell them
his only story.

As the years had gone by, one by one the lights of memory had gone out
in darkness. Well-known scenes had grown dim; old faces were forgotten;
names he knew as well as his own, could not be recalled: but this one
story was as fresh and real to him, as on the night he learned it.

The words he chose were simple, the voice was tremulous with weakness;
but he spoke with a dramatic fervor that made Joel creep nearer and
nearer, until he knelt, unknowing, at the old man's knee, spell-bound by
the wonderful tale.

"We were keeping watch in the fields by night," began the old shepherd,
"I and my sons and my brethren. It was still and cold, and we spoke but
little to each other. Suddenly over all the hills and plains shone a
great light,--brighter than light of moon or stars or sunshine. It was
so heavenly white we knew it must be the glory of the Lord we looked
upon and we were sore afraid, and hid our faces, falling to the ground.
And, lo! an angel overhead spake to us from out of the midst of the
glory, saying, 'Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great
joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the
city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a
sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes,
lying in a manger.'

"And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host
praising God, and saying, 'Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth,
good-will toward men!'

"Oh, the sound of the rejoicing that filled that upper air! Ever since
in my heart have I carried that foretaste of heaven!"

The old shepherd paused, with such a light on his upturned face that he
seemed to his awestruck listeners to be hearing again that same angelic
chorus,--the chorus that rang down from the watch-towers of heaven,
across earth's lowly sheep-fold, on that first Christmas night.

There was a solemn hush. Then he said, "And when they were gone away,
and the light and the song were no more with us, we spake one to
another, and rose in haste and went to Bethlehem. And we found the Babe
lying in a manger with Mary its mother; and we fell down and worshipped
Him.

"Thirty years has it been since the birth of Israel's Messiah; and I sit
and wonder all the day,--wonder when He will appear once more to His
people. Surely the time must be well nigh here when He may claim His
kingdom. O Lord, let not Thy servant depart until these eyes that
beheld the Child shall have seen the King in His beauty!"

Joel remained kneeling beside old Heber, perfectly motionless. He was
fitting together the links that he had lately found. A child, heralded
by angels, proclaimed by a star worshipped by the Magi! A man changing
water into wine at only a word!

"I shall yet see Him!" exclaimed the voice of old Heber, with such
sublime assurance of faith that it found a response in every heart.

There was another solemn stillness, so deep that the soft fluttering of
a night-moth around the lamp startled them.

Then the child's voice rang out, eager and shrill, but triumphant as if
inspired: "Rabbi Phineas, _He_ it was who changed the water into
wine!--This friend of Nazareth and the babe of Bethlehem are the same!"

The heart of the carpenter was strangely stirred, but it was full of
doubt. Not that the Christ had been born,--the teachings of all his
lifetime led him to expect that; but that the chosen One could be a
friend of his,--the thought was too wonderful for him.

The old shepherd sat on the couch, feebly twisting his fingers, and
talking to himself. He was repeating bits of the story he had just told
them: "And, lo, an angel overhead!" he muttered. Then he looked up,
whispering softly, "Glory to God in the highest--and peace, yes, on
earth peace!"

"He seems to have forgotten everything else," said Nathan, signalling to
the men outside to lead him home. "His mind is wiped away entirely, that
it may keep unspotted the record of that night's revelation. He tells it
over and over, whether he has a listener or not."

They led him gently out, the white-haired, white-souled old shepherd
Heber. It seemed to Joel that the wrinkled face was illuminated by some
inner light, not of this world, and that he lingered among men only to
repeat to them, over and over, his one story. That strange sweet story
of Bethlehem's first Christmas-tide.




CHAPTER IV.


Next morning a goodly train set out from the gates of Nathan ben Obed.
It was near the time of the feast of the Passover, and he, with many of
his household, was going down to Jerusalem.

The family and guests went first on mules and asses. Behind them
followed a train of servants, driving the lambs, goats, and oxen to be
offered as sacrifices in the temple, or sold in Jerusalem to other
pilgrims.

All along the highway, workmen were busy repairing the bridges, and
cleaning the springs and wells, soon to be used by the throngs of
travellers.

All the tombs near the great thoroughfares were being freshly
white-washed; they gleamed with a dazzling purity through the green
trees, only to warn passers-by of the defilement within. For had those
on their way to the feast approached too near these homes of the dead,
even unconsciously, they would have been accounted unclean, and unfit
to partake of the Passover. Nothing escaped Joel's quick sight, from the
tulips and marigolds flaming in the fields, to the bright-eyed little
viper crawling along the stone-wall.

But while he looked, he never lost a word that passed between his friend
Phineas and their host. The pride of an ancient nation took possession
of him as he listened to the prophecies they quoted.

Every one they met along the way coming from Capernaum had something to
say about this new prophet who had arisen in Galilee. When they reached
the gate of the city, a great disappointment awaited them. _He had been
there, and gone again._

Nathan ben Obed and his train tarried only one night in the place, and
then pressed on again towards Jerusalem. Phineas went with them.

"You shall go with us next year," he said to Joel; "then you will be
over twelve. I shall take my own little ones too, and their mother."

"Only one more year," exclaimed Joel, joyfully. "If that passes as
quickly as the one just gone, it will soon be here."

"Look after my little family," said the carpenter, at parting. "Come
every day to the work, if you wish, just as when I am here; and
remember, my lad, you are almost a man."

Almost a man! The words rang in the boy's thoughts all day as he pounded
and cut, keeping time to the swinging motion of hammer and saw. Almost a
man! But what kind of one? Crippled and maimed, shorn of the strength
that should have been his pride, beggared of his priestly birthright.

Almost, it might be, but never in its fulness, could he hope to attain
the proud stature of a perfect man.

A fiercer hate sprang up for the enemy who had made him what he was; and
the wild burning for revenge filled him so he could not work. He put
away his tools, and went up the narrow outside stairway that led to the
flat roof of the carpenter's house. It was called the "upper chamber."
Here a latticed pavilion, thickly overgrown with vines, made a cool
green retreat where he might rest and think undisturbed.

Sitting there, he could see the flash of white sails on the blue lake,
and slow-moving masses of fleecy clouds in the blue of the sky above.
They brought before him the picture of the flocks feeding on the
pastures of Nathan ben Obed.

Then, naturally enough, there flashed through his mind a thought of Buz.
He seemed to see him squinting his little eyes to take aim at a leaf
overhead. He heard the stone whirr through it, as Buz said: "I'd blind
him!"

Some very impossible plans crept into Joel's day-dreams just then. He
imagined himself sitting in a high seat, wrapped in robes of state;
soldiers stood around him to carry out his slightest wish. The door
would open and Rehum would be brought forth in fetters.

"What is your will concerning the prisoner, O most gracious sovereign,"
the jailer would ask.

Joel closed his eyes, and waved his hand before an imaginary audience.
"Away with him,--to the torture! Wrench his limbs on the rack! Brand his
eyelids with hot irons! Let him suffer all that man can suffer and live!
Thus shall it be done unto the man on whom the king delighteth to take
vengeance!"

Joel was childish enough to take a real satisfaction in this scene he
conjured up. But as it faded away, he was man enough to realize it could
never come to pass, save in his imagination; he could never be in such a
position for revenge, unless,--

That moment a possible way seemed to open for him. Phineas would
probably see his friend of Nazareth at the Passover. What could be more
natural than that the old friendship should be renewed. He whose hand
had changed the water into wine should finally cast out the alien king
who usurped the throne of Israel, for one in whose veins the blood of
David ran royal red,--what was more to be expected than that?

The Messiah would come to His kingdom, and then--and then--the thought
leaped to its last daring limit.

Phineas, who had been His earliest friend and playfellow, would he not
be lifted to the right hand of power? Through him, then, lay the royal
road to revenge.

The thought lifted him unconsciously to his feet. He stood with his arms
out-stretched in the direction of the far-away Temple, like some young
prophet. David's cry of triumph rose to his lips: "Thou hast girded me
with strength unto the battle," he murmured. "Thou hast also given me
the necks of mine enemies, that I might destroy them that hate me!"

A sweet baby voice at the foot of the steps brought him suddenly down
from the height of his intense feeling.

"Joel! Joel!" called little Ruth, "where is you?"

Then Jesse's voice added, "We're all a-coming up for you to tell us a
story."

Up the stairs they swarmed to the roof, the carpenter's children and
half-a-dozen of their little playmates.

Joel, with his head still in the clouds, told them of a mighty king who
was coming to slay all other kings, and change all tears--the waters of
affliction--into the red wine of joy.

"H'm! I don't think much of that story," said Jesse, with out-spoken
candor. "I'd rather hear about Goliath, or the bears that ate up the
forty children."

But Joel was in no mood for such stories, just then. On some slight
pretext he escaped from his exacting audience, and went down to the
sea-shore. Here, skipping stones across the water, or writing idly in
the sand, he was free to go on with his fascinating day-dreams.

For the next two weeks the boy gave up work entirely. He haunted the
toll-gates and public streets, hoping to hear some startling news from
Jerusalem. He was so full of the thought that some great revolution was
about to take place, that he could not understand how people could be
so indifferent. All on fire with the belief that this man of Nazareth
was the one in whom lay the nation's hope, he looked and longed for the
return of Phineas, that he might learn more of Him.

But Phineas had little to tell when he came back. He had met his friend
twice in Jerusalem,--the same gentle quiet man he had always known,
making no claims, working no wonders. Phineas had heard of His driving
the moneychangers out of the Temple one day, and those who sold doves in
its sacred courts, although he had not witnessed the scene.

The carpenter was rather surprised that He should have made such a
public disturbance.

"Rabbi Phineas," said Joel, with a trembling voice, "don't you think
your friend is the prophet we are expecting?"

Phineas shook his head. "No, my lad, I am sure of it now."

"But the herald angels and the star," insisted the boy.

"They must have proclaimed some one else. He is the best man I ever
knew; but there is no more of the king in His nature, than there is in
mine."

The man's positive answer seemed to shatter Joel's last hope. Downcast
and disappointed, he went back to his work. Only with money could he
accomplish his life's object, and only by incessant work could he earn
the shining shekels that he needed.

Phineas wondered sometimes at the dogged persistence with which the
child stuck to his task, in spite of his tired, aching body.

He had learned to make sandal-wood jewel-boxes, and fancifully wrought
cups to hold the various dyes and cosmetics used by the ladies of the
court.

Several times, during the following months, he begged a sail in some of
the fishing-boats that landed at the town of Tiberias. Having gained the
favor of the keeper of the gates, by various little gifts of his own
manufacture, he always found a ready admittance to the palace.

To the ladies of the court, the sums they paid for his pretty wares
seemed trifling; but to Joel the small bag of coins hidden in the folds
of his clothes was a little fortune, daily growing larger.




CHAPTER V.


IT was Sabbath morning in the house of Laban the Pharisee. Joel, sitting
alone in the court-yard, could hear his aunt talking to the smaller
children, as she made them ready to take with her to the synagogue.

From the upper chamber on the roof, came also a sound of voices, for two
guests had arrived the day before, and were talking earnestly with their
host. Joel already knew the object of their visit.

They had been there before, when the preaching of John Baptist had drawn
such great crowds from all the cities to the banks of the Jordan. They
had been sent out then by the authorities in Jerusalem to see what
manner of man was this who, clothed in skins and living in the
wilderness, could draw the people so wonderfully, and arouse such
intense excitement. Now they had come on a like errand, although on
their own authority.

Another prophet had arisen whom this John Baptist had declared to be
greater than himself. They had seen Him drive the moneychangers from the
Temple; they had heard many wild rumors concerning Him. So they followed
Him to His home in the little village of Nazareth, where they heard Him
talk in the synagogue.

They had seen the listening crowd grow amazed at the eloquence of His
teaching, and then indignant that one so humble as a carpenter's son
should claim that Isaiah's prophecies had been fulfilled in Himself.

They had seen Him driven from the home of His boyhood, and now had come
to Capernaum that they might be witnesses in case this impostor tried to
lead these people astray by repeating His claims.

All this Joel heard, and more, as the earnest voices came distinctly
down to him through the deep hush of the Sabbath stillness. It shook his
faith somewhat, even in the goodness of this friend of his friend
Phineas, that these two learned doctors of the Law should consider Him
an impostor.

He stood aside respectfully for them to pass, as they came down the
outside stairway, and crossed the court-yard on their way to the
morning service.

Their long, flowing, white robes, their broad phylacteries, their
dignified bearing, impressed him greatly. He knew they were wise, good
men whose only aim in life was to keep the letter of the Law, down to
its smallest details. He followed them through the streets until they
came to the synagogue. They gave no greeting to any one they passed, but
walked with reverently bowed heads that their pious meditation might not
be disturbed by the outside world. His aunt had already gone by the way
of the back streets, as it was customary for women to go, her face
closely veiled.

The synagogue, of finely chiselled limestone, with its double rows of
great marble pillars, stood in its white splendor, the pride of the
town. It had been built by the commander of the garrison who, though a
Roman centurion, was a believer in the God of the Hebrews, and greatly
loved by the whole people.

Joel glanced up at the lintel over the door, where Aaron's rod and a pot
of manna carved in the stone were constant reminders to the daily
worshippers of the Hand that fed and guided them from generation to
generation.

Joel limped slowly to his place in the congregation. In the seats of
honor, facing it, sat his uncle and his guests, among the rulers of the
synagogue.

For a moment his eyes wandered curiously around, hoping for a glimpse of
the man whose fame was beginning to spread all over Galilee. It had been
rumored that He would be there. But Joel saw only familiar faces. The
elders took their seats.

During the reading of the usual psalm, the reciting of a benediction,
and even the confession of the creed, Joel's thoughts wandered. When the
reader took up his scroll to read the passages from Deuteronomy, the boy
stole one more quick glance all around. But as the whole congregation
arose, and turned facing the east, he resolutely fixed his mind on the
duties of the hour.

The eighteen benedictions, or prayers, were recited in silence by each
devout worshipper. Then the leader repeated them aloud, all the
congregation responding with their deep Amen! and Amen! Joel always
liked that part of the service and the chanting that followed.

Another roll of parchment was brought out. The boy looked up with
interest. Probably one of his uncle's guests would be invited to read
from it, and speak to the people.

No, it was a stranger whom he had not noticed before, sitting behind one
of the tall elders, who was thus honored.

Joel's heart beat so fast that the blood throbbed against his ear-drums,
as he heard the name called. It was the friend of his friend Phineas,
_the Rabbi Jesus_.

Joel bent forward, all his soul in his eyes, as the stranger unrolled
the book, and began to read from the Prophets. The words were old
familiar ones; he even knew them by heart. But never before had they
carried with them such music, such meaning. When He laid aside the roll,
and began to speak, every fibre in the boy's being thrilled in response
to the wonderful eloquence of that voice and teaching.

The whole congregation sat spell-bound, forgetful of everything except
the earnestness of the speaker who moved and swayed them as the wind
does the waving wheat.

Suddenly there arose a wild shriek, a sort of demon-like howl that
transfixed them with its piercing horror. Every one turned to see the
cause of the startling sound. There, near the door, stood a man whom
they all knew,--an unhappy creature said to be possessed of an unclean
spirit.

"Ha!" he cried, in a blood-curdling tone. "What have we to do with Thee,
Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy us? I know Thee, who thou
art, the holy One of God!"

There was a great stir, especially in the woman's gallery; and those
standing nearest him backed away as far as possible.

Every face was curious and excited, at this sudden interruption,--every
face but one; the Rabbi Jesus alone was calm.

"Hold thy peace and come out of him!" He commanded. There was one more
shriek, worse than before, as the man fell at His feet in a convulsion;
but in a moment he stood up again, quiet and perfectly sane. The wild
look was gone from his eyes. Whatever had been the strange spell that
had bound him before, he was now absolutely free.

There was another stir in the woman's gallery. Contrary to all rule or
custom, an aged woman pushed her way out. Down the stairs she went,
unveiled through the ranks of the men, to reach her son whom she had
just seen restored to reason. With a glad cry she fell forward,
fainting, in his arms, and was borne away to the little home, now no
longer darkened by the shadow of a sore affliction.

Little else was talked about that day, until the rumor of another
miracle began to spread through the town. Phineas, stopping at Laban's
house on his way home from an afternoon service, confirmed the truth of
it.

One of his neighbors had been dangerously ill with a fever that was
common in that part of the country; she was the mother-in-law of Simon
bar Jonah. It was at his home that the Rabbi Jesus had been invited to
dine.

As soon as He entered the house, they besought Him to heal her. Standing
beside her, He rebuked the fever; and immediately she arose, and began
to help her daughter prepare for the entertainment of their guest.

"Abigail was there yesterday," said Phineas, "to carry some broth she
had made. She thought then it would be impossible for the poor creature
to live through the night. I saw the woman a few hours ago, and she is
perfectly well and strong."

That night when the sun was setting, and the Sabbath was at an end, a
motley crowd streamed along the streets to the door of Simon bar Jonah.
Men carried on couches; children in their mother's arms; those wasted by
burning fevers; those shaken by unceasing palsy; the lame; the blind;
the death-stricken,--all pressing hopefully on.

What a scene in that little court-yard as the sunset touched the wan
faces and smiled into dying eyes. Hope for the hopeless! Balm for the
broken in body and spirit! There was rejoicing in nearly every home in
Capernaum that night, for none were turned away. Not one was refused. It
is written, "He laid His hand on every one of them, and healed them."

That he might not seem behind his guests in zeal and devotion to the
Law, the dignified Laban would not follow the crowds.

"Let others be carried away by strange doctrines and false prophets, if
they will," he declared; "as for me and my household, we will cling to
the true faith of our fathers."

So the three sat in the upper chamber on the roof, and discussed the new
teacher with many shakes of their wise heads.

"It is not lawful to heal on the Sabbath day," they declared. "Twice
during the past day He has openly transgressed the Law. He will lead all
Galilee astray!"

But Galilee cared little how far the path turned from the narrow faith
of the Pharisees, so long as it led to life and healing.

Down in the garden below, the children climbed up on the grape-arbor,
and peered through the vines at the surging crowds which they would have
joined, had it not been for Laban's strict commands.

One by one they watched people whom they knew go by, some carried on
litters, some leaning on the shoulders of friends. One man crawled
painfully along on his hands and knees.

After awhile the same people began to come back.

"Look, quick, Joel!" one of the children cried; "there goes Simon ben
Levi. Why, his palsy is all gone! He doesn't shake a bit now! And
there's little Martha that lives out near Aunt Rebecca's! Don't you know
how white and thin she looked when they carried her by a little while
ago? See! she is running along by herself now as well as we are!"

The children could hardly credit their own sense of sight, when
neighbors they had known all their lives to be bed-ridden invalids came
back cured, singing and praising God.

It was a sight they never could forget. So they watched wonderingly till
darkness fell, and the last happy-hearted healed one had gone home to a
rejoicing household.

While the fathers on the roof were deciding they would have naught of
this man, the children in the grape-arbor were storing up in their
simple little hearts these proofs of his power and kindness.

Then they gathered around Joel on the doorstep, while he repeated the
story that the old shepherd Heber had told him, of the angels and the
star, and the baby they had worshipped that night in Bethlehem.

"Come, children," called his Aunt Leah, as she lit the lamp that was to
burn all night. "Come! It is bed-time!"

His cousin Hannah lingered a moment after the others had gone in, to
say, "That was a pretty story, Joel. Why don't you go and ask the good
man to straighten your back?"

Strange as it may seem, this was the first time the thought had occurred
to him that he might be benefited himself. He had been so long
accustomed to thinking of himself as hopelessly lame, that the wonderful
cures he had witnessed had awakened no hope for himself. A new life
seemed to open up before him at the little girl's question. He sat on
the doorstep thinking about it until his Uncle Laban came down and
crossly ordered him to go to bed.

He went in, saying softly to himself, "I will go to him to-morrow; yes,
early in the morning!"

Strange that an old proverb should cross his mind just then. "Boast not
thyself of to-morrow. Thou knowest not what a day may bring forth."




CHAPTER VI.


WHEN Joel went out on the streets next morning, although it was quite
early, he saw a disappointed crowd coming up from the direction of
Simon's house on the lake shore.

"Where have all these people been?" he asked of the baker's boy, whom he
ran against at the first corner.

The boy stopped whistling, and rested his basket of freshly baked bread
against his knee, as he answered:--

"They were looking for the Rabbi who healed so many people last night.
Say! do you know," he added quickly, as if the news were too good to
keep, "he healed my mother last night. You cannot think how different it
seems at home, to have her going about strong and well like she used to
be."

Joel's eyes brightened. "Do you think he'll do anything for me, if I go
to him now?" he asked wistfully. "Do you suppose he could straighten out
such a crooked back as mine? Look how much shorter this leg is than the
other. Oh, _do_ you think he could make them all right?"

The boy gave him a critical survey, and then answered, emphatically,
"Yes! It really does not look like it would be as hard to straighten you
as old Jeremy, the tailor's father. He was twisted all out of shape, you
know. Well, I'll declare! There he goes now!"

Joel looked across the street. The wrinkled face of the old
basket-weaver was a familiar sight in the market; but Joel could hardly
recognize the once crippled form, now restored to its original
shapeliness.

"I am going right now," he declared, starting to run in his excitement.
"I can't wait another minute."

"But he's gone!" the boy called after him. "That's why the people are
all coming back."

Joel sat down suddenly on a ledge projecting from the stone-wall.
"Gone!" he echoed drearily. It was as if he had been starving, and the
life-giving food held to his famished lips had been suddenly snatched
away. Both his heart and his feet felt like lead when he got up after
awhile, and dragged himself slowly along to the carpenter's house.

[Illustration: "'I PEEPED OUT 'TWEEN 'E WOSE--VINES'"]

It was such a bitter disappointment to be so near the touch of healing,
and then to miss it altogether.

No cheerful tap of the hammer greeted him. The idle tools lay on the
deserted workbench. "Disappointed again!" he thought. Then the doves
cooed, and he caught a glimpse of Ruth's fair hair down among the garden
lilies.

"Where is your father, little one?" he called.

"Gone away wiv 'e good man 'at makes everybody well," she answered. Then
she came skipping down the path to stand close beside him, and say
confidentially: "I saw Him--'e good man--going by to Simon's house. I
peeped out 'tween 'e wose-vines, and He looked wite into my eyes wiv His
eyes, and I couldn't help loving Him!"

Joel looked into the beautiful baby face, thinking what a picture it
must have made, as framed in roses it smiled out on the Tender-hearted
One, going on His mission of help and healing.

With her little hand in his, she led him back to hope, for she took him
to her mother, who comforted him with the assurance that Phineas
expected to be home soon, and doubtless his friend would be with him.

So there came another time to work by himself and dream of the hour
surely dawning. And the dreams were doubly sweet now; for side by side
with his hope of revenge, was the belief in his possible cure.

They heard only once from the absent ones. Word came back that a leper
had been healed. Joel heard it first, down at the custom-house. He had
gotten into the way of strolling down in that direction after his work
was done; for here the many trading-vessels from across the lake, or
those that shipped from Capernaum, had to stop and pay duty. Here, too,
the great road of Eastern commerce passed which led from Damascus to the
harbors of the West. So here he would find a constant stream of
travellers, bringing the latest news from the outside world.

The boy did not know, as he limped up and down the water's edge, longing
for some word from his absent friends, that near by was one who watched
almost as eagerly as himself.

It was Levi-Matthew, one of the officials, sitting in the seat of
custom. Sprung from the same priestly tribe as Joel, he had sunk so low,
in accepting the office of tax-gatherer, that the righteous Laban would
not have touched him so much as with the tip of his sandal.

"Bears and lions," said a proverb, "might be the fiercest wild beasts in
the forests; but publicans and informers were the worst in cities."

One could not bear witness in the courts, and the disgrace extended to
the whole family. They were even classed with robbers and murderers. No
doubt there was deep cause for such a feeling; as a class they were
unscrupulous and unjust. There might have been good ones among their
number, but the company they kept condemned them to the scorn of high
and low.

When a Jew hates, or a Jew scorns, be sure it is thoroughly done; there
is no half-way course for his intense nature to take.

So this son of Levi, sitting in the seat of custom, and this son of Levi
strolling past him, were, socially, as far apart as the east is from the
west,--as unlike as thorn and blossom on the same tribal stem.

Matthew knew all the fishermen and ship-owners that thronged the busy
beach in front of him. The sons of Jonah and of Zebedee passed him
daily; and he must have wondered when he saw them throw down their nets
and leave everything to follow a stranger.

He must have wondered also at the reports on every tongue, and the
sights he had seen himself of miraculous healing. But while strangely
drawn towards this new teacher from Nazareth, it could have been with no
thought that the hand and the voice were for him. He was a publican, and
how could they reach to such depths?

A caravan had just stopped. The pack-animals were being unloaded, bales
and packages opened, private letters pried into. The insolent officials
were tossing things right and left, as they made a list of the taxable
goods.

Joel was watching them with as much interest as if he had not witnessed
such scenes dozens of times before, till he noticed a group gathering
around one of the drivers. He was telling what he had seen on his way to
Capernaum. Several noisy companions kept interrupting him to bear
witness to the truth of his statements.

"And he who but a moment before had been the most miserable of lepers
stood up before us all, cleansed of his leprosy. His skin was soft and
fair as a child's, and his features were restored to him," said the
driver.

Joel and Levi-Matthew stood side by side. At another time the boy might
have drawn his clothes away to keep from brushing against the despised
tax-gatherer. But he never noticed now that their elbows touched.

When he had heard all there was to be told, he limped away to carry the
news to Abigail. To know that others were being cured daily made him all
the more impatient for the return of this friend of Phineas.

The publican turned again to his pen and his account-book. He, too,
looked forward with a burning heart to the return of the Nazarene,
unknowing why he did so.

At last Joel heard of the return, in a very unexpected way. There were
guests in the house of Laban again. One of the rabbis who had been there
before, and a scribe from Jerusalem. Now there were longer conferences
in the upper chamber, and graver shakings of the head, over this false
prophet whose fame was spreading wider.

The miracle of healing the paralytic at the pool of Bethesda, when he
had gone down to Jerusalem to one of the many feasts, had stirred Judea
to its farthest borders. So these two men had been sent to investigate.

On the very afternoon of their arrival, a report flew through the
streets that the Rabbi Jesus was once more in the town. Their host led
them with all the haste their dignity would allow, to the house where He
was said to be preaching. The common people fell back when they saw
them, and allowed them to pass into the centre of the throng.

The Rabbi stood in the doorway, so that both those in the house and
without could distinctly hear Him. The scribe had never seen Him before,
and in spite of his deep-seated prejudice could not help admiring the
man whom he had come prepared to despise. It was no wild fanatic who
stood before him, no noisy debater whose fiery eloquence would be likely
to excite and inflame His hearers.

He saw a man of gentlest dignity; truth looked out from the depths of
His calm eyes. Every word, every gesture, carried with it the conviction
that He who spoke taught with God-given authority.

The scribe began to grow uneasy as he listened, carried along by the
earnest tones of the speaker.

There was a great commotion on the edge of the crowd, as some one tried
to push through to the centre.

"Stand back! Go away!" demanded angry voices.

The scribe was a tall man, and by stretching a little, managed to see
over the heads of the others. Four men, bearing a helpless paralytic,
were trying to carry him through the throngs; but they would not make
room for this interruption.

After vainly hunting for some opening through which they might press,
the men mounted the steep, narrow staircase on the outside of the
building, and drew the man up, hammock and all, to the flat roof on
which they stood.

There was a sound of scraping and scratching as they broke away the
brush and mortar that formed the frail covering of the roof. Then the
people in the room below saw slowly coming down upon them between the
rafters, this man whom no obstacle could keep back from the Great
Physician.

But the paralyzed hands could not lift themselves in supplication; the
helpless tongue could frame no word of pleading,--only the eyes of the
sick man could look up into the pitying face bent over him, and implore
a blessing.

The scribe leaned forward, confidently expecting to hear the man bidden
to arise. To his surprise and horror, the words he heard were: "Son, thy
_sins_ be forgiven thee!"

He looked at Laban and his companion, and the three exchanged meaning
glances. When they looked again at the speaker, His eyes seemed to read
their inmost thoughts.

"Wherefore think ye evil in your hearts?" He asked, with startling
distinctness. "Whether is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy, Thy
sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and take up thy bed, and walk?
But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive
sins," here He turned to the helpless form lying at His feet, "I say
unto thee, Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy way unto thine house."

The man bounded to his feet, and picking up the heavy rug on which he
had been lying, went running and leaping out of their midst.

Without a word, Laban and his two guests drew their clothes carefully
around them, and picked their way through the crowd. Phineas, who stood
at the gate, gave them a respectful greeting. Laban only turned his eyes
away with a scowl, and passed coldly on.

"The man is a liar and a blasphemer!" exclaimed the scribe, as they sat
once more in the privacy of Laban's garden.

"Only God can forgive sins!" added his companion. "This paralytic should
have taken a sin-offering to the priest. For only by the blood of
sacrifice can one hope to obtain pardon."

"Still He healed him," spoke up the scribe, musingly.

"Only through the power of Satan!" interrupted Laban. "When He says He
can forgive sins, He blasphemes."

The other Pharisee leaned forward to say, in an impressive whisper:
"Then you know the Law on that point. He should be stoned to death, His
body hung on a tree, and then buried with shame!"

It was not long after that Joel, just back from a trip to Tiberias in a
little sailing-boat, came into the garden. He had been away since early
morning, so had heard nothing of what had just occurred; he had had good
luck in disposing of his wares, and was feeling unusually cheerful.
Hearing voices in the corner of the garden, he was about to pass out
again, when his uncle called him sternly to come to him at once.

Surprised at the command, he obeyed, and was questioned and
cross-questioned by all three. It was very little he could tell them
about his friend's plans; but he acknowledged proudly that Phineas had
always known this famous man from Nazareth, even in childhood, and was
one of his most devoted followers.

"This man Phineas is a traitor to the faith!" roared Laban. "He is a
dangerous man, and in league with these fellows to do great evil to our
nation."

The scribe and the rabbi nodded approvingly.

"Hear me, now!" he cried, sternly. "Never again are you to set foot over
his threshold, or have any communication whatsoever with him or his
associates. I make no idle threat; if you disobey me in this, you will
have cause to wish you had never been born. You may leave us now!"

Too surprised and frightened to say a word, the child slipped away. To
give up his daily visit to the carpenter's house, was to give up all
that made his life tolerable; while to be denied even speaking to his
associates, meant to abandon all hope of cure.

But he dared not rebel; obedience to those in authority was too
thoroughly taught in those days to be lightly disregarded. But his uncle
seemed to fear that his harsh command would be eluded in some way, and
kept such a strict watch over him, that he rarely got beyond the borders
of the garden by himself.

One day he was all alone in the grape-arbor, looking out into the
streets that he longed to be in, since their freedom had been denied
him.

A little girl passed, carrying one child in her arms, and talking to
another who clung to her skirts. It was Jerusha.

Joel threw a green grape at her to attract her attention, and then
beckoned her mysteriously to come nearer. She set the baby on the
ground, and gave him her bracelet to play with, while she listened to a
whispered account of his wrongs through the latticed arbor.

"It's a shame!" she declared indignantly. "I'll go right down to the
carpenter's house and tell them why you cannot go there any more. And
I'll keep watch on all that happens, and let you know. I go past here
every day, and if I have any news, I'll toss a pebble over the wall and
cluck like a hen. Then if nobody is watching, you can come to this hole
in the arbor again."

The next day, as Joel was going in great haste to the baker's, whither
his aunt had sent him, he heard some one behind him calling him to wait.
In another moment Jerusha was in speaking distance, nearly bent double
with the weight of her little brother, whom she was carrying as usual.

"There!" she said, with a puff of relief, as she put him on his own
feet. "Wait till I get my breath! It's no easy thing to carry such a
load and run at the same time! How did you get out?"

"There was an errand to be done, and no one else to do it," answered
Joel, "so Aunt sent me."

"Oh, I've got such news for you!" she exclaimed. "Guess what has
happened! Your Rabbi Jesus has asked Levi-Matthew to be one of His
followers, and go around with Him wherever He goes. Think of it! One of
those horrid tax-gatherers! He settled his accounts and gave up his
position in the custom-house yesterday. And he is getting ready for a
great feast. I heard the butcher and the wine-dealer both telling about
the big orders he had given them.

"All the publicans and low common people that are his friends are
invited. Yes, and so is your friend the carpenter. Think of that, now!
He is going to sit down and eat with such people! Of course respectable
folks will never have anything more to do with him after that! I guess
your uncle was right about him, after all!"

Both the little girl's face and manner expressed intense disgust.

Joel was shocked. "Oh, are you sure?" he cried. "You certainly must be
mistaken! It cannot be so!"

"I guess I know what I see with my own eyes, and hear with my own ears!"
she retorted, angrily. "My father says they are a bad lot. People that
go with publicans are just as unclean themselves. If you know so much
more than everybody else, I'll not trouble myself to run after you with
any more news. Mistaken, indeed!"

With her head held high, and her nose scornfully turned up, she jerked
her little brother past him, and went quickly around the corner of the
street.

The indignation of some of the rabbis knew no bounds. "It has turned out
just as I predicted," said the scribe to Laban, at supper. "They are
nothing but a set of gluttons and wine-bibbers!"

There was nothing else talked of during the entire meal. How Joel's
blood boiled as he listened to their conversation! The food seemed to
choke him. As they applied one coarse epithet after another to his
friend Phineas, all the kindness and care this man had ever given him
seemed to rise up before him. But when they turned on the Nazarene, all
the stories Joel had heard in the carpenter's house of His gentle
sinless childhood, all the tokens he had seen himself of His pure
unselfish manhood, seemed to cry out against such gross injustice.

It was no light thing for a child to contradict the doctors of the Law,
and, in a case of this kind, little less than a crime to take the stand
Joel did.

But the memory of two faces gave him courage: that of Phineas as it had
looked on him through all those busy happy hours in the carpenter's
home; the other face he had seen but once, that day of healing in the
synagogue,--who, having once looked into the purity of those eyes, the
infinite tenderness of that face, could sit calmly by and raise no voice
against the calumny of his enemies?

The little cripple was white to the lips, and he trembled from head to
foot as he stood up to speak.

The scribe lifted up both hands, and turned to Laban with a meaning
shrug of the shoulders. "To think of finding such heresy in your own
household!" he exclaimed. "Among your own children!"

"He is no child of mine!" retorted Laban. "Nor shall he stay among
them!" Then he turned to Joel.

"Boy, take back every word you have just uttered! Swear you will
renounce this man,--this son of perdition,--and never have aught to say
well of Him again!"

Joel looked around the table, at each face that shone out pale and
excited in the yellow lamplight. His eyes were dilated with fear; his
heart thumped so in the awful pause that followed, that he thought
everybody else must hear it.

"I cannot!" he said hoarsely. "Oh, I cannot!"

"Then take yourself out of my sight forever. The doors of this house
shall never open for you again!"

There was a storm of abuse from the angry man at this open defiance of
his authority. With these two cold, stern men to nod approval at his
zealousness, he went to greater lengths than he might otherwise have
done.

With one more frightened glance around the table, the child hurried out
of the room. The door into the street creaked after him, and Joel limped
out into the night, with his uncle's curse ringing in his ears.




CHAPTER VII.


PHINEAS, going along the beach that night, in the early moonlight,
towards his home, saw a little figure crouched in the shadow of a low
building beside the wharf. It was shaking with violent sobs. He went up
to the child, and took its hands down from its wet face, with a
comforting expression of pity. Then he started back in surprise. It was
Joel!

"Why, my child! My poor child!" he exclaimed, putting his arm around the
trembling, misshapen form. "What is the meaning of all this?"

"Uncle Laban has driven me away from home!" sobbed the boy. "He was
angry because you and Rabbi Jesus were invited to Levi-Matthew's feast.
He says I have denied the faith, and am worse than an infidel. He says I
am fit only to be cast out with the dogs and publicans!--and--and--" he
ended with a wail. "Oh, he sent me away with his curse!"

Phineas drew him closer, and stroked the head on his shoulder in pitying
silence.

"Fatherless and motherless and lame!" the boy sobbed bitterly. "And now,
a homeless outcast, blighted by a curse, I have been sitting here with
my feet in the dark water, thinking how easy it would be to slip down
into it and forget; but, Rabbi Phineas, that face will not let me,--that
face of your friend,--I keep seeing it all the time!"

Phineas gathered the boy so close in his arms that Joel could feel his
strong, even heart-beats.

"My child," he said solemnly, "call me no more, Rabbi! Henceforth, it is
to be _father_ Phineas. You shall be to me as my own son!"

"But the curse!" sobbed Joel. "The curse that is set upon me! It will
blight you too!"

"Nay," was the quiet answer; "for it is written, 'As the bird by
wandering, as the swallow by flying, _so the curse, causeless, shall not
come_.'"

But the boy still shook as with a chill. His face and hands were burning
hot.

"Come!" said Phineas. He picked him up in his strong arms, and carried
him down the beach to Abigail's motherly care and comforting.

"He will be a long time getting over the shock of this," she said to
her husband, when he was at last soothed to sleep.

"Ah, loyal little heart!" he answered, "he has suffered much for the
sake of his friendship with us!"

Poor little storm-tossed bark! In the days that followed he had reason
to bless the boisterous winds, that blew him to such a safe and happy
harbor!

       *       *       *       *       *

Over on the horns of Mount Hattin, the spring morning began to shine.
The light crept slowly down the side of the old mountain, till it fell
on a little group of men talking earnestly together. It was the Preacher
of Galilee, who had just chosen twelve men from among those who followed
Him to help Him in His ministry.

They gathered around Him in the fresh mountain dawn, as He pictured the
life in store for them. Strange they did not quail before it, and turn
back disheartened. Nay, not strange! For in the weeks they had been with
Him, they had learned to love Him so, that His "follow me," that drew
them from the toll-gate and fishing-boat, was stronger than ties of home
and kindred.

Just about this time, Phineas and Joel were starting out from Capernaum
to the mountain. Hundreds of people were already on the way; people who
had come from all parts of Judea, and beyond the Jordan. Clouds of dust
rose above the highway as the travellers trudged along.

Joel was obliged to walk slowly, so that by the time they reached the
plain below, a great multitude had gathered.

"Let's get close," he whispered. He had heard that those who barely
touched the garments of the strange Rabbi were made whole, and it was
with the hope that he might steal up and touch Him unobserved that he
had begged Phineas to take him on such a long, painful walk.

"There is too great a crowd, now," answered Phineas. "Let us rest here
awhile, and listen. Let me lift you up on this big rock, so that you can
see. 'Sh! He is speaking!"

Joel looked up, and, for the second time in his life, listened to words
that thrilled him like a trumpet call,--words that through eighteen
hundred years have not ceased to vibrate; with what mighty power they
must have fallen when, for the first time, they broke the morning
stillness of those mountain wilds!

Joel forgot the press of people about him, forgot even where he was, as
sentence after sentence seemed to lift him out of himself, till he
could catch glimpses of lofty living such as he had never even dreamed
of before.

Round by round, he seemed to be carried up some high ladder of thought
by that voice, away from all that was common and low and earthly, to a
summit of infinite love and light.

Still the voice led on, "Ye have heard that it hath been said, 'An eye
for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.'"

Joel started so violently at hearing his own familiar motto, that he
nearly lost his balance on the rock.

"But I say unto you that you resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite
thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.... Ye have heard
that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thine
enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you,
do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use
you, and persecute you."

Poor little Joel, it was a hard doctrine for him to accept! How could he
give up his hope of revenge, when it had grown with his growth till it
had come to be as dear as life itself?

He heard little of the rest of the sermon, for through it all the words
kept echoing, "Bless them that curse you! Do good to them that hate
you! Pray for them which despitefully use you!"

"Oh, I can't! I can't!" he groaned inwardly.

"I have found a chance for you to ride home," said Phineas, when the
sermon was over, and the people began to file down the narrow mountain
paths. "But there will be time for you to go to Him first, for healing.
You have only to ask, you know."

Joel took an eager step forward, and then shrank back guiltily. "Not
now," he murmured, "some other time." He could not look into those clear
eyes and ask a blessing, when he knew his heart was black with hate.

After all his weeks of waiting the opportunity had come; but he dared
not let the Sinless One look into his soul.

Phineas began an exclamation of surprise, but was interrupted by some
one asking him a question. Joel took advantage of this to climb up
behind the man who had offered him a ride. All the way home he weighed
the two desires in his mind,--the hope of healing, and the hope of
revenge.

By the time the two guardian fig-trees were in sight, he had decided. He
would rather go helpless and halting through life than give up his
cherished purpose.

But there was no sleep for him that night, after he had gone up to his
little chamber on the roof. He seemed to see that pleading face on the
mountain-side; it came to him again and again, with the words, "Bless
them that curse you! Pray for them that despitefully use you!"

All night he fought against yielding to it. Time and again he turned
over on his bed, and closed his eyes; but it would not let him alone.

He thought of Jacob wrestling with the angel till day-break, and knew in
his heart that the sweet spirit of forgiveness striving with his selfish
nature was some heavenly impulse from another world.

At last when the cock-crowing commenced at dawn, and the stars were
beginning to fade, he drew up his crooked little body, and knelt with
his face to the kindling east.

"Father in heaven," he prayed softly, "bless mine enemy Rehum, and
forgive all my sins,--fully and freely as I now forgive the wrong he has
done to me."

A feeling of light-heartedness and peace, such as he had never known
before, stole over him. He could not settle himself to sleep, though
worn out with his night's long vigil.

[Illustration: "NOT A WORD WAS SAID"]

Hastily slipping on his clothes, he tiptoed down the stairs, and limped,
bare-headed, down to the beach. The lake shimmered and glowed under the
faint rose and gray of the sky like a deep opal. The early breeze blew
the hair back from his pale face with a refreshing coolness.

It seemed to him the world had never looked one half so beautiful
before, as he stood there.

A firm tread on the gravel made him turn partly around. A man was coming
up the beach; it was the friend of Phineas. As if drawn by some
uncontrollable impulse, Joel started to meet Him, an unspoken prayer in
his pleading little face.

Not a word was said. For one little instant Joel stood there by the
shining sea, his hand held close in the loving hand of the world's
Redeemer. For one little instant he looked up into His face; then the
man passed on.

Joel covered his face with his hands, seeming to hear the still small
voice that spoke to the prophet out of the whirlwind.

"He is the Christ!" he whispered reverently,--"He is the Christ!"

In his exalted feeling all thought of a cure had left him; but as he
walked on down the beach, he noticed that he no longer limped. He was
moving along with strong, quick strides. He shook himself and threw
back his shoulders; there was no pain in the movement. He passed his
hands over his back and down his limbs.

Oh, he was straight and strong and sinewy! He seemed a stranger to
himself, as running and leaping, then stopping to look down and feel his
limbs again, he ran madly on.

Suddenly he cast his garments aside and dived into the lake. Before his
injury, he had been able to swim like a fish, now he reached out with
long powerful strokes that sent him darting through the cold water with
a wonderful sense of exhilaration.

Then he dressed again, and went on running and leaping and climbing till
he was exhausted, and his first wild delirious joy began to subside into
a deep quiet thankfulness. Then he went home, radiant in the happiness
of his new-found cure.

But more than the mystery of the miracle, more than the joy of the
healing, was the remembrance of that moment, that one little moment,
when he felt the clasp of the Master's hand, and seemed wrapped about
with the boundless love of God.

From that moment, he lived but to serve and to follow Him.




CHAPTER VIII.


HIGH up among the black lava crags of Perea stood the dismal fortress of
Macherus. Behind its close prison bars a restless captive groped his way
back and forth in a dungeon cell. Sometimes, at long intervals, he was
given such liberty as a chained eagle might have, when he was led up
into one of the towers of the gloomy keep, and allowed to look down,
down into the bottomless gorges surrounding it. For months he had chafed
in the darkness of his underground dungeon; escape was impossible.

It was John Baptist, brought from the wild, free life of the desert to
the tortures of the "Black Castle." Here he lay at the mercy of Herod
Antipas, and death might strike at any moment. More than once, the
whimsical monarch had sent for him, as he sat at his banquets, to be the
sport of the passing hour.

The lights, the color, the flash of gems may have dazzled his eyes for a
brief space, accustomed as they were to the midnight darkness of his
cell; but his keen vision saw, under the paint and purple of royal
apparel, the corrupt life of king and court.

Pointing his stern, accusing finger at the uneasy king, he cried, "It is
not lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife!" With words that stung
like hurtling arrows, he laid bare the blackened, beastly life that
sought to hide its foulness under royal ermine.

Antipas cowered before him; and while he would gladly have been freed
from a man who had such power over him, he dared not lift a finger
against the fearless, unflinching Baptist.

But the guilty Herodias bided her time, with blood-thirsty impatience;
his life should pay the penalty of his bold speech.

Meanwhile he waited in his cell, with nothing but memories to relieve
the tediousness of the long hours. Over and over again he lived those
scenes of his strange life in the desert,--those days of his
preparation,--the preaching to the multitudes, the baptizing at the ford
of the Jordan.

He wondered if his words still lived; if any of his followers still
believed on him. But more than all, he wondered what had become of that
One on whom he had seen the spirit of God descending out of heaven in
the form of a dove.

"Where art Thou now?" he cried. "If Thou art the Messiah, why dost Thou
not set up Thy kingdom, and speedily give Thy servant his liberty?" The
empty room rang often with that cry; but the hollow echo of his own
words was the only answer.

One day the door of his cell creaked back far enough to admit two men,
and then shut again, leaving them in total darkness. In that momentary
flash of light, he recognized two old followers of his, Timeus bar Joram
and Benjamin the potter.

With a cry of joy he groped his way toward them, and clung to their
friendly hands.

"How did you manage to penetrate these Roman-guarded walls?" he asked,
in astonishment.

"I knew the warden," answered Benjamin. "A piece of silver conveniently
closes his eyes to many things. But we must hasten! Our time is
limited."

They had much to tell of the outside world. Pilate had just given
special offence, by appropriating part of the treasure of the Temple,
derived from the Temple tax, to defray the cost of great conduits he had
begun, with which to supply Jerusalem with water.

Stirred up by the priests and rabbis, the people besieged the government
house, crying loudly that the works be given up. Armed with clubs,
numbers of soldiers in plain clothes surrounded the great mob, and
killed so many of the people that the wildest excitement prevailed
throughout all Judea and Galilee.

There was a cry for a national uprising to avenge the murder.

"They only need a leader!" exclaimed John. "Where is He for whom I was
but a voice crying in the wilderness? Why does He not show Himself?"

"We have just come from the village of Nain," said Timeus bar Joram. "We
saw Him stop a funeral procession and raise a widow's son to life. He
was followed by a motley throng whom He had healed of all sorts of
diseases; and there were twelve men whom He had chosen as life-long
companions.

"We questioned some of them closely, and they gave us marvellous reports
of the things He had done."

"Is it not strange," asked Benjamin the potter, "that having such power
He still delays to establish His kingdom?"

The captive prophet made no answer for awhile. Then he groped in the
thick darkness till his hand rested heavily on Benjamin's arm.

"Go back, and say that John Baptist asks, 'Art Thou the Coming One, or
must we look for another?'"

Days passed before the devoted friends found themselves once more inside
the prison walls. They had had a weary journey over rough hills and
rocky by-paths.

"What did He say?" demanded the prisoner, eagerly.

"Go and tell John what ye saw and heard: that the blind receive sight;
the lame walk; the lepers are cleansed; the deaf hear; the dead are
raised; and the poor have the gospel preached unto them."

The man stood up, his long hair hanging to his shoulder, his hand
uplifted, and his eyes dilated like a startled deer that has caught the
sound of a coming step.

"The fulfilment of the words of Isaiah!" he cried. "For he hath said,
'Your God will come and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be
opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame
man leap as a hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing!' Yea, he _hath_
bound up the broken-hearted; and he shall yet 'proclaim liberty to the
captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound, to
proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord!'"

Then with both hands clasped high above his head, he made the prison
ring with the cry, "The kingdom is at hand! The kingdom is at hand! I
shall soon be free!"

Not long after that, the castle blazed with the lights of another
banquet. The faint aroma of wines, mingled with the heavy odor of
countless flowers, could not penetrate the grim prison walls. Nor could
the gay snatches of song and the revelry of the feast. No sound of
applause reached the prisoner's ear, when the daughter of Herodias
danced before the king.

Sitting in darkness while the birthday banqueters held high carnival, he
heard the heavy tramp of soldiers' feet coming down the stairs to his
dungeon. The great bolts shot back, the rusty hinges turned, and a
lantern flickered its light in his face, as he stood up to receive his
executioners.

A little while later his severed head was taken on a charger to the
smiling dancing girl. She stifled a shriek when she saw it; but the
wicked Herodias looked at it with a gleam of triumph in her treacherous
black eyes.

When the lights were out, and the feasters gone, two men came in at the
warden's bidding,--two men with heavy hearts, and voices that shook a
little when they spoke to each other. They were Timeus and Benjamin.
Silently they lifted the body of their beloved master, and carried it
away for burial; and if a tear or two found an unaccustomed path down
their bearded cheeks, no one knew it, under cover of the darkness.

So, out of the Black Castle of Macherus, out of the prison-house of a
mortal body, the white-souled prophet of the wilderness went forth at
last into liberty.

For him, the kingdom was indeed at hand.

       *       *       *       *       *

Meanwhile in the upper country, Phineas was following his friend from
village to village. He had dropped his old familiar form of address, so
much was he impressed by the mysterious power he saw constantly
displayed.

Now when he spoke of the man who had been both friend and playfellow,
it was almost reverently that he gave Him the title of Master.

It was with a heavy heart that Joel watched them go away. He, too,
longed to follow; but he knew that unless he took the place at the
bench, Phineas could not be free to go.

Gratitude held him to his post. No, not gratitude alone; he was learning
the Master's own spirit of loving self-sacrifice. As he dropped the
plumb-line over his work, he measured himself by that perfect life, and
tried to straighten himself to its unbending standard.

He had his reward in the look of pleasure that he saw on the carpenter's
face when Phineas came in, unexpectedly, one day, dusty and
travel-stained.

"How much you have accomplished!" he said in surprise. "You have filled
my place like a grown man."

Joel stretched his strong arms with a slight laugh. "It is a pleasure to
work now," he said. "It seems so queer never to have a pain, or that
worn-out feeling of weakness that used to be always with me. At first I
was often afraid it was all a happy dream, and could not last. I am
getting used to it now. Where is the Master?" Joel asked, as Phineas
turned towards the house.

"He is the guest of Simon. He will be here some days, my son. I know you
wish to be with Him as much as possible, so I shall not expect your help
as long as He stays."

"If I could only do something for Him!" was Joel's constant thought
during the next few days. Once he took a coin from the little money bag
that held his hoarded savings--a coin that was to have helped buy his
revenge--and bought the ripest, juiciest pear he could find in the
market. Often he brought Him water, fresh and cold from the well when He
looked tired and warm from His unceasing work.

Wherever the Master turned, there, close beside Him, was a beaming
little face, so full of love and childish sympathy that it must have
brought more refreshment to His thirsty soul than either the choice
fruit or the cooling water.

One evening after a busy day, when He had talked for hours to the people
on the seashore who had gathered around the boat in which He sat, He
sent away the multitude.

"Let us pass over unto the other side," He said.

Joel slipped up to Andrew, who was busily arranging their sails. "Let me
go, too!" he whispered pleadingly.

"Well," assented the man, carelessly, "You can make yourself useful, I
suppose. Will you hand me that rope?"

Joel sprang to obey. Presently the boat pushed away from the shore, and
the town, with its tumult and its twinkling lights, was soon left far
behind.

The sea was like glass, so calm and unruffled that every star above
could look down and see its unbroken reflection in the dark water below.

Joel, in the hinder part of the ship, lay back in his seat with a sigh
of perfect enjoyment. The smooth gliding motion of the boat rested him;
the soft splash of the water soothed his excited brain. He had seen his
Uncle Laban that afternoon among other of the scribes and Pharisees, and
heard him declare that Beelzebub alone was responsible for the wonders
they witnessed.

Joel's indignation flared up again at the memory. He looked down at the
Master, who had fallen asleep on a pillow, and wondered how anybody
could possibly believe such evil things about Him.

It was cooler out where they were now. He wondered if he ought not to
lay some covering over the sleeping form. He took off the outer mantle
that he wore, and bent forward to lay it over the Master's feet. But he
drew back timidly, afraid of wakening Him. "I'll wait awhile," he said
to himself, folding the garment across his knees in readiness.

Several times he reached forward to lay it over Him, and each time drew
back. Then he fell asleep himself.

From its situation in the basin of the hills, the Galilee is subject to
sudden and furious storms. The winds, rushing down the heights, meet and
clash above the water, till the waves run up like walls, then sink again
into seething whirlpools of danger.

Joel, falling asleep in a dead calm, awoke to find the ship rolling and
tossing and half-full of water. The lightning's track was followed so
closely by the crash of thunder, there was not even pause enough between
to take one terrified gasp.

Still the Master slept. Joel, drenched to the skin, clung to the boat's
side, expecting that every minute would be his last. It was so dark and
wild and awful! How helpless they were, buffetted about in the fury of
the storm!

As wave after wave beat in, some of the men could no longer control
their fear.

"Master!" they called to the sleeping man, as they bent over Him in
terror. "Carest Thou not that we perish?"

He heard the cry for help. The storm could not waken Him from His deep
sleep of exhaustion, but at the first despairing human voice, He was up,
ready to help.

Looking up at the midnight blackness of the sky, and down at the wild
waste of waters, He stretched out His hand.

"_Peace!_" he commanded in a deep voice. "_Be still!_" The storm sank to
earth as suddenly as a death-stricken raven; a great calm spread over
the face of the waters. The silent stars shone out in their places; the
silent sea mirrored back their glory at His feet.

The men huddled fearfully together. "What manner of man is this?" they
asked, one of another. "Even the wind and the sea obey Him!"

Joel, looking up at the majestic form, standing so quietly by the
railing, thought of the voice that once rang out over the night of
Creation with the command, "Let there be light!" At its mere bidding
light had flowed in across the darkness of primeval night.

Just so had this voice thrilled the storm with its "Peace! Be still!"
into utter calm.

The child crouched at His feet, burying his face in his mantle, and
whispering, in awe and adoration, "He _is_ the Christ! He is the son of
God!"




CHAPTER IX.


AFTER that night of the voyage to the Gadarenes, Joel ceased to be
surprised at the miracles he daily witnessed. Even when the little
daughter of Jairus, the ruler of the synagogue, was called back to life,
it did not seem so wonderful to him as the stilling of the tempest.

Many a night after Phineas had gone away again with the Master to other
cities, Joel used to go down to the beach, and stand looking across the
water as he recalled that scene.

The lake had always been an interesting place to him at night. He liked
to watch the fishermen as they flashed their blazing torches this way
and that. A sympathetic thrill ran through him as they sighted their
prey, and raised their bare sinewy arms to fling the net or fly the
spear.

But after that morning of healing, and that night of tempest, it seemed
to be a sacred place, to be visited only on still nights, when the town
slept, and heaven bent nearer in the starlight to the quiet earth.

The time of the Passover was drawing near,--the time that Joel had been
looking forward to since Phineas had promised him a year ago that he
should go to Jerusalem.

The twelve disciples who had been sent out to all the little towns
through Galilee, to teach the things they had themselves been taught,
and work miracles in the name of Him who had sent them, began to come
slowly back. They had an encouraging report to bring of their work; but
it was shadowed by the news they had heard of the murder of John
Baptist.

Joel joined them as soon as they came into Capernaum, and walked beside
Phineas as the footsore travellers pressed on a little farther towards
Simon's house.

"When are we going to start for Jerusalem?" was his first eager
question.

Phineas looked searchingly into his face as he replied, "Would you be
greatly disappointed, my son, not to go this year?"

Joel looked perplexed; it was such an unheard of thing for Phineas to
miss going up to the Feast of the Passover.

"These are evil times, my Joel," he explained. "John Baptist has just
been beheaded. The Master has many enemies among those in high places.
It would be like walking into a lion's den for Him to go up to
Jerusalem.

"Even here He is not safe from the hatred of Antipas, and after a little
rest will pass over into the borders of the tetrarch Philip. We have no
wish to leave Him!"

"Oh, why should He be persecuted so?" asked Joel, looking with
tear-dimmed eyes at the man walking in advance of them, and talking in
low earnest tones to John, who walked beside Him.

"You have been with Him so much, father Phineas. Have _you_ ever known
Him to do anything to make these men His enemies?"

"Yes," said Phineas. "He has drawn the people after Him until they are
jealous of His popularity. He upsets their old traditions, and teaches a
religion that ignores some of the Laws of Moses. I can easily see why
they hate Him so. They see Him at such a long distance from themselves,
they can not understand Him. Healing on the Sabbath, eating with
publicans and sinners, disregarding the little customs and ceremonies
that in all ages have set apart our people as a chosen race, are crimes
in their eyes.

"If they only could get close enough to understand Him; to see that His
pure life needs no ceremonies of multiplied hand-washings; that it is
His broad love for His fellow-men that makes Him stoop to the lowest
classes,--I am sure they could not do otherwise than love Him.

"Blind fanatics! They would put to death the best man that ever lived,
because He is so much broader and higher than they that the little
measuring line of their narrow creed cannot compass Him!"

"Is He never going to set up His kingdom?" asked Joel. "Does He never
talk about it?"

"Yes," said Phineas; "though we are often puzzled by what He says, and
ask ourselves His meaning."

They had reached the house by this time, and as Simon led the way to its
hospitable door, Phineas said, "Enter with them, my lad, if you wish. I
must go on to my little family, but will join you soon."

To Joel's great pleasure, he found they were to cross the lake at once,
to the little fishing port of Bethsaida. It was only six miles across.

"We have hardly had time to eat," said Andrew to Joel, as they walked
along towards the boat "I will be glad to get away to some desert
place, where we may have rest from the people that are always pushing
and clamoring about us."

"How long before you start?" asked Joel.

"In a very few minutes," answered Andrew; "for the boat is in
readiness."

Joel glanced from the street above the beach to the water's edge, as if
calculating the distance.

"Don't go without me," he said as, breaking into a run, he dashed up the
beach at his utmost speed. He was back again in a surprisingly quick
time, with a cheap little basket in his hand; he was out of breath with
his rapid run.

"Didn't I go fast?" he panted. "I could not have done that a few weeks
ago. Oh, it feels so good to be able to run when I please! It is like
flying."

He lifted the cover of the basket. "See!" he said. "I thought the Master
might be hungry; but I had no time to get anything better. I had to stop
at the first stall I came to."

At the same time the boat went gliding out into the water with its
restful motion, thousands of people were pouring out of the villages on
foot, and hurrying on around the lake, ahead of them.

The boat passed up a narrow winding creek, away from the sail-dotted
lake; its green banks seemed to promise the longed-for quiet and rest.
But there in front of them waited the crowds they had come so far to
avoid.

They had brought their sick for healing. They needed to be helped and
taught; they were "as sheep without a shepherd!" He could not refuse
them.

Joel found no chance to offer the food he had bought so hastily with
another of his hoarded coins,--the coins that were to have purchased his
revenge.

As the day wore on, he heard the disciples ask that the multitudes might
be sent away.

"It would take two hundred pennyworth of bread to feed them," said
Philip, "and even that would not be enough."

Andrew glanced over the great crowds and stroked his beard thoughtfully.
"There is a lad here which hath five barley loaves and two small fishes,
but what are they among so many?"

Joel hurried forward and held out his basket with its little
store,--five flat round loaves of bread, not much more than one hungry
man could eat, and two dried fishes.

He hardly knew what to expect as the people were made to sit down on the
grass in orderly ranks of fifties.

His eyes grew round with astonishment as the Master took the bread, gave
thanks, and then passed it to the disciples, who, in turn, distributed
it among the people. Then the two little fishes were handed around in
the same way.

Joel turned to Phineas, who had joined them some time ago. "Do you see
that?" he asked excitedly. "They have been multiplied a thousand fold!"

Phineas smiled. "We drop one tiny grain of wheat into the earth," he
said, "and when it grows and spreads and bears dozens of other grains on
its single stalk, we are not astonished. When the Master but does in an
instant, what Nature takes months to do, we cry, 'a miracle!' 'Men are
more wont to be astonished at the sun's eclipse, than at its daily
rising,'" he quoted, remembering his conversation with the old
traveller, on his way to Nathan ben Obed's.

A feeling of exaltation seized the people as they ate the mysterious
bread; it seemed that the days of miraculous manna had come again. By
the time they had all satisfied their hunger, and twelve basketfuls of
the fragments had been gathered up, they were ready to make Him their
king. The restlessness of the times had taken possession of them; the
burning excitement must find vent in some way, and with one accord they
demanded Him as their leader.

Joel wondered why He should refuse. Surely no other man he had ever
known could have resisted such an appeal.

The perplexed fisherman, at Jesus's command, turned their boat homeward
without Him. To their simple minds it seemed that He had made a mistake
in resisting the homage forced upon Him by the people; they longed for
the time to come when they should be recognized as the honored officials
in the new kingdom. Many a dream of future power and magnificence must
have come to them in the still watches of the night, as they drifted
home in the white light of the Passover moon.

Many a time in the weeks that followed, Joel slipped away to his
favorite spot on the beech, a flat rock half hidden by a clump of
oleander bushes. Here, with his feet idly dangling in the ripples, he
looked out over the water, and recalled the scenes he had witnessed
there.

It seemed so marvellous to him that the Master could have ever walked
on those shining waves; and yet he had seen Him that night after the
feeding of the multitudes. He had seen, with his own frightened eyes,
the Master walk calmly towards the boat across the unsteady water, and
catch up the sinking Peter, who had jumped overboard to meet Him. It
grieved and fretted the boy that this man, of God-given power and such
sweet unselfish spirit, could be so persistently misunderstood by the
people. He could think of nothing else.

He had not been with the crowds that pressed into the synagogue the
Sabbath after the thousands had been fed; but Phineas came home with
grim lips and knitted brows, and told him about it.

"The Master knew they followed Him because of the loaves and fishes," he
said. "He told them so.

"When we came out of the door, I could not help looking up at the lintel
on which is carved the pot of manna; for when they asked Him for a sign
that they might believe Him, saying, 'Our fathers ate manna in the
wilderness!' He answered: 'I am the bread of life! Ye have seen me, and
yet believe not!'

"While He talked there was a murmuring all over the house against Him,
because He said that He had come down from heaven. Your uncle Laban was
there. I heard him say scornfully: 'Is not this the son of Joseph, whose
father and mother we know? How doth He now say, "I am come down out of
heaven"?' Then he laughed a mocking little laugh, and nudged the man who
stood next to him. There are many like him; I could feel a spirit of
prejudice and persecution in the very air. Many who have professed to be
His friends have turned against Him."

While Phineas was pouring out his anxious forebodings to his wife and
Joel, the Master was going homeward with His chosen twelve.

"Would ye also go away?" He asked wistfully of His companions, as He
noted the cold, disapproving looks of many who had only the day before
been fed by Him, and who now openly turned their backs on Him.

Simon Peter gave a questioning glance into the faces of his companions;
then he pressed a step nearer. "Lord, to whom shall we go?" he answered
impulsively. "Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we have believed,
and know that Thou art the Holy One of God."

The others nodded their assent, all but one. Judas Iscariot clutched the
money bags he held, and looked off across the lake, to avoid the
searching eyes that were fixed upon him.

These honest Galileans were too simple to suspect others of dark
designs, yet they had never felt altogether free with this stranger from
Judea. He had never seemed entirely one of them. They did not see in his
crafty quiet manners, the sheep's clothing that hid his wolfish nature;
but they could feel his lack of sympathetic enthusiasm.

He had been one of those who followed only for the loaves and fishes of
a temporal kingdom, and now, in his secret soul, he was sorry he had
joined a cause in whose final success he was beginning to lose faith.

The sun went down suddenly that night behind a heavy cloud, as a
gathering storm began to lash the Galilee and rock the little boats
anchored at the landings.

The year of popularity was at an end.




CHAPTER X.


ABIGAIL sat just inside the door, turning the noisy hand-mill that
ground out the next day's supply of flour. The rough mill-stones grated
so harshly on each other that she did not hear the steps coming up the
path. A shadow falling across the door-way made her look up.

"You are home early, my Phineas," she said, with a smile. "Well, I shall
soon have your supper ready. Joel has gone to the market for some honey
and--"

"Nay! I have little wish to eat," he interrupted, "but I have much to
say to you. Come! the work can wait."

Abigail put the mill aside, and brushing the flour from her hands, sat
down on the step beside him, wondering much at his troubled face.

He plunged into his subject abruptly. "The Master is soon going away,"
he said, "that those in the uttermost parts of Galilee may be taught of
Him. And He would fain have others beside the twelve He has chosen to go
with Him on His journey."

"And you wish to go too?" she questioned, as he paused.

"Yes! How can I do otherwise? And yet how can I leave you and the little
ones alone in these troubled times? You cannot think how great the
danger is. Remember how many horrors we have lately heard. The whole
country is a smouldering volcano, ready to burst into an eruption at any
moment. A leader has only to arise, and all Israel will take up arms
against the powers that trample us under foot."

"Is not this prophet, Jesus, He who is to save Israel?" asked Abigail.
"Is He not even now making ready to establish His kingdom?"

"I do not understand Him at all!" said Phineas, sadly. "He does talk of
a kingdom in which we are all to have a part; but He never seems to be
working to establish it. He spends all His time in healing diseases and
forgiving penitent sinners, and telling us to love our neighbors.

"Then, again, why should He go down to the beach, and choose for His
confidential friends just simple fishermen. They have neither influence
nor money. As for the choice of that publican Levi-Matthew, it has
brought disgrace on the whole movement. He does not seem to know how to
sway the popular feeling. I believe He might have had the support of the
foremost men of the nation, if He had approached them differently.

"He shocks them by setting aside laws they would lay down their lives
rather than violate. He associates with those they consider unclean; and
all His miracles cannot make them forget how boldly He has rebuked them
for hypocrisy and unrighteousness. They never will come to His support
now; and I do not see how a new government can be formed without their
help."

Abigail laid her hand on his, her dark eyes glowing with intense
earnestness, as she answered: "What need is there of armies and human
hands to help?

"Where were the hosts of Pharaoh when our fathers passed through the Red
Sea? Was there bloodshed and fighting there?

"Who battled for us when the walls of Jericho fell down? Whose hand
smote the Assyrians at Sennacherib? Is the Lord's arm shortened that He
cannot save?

"Why may not His prophet speak peace to Jerusalem as easily as He did
the other night to the stormy sea? Why may not His power be multiplied
even as the loaves and fishes?

"Why may not the sins and backslidings of the people be healed as well
as Joel's lameness; or the glory of the nation be quickened into a new
life, as speedily as He raised the daughter of Jairus?

"Isaiah called Him the Prince of Peace. What are all these lessons, if
not to teach us that the purposes of God do not depend on human hands to
work out their fulfilment?"

Her low voice thrilled him with its inspiring questions, and he looked
down into her rapt face with a feeling of awe.

"Abigail," he said softly, "'my source of joy,'--you are rightly named.
You have led me out of the doubts that have been my daily torment. I see
now, why He never incites us to rebel against the yoke of Cæsar. In the
fulness of time He will free us with a breath.

"How strange it should have fallen to my lot to have been His playmate
and companion. My wonder is not that He is the Messiah; but that I
should have called Him friend, all these years, unknowing."

"How long do you expect to be away?" she asked, after a pause, suddenly
returning to the first subject.

"Several months, perhaps. There is no telling what insurrections and
riots may arise, all through this part of the country. Since the murder
of John Baptist, Herod has come back to his court in Tiberias. I dislike
to leave you here alone."

Abigail, too, looked grave, and neither spoke for a little while. "I
have it!" she exclaimed at length, with a pleased light in her eyes. "I
have often wished I could make a long visit in the home of my girlhood.
The few days I have spent in my father's house, those few times I have
gone with you to the feasts, have been so short and unsatisfactory. Can
I not take Joel and the children to Bethany? Neither father nor mother
has ever seen little Ruth, and we could be so safe and happy there till
your return."

"Why did I not come to you before with my worries?" asked Phineas. "How
easily you make the crooked places straight!"

Just then the children came running back from the market. Abigail went
into the house with the provisions they had brought, leaving their
father to tell them of the coming separation and the long journey they
had planned.

A week later, Phineas stood at the city gate, watching a little company
file southward down the highway. He had hired two strong,
gayly-caparisoned mules from the owner of the caravan. Abigail rode on
one, holding little Ruth in her arms; Joel mounted the other, with Jesse
clinging close behind him.

Abigail, thinking of the joyful welcome awaiting her in her old home,
and the children happy in the novelty of the journey, set out gayly.

But Phineas, thinking of the dangers by the way, and filled with many
forebodings, watched their departure with a heavy heart.

At the top of a little rise in the road, they turned to look back and
wave their hands. In a moment more they were out of sight. Then Phineas,
grasping his staff more firmly, turned away, and started on foot in the
other direction, to follow to the world's end, if need be, the friend
who had gone on before.

It was in the midst of the barley harvest. Jesse had never been in the
country before. For the first time, Nature spread for him her great
picture-book of field and forest and vineyard, while Abigail read to him
the stories.

First on one side of the road, then the other, she pointed out some spot
and told its history.

Here was Dothan, where Joseph went out to see his brothers, dressed in
his coat of many colors. There was Mount Gilboa, where the arrows of the
Philistines wounded Saul, and he fell on his own sword and killed
himself. Shiloh, where Hannah brought little Samuel to give him to the
Lord; where the Prophet Eli, so old that his eyes were too dim to see,
sat by the gate waiting for news from the army, and when word was
brought back that his two sons were dead, and the Ark of the Covenant
taken, here it was that he fell backward from his seat, and his neck was
broken.

All these she told, and many more. Then she pointed to the gleaners in
the fields, and told the children to notice how carefully Israel still
kept the commandment given so many centuries before: "When ye reap the
harvest of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap the corners of thy
field, neither shalt thou gather the gleanings of thy harvest. And thou
shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou gather every grape of
thy vineyard, thou shalt leave them for the poor and the stranger."

At Jacob's well, where they stopped to rest, Joel lifted Jesse up, and
let him look over the curb. The child almost lost his balance in
astonishment, when his own wondering little face looked up at him from
the deep well. He backed away from it quickly, and looked carefully into
the cup of water Joel handed him, for more than a minute, before he
ventured to drink.

The home to which Abigail was going was a wealthy one. Her father,
Reuben, was a goldsmith, and for years had been known in Jerusalem not
only for the beautifully wrought ornaments and precious stones that he
sold in his shop near the Temple, but for his rich gifts to the poor.

"Reuben the Charitable," he was called, and few better deserved the
name. His business took him every day to the city; but his home was in
the little village of Bethany, two miles away. It was one of the largest
in Bethany, and seemed like a palace to the children, when compared to
the humble little home in Capernaum.

Joel only looked around with admiring eyes; but Jesse walked about,
laying curious little fingers on everything he passed. The bright
oriental curtains, the soft cushions and the costly hangings, he
smoothed and patted. Even the silver candlesticks and the jewelled cups
on the side table were picked up and examined, when his mother happened
to have her back turned.

[Illustration: "'WE TALKED LATE'"]

There were no pictures in the house; the Law forbade. But there were
several mirrors of bright polished metal, and Jesse never tired of
watching his own reflection in them.

Ruth stayed close beside her mother. "She is a ray of God's own
sunshine," said her grandmother, as she took her in her arms for the
first time. The child, usually afraid of strangers, saw in Rebecca's
face a look so like her mother's that she patted the wrinkled cheeks
with her soft fingers. From that moment her grandmother was her devoted
slave.

Jesse was not long in finding the place he held in his grandfather's
heart. The old man, whose sons had all died years before, seemed to
centre all his hopes on this son of his only daughter. He kept Jesse
with him as much as possible; his happiest hours were when he had the
child on his knee, teaching him the prayers and precepts and proverbs
that he knew would be a lamp to his feet in later years.

"Nay! do not punish the child!" he said, one morning when Jesse had been
guilty of some disobedience. Abigail went on stripping the leaves
from an almond switch she just had broken off.

"Why, father," she said, with a smile, "I have often seen you punish my
brothers for such disobedience, and have as often heard you say that one
of Solomon's wisest sayings is, 'Chasten thy son while there is hope,
and let not thy soul spare for his crying.' Jesse misses his father's
firm rule, and is getting sadly spoiled."

"That is all true, my daughter," he acknowledged; "still I shall not
stay here to witness his punishment."

Abigail used the switch as she had intended. The boy had overheard the
conversation, and the cries that reached his grandfather as he rode off
to the city were unusually loud and appealing. They may have had
something to do with the package the good man carried home that
night,--cakes and figs and a gay little turban more befitting a young
prince than the son of a carpenter.

"Who lives across the street?" asked Joel, the morning after their
arrival.

"Two old friends of mine," answered Abigail. "They came to see me last
night as soon as they heard I had arrived. You children were all asleep.
We talked late, for they wanted to hear all I could tell them of Rabbi
Jesus. He was here last year, and Martha said He and her brother Lazarus
became fast friends. Ah, there is Lazarus now!--that young man just
coming out of the house. He is a scribe, and goes up to write in one of
the rooms of the Temple nearly every day.

"Mary says some of the copies of the Scriptures he has made are the most
beautifully written that she has ever seen."

"See!" exclaimed Joel, "he has dropped one of the rolls of parchment he
was carrying, and does not know it. I'll run after him with it."

He was hardly yet accustomed to the delight of being so fleet of foot;
no halting step now to hinder him. He almost felt as if he were flying,
and was by the young man's side nearly as soon as he had started.

"Ah, you are the guest of my good neighbor, Reuben," Lazarus said, after
thanking him courteously. "Are you not the lad whose lameness has just
been healed by my best friend? My sisters were telling me of it. It must
be a strange experience to suddenly find yourself changed from a
helpless cripple to such a strong, straight lad as you are now. How did
it make you feel?"

"Oh, I can never begin to tell you, Rabbi Lazarus," answered Joel. "I
did not even think of it that moment when He held my hand in His. I only
thought how much I loved Him. I had been starving before, but that
moment He took the place of everything,--father, mother, the home love I
had missed,--and more than that, the love of God seemed to come down and
fold me so close and safe, that I knew He was the Messiah. I did not
even notice that I was no longer lame, until I was far down the beach.
Oh, you do not know how I wanted to follow Him! If I could only have
gone with Him instead of coming here!"

"Yes, my boy, I know!" answered the young man, gently; "for I, too, love
Him."

This strong bond of sympathy between the two made them feel as if they
had known each other always.

"Come walk with me a little way," said Lazarus. "I am going up to
Jerusalem to the Temple. Or rather, would you not like to come all the
way? I have only to carry these rolls to one of the priests, then I will
be at liberty to show you some of the strange sights in the city."

Joel ran back for permission. Only stopping to wind his white linen
turban around his head, he soon regained his new-found friend.

His recollection of Jerusalem was a very dim, confused one. Time and
time again he had heard pilgrims returning from the feasts trying to
describe their feelings when they had come in sight of the Holy City.
Now as they turned with the road, the view that rose before him made him
feel how tame their descriptions had been.

The morning sun shone down on the white marble walls of the Temple and
the gold that glittered on the courts, as they rose one above the other;
tower and turret and pinnacle shot back a dazzling light.

It did not seem possible to Joel that human hands could have wrought
such magnificence. He caught his breath, and uttered an exclamation of
astonishment.

Lazarus smiled at his pleasure. "Come," he said, "it is still more
beautiful inside."

They went very slowly through Solomon's Porch, for every one seemed to
know the young man, and many stopped to speak to him. Then they crossed
the Court of the Gentiles. It seemed like a market-place; for cages of
doves were kept there for sale, and lambs, calves, and oxen bleated and
lowed in their stalls till Joel could scarcely hear what his friend was
saying, as they pushed their way through the crowd, and stood before the
Gate Beautiful that led into the Court of the Women.

Here Lazarus left Joel for a few moments, while he went to give the
rolls to the priest for whom he had copied them.

Joel looked around. Then for the first time since his healing, he
wondered if it would be possible for him to ever take his place among
the Levites, or become a priest as he had been destined.

While he wondered, Lazarus came back and led him into the next court.
Here he could look up and see the Holy Place, over which was trained a
golden vine, with clusters of grapes as large as a man's body, all of
purest gold. Beyond that he knew was a heavy veil of Babylonian
tapestry, hyacinth and scarlet and purple, that veiled in awful darkness
the Holy of Holies.

As he stood there thinking of the tinkling bells, the silver trumpets,
the clouds of incense, and the mighty songs, a great longing came over
him to be one of those white-robed priests, serving daily in the
Temple.

But with the wish came the recollection of a quiet hillside, where only
bird-calls and whirr of wings stirred the stillness; where a breeze from
the sparkling lake blew softly through the grass, and one Voice only was
heard, proclaiming its glad new gospel under the open sky.

"No," he thought to himself; "I'd rather be with Him than wear the High
Priest's mitre."

It was almost sundown when they found themselves on the road homeward.
They had visited place after place of interest.

Lazarus found the boy an entertaining companion, and the friendship
begun that day grew deep and lasting.




CHAPTER XI.


"WHAT are you looking for, grandfather?" called Jesse, as he pattered up
the outside stairs to the roof, where Reuben stood, scanning the sky
intently.

"Come here, my son," he called. "Stand right here in front of me, and
look just where I point. What do you see?"

The child peered anxiously into the blue depths just now lit up by the
sunset.

"Oh, the new moon!" he cried. "Where did it come from?"

"Summer hath dropped her silver sickle there, that Night may go forth to
harvest in her star-fields," answered the old man. Then seeing the look
of inquiry on the boy's face, hastened to add, "Nay, it is the censer
that God's hand set swinging in the sky, to remind us to keep the
incense of our praises ever rising heavenward. Even now a messenger may
be running towards the Temple, to tell the Sanhedrin that it has
appeared. Yea, other eyes have been sharper than mine, for see! Already
the beacon light has been kindled on the Mount of Olives!"

Jesse watched the great bonfire a few minutes, then ran to call his
sister. By the time they were both on the roof, answering fires were
blazing on the distant hilltops throughout all Judea, till the whole
land was alight with the announcement of the Feast of the New Moon.

"I wish it could be this way every night, don't you, Ruth?" said Jesse.
"Are you not glad we are here?"

The old man looked down at the children with a pleased smile. "I'll show
you something prettier than this, before long," he said. "Just wait till
the Feast of Weeks, when the people all come to bring the first fruits
of the harvests. I am glad your visit is in this time of the year, for
you can see one festival after another."

The day the celebration of the Feast of Weeks commenced, Reuben left his
shop in charge of the attendants, and gave up his entire time to Joel
and Jesse.

"We must not miss the processions," he said. "We will go outside the
gates a little way, and watch the people come in."

They did not have long to wait till the stream of people from the upper
countries began to pour in; each company carried a banner bearing the
name of the town from which it came. A white ox, intended for a
peace-offering, was driven first; its horns were gilded, and its body
twined with olive wreaths.

Flocks of sheep and oxen for the sacrifice, long strings of asses and
camels bearing free-will gifts to the Temple, or old and helpless
pilgrims that could not walk, came next.

There were wreaths of roses on the heads of the women and children;
bands of lilies were tied around the sheaves of wheat. Piled high in the
silver vessels of the rich, or peeping from the willow baskets of the
poor, were the choicest fruits of the harvest.

Great bunches of grapes from whose purple globes the bloom had not been
brushed, velvety nectarines, tempting pomegranates, mellow pears, juicy
melons,--these offerings of fruit and flowers gleamed all down the long
line, for no one came empty-handed up this "Hill of the Lord."

As they drew near the gates, a number of white-robed priests from the
Temple met them. Reuben lifted Jesse in his arms that he might have a
better view. "Listen," he said. Joel climbed up on a large rock.

A joyful sound of flutes commenced, and a mighty chorus went up: "I was
glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord. Our
feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem!"

Voice after voice took up the old psalm, and Reuben's deep tones joined
with the others, as they chanted, "Peace be within thy walls, and
prosperity within thy palaces!"

Following the singing pilgrims to the Temple, they saw the priests take
the doves that were to be for a burnt-offering, and the first fruits
that were to be laid on the altars.

Jesse held fast to his grandfather's hand as they passed through the
outer courts of the Temple. He was half frightened by the din of voices,
the stamping and bellowing and bleating of the animals as they were
driven into the pens.

He had seen one sacrificial service; the great stream of blood pouring
over the marble steps of the altar, and the smoke of the burnt-offering
were still in his mind. It made him look pityingly now at the
gentle-eyed calves and the frightened lambs. He was glad to get away
from them.

Soon after the time of this rejoicing was over, came ten solemn days
that to Joel were full of interest and mystery. They were the days of
preparation for the Fast of the Atonement. Disputes between neighbors
were settled, and sins confessed.

The last great day, the most solemn of all, was the only time in the
whole year when the High Priest might draw aside the veil, and enter
into the Holy of Holies.

With all his rich robes and jewels laid aside, clad only in simple
white, with bare feet and covered head, he had to go four times into the
awful Presence. Once to offer incense, once to pray, to sprinkle the
blood of a goat towards the mercy-seat, and then to bring out the
censer.

That was the day when two goats were taken; by casting lots one was
chosen for a sacrifice. On the other the High Priest laid the sins of
the people, and it was driven out into the wilderness, to be dashed to
pieces from some high cliff.

Tears came into Joel's eyes, as he watched the scape-goat driven away
into the dreary desert. He pitied the poor beast doomed to such a death
because of his nation's sins.

Then came the closing ceremonies, when the great congregation bowed
themselves three times to the ground, with the High Priest shouting
solemnly, "Ye are clean! Ye are clean! Ye are clean!"

Joel was glad when the last rite was over, and the people started to
their homes, as gay now as they had been serious before.

"When are we going back to our other home?" asked Ruth, one day.

"Why, are you not happy here, little daughter?" said Abigail. "I thought
you had forgotten all about the old place."

"I want my white pigeons," she said, with a quivering lip, as if she had
suddenly remembered them. "I don't want my father not to be here!" she
sobbed; "and I want my white pigeons!"

Abigail picked her up and comforted her. "Wait just a little while. I
think father will surely come soon. I will get my embroidery, and you
may go with me across the street."

Ruth had been shy at first about going to see her mother's friends; but
Martha coaxed her in with honey cakes she baked for that express
purpose, and Mary told her stories and taught her little games.

After a while she began to flit in and out of the house as fearlessly as
a bright-winged butterfly.

One day her mother was sitting with the sisters in a shady corner of
their court-yard, where a climbing honeysuckle made a cool sweet arbor.
Ruth was going from one to the other, watching the bright embroidery
threads take the shape of flowers under their skilful fingers. Suddenly
she heard the faint tinkle of a silver bell. While she stood with one
finger on her lip to listen, Lazarus came into the court-yard.

"See what I have brought you, little one," he said. "It is to take the
place of the pigeons you are always mourning for."

It was a snow-white lamb, around which he had twined a garland of many
colored flowers, and from whose neck hung the little silver bell she had
heard.

At first the child was so delighted she could only bury her dimpled
fingers in the soft fleece, and look at it in speechless wonder. Then
she caught his hand, and left a shy little kiss on it, as she lisped,
"Oh, you're so good! You're so good!"

After that day Ruth followed Lazarus as the white lamb followed Ruth;
and the sisters hardly knew which sounded sweeter in their quiet home,
the tinkling of the silver bell, or the happy prattle of the baby
voice.

Abigail spent many happy hours with her friends. One day as they sat in
the honeysuckle arbor, busily sewing, Ruth and Jesse came running
towards them.

"I see my father coming, and another man," cried the boy. "I'm going to
meet them."

They all hastened to the door, just as the tired, dusty travellers
reached it.

"Peace be to this house, and all who dwell therein," said the stranger,
before Phineas could give his wife and friends a warmer greeting.

"We went first to your father's house, but, finding no one at home, came
here," said Phineas.

"Come in!" insisted Martha. "You look sorely in need of rest and
refreshment."

But they had a message to deliver before they could be persuaded to eat
or wash.

"The Master is coming," said Phineas. "He has sent out seventy of His
followers, to go by twos into every town, and herald His approach, and
proclaim that the day of the Lord is at hand. We have gone even into
Samaria to carry the tidings there."

"At last, at last!" cried Mary, clasping her hands. "Oh, to think that I
have lived to see this day of Israel's glory!"

"Tell us what the Master has been doing," urged Abigail, after the men
had been refreshed by food and water.

First one and then the other told of miracles they had seen, and
repeated what He had taught. Even the children crept close to listen,
leaning against their father's knees.

"There has been much discussion about the kingdom that is to be formed.
While we were in Peter's house in Capernaum, some of the disciples came
quarrelling around Him, to ask who should have the highest positions. I
suppose those who have followed Him longest think they have claim to the
best offices."

"What did He say?" asked Abigail, eagerly.

Phineas laid his hand on Ruth's soft curls. "He took a little child like
this, and set it in our midst, and said that he who would be greatest in
His kingdom, must become even like unto it!"

"Faith and love and purity on the throne of the Herods," cried Martha.
"Ah, only Jehovah can bring such a thing as that to pass!"

"Are you going to stay at home now, father?" asked Jesse, anxiously.

"No, my son. I must go on the morrow to carry my report to the Master,
of the reception we have had in every town. But I will soon be back
again to the Feast of Tabernacles."

"Carry with you our earnest prayer that the Master will abide with us
when He comes again to Bethany," said Martha, as her guests departed.
"No one is so welcome in our home, as the friend of our brother
Lazarus."

The preparation for the Feast of the Tabernacles had begun. "I am going
to take the children to the city with me to-day!" said Reuben, one
morning, "to see the big booth I am having built. It will hold all our
family, and as many friends as may care to share it with us."

Jesse was charmed with the great tent of green boughs.

"I wish I could have been one of the children that Moses led up out of
Egypt," he said, with a sigh.

"Why, my son?" asked Reuben.

"So's I could have wandered around for forty years, living in a tent
like this. How good it smells, and how pretty it is! I wish you and
grandmother would live here all the time!"

The next day Phineas joined them. It was a happy family that gathered in
the leafy booth for a week of out-door rejoicing in the cool autumn
time.

"Where is the Master?" asked Abigail.

"I know not," answered her husband. "He sent us on before."

"Will He be here, I wonder?" she asked, and that question was on nearly
every lip in Jerusalem.

"Will He be here?" asked the throngs of pilgrims who had heard of His
miracles, and longed to see the man who could do such marvellous things.

"Will He be here?" whispered the scribes to the Pharisees. "Let Him
beware!"

"Will He be here?" muttered Caiaphas the High Priest. "Then better one
man should die, than that the whole community perish."

The sight that dazzled the eyes of the children that first evening of
the week, was like fairyland; a blaze of lanterns and torches lit up the
whole city.

In the Court of the Women, in the Temple, all the golden lamps were lit,
twinkling and burning like countless stars.

On the steps that separated this court from the next one, stood three
thousand singers, the sons and daughters of the tribe of Levi. Two
priests stood at the top of the steps, and as each gave the signal on a
great silver trumpet, the burst of song that went up from the vast choir
seemed to shake the very heavens. Harps and psalters and flutes swelled
with the rolling waves of the organ's melody. To the sound of this
music, men marched with flaming torches in their hands, and the marching
and a weird torch-dance were kept up until the gates of the Temple
closed.

In the midst of all the feasting and the gayeties that followed, the
long-expected Voice was heard in the arcades of the Temple.

The Child of Nazareth was once more in His Father's house about His
Father's business.

On the last great day of the feast, Joel was up at day-break, ready to
follow the older members of the family as soon as the first
trumpet-blast should sound.

In his right hand he carried a citron, as did all the others; in his
left was a palm-branch, the emblem of joy. An immense multitude gathered
at the spring of Siloam. Water was drawn in a golden pitcher, and
carried back to be poured on the great altar, while the choir sang with
its thousands of voices, and all the people shouted, Amen and Amen!

When the days had gone by in which the seventy bullocks had been
sacrificed, and when the ceremonies were all over, then the leaves were
stripped from the green booths, and the people scattered to their
homes.

Long afterward, Jesse remembered only the torch-light dances, the silver
trumpets and the crowds, and the faint ringing of the fringe of bells on
the priest's robes as he carried the fire on the golden shovel to burn
the sweet-smelling incense.

Joel's memory rang often with two cries that had startled the people.
One when the water was poured from the golden pitcher. It was the
Master's voice: "_If any man thirst, let him come unto me_." The other
was when all eyes were turned on the blazing lamps. "_I am the Light of
the World!_"

Reuben thought oftenest of the blind man to whom he had seen sight
restored. But Lazarus was filled with anxiety and foreboding; through
his office of scribe, he had come in close contact with the men who were
plotting against his friend. Dark rumors were afloat. The air was hot
with whisperings of hate.

He had overheard a conversation between the Temple police, and some of
the chief priests and Pharisees.

"Why did ye not take Him, as ye were ordered?" they demanded angrily.

"We could not," was the response; "for never man spake like this man."

He had seen the mob searching for stones to throw at Him. Though He had
disappeared out of their midst unhurt, still Lazarus felt that some
terrible disaster was hanging threateningly over the head of his beloved
friend.




CHAPTER XII.


IT was with a deep feeling of relief that the two families watched the
Master go away into Perea. Phineas still kept with Him. As the little
band disappeared down the street, Ruth hid her face in her mother's
dress and began to cry.

"I don't want my father to go away again!" she sobbed. Abigail took her
in her lap and tried to comfort her, although there were tears in her
own eyes.

"We will go home soon, little daughter, and then father will be with us
all the time. But we must wait first, till after the cold, rainy season,
and the Feast of Dedication."

"What! another feast?" asked Jesse, to whom the summer had seemed one
long confusion of festivals. "Don't they have lots of them down in this
country! What's this one for?"

"Grandfather will tell you," answered his mother. "Run out and ask him
for the story. I know you will like it."

Seated on his grandfather's knee, Jesse doubled up his little fists, as
he heard how a heathen altar had once been set up on the great altar of
burnt-offering, and a heathen general had driven a herd of swine through
the holy Temple, making it unclean. But his breath came quick, and his
eyes shone, as the proud old Israelite told him of Judas the Maccabee,
Judas the lion-hearted, who had whipped the Syrian soldiers, purified
the Temple, and dedicated it anew to the worship of Jehovah.

"Our people never forget their heroes," ended the old man. "Every year,
in every home, no matter how humble, one candle is lighted at the
beginning of the feast; the next night, two, and the next night, three,
and so on, till eight candles shine out into the winter darkness.

"For so the brave deeds of the Maccabees burn in the memory of every
child of Abraham!"

The feast came and went. While the candles burned in every home, and the
golden lamps in the great Temple blazed a welcome, the Nazarene came
back to His Father's house, to be once more about His Father's business.

Joel caught a glimpse of Him walking up and down the covered porches in
front of the Gate Beautiful. The next moment he was pushing and
elbowing his way through the jostling crowds, till he stood close beside
Him.

After that, the services that followed were a blank. He saw only one
face,--the face that had looked into his beside the Galilee, and drawn
from his heart its intensest love. He heard only one voice,--the voice
he had longed for all these weeks and days. Just to be near Him! To be
able to reach out reverent fingers and only touch the clothes He wore;
to look up in His face, and look and look with a love that never
wearied,--that was such happiness that Joel was lost to everything else!

But after a while he began to realize that it was for no friendly
purpose that the chief priests came pressing around with questions.

"If Thou be the Christ, tell us plainly," they demanded. Then up and
down through the long Porch of Solomon, among all its white marble
pillars, they repeated His answer:--

"The works that I do in my Father's name, they bear witness of me. I and
my Father are one!"

"Blasphemy!" shouted a mocking voice behind Him. "Blasphemy!" echoed
Pharisee and Sadducee for once agreed. The crowds pushed and shoved
between the pillars; some ran out for stones. In the confusion of the
uproar, as they turned to lay violent hands on Him, He slipped out of
their midst, and went quietly away.

Joel hunted around awhile for the party he had come with, but seeing
neither Phineas nor Lazarus, started back to Bethany on the run. A cold
winter rain had begun to fall.

None of Reuben's family had gone into Jerusalem that day on account of
the weather, but were keeping the feast at home.

They were startled when the usually quiet boy burst excitedly into the
house, and told them what he had just seen.

"O mother Abigail!" he cried, throwing himself on his knees beside her.
"If He goes away again may I not go with Him? I cannot go back to
Galilee and leave Him, unknowing what is to happen. If He is to be
persecuted and driven out, and maybe killed, let me at least share His
suffering, and be with Him at the last!"

"You forget that He has all power, and that His enemies can do Him no
harm," said Abigail, gently. "Has He not twice walked out unharmed,
before their very eyes, when they would have taken Him? And besides what
good could you do, my boy? You forget you are only a child, and might
not be able to stand the hardships of such a journey."

"I am almost fourteen," said Joel, stretching himself up proudly. "And I
am as strong now as some of the men who go with Him. _He_ gave me back
my strength, you know. Oh, you do not know how I love Him!" he cried.
"When I am away from Him, I feel as you would were you separated from
Jesse and Ruth and father Phineas. My heart is always going out after
Him!"

"Child, have you no care for us?" she responded reproachfully.

"Oh, do not speak so!" he cried, catching up her hand and kissing it. "I
_do_ love you; I can never be grateful enough for all you have done for
me. But, O mother Abigail, you could never understand! You were never
lame and felt the power of His healing. You were never burning with a
wicked hatred, and felt the balm of His forgiveness! You cannot
understand how He draws me to Him!"

"Let the boy have his way," spoke up Reuben. "I, too, have felt that
wonderful power that draws all men to Him. Gladly would I part with
every shekel I possess, if I thereby might win Him the favor of the
authorities."

When once more a little band of fugitives followed their Master across
the Jordan, Joel was with them.

The winter wore away, and they still tarried. Day by day, they were
listening to the simple words that dropped like seeds into their
memories, to spring up in after months and bear great truths. Now they
heard them as half understood parables,--the good Samaritan, the barren
fig-tree, the prodigal son, the unjust steward.

There was one story that thrilled Joel deeply,--the story of the lost
sheep. For he recalled that stormy night in the sheepfold of Nathan ben
Obed, and the shepherd who searched till dawn for the straying lamb.

It was only long afterwards that he realized it was the Good Shepherd
Himself who told the story, when He was about to lay down His own life
for the lost sheep of Israel.

       *       *       *       *       *

Meanwhile in Bethany, Rabbi Reuben and his wife rejoiced that their
daughter's visit stretched out indefinitely.

Jesse openly declared that he intended to stay there always, and learn
to be a goldsmith like his grandfather.

Ruth, too, was happy and contented, and seemed to have forgotten that
she ever had any other home. As the early spring days came on, she lived
almost entirely out in the sunshine. She had fallen into the habit of
standing at the gate to watch for Lazarus every evening when he came
back from the Temple. As soon as she saw him turn the corner into their
street, she ran to meet him, her fair curls and white dress fluttering
in the wind.

No matter how tired he was, or what cares rested heavily on his mind,
the pale face always lighted up, and his dark eyes smiled at her coming.

"Lazarus does not seem well, lately," she heard Martha say to her mother
one day. "I have been trying to persuade him to rest a few days; but he
insists he cannot until he has finished the scroll he is illuminating."

A few days after that he did not go to the city as usual. Ruth peeped
into the darkened room where he was resting on a couch; his eyes were
closed, and he was so pale it almost frightened her.

He did not hear her when she tiptoed into the room and out again; but
the fragrance of the little stemless rose she laid on his pillow aroused
him. He opened his eyes and smiled languidly, as he caught sight of her
slipping noiselessly through the door.

Her mother, sewing by the window, looked out and saw her running across
the street. Jesse was out in front of the house, playing with a ball.

"Who is that boy talking to Jesse?" asked Abigail of Rebecca, who stood
in the doorway, holding out her arms as Ruth came up.

"Why, that is little Joseph, the only son of Simon the leper. Poor
child!"

"Simon the leper," repeated Abigail. "A stranger to me."

"Surely not. Have you forgotten the wealthy young oil-seller who lived
next the synagogue? He has the richest olive groves in this part of the
country."

"Not the husband of my little playmate Esther!" cried Abigail. "Surely
he has not been stricken with leprosy!"

"Yes; it is one of the saddest cases I ever heard of. It seems so
terrible for a man honored as he has been, and accustomed to every
luxury, to be such a despised outcast."

"Poor Esther!" sighed Abigail. "Does she ever see him?"

"Not now. The disease is fast destroying him; and he is such a hideous
sight that he has forbidden her to ever try to see him again. Even his
voice is changed. Of course he would be stoned if he were to come back.
He never seeks the company of other lepers. She has had a room built for
him away from the sight of men. Every day a servant carries him food and
tidings. It is well that they have money, or he would be obliged to live
among the tombs with others as repulsive-looking as himself, and such
company must certainly be worse than none. Sometimes little Joseph is
taken near enough to speak to him, that he may have the poor comfort of
seeing his only child at a distance."

"What if it were my Phineas!" exclaimed Abigail, her tears dropping fast
on the needlework she held. "Oh, it is a thousand times worse than
death!"

Out in the street the boys were making each other's acquaintance in the
off-hand way boys of that age have.

"My name is Jesse. What's yours?"

"Joseph."

"Where do you live?"

"Around the corner, next to the synagogue."

"My father is a carpenter. What's yours?"

Joseph hesitated. "He used to be an oil-seller," he said finally. "He
doesn't do anything now."

"Why?" persisted Jesse.

"He is a leper now," was the reluctant answer.

A look of distress came over Jesse's face. He had seen some lepers once,
and the sight was still fresh in his mind. As they were riding down from
Galilee, Joel had pointed them out to him. A group of beggars with
horrible scaly sores that had eaten away their flesh, till some were
left without lips or eyelids; one held out a deathly white hand from
which nearly all the fingers had dropped. Their hair looked like white
wire, and they called out, in shrill, cracked voices, "Unclean! Unclean!
Come not near us!"

"How terrible to have one's father like that," thought Jesse. A lump
seemed to come up in his throat; his eyes filled with tears at the bare
idea. Then, boy-like, he tossed up his ball, and forgot all about it in
the game that followed.

Several days after he met Joseph and a servant who was carrying a large,
covered basket and a water-bottle made of skin.

"I'm going to see my father, now," said Joseph. "Ask your mother if you
can come with me."

Jesse started towards his home, then turned suddenly. "No, I'm not going
to ask her, for she'll be sure to say no. I am just going anyhow."

"You'll catch it when you get home!" exclaimed Joseph.

"Well, it cannot last long," reasoned Jesse, whose curiosity had gotten
the better of him. "I believe I'd rather take a whipping than not to
go."

Joseph looked at him in utter astonishment.

"Yes, I would," he insisted; "so come on!"

A short walk down an unfrequented road, in the direction of Jericho,
took them to a lonely place among the bare cliffs. A little cabin stood
close against the rocks, with a great sycamore-tree bending over it.
Near by was the entrance to a deep cave, always as cool as a cellar,
even in the hottest summer days.

At the mouth of the cave sat Simon the leper. He stood up when he saw
them coming, and wrapped himself closely in a white linen mantle that
covered him from head to foot. It was a ghostly sight to Jesse; but to
Joseph, so long accustomed to it, there seemed nothing strange.

At a safe distance the servant emptied his basket on a large flat rock,
and poured the water into a stone jar standing near. Last of all, he
laid a piece of parchment on the stone. It was Esther's daily letter to
her exiled husband.

No matter what storms swept the valley, or what duties pressed at home,
that little missive was always sent. She had learned to write for his
sake. By all his friends he was accounted dead; but her love, stronger
than death, bridged the gulf that separated them. She lived only to
minister to his comfort as best she could.

Simon did not send as long a message in return as this trusted messenger
usually carried. He had much to say to his boy, and the sun was already
high.

Jesse, lagging behind in the shelter of the rock, heard the tender words
of counsel and blessing that came from the white-sheeted figure with a
feeling of awe.

As the father urged his boy to be faithful to every little duty, careful
in learning the prayers, and above all obedient to his mother, Jesse's
conscience began to prick him sorely.

"I believe I know somebody that could cure him," he said, as they picked
their way over the rocks, going home. "'Cause He made Joel well."

"Who's Joel?" asked Joseph.

"A boy that lives with us. He was just as lame, and limped way over when
he walked. Now he is as straight as I am. All the sick people where I
lived went to Him, and they got well."

Joseph shook his head. "Lepers can't be cured. Can they, Seth?" he
asked, appealing to the servant.

"No, lepers are just the same as dead," answered Seth. "There's no help
for them."

Jesse was in a very uncomfortable frame of mind, as, hot and dusty, he
left his companion and dragged home at a snail's pace.

Next morning Joseph was waiting for him out in front. "Well, did she
whip you?" he asked, with embarrassing frankness.

"No," said Jesse, a little sheepishly. "She put me to bed just as soon
as I had eaten my dinner, and made me stay there till this morning."




CHAPTER XIII.


RUTH went every day to ask for her sick friend, sometimes with a bunch
of grapes, sometimes with only a flower in her warm little hand.

But there came a time when Martha met her, with eyes all swollen and red
from crying, and told her they had sent to the city for a skilful
physician.

In the night there came a loud knocking at the door, and a call for
Rabbi Reuben to come quickly, that Lazarus was worse. At day-break a
messenger was sent clattering away to hurry over the Jordan in hot
haste, and bring back from Perea the only One who could help them.

The noise awakened Ruth; she sat up in surprise to see her mother
dressed so early. The outer door was ajar, and she heard the message
that the anxious Martha bade the man deliver: "Lord, he whom Thou lovest
is sick."

"He will come right away and make him well, won't He, mother?" she asked
anxiously.

"Surely, my child," answered Abigail. "He loves him too well to let him
suffer so."

But the day wore on, and the next; still another, and He did not come.

Ruth stole around like a frightened shadow, because of the anxious looks
on every face.

"Why doesn't He come?" she wondered; and on many another lip was the
same question.

She was so quiet, no one noticed when she stole into the room where her
friend lay dying. Mary knelt on one side of the bed, Martha on the
other, watching the breath come slower and slower, and clinging to the
unresponsive hands as if their love could draw him back to life.

Neither shed a tear, but seemed to watch with their souls in their eyes,
for one more word, one more look of recognition.

Abigail sat by the window, weeping softly. Ruth had never seen her
mother cry before, and it frightened her. She glanced at her
grandfather, standing by the foot of the bed; two great tears rolled
slowly down his cheeks, and dropped on his long beard.

A sudden cry from Mary, as she fell fainting to the floor, called her
attention to the bed again. Martha was silently rocking herself to and
fro, in an agony of grief.

Still the child did not understand. Those in the room were so busy
trying to bring Mary back to consciousness, that no one noticed Ruth.

Drawn by some impulse she could not understand, the child drew nearer
and nearer. Then she laid her soft little hand on his, thinking the
touch would surely make him open his eyes and smile at her again; it had
often done so before.

But what was it that made her start back terrified, and shrink away
trembling? It was not Lazarus she had touched, but the awful mystery of
death.

"I did not know that a little child could feel so deeply," said Abigail
to her mother, when she found that Ruth neither ate nor played, but
wandered aimlessly around.

"I shall keep her away from the funeral."

But all her care could not keep from the little one's ears the mournful
music of the funeral dirge, or the wailing of the mourners, who gathered
to do honor to the young man whom all Bethany knew and loved.

Many friends came out from Jerusalem to follow the long procession to
the tomb. There was a long eulogy at the grave; but the most impressive
ceremony was over at last, and the great stone had to be rolled into the
opening that formed the doorway.

Then the two desolate sisters went back to their lonely home and empty
life, wondering how they could go on without the presence that had been
such a daily benediction.

The fourth day after his death, as Martha sat listlessly looking out of
the green arbor with unseeing eyes, Ruth ran in with a radiant face.

"He's come!" she cried. "He's come, and so has my father. Hurry! He is
waiting for you!"

Martha drew her veil about her, and mechanically followed the eager
child to the gate, where Phineas met her with the same message.

"Oh, why did He not come sooner?" she thought bitterly, as she pressed
on after her guide.

Once outside of the village, she drew aside her veil. There stood the
Master, with such a look of untold sympathy on His worn face, that
Martha cried out, "Lord, if Thou hadst been here my brother had not
died!"

"Thy brother shall rise again," He said gently.

"Yes, I know he shall rise again in the resurrection, at the last day,"
she said brokenly. "That brings hope for the future; but what comfort is
there for the lonely years we must live without him?" The tears streamed
down her face again.

Then for the first time came those words that have brought balm into
thousands of broken hearts, and hope into countless tear-blind eyes.

"I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth in me shall never
die. Believest thou this?"

Martha looked up reverently. "Yea, Lord, I believe that Thou art the
Christ, the Son of God which should come into the world."

A great peace came over her troubled spirit as she hurried to her home,
where the many friends still sat who had come to comfort them. A number
of them were from Jerusalem, and she knew that among them were some who
were unfriendly to her brother's friend.

So she quietly called her sister from the room, whispering, "The Master
is come, and calleth for thee!"

Those who sat there thought they were going to the grave to weep, as was
the custom. So they rose also, and followed at a little distance.

Mary met Him with the same exclamation that her sister had uttered, and
fell at His feet.

He, seeing in her white face the marks of the deep grief she had
suffered, was thrilled to the depths of His humanity by the keenest
sympathy. His tears fell too, at the sight of hers.

"Behold how He loved Lazarus!" said a man to the one who stood beside
him.

"Why did He not save him then?" was the mocking answer.

"They say He has the power to open the eyes of the blind, and even to
raise the dead. Let Him show it in this case!"

It was a curious crowd that followed Him to the door of the tomb: men
who hated Him for the scorching fire-brands of rebuke He had thrown into
their corrupt lives; men who feared Him as a dangerous teacher of false
doctrines; men who knew His good works, but hesitated either to accept
or refuse; and men who loved Him better than life,--all waiting,
wondering what He would do.

"Roll the stone away!" He commanded; a dozen strong shoulders bent to do
His bidding. Then He looked up and spoke in a low tone, but so
distinctly that no one lost a word.

"Father," He said,--He seemed to be speaking to some one just beside
Him,--"I thank Thee that Thou hast heard me, and I knew that Thou
hearest me always: but because of the people which stand by I said it,
that they may believe that Thou hast sent me."

A cold shiver of expectancy ran over those who heard. Then He cried, in
a loud voice, "_Lazarus, come forth!_" There was a dreadful pause. Some
of the women clutched each other with frightened shrieks; even strong
men fell back, as out of the dark grave walked a tall figure wrapped in
white grave-clothes.

His face was hidden in a napkin. "Loose him, and let him go," said the
Master, calmly.

Phineas stepped forward and loosened the outer bands. When the napkin
fell from his face, they saw he was deathly white; but in an instant a
warm, healthful glow took the place of the corpse-like pallor.

Not till he spoke, however, could the frightened people believe that it
was Lazarus, and not a ghost they saw.

Never had there been such a sight since the world began: the man who had
lain four days in the tomb, walking side by side with the man who had
called him back to life.

The streets were full of people, laughing, shouting, crying, fairly
beside themselves with astonishment.

Smiths left their irons to cool on the anvils; bakers left their bread
to burn in the ovens; the girl at the fountain dropped her half-filled
pitcher; and a woman making cakes ran into the street with the dough in
her hands.

Every house in the village stood empty, save one where a sick man moaned
for water all unheeded, and another where a baby wakened in its cradle
and began to cry.

Long after the reunited family had gone into their home with their
nearest friends, and shut the door on their overwhelming joy, the crowds
still stood outside, talking among themselves.

Many who had taken part against the Master before, now believed on
account of what they had seen. But some still said, more openly than
before, "He is in league with the evil one, or He could not do such
things." These hurried back to Jerusalem, to spread the report that this
dangerous man had again appeared, almost at the very gates of the great
Capital.

That night there was a secret council of the chief priests and the
Pharisees. "What shall we do," was the anxious question. "If we let Him
alone, all men will believe on Him; and the Romans shall come and take
away both our place and our nation."

Every heart beat with the same thought, but only Caiaphas put it in
words. At last he dared repeat what he had only muttered to himself
before: "It is expedient for us that one man should die for the people,
and that the whole nation perish not."

While the streets were still full of people, Jesse crept up to Joel, as
they sat together in the court-yard. "Don't you think it would be just
as easy to cure a leper as to raise Rabbi Lazarus from the dead?"

"Yes, indeed!" answered Joel, positively, "I've seen it done."

"Oh, have you?" cried the boy, in delight. "Then Joseph can have his
father back again."

He told him the story of Simon the leper, and of his visit to the lonely
cave.

Joel's sympathies were aroused at once. Ever since his own cure, he had
felt that he must bring every afflicted one in the wide world to the
great source of healing.

Just then a man stopped at the gate to ask for Phineas. Joel had learned
to know him well in the weeks they had been travelling together; it was
Thomas.

The boy sprang up eagerly. "Do you know when the Master is going to
leave Bethany?" he asked.

"In the morning," answered Thomas, "and right glad I am that it is to be
so soon. For when we came down here, I thought it was but to die with
Him. He is beset on all sides by secret enemies."

"And will He go out by the same road that we came?"

"It is most probable."

Joel waited for no more information from him, but went back to Jesse to
learn the way to the cave.

Jesse was a little fellow, but a keen-eyed one, and was able to give
Joel the few simple directions that would lead him the right way.

"Oh, I'm so glad you are going!" he exclaimed. "Shall I run and tell
Joseph what you are going to do?"

"No, do not say a word to any one," answered Joel. "I shall be back in a
very short time."




CHAPTER XIV.


SIMON the leper sat at the door of his cave. He held a roll of vellum in
his unsightly fingers; it was a copy of the Psalms that Lazarus had once
made for him in happier days.

Many a time he had found comfort in these hope-inspiring songs of David;
but to-day he was reading a wail that seemed to come from the depths of
his own soul:

"Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and Thou hast afflicted me with all Thy
waves. Thou hast put mine acquaintance far from me. Thou hast made me an
abomination unto them. I am shut up and I cannot come forth. Lord, I
have called daily upon Thee. I have stretched out my hands unto Thee.
Wilt Thou show wonders to the dead? Shall the dead arise again and
praise Thee? Lord, why casteth Thou off my soul? Why hidest Thou Thy
face from me?"

The roll dropped to the ground, and he hid his face in his hands,
crying, "How long must I endure this? Oh, why was I not taken instead of
Lazarus?"

The sound of some one scrambling over the rocks made him look up
quickly.

Seth never made his visits at this time of the day, and strangers had
never before found the path to this out-of-the-way place.

Joel came on, and stopped by the rock where the water-jar stood.

Simon stood up, covering himself with his mantle, and crying out,
warningly, "Beware! Unclean! Come no further!"

"I bring you news from the village," said Joel. The man threw out his
hand with a gesture of alarm.

"Oh, not of my wife Esther," he cried, imploringly, "or of my little
Joseph! I could not bear to hear aught of ill from them. My heart is
still sore for the death of my friend Lazarus. I went as near the
village as I dared, and heard the dirge of the flutes and the wailing of
the women, when they laid him in the tomb. I have sat here ever since in
sackcloth and ashes."

"But Lazarus lives again!" exclaimed Joel, simply. He had seen so many
miracles lately, that he forgot the startling effect such an
announcement would have on one not accustomed to them.

[Illustration: "'YOU BUT MOCK ME, BOY'"]

The man stood petrified with astonishment. At last he said bitterly,
"You but mock me, boy; at least leave me to my sorrow in peace."

"No!" cried Joel. "As the Lord liveth, I swear it is the truth. Have you
not heard that Messiah has come? I have followed Him up and down the
country, and know whereof I speak. At a word from Him the dumb sing, the
blind see, and the lame walk. I was lame myself, and He made me as you
see me now."

Joel drew himself up to his fullest height. Simon looked at him,
completely puzzled.

"Why did you take the trouble to come and tell me that,--a poor despised
leper?" he finally asked.

"Because I want everybody else to be as happy as I am. He cured me. He
gave me back my strength. Then why should not my feet be always swift to
bring others to Him for the same happy healing? He Himself goes about
all the time doing good. I know there is hope for you, for I have seen
Him cleanse lepers."

Simon trembled, as the full meaning of the hope held out to him began to
make itself clear to his confused mind: health, home, Esther,
child,--all restored to him. It was joy too great to be possible.

"Oh, if I could only believe it!" he cried.

"Lazarus was raised when he had been four days dead. All Bethany can
bear witness to that," persisted Joel. The words poured out with such
force and earnestness, as he described the scene, that Simon felt
impelled to believe him.

"Where can I find this man?" he asked.

Joel pointed down the rocky slope. "Take that road that leads into
Bethany. Come early in the morning, and as we all pass that way, call to
Him. He never refuses any who have faith to believe that He can grant
what they ask."

When Joel was half-way down the hill, he turned back. "If He should not
pass on the morrow," he said, "do not fail to be there on the second
day. We will surely leave here soon."

Simon stood in bewilderment till the boy had passed down the hill; he
began to fear that this messenger had been only the creation of a dream.
He climbed upon the cliff and peered down into the valley. No, he had
not been deceived; the boy was no mirage of his thirsty soul, for there,
he came out into full sight again, and now, he was climbing the opposite
hillside.

"How beautiful upon the mountain are the feet of him who bringeth good
tidings!" he murmured. "Oh, what a heaven opens out before me, if this
lad's words are only true!"

Next morning, after they left Bethany, Joel looked anxiously behind
every rock and tree that they passed; but Simon was not to be seen.

Presently Joel saw him waiting farther down the road; he was kneeling in
the dust. The white mantle, that in his sensitiveness was always used to
hide himself from view, was cast aside, that the Great Healer might see
his great need.

He scanned the approaching figures with imploring eyes. He was looking
for the Messiah,--some one in kingly garments, whose jewelled sceptre's
lightest touch would lay upon him the royal accolade of health.

These were evidently not the ones he was waiting for. These were only
simple wayfarers; most of them looked like Galileans.

He was about to rise up with his old warning cry of unclean, when he
caught sight of Joel. But where was the princely Redeemer of prophecy?

Nearer and nearer they came, till he could look full in their faces. No
need now to ask on which one he should call for help; indeed, he seemed
to see but one face, it was so full of loving pity.

"O Thou Messiah of Israel!" he prayed. "Thou didst call my friend
Lazarus from the dead, O pass me not by! Call me from this living death!
Make me clean!"

The eyes that looked down into his seemed to search his soul. "Believest
thou that I can do this?"

The pleading faith in Simon's eyes could not be refused. "Yea, Lord," he
cried, "Thou hast but to speak the word!"

He waited, trembling, for the answer that meant life or death to him.

"I will. Be thou clean!" He put out His hand to raise the kneeling man
to his feet. "Go and show thyself to the priests," He added.

The party passed on, and Simon stood looking after them. _Was_ it the
Christ who had passed by? Where were His dyed garments from Bozrah? The
prophet foretold Him as glorious in apparel, travelling in the greatness
of His strength. No sceptre of divine power had touched him; it was only
the clasp of a warm human hand he had felt. He looked down at himself.
Still a leper! His faith wavered; but he remembered he had not obeyed
the command to show himself to the priests. Immediately he started
across the fields on a run, towards the road leading into Jerusalem.

Far down the highway Joel heard a mighty shout; he turned and looked
back. There on the brow of a hill, sharply outlined against the sky,
stood Simon. His arms were lifted high up towards heaven; for as he ran,
in obedience to the command, the leprosy had gone from him. He was
pouring out a flood of praise and thanksgiving, in the first ecstasy of
his recovery, at the top of his voice.

Joel thought of the tiresome ceremonies to be observed before the man
could go home, and wished that the eight days of purification were over,
that the little family might be immediately reunited.

Meanwhile, Seth, with his basket and water-bottle, was climbing the hill
toward the cave. For the first time in seven years since he had
commenced these daily visits, no expectant voice greeted him. He went
quite close up to the little room under the cliff; he could see through
the half-open door that it was empty. Then he cautiously approached the
mouth of the cave, and called his master. A hundred echoes answered him,
but no human voice responded. Call after call was sent ringing into the
hollow darkness. The deep stillness weighed heavily upon him; he began
to be afraid that somewhere in its mysterious depths lay a dead body.

The fear mastered him. Only stopping to put down the food and pour out
the water, he started home at the top of his speed.

As he reached the road, a traveller going to Bethany hailed him. "What
think you that I saw just now?" asked the stranger. "A man running with
all his might towards Jerusalem. Tears of joy were streaming down his
cheeks, and he was shouting as he ran, 'Cleansed! Cleansed! Cleansed!'
He stopped me, and bade me say, if I met a man carrying a basket and
water-skin, that Simon the leper has just been healed of the leprosy. He
will be home as soon as the days of purification are over."

Seth gazed at him stupidly, feeling that he must be in a dream. Esther,
too, heard the message unbelievingly. Yet she walked the floor in a
fever of excitement, at the bare possibility of such a thing being true.

The next morning, she sent Seth, as usual, with the provisions. But he
brought them back, saying the place was still deserted.

Then she began to dare to hope; although she tried to steel herself
against disappointment, by whispering over and over that she could never
see him again, she waited impatiently for the days to pass. At last they
had all dragged by.

The new day would begin at sunset, the very earliest time that she might
expect him. The house was swept and garnished as if a king were coming.
The table was set with the choicest delicacies Seth could find in the
Jerusalem markets.

The earliest roses, his favorite red ones, were put in every room. In
her restless excitement nothing in her wardrobe seemed rich enough to
wear. She tried on one ornament after another before she was suited.
Then, all in white, with jewels blazing in her ears, on her throat, on
her little white hands, and her eyes shining like two glad stars, she
sat down to wait for him.

But she could not keep still. This rug was turned up at the corner; that
rose had dropped its petals on the floor. She would have another kind of
wine on the table.

At last she stepped out of the door in her little silken-bound sandals,
and climbed the outside stairs to the roof, to watch for him.

The sun was entirely out of sight, but the west was glorious with the
red gold of its afterglow. Looking up the Mount of Olives, she could see
the smoke of the evening sacrifice rising as the clouds of incense
filled the Temple. Surely he must be far on the way by this time.

Her heart almost stopped beating as she saw a figure coming up the road,
between the rows of palm-trees. She strained her eyes for a nearer view,
then drew a long tremulous breath. It was Lazarus; there went the two
children and the lamb to meet him. All along the street, people were
standing in the doors to see him go past; he was still a wonder to them.

She shaded her eyes with her hand, and looked again. But while her gaze
searched the distant road, some one was passing just below, under the
avenue of leafy trees, with quick impatient tread; some one paused at
the vine-covered door; some one was leaping up the stairs three steps at
a time; some one was coming towards her with out-stretched arms, crying,
"Esther, little Esther, O my wife! My God-given one!"

For the first time in seven years, she turned to find herself in her
husband's arms. Strong and well, with the old light in his eyes, the old
thrill in his voice, the glow of perfect health tingling through all his
veins, he could only whisper tremulously, as he held her close, "Praise
God! Praise God!"

No wonder he seemed like a stranger to Joseph. But the clasp of the
strong arms, and the deep voice saying "my son," so tenderly, were
inexpressibly dear to the little fellow kept so long from his birthright
of a father's love.

He was the first to break the happy silence that fell upon them. "What a
good man Rabbi Jesus must be, to go about making people glad like this
all the time!"

"It is He who shall redeem Israel!" exclaimed Simon. "To God be the
glory, who hath sent Him into this sin-cursed world! Henceforth all that
I have, and all that I am, shall be dedicated to His service!"

Kneeling there in the dying daylight, with his arms around the wife and
child so unexpectedly given back to him, such a heart-felt prayer of
gratitude went upward to the good Father that even the happiest angels
must have paused to listen, more glad because of this great
earth-gladness below.




CHAPTER XV.


"I THINK there will be an unusual gathering of strangers at the Passover
this year," said Rabbi Reuben to Lazarus, as they came out together from
the city, one afternoon. "The number may even reach three millions. A
travelling man from Rome was in my shop to-day. He says that in the
remotest parts of the earth, wherever the Hebrew tongue is found, one
may hear the name of the Messiah.

"People pacing the decks of the ships, crossing the deserts, or trading
in the shops, talk only of Him and His miracles; they have aroused the
greatest interest even in Athens and the cities of the Nile. The very
air seems full of expectancy. I cannot but think great things are about
to come to pass. Surely the time is now ripe for Jesus to proclaim
Himself king. I cannot understand why He should hide Himself away in the
wilderness as if He feared for His safety."

Lazarus smiled at the old man, with a confident expression. "Be sure, my
friend, it is only because the hour has not yet come. What a sight it
will be when He does stand before the tomb of our long dead power, to
call back the nation to its old-time life and grandeur. I can well
believe that with Him all things are possible."

"Would that this next Passover were the time!" responded Reuben. "How I
would rejoice to see His enemies laid low in the dust!"

Already, on the borders of Galilee, the expected king had started toward
His coronation. Many of the old friends and neighbors from Capernaum had
joined their band, to go on to the Paschal feast.

They made slow progress, however, for at every turn in the road they
were stopped by outstretched hands and cries for help. Nearly every step
was taken to the sound of some rejoicing cry from some one who had been
blessed.

Joel could not crowd all the scenes into his memory; but some stood with
clear-cut distinctness. There were the ten lepers who met them at the
very outset; and there was blind Bartimeus begging by the wayside. He
could never forget the expression of that man's face, when his eyes
were opened, and for the first time he looked out on the glory of the
morning sunshine.

Joel quivered all over with a thrill of sympathy, remembering his own
healing, and realizing more than the others what had been done for the
blind beggar.

Then there was Zaccheus, climbing up to look down through the sycamore
boughs that he might see the Master passing into Jericho, and Zaccheus
scrambling down again in haste to provide entertainment for his honored
guest.

There was the young ruler going away sorrowful because the sacrifice
asked of him was more than he was willing to make. But there was one
scene that his memory held in unfading colors:--

Roses and wild honeysuckle climbing over a bank by the road-side.
Orange-trees dropping a heavy fragrance with the falling petals of their
white blossoms. In the midst of the shade and the bloom the mothers from
the village near by, gathering with their children, all freshly washed
and dressed to find favor in the eyes of the passing Prophet.

Babies cooed in their mother's arms. Bright little faces smiled out from
behind protecting skirts, to which timid fingers clung. As they waited
for the coming procession, and little bare feet chased each other up and
down the bank, the happy laughter of the older children filled all the
sunny air.

As the travellers came on, the women caught up their children and
crowded forward. It was a sight that would have made almost any one
pause,--those innocent-eyed little ones waiting for the touch that would
keep them always pure in heart,--that blessing their mothers coveted for
them.

But some of the disciples, impatient at the many delays, seeing in the
rosy faces and dimpled limbs nothing that seemed to claim help or
attention, spoke to the women impatiently. "Why trouble ye the Master?"
they said. "Would ye stop the great work He has come to do for matters
of such little importance?"

Repelled by the rebuke, they fell back. But there was a look of
displeasure on His face, such as they had never seen before, as Jesus
turned toward them.

"Suffer the little children to come unto me," He said, sternly, "and
forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of heaven!"

Then holding out His hands He took them up in His arms and blessed
them, every one, even the youngest baby, that blinked up at Him
unknowingly with its big dark eyes, received its separate blessing.

So fearlessly they came to Him, so lovingly they nestled in His arms,
and with such perfect confidence they clung to Him, that He turned again
to His disciples. "Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive
the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein."

Met at all points as He had been by loathsome sights, ragged beggars,
and diseases of all kinds, this group of happy-faced children must have
remained long in His memory, as sweet as the unexpected blossoming of a
rose in a dreary desert.

At last the slow journey drew towards a close. The Friday afternoon
before the Passover found the tired travellers once more in Bethany.
News of their coming had been brought several hours before by a man
riding down from Jericho. His swift-footed beast had overtaken and
passed the slow procession far back on the road.

There was a joyful welcome for the Master in the home of Lazarus. The
cool, vine-covered arbor was a refreshing change from the dusty road.
Here were no curious throngs and constant demands for help.

Away from the sights that oppressed Him, away from the clamor and the
criticism, here was a place where heart and body might find rest. The
peace of the place, and the atmosphere of sympathy surrounding Him, must
have fallen like dew on His thirsty soul. Here, for a few short days, He
who had been so long a houseless wanderer was to know the blessedness of
a home.

Several hours before the first trumpet blast from the roof of the
synagogue proclaimed the approaching Sabbath, Simon hurried to his home.

"Esther," he called in great excitement, "I have seen Him! The Christ! I
have knelt at His feet. I have looked in His face. And, oh, only
think!--He has promised to sit at our table! To-morrow night, such a
feast as has never been known in the place shall be spread before Him.
Help me to think of something we may do to show him especial honor."

Esther sprang up at the news. "We have very little time to prepare," she
said. "Seth must go at once into the city to make purchases. To-morrow
night, no hireling hand shall serve him. I myself shall take that lowly
place, with Martha and Mary to aid me. Abigail, too, shall help us, for
it is a labor of love that she will delight to take part in. I shall go
at once to ask them."

The long, still Sabbath went by. The worshippers in the synagogue looked
in vain for other miracles, listened in vain for the Voice that wrought
such wonders.

Through the unbroken rest of that day He was gathering up His strength
for a coming trial. Something of the approaching shadow may have been
seen in His tender eyes; some word of the awaiting doom may have been
spoken to the brother and sisters sitting reverently at his feet,--for
they seemed to feel that a parting was at hand, and that they must crowd
the flying hours with all the loving service they could render Him.

That night at the feast, as Esther's little white hands brought the
water for the reclining guests to wash, and Martha and Abigail placed
sumptuously filled dishes before them, Mary paused in her busy passing
to and fro; she longed to do some especial thing to show her love for
the honored guest.

Never had His face worn such a look of royalty; never had He seemed so
much the Christ. The soft light of many candles falling on His worn
face seemed to reveal as never before the divine soul soon to leave the
worn body where it now tarried.

An old Jewish custom suddenly occurred to her. She seemed to see two
pictures: one was Aaron, standing up in the rich garments of the
priesthood, with his head bowed to receive the sacred anointing; the
other was Israel's first king, on whom the hoary Samuel was bestowing
the anointing that proclaimed his royalty. Token of both priesthood and
kingship,--oh, if she dared but offer it!

No one noticed when she stepped out after awhile, and hurried swiftly
homeward. Hidden away in a chest in her room, was a little alabaster
flask, carefully sealed. It held a rare sweet perfume, worth almost its
weight in gold.

She took it out with trembling fingers, and hid it in the folds of her
long flowing white dress. Her breath came quick, and her heart beat
fast, as she slipped in behind the guests again. The color glowed and
paled in her cheeks, as she stood there in the shadow of the curtains,
hesitating, half afraid to venture.

At last, when the banquet was almost over, she stepped noiselessly
forward. There was a hush of surprise at this unusual interruption,
although every one there was familiar with the custom, and recognized
its deep meaning and symbolism.

First on His head, then on His feet, she poured the costly perfume.
Bending low in the deepest humility, she swept her long soft hair across
them to wipe away the crystal drops. The whole house was filled with the
sweet, delicate odor.

Some of those who saw it, remembered a similar scene in the house of
another Simon, in far away Galilee; but only the Anointed One could feel
the deep contrast between the two.

That Simon, the proud Pharisee, condescending and critical and scant in
hospitality; this Simon, the cleansed leper, ready to lay down his life,
in his boundless love and gratitude. That woman, a penitent sinner,
kneeling with tears before His mercy; this woman, so pure in heart that
she could see God though hidden in the human body of the Nazarene. That
anointing, to His priesthood at the beginning of His ministry; this
anointing, to His kingdom, now almost at hand. No one spoke as the
fragrance rose and spread itself like the incense of a benediction. It
seemed a fitting close to this hour of communion with the Master.

Across this eloquent silence that the softest sound would have jarred
upon, a cold, unfeeling voice broke harshly.

[Illustration: "A DARK FIGURE WENT SKULKING OUT INTO THE NIGHT"]

It was Judas Iscariot who spoke. "Why was all this ointment wasted?" he
asked. "It would have been better to have sold it and given it to the
poor."

Simon frowned indignantly at this low-browed guest, who was so lacking
in courtesy, and Mary looked up distressed.

"Let her alone!" said the Master, gently. "Ye have the poor with you
always, and whensoever ye will, ye may do them good: but me ye have not
always. She hath done what she could: she is come aforehand to anoint my
body to the burying."

A dark look gleamed in the eyes of Judas,--there was that reference
again to His burial. There seemed to be no use of making any further
pretence to follow Him any longer. His kingdom was a delusion,--a vague,
shadowy, spiritual thing that the others might believe in if they chose.
But if there was no longer any hope of gaining by His service, he would
turn to the other side.

That night there was another secret council of some of the Sanhedrin,
and Judas Iscariot was in their midst.

When the lights were out, and the Temple police were making their final
rounds, a dark figure went skulking out into the night, and wound its
way through the narrow streets,--the dark figure that still goes
skulking through the night of history,--the man who covenanted for
thirty pieces of silver to betray his Lord.




CHAPTER XVI.


"WHO is that talking in the house?" asked Joel of Abigail the morning
after the feast. He had been playing in the garden with Jesse, and
paused just outside the door as he heard voices.

"Only father and Phineas, now," answered Abigail. "Simon the oil-seller
has just been here, and I am sure you could not guess his errand. It was
about you."

"About me?" echoed Joel, in surprise.

"Yes, I never knew until this morning that you were the one who
persuaded him to go to the Master for healing. He says if it had not
been for you, he would still be an outcast from home. During these weeks
you have been away, he has been hoping to find some trace of you, for he
longs to express his gratitude. Last night at the feast, he learned your
name, and now he has just been here to talk to Phineas and father about
you. His olive groves yield him a large fortune every year, and he is in
a position to do a great deal for you, if you will only let him."

"What does he want to do?" asked Joel.

"He has offered a great deal: to send you to the best schools in the
country; to let you travel in foreign lands, and see life as it is in
Rome and Athens and the cities of Egypt. Then when you are grown, he
offers to take you in business with himself, and give you the portion of
a son. It is a rare chance for you, my boy."

"Yes," answered Joel, flushing with pleasure at the thought of all he
might be able to see and learn. He seemed lost for a few minutes in the
bright anticipation of such a tempting future; then his face clouded.

"But I would have to leave everybody I love," he cried, "and the home
where I have been so happy! I cannot do it, mother Abigail; it is too
much to ask."

"Now you talk like a child," she answered, half impatiently; but there
was a suspicion of tears in her eyes as she added, "Joel, you have grown
very dear to us. It will be hard to give you up, for you seem almost
like an own son. But consider, my boy; it would not be right to turn
away from such advantages. Jesse and Ruth will be well provided for. All
that my father has will be theirs some day. But Phineas is only a poor
carpenter, and cannot give you much beyond food and clothing. I heard
him say just now that he clearly thought it to be your duty to accept,
and he had no doubt but that you would."

"But I cannot be with the Master!" cried Joel, as the thought suddenly
occurred to him that he could no longer follow Him as he had been doing,
if he was to be sent away to study and travel.

"No; but think what you may be able to do for His cause, if you have
money and education and influence. It seems to me that for His sake
alone, you ought to consent to such an arrangement."

That was the argument that Phineas used when he came out; and the boy
was sadly bewildered between the desire to be constantly with his
beloved Master, and his wish to serve Him as they suggested.

It was in this perplexed state of mind that he started up to Jerusalem
with Jesse and his grandfather.

The streets were rapidly filling with people, coming up to the Feast of
the Passover, and Joel recognized many old friends from Galilee.

"There is Rabbi Amos!" he exclaimed, as he caught sight of an old man in
the door of a house across the street. "May I run and speak to him?"

"Certainly!" answered Reuben. "You know your way so well about the
streets that it makes no difference if we do get separated. Jesse and I
will walk on down to the shop. You can meet us there."

Rabbi Amos gave Joel a cordial greeting. "I am about to go back to the
Damascus gate," he said. "I have just been told that the Nazarene will
soon make His entrance into the city, and a procession of pilgrims are
going out to meet Him. I have heard much of the man since He left
Capernaum, and I have a desire to see Him again. Will you come?"

The old man hobbled along so painfully, leaning on his staff, that they
were a long time in reaching the gate. The outgoing procession had
already met the coming pilgrims, and were starting to return. The way
was strewn with palm branches and the clothes they had taken off to lay
along the road in front of the man they wished to honor. Every hand
carried a palm branch, and every voice cried a Hosannah.

At first Joel saw only a confused waving of the green branches, and
heard an indistinct murmur of voices; but as they came nearer, he caught
the words, "Hosannah to the Son of David!"

"Look!" cried Rabbi Amos, laying his wrinkled, shaking hand heavily on
Joel's shoulder. "Look ye, boy, the voice of prophecy! No Roman
war-horse bears the coming victor! It is as Zechariah foretold! That the
king should come riding upon the colt of an ass,--the symbol of peace.
So David rode, and so the Judges of Israel came and went!"

Joel's eyes followed the gesture of the tremulous, pointing finger.
There came the Master, right in the face of His enemies, boldly riding
in to take possession of His kingdom.

At last! No wandering now in lonely wildernesses! No fear of the jealous
scribe or Pharisee! The time had fully come. With garments strewn in the
way, with palms of victory waving before Him, with psalm and song and
the shouting of the multitude, He rode triumphantly into the city.

Joel was roused to the highest pitch of enthusiasm, to see His best
beloved friend so honored. People understood Him now; they appreciated
Him. The demonstrations of the multitude proved it. He was so happy and
excited, he scarcely knew what he was doing. He had no palm branch to
wave, but as the head of the procession came abreast with him, and he
saw the face of the rider, he was almost beside himself.

He waved his empty hands wildly up and down, cheering at the top of his
voice; but his shrillest Hosannahs were heard only by himself. They were
only a drop in that mighty surf-beat of sound.

Scarcely knowing what to expect, yet prepared for almost anything, they
followed the procession into the city. When they reached the porch of
the Temple, the Master had disappeared.

"I wonder where He has gone," said Joel, in a disappointed tone. "I
thought they would surely crown Him."

"He evidently did not wish it to be," answered Rabbi Amos. "It would be
more fitting that the coronation take place at the great feast. Wait
until the day of the Passover."

As they sat in the Court of the Gentiles, resting, Joel told Rabbi Amos
of the offer made him by the wealthy oil-dealer Simon.

"Accept it, by all means!" was the old man's advice. "We have seen
enough just now to know that a new day is about to dawn for Israel. In
Bethany, you will be much nearer the Master than in Capernaum; for
surely, after to-day's demonstration, He will take up His residence in
the capital. In time you may rise to great influence in the new
government soon to be established."

The old rabbi's opinion weighed heavily with Joel, and he determined to
accept Simon's offer. Then for awhile he was so full of his new plans
and ambitions, he could think of nothing else.

All that busy week he was separated from the Master and His disciples;
for it was the first Passover he had ever taken part in. After it was
over, he was to break the ties that bound him to the carpenter's family
and the simple life in Galilee, and go to live in Simon's luxurious home
in Bethany.

So he stayed closely with Phineas and Abigail, taking a great interest
in all the great preparations for the feast.

       *       *       *       *       *

Reuben chose, from the countless pens, a male lamb a year old, without
blemish. About two o'clock the blast of two horns announced that the
priests and Levites in the Temple were ready, and the gates of the inner
courts were opened, that all might bring the lambs for examination.

The priests, in two long rows, caught the blood in great gold and silver
vessels, as the animals were killed, and passed it to others behind,
till it reached the altar, at the foot of which it was poured out.

Then the lamb was taken up and roasted in an earthen oven, and the feast
commenced at sunset on Thursday. The skin of the lamb, and the earthen
dishes used, were generally given to the host, when different families
lodged together.

As many as twenty were allowed to gather at one table. Reuben had
invited Nathan ben Obed, and those who came with him, to partake of his
hospitality. Much to Joel's delight, a familiar shock of sunburned hair
was poked in at the door, and he recognized Buz's freckled face,
round-eyed and open mouthed at this first glimpse of the great city.

During the first hour they were together, Buz kept his squinting eyes
continually on Joel. He found it hard to believe that this straight,
sinewy boy could be the same pitiful little cripple who had gone with
him to the sheepfolds of Nathan ben Obed.

"Say," he drawled, after awhile, "I know where that fellow is who made
you lame. I was so upset at seeing you this way that I forgot to tell
you. He had a dreadful accident, and you have already had your wish, for
he is as blind as that stone."

"Oh, how? Who told you?" cried Joel, eagerly.

"I saw him myself, as we came through Jericho. He had been nearly beaten
to death by robbers a few weeks before. It gave him a fever, and both
eyes were so inflamed and bruised that he lost his sight."

"Poor Rehum!" exclaimed Joel.

"Poor Rehum!" echoed Buz, in astonishment. "What do you mean by poor
Rehum? Aren't you glad? Isn't that just exactly what you planned; or did
you want the pleasure of punching them out yourself?"

"No," answered Joel, simply; "I forgave him a year ago, the night before
I was healed."

"You forgave him!" gasped Buz,--"you forgave him! A dog of a Samaritan!
Why, how could you?"

Buz looked at him with such a wondering, puzzled gaze that Joel did not
attempt to explain. Buz might be ignorant of a great many things, but he
knew enough to hate the Samaritans, and look down on them with the
utmost contempt.

"I don't really believe you could understand it," said Joel, "so it is
of no use to try to tell you how or why. But I did forgive him, fully
and freely. And if you will tell me just where to find him, I will go
after him early in the morning and bring him back with me. The Hand
that straightened my back can open his eyes; for I have seen it done
many times."

All during the feast, Buz kept stealing searching glances at Joel. He
could hardly tell which surprised him most, the straightened body or the
forgiving spirit. It was so wonderful to him that he sat speechless.

At the same time, in an upper chamber in another street, the Master and
His disciples were keeping the feast together. It was their last supper
with Him, although they knew it not. Afterwards they recalled every word
and every incident, with loving memory that lingered over each detail;
but at the time they could not understand its full import.

The gates were left open on Passover night. While the Master and His
followers walked out to the Garden of Gethsemane, where they had often
gone together, Joel was questioning Buz as to the exact place where he
was to find his old enemy.

"I'll go out very early in the morning," said Joel, as his head touched
the pillow. "Very early in the morning, for I want Rehum's eyes to be
open just as soon as possible, so that he can see the Master's face.
Lord help me to find him to-morrow," he whispered, and with a blessing
on his lips for the one he had so long ago forgiven, his eyes closed
softly.

Sleep came quickly to him after the fatigue and excitement of the day.
In his dreams he saw again the Master's face as He made His triumphal
entrance into the city; he heard again the acclamations of the crowd.
Then he saw Rabbi Amos and Simon and little Ruth. There was a confused
blending of kindly faces; there was a shadow-like shifting of indistinct
but pleasant scenes. In the fair dreamland where he wandered, fortune
smiled on him, and all his paths were peace.

Sleep on, little disciple, happy in thy dreaming; out in Gethsemane's
dark garden steals one to betray thy Lord! By the light of glimmering
lanterns and fitful torches they take Him now. Armed with swords and
staves, they lead Him out from the leafy darkness into the moon-flooded
highroad.

Now He stands before the High Priest,--alone, unfriended. Sleep, and
wake not at the cock's shrill crowing, for there is none to make answer
for Him, and one who loved Him hath thrice denied!

Dream on! In the hall of Pilate now, thorn-crowned and purple-clad, Him
whom thou lovest; scourged now, and spat upon. This day, indeed, shall
He come into His kingdom, but well for thee, that thou seest not the
coronation.

Sleep on, little disciple, be happy whilst thou can!




CHAPTER XVII.


IT was so much later than he had intended, when Joel awoke next morning,
that without stopping for anything to eat, he hurried out of the city,
and took the road by which the Master had made such a triumphal entry a
few days before.

Faded branches of palms still lay scattered by the wayside, thickly
covered with dust.

All unconscious of what had happened the night before, and what was even
at that very moment taking place, Joel trudged on to Bethany at a rapid
pace, light-hearted and happy.

For six days he had been among enthusiastic Galileans who firmly
believed that before the end of Passover week they should see the
overthrow of Rome, and all nations lying at the feet of a Jewish king.
How long they had dreamed of this hour!

He turned to look back at the city. The white and gold of the Temple
dazzled his eyes, as it threw back the rays of the morning sun. He
thought of himself as he had stood that day on the roof of the
carpenter's house, stretching out longing arms to this holy place, and
calling down curses on the head of his enemy, Rehum.

Could he be the same boy? It seemed to him now that that poor, crippled
body, that bitter hatred, that burning thirst for revenge, must have
belonged to some one else, he felt so well, so strong, so full of love
to God and all mankind.

A little broken-winged sparrow fluttered feebly under a hedgerow. He
stopped to gather a handful of ripe berries for it, and even retraced
his steps to a tiny spring he had noticed farther back, to bring it
water in the hollow of a smooth stone.

He did not find Rehum at the place where Buz had told him to inquire.
His father had taken him to his home, somewhere in Samaria.

Joel turned back, tired and disappointed. He was glad to lie down, when
he reached Bethany again, and rest awhile. A peculiar darkness began to
settle down over the earth. Joel was perplexed and frightened; he knew
it could not be an eclipse, for it was the time of the full moon.
Finally he started back to Jerusalem, although it was like travelling in
the night, for the darkness had deepened and deepened for nearly three
hours, and the mysterious gloom made him long to be with his friends.

His first thought was to find the Master, and he naturally turned toward
the Temple. Just as he started across the Porch of Solomon, the darkness
was lifted, and everything seemed to dance before his eyes. He had never
experienced an earthquake shock before, but he felt sure that this was
one.

He braced himself against one of the pillars. How the massive columns
quivered! How the hot air throbbed! The darkness had been awful, but
this was doubly terrifying.

The earth had scarcely stopped trembling, when an old white-bearded
priest ran across the Court of the Gentiles; his wrinkled hands, raised
above his head, shook as with palsy. The scream that he uttered seemed
to transfix Joel with horror.

"_The veil of the Temple is rent in twain!_" he cried,--"_The veil of
the Temple is rent in twain!_"

Then with a convulsive shudder he fell forward on his face. Joel's knees
shook. The darkness, the earthquake, and now this mighty force that had
laid bare the Holy of Holies, filled him with an undefined dread.

He ran past the prostrate priest into the inner court, and saw for
himself. There hung the heavy curtain of Babylonian tapestry, in all its
glory of hyacinth and scarlet and purple, torn asunder from top to
bottom. No earthquake shock could have made that ragged gash. The wrath
of God must have come down and laid mighty fingers upon it.

He ran out of the Temple, and towards the house where he had slept the
night before.

The earthquake seemed to have shaken all Jerusalem into the streets.
Strange words were afloat. A question overheard in passing one excited
group, an exclamation in another, made him run the faster.

At Reuben's shop he found Jesse and Ruth both crying from fright. The
attendant who had them in charge told him that his friends had been gone
nearly all day.

"Where?" demanded Joel.

"I do not know exactly. They went out with one of the greatest
multitudes that ever passed through the gates of the city. Not only
Jews, but Greeks and Romans and Egyptians. You should have seen the
camels and the chariots, the chairs and the litters!" exclaimed the man.

A sudden fear fell upon the boy that this was the day that the One he
loved best had been made king, and he had missed it,--had missed the
greatest opportunity of his life.

"Was it to follow Rabbi Jesus of Nazareth?" he demanded eagerly.

The man nodded.

"To crown Him?" was the next breathless question.

"No; to crucify Him."

The unexpected answer was almost a death-thrust. Joel stood a moment,
dumb with horror. The blood seemed to stand still in his veins; there
was a roaring in his ears; then everything grew black before him. He
clutched blindly at the air, then staggered back against the wall.

"No, _no_, _no_, NO!" he cried; each word was louder than the last. "I
will not believe it! You do not speak truth!"

He ran madly from the shop, down the street, and through the city gate.
Out on the highway he met the returning multitude, most of them in as
great haste as he.

Everything he saw seemed to confirm the truth of what he had just heard,
but he could not believe it.

"No, no, no!" he gasped, in a breathless whisper, as he ran. "No, no,
no! It cannot be! He is the Christ! The Son of God! They could not be
able to do it, no matter how much they hated Him!"

But even as he ran he saw the hill where three crosses rose. He turned
sick and cold, and so weak he could scarcely stand. Still he stumbled
resolutely on, but with his face turned away from the sight he dared not
look upon, lest seeing should be knowing what he feared.

At last he reached the place, and, shrinking back as if from an expected
blow, he slowly raised his eyes till they rested on the face of the dead
body hanging there.

The agonized shriek on his lips died half uttered, as he fell
unconscious at the foot of the cross.

A long time after, one of the soldiers happening to notice him, turned
him over with his foot, and prodded him sharply with his spear. It
partially aroused him, and in a few moments he sat up. Then he looked up
again into the white face above him; but this time the bowed head awed
him into a deep calm.

The veil of the Temple was rent indeed, and through this pierced body
there shone out from its Holy of Holies the Shekinah of God's love for a
dying world. It uplifted Joel, and drew him, and drew him, till he
seemed to catch a faint glimpse of the Father's face; to feel himself
folded in boundless pardon, in pity so deep, and a love so unfathomed,
that the lowest sinner could find a share. But while he gazed and gazed
into the white face, so glorified in its marble stillness, Joseph of
Arimathea stood between him and the cross, giving directions, in a low
tone, for the removal of the body.

It seemed to waken Joel out of his trance; and when the bloodstained
form was stretched gently on the ground, he forgot his glimpse of
heavenly mysteries, he saw no longer the uplifted Christ. He saw
instead, the tortured body of the man he loved; the friend for whom he
would gladly have given his life.

Almost blinded by the rush of tears, he groped his way on his knees
toward it. A mantle of fine white linen had been laid over the lifeless
body; but one hand lay stretched out beside Him with a great bloody
nail-hole through the palm,--it was the hand that had healed him; the
hand that had fed the hungry multitudes; the hand that had been laid in
blessing on the heads of little children, waiting by the roadside! With
the thought of all it had done for him, with the thought of all it had
done for all the countless ones its warm, loving touch had comforted,
came the remembrance of the torture it had just suffered. Joel lay down
beside it with a heart-broken moan.

Men came and lifted the body in its spotless covering. Joel did not look
up to see who bore it away.

The lifeless hand still hung down uncovered at His side. With his eyes
fixed on that, Joel followed, longing to press it to his lips with
burning kisses; but he dared not so much as touch it with trembling
fingers,--a sense of his unworthiness forbade.

As the silent procession went onward, Joel found himself walking beside
Abigail. She had pushed her veil aside that she might better see the
still form borne before them; she had stood near by through all those
hours of suffering. Her wan face and swollen eyes showed how the force
of her sympathy and grief had worn upon her.

Joel glanced around for Phineas. He was one of those who walked before
with the motionless burden, his strong brown hands tenderly supporting
the Master's pierced feet; his face was as rigid as stone, and seemed to
Joel to have grown years older since the night before.

Another swift rush of tears blinded Joel, as he looked at the set,
despairing face, and then at what he carried.

O friend of Phineas! O feet that often ran to meet him on the grassy
hillsides of Nazareth, that walked beside him at his daily toil, and led
him to a nobler living!--Thou hast climbed the mountain of Beatitudes!
Thou hast walked the wind-swept waters of the Galilee! But not of this
is he thinking now. It is of Thy life's unselfish pilgrimage; of the
dust and travel stains of the feet he bears; of the many steps, taken
never for self, always for others; of the cure and the comfort they have
daily carried; of the great love that hath made their very passing by to
be a benediction.

It seemed strange to Joel that, in the midst of such overpowering
sorrow, trivial little things could claim his attention. Years afterward
he remembered just how the long streaks of yellow sunshine stole under
the trees of the garden; he could hear the whirr of grasshoppers,
jumping up in the path ahead of them; he could smell the heavy odor of
lilies growing beside an old tomb.

The sorrowful little group wound its way to a part of the garden where a
new tomb had been hewn out of the rock; here Joseph of Arimathea
motioned them to stop. They laid the open bier gently on the ground, and
Joel watched them with dry eyes but trembling lips, as they noiselessly
prepared the body for its hurried burial.

From time to time as they wound the bands of white linen, powdered with
myrrh and aloes, they glanced up nervously at the sinking sun. The
Sabbath eve was almost upon them, and the old slavish fear of the Law
made them hasten. A low stifled moaning rose from the lips of the women,
as the One they had followed so long was lifted up, and borne forever
out of their sight, through the low doorway of the tomb.

Strong hands rolled the massive stone in place that barred the narrow
opening. Then all was over; there was nothing more that could be done.

The desolate mourners sat down on the grass outside the tomb, to watch
and weep and wait over a dead hope and a lost cause.

A deep stillness settled over the garden as they lingered there in the
gathering twilight. They grew calm after awhile, and began to talk in
low tones of the awful events of the day just dying.

Gradually, Joel learned all that had taken place. As he heard the story
of the shame and abuse and torture that had been heaped upon the One he
loved better than all the world, his face grew white with horror and
indignation.

"Oh, wasn't there _one_ to stand up for Him?" he cried, with clasped
hands and streaming eyes. "Wasn't there _one_ to speak a word in His
defence? O my Beloved!" he moaned. "Out of all the thousands Thou didst
heal, out of all the multitudes Thou didst bless, not one to bear
witness!"

He rocked himself to and fro on his knees, wringing his hands as if the
thought brought him unspeakable anguish.

"Oh, if I had only been there!" he moaned. "If I could only have stood
up beside Him and told what He had done for me! O my God! My God! How
can I bear it? To think He went to His death without a friend and
without a follower, when I loved Him so! All alone! Not one to speak for
Him, not one!"

Groping with tear-blinded eyes towards the tomb, the boy stretched his
arms lovingly around the great stone that stopped its entrance; then
suddenly realizing that he could never go any closer to the One inside,
never see Him again, he leaned his head hopelessly against the rock, and
gave way to his feeling of utter loneliness and despair.

How long he stood there, he did not know. When he looked up again, the
women had gone, and it was nearly dark. Phineas and several other men
lingered in the black shadows of the trees, and Joel joined them.

Roman guards came presently. A stout cord was stretched across the
stone, its ends firmly fastened, and sealed with the seal of Cæsar. A
watch-fire was kindled near by; then the Roman sentinels began their
steady tramp! tramp! as they paced back and forth.

High overhead the stars began to set their countless watch-fires in the
heavens; then the white full moon of the Passover looked down, and all
night long kept its silent vigil over the forsaken tomb of the sleeping
Christ.

       *       *       *       *       *

Abigail had found shelter for the night with friends, in a tent just
outside the city; but Joel and Phineas took their way back to Bethany.

Little was said as they trudged along in the moonlight. Joel thought
only of one thing,--his great loss, the love of which he had been
bereft. But to Phineas this death meant much more than the separation
from the best of friends; it meant the death of a cause on which he had
staked his all. He must go back to Galilee to be the laughing-stock of
his old neighbors. He who they trusted would have saved Israel had been
put to death as a felon,--crucified between two thieves! The cause was
lost; he was left to face an utter failure.

When the moon went down that morning over the hills of Judea, there were
many hearts that mourned the Man of Nazareth, but not a soul in all the
universe believed on Him as the Son of God.

Hope lay dead in the tomb of Joseph, with a great stone forever walling
it in.




CHAPTER XVIII.


"WAKE up, Joel! Wake up! I bring you good tidings, my lad!" It was
Abigail's voice ringing cheerily through the court-yard, as she bent
over the boy, fast asleep on the hard stones.

All the long Sabbath day after the burial, he had sat listlessly in the
shady court-yard, his blank gaze fixed on the opposite wall. No one
seemed able to arouse him from his apathy. He turned away from the food
they brought him, and refused to enter the house when night came.

Towards morning he had gone over to the fountain for a long draught of
its cool water; then overcome by weakness from his continued fast, and
exhausted by grief, he fell asleep on the pavement.

Abigail came in and found him there, with the red morning sun beating
full in his face. She had to shake him several times before she could
make him open his eyes.

He sat up dizzily, and tried to collect his thoughts. Then he
remembered, and laid his head wearily down again, with a groan.

"Wake up! Wake up!" she insisted, with such eager gladness in her voice
that Joel opened his eyes again, now fully aroused.

"What is it?" he asked indifferently.

"_He is risen!_" she exclaimed joyfully, clasping her hands as she
always did when much excited. "I went to His tomb very early in the
morning, while it was yet dark, with Mary and Salome and some other
women. The stone had been rolled aside; and while we wondered and wept,
fearing His enemies had stolen Him away, He stood before us, with His
old greeting on His lips,--'All hail!'"

Joel rubbed his eyes and looked at her. "No, no!" he said wearily, "I am
dreaming again!"

He would have thrown himself on the ground as before, his head pillowed
on his arm, but she would not let him. She shook his hands with a
persistence that could not be refused, talking to him all the while in
such a glad eager voice that he slowly began to realize that something
had made her very happy.

"What is it, Mother Abigail?" he asked, much puzzled.

"I do not wonder you are bewildered," she cried. "It is such blessed,
such wonderful news. Why He is _alive_, Joel, He whom Thou lovest! Try
to understand it, my boy! I have just now come from the empty tomb. I
saw Him! I spoke with Him! I knelt at His feet and worshipped!"

By this time all the family had come out. Reuben looked at his daughter
pityingly, as she repeated her news; then he turned to Phineas.

"Poor thing!" he said, in a low tone. "She has witnessed such terrible
scenes lately, and received such a severe shock, that her mind is
affected by it. She does not know what she is saying. Did not you
yourself help prepare the body for burial, and put it in the tomb?"

"Yes," answered Phineas, "and helped close it with a great stone, which
Mammy had sat very silent all the time, her old face wearing a puzzled
expression, her keen eyes fixed upon a paper cutter which lay upon
Haydn’s desk, her lips pursed up doubtfully. Haydn did not break the
silence; he only watched. After a few moments she looked up, gave a
perplexed sigh, and said:

“Well, sah, p’raps yo’ is right. P’raps yo’ is. I ain’t nothin’ but a’
ole nigger woman, but, bress Gawd, I loves ma white folks, an’ I hates
fer ter see de ole times so twisted up wid de new ideas, I sartain’
does. It goes against de grain p’intedly.”

“I can understand all that, dear old Mammy, but you mark my words, the
results will justify the deeds.”

So Mammy gave up the argument, though she was far from resigned to the
plans.

And thus had the enterprise grown. Constance finished her year at the
high-school, Mary Willing was established in the model little candy
kitchen, with all its practical little appointments, and before long was
nearly as proficient as Constance herself, and quite as enthusiastic.
One year slipped by and another followed it. Then a third was added to
the number, until now, with the autumn of 19— Constance was nineteen
years old and Eleanor twenty-one.

Neither has changed a great deal. Eleanor’s three years in the college
world have given her greater poise and independence, a more matured
outlook upon life, but the old Eleanor Carruth is still in evidence.

Constance had grown taller, the slight figure is more rounded, though
still girlish. She still has the wonderfully sweet, frank expression, in
spite of her two years out in the business world, for after her
graduation she took firmer hold than ever of her business venture and
branched out in many directions. New booths were opened in adjacent
towns, private orders were filled for patrons in New York City, holiday
consignments were made to more remote ones, to which her fame had spread
through friends and friends’ friends. Of course some losses had been
sustained, but in comparison with her output and returns they were
trivial, and her success was an established fact. But the work
continued, her aim being absolute independence for her mother, and for
Jean the home and the atmosphere their mother had formerly known and
loved.

And the silent partner of the firm, old Baltie, how had the three years
dealt with him? A horse which has attained twenty-five years and is
sightless is supposed to be out of the running, but Baltie lived
apparently to prove the fallacy of such a supposition. At twenty-eight
he was younger and more active than at twenty-four, his age when rescued
by Jean. Nothing could restore his sight, but with each year his hearing
seemed to have grown keener, and the ears were as sensitive as a wild
animal’s. But Baltie needs a chapter to himself.




CHAPTER II

THE SILENT PARTNER AND OTHERS.


“Mother, have you seen Jean?” asked Constance, popping her head into her
mother’s room shortly after breakfast one glorious October morning.

“She was here but a few moments ago, dear,” answered Mrs. Carruth,
looking up from her desk at which she sat writing out the marketing list
for Mammy.

“I want her to leave this parcel at Mrs. Morgan’s on her way to school,
and, by the same token, she ought to be on her way there this very
minute. I wonder where she has gone?”

“Not very far, I think. She knows she must start at once.”

Constance laughed as she replied: “I wonder if she ever will know? Time
doesn’t exist for her, or perhaps I would better say that it exists only
for her; she so calmly takes all she wishes. But she really must start
now. I’ll go hunt her up and get her headed in the right direction.”

“Yes, do, Honey,” urged Mrs. Carruth, as Constance hurried away in quest
of the youngest member of the household.

Mrs. Carruth resumed her writing. The past three years had dealt kindly
with her: Mammy and the daughters of the home had seen to that. Nothing
could ever alter the gentle expression of her eyes, or change the tender
curves of her lips. Each told its story of love for those nearest and
dearest to her, as well as her sympathy and interest in her
fellow-beings. Mrs. Carruth had passed her forty-seventh birthday, but
did not look more than thirty-eight. The hardest years of her life were
those following upon her husband’s death, and the serious financial
losses she was then forced to meet. Since Constance’s venture and the
success which had almost immediately attended it, the outlook for all
had been more hopeful, and if now living less pretentiously than she had
lived during her husband’s lifetime, she was none the less comfortable.
Upon Hadyn Stuyvesant’s advice Mrs. Carruth had not rebuilt the old
home, although by careful economy she could have done so. But Hadyn was
looking farther into the future than Mrs. Carruth looked. Perhaps his
wish had some bearing upon the thought, for from the moment Hadyn
Stuyvesant had met Constance Carruth _his_ future was settled so far as
he was concerned. But he was too wise to let the sixteen-year-old girl
guess his feelings. The gulf between sixteen and twenty-three is a wide
one. As the years advance it mysteriously narrows. At nineteen Constance
often wondered why Hadyn seemed younger to her in his twenty-sixth year
than he had at twenty-three. Never by look or word had he betrayed any
warmer feeling for her than the good-comradeship established at the
beginning of their acquaintance. He was like a brother in that dear
home. Mrs. Carruth consulted him freely upon all occasions. Eleanor
accepted him as a matter-of-course; that was Eleanor’s way. Constance
found in him the jolliest companion. Jean adored him openly, and he was
her valiant champion whenever she needed one. From the day he had taken
his first meal in her home she had been to him the “Little Sister,” and
he never called her by any other name. Not long after that event she had
coined a name for him—a funny enough one, too. Rushing into Constance’s
room in her impetuous way one day, she demanded: “Connie, when knights
used to fight for their ladies, ever ever so long ago, what did they
call them?—the knights I mean.”

“Do you mean Knight Errant?” asked Constance, looking up to smile at the
eager little girl.

“Knight Errant? Knight Errant?” repeated Jean, doubtfully. “No, somehow
that doesn’t fit him. I couldn’t call him that, it’s too long.”

“Call whom, Jean?” Constance began to wonder what was simmering in this
little sister’s head.

“Mr. Stuyvesant. He calls me ‘Little Sister,’ and I want a name for
him.”

“Do you think mother would approve of your calling him by a nickname?”

“’Tisn’t going to be a nickname; it’s going to be a _love_ name for him,
just like his for me is,” was Jean’s curious distinction.

“Oh!” The tone did not imply deep conviction.

“Now, Connie, you don’t understand at all. You think I’m going to
be—be—, well, you don’t think I’m respectful, but I _am_. I don’t know
anyone that I feel more respectfuller to than Mr. Stuyvesant. He’s just
lovely. Only just plain Mr. Stuyvesant keeps him such a long way off,
and he mustn’t be. Mother has adopted him, you know, ’cause we all
agreed to lend part of her to him. So I must have a homey name for him.
What were the other names they gave those old knights?”

“They were often called ‘champions of their fair ladies,’” answered
Constance, slipping her arm about Jean and drawing her close to her
side.

“That’s it! That just suits him, doesn’t it? He was my champion the day
Jabe Raulsbury turned old Baltie out to die in the road, and he has been
a heap of times since when I’ve got into scrapes. So that’s what I’m
going to call him. He is down on the piazza talking with mother about
the new fence, and I’m going right straight down to ask him if I may
call him Champion,” ended Jean, delighted with her new acquisition and
bounding away.

“Don’t interrupt Mother,” warned Constance, always a little doubtful of
the outbreaks of the fly-away.

Hadyn Stuyvesant had not only approved the name, but was delighted with
the idea, and vowed from thenceforth to guard his “lady fair.” So
“Champion” he was from that moment on, and, long as the name was, it had
clung. The three years had not lessened Jean’s love for him or his
devotion to her.

As Constance descended the stairs in quest of Jean she met Mammy at the
foot.

“Is yo’ Ma up in her room, Baby?” she asked.

“Yes, Mammy, and just finishing the marketing list. Have you seen Jean?
It is high time she started for school.”

“Dat’s de livin’ truf, an’ it’s what I done tol’ her a’reddy, but she
boun’ ter go out yonder to see dat hawse.”

“Then I’m bound to go out yonder after her,” laughed Constance, as she
ran briskly down the hall, passed through the door which led to the
piazza and opened upon the lawn. There was no sign of Jean, but
Constance crossed the velvety turf to the stable at the further side of
the grounds, passing on her way the candy kitchen, and calling cheerily
to Mary Willing, who was already busy within: “Polly’s got her kettle on
for our candee,” to be promptly answered by: “Yes, and it’s a-boiling,
if you will come and see.”

“Good! I will be there in just a minute. I’m hunting for Jean.” A moment
later she turned the corner of the stable and came upon Jean and Old
Baltie.

To say that Old Baltie had become almost human during the four years
spent in this home conveys very little idea of the mutual understanding
existing between him and his friends, Jean and Mammy were, of course,
his joint owners; but since his marriage to Mammy, Charles also claimed
ownership. No one would have recognized the old horse for the one
rescued by Jean. His coat was now as sleek as satin, his old body round
and plump, his manners those of a thoroughly spoiled thoroughbred horse.
It had not required all the four years spent with the Carruths to blot
out the effects of Jabe’s harsh treatment, or to revive in Baltie the
memory of his earlier days as Grandfather Raulsbury’s pet. The interval
in which he had fallen upon evil days had vanished as an ugly dream, and
with nobility’s inherent qualities, whether manifested in man or beast,
he had dismissed the memory, risen above it, and with all of his
noblesse oblige was helping others to do likewise.

His wonderfully attuned ears were quick to catch the sound of
Constance’s footfalls upon the soft turf, and he greeted her with a
stifled nicker, for his position made a gentlemanly greeting well-nigh
impossible: he was lying at full length upon a bed of sweet clover, his
head in Jean’s lap. These two were never in the positions or situations
of their kind if they could possibly achieve others.

“Hello!” called Jean, glancing up from pressing her cheek against one
large satiny ear which she held against it.

“Thought I’d find you here, Honey; but I’ve got to hustle you off to
school. Do you know what time it is?”

“Only half-past eight, and we’re having a beau-ti-ful time, aren’t we,
Baltie, dear?”

“Hoo-hoo-hoo!” fluttered the delicate nostrils. Constance dropped down
beside Jean and ran her hand along the warm, sleek neck. Another nicker
acknowledged the caress, but the great horse did not stir. The clear
morning sunshine flooded the paddock, Baltie’s little kingdom, and
filtered through the gorgeous sugar maples overhead. The air was clear
and crisp, the ground dry as though night dews were unknown. Off at the
edge of the paddock a cricket shrilled his monotonous little song of the
coming winter—a snug stable for the old horse and a warm fireside for
his friends.

“You really must go now, dear,” urged Constance, rising to her feet
after a final caress.

“Oh, dear, and he is so big and so warm and so soft and so good,”
protested Jean. “But I s’pose I must. Come, Baltie, you’ve got to get
up. Now! All together!” and placing her arms beneath the great neck Jean
gave the preliminary heave-ho! necessary to start the old horse. Four
years before it would have been impossible for him to get to his feet,
but, as Mammy insisted:

“Charles Devon hadn’t been Massa Stark’s groom fer nothin’,” and she
herself was a master hand at “mashargin” (Mammy’s pronunciation of
massaging), a course of treatment to which Baltie had been most
vigorously subjected, to the wonderful rejuvenation of his old bones and
muscles.

A horse, even in his most nimble days of colthood, does not rise from a
prone position with any great degree of grace; yet Baltie might have
given points to some of his younger brethren. Up came his head, the
slender forefeet were braced, there was a mighty heave and hoist, and
Baltie stood upon all-fours, shaking clover leaves from his flanks.

“Now fly, Jean! Be sure to take the parcel for Mrs. Morgan. I’ll stop a
moment with Baltie to make your peace for your abrupt departure,” said
Constance, gayly, well knowing that Jean’s leave-taking from her pet was
usually a prolonged ceremony.

Away hurried the little girl, leaving the older sister to spend the
ensuing five minutes with the old horse, who nozzled and fussed over
her, as only a petted horse knows how.

“Now, old silent partner, I must run away and look after my forewoman
and get busy myself. Goodness, how the Carruth family is developing!
Eleanor already offered a position at Sunnymeade for next fall, my
humble self a full-fledged business woman with a flourishing trade; Jean
junior partner with a private following of her own, and you, you dear,
blind, faithful old creature, setting us all an example of faithfulness
and devotion; Mammy and Charles the biggest hit of the whole
establishment with their lunch counter, and yonder the little girl whom
Mother has made over brand new! No wonder I’m proud; no wonder I’m
sometimes afraid my head will be turned by all our good fortune and
success. Keep me headed right, Baltie. If you, without sight, can steer
a straight course, surely I, with both my eyes to the good, ought to be
able to. Good-bye, dear,” and clasping her arms around the sleek, warm
neck, Constance stood perfectly still for a moment or two, her head
pillowed upon the silky mane, her thoughts traveling rapidly back across
the intervening years—years so full of effort, anxiety, hope,
disappointment, love and faith. The one which was beginning with this
October—for it was in October that she had begun her work four years
before—was bidding fair to prove a crisis in all their lives.
Instinctively the girl felt this. Girl in years, yes, but a little woman
in executive ability, foresight and execution, withal, still sweet and
true, and retaining her faith in her fellow-beings. Never had she looked
lovelier than at this moment standing there in the glorious October
sunlight, her arms clasped about the big bay horse, her eyes shining
with hope, health, courage, her cheeks glowing. She was dressed for her
morning’s work, her gown a simple tan-colored linen with white collar,
cuffs and belt, a soft tie of brown silk at her throat. She was good to
look at this girl of nineteen, as she stood with such unstudied grace,
the very personification of hope. Presently, with a little start, she
came back to a realization of things around her, and with a parting
caress for the blind horse ran lightly from the paddock across the lawn
to the little candy kitchen, and entered with a cheery greeting.




CHAPTER III

THE BEE-HIVE.


When three years before, Hadyn Stuyvesant, the owner of the property
rented by the Carruths, had followed out Constance Carruth’s plans for a
model kitchen in which she could make her candy, he was not a little
surprised at the sixteen-year-old girl’s practical ideas. She asked him
to build an extension to the little cottage at the end of the grounds
occupied by Mammy and Charles, and had drawn the plans and
specifications herself. The result was a marvel to him.

The extension consisted of three rooms on the first floor and two on the
second. Upon entering the door one found one’s self in a good-sized
room, with rubber-tiled floor all blue and white, the walls snowy in
alabasterine. Here on numberless white enameled shelves were placed the
boxes of candy ready for shipment. From this attractive room opened the
packing room, floor, walls and ceiling scrupulous. Long zinc-covered
tables ready for the pans of candy, little portable stands at hand to
hold the boxes in which the candy was to be packed. Perhaps the most
practical feature of this packing room was the height of the tables, or
more correctly their lack of height. Constance had reason to know that
one can be foot-weary after several hours spent in candy-making.
Consequently these packing tables were made low enough to enable those
working at them to sit upon the comfortable bent-wood chairs while doing
the work, which often required several hours, for not only had the candy
to be packed in its pretty boxes, but the boxes had to be wrapped and
tied with dainty ribbons. Nothing must fall short of perfection.

But the crowning point of Constance’s practicability was shown in the
actual kitchen itself. This was also tiled, but the tiles were of
shining porcelain, washable, scrubable, scourable to the very limit. A
big gas range stood at one side, near it hung pans, pots and kettles of
every size and possible need, all of white enamel ware. A big porcelain
sink and draining tray stood next. Close at hand was a large table, its
top of white marble warranted to withstand the hottest candy which could
be poured upon it, to chill it quickly for handling or cutting, and to
come forth from its boiling baptism immaculate under the alchemy of hot
soapsuds.

On the walls were great hooks, upon which to pull long ropes of molasses
or cream candy. Along another side of the kitchen were shelves to hold
the hundred and one ingredients which were to be transformed into the
most toothsome of dainties, and these were too numerous to name. A
spacious closet held aprons, caps, towels, dish-cloths and what not,
needed in the work.

On the floor overhead, and reached by a quaint little stairway from the
shipping room, was the stock room, where boxes, labels, wrapping paper,
twine, and a hundred other needfuls were kept. In one corner a
business-like roll-top desk, with still more business-like ledgers, told
of the ability of this little lady to keep track of her finances. And
room number five? Ah, the eternal feminine! Who says she must waive all
claim to her womanly instincts, merge them in the coarser, less refined
ones of the hurrying, struggling world around her when she sets out to
be a bread-winner among her masculine contemporaries? If some do this,
Constance Carruth was not to be numbered among them, and no better proof
of it could have been offered than the “fifth wheel to her business
wagon,” as she laughingly called room number five. That little room is
worthy of minute description.

To begin with, the walls were tinted a soft ivory white, with a delft
blue frieze running around the top. The floor was of hard wood, with a
pretty blue and white rug spread in the center. On this stood a white
enameled table, with snowy linen cover, a reading lamp, the several
books and magazines testifying to its primal use. Four or five
comfortable wicker chairs, with cushions of pretty figured Japanese
crepe, stood about. In one corner a couch with a delft blue and white
cover and enough pillows to spell luxury, invited weary bodies to rest
when labors were ended, and yet never once hinted that by removing the
cover and pillows a bed stood ready for a guest if extra space were
needed. Book shelves of white enameled wood filled half one side of the
room, and held every sort of cook-book ever published, as well as many
of Constance’s favorite authors. A white chiffonnier held many necessary
articles, for after one has spent several hours over a boiling kettle
one longs for a tub and fresh garments; and all these were at hand in
the big closet. Opening from this restful room was a perfectly appointed
bathroom. Could plans have been more perfect?

Certainly the girl, bending over the big saucepan, stirring its boiling
contents, felt that _her_ little paradise had been gained when she
changed from the bustling, rushing Arcade to the peace, tranquillity and
refinement of her present surroundings. The accident which
short-circuited the switchboard wires in the telephone booth that
eventful Labor Day had brought to Mary Willing, even at the cost of a
good deal of physical suffering, present advantages and an outlook for
the future such as she had never pictured. Indeed, her horizon had been
much too circumscribed for her imagination to reach so far. It needed
the influence and environment of the past three years to make her fully
appreciate the vast difference between the acquisitions which mere
dollars can command, and those which true refinement of heart, mind,
soul and body hold as invaluable and indeprivable heritages. Possibly
the best proof that she had taken the lesson to heart lay in the fact
that “Pearl” Willing had completely dropped out of the world’s ken, and
in her stead, quiet, dignified Mary Willing moved and had her being.
Unconsciously Mrs. Carruth had undertaken to solve a knotty,
sociological problem, but the results already obtained seemed to justify
her belief that she was right in her estimate of this girl. At all
events she had reason to be sanguine of ultimate success in bending a
hitherto neglected twig. It needed courage, however, upon Mrs. Carruth’s
part to undertake this reformation. From her childhood, to her
nineteenth year Mary Willing’s environment had been, if not
demoralizing, certainly detrimental to a higher development in any girl.
Her associates were coarse, boisterous, heedless girls, without the
faintest sense of the fitness of things, or the first rudiments of
refinement. To earn enough money to clothe themselves in shoddy finery,
to contribute as small a percentage of their earnings to the family
purse as possible, and to have as much “fun,” never mind at whose
expense, or at what sacrifice of their own dignity, bounded their aims
and ambitions. And Mary Willing had seen no reason for not following in
their footsteps. Handsomer than any of her companions, and holding a
position where her personal charms were conspicuous for all who passed
to comment upon them, she had used them to attract the attention of
those whom she thought likely to contribute to her pleasure.

To make her more self-conscious, and senselessly pave the way to greater
evil, her mother had continually urged her to make the most of her good
looks while she had them, assuring her that unless she managed to “catch
a rich husband with her handsome face she needn’t hope to get one at
all.”

Was it any wonder the girl grew up vain, shallow, and with standards
poorly calculated to withstand temptations if offered opportunely?
Still, there was a certain something in her which, up to her nineteenth
year, had saved her from anything worse than shallow flirtations; and
then when everything seemed conspiring to lead her to more serious
consequences of her folly, Fate had established close at her side a
personality and atmosphere in such contrast to her own, and all she had
ever known, that it acted as a dash of cold water acts upon a
sleepwalker. At first she was startled, then roused, and finally
thoroughly wakened to the perilous path she was following.

But the strangest part of it all lay in the fact that the individual
which capricious Dame Fate had used as her instrument never for one
moment suspected that she was being used at all, but continued on her
sweet, cheery, sunny way entirely unconscious of her responsibilities.
Perhaps therein lay her greatest strength. Then came the accident on the
river, and Mrs. Carruth, quick to read and comprehend, found a field for
the sweetest missionary work a woman can enter upon—that of shaping the
life of a young girl for the noblest position to which she can attain—a
refined young womanhood, a beautiful wifehood, and a motherhood as
perfect as God will give her grace to make it. Mary Willing could hardly
have found a more beautiful example, and the three years had wrought
miracles.

Mrs. Carruth had made haste slowly. The first year Mary Willing entered
upon her duties in the candy kitchen she went and came daily, learning
and applying herself with all the enthusiasm her gratitude to those she
so admired and strove to emulate inspired. The relations between the
girl and Constance were those of valued employee and respected employer.
It could not have been otherwise. Mary had a vast deal to _un_learn, the
hardest of all things to accomplish, and when old impressions were
effaced to begin an entirely new page. Gradually as time passed on the
girl grew into her new environment. Old habits of manner and speech gave
way to gentler ones, old viewpoints shifted to those of these good
friends, who had risen up at such a crucial point in her life and were
fitting her to be a little woman in the truest sense. In the course of
the three years just passed she and Constance had grown closer to each
other. The latter, quick to see the former’s sincere desire to improve,
and take advantage of every opportunity to do so, felt the keenest
sympathy for her less fortunate sister, and the strongest desire to aid
her. Mary’s aim and ambition was to grow “just exactly like Constance
Carruth! The dearest, best and loveliest girl that ever lived,” as she
confided to her mother. The greatest obstacle to be overcome was the
unhappy influence in Mary Willing’s own home life. It sometimes seemed
to Mrs. Carruth that whatever good they accomplished in the five and a
half working days of the week was entirely undone during the one day and
a half which the girl spent in the hurly-burly, the untidiness and
hopeless shallowness of her own home, to say nothing of the coarsening
influence of a worthless, dissipated father’s presence. Mrs. Carruth
believed that Mary Willing had naturally been endowed with instincts far
above the average of her class, though from what source inherited she
could not understand, and that all needed to develop them was a more
wholesome atmosphere, wise guiding, and, of course, separation from
former contaminating influences. But she bided her time and, when least
expecting to do so, discovered the secret. At length, when she felt the
moment to be ripe, she suggested most tactfully that Mary come to live
with them, to occupy the little room which had once been Mammy’s, but,
since her marriage to Charles, and her removal to the snug cottage
adjoining the candy kitchen, had been newly decorated and furnished for
what Jean, in her characteristic fashion, termed “the left-overs;”
“left-overs” being any extra guest who might claim the hospitality of
the family when the other guest room was occupied. It was a pretty
little room, up in the third floor at the rear of the house, and
overlooked the lawn, the candy kitchen, Mammy’s cottage, and the rolling
country beyond owned by Jabe Raulsbury. It had been papered in the
softest green paper, with garlands of pink roses as a border. The floor
was carpeted with a deeper shade of ingrain filling, upon which lay two
pretty rugs in pink and green. Dimity curtains, looped back with chintz
bands, draped the windows. The furniture was of white enamel, with plain
white iron bedstead. Cushions and coverings, as well as table and bureau
scarfs, were of the chintz, edged with inexpensive lace—the bedspread of
snowy white. Had the room been designed for Mary Willing’s rich coloring
it could hardly have suited her more perfectly. But it had not; Fate was
simply working out her scheme not only in color but in influence. How
great the influence of that simple little room would prove not even Mrs.
Carruth suspected, although she was a firm believer in the influence of
one’s surroundings.

When Mrs. Carruth suggested that Mary remain with them in order to be at
hand whenever needed in an emergency, and to avoid during the cold,
stormy days of winter the long trip to and from her own home, the girl
had responded with an eagerness which touched Mrs. Carruth very deeply.
“And if I come here to live you must let me pay my board,” she cried,
impulsively. Then, noticing the color which crept into the older woman’s
face, she hastened to add, contritely: “Oh, dear me! Shall I ever learn
how to say things? I’m—I’m so—I mean I know so _little_. Please forgive
me, Mrs. Carruth. I didn’t stop to think how rude that was. I ought to
have said you must not pay me such a large salary if you let me live
here. I know that no amount of money that I could earn could pay my
board. I’ve learned _that_ much, you see, even if I don’t seem to have
learned very much more during the last two years. But I’m truly, truly
trying hard to learn.”

“I know it, dear. Perhaps I am over-sensitive. Old instincts are hard to
overcome. No, I do not think we will change the salary. Constance had
already thought of increasing the sum she is now paying you, for you
earn it. Work has increased rapidly during these two years, and you are
very proficient, and very valuable to her.”

“Oh, I am so glad! I want so much to be.”

“You are; so live here with us, and let the little room and the ‘bread
and salt’ stand as a part of your salary.”

Mary Willing had never had occasion to enter this room, and when
Constance led her to it upon the day she took up her residence with
them, the girl stopped short upon the threshold, clasped her hands in a
little ecstacy of rapture, and cried: “I’ll live up to every single
thing in it, for only a gentlewoman could have arranged such a room, and
only a gentlewoman has any right to live in it. It just speaks of that
dear, blessed little mother of yours from every corner, and from every
single rose on the paper and the chintz; and if I don’t live to make her
proud of me I shall want to know why.”




CHAPTER IV

THE BUSY BEES.


“I’m afraid the head of the firm is very late this morning,” cried
Constance, merrily, as she entered the candy kitchen. Mrs. Carruth had
long since given it the name of the Bee-hive.

“I think the head of the firm has earned the right to arrive late if she
wishes to,” answered Mary Willing, glancing backward over her shoulder
as she stood before the gas range. Her arms were bared to the elbows,
for the waist she wore was made with short sleeves, in order to give her
perfect freedom in her work. They were beautiful arms, strong,
well-rounded and smooth as ivory.

“No, indeed, the head of the firm is a far cry from such indulgences,
let me tell you. She has just heaps and loads to accomplish before she
can arrive at such luxuries. But how goes the candy, Mary? Are you ready
for me yet?”

“Not quite; but I shall be in just a few minutes. See, it is beginning
to rope,” was the reply as the candy-maker lifted a spoonful of the
boiling syrup and let it run back into the kettle, the last drop falling
from the spoon quickly forming into little threads, which wavered in the
hot air rising from the range.

“Better begin beating it now, and let me pop in the nuts; then we’ll
pour it off,” answered Constance, her practiced eye quick to see that
another moment’s boiling might undo a morning’s work.

“Well, you’re the boss! Oh, I beg your pardon, Miss Constance, I didn’t
mean that! I mean you’re—” and the girl paused in confusion, her face
coloring a deeper red than the heat and her work had brought there.

“I’ll make believe I didn’t hear,” answered Constance, a softer light
filling her eyes in place of the pained one which for a little instant
had crept into them, as a cloud can cast a momentary shadow upon a
wind-swept, shining October sea.

“You have to make believe so many times,” answered the girl, contritely,
as she lifted the kettle from the range, and placing it upon the marble
table, began to beat vigorously.

“Not nearly so often as I used to,” answered Constance, emptying into
the kettle a great dish of walnuts. Mary again beat vigorously with her
big spoon, shaking her head doubtfully the while. Constance did not look
at her, but, arming herself with a large knife, guided the candy into
the little grooves which would shape it as it was poured upon the table
from the tilted kettle. One end of the table had been blocked out like a
checkerboard, each inch square lined for cutting the candy accurately.

“Now watch me do my stunt,” she cried, standing with knife suspended
over the fast chilling candy, and smiling up at the tall girl at her
side.

“Do you forgive my—my—oh, the things I’m forever saying that must feel
just like a file drawn over your teeth? If you only knew how hard it is
to forget old ways and words and learn the better ones!”

“Do you see that little motto over there?” asked Constance, pointing
with her poised knife to a card, one of several hanging upon the wall of
the kitchen. The one toward which she pointed was in dark blue letters
upon a white ground. It read: “Forget It!”

“Yes, that is just exactly what I am forever doing,” was Mary’s petulant
reply. “If I didn’t forget all the time I’d never _have_ to forget at
all, and if that isn’t the finest bit of Irish you’ve ever heard, please
improve on it if you can.”

The laughter which floated out through the open door greeted Mrs.
Carruth as she entered the packing room.

“May I share the joke?” she asked. “I’m sure it must be a good one, and
rich as the odors floating out to tempt nose and palate. Cut it quickly,
Honey; I know it must be chilled enough and it does smell so good. Mary,
you are a master hand. M—mm—m! A veritable lump of delight, though still
slightly warm,” she ended as Constance dropped into her mouth a square
of the nut fudge she had just cut from the great mass covering the
table.

“Sit down, Mumsey, dear, and be good, consequently happy, while we work
like beavers. How does it chill so rapidly? Quick! Mary, you cut at that
end while I work at this. We’ve pounds and pounds to get done this
morning if we are to fill all the orders.”

For a few moments only the swift swish of the great knives as they cut
the candy could be heard, now and again one girl or the other catching
up a square upon the end of her knife and pausing just long enough to
offer it to Mrs. Carruth. Presently all was cut, and as it lay cooling
they set to work upon the next batch to be made, Mary cleaning the fudge
kettle while Constance got out another for the walnut creams. Each kind
of candy had its special cooking utensils, and no others were ever used
for it. In a few minutes Constance had a second batch of candy bubbling
upon her range, ready to turn over to Mary when she should have finished
washing the kettles and other articles used in making the fudge.

“I came out to be useful; may I prove it?” asked Mrs. Carruth.

“Just sit and watch us work. That helps,” answered Mary, as she relieved
Constance.

“Will you be just a heap happier if I let you help wrap the fudge in
paraffin paper?” asked Constance as she nestled her head for a moment in
her mother’s neck. “Eh? Will you? You busy body. Why can’t you let us do
all the work and so win all the glory? I suspect you’re a terribly
selfish mother; yes, I do. You needn’t protest. You won’t even let your
girls, real own ones or adopted ones, make their sticky marks in this
world in peace. You must come poking out here to buzz around in the hive
and beg honey.”

“I don’t have to beg, for it is voluntarily given,” laughed Mrs.
Carruth, kissing the soft cheek so close to her lips. “This kind I mean,
and I know of none sweeter.”

“Gross flattery! Now I _know_ you are scheming, so ’fess right off,”
cried Constance, whirling around to peer into her mother’s face, and
break into a merry laugh.

Mrs. Carruth pursed up her lips into a derisive pucker, and looked into
the merry eyes of this sunshiny daughter.

“And if I am, what then?” she asked.

“I knew it!” was the triumphant retort. “But I dare not waste time
bringing you to order now. Yes, you may help wrap. If anything will
wheedle you into being good, letting you get busy will,” ended
Constance, turning to the table and deftly lifting the squares to the
flat pans upon which they were to be carried to the packing room.

“Shoo along in there and get busy if you must, and while you are getting
sticky enough to satisfy even yourself, you will tell me what is
simmering. And mind, Mary can hear, too; so if it is too anarchistic she
will come to the rescue. Oh, you can’t do as you used to. Whyfor do I
make candy by the pounds innumerable? Whyfor do I send it to tickle many
palates? Whyfor do I take in dollars galore? All, _all_ to keep you from
running off on some wild project whereby you shall earn as many more
dollars to my utter undoing, lost glory and disgrace appalling to
contemplate in a girl who has a tendency to grow fat—yes, fat!”

As she rattled on with her nonsense Constance worked busily getting out
her paraffin paper, the necessary boxes and the dainty ribbons with
which to tie them. Then seating herself beside her mother, who was
already busy wrapping the fudge in its little squares of paraffin, she
began packing the candy in its boxes.

“Now, what is it?” she asked, looking quizzically into the sweet,
lovable face. Mrs. Carruth laughed a low, little laugh as she asked:
“Why are you so sure that it is anything?”

“I know the signs. They have periodical simmerings, sort of seismic
rumblings, so to speak,” nodded Constance, working swiftly.

“I feel such a drone in a busy hive—” began Mrs. Carruth, then
hesitated.

“I knew it! Mary, it has bubbled to the surface again,” Constance called
into the kitchen, where brisk footsteps testified to the occupant’s
industry.

“Shall I come to your rescue?” was the laughing question.

“Not yet; I’m still able to handle her, though there is no telling how
soon she will get beyond me. I’ll call you if I see signs,” was called
back. “Now go on, you incorrigible woman, and tell your long-suffering
child what bee you have buzzing in your bonnet now. A brand new fall
bonnet, too! It’s outrageous to so misuse it after all the trouble I’ve
been put to to induce you to indulge in it at all, and not sneak off to
Madame Elsie with a lot of old finery to be made over into a creation
warranted (by her) to deceive the keenest eye. Oh, I know your sly ways,
and have to lie awake nights to think how to thwart them. You sly,
wicked woman, to deprive me of my sorely needed rest and beauty sleep.
Why, I’m growing thin—”

“Alas for consistency!” interrupted Mrs. Carruth, derisively. “A moment
ago you assured me you were growing fat. That scores me one, and
entitles me to have my little say-so and hold my own against this
conspiracy of—how many shall I say? Six. Yes, think of the outrageous
odds brought against one weak woman.”

“Weak! Weak! Why, it requires all the energy and shrewdness the combined
force can bring to bear upon her to keep her within bounds, doesn’t it,
Mary?”

“And we don’t always do it then,” was the bantering reply.

“No, we do not,” was the emphatic agreement. “Neither Mammy, Charles,
Eleanor, Jean, Hadyn, you, nor I can feel sure that we have settled her
vaulting ambitions at once and for all time. Is your candy ready for me
yet?—Don’t need me? Very well, I’ll keep at this job, then; it’s a
co-operative job, and the hardest part of it is to hold down my rival.
There, those boxes are all packed, and now, Madame busy-body, I’m ready
to listen. No, you are not going to tie bows while you talk, it gives
you too great an advantage. Look right straight into my eyes, and while
you confess your desires to transgress you shall keep up a sub-conscious
train of thought along this line: ‘This is my second daughter, Constance
Blairsdale Carruth. She is past nineteen years of age. She weighs one
hundred and eighteen pounds. She still possesses all her faculties
unimpaired. Is endowed (I hope!) with the average degree of intelligence
and common sense. She has never been ill a day in her life (whistle and
knock wood when you think that), and she is taking mighty good care of
the health she enjoys. She has been at work four years transmuting
syrups and sugars into dollars and cents, in which undertaking she has
met with rather amazing success, and is going to meet with even greater.
Her plan is to make one dear, blessed little mother quite independent,
and—please God—(these words were spoken in a mere whisper)—she will
compass it. Now, are you going to let her do all this quite untrammeled,
or are you going to worry her by suggesting all manner of wild plans for
doing things for yourself?”

Constance had risen from her chair while speaking, and dropped upon her
knees before her mother to clasp her arms about her waist and look into
the face she loved best on earth. The girl’s expression was half grave,
half merry, though wholly sweet and winning.

Mrs. Carruth took the upraised face in both her hands, bent toward it,
rested her lips upon the soft, silky hair, and said gently:

“Dear heart, dear heart; my dauntless little daughter. Yes, you _are_
doing all and far more than you have said, and that is exactly the
reason I wish to contribute my share. Can’t you see, dear, that I feel
such a dull, dull drone in this busy hive?”

“Dull?—when you keep the hive in such running order that we never even
suspect where the machinery which runs it is located. Dull?—when you
keep our home as charming in every detail as it was when you had ample
means at your command to conduct it. Dull?—when you are here every
moment as its sweet and gracious head to make it such a home as few know
in this northern world, where homes for the most part mean simply a roof
to cover one, and under which food is served three times daily. Mother,
can’t you see and feel what you are doing for us girls? How you are
surrounding us with an atmosphere so beautiful, so exceptional in these
days of hurry and bustle that its influence must bide with us all our
days and remain a dear memory all our lives? We may leave it sooner or
later, other duties may call us away, but nothing, nothing can ever
deprive us of all this—” Constance raised one arm to sweep it
comprehensively over the room in which they sat and all-embracingly
beyond. “So please let all rest as it is. Let Nonnie work away at
college, and later—” here a merry twinkle filled the girl’s eyes—“let
her, well, let her take up the co-ed plan, if she likes. Things seem
shaping that way if the signs can be trusted. Let me boil a way to fame
and fortune. Let Jean—if Fate so decrees—though by the same token I’ve a
notion she won’t, follow in Nonnie’s footsteps. Alack! Jean’s energies
do not point toward the campus of —— college. I misdoubt,” and Constance
smiled. Then, turning serious again, she resumed: “Will you promise me
something?”

“Will you first listen to my little plan?” was her mother’s counter
question.

“Yes, I’ll listen.”

“You know how I delight in fancy work, dear, and there is such a field
for embroidery and other kinds I do so well. The Woman’s Exchange, you
know.”

“You may do all you want to—yards, pounds, dozens, heaps—however it is
described—but you must do it for _our_ home, not other people’s. I’ll
tell you what you may do, all against the coming climax, for it is
coming, you mark my words: You begin right now and make dozens of the
daintiest pieces of underwear imaginable—”

“Oh, Constance!” cried Mrs. Carruth, reproachfully, the softest rose
creeping into her cheeks.

“Can’t help it!” protested Constance. “I know that co-ed plan will
develop. My heart! Do you think I’m blind as a bat? When a man bids a
girl good-bye at a railway station and helps her on board the
smoking-car instead of the Pullman, and neither of them knows the
difference—well. You just wait till spring, my lady. It is a case of ‘I
smell a mouse, I feel him in the air,’ etc., get busy, Mumsey, get busy.
The entire winter won’t be too long, I tell you; for when that explosion
takes place it will be with a bang, you mark my words.”

“Connie, Connie, this is dreadful!”

“May be,” answered Constance, wagging her head dubiously; “but I’m
afraid we must resign ourselves to it. Mercy only knows how she will
come home at Thanksgiving. I believe he is to meet her. I’m prepared for
a box car or even a flat car. Yes, it is dreadful, you are quite right.
Wonder how it will affect me if I ever succumb? But take my advice, get
busy, Mumsey, and, dear, remember this—” Swiftly the tone changed from
the jesting one to the tenderest as the girl rested her head upon her
mother’s shoulder: “You represent _home_ to us girls. Without you it
would be the harp without its strings, the organ without its pipes. It
would disintegrate. Keep it for us. Try to feel that you are doing far
more in our busy hive by just being our Queen Bee than you ever could by
going abroad in the land to gather the honey. Let _us_ do that, and
remember this—I read it not long ago and I’ll never forget it:—

      “‘The beautiful gracious mother,
        Wherever she places her chair,
      In the kitchen (this one) or the parlor,
        The center of home is there.’

“Ready for me in there, Mary? Mother is perishing for occupation, and
I’ve scolded her as much as I dare,” and, with a tender kiss upon her
mother’s cheek, the girl ran swiftly into the next room.




CHAPTER V

MAMMY MAKES INVESTIGATIONS.


“Bress de Lord, we ain’t got ter run no counter on Thanksgiving Day!”
was Mammy’s fervent exclamation, as she rose from her bed on the Monday
preceding Thanksgiving Day. Hurrying across the room she opened the
draughts in the little stove, for Charles’ rheumatic twinges must not be
aggravated by the sudden chill of rising from a warm bed to dress in a
cold room. The fire had been carefully covered the night before, and
now, replenished by a few shovelfuls of coal, and a vigorous shake of
the revolving grate, was soon snapping and roaring right comfortably.
The rattling had served more than one end, as had the clatter made by
putting on the fresh fuel. Although Mammy had no idea of permitting her
spouse to contract a cold from dressing in a cold room, she, on the
other hand, saw no reason why he should indulge in over-many morning
winks after she, herself, had risen and begun the duties of the day.

“Eh? Um, yas, Honey,” came in somnolent tones from the billows of
feathers in which Charles’ shiny bald pate, with its fringe of snowy
wool, was nearly buried. Mammy could not abide the new-fangled hair
mattresses, but clung tenaciously to her bygone ideas of “real downright
comfort fer a body dat’s clar beat out when de day’s done. No, sir-ee!
Don’t talk ter me ob dese hyar ha’r mattresses. I ain’t got a mite er
use fer ’em needer has Charles, _if I ses-so_. Give me de suah ’nough
fedders wid de down on ’em; none ob yo’ hawse ha’r stuffed bags. De
fedders fits wherever dey teches, ’an snugs up mighty soft on de achy
spots, but dose highfalutin’ h’ar mattresses,—well, dey jest lak dese
hyar Norf folks we meet up wid: ef yo’ kin fit _dem_, well an’ good,
yo’s all right, but does yo’ t’ink dey’s gwine ter try fer ter fit yo’?
Go ’long, chile.”

Consequently the bed, which stood in the bedroom of the little cottage
in which Mammy and Charles lived, boasted a feather bed, the like of
which for downiness and size was rarely seen. It had been made by Mammy
herself of the downiest of feathers, plucked by her own hand from the
downiest of her own geese, hatched under her own critical eyes when she
was a young woman on her old master’s plantation. It had taken many
geese, many days, much drying and curing to achieve such a triumph; and
the “baid” was Mammy’s most cherished possession. The airings, sunnings,
beatings and renovatings to which it had been subjected during the years
she had owned it would have totally wrecked any less perfect article of
household economy; but it had survived all, and each morning, after its
prescribed hours of airing, was “spread up” into a most imposing mound,
covered with a “croshey” spread, made by the sanctified hands of “ol’
Miss” (Mrs. Carruth’s mother), and still further adorned by “piller
shams,” made by “Miss Jinny” herself.

More than one of Mrs. Carruth’s guests had been conducted through
Mammy’s cottage by its proud inmate, and the “baid” and its coverings
displayed with justifiable pride.

“Yas, wake up!” commanded Mammy, making her own toilet with despatch.
“We’s got a pile o’ wo’k ter do terday, an’ I’se gotter see dat dose no
count nigger gals what’s a-pertendin’ ter do Miss Jinny’s wo’k
now-a-days gits a move on ’em. Dey pesters me mightily, dough I ain’t
let ’em ’spect it, I tells yo’. Ef I did dey’d jes nachelly climb right
ober de house an’ ebery las’ pusson in it. But I knows how ter han’le
’em ef Miss Jinny don’t. She t’ink she gwine do it jes lak she useter
back yonder on her Pa’s plantation, but it don’ do up hyar. Trouble is
wid dese hyar Norf niggers dey ain’ know dey _is_ niggers, and dey gits
mighty mix in dey minds twell somebody come along and tells ’em jest
’zackly what dey is, an’ whar dey b’longs at. I done tol’ dem two in
yonder, an’ I reckon dey’s learnt a heap since I done took ’em in han’.
Yas, I does. Dey don’ come a-splurgin’ an’ a-splutterin’ roun’ me no mo’
wid dey, ‘Dis hyar ain’ ma juty. I ain’ ’gaged fer ter do dat wuk.’ My
Lawd! I come pretty nigh bustin’ dat Lilly May’s haid las’ week when I
tell her ter do sumpin’ an’ she say dat ter me. She foun’ out what her
juty was, an’ she ain’t fergit it again, I tell yo’. Now come ’long
down, Charles, I gwine have brekfus ready befo’ yo’ get yo’ wool
breshed,” and off hurried the old woman to begin the routine of her more
than busy day.

The clock was striking five when Charles came slowly down the stairs and
entered the immaculate kitchen. The past three years have dealt kindly
with the old couple in spite of their incessant labors. Mammy has not
changed in the least. Charles is a trifle more bent, perhaps, but the
three years have certainly not detracted from the old man’s appearance,
nor have they robbed him of any strength. Indeed, he seems in better
health and physical condition than upon the day he celebrated his golden
wedding. Mammy has made up for the lost years by caring for him as she
would have cared for a child.

The business which they started in the Arcade has flourished and
prospered beyond their wildest hopes. Charles still holds the honorary
position of “Janitor-in-Chief” at the Arcade, a sinecure in every sense
of the word excepting one; he keeps the acting janitor up to the high
mark in the performance of _his_ duties, greatly to Mr. Porter’s
amusement. He also keeps the dapper mulatto youth, who now serves at the
lunch counter headed due north. To that young man Charles is “Mr.
Devon,” of the firm of “Blairsdale & Devon.”

At the cottage Mammy still cooks, bakes, preserves and concocts with all
her wonderful skill, assisted by a little colored girl, the eldest of
those whom Jean impressed upon Mammy’s wedding day.

Oh, Mammy is a most important personage these days.

Breakfast over in the little cottage, and it was a breakfast fit for a
king, Mammy began issuing her orders like a general, and Charles lived
only to obey.

“Now hike in dar an’ git de furnace a-goin’ good, an’ den go ’long ter
de gre’t house an’ have it good an’ warm befo’ dem chillern wakes up. I
cyant have em’ ketchin’ cold, an’ de mawnin’s right snappy,” she said,
as dish-towel in hand she looked out of her kitchen door at the
glistening world, for a heavy hoar frost covered lawn and foliage,
prophesying a storm before many days.

“Here, put on yo’ coat! What’s de use ob my rubbin’ yo’ shoulder wid
linnimint ef yo’ gwine right spang out dis here warm kitchen inter de
chill ob de mawnin’ widout wroppin’ up? Laws-a-massy, it tek mos’ de
whole endurin’ time ter keep you from doin’ foolishnesses, I clar it
do.”

Charles chuckled delightedly. It was, on the whole, rather flattering to
be so cherished and looked after as he had been during the last three
years. Poor old soul, those he had spent alone had been barren enough of
care or comforts.

“You needn’t ter snort dat-a-way,” protested his dominating wife. “I’s
only jes’ a-watchin’ out fer my _own_ sake. I’se got a sight ter do
’sides nussin’ rheumatics an’ tekin’ keer sick folks wid a misery in dey
backs.”

“Honey, yo’s a wonder. Yas, yo’ _is_,” was Charles’ parting rejoinder,
as he toddled off to the duties, which to him, as well as to Mammy, were
labors of love. Before many minutes had passed the little candy kitchen
was snug and warm for its mistress, and then the old man made his way to
the “gre’t house,” as he and Mammy, true to earlier customs, always
called the home which sheltered their white folks. Mammy had already
finished her own household tasks and met him at the door. Together they
entered the silent house, their key making not the slightest sound, lest
they disturb the sleeping inmates. The maids now in Mrs. Carruth’s
service did not sleep in the house, but came at seven each morning, and
woe betide the tardy one! Mammy was always on hand, and her greeting was
governed by the moment of the said damsel’s arrival. There were a few
duties, however, which Mammy would permit no other than herself to
perform. She must see that the breakfast table was properly laid, the
breakfast under way and the rooms dusted, aired and warmed before she
stole softly upstairs to call her “chillern.” Then she turned all over
to her dusky satellites, and at once became grand high potentate and
autocrat.

It was a few minutes past seven when she entered Mrs. Carruth’s room
with a cheery “Mawnin’, honey. ’Spose ef I lets yo’ sleep any longer yo’
gwine give me sumpin’ I ain’t cravin’ fer ter git. Cyant fer de life er
me see why yo’ boun’ ter git up dese mawnin’s. Why won’ yo’ let me bring
up yo’ tray, honey?” said the good old soul, moving softly about the
room, raising the window shades and turning on the valve of the
radiator.

“Because I have all I can do as it is to keep you and the girls from
spoiling me completely,” returned Mrs. Carruth, as she rose from her bed
and stepped into the adjoining bathroom, where Mammy already had her
bath prepared.

“Well, it’s de biggest job we-all ever is tackled,” insisted the old
woman, as she placed a chair before the dressing table and took from the
closet the garments Mrs. Carruth would need for the day. Since sunnier
times had come to this home Mammy had fallen back into old habits. The
“chillern,” as she called Eleanor, Constance and Jean, were called
before their mother was awakened, but “Miss Jinny” claimed her undivided
attention, and it would have nearly broken Mammy’s loving old heart had
Mrs. Carruth denied her this privilege, so long made impossible by the
strenuous days and manifold duties following upon the misfortunes which
succeeded Mr. Carruth’s death.

The delight of Mammy’s life was to assist at her “Miss Jinny’s” toilet,
as she had done in her mistress’ girlhood days—to brush and arrange the
still abundant hair, and to hand her a fresh handkerchief and say, as
she had said to the young girl years ago:

“Gawd bless yo’, honey! Yo’ is as sweet as de roses dis mawnin’.”

When all was completed to her satisfaction, and Mrs. Carruth was about
to leave the room, Mammy remarked, with well-assumed indifference:

“I ’spose dat Lilly done got Miss Nonnie’s room all fix jes right, but I
reckons I better cas’ ma eyes ober it; cyant trus’ dese girls wid no
’sponserbility, nohow.”

“I think everything is in perfect order, Mammy, but I dare say you will
feel happier if you give those little touches which you alone can give.
Eleanor will recognize them and be happier because you gave them. It
will be a joy to us all to have her back again, won’t it, although she
has not been away so very long after all.”

“No’m, she ain’t. How long she gwine be wid us dis time?”

“Not quite a week, Mammy. She will reach here this afternoon and must
leave us early Saturday; Thanksgiving holidays are short ones. We shall
have her longer at Christmas, then we will count the days till Easter,
and after that to June, when we will have her for a long, long holiday,
and college days will be ended.”

“M’m-u’m,” nodded Mammy, drawing the coverings from the bed and laying
them carefully over chairs to air. “Spec she’ll find dat trip down from
up yonder mighty tiresome. Trabblin’ all alone is sort of frazzlin’.”

“She is hardly likely to travel alone. Mammy. So many of her college
mates will be journeying the same way, and even if they were not, she
will be pretty sure to meet Mr. Forbes; he was obliged to run up to
Springfield on Saturday and expects to return to-day. They may meet on
the same train.”

Mammy was looking out of the window. It would have made very little
difference had she been facing Mrs. Carruth. Her face was absolutely
inscrutable, as she answered:

“’Spec dat would save Miss Nonnie a heap ob trouble. Yas’m, mebbe dey
will meet up wid one anoder.”

Mrs. Carruth went upon her way to the breakfast room. Mammy had learned
all she wished to know.

At four o’clock that afternoon Miss Jean Carruth was perched upon her
point of vantage, from which every object approaching her home could be
descried. It was not a particularly easy point to reach, but that only
added to its attraction; nobody else was likely to choose it. Nearly
everyone sought the terrace, the piazza, or the upper windows in
preference to the stable roof, even though the stable roof boasted a
delightful assortment of gables and dormer windows, to say nothing of a
broad gutter, around which one could prance at the imminent risk of a
header to the ground, at least twelve feet below. In the golden haze of
that mellow November afternoon, for autumn lingered late this year, Jean
sat curled up in her corner, her chin resting in her palms, and her
wonderful eyes fixed upon the road leading up the hill to her home. It
was in reality more street than road, but was nearly always mentioned as
the “hill road,” owing to its contrast to the broader highway from which
it branched and zig-zagged up the hill to the more sparsely settled
section of Riveredge. The watcher commanded all its length. Presently
the shining eyes lighted up with a queer, half-delighted, half-defiant
expression. Far down the road a vehicle was approaching; it was one of
the railroad station surreys, and in it were seated two people, besides
the driver: two people quite oblivious to all the rest of the world, if
one could judge by their absorbing interest in each other, for the keen
eyes watching them could discern this, even from their owner’s distance
from the surrey.

“Um.” The utterance might be interpreted almost any way. Then, “_Now_, I
dare say, we’ve got to have him here all this evening, and all
to-morrow, and all the next day, and all every day; and I don’t want him
around every single minute. My goodness, it was bad enough before Nonnie
left for —— College; we never could get a single word in edgeways. I
wonder if he’s going to board here? I used to like him when he just came
to see us all, but now he’s tickled to death if everybody’s engaged when
he shows up; _everybody but Nonnie_. I reckon I’ve got to take things in
hand. Nonnie’s only twenty-one, and he’s, he’s? I do believe he’s about
_forty-one_, though I never could get him to tell. But it doesn’t make
any difference! He’s too old for Nonnie, and I’m not going to let him
have her,” was the emphatic conclusion to this monologue, as Jean
scrambled to her feet and gave a defiant nod toward the vehicle, which
had just drawn up in front of the carriage block. At that moment Mrs.
Carruth and Constance hurried down the steps to greet the new arrivals.
Evidently the welcome accorded the masculine member of the party aroused
a keen sense of resentment in Jean, and some manner of outlet for her
feelings became imperative. Physical exercise was her usual
safety-valve, and in this instance she chose one which had on former
occasions proved effective, and more than once brought Mammy to the
verge of nervous prostration, and the dire prophecy that “sooner or
later dat chile gwine brek her neck.” As before stated, the gutter was
wide, it was also a stoutly constructed one of galvanized iron, but it
had _not_ been designed for a promenade, much less a running track for
athletic training. Nevertheless, it had to serve as one this time, for
Jean started running around it as though bent upon its destruction, or
her own. It came near proving her own, for just as Homer Forbes was
placing a couple of suit cases upon the piazza he chanced to catch sight
of the prancing demoiselle, and with a shout of: “Great Josephus! Are
you courting sudden death?” made a wild dash for the stable.

With a defiant skip, Jean made for the other side at top speed, lost her
balance, slipped, and the next second was hanging suspended by her arms
between earth and sky. Had she not been lithe as a cat she never could
have saved herself. Forbes was nearly petrified.

“Hang on! Confound it, what took you up there, anyway?” he cried, with
no little asperity, as the others hurried across the lawn to the trapeze
performer’s rescue.

“My feet took me up and my hands are keeping me here. Stand from under!
I’m going to drop.”

“Drop nothing!” was the very un-savant like retort. “You’ll break both
your legs. Hold on till I can get up there,” and the would-be rescuer
darted within the stable.

How she managed it no one could quite grasp, but there was a flutter of
skirts, a swing, and Jean was in a little heap upon the soft turf.
Springing lightly to her feet and dusting the grass from her palms, she
said:

“Hello, Nonnie! I got _him_ out of the way long enough to hug you
without having him watch how it’s done. Reckon he’ll learn soon enough
without me to teach him. Come on into the house, quick. He’ll find out
that I’m not killed when he looks out of the window.”

If Mrs. Carruth seemed resigned, Constance quite convulsed and Eleanor
unduly rosy, Jean seemed oblivious of those facts.




CHAPTER VI

THANKSGIVING.


With the happier outlook resulting from Constance’s success in her
candy-making, it had been deemed advisable to send Jean to the private
school from which Eleanor had graduated. Consequently, that autumn Jean
had been enrolled among its pupils, and her place in the public school
at which she and Constance had been pupils knew her no more, and Jean
was much divided in her mind as to whether she was made happier or
otherwise by the change. In the old school were many friends whom she
loved dearly, and whom she missed out of her daily life. In the new one
was her boon companion, Amy Fletcher, and also a number of the girls
whom she constantly met in the homes of her mother’s friends. But Jean
was a loyal little soul, and her interest in her fellow-beings a lively
one. She could hardly have been her mother’s daughter otherwise.
Naturally in the public school were many children from the less
well-to-do families of Riveredge, and not a few from those in very
straitened circumstances. Among the latter were three girls very near
Jean’s own age. They were sisters, and were ambitious to complete the
grammar school course, in order to fit themselves for some employment.
There were other children older and other children younger; in fact,
there seemed to be no end to the children in the Hodgeson family, a new
one arriving upon the scene with the punctuality of clockwork. This fact
had always disturbed Jean greatly.

“If there only _would_ come an end to the Hodgesons,” she lamented to
her mother. “The trouble is, we no sooner get settled down and think
we’ve reached the end than we have to begin all over again. Those babies
keep things terribly stirred up. Don’t you think you could make Mrs.
Hodgeson understand that she could get on with fewer of them, Mother?
You see, the clothes never do hold out, and as for that last baby
carriage you managed to get for her, why, it’s just a wreck already. The
other day, when I went by there on my way to the Irving School, I saw
Billy Hodgeson riding the newest and the next newest, and the _third_
newest in it, and the third newest had a puppy in his arms. No carriage
could stand all that, could it?”

“I’m afraid not, dear. Perhaps we had better ask some other friends if
they have a carriage they no longer need.”

“Oh, no, don’t! Please, don’t! If you do, Mrs. Hodgeson will think she’s
got to get a brand new baby to put into it, for the old babies wouldn’t
match, you know. No, please, don’t.”

“Very well; we must let them get on with the old ones, both babies and
carriage, I see,” Mrs. Carruth answered, much amused.

“Yes, I really would; but here is something that’s bothering me,” and
Jean snuggled close into the encircling arms of the big chair in which
she and her mother sat for this twilight hour conference.

“What are they going to do when Thanksgiving Day comes? No turkey on
earth would be big enough to go ’round, even if they could buy one,
which I don’t believe they can. I was talking to Mrs. Hodgeson about it
just the other day, and she said she was afeered her man couldna buy one
nohow this year; they was so terrible intortionate in the prices,”
concluded Jean, lapsing unconsciously into the slipshod Mrs. Hodgeson’s
vernacular.

“I think she must have meant extortionate,” corrected Mrs. Carruth.

“Perhaps she did; I don’t know. But I’ll bet five cents they won’t have
a thing when the day comes around, and I think that’s awful.”

“We are sending out a number of baskets from the church, and I have
asked that one be sent to the Hodgesons,” was Mrs. Carruth’s hopeful
reply. It was not welcomed as she anticipated.

“That won’t do a bit of good,” answered Jean, with a dubious shake of
her copper-tinted head. “Not a _single bit_, for when Mrs. Hodgeson said
she reckoned they’d have to get along without a turkey I said right off
that I thought I could manage one all right, ’cause you could get one
sent to her. My, but she got mad! And she told me she guessed she could
get along without no charity turkey; that Hodgeson always _had_ managed
to fill up the young ones somehow, and if he couldn’t do it on turkey
this year he could do it on salt pork. Ugh! Wouldn’t that be awful? Why,
Mammy won’t have salt pork near her except for seasoning use, as she
calls it. No, we’ve got to do something else for those everlasting
Hodgesons.”

Mrs. Carruth thought the term well applied, even though she did not say
so; they were everlasting. But she was hardly prepared for Jean’s
solution of the problem with which she had seen fit to burden her
youthful shoulders.

Mrs. Carruth’s Thanksgiving guests were Hadyn Stuyvesant and Homer
Forbes. Her table was laid for six, and a pretty table it was,
suggestive in its decorations of the day. According to her Southern
traditions, the meal was ordered for two o’clock instead of the more
fashionable hour favored by her Northern friends. Her guests had
arrived, and Charles, the very personification of the old family
servitor, had just announced with all the elegance and mannerism of
which he was capable:

“De Madam is sarved.”

Upon this day Mammy had taken affairs strictly into her own hands. No
one except herself should prepare her Miss Jinny’s Thanksgiving dinner.
The other servants might assist Charles in serving it, but the actual
preparation and cooking must be done by her own faithful hands.
Consequently all the marketing for this occasion had been personally
looked to by Mammy and Charles. In their chariot of state, drawn by
Baltie, they had driven to South Riveredge, selected every article, and
carried it home in their own baskets. Once that lordly turkey had been
scientifically poked and pinched by her and met with approval, she was
not going to let it out of her sight “an’ have no secon’-rater sont up
to de house instid.” Mammy had small faith in Northern tradesmen. So to
her cabin all had been sent, there to be prepared and cooked by her on
“de fines’ range in de worl’!” as she confidently believed her own to
be, and truly it was a wondrous feast which now stood ready for Charles’
serving, the two maids to dart like shuttles between Mammy’s cabin and
the great house.

It was Hadyn Stuyvesant who with graceful bow offered his arm to Mrs.
Carruth, while Homer Forbes turned to the two girls. As she rose to
accept Hadyn’s arm Mrs. Carruth paused a moment, doubt and indecision in
her eyes, and asked:

“Where is Jean?”

“She left the room just a short time ago, mother. Shall I call her?”
asked Constance.

“Yes, do, dear. We will wait just a moment for you.”

Constance left the room, to return in two minutes with consternation
written upon her face.

“Where is she and what—?” asked Mrs. Carruth, resignation to any
possibility descending upon her.

“She has just come in, mother, and—and—” the words ended in a laugh as
Constance collapsed upon a chair.

“What is it, Connie?” demanded Eleanor. “What has Jean done now?”

“Where’s my little sister?” asked Hadyn. “You can’t make me believe she
has broken all the laws of the Medes and Persians.”

“No, not those old fogies, but, oh, dear, what do you suppose she has
done?—invited, sans ceremony, Victoria Regina, Mary Stuart, and Adelaide
Elizabeth Hodgeson to dine with her!”

“Constance! Never!” cried Mrs. Carruth.

“She has. They are up in her room this very minute putting the finishing
touches to their very unique toilets.”

“Go get ’em. Fetch ’em on. We’ll entertain ’em right royally! I know
that National bird is a bouncer, and big enough to feed a dozen
Hodgesons as well as all present,” was Hadyn’s laughing command.

“Oh, Hadyn, we can’t,” protested Eleanor, whose dignity and sense of
propriety were continually receiving slight jars from this friend of the
household.

“Why not? It will be the experience of their lives—an education by
practical illustration of manners polite. How can you hesitate, Eleanor?
I thought you were a strong advocate of settlement work, and here you
are overlooking an opportunity sent to your very door. Who was it I
heard talking about ‘neglected opportunities’ not long since? A most
edifying dissertation, if I recollect aright, too.”

“I second the motion. Such a zest to a meal may never again be offered.
Yes, Mrs. Carruth, you’ve got it to do. It is clearly a duty brought to
your door,” added Homer Forbes. “Moreover, it will give me a wonderful
opportunity to pursue my psychological studies. Didn’t know I was
knee-deep in them, did you, Eleanor? Fact, however. Human emotions as
the direct result of unsuspected mental suggestion, etc. Bring on your
subjects, Constance.”

“I give in. Do as you’ve a mind to, you incorrigible children, only bear
this in mind—you are _not_ to tease those girls and make them miserable.
Jean has made one wild break, but there shall be no more if I can
prevent it. Since she has brought them here, and you _will_ dine with
them, so be it; but you are not to tease them, you madcap men,” was Mrs.
Carruth’s final dictum.

“Not a tease, not a smile out of order,” agreed Hadyn, though his
twinkling eyes half belied his words.

“You just watch us entertain ’em,” insisted Homer.

“I’ll watch, you may be sure of that,” laughed Mrs. Carruth. “Now fly,
Connie, and summon our unexpected guests.”

We will pass over the oysters, which were disposed of as never before
oysters had been, and the soup, which disappeared audibly. That dinner
was a genuine Southern one, and no item was lacking. At length arrived
the critical moment when the bird of national fame should have appeared,
but—didn’t. There was a long, ominous delay. Charles bustled and fussed
about, one eye upon his mistress, the other upon the pantry. No one
noticed that Jean’s conversational powers, never mediocre, were now
phenomenal. She talked incessantly and as rapidly as a talking machine,
albeit her listeners seemed to offer small encouragement for such a
ceaseless flow of language. They sat with their eyes fastened to their
plates—plates which would require very little scraping before washing.
To and from pantry and dining room vibrated Charles. The vegetables,
relishes, jellies—in short, everything to be served with the turkey—was
placed in tempting array upon the sideboard; but still no sign of the
festive bird itself, and Charles’ perturbation was increasing by the
second. As on many another occasion it was Mammy who supplied the
climax. At this crucial moment she appeared in the doorway of the
pantry, her eyes blazing, her face a thundercloud, as she stammered:

“Miss Jin-n-n-ninny! M-m-iss Jinny! Please, ma’am, fergive me fer
’trudin’ in ’pon yo’ when yo’ is entertainin’; but ’tain’t lak dey was
strangers, dey’s all ob de family, so to speak, ma’am” (Mammy was too
excited to notice that the cheeks of two individuals seated at that
board had turned a rosy, rosy pink), “an’ I jes’ natchelly _got_ to
speak ma min’ or bus’—”

“Why, Mammy, what has happened?” interrupted Mrs. Carruth, quite aware
that Mammy managed to find mares’ nests when others were unable to do
so, but surprised by this one, nevertheless. Mammy did not often
overstep the lines set by convention; but on this occasion she certainly
seemed tottery.

“De bird! De tuckey! It’s gone! It’s done been stole right out ob ma
wamin oven yonder. I done had it all cook to a tu’n, an’ set up in ma
oven fer ter keep it jes’ ter de true livin’ p’int ob sarvin’, an den I
run inter Miss Connie’s kitchen fer ter git some ob dem little frilly
papers I need fer its laigs, an—an’ it mus’ ’a’ been stole whilst I was
in dar, er else de very debbil hisself done fly away wid it right from
unner ma nose, kase I ain’t been outer dat kitchen one single minnit
since—not one!” emphasized Mammy, with a wag of her turbaned head, her
talking machine running down simply because her breath had given out.

If poor Mammy had needed anything to further outrage her feelings and
put a climax to her very real distress, the roar which at that instant
arose from two masculine throats would have been more than enough; but
when Homer Forbes turned a reproachful face toward her and asked, “Mammy
Blairsdale, do you mean to tell me that our goose—”

“No, sah! No, sah! de _tuckey_!” corrected Mammy instantly.

“Well, then, our turkey is cooked—”

“Cooked! Cooked! Ef it was only de _cookin’_ dat pestered me I wouldn’t
be pestered,” was Mammy’s Hibernian reply. “It’s done been _stole_, sah!
Clean, cl’ar stole out ob ma kitchen.”

“Let’s go find the thief, Forbes!” cried Hadyn, casting his napkin upon
the table and springing to his feet. “Come on. Mammy, whom do you
suspect? Which way shall we run? What must we do with him when we
overhaul him?”

“Oh, yo’ jes’ a-projeckin, I knows dat all right, but I tells you dat
bird ain’ got no ekal in dis town. I done supervise his p’ints masef,
an’ he’s de best to be had. If yo’ wants to know who I thinks is got
him, I thinks it’s a man what done stop at ma door when I was a-stuffin’
dat tucky early dis mawnin’. He was a tromp, an’ he ax me fer somethin’
ter eat. I ain’t ginnerly got no use fer tromps, but dis hyer was de
Thanksgivin’ mawnin’, an’ seem lak I couldn’t turn him away hungry.”

“We’ll find him! Come on, Forbes! Where’s that stout walking-stick, Mrs.
Carruth? Bring along the wheelbarrow for the remains, Charles—of the
turkey, I mean.”

Haydn was making for the door, Forbes hard upon his heels, when Jean
darted to her mother’s side to draw her head toward her and whisper
something into the listening ear. Jean’s guests sat like graven images.
Constance and Eleanor were ready to shriek at the absurdity of the
situation.

“Hadyn, Homer, come back! Mammy, send in the quail pie and all the other
good things you’ve prepared; we shall not starve. Ladies and gentlemen,
circumstances render explanations somewhat embarrassing at this moment.
Don’t be distressed, Mammy. On with the feast, Charles.

“Why? what? where? who?” were the words which rattled about Mrs.
Carruth’s ears.

Mammy gave one glance at Jean, who had returned to her seat. She had not
been in this family sixty-eight years without arrogating a few
prerogatives. Then, but for Mrs. Carruth’s upraised hand, Etna would
have broken forth. But Jean knew her hour of reckoning would come later.
Her conversational powers seemed to have suffered a reaction. Her chair
was next Hadyn’s. As he returned to his place he bent low, slipped his
arm about the subdued little figure, and asked in a tone which it would
have been hard to resist:

“Little Sister, what did you do with that turkey?”

“Rolled it in a big towel, put it in a basket, and carried it to the
Hodgesons’ with mother’s Thanksgiving compliments, when I went after the
girls. They wouldn’t eat a _charity_ turkey, but a compliment turkey was
different,” was whispered back in a voice suspiciously charged with
tears.

“I call you a trump!” Then in a lower tone he turned to Constance, who
sat at the other side, and said: “Who gives himself with his gift,
serves three.”




CHAPTER VII

EXPANSION.


The short Thanksgiving holiday ended, Eleanor returned to college and
Jean to school, found Constance busier than ever in her kitchen, for the
holiday season was her hardest time, and this year promised to be an
exceptional one. An extra supply of candy must be made for the booth in
the Arcade, as well as for those who sold her candies on commission in
other towns. Then, too, an unusual number of private orders had already
come in. These all meant incessant work for Constance and Mary Willing.

The first week in December she entered the kitchen where Mary was just
cutting into squares great masses of chocolate caramels. She had been
hard at work all the morning, and her face was flushed from her
exertions.

“Oh, I’m afraid you are nearly done up,” cried Constance, contritely.
“You have been working so hard ever since eight o’clock, and it is now
past eleven. I am so sorry to leave all this work to you while I do the
easy part.”

“Do you call it easy work to write about two dozen letters, keep track
of all the orders which are pouring in now, and run accounts
straight?—to say nothing of ordering our supplies. _I_ don’t, and I’m
thanking my lucky stars that I can do _my_ share of the work with a big
spoon instead of a pen,” was Mary’s cheerful reply, as she raised her
arm to push back from her forehead an unruly lock of hair which fell
across her eyes.

“Let me,” said Constance quickly, lifting the soft strand into place.
“You are all sticky, and when one’s hands are sticky that is the time
for hair to grow rampant and one’s nose to itch! I’ve been there too
many times myself not to know all about it, I tell you. But that isn’t
what I came downstairs to say! Do you know that this pile of letters has
set me thinking, Mary? If things go on at this rate you and I can never
in the world handle the business. Why, it has taken me the whole morning
to look after the letters and acknowledge the orders which came by the
early mail. I haven’t been able to do one single stroke in here, and now
I have got to go down to South Riveredge. Charles told Mammy that we
ought to have more space there for our goods, and he wished I would see
Mr. Porter about it at once. He thinks we ought to rent one of the other
spaces for the Christmas season, anyway, and have someone there to
attend to it. What do you think? And do you know of someone we could
get? You see Christmas is only three weeks off, and whatever we do we’ve
got to do at once.”

As Constance talked she wielded a big knife and helped briskly. Mary did
not answer at once; her pretty forehead wore a perplexed pucker. At
length she said:

“I know a girl who could take charge of it I think, although I don’t
know whether you’d like her or not.”

Constance smiled as she answered: “Suppose you tell me who she is, then
maybe I can tell you whether I like her or not.”

“It’s Kitty Sniffins. We used to go to school together.”

“I don’t know her at all, so I’m a poor judge of her qualifications, am
I not? But if you think she is the sort of girl we would like to have
there, I am sure she needs no other recommendation, Mary. What is her
address?”

“Her brother is an insurance agent down on State Street. You might see
him. They moved not long ago, and I don’t know where they live now.”

“Oh——,” exclaimed Constance, light beginning to dawn upon her. She had
not heard the name Sniffins since the year in which she began her
candy-making, as the result of the burning of their home, and the name
had not figured very pleasantly in the experience of that October, or
the months which followed. Still, the sister might prove very unlike the
brother, and just now time was precious. If she was to act upon Charles’
suggestion she must act immediately.

“I think I’ll drop her a note in care of her brother; I don’t like to go
to his office. She can call here,” said Constance.

Mary glanced up quickly to ask:

“Is there any reason, Miss Constance, why you would prefer someone
else?” for something in Constance’s tone made her surmise that for some
reason which she failed to comprehend Kitty Sniffins did not meet with
her young employer’s approval.

“If I have one it is too silly to put into words,” laughed Constance,
“so I will not let it influence me. I dare say Kitty Sniffins is a right
nice girl and will sell enough candy to make me open my eyes. At all
events, I’ll have a pow-wow with her. But before she can sell candy or
anything else she must have a place to sell it in, and it’s up to me to
scuttle off to the Arcade as fast as I can go. And, by the way, you’ve
got to have more help here, Mary. Yes, you _have_. You need not shake
your head. As matters are shaping I shall have to give every moment of
my time to the business of this great and glorious enterprise. Now whom
shall I get? What is Fanny doing this fall? She left school in the
spring, didn’t she?”

“Yes. She is helping mother sew, but——” and an eager light sprang into
Mary’s eyes. Fanny Willing was a younger sister, a rather delicate girl,
who was growing more delicate from the hours spent at work in the close
rooms of her home, and running a heavy, old-fashioned sewing machine.
She was a plain, quiet little thing, very unlike her striking-looking
older sister, and as such had not found favor in her mother’s eyes. In
her younger days Mrs. Willing had boasted a certain style of beauty, and
with it had contrived to win a husband whom she felt would elevate her
to a higher social plane, but her hopes had never been realized.
Probably every family has a black sheep; Jim Willing had figured as that
unenviable figure in his. It was the old story of the son born after his
parents had been married a number of years, and several older sisters
were waiting to spoil him; plenty of money to fling about, a wild
college career of two years, marriage with a pretty housemaid
and—disinheritance. It had required only twenty-three years to bring it
all to pass, and the next twenty-three completed the evil. At forty-six
Jim Willing looked like a man of fifty-six—so can dissipation and moral
degeneration set their seal upon their victims. Gentle blood? What had
it done for him? Very little, because he had permitted it to become
hopelessly contaminated. And his children?—they were working out the
problem of heredity; paying the penalties of an earlier generation;
demonstrating the commandment which says, “unto the third and fourth
generation.” A cruel, relentless one, but not to be lightly broken.

In Mary was one illustration of it; Fanny another. Each was to “drie her
weird,” as the Scotch say.

“Do you think your mother can spare her?”

“I’m sure she can. The fact is, Fanny has been trying to get some work
in one of the shops in South Riveredge. Sewing doesn’t agree with her,
somehow; she seems to grow thinner every day; she ain’t—_isn’t_, I
mean—very strong, you see.”

“Will you send word to her, Mary? I think this sort of work will be
better for her than the sewing, and we’ll talk about the salary when she
comes over.”

“She’ll be a mighty lucky girl just to _get_ here, salary or _no_
salary!” was Mary’s positive reply. “If you don’t mind I’ll run down
home this afternoon and tell her to come early to-morrow morning. I’ll
have all this batch made, and the rest can wait until the morning; we’ve
got a good lot ahead already.” Mary’s eagerness manifested itself in her
every action, and Constance nodded a cheerful approval as she laid down
her big knife and turned to leave the kitchen.

“Go ahead, partner, but I must be off now.”

“So the business is expanding?” exclaimed Mr. Porter, heartily, when
Constance had explained to him her wish to rent an arch for her
Christmas trade. “Good! I knew it would. Couldn’t possibly help it with
such candy as that to back it up. But mind, you are not to forget my
Christmas order in all your bustle and hurry for other people. Twenty
pounds——”

“What!” cried Constance, aghast at the recklessness of her oldest
customer.

“Now, that will do, young lady. Will you please answer me this! Why must
I always be looked upon as a mild sort of lunatic when I give you an
order? ’Twas ever thus! Why, you hooted my first order, and you have
kept on hooting every single one since. I wonder I haven’t transferred
my patronage long since. Trouble is you realize where you have me
cornered. You know I can’t duplicate those candies anywhere. Now come
along with me and let us arrange for the new quarters which are to
replace the outgrown ones, and—mark my word—this business will never
again contract to the old space. This is where my business acumen shows
itself. Once I’ve got you into the bigger stand, and the rent into my
coffers, I mean to keep you there, even if I have to get out and drum up
the extra trade to meet the extra outlay. Co-operation.”

Constance was too accustomed to this good friend’s nonsense to see
anything but the deepest interest for her welfare underlying it. She
knew that, with all his seeming badinage, he was looking further ahead
than she, with her still limited experience, even after four years in
her little business world, could look, for her’s, while exceptional for
her years and sex, could never match that of this man of the great,
active business world. But if Mr. Porter was far-seeing in some
directions, in others he was short-sighted, and his range of vision was
to be broadened by one who dwelt in a far humbler walk of life—Mammy
Blairsdale.

Upon this particular morning Mammy had elected to drive in state to
South Riveredge, ostensibly to cast a critical eye over the
Blairsdale-Devon Lunch Counter, but in reality to convey to it a very
special dainty for her pet customer—Hadyn Stuyvesant.

In addition to a few hundred other side issues to her business, Mammy
had raised poultry during the previous summer, and, curiously enough, to
every chick hatched out, there had pecked themselves into the world
about four roosters, until poor Mammy began to believe her setting eggs
must have had a spell cast upon them. As the summer advanced such an
array of lordly, strutting, squawking young cocks never dominated a
poultry yard, and the sequel was inevitable. When they arrived at the
_crowing age_ the neighbors arose in revolt! Such a vociferous,
discordant collection of birds had never fought and crowed themselves
into public notice. Mammy became almost distracted, and was at her wits’
end until a diplomatic move struck her: those roosters should win not
only fame for themselves, but for their owner also; and not long
afterward first one neighbor then another was mollified and highly
flattered to receive a fine daintily broiled, fried, or roasted young
bird, cooked as only Mammy knew how to cook a fowl, garnished as only
Mammy knew how to garnish, and accompanied by a respectful note, _not_
written by Mammy, but by Jean, somewhat in this strain:

“Will Mrs. —— please accept this dish with the most respectful
compliments of Mammy Blairsdale, who _hopes_ this noisy rooster will
never disturb her any more?”

Oh, “sop to Cerberus!” Could diplomacy go further?

It was one of the most vociferous of her flock which now lay upon his
lordly back, his legs pathetically turned to the skies, his fighting and
his squaking days ended forever, that reposed in Mammy’s warming can, to
be transferred to Charles’ warming oven, there to await Hadyn’s arrival.

As Constance and Mr. Porter drew near the lunch counter, Mammy was
giving very explicit directions to Charles. Constance and Mr. Porter
were too occupied to be aware of her presence; not she of theirs,
however.

Mr. Porter conducted Constance to the arch next but one to that in which
the lunch counter stood, only separated from it by the cigar stand.

“Now here is a space which you can have as well as not, and it is close
enough to Charles for him to cast an eye over it from time to time.”

“And may I rent it for one month?” asked Constance.

“Better rent it for one year,” urged Mr. Porter. “It’s in a mighty good
location.”

“And _I_ call it a mighty _po’_ location,” broke in an emphatic voice.
“A _mighty_ po’ one, and no kynd ob a place fo’ one ob ma chillen fer to
be at. _Gobblin_ men-folks hyar at de lunch stan’; _smokin’_ men-folks
at de nex’ one; an’ we kin bress Gawd ef we don’t fin’ oursefs wid
_guzzlin_ men-folks on yonder at de tother side befo’ long.”

“Now, now! Hold on, Mammy! Go slow,” broke in Mr. Porter, laughingly.
“You know the Arcade doesn’t stand for _that_ sort of thing. Don’t hit
us so hard.”

“How I gwine know what it boun’ ter stan’ fer if _it_ lak ter stan’ fer
lettin’ dat chile rint a counter nex’ door to a segar stan’?” snapped
Mammy, her eyes fixed upon the luckless superintendent, personifying the
strongly emphasized _it_.

“Well, it’s lucky we found you here. Now, we never took _that_ side of
the question into consideration, did we, little girl? Yes, I guess
Mammy’s judgment beats ours. Great head! So come on, Mammy, and let us
have your sound advice in this choice of bigger quarters for Miss
Constance. You see, _I_ predict that she will never return to the
smaller ones again.”

“Don’t need no gre’t secon’-sight fer ter make _dat_ out, I reckon,” was
the superior retort.

Mr. Porter looked crushed and then dropped behind Mammy, who went
sailing majestically down the Arcade, to stop at the very first and most
pretentious of all the Arches—one which had been rented until very
recently by a stationer, who had profited so handsomely that he had
built a large shop not far from the Arcade, and now wished to sub-let
this arch until his lease expired. Next to it was a florist’s stand, and
opposite a stationer’s, each of a very high order. Constance stood
aghast at Mammy’s audacity.

“Why, Mammy, this is the highest-priced arch in the Arcade,” she
exclaimed.

“Well, what _dat_ got ter do wid it, Baby? Ain’t your candy _de
highest-priced candy_? _An’ ain’ you de very high-water mark quality?_
Who gwine ter ’spute dat? Go ’long an’ rint yo’ place; yo’ all matches
p’intedly,” and with this speech Mammy stalked back to her own quarters.

Constance gave one look at Mr. Porter, then sank upon one of the little
benches within the arch.

“By George, she’s right and I’m a blockhead! Think I’d better turn over
my job to her and go down into the engine-room until I learn to read
human nature as _she_ can. Yes, it is the finest, highest-priced arch in
the building, but it didn’t take that old black woman five seconds to
discover the match for it.”

“But, Mr. Porter,” protested Constance, “of all the extravagant steps,
and for Mammy, above all others, to urge it. That conservative creature!
And the way she expressed it! _Why_ was I born a Blairsdale? It will
shorten my years, I know, to have to live up to the name,” and Constance
broke into a merry laugh.

“Perhaps the burden will be lifted before long, and such a calamity to
your friends averted,” answered Mr. Porter, soberly, but with twinkling
eyes. The one o’clock whistle had just blown in a building hard by, and
the Arcade’s elevator was beginning to bring down the people from the
floors above. Among them was Hadyn Stuyvesant, who went at once to the
luncheon counter, quite unaware of the presence of a certain little lady
near the entrance of the Arcade; but her back was toward the elevator.
For one second she glanced at Mr. Porter entirely innocent of the
purport of his words. Then, catching sight of the mischievous eyes
twinkling at her, she rose suddenly to her feet, saying: “Come at once
and let me learn what this rash step will cost me.”

With a low laugh Mr. Porter strode toward his office beside a very
rosy-cheeked young girl.




CHAPTER VIII

VAULTING AMBITIONS.


In the course of a few days Constance’s new quarters in the Arcade were
in operation, for Mr. Porter lost no time in fitting up Arch Number One.
The little booth beneath the stairs was dismantled to furnish forth the
new one. Down at the kitchen Mary and her sister Fanny, who had come to
assist in the work, were doing their best to keep abreast of the orders
pouring in with each mail, while Mrs. Carruth, her ambitions at length
achieved, was attending to the correspondence, since Constance’s time
must for a little while be given to the new booth. She had not received
a reply to her letter to Kitty Sniffins, and for the time being was too
occupied with the demands of the new booth to take further steps in the
matter. Indeed, she had about made up her mind to look for someone else,
once order was brought out of the confusion of moving and settling, for
some indefinable instinct caused her to feel an aversion to engaging
Kitty Sniffins. Had she been asked to state why, she would have found it
difficult to put her objection into actual words, and more than once she
reproached herself for entertaining it at all. Nevertheless, she could
not free herself from it, but was too busy just then to dwell upon it.
In the course of a few days everything would be settled and in running
order; and meanwhile she, herself, would go to the Arcade each day
where, with Charles as her Majordomo, body-guard and faithful friend,
she was a veritable queen of her little realm, and woe betide the
individual so reckless as to forget that he or she was in the presence
of a Blairsdale.

The pretty Arch had been in perfect running order for one week when
Constance began to cast about for someone to take her place, since
neither she herself, nor her family felt content to have her make the
journey to and from South Riveredge each day, or to spend her time at
the Arch. On the previous Saturday she had put a carefully-worded
advertisement in the _Riveredge Times_, the answers to be sent to Arch
No. 1, Arcade Building; and upon her arrival at her Arch on this Monday
morning she found dozens of letters from girls, and even men, asking
employment. She was reading one of the letters when a shadow fell across
the page, and raising her eyes she saw a young man standing at the
counter. Thinking he had come to purchase a box of candy, she rose from
her chair and stood waiting for him to make his wants known to her.
Instead of doing so, he raised his hat, and with a most impressive bend
of his long, loosely-hung figure, and a smile which irritated her by its
self-complacency, said:

“How are you, Miss Carruth? You’re sure putting up a big show here,
ain’t you?”

“What can I do for you?” asked Constance, with quiet dignity.

“Guess you can’t do nothing for _me_, but maybe I can do something for
_you_. Candy ain’t in my line. Never spent none o’ my solid cash for the
stuff, but I’m glad other people do; plenty of fools in this world to
help wise folks get rich, ain’t there?”

“Will you please state your business?” and Constance took up another
letter as a hint to her unwelcome visitor that her time, if not his, was
of some value.

“Got a pile o’ answers, ain’t you? That’s just what I thought, and it’s
just what brought me down here this early. This letter come for Kitty in
my care ’most a week ago, but she’s down in the city doin’ somethin’ or
’nother; don’t ’mount to much, I guess, though. I knew she hadn’t no
friends up yonder in swell Riveredge, and when I saw your ad. in the
_Riveredge Times_ it didn’t take me no time to put two and two together.
Oh, I’m fly, I am! I knowed—_knew_—the postmark meant something about
that candy kitchen, ’cause Mary Willing and Kit used to be school pals,
and I guessed you was a-lookin’ for more help, and I don’t often guess
wrong, neither. I sent a telegraph to Kit to come on home this mornin’
to see you, but I weren’t goin’ to take any chances, so I come right up
to clench the job for her.”

“Then I assume that you are Miss Sniffins’ brother. May I ask why you
felt so sure that the letter sent to your care was from me, or had
anything to do with my need of more help in this business?”

The smile and wink which prefaced his reply nearly proved the last
straw. Quietly reaching below the counter, Constance pressed an electric
button. She had been wise beyond her years when she had this connection
made between her Arch and Charles’ counter. Sniffins did not notice the
motion.

“Well, you see, I’m boss in my own house and run the wimmin-folks. When
I suspicioned what the letter was, I just took French leave, so to
speak, and opened and read it——”

“What!” The indignation in Constance’s tone was a trifle disconcerting
even to the thick-skinned Sniffins, and he had the grace to color
slightly. But it was only momentary. He rarely forgot Sniffins.

“Oh, that’s all O. K. All in the family, you see. Kit won’t dare kick;
she ain’t the kickin’ kind—not with _me_, anyhow. She knows too well
which side her bread’s buttered to kick. _I’m_ the head of things down
yonder in our house, and as long as I can earn the pile and put up the
cash for ’em Ma and Kit can toe the mark. But I don’t see no reason why
they shouldn’t add some to the pile. We ain’t, so-to-speak, _rich_ yet,
but we ain’t _poor_; oh, no-siree, we ain’t poor. That savings bank next
door knows we ain’t poor no more, and it knows we’re goin’ to be——”

“Yes, Charles, I need you,” interrupted Constance, for unobserved by her
visitor old Charles had drawn near, and now stood just behind Sniffins,
and had heard a good portion of his senseless boasting.

“Yas, Mist’ess, I’s right hyer fer ter sarve yo’.”

Sniffins turned quickly.

“Hello, old stager, where did you come from?”

Charles paid no more attention to him than he would have paid to a stray
dog—not as much.

“Will you please remain at the counter a few moments, Charles. When your
sister returns she may call here to see me, Mr. Sniffins. Good-morning.”
And without another glance at the man Constance walked quickly away from
the counter, and down to the ’phone booth, where she called a number.
Sniffins’ eyes followed her. When she disappeared he turned to Charles
and, with an unpleasant sneer, remarked: “Workin’ for her livin’ an’
tryin’ ter play the big-bug, too, ain’t she?”

“Does yo’ wish fer ter purchase some of dis hyer candy, sah?” asked
Charles, icily.

“No, I don’t, an’ if I did I ain’t takin’ it from niggers.”

“No, sah, I don’ reckon yo’ is, kase—Mor’in’, Massa Po’tah, I’se right
glad fer ter see a _gemmen_, sah. Dey’s mighty skurse sometimes. How kin
I sarve yo’, sah?”

“Morning, Charles. Where is my little girl this morning? Gone to the
telephone booth? Be back pretty quick, won’t she? I want to speak to her
a moment.”

“She’ll return, sah, when de air’s better fer her ter breve; it got sort
o’ foul-like, an’ if you’se no objections I’se gwine raise de winder
jist a trifle.”

“Do, by all means. Must keep the air pure and sweet for that little
lady.”

“Yas, sir: Yas, sir: Dat’s percis’ly what I’s amin’ ter do. _Dat’s_ why
I’se always on han’.”

“Good! We’ll watch out for her, won’t we? Hello, Sniffins. How about
that big deal you were going to put through for me? I haven’t heard much
about it lately.”

“Oh, you’ll hear from that all right, all right. Trouble is you expect a
man to do in two weeks somethin’ most men needs two months to do.”

“Well if _you_ take two months to settle that matter for me, the other
fellow, _who can_ do it in two weeks, will win out, you mark my word. So
you’d better not take time to buy candy at ten A. M. on Monday
mornings,” for in some way Mr. Porter had gathered from Charles the true
situation, and had given this broad hint. Sniffins was not given to
taking hints, but he dared not go counter to Mr. Porter’s implied wish
that he leave the Candy Arch. Still, he was bound to have his last shot,
and, with what he intended to be a telling glance, he said:

“You tell Miss Carruth that my sister will take that position, and I’ll
call ’round later to arrange about her salary.”

“It will not be necessary for you to do so, Mr. Sniffins; I have just
’phoned to someone else.” Constance had returned so quietly that no one
was aware of her approach.

“How do you do, Mr. Porter? I am glad to see you. What can I do for you?
Come into my sanctum.”

She led the way to the rear of the Arch, where a little inclosure held
her desk and two chairs. Sniffins turned to leave the Arch. At the
entrance he came face to face with Hadyn Stuyvesant. The look which
accompanied the nod Sniffins gave him was not pleasant. Hadyn did not
know him at all, and looked at him in surprise, believing him to have
mistaken him for someone else. But Sniffins knew Hadyn.

“So _he’s_ on there, too, is he? Guess he can see through a millstone
most as far as other folks can. If that girl keeps on she’s goin’ to be
rich, _rich_. That business has growed—ah, grown—like a—a—well, it’s
_grown_. ’For’ long she’s goin’ to have a big thing in it. Wake up,
Sniffins, my boy. You’re got as good a chance as any other fellow, an’
you’re no sloach on looks, neither. Get busy and spruce up more’n ever.
Buy some new clothes, old man; you’ll find ’em a good investment, I tell
you. Get Kit down there _somehow_; that’s your best wedge for gettin’
into the swell set up yonder. Kit’s half-way good-lookin’, and ain’t got
the spunk of a mouse to do any way except the way _I_ tell her.”

By the time this monologue came to an end Sniffins had turned into his
office on State Street, and there found his sister awaiting him. She had
returned to South Riveredge nearly frightened to death by his telegram.

“Ah, cut it out! What’s the use whooping things up for nothing?” was his
short ordering. “Nobody’s dead nor dyin’, but I want you to get down to
the Arcade and _get this job_, see? Don’t come back here whinin’ that
you _can’t_. You’re _got_ to get it, or you can dust out o’ South
Riveredge an’ your happy home. Now listen to what I’m tellin’ you: Don’t
you let on _who_ you _are_. If you do the jig’s up, for that high and
mighty sprig down there ain’t got no sort o’ use for _me_. But I’ll
_tame_ her. I ain’t seen the girl yet I couldn’t tame. But I want you
there ’cause I want to keep track of the revenue, do you see? and if
your head’s worth half a muttonhead you can’t _help_ gettin’ a good idea
of what that business is worth, and that’s what I mean to know. She
don’t know you from a hole in the ground, and you ain’t goin’ to let
her——”

“But she will know my name, Lige.”

“How will she know your name if you don’t _tell_ her your name? You’ve
got a middle name, ain’t you? Well, what’s the matter with that?
Katherine Boggs is all right, ain’t it? You haven’t _got_ to tack on the
Sniffins.”

“Oh, I’d forget, and people would know me, and I’d be scared to death to
do it, Lige.”

“Now see here: You’ll be scared to death if you _don’t_ do it, let me
tell you, for I’ll scare you myself. Now get down there and do the job
right up to the mark.”

About half an hour later a sweet-faced, timid girl presented herself at
Constance’s Arch. She seemed unduly agitated, and her hands trembled as
she rested them on the counter, to ask if Miss Carruth was to be seen.

“I think she can be,” answered Constance, smiling encouragingly at the
perturbed little figure before her, for Constance was too much her
mother’s child not to feel the deepest sympathy for such a girl.

“Is she in?” ventured her visitor.

“I am Miss Carruth. What can I do for you?”

“Oh! Why, you want a girl, a clerk?”

“I do. Come into my little office; no one will interrupt us there. Sit
down; you seem tired. Now tell me all about it. I’ve had such a pile of
letters that I hardly know which to answer. By the way, I have just
’phoned to one who gave me her number but not her name. I asked her to
call at once. I wonder if you can be No. 795?” Constance paused with a
most encouraging smile upon her lips and light in her eyes.

“Yes—oh—no; I mean——”

“Why are you so nervous? It will not be a very difficult undertaking,
I’m sure, just to sit here and sell boxes of candy, and I’m not _half_
as formidable a young woman as you must have pictured me. The hours are
not so very long, and there will be a good many spare moments. The
salary is seven dollars a week. Do you care to consider it, Miss——?”

“S—Boggs, I mean Miss Boggs. Yes, I’ll take it, I want it very much,
I’ll try to please you——”

Constance looked at the girl. What ailed her? Why this feverish
eagerness to secure the position, and why a degree of nervousness which
almost amounted to a panic?

“Will you please give me your address? And”—Constance hesitated. She was
upon the point of asking for references, but sympathy for the girl
withheld her from doing so.

The girl gave an address in a distant part of the town, and rose to go.
Constance’s look held her. There was nothing alarming in the quiet gaze
of those deep brown eyes; on the contrary, it was soothing, if
compelling.

“Do you mind telling me why you are so agitated? I can see no cause for
it, yet there may be one which I do not guess, and if I can help remove
it I shall be glad to do so. It troubles me to see you disturbed.
Perhaps a good deal depends upon your securing a situation at once, and
if that is the cause of your trouble we have removed it, haven’t we? for
you are already engaged.”

“Oh, yes, I know I’m very foolish; I do want the situation; I’ve _got_
to take it; I’ll do my very, very best; I truly will. Please excuse me.
When must I come?”

“Can you come this afternoon? I am very anxious to get back to my duties
in my candy kitchen, and if you can arrange to come here after luncheon,
I shall have time to show you the little things you would like to learn,
and to-morrow morning you can get along without me.”

“Yes, I’ll come. I’ll be here at two o’clock, and I’ll try so hard to
please you, Miss Carruth.” For a moment a smile lighted up the girl’s
face and quite transformed it.

She was a plain, colorless little thing, but something in her smile made
her very attractive.

“I shall be here. Good-bye for a couple of hours.”

The girl hurried away.

“Well, if she isn’t one of the oddest little creatures I’ve ever come
across. I am sure I don’t know what impelled me to engage her, for I
dare say I could have found a dozen others much better qualified to
attend to things here, but—somehow—well, I dare say, there’s a lot of
mother in me, and when our sympathies are aroused we sometimes do queer
things.”

Constance was not conscious of having spoken aloud, as she moved about
the Arch arranging and giving a touch here and there, until a laughing
voice asked:

“What is this I’m listening to? A budding elocutionist practicing her
monologue?”

“Does sound a little like it, doesn’t it? but it’s nothing half so
brilliant. In fact, you might suspect me of bordering on mental
aberration instead if I told you, so I reckon I won’t. But I am starved
even if you are not. Let us go see what Blairsdale _and_ Devon have to
offer to-day.”

A moment later Constance and Hadyn Stuyvesant were seated in the little
screened-off corner back of Charles’ counter, his duties transferred to
his satellite, as he laid before his young mistress, and the one whom in
his faithful old heart he had long cherished a wish to call his “Young
Massa,” the dainties especially prepared for them by Mammy.




CHAPTER IX

AT MERRY YULETIDE.


“Hurry, Eleanor. We are all waiting for you,” called Constance from the
terrace, where a group of young people stood waiting for the tardy one.

It was the day following Christmas, and such a day as long dwells in
one’s memory of perfect winter days; scarcely a cloud in the sky, and
the air filled with a crispness which set one’s blood a-tingle. The
world wore her white robes of the season, bedecked with a thousand
sparkling jewels. The river was frozen nearly across, and on its
glistening surface groups of skaters darted about, or pushed ice-chairs,
in which were seated older or less vigorous bodies for whom skating was
not.

Early in December, when the weather had turned unusually cold for the
season, the river had commenced to freeze over. It had been thirty years
since such heavy ice had formed, and those who recalled that time
predicted that the present cold snap would hold as that one had held,
and the New Year find, as it had then found, the sleighs crossing to the
opposite shore.

Eleanor Carruth had returned from college three days before Christmas,
to find everyone in the liveliest, gayest mood, and each moment crowded
to its very limit with duties or pleasures. Christmas in Mrs. Carruth’s
home had always been a day of “good will toward man” in its truest,
sweetest sense. No one had time to think of self in her desire to think
of others. For more than sixty years Mammy’s voice had been the first
one to cry “Christmas gif’” to her children, as she went from bed to bed
in the chill Christmas dawn. Try as they might in bygone years, none of
the other servants on the old plantation had been able to creep up to
the bedchambers before her, and now in the newer life of the Northern
world, to which she had followed those she loved, she had never missed
her greeting. In the dark, difficult days when resources were limited
and every penny had to be so carefully expended, the Christmas gifts had
been very simple little remembrances interchanged, but old Mammy had
invariably managed to have _some_ trifle for her “chillen,” and they
would sooner have gone without their own than have failed to have their
token of the season lying at her door on Christmas morning.

But happier days had now dawned for all, and the Christmas day just
passed had been a red-letter one for the family. True, Eleanor’s
resources were not yet equal to Constance’s. Eleanor’s spending money
was derived from the source which, prior to her entrance in college, had
caused Mammy such deep concern. Eleanor still coached a number of the
less brilliant lights of the college. In this way she felt more
independent of her aunt and less dependent upon Constance.

Constance protested and scolded, declaring that it was perfect nonsense
for Eleanor to so burden herself, since the candy kitchen was more than
equal to the demands made upon it. But Eleanor was a Carruth.

As the party stood waiting for her, Jean, keeping fast hold of Haydn’s
hand and jigging up and down in her impatience to be off, Forbes talking
to one of Eleanor’s friends, and the others all chatting at once,
Eleanor came hurrying from the house, carrying in her hand a pair of
shining skates, and carefully tucked under her arm a _broom_.

Haydn was the first to spy it. His eyes began to twinkle, and he quickly
slipped over to Constance’s side.

“Is this a very mid-winter madness?” he asked under his breath.

Constance glanced up quickly. Her eyes instantly caught the twinkle, and
darted toward Forbes, who was too deeply engaged in trying to prove to
his rather skeptical listener that the soft little wraith-like clouds
beginning to gather overhead meant wind, and perhaps more snow also,
within twenty-four hours, to be aware of Eleanor’s unusual departure in
the line of impedimenta. Neither Constance nor Hadyn intended to spoil
the joke by jogging their wits, and the others who were alive to the fun
preferred to see it to the end.

Eleanor hurried up to Forbes and said, as though to confirm his
argument:

“Yes, it _is_ clouding over, isn’t it? Mammy says it is going to snow
and urged me to carry this umbrella. I can always trust Mammy’s ‘bones,’
she ended as she held forth the broom to the bewildered man, who looked
from her face to it as though questioning her sanity.”

Then Eleanor wakened.

“Oh, why—I thought—why, how did I get this?”

“Let me relieve you of your strange burden, Eleanor. Still want an
umbrella? I’ll fetch one if you say so, but you may find the broom more
useful, on second thought. Let’s take it along to clear away the light
snow which fell last night. Come on, people! If we expect to get up an
appetite for Mammy’s luncheon at two o’clock, we’d best make a move
toward the river,” cried Hadyn, leading the way with the broom
shouldered like a musket, and Jean in full prance beside him.

It was a merry party which gathered upon the crystal surface of the
river that morning. For many days Jack Frost had been busy, and had done
his wonderful work most effectively, completing it during the previous
night by a light coating of diamond-dust, which glistened and sparkled
in the clear sunshine, or swirled up in fantastic spirals as the skaters
whirled away through it. The boathouse at the river’s edge served as a
shelter for the chilled ones, and, far-sighted woman! Mammy had sent
Charles down there with a great basket of sandwiches, and a heaterful of
steaming chocolate. Somehow nature had made a big mistake when she
fashioned Mammy: she should have formed a man, a _white_ man, and cast
his lot among the great commerical lights of his day.

The chocolate heater had to be replenished more than once, and the
manner in which the sandwiches vanished was almost miraculous.

Eleanor, Constance and Jean were as much at home upon their skates as
upon the soles of their feet, and Hadyn had skated ever since he could
move without assistance; but Forbes had acquired the art during a winter
spent in Northern Europe, and at a date not so remote as to have
lessened the novelty of the experience. He had brought with him from
Holland a pair of skates of truly remarkable design, and it was upon
these “ice boats,” as Hadyn instantly dubbed them, that he was now
demonstrating the extraordinary agility of the Dutch skaters.

“Stand off! Make way!” cried Hadyn, as Forbes, one arm about Eleanor’s
waist and the other holding her hand aloft in what he fondly believed to
be a perfect imitation of the Dutch peasants’ graceful poise and motion,
bore down upon the party, his long, upturned skates and still longer
legs causing Eleanor to cast skittish glances in their direction as she
swung along beside him.

“Great! How do you do it, old man?” asked Hadyn as Eleanor was almost
hurled into his arms, Forbes’ momentum carrying him on and past them
like a runaway motor-car.

“Simplest thing in the world! Be back in a second to show you how.
Nothing like it! Absolutely—” but he was carried beyond his hearers,
whose eyes followed his wild evolutions with more or less apprehension
for “what next?” since it seemed contrary to all laws of gravitation for
any human being to maintain his equilibrium very long if he took such
chances.

“He has turned! He’s coming back! Now watch out, Hadyn, and learn how
it’s done,” laughed Constance, as this skated “Ichabod Crane” bore down
upon them, hair blown on end, arms flying, legs cutting capers legs
never before had cut, and upon his face the expression of “do or die,
man, for _she_ is watching you.”

“Gee, what a swathe he cuts!” cried another man, as the light snow lying
upon the ice flew from beneath the rushing skates.

“Now watch out! Clear the track! Look sharp, and you’ll all catch the
knack of it without half trying. Nothing easier,” shouted the skater as
he drew nearer, pride in his eyes, glory descending upon him. But alack!
it’s said ’a haughty spirit goeth before a fall.’ There _may_ have been
an ice fissure. Forbes insisted there _was_ one in which he caught his
skate; but there certainly _was_ the fall both actual and figurative. As
the enthusiast came within ten feet of his spellbound audience, a pair
of very long legs came up, and a very loosely-hung body came down with
dispatch. The legs flew apart until the figure resembled an ice-boat
under full headway, nor did its momentum perceptibly lessen as it sped
past its audience, the light snow piling up in front of it and flying
over its shoulders as it flies back from a snow-plow. For fully thirty
feet the wild figure slid along before it lost its impetus. Then it came
to a dazed stop. Only one of the audience was prepared to go to its aid;
the others were entirely helpless, and were hanging upon each other’s
necks—let us hope in tears of sympathy.

“Can—can I help you?” stammered Hadyn, as he bent over to raise the
prone one. “You—you rather came a cropper that time, and—and—”

“Get behind me, for heaven’s sake. Do you think a man can slither along
on the ice for thirty feet and—and not damage his garments? Quick,
before all those people get wise. Is your long cape in the boathouse?
Yes? Thanks, I’ll take it, and I don’t care a hang if _you freeze_;” and
scrambling to his feet Forbes sped for the boathouse, and the world saw
him not again that day.

Scarcely had Forbes left the party on the pond when a new member was
added to it, or, at least, arrived upon the scene with a very firmly
fixed intention of being added to it if he could contrive to be.

He was arrayed, from his standpoint of a proper toilet for the occasion,
in a costume altogether irresistible, and which it had cost him no
little time and outlay to procure.

Heavy tan shoes, a plaided Scotch tweed suit, a sweater of gorgeous red,
and a sealskin cap.

With many a curve and flourish, for the man _could_ skate, he came up to
the group, and with a most impressive bow to Constance, raised the fur
cap, and, standing uncovered, said:

“Good-morning, Miss Carruth. Fine sport, ain’t it? May I compliment you
on your skating? You ain’t got a rival on the ice, nor off it, neither.”

For a moment Constance was at a loss to place the man, then she recalled
his visit to her Candy Arch about three weeks before. It was Elijah
Sniffins.

The very audacity of this move deprived her of speech for a moment, and
the others with her were too amazed to come to her rescue. Indeed, they
did not know the man at all, and, consequently, did not realize the
extent of his presumption.

Then Constance came to herself. Looking straight into the man’s eyes,
her own ominous with indignation, and her cheeks flushing with
resentment, she replied:

“Haven’t you made a slight mistake, Mr. Sniffins? I believe the business
matter upon which you called at the Arcade was settled then and there,
for I had already made other arrangements. I hardly think there is
anything more to be discussed.”

“Oh, that’s all in the sweet bygones. You needn’t think I’ve got to talk
business every time we meet any mor’n you have; I just give myself a
holiday once in so often just like you do, and this is one of ’em. Great
day for a holiday. But, by the way, did you get a nice girl for your
counter?—one that’s goin’ to have some snap to her and do a rushin’
business with all the young folks anxious to get rid of their money?”

“She is quite satisfactory, thank you, and good-morning, Mr. Sniffins.”

“Oh, I say, won’t you give me just one turn? Never see anyone could
skate like you—”

“Hadyn, isn’t it about time we went home? Just one more spin, please,”
and turning toward Hadyn Stuyvesant Constance held out both hands toward
him. He had turned to speak to another member of the party, and until
that moment had not been aware of Sniffins’ intrusion. At sight of
Constance’s face his own changed, and he gave a quick glance at the man,
who seemed undecided as to whether it would be wiser to accept his
dismissal or persist in his unwelcome attentions. It may have been
something in Hadyn’s glance which deterred him, for with another
impressive bow he skated rapidly away, muttering:

“Little snob! Thinks she’s out of sight; but she ain’t any better’n
others who are makin’ their pile, and I’ll learn her yet.”

“Who is he? What is the matter, little girl?” asked Hadyn, as he and
Constance swung away over the ice.

“Why, it’s that odious man. I don’t know what to make of him. This is
the second time he has forced himself upon me, and why he does so is
more than I can fathom. He is the Fire Insurance Agent down in State
Street; and the only time we have ever had any intercourse whatsoever
with him was when the house burned. But _I_ did not see him even then.
Mother or Mammy were the only ones who had any dealings with him at that
time, though once later, when the Candy Booth in the Arcade caught fire,
he did speak to me, now I remember, though I had quite forgotten it.
What in this world can the man want? I declare he half frightens me, he
is so audacious.”

She then told Hadyn of Sniffins’ visit to the Arcade. He listened
attentively, seeing far more in it than the girl beside him guessed, but
taking care not to let her know.

“And you did not engage his sister, after all?” he inquired.

“No; I have a Katherine Boggs doing duty there. She’s a quiet, nice
little thing, and not likely to do the ’rushin’ business with all the
young fools,’ which this idiot seems to think a requisite qualification.
Ugh! How I loathe the very sight of that man! It’s mighty lucky I did
not engage his sister, isn’t it? He would have used her as a wedge to
force his presence upon me, though why on earth he wishes to is more
than I can understand.”

The face she turned up to Hadyn’s was the very personification of
sweetness and modesty.

He looked at her, a slight color creeping into his own and a light
filling his eyes, which for the first time since she had known him sent
an odd little thrill to the girl’s heart, which caused it to beat a
trifle quicker, and her eyes to fall before his. It was all over in a
moment, and all he said was:

“Keep your modesty, little girl. It is a valuable asset to womanhood.
And now we must get back home, or the little Mother and Mammy will get
after us.”




CHAPTER X

“THEN CAME THE WILD WEATHER.”


January and February, blustery, wild months, crept slowly away, and
March, still more blustery, came in. The cold and dampness told upon
poor old Charles, and more than one day found him a fast prisoner in the
“baid,” which, in spite of Mammy’s conviction “dat it fair hit de sore
spots,” frequently failed to find Charles’, and only served to smother
his groans. Then one day, when, in spite of his spouse’s protests, he
insisted upon going to the Arcade in a driving snowstorm, the climax was
reached, and when Charles reached his little cabin at nightfall he was
“cl’ar beat out an’ ready fer ter drap,” as Mammy told Mrs. Carruth. The
next day he was downright ill, and a physician had to be summoned.

“Seem lak, seem lak de very ol’ boy hisself done got inter dat man,”
scolded Mammy, her wrath the outcome of nervous irritation, for Charles
was the pride and the love of her life. “No matter how I is ter argify
wid him, he just natcherly boun’ ter go ’long ter dat Arcyde yistiddy,
an’ now see what done come of it! Gawd bress ma soul, I reckons I’d
smack him good ef he warn’t lyin’ dar groanin’ so wid his misery dat he
lak ’nough wouldn’t feel de smacks I give him. Tch! tch!” and Mammy
shook her head ominously.

“Poor Charles! I’ll go right out to the cabin, Mammy, and sit with him
while you look after your cooking; it’s too bad, too bad; but I think he
will soon be about again.”

“Yes, an’ ef yo’ goes out in dis hyar blizzardy weather I’ll have two
sick folks on my han’s ’stid o’ one. Now, see here, Miss Jinny, yo’ min’
me an’ stay indoors! Yo’ hear me?”

“Nonsense, Mammy. Do you think I shall take cold by walking from here to
your cabin? How foolish,” protested Mrs. Carruth. “Your luncheon counter
cannot be neglected, and with but one pair of hands how can you do your
cooking and nurse Charles, too?”

As she spoke Mrs. Carruth tied a scarf over her head and wrapped a long,
heavy cloak about her, Mammy never for a second ceasing to protest.

“Now come, Mammy,” she said, leading the way to the back door, Mammy
following and scolding every step of the way. As they opened the door
leading to the back porch they were assailed by a gust of wind and a
whirl of snow which blinded them, and at the same time nearly carried
them off their feet.

“Mighty man! Go ’long back, Miss Jinny’ Go back! Dis hyar ain’t no
fittin’ place fer yo’, I tells yo’,” gasped Mammy, turning to bar Mrs.
Carruth’s progress, for even Mammy’s weight was as a straw against the
gale which swept around the corner of the porch. But slight as she was,
Mrs. Carruth was not to be overborne. For a moment she laid hold of the
porch railing to steady herself, then with a firm hold upon her flapping
cloak braced herself against the wind, and started for the cottage.
Mammy was for once silenced, simply because the words were swept from
her lips as soon as she tried to form them.

Earlier in the morning an attempt had been made to clear a path to the
cottage; but in such a wild, howling blizzard a half hour was more than
enough to set man’s work at naught, and Mrs. Carruth and Mammy had to
flounder through the snowdrifts as best they could, and were breathless
when they reached the bottom of the garden.

“Fo’ Gawd’s sake, come unner de lee ob de house ’fore yo’ is blown daid
unner ma eyes, honey,” panted Mammy. “Oh, why for is we ever come ter
sech a place fer ter live! We all gwine be froz daid ’fore we kin draw
our brefs. Come in de house, Miss Jinny, come in,” and, half dragging,
half carrying her mistress, Mammy led her into the cabin where the
little darkey, Mammy’s handmaiden, stood with her eyes nearly popping
out of her head with fright, for she had been watching them from the
safe shelter of the kitchen.

Mrs. Carruth dropped upon a chair well-nigh exhausted, for even though
the cabin was barely two hundred feet from the house, it had required
all the strength she could summon to battle her way to it in the force
and smother of the blizzard.

“Why—why, I’d no idea it was so terrible,” she panted. “I’ve never known
such a storm.”

“Ain’t I tell yo’ so? Ain’t I tell yo’ not ter come out in it? An’ how I
is ter git yo’ back ter de house is mo’n I kin tell,” deplored Mammy, as
she hastily divested herself of her own wrappings and then turned to
remove her mistress’.

“Yo’ foots is soppin’, soakin’ wet. Yo’ mought as well not ’a’ had no
rubbers on ’em, fer yo’ is wet ter de knees. Hyer, you no ’count
Mirandy, get me some hot water, an’ den hike upstairs fo’ de bottle ob
alcohol, yo’ hyer me!” stormed Mammy, relieved to find someone to vent
her irritation upon. “An’ yo’ ain’t gwine back ter dat house whilst dis
storm is ragin’, let me tell yo’.”

“I am all right, Mammy; this is mere folly. I shall be as dry as a bone
in just a few minutes,” protested Mrs. Carruth.

“Yis! Yis! An’ lak enough chilled to de bone, too. Now, yo’ min’ what I
tells you,” and, in spite of their protests, Mrs. Carruth was presently
rubbed and warmed into dry garments and comfort. It was well Constance’s
Candy Kitchen communicated with Mammy’s quarters, and that a supply of
clothing was always kept in it. It was deserted this morning, for Mary
and Fanny had gone home on the previous, Saturday afternoon, and the
storm had made it impossible for them to return. A large supply of candy
had been sent to the Arcade on Saturday morning; so even if customers
were courageous enough to face the blizzard in quest of sweets there
would be no lack of of sweets to please the sweet tooth, and Constance
was glad of the respite the storm gave her, for, like many another busy
little business woman, she found many things to attend to in the house
when she could steal the time from her regular duties.

This morning she was busy with a dozen little odd bits of work, while
Jean, school impossible in such weather, was lost to all the outer world
in a new book.

When Mrs. Carruth was made comfortable she went upstairs to Charles. She
found him in a sorry plight, and saw at once that poor old Charles was
in a more serious condition than Mammy realized, troubled as she was
about him; but this was carefully concealed from the old woman.

“We have both to take our scolding now,” she said as she seated herself
near him. “Mammy will never forgive either of us for disobeying her,
Charles. But what can I do for you?”

Charles was too stiff and full of pain to move, but he tried to smile
bravely as he answered:

“Reckons we’d better a-minded her, Honey. Reckons we had. She’s a mighty
pert ’oman, she is, an’ when she say do, we better _do_, an’ when she
say don’t, we better _don’t_, dat’s suah. An’ jes’ look at me! Hyar I
layin’ lak I tied han’ an’ foot, an’ de bis’ness down yonder gwine ter
rack an’ ruin, lak ’nough, wid dat no ’count boy a-runnin’ it. And
Charles groaned in tribulation of spirit.

“Wait a moment; I’ll see that all goes well down there,” answered Mrs.
Carruth, soothingly, and slipping away from the room she went into the
deserted Bee-hive to ’phone to the Arcade. After considerable delay she
got Mr. Porter and told him the situation. He was all interest, and
begged her to tell Charles that if necessary he himself would mount
guard over the luncheon counter. She next called Hadyn, and asked him to
let her know how all went at the candy booth. He assured her that all
was well, but that business did not seem to be flourishing.

“Will you please tell Miss Boggs to close it for the day and to go home
at once, Hadyn? The storm grows worse every moment, I believe, and if
she remains there any longer she may not be able to get home.”

“I’ll tell her, and I’ll see that she gets home, too. Don’t worry,
little mother. I’ll be down a little later to see how you all fare.”

“Oh, no! No! Don’t try to come. We are all right, and you must not try
to drive here in this awful storm. Promise me that you won’t, Hadyn.”

“Can’t make rash promises, and Comet has breasted even worse storms than
this,” was the laughing answer. “Who is looking after your furnace, now
that Charles is down and out?”

“Mr. Henry’s man. He was here this morning, and will be back this
evening. We lack nothing, and we don’t want you under _any_
circumstances. Please, say you won’t try to come.”

“Not unless——” Then there was a whirr and one or two disconnected words
and the connection broke short off. No wires could long withstand the
weight of ice and snow and the force of wind wrenching at them. Mrs.
Carruth tried again and again to get the connection, but all to no
purpose, and with a strange apprehension in her heart she returned to
Charles’ bedside to reassure him regarding his luncheon counter.

At noon the doctor called to see Charles, and during Mammy’s absence
from the room Mrs. Carruth contrived to have a word with him.

“He’s a pretty old man, and took big chances yesterday. If it were only
the rheumatism I had to contend with, I should not feel the least
concern for him. That is painful, I know, but not dangerous, as it has
settled in his limbs; but I don’t like this temperature and breathing.
Yet I dare say, if I use a stethoscope, he will think he is a dead man
already. These colored people are difficult patients to handle, what
with their ignorance and their emotional temperaments they are far worse
than children, for we can compel children to do as we think best.”

Mrs. Carruth smiled. “You do not know the ante-bellum negro,” she said.

“Maybe I do not, but I know the post-bellum, I can tell you, and I’ve
very little use for them.”

“Do you wish to examine Charles?” she asked, quietly.

“If he had been a white man, I should have done so last night when I was
first called to attend him; but I came near being mobbed the last time I
tried to use a stethoscope on a negro patient. The family thought I was
about to remove the woman’s lungs, I believe.”

“Charles, I wish Dr. Black to examine you very thoroughly while he is
here—as thoroughly as if he were treating me. There is nothing to alarm
you; but we cannot treat you understandingly unless he learns exactly
where the greatest difficulty lies.”

“Wha’ he gwine do to me?” asked Charles, his eyes opening wide.

“Examine your lungs and heart to see if they are sound and strong.”

“He gwine cut me wide open?” cried the old man.

Just then Mammy entered. It was well she did. “Luty, Luty, dat man gwine
projec’ wid me, honey; don’ you let him.”

For a moment Mammy seemed ready to take the defensive, and Dr. Black
shrugged his shoulders in a manner which indicated: “I told you so.”
Perhaps it was the shrug—Mammy wasn’t slow to grasp a situation—but more
likely it was the look in her Miss Jinny’s eyes, for, turning to the
doctor, she said, with the air of an African queen:

“Yo’ is de perfessional ’tendant, an’ I wishes yo’ fer ter do what yo’
an’ ma Miss Jinny knows fer ter be right wid de patient.”

When Dr. Black left a few moments later, he said to Mrs. Carruth, who
had followed him downstairs, while Mammy remained behind to alternately
berate and calm Charles:

“If we can keep the fever down, the old fellow may escape with nothing
worse than his rheumatic twinges—hard to bear, but not alarming; but I
don’t like the other symptoms. He was too old to take such chances. Can
you let me hear from him about eight this evening?”

“Every hour if necessary. He is like one of our own family to us, and
nothing we can do for him or Mammy can ever repay their devotion to us.
Would it not be better for you to call again?”

“I’d gladly do so, but I am likely to be summoned to a patient in
Glendale at any moment, and with this storm——” And the doctor waved his
hand toward the turmoil beyond the windows.

“I know it. I will ’phone if——” Then Mrs. Carruth paused in dismay.
“What if the wires were down?”

“My wire was all right when I left home less than an hour since, and you
may not need me, after all. I hope you will not.”

“Amen to that hope,” said Mrs. Carruth, fervently, and, bidding the
doctor good-bye, she returned to Charles.

As the day dragged on the storm increased in violence. Mammy would not
hear of Mrs. Carruth returning to the house, but prepared a dainty tray
for her and ordered her into the Bee-hive to partake of her luncheon,
and afterward to lie down. Perhaps she would not have been so ready to
comply with the old woman’s wishes had she not resolved upon a course
which she felt sure Mammy would combat with all her strength. This was
to spend the night with Charles, whose condition did not improve. Toward
evening Jean came battling out to the cottage, followed by Constance,
greatly to Mammy’s consternation.

“I ’clar’s ter goodness, yo’s all gone crazy!” she stormed as they came
in from the Bee-hive. “Fo’ de Lawd’s sake, wha’ brung you chillun out
hyer? Ain’ yo’ Ma an’ me got ’nough fer ter pester us wid dat sick man
up dar widout any mo’ tribberlations ’scendin’ ’pon us? Go ’long back, I
tells yo’; ’fo’ we’s driven cl’ar crazy.”

“Hush, Mammy, dear,” said Constance. “I want mother to go back to the
house and let me take her place with Charles. I am so strong that it
won’t tire me, and you know I’m a good nurse, don’t you?”

“And so am I, Mammy. You know I am,” broke in Jean. “Please, please let
me stay.”

For a moment Mammy looked as though she were about to take a wild flight
into the wilder weather outside, and her wits along with her; then she
stamped her foot and said:

“Yo’ chillern come an’ talk wid yo’ ma.”




CHAPTER XI

IN THE VALLEY.


“No, dear. I shall not wear myself out,” said Mrs. Carruth, gently,
though firmly. “I want you to go back to the house to look after the
maids and Jean——”

“Oh, I don’t want to go back! Please, please let me sleep in the
Bee-hive, mother. Please, please do,” begged Jean, clasping her arms
about her mother’s waist. Constance interrupted:

“Yes, mother, do. I will go back if you are determined not to, for I
dare say the maids would be panic-stricken if left alone; but Jean might
just as well remain here with you,” for into Constance’s active brain
had sprung an idea which she wished to carry out, and she knew she could
count upon Jean’s co-operation.

“But you and the maids would be quite alone in the house,” demurred Mrs.
Carruth.

“And do you think Jean would be big and valiant enough to protect me
from prowlers?” smiled Constance. “It would be a hard-pressed burglar
who would venture forth this night, I’m thinking.”

Just then a sound overhead caused Mrs. Carruth to raise her hand to
enjoin silence, and Mammy was heard to say soothingly:

“Dar, dar, honey, jis’ let me raise an’ ease yo’ up a leetle, so’s yo’
hits de sof’est fedders in de baid,” and quickly upon the softer, more
soothing tones followed: “Yit what in de name o’ man ever done teken yo’
out of dis house yistiddy’s mo’n I can tell. Ef yo’d done taken heed ter
ma’ wo’ds yo’ wouldn’ never come ter dis hyer pass.”

Then followed a series of groans from the patient.

“Mammy is getting worn out and consequently irritable,” said Mrs.
Carruth. “Yes, you may remain, Jean, but Constance must go back, and I
must go to Charles. If Mammy has much more to tax her strength and mind
she will be ill, and she is in no mood to care for Charles now; she will
do more harm than good. Good-night, darling. Don’t worry about me I will
’phone over to the house if I need anything in the night.” And Mrs.
Carruth hurried upstairs.

“Come into the Bee-hive, Jean,” whispered Constance. The little girl
followed.

“Now, dear,” said Constance, earnestly, “you and I have got to take
matters into our own hands. Can I trust you, Jean?” Constance dropped
upon a chair, and placing both arms about the little sister looked
straight into her eyes.

The look was returned as steadfastly, and the fine little head poised in
a manner which would have delighted an artist’s soul, as Jean asked:

“Don’t you know you can, Connie?”

“Yes, I do! And here is the situation: Before we came over here I tried
to ’phone over to mother, but even our wire is out of order. I dare say
every wire is, and that the trouble is in the central office, owing to
this storm. I did not tell mother because it would only alarm her, and
she may not have occasion to use the ’phone at all; I earnestly hope she
will not until it is repaired. I shall go home, but I shall not go to
bed. You stay here in the Bee-hive, but don’t undress, Jean; roll this
warm rug around you and cuddle down on the couch. I know you will drop
asleep, but I know you will not sleep so soundly that you will be lost
to the world altogether. I shall be on the couch in the library and can
see this window from there. If Charles grows worse, or you think mother
is worn out and needs me, will you flash the electric light three times?
I shall know what it means and come straight over.” Constance spoke very
quietly, but very earnestly.

“I’ll do it. I may go to sleep, but somehow I know I shall wake up if I
am needed, Connie. Even if I am only fourteen years old I can be a
little woman, as mother so often says I am.”

“I know you can, dear, and you are, Jean; even if in many ways you are
younger than most girls of your age. I don’t think any of us have grown
up quite so fast as the girls around us. Mother says we have not, and
she does not wish us to, because there are so many more years in which
we must be old than in which we can be young; but I reckon we can rise
to a situation when occasion demands, and, somehow, I feel that we will
both be needed to-night. Dear old Charles, he is pretty sick, I know, or
mother would not look so anxious, and _such_ a night as this is. Why,
Jean, we could not get a message to Dr. Black however badly we might
need him. We must depend entirely upon ourselves.”

“I wonder Champion did not come over.”

“He ’phoned mother this morning, but before she got all his message the
connection broke, and, I dare say, the roads have been almost
impassable.”

“Impassable roads would never keep him from coming,” cried the
“Champion’s” champion. “There must have been something worse than the
roads. I don’t know what, but I know it was something,” insisted Jean.

“Yes, I am sure there must have been, he is always so thoughtful for
us,” replied Constance, a soft light springing into her eyes as she
recalled Hadyn’s unvarying kindness from the first moment she knew him.
“Now, good-night, honey. I hope you won’t need me at all, but I know you
will be on the lookout if you do.”

A moment later Constance was struggling back to the house through the
blinding storm and snowdrifts. As she entered the back door the front
one opened to admit a snow-covered, panting figure, and Hadyn confronted
her.

“Great Scott! Where have you come from?” he demanded.

“I might ask the same question,” panted Constance, divesting herself of
her cloak, and shaking it to free it from the snow which covered it.
“Get out of your coat, quick, and give it to Lilly to hang in the
kitchen until it is dry. What under the sun possessed you to try to come
here to-night, you madman?”

“Under the sun? Nay, lady, neither sun nor moon. I fear you are
wandering. Is it a case of blizzard-madness?” answered Hadyn, as he
slipped off his big ulster and cap and gave them to the maid.

“Now, come along in here and tell me all the little mother couldn’t tell
me. Where is she, and where is my little sister?”

“Lilly, please bring some more logs for the library fire. Come in here,
Hadyn, and I’ll tell you all about it. Mother and Jean are over With
Charles and Mammy, and I’m here to mount guard over the house and maids,
who, luckily, are storm-bound.”

“But why on earth aren’t you all here? The little mother and Jean have
no business to be anywhere else on such a villainous night. Let me go
right over after them,” and Hadyn turned toward the door.

“Stop! Wait! Listen to me!”

“Oh, of course, Mademoiselle la General,” laughed Hadyn, as Constance
laid a detaining hand upon his arm. “I’m listening.”

“Then sit down to do it and hear the whole story. When you really know
all about it you can help me; but you might as well whistle to the wind
out yonder as to hope to get mother back here to-night. Yes, Lilly, put
the logs in the basket, and you and Rose please stay in the kitchen
until eleven. I will be out to speak to you when Mr. Stuyvesant goes.”

“When he _does_,” said Hadyn, under his breath, then louder: “It must be
rather satisfying to have such a flower-garden right indoors when it is
whooping things up so outside,” and he nodded toward the maid just
leaving the room. “If you could only have a ‘Violet’ and a ‘Pansy,’ and
one or two other blossoms, you’d have a whole greenhouse.”

Constance laughed outright as she answered:

“We’ve had wood nymphs, and some of the months—May and June, for
instance—and several jewels, to say nothing of a few royalties, so
nothing will surprise us now; but Mammy seems equal to all of them put
together. And apropos of Mammy, let me tell you all about her and
Charles.”

They sat down before the blazing logs while Constance told of the
experiences of the past twenty-four hours. Hadyn listened with a
troubled face.

“I’d no idea it was so serious,” he said, when she finished, “but I am
mighty glad I came over to-night. And now you are to heed what _I_ say:
you may sit here with me until eleven if you will. I’ll be right glad of
your company. _Then_ you are going upstairs to bed—_yes_, you are, too.
Now, it is no use ‘argifyin’,’ to quote Mammy. I’ll stay here in the
library snug, warm, and as comfortable as any man could wish to be. I
shall see Jean’s light if she signals, and I’ll be good—yes, honest I
will. You doubt it, I know, and you think I will sneak over yonder and
be more bother than I am worth; but I give you my word I won’t. I’ll do
exactly as you would do if you were here alone.”

Constance raised her eyes to his, and little guessed how hard it was for
the man who looked into their pure, trustful depths to refrain from
holding out his arms to the girl who had grown so dear to him during the
past three and a half years.

“I’ll take you at your word,” she answered.

“Good. Now sit down and toast your toes before this blaze. By Jove, is
there anything like blazing logs and soft lamplight? They spell
_h-o-m-e_, don’t they?” and Hadyn glanced around the cosy room as though
to him, at least, it held the sweetest elements of home a man could ask
for.

Softly the little clock ticked the moments and hours away as they sat
there together, talking over a hundred little happenings of the past
years, now and then glancing over to the Bee-hive. But all was quiet. A
dim light shone in Mammy’s bedroom, and in the Bee-hive Jean’s shaded
electric light cast a faint halo upon the snow which continued to whirl
by the window, although the wind had died down a little and the storm
seemed less violent. Shortly after ten Constance went out to the kitchen
to see that the storm-bound maids were comfortable. Cots had been placed
in the laundry for them, and they were probably far better off than they
would have been in their own home.

“Now, are you sure _you_ will be comfortable?” she asked Hadyn when she
returned to the library. He glanced about the room, at the cheerful fire
and the divan, with its numberless pillows, and smiled significantly.
“Only trouble is, I may be _too_ comfortable,” he said. “But you need
not worry,” as a slight shade of doubt crossed Constance’s face. “I
won’t go to the Land o’ Nod. But _you_ must, so good-night, little girl.
Go on upstairs and sleep well. I know just what that room looks like; I
shall never forget the night you gave it up to me. If I had known it a
little sooner, I should not have let you do so, although the memory of
it has been one of the sweetest ones of my life. Good-night.”

“Good-night, Hadyn, and—thank you a thousand times.”

If Haydn held the slender fingers an extra moment, and looked earnestly
into the beautiful eyes raised to his, he was hardly to be blamed.

Turning to the book shelves, he selected a book and went back to his
chair before the fire. Eleven and twelve were struck by the clock on the
mantle shelf, but all was quiet in the little cottage at the foot of the
garden. Then came three single strokes in succession; twelve-thirty,
one, one-thirty. Hadyn remembered no more. His wild struggle through the
storm earlier in the evening, the silent house, the warmth, the
luxurious depth of the Morris chair had all conspired against his
resolutions, and three o’clock was striking when he started wide awake
with a sense of calamity at hand and the deepest contrition in his
heart—an hour and a half blotted out as though they had never been!




CHAPTER XII

OF THE SHADOW.


As the night wore on, Mrs. Carruth and Mammy grew more and more anxious
for their patient. The severe weather told upon him in spite of the even
temperature of the cottage, and he suffered as a man upon the rack. With
the intense pain came higher temperature, and by one o’clock Mrs.
Carruth began to see that further medical advice was imperative;
something more than they could do must be done for Charles, for he could
not endure such torture for many more hours. Furthermore, his breathing
had become very labored, and Mrs. Carruth feared the worst from that
symptom. Without saying anything to Mammy she slipped noiselessly into
the Bee-hive, meaning to ’phone to Dr. Black. In that little sanctum all
was snug and quiet. Noiselessly removing the receiver, she tried to call
up central. There was no response, and a shadow fell across her face.
Then she tried her own home, but without result; the storm had
completely disorganized the entire service. She was sorely troubled and
about to slip back to Charles, when Jean’s face appeared at the top of
the stairway, and she called softly:

“Mother, is Charles worse?”

“Why, dearie! What are you doing out of your bed at this hour?”

“Don’t scold me, Mumsey, I haven’t been in it, only lying on the
outside, ’cause I thought you might need me; do you?”

“No, honey, certainly not. You must undress at once and get into bed.”

“But, mother, _is_ Charles worse? If he isn’t please let me go and sit
with Mammy while you come in here and go to bed; you have been up all
night. If he isn’t worse you can be spared, and I’ll be all the help
Mammy needs. If he is worse you need me, anyway. I’ve had a long rest,
and been asleep, too, though I tried hard not to.”

As she talked, Jean tiptoed down the stairs, and, coming close to her
mother, slipped her arms about her waist and nestled her head against
her shoulder. The past three months had made a great change in Jean. For
a long time it seemed as though she never meant to grow another inch,
for at thirteen she was no taller than a child of eleven, although plump
and strong beyond the average child. Then she suddenly took a start and
shot up, up, up, until now she was fully as tall as Constance, but
slight and pliable as a willow wand.

Mrs. Carruth laid her arms caressingly about her shoulders, and rested
her cheek against the wonderful hair: hair of the deepest, richest
bronze, and soft and wavy to a degree.

“My little woman,” she said, very tenderly.

“If I truly am, then let me do a little woman’s part. You are tired and
terribly worried about Charles. Let me come in and help.”

“There is so little we can do, Jean. We have done practically all we
know how to do, and Dr. Black asked me to ’phone if there seemed to be
any pronounced change. I haven’t said anything to Mammy, because I do
not want to alarm her more than I must; but I would give anything to
communicate with him, and the wires are down.”

“Yes, I know they are; Connie told me so before she went home, and that
was one reason she wanted me to stay here: she was afraid you would need
help during the night and be unable to get it.”

Mrs. Carruth was about to reply, when Mammy’s frightened face appeared
in the doorway.

“Yes, Mammy! What is it?”

Poor old Mammy! One of the child-race, she was pitifully at a loss in
the face of such a situation as the present crisis. Had it been any of
her white folks she would have been efficient to the last degree,
carrying out the precepts of “ole Miss,” who “raised” her, remembering
with marvellous accuracy each detail of that ante-bellum training, and
performing each with a patience and tenderness incomprehensible to those
who have never known the heart-service rendered by those old-time
servitors. But, strange anomaly, though a characteristic so very marked
in her race, Mammy was utterly helpless when it came to taking the
initiative for Charles or herself in sickness. Then she turned to her
“white folks,” and if her Miss Jinny had bidden her drink strychnine, or
give it to Charles, she would have obeyed her unquestionably. Strange
people that they are!

“Please, come quick, Miss Jinny! I’se powerful trebbled. Charles he
sought o’ wanderin’ in his min’ and talkin’ a heap o’ foolishness.”

Without a word Mrs. Carruth hurried from the Bee-hive in Mammy’s wake,
Jean, unnoticed, close behind her. As she entered the room Charles was
sitting upright, talking wildly and gesticulating to some imaginary
person at the foot of his bed. Mammy, true to her instincts, flung her
apron over her head, and, dropping upon her knees in the middle of the
floor, cried:

“He sees de hants! He sees de hants! His hours done numbered!” and
followed it up with earnest petitions for Charles’ life. Mrs. Carruth
knew colored people too well to waste time in expostulations. She knew
that the only way to bring Mammy back to her senses was to set about
doing for Charles the things which Mammy, in a more rational frame of
mind, would have done herself. Hurrying to his bedside, she said to the
semi-delirious old man:

“Why, Charles, did you miss me when I went to speak to Miss Jean? It is
Jean you wish to see, isn’t it? Well, here she is right at the foot of
the bed, but you can talk to her quite as well when you are lying down.
There, that is better,” as Charles, in obedience to her gentle easing
down, let her lay him back among his pillows. Mammy caught sight of the
act, and it recalled her to her senses quicker than a whip lash could
have done. Springing to her feet, she hurried to the bedside, and taking
her mistress by both hands forced her into the chair near at hand,
exclaiming under her breath:

“Bress Gawd, baby! wha’, wha’ yo’ mean by liftin’ dat heavy man?”

Mrs. Carruth had not misjudged, but she was none the less concerned for
Charles who continued to ramble on to Jean, who stood at the foot of the
bed. A distant clock struck one-thirty. Mammy was doing all she could to
quiet Charles, while Mrs. Carruth slipped into the adjoining room to
prepare some medicine for him. Jean chose that moment to hurry back to
the Bee-hive. A moment later the electric drop light was flashing its
message across the snow-bound garden to the darkened house beyond. There
was no response. Again and again Jean turned the switch, flashing out
across the snow the bright light from the Tungsten bulb, and watching
eagerly for some response, but the house remained perfectly dark; and at
length, in despair, she gave up signalling and went swiftly back to
Mammy’s side of the cottage. Creeping softly up to the bedroom she
looked in. Her mother was too much occupied with Charles to notice her
return, and Mammy was placing hot water bags at the old man’s feet. From
the anxious look upon her mother’s face, Jean knew that she was
seriously alarmed for Charles, who was trembling and quivering with a
sudden chill. Without a word she turned and sped back to the Bee-hive.
Five minutes later she opened the door and slipped out into the night.
The storm had nearly ceased, but the clouds, driven by a wild, bleak
wind, were still scudding across the sky. There was no moon, and it
would have been a brave star which dared send its cheerful gleam through
that cloud rack. Upon the ground the snow lay in deep wind-driven banks,
in some places higher than Jean’s head. All the world was dark, silent,
awesome. Jean never paused. She had formed her plans upon the instant,
and was acting upon them as promptly. A hundred feet from the cottage
old Baltie’s stable loomed in the darkness, the snow upon the eastern
side of it banked high as the little window over his stall. Luckily the
doors were upon the southern, more protected side of the building; and
after struggling and wallowing through the snow until she was nearly
breathless, Jean reached them. Pausing a moment to recover her breath,
she inserted the key in the lock and opened the smaller door. She was
instantly greeted by a soft nicker. Baltie never slept when the
footfalls, however light, of those he loved drew near.

“Baltie, Baltie, dear,” cried Jean, softly, running to the box and
opening the door, switching on the light as she ran. But neither light
nor darkness meant anything to Baltie. His sensitive ears bounded his
world of darkness, and love did the rest. His head was in Jean’s arms in
a moment.

“Can you do it, dear? Can you do it for Charles and Mammy? I wouldn’t
ask you to if I could go alone, but you are bigger and stronger than I
am, Baltie, even if you are so old. Can you take me to Dr. Black’s
through this deep snow? It isn’t so very far, Baltie, and we’ll be
careful. Can you, Baltie? We must have him, for Charles is so sick.”

For answer the horse nestled closer to the girl, and nickered
repeatedly.

“I know you mean ‘yes,’ dear. I know you do. I’ll be careful, Baltie.
I’ll cover you up all warm and snug.”

As she talked, Jean threw over Baltie’s head the head and neck blanket,
which Charles had insisted must be part of the old horse’s impedimenta
during the severe winter months. Deftly pushing his ears into the ear
coverings, she drew the hood over his head, his soft eyes shining upon
her like two moons from the circular openings, and buttoned it around
his throat. An extra blanket was quickly added, and then the old saddle
was strapped on. Leading Baltie to the door, Jean switched off the
electric light, gave one lithe little spring and landed across the
saddle. It had not taken her long to shift from her ordinary clothing
into Constance’s divided riding skirt up there in the Bee-hive, or to
add the heavy outer garments the inclement weather made necessary.

“Now, Baltie, we must go, we must, dear. Please, please do your best for
Charles and Mammy, they have been so good to you.”

As though he understood every word spoken to him, the horse bent to the
driving wind and plunged into the unbroken road. Dr. Black’s home was
less than a mile from Mrs. Carruth’s, and ordinarily Jean could have
walked it in less than fifteen minutes, or run it in ten, and had often
done so; but all walks and roadways were now completely obliterated. She
must trust to her sense of direction and to Baltie’s wonderful instinct.

On plodded the good old creature, breaking into a light lope where the
wind had swept the street comparatively free of snow, wallowing,
pounding, pawing into the drifts where they barred his progress,
snorting his protest, not at Jean, but at the elements, though never
pausing in his efforts, which made him breathe hard, and more than once
slow up for his second wind.

Jean had ridden from her earliest childhood, and had a man’s seat in the
saddle. Now she leaned forward, her arms clasped about the great,
heaving neck, the while speaking encouraging words into the ears laid
back to catch her voice. As they drew near the more thickly settled
portion of Riveredge, the blank, dense silence in which it lay impressed
her strongly. During the first half mile the electric lights at measured
intervals cast their fantastic gleam and shadows upon the snow. In this
section they were numerous and brought into stronger relief the ghostly
houses. Far off some shivering dog howled dismally, and instantly Jean
thought of old Mammy’s superstitions, and her convictions “dat ef he
howl _two_ times an’ stop, it sure is fer a man ter die.” This dog had
howled “two times.” Jean was not superstitious, but she was the child of
southern-born parents, and had been “raised” by a very typical southern
“Mammy.” Tradition is very hard to overcome. She shivered, but not from
the biting cold, though her feet were numb from it.

Not a human being was in sight as she turned into the street upon which
Dr. Black’s house stood five blocks further down. They might almost as
well have been fifty, for the street was narrower than most of the
others, and running north and south had caught the full brunt of the
northeaster. More than one piazza and front door was banked nearly to
the piazza roof, and the street itself practically impassable.

Baltie had come bravely thus far, but such a white mountain as now lay
before him was enough to daunt a young horse, much less an old blind
one. He stopped, his flanks heaving, his head drooping. Jean was almost
ready to give up in despair, for the cold had chilled her to the bone,
and feet and hands were almost without sensation.

“Oh, Baltie, Baltie, my dear old horse, can’t you go a little further?
Can’t you, dear? Please, please try just once more. It’s only a very
little way now; only such a little way! I can see the light in front of
Dr. Black’s door. I’d get off your back and walk, or try to, if I didn’t
know that I couldn’t go five steps. Come, Baltie, please try just once
more.”

Perhaps it was Jean’s pleading, perhaps Baltie’s wind had returned; at
all events, he raised his head, gave a wild snort, a mad plunge, and,
after a desperate struggle, floundered up to Dr. Black’s gate. The house
was barely twenty feet from it, but the snow was up to Jean’s waist.

She never knew how she forced her way through it, or reached the
electric button. She only knew she must do it somehow. When, in response
to its prolonged jingling by his bedside, Dr. Black came back to this
world of real things from the world of dreams, into which a long, hard
day of work and exposure had carried him, and making a hurried toilet
hastened down to the door, he found a huddled heap upon the doormat, and
saw in the drifts beyond a quivering, panting horse.

In two minutes the whole household was astir, kind Mrs. Black had Jean
up in her bedroom, the doctor administering restoratives, the doctor’s
man had led Baltie around to the stable and was caring for him with all
possible despatch.

“Look after her, Polly, and don’t let her leave that bed until I say she
may. I must be off to Mrs. Carruth’s. I don’t believe she even knows
this child is here. It’s all the result of this confounded storm and the
wires being down. Such a blizzard as this hasn’t struck Riveredge in
thirty years.”

It did not take Dr. Black as long to reach Mrs. Carruth’s home as it had
taken Jean to reach his, and when he arrived he found a distracted
household. Hadyn had rushed over to the Bee-hive to find Jean vanished,
Mrs. Carruth entirely absorbed with Charles, who was in a very critical
condition, and Mammy nearly beside herself. As Hadyn, in spite of Mrs.
Carruth’s protests, insisted upon going after Dr. Black, he was
confronted by that gentleman at the very door.




CHAPTER XIII

AFTERMATH.


That storm of March, 19—, claimed many a victim. More than one was
frozen to death, many died from the exposure, and many more were
invalids for months as the result of it. All that terrible night Dr.
Black worked over old Charles, with Mammy and Hadyn to aid him, and
Constance to vibrate between the house and the cottage, for with the
first peep of dawn Mr. Henry’s man came over to dig out the snow-bound
family and make a path from house to cottage. Mrs. Carruth, upon
learning of Jean’s desperate rush for Dr. Black and her collapse at his
doorstep, started instantly for his home. Charles could claim a great
deal from her, but the claim of her own was far greater, and Dr. Black’s
sleigh and powerful horse carried her to Jean as quickly as the great
snowdrifts permitted.

But Jean was really none the worse for her mad ride once she was warmed
and had partaken of Mrs. Black’s cup of steaming hot chocolate. She was
as strong and pliable as a hickory sapling, which, the storm having
passed over it, springs erect and is as vigorous as ever. Mrs. Black
soon reassured Mrs. Carruth, and at length had the satisfaction of
seeing them both fast asleep in her guest room, Mrs. Carruth’s arm, even
in her sleep, laid caressingly and protectingly across Jean’s shoulder.
Both were worn out, and noon had struck before they wakened to reproach
themselves for their long rest and to make inquiry for Charles. Dr.
Black had just returned, and reported a decided improvement in the old
man.

“And Baltie—dear old Baltie?” demanded Jean.

“Baltie is sure enough in clover, little girl,” answered the good
doctor. “Dried clover, and last summer’s clover, to be sure, but none
the less clover, for Dick has nearly buried him in it, and the old
fellow seems none the worse for his struggle through snowdrifts. But you
are both trumps—the queen of hearts and the king, by George! I don’t
know how you did it!”

“We _had_ to do it. There wasn’t anyone else to.”

Dr. Black took the earnest face in both his hands, and, looking into the
hazel eyes, said:

“It is a pity a few more are not convinced of that ‘we had to.’”

Then he drove his guests back to their home. It was agreed that Baltie
should not be taken out of Dr. Black’s stable until the weather
moderated.

A week passed. Charles was out of danger, but still required the closest
attention, and Constance insisted upon a nurse from Memorial Hospital.
Mammy protested, but her protests were of no avail. Constance saw very
quickly that weeks of careful nursing lay ahead, and she would not
permit her mother to overtax her strength. Mammy must attend to her
cooking and the luncheon counter, now that Charles could not. Constance
had her own hands full with her candy kitchen, for, even with Mary and
Fanny Willing to assist her, she had all she could do to keep abreast of
her orders. So the nurse took command in Mammy’s bedroom, and Mammy had
to yield.

Perhaps no one felt the situation half as keenly as Hadyn did. That he
had dozed off in that hour and a half in which so much occurred filled
him with a remorse he could not overcome. He had been left at a post of
duty at a critical hour, and he had failed ignominiously. He would not
admit any extenuating circumstances, for he sincerely felt that there
were none. If others had kept awake when it was imperative to keep
awake, why had he not done so? If little Jean had been able to do so,
and when he had failed her had undertaken such a ride, undaunted by the
hour, the darkness, the loneliness and the terrific storm, while he
dozed snugly before the open fire—oh, it was intolerable, disgraceful!
And these friends had done so much for him! True, no harm had come to
Jean or to the others, but Hadyn shuddered when he pictured what might
have happened in those ninety minutes. Coax and urge as he would he
could not induce Jean to admit that she had signalled to the house for
aid, albeit he felt as certain that she had done so as if he had seen
the electric light flashed. When he urged she simply closed her lips and
shook her head, and as no one else, not even Constance, could enlighten
him, he had to let the matter drop.

In the course of the next week Baltie came hobbling back to his home. In
spite of all the care given him at Dr. Black’s, the old horse showed the
effects of his exposure and the terrible tax upon his strength that wild
night; yet none who loved him so well dreamed that the great summons had
really come to the animal which had given more than thirty years of
faithful service to his friends. From little colthood he had been
Grandfather Raulsbury’s pet until the old man’s death. Then had come the
dreadful interval of evil days when Jabe Raulsbury had so misused him,
to be followed by the happier ones with the Carruths—days of unremitting
care, affection and happiness for Baltie and those who loved him, and
especially to Jean and Mammy. And how generously he had requited their
devotion to him! Indeed, the last act of his life was to be recorded as
one of service to those he loved—a service which had undoubtedly saved
the life of one who had tenderly ministered to his comfort. But for
Baltie’s devotion Charles’ life could not have been saved, all agreed,
and the one who loved the blind horse more than any other excepting Jean
would have mourned her old husband. Mammy’s heart was large enough to
take in all the world if they needed her love and care, though she often
hid that fact beneath an assumed aggressiveness. That was Mammy’s way.

From the hour that Baltie had become the joint property of Jean and
Mammy, and later the ownership had embraced Charles, they had not missed
visiting his stable the first thing in the morning. For a long time
Mammy’s was the first voice the blind old horse heard when he greeted
the morning sunlight which streamed into his big box stall; Mammy’s the
first hand to minister to his comfort and caress him. Then, as soon as
she was dressed, Jean flew to the stable, and a pretty scene always
followed. When Charles came into the family he was the one to go first
to the stable; but neither Jean nor Mammy ever failed to visit Baltie a
little later, and during those years he had become almost human. Only
human speech seemed denied him, but this lack he supplied by his own
Houyhnhum language, and the silent but most eloquent language of the
eyes and ears which God has given mute creatures—each so very wonderful
if dull humans will only try to learn them. In the audible one are
almost as many inflections as in the broader range of the human voice,
and it is a dull intellect indeed which cannot interpret:

“I love you. I am cold. I am hungry. I am parched with thirst,” and a
hundred other sentences, or read the language of the eyes and ears.

And Baltie’s vocabulary was a liberal one; his conversational powers,
exceptional; his friends understanding the keenest.

As often occurs, that blizzard, which is now history, was followed by
weather as soft and balmy as mid-April rather than late March. As if by
magic the snow disappeared, running away in rivers of water and leaving
the turf beneath showing promising bits of green, which made one feel
little tingles of joy at the hint of springtime. Only in sunless spots
did banks of snow linger surlily and soiled, like some malign creature
beaten, but yet too vindictive to withdraw. The stable fronted south,
and all the graciousness of that early spring sunshine fell upon it and
entered its doors the minute they were opened. In spite of her anxiety
for Charles, and her increased labors as the result of his illness and
convalescence, Mammy had somehow found time to visit Baltie each day,
though she was not often able to do so early in the morning. It was Jean
who ran out to him long before anyone else was astir, and more than once
had Constance been obliged to go out after her, lest she forget
breakfast, school, and everything else.

Baltie had been back in his own stable about a week when he began to
show signs that the wonderful machinery which had endured for so many
years was wearing out. Had Charles or Mammy been looking after him then,
they would have recognized the signs; but Mr. Henry’s man, though he did
everything for Baltie’s comfort, saw in him nothing but a worn-out old
horse, which must very soon go the way of all old worn-out horses, and
Jean lacked experience to understand. So the climax came when no one
dreamed it was pending.

It was a wonderful morning in mid-April. Out in the garden some pioneer
robins had ventured into the northern world, and were calling madly to
one another of the grave responsibilities of selecting building sites,
and constructing homes against the arrival of their wives, who had, like
themselves, been wintering in the South. On the southern terrace a few
venturesome crocuses popped their heads up through the moist earth to
smile a “howdy, friend,” at a passerby. Off in the distance the river
lay like a mirror, with vast ice floes dropping down stream with the
tide, crystal barges for Elaine, and moving as silently, each duplicated
in the water mirror that floated them, as were also the opposite shore
and mountains. A wonderful picture, mirage-like in its outline and
exquisite coloring. Those who knew that river best read the signs
unerringly. The farmers living in the environs of Riveredge called this
peculiar atmospheric condition a “weather breeder.”

There was something in Jean which fairly leaped out to meet the newly
awakened world and springtide. From a little child she had lived very
close indeed to nature’s heart. The first balmy breath of spring seemed
to intoxicate her; the first bird-call could throw her into an ecstacy;
an early spring blossom invariably caused a rapture; summer’s languor
and richness bore her off into a beautiful world of her own; autumn’s
“mellow, yellow, ripening days, floating in a golden coating of a
dreamy, listless haze,” conveyed her instantly into dreamland; winter’s
frost and sparkle produced the wildest exhilaration. Was it any wonder
that, coming out into the early morning sunlight of that soft springlike
day, with bird notes filling the air, and her own pulses thrilling with
life at its dawn, Jean’s cheeks glowed and her eyes sparkled with the
very joy of living?

It was still very early and no one yet astir. Over in Mammy’s cottage a
faint smoke wraith floated up from the chimney, telling that Mammy was
astir. Jean had thrown a warm cape about her, for the morning air still
had its chill, and, enticed by the sunlight, she ran down the piazza
steps, inhaling deep breaths of the delicious air. Pausing a moment to
revel in it all, her eyes fell upon the stable. The next second she was
darting away like a swallow, no premonition in her heart of what lay
behind its closed doors.

Opening the door she entered with a soft whistle. When had there failed
to be an instant response to that whistle? This time there was silence
only.

“Oh, Baltie, dear! Come, Baltie!” she called, running across to the box
stall and opening the door. Then there was a low cry, and Jean stood for
a moment as though petrified. On the sweet, clean straw lay the old
horse, body inert, limbs relaxed, head resting upon its bed of soft
straw as a tired, worn-out veteran’s might rest upon his pillow, his
eyes closed, and without a flutter of the delicate nostrils to indicate
breathing. Life seemed extinct. With a piteous cry Jean glided to the
horse’s head and dropped upon her knees, clasping her arms about the
silky neck.

“Baltie, oh, Baltie, dear, look at me! Speak to me,” she begged.

The eyelids fluttered, and the faintest possible nicker was breathed
through the nostrils as he strove to raise his head. Too late! The angel
of death was about to claim one of his most faithful creatures, and, let
us hope, the recording angel was already checking off the deeds of a
devoted life and a disposition which many of his friends claiming
immortality might emulate.

“Oh, my Baltie, my Baltie!” sobbed Jean, slipping into a sitting
position and lifting the horse’s head into her lap. “Must you leave me?
Must your life end now? I love you so, Baltie, I love you so! You have
been so good, so faithful! How can I let you die? how can I?” and with
heartbreaking sobs Jean buried her head in the silky forelock as her
arms clasped the great head.

Slowly the sunlight which Baltie and Jean so loved crept around and
looked into the window of the stall. On a branch just beyond the window
a bluebird caroled as though not in all the sunlit world was there
sorrow or death.

In the stall Jean sat motionless. Her first impulse had been to rush for
aid; but who could aid in this extremity? Instinctively the girl knew it
to be the end, and somehow, in her great love for her pet, she did not
wish anyone else to intrude upon the moment of his passing. She had no
idea of the flight of time. Ten minutes or an hour might have passed
without her noting them. Baltie lay perfectly still, his head in her
lap, her arms clasping his neck. Gently, sweetly as he had lived, so was
Baltie slipping out of the world of sentient creatures. Only the
faintest flutter of breath indicated that life lingered. His effort to
greet the one he loved seemed to have demanded his last atom of
vitality. After a little Jean’s sobs ceased, though tears still fell
upon the satiny head. She did not know how long she had been in the
stall, when just the softest sigh was breathed from the delicate
nostrils, a faint quiver passed over the great frame, and Baltie was at
rest forever. Gently as he had lived, so had Baltie died.

Two hours later Mammy came out to the stable in quest of Jean.




CHAPTER XIV

IN THE SPRINGTIDE.


It is probable that not even those who loved her best realized how Jean
had loved the pet which had been her daily companion for nearly four
years. The very fact that she had rescued him from a miserable death,
nursed and tended him to restored health, had felt his love for her
growing with each day, made Baltie nearer and dearer to her than a
young, vigorous horse could ever have been.

Baltie was now resting in his lowly bed at the foot of the garden, but
Jean did not cease to grieve for him. When Mammy had found her with
Baltie’s head in her lap that morning there had been a pathetic little
scene—for Mammy loved the old horse as dearly as Jean loved him; but had
she been entirely indifferent to him, the fact that her baby loved him
would have been enough to exalt him above all other animals in Mammy’s
sight. Jean was utterly exhausted by her grief and benumbed from her
cramped position when Mammy found her, and the good old soul was
genuinely alarmed when she tried to help the child to her feet. Baltie’s
weight and her cramped position had completely arrested circulation. In
spite of her own grief Mammy lifted Baltie’s head from Jean’s lap, laid
it gently upon the straw and then helped the girl up, or tried to, for
Jean was too numb to stand.

“Bress Gawd, what comin’ to us nex’?” she cried, half carrying Jean to
the house, where Constance met them.

It was hours before Jean could walk unaided, and many days before the
girl smiled again. Mrs. Carruth grew troubled, and one afternoon spoke
to Hadyn about her.

“I am so distressed about it. She is filled with remorse for having
taken Baltie out that night, and that, added to her grief for him, is
making the child positively ill. I have done my best to make her
understand that Baltie had already lived far beyond a horse’s allotted
years, and that very soon he must have come into his long rest, but I
seem to make no impression.”

“If I had been on hand when needed he would be alive this minute, and my
little girl happy and cheery as ever,” protested Hadyn. “I’ll never,
never forgive myself that lapse as long as I live, and nothing I can do
will ever atone for it. It was the most contemptible failure of which I
have ever been guilty; but I declare to you, I’m going to do something
to make reparation. Where is Jean now?”

“She went down to the Arcade for Constance about an hour ago, but she
ought to be back very soon.”

“I’ll walk down and meet my little sister. I’ve a scheme simmering far
back in my witless mind which may take form and shape if I can keep
awake. Au revoir, little mother,” and with the grace so characteristic
of him, Hadyn raised her hand and pressed his lips to it! There was no
one on earth he loved as he loved this gentle, gracious woman.

Riveredge in its late April dress was very dainty. She seemed to be
preparing for Easter, which this year fell late in the month, and over
all the world lay the softest veil of gossamer green. The air was
redolent of cherry and apple blossoms, and filled with bird notes.

As Hadyn walked down the steep roadway, which led from the Carruth’s to
the broader highway, he saw Jean coming toward him and waved his hand in
greeting. As he hurried toward her he called:

“Well met, little sister,” raising his hat and extending his hand.

A quick light sprung into Jean’s eyes. “I like that,” she said, with a
quaint, little upraising of her head.

“Like what, Jean?”

“I like to have a man bow as you do, Champion. Because I’m only fourteen
and still wear short skirts some of them seem to think a nod and
‘how-d’-do’ is all that is required of them, but I don’t agree with
them.”

Hadyn did not betray the amusement this characteristic little comment
caused him. He knew Jean to be more observing of the amenities than most
girls of her age, and that all her Southern instincts demanded the
chivalrous attention which generations of her ancestors had received
from men. Many of her girl friends laughed at her and teased her, but
that did not lower her standard of what was due womanhood from manhood.

“I should be unworthy the name you’ve given me if I forgot,” said Hadyn.

“It wouldn’t make one bit of difference whether I had given you that
name or not, you couldn’t be different.”

“Thank you. But where are you going now?”

“Nowhere in particular. Amy is away and Connie up to her eyes in the
month’s accounts. So I’m adrift.”

“How would you like to come for a walk in the woods with me? I am not
going back to the office this afternoon, for the fever is on me. The
call of the woods gets into my blood sometimes, and then I’ve got to
tramp. Only trouble is, I can’t always get a tramping companion. Will
you come?”

“I’d love to, but I must let mother know, she might worry.”

“She won’t, because she knows I came to ask you to go with me if I could
find you.”

They struck into a side road, which presently became a mere wood path
leading up the mountain, and from which a little higher up an exquisite
picture of the river and opposite mountains could be seen. Hadyn,
pausing at a broad, flat rock, said:

“Let’s sit down and enjoy all this. Come, sit beside me, little sister.”

Jean dropped down upon the lichen-covered rock, warm and dry in the
afternoon sunshine which fell upon it, and said:

“Isn’t it beautiful? Isn’t all the world beautiful? Why need anybody or
anything in it ever die, and why will other people make them. Oh,
Champion, if I only hadn’t made Baltie!” and quick tears sprung into her
eyes. During the two weeks since Baltie’s death Jean had actually lost
flesh and grown pale in her sorrow and remorse for what she believed to
be purely the result of her want of thought.

Hadyn put his hand on hers and, looking into her eyes, asked:

“Little sister, do you know how that hurts _me_? It was not your want of
forethought that night, but my faithlessness which carried you out into
that terrible storm, and I shall never, never forgive myself. You might
have been the victim instead of old Baltie, but as it is his life paid
the penalty of my lapse. True, he was very old and might not have lived
a great deal longer, but his end certainly would not have been hastened,
or your loving heart grieving as it now is had I done my duty. Can you
ever forgive me, dear?”

As Hadyn talked a swift change swept over Jean’s expressive face; a new
light sprung into her eyes, and she said:

“Why, Champion, I never for one single second blamed you. Did you think
I did? Oh, you couldn’t think that, not when you know how dearly I love
you, and how good you’ve always been to Baltie and me. Why, you saved
his life, you know, and have always helped me look out for him; and
you’ve done hundreds and hundreds of things for us both. Please, please
never say that again. You didn’t know I was going to signal that night.”

“Ah, but I _did_ know it, and it was only upon that condition that
Constance consented to go upstairs to bed. She thought she could trust
me to answer that signal, but you see she couldn’t, and all this is the
result. You are grieving for your pet until you are almost ill from it,
and I feel like—like, oh, like the most contemptible thing that ever
happened. What can I do to help, little one? It hurts me to see you or
yours unhappy.”

“I shall not be unhappy,” was Jean’s instant assertion. “I do miss
Baltie terribly, for I loved him, and—and he seemed so much mine, and
was so good and faithful—” here a little sob checked her words. Hadyn
slipped his arms about her, and she leaned her head upon his shoulder.
This big “brother” was a great source of strength and comfort to her.
Then she resumed: “But I shall not let it make you unhappy, too. I dare
say I am silly—the girls laugh at me and say I am, but I can’t help
it—when I love anybody, or anything, I _love_ them, and that’s all there
is about it. Baltie knew me better than he knew anyone else, and loved
me better. No one knows or believes how he understood me, or I him, and
it is no use trying to make them; but I feel as if some part of me had
gone without having him to love and visit and pet every day, and have
him snuggle up to me. I wish horses could have monuments raised to their
memory, and some record kept of their good deeds and faithfulness for
people to read. My goodness, more good things could be said of Baltie
this minute, and they’d be true, too, than can be said of that dreadful
old Jabe Raulsbury; and yet when he died last year they put up a
tombstone for him the very first thing, and what do you think they had
inscribed on it?”

“I’m sure I don’t know,” and Hadyn smiled at the thought of any
commendatory legend being placed upon the monument of the irascible
Jabe, whose life had been one long series of quarrels with his
neighbors, brutality to the dumb creatures which had lucklessly fallen
into his hands, and whose last act had been to fly into a wild rage and
beat his wife. Fortunately, it had been his last transgression, for a
neighbor, hearing her screams, had rushed to her aid, and Jabe, hearing
his approach, and starting to escape by a back door, had pitched
headlong through an open trap-door and into his cellar. Several broken
bones and some internal injuries brought him his just desserts of four
months’ torture, ending in his death, and the town drew a sigh of
relief. Then his widow erected a monument to his memory. It bore this
memorial to the deceased Jabe:

    “A loving husband, tender brother.
    Never shall we find another,”

The first statement was open to doubt, also, the second, for Ned
Raulsbury, who had not had the pleasure of fraternal intercourse with
his brother Jabe for many years, unless a ten years’ lawsuit to secure
his own share of the estate represented it, probably congratulated
himself that he was not likely to “find another.”

Jean repeated the legend with infinite scorn, and Hadyn laughed
outright. Then growing serious again, he said:

“Perhaps a better record of Jabe’s true character is preserved in his
neighbors’ memory of him, and I should think that Mrs. Raulsbury might
now draw her first free breath. It _is_ true that a man’s death can
sometimes bring oblivion of his evil deeds. Poor old Baltie might have
told a few of Jabe’s, but even had he possessed human speech I doubt if
he would have so employed it. Baltie was a gentleman. And, Little
Sister, as a gentleman he must have a monument. Yes, I mean it. A shaft
shall mark the old horse’s resting-place down there in the garden, and I
shall have it erected; it is the least I can do under the circumstances.
Don’t say anything about it to anyone. What would you like inscribed on
it, dear?”

As Hadyn talked in his deep, softly-modulated voice, Jean’s face grew
radiant. At his concluding question she clasped his hand in both of hers
and pressed her lips to it again and again, exclaiming:

“No one but you would ever have understood! No, not anyone. You have
_always_ understood; right from the very first day I knew you. Baltie
would never have been saved on that awful day, or ever have been mine at
all, if it hadn’t been for you, Champion, and oh, how hard, hard, hard I
love you for it. Please don’t ever go away from us; I couldn’t live
without you now; none of us could; you’ll be just one of us always,
won’t you, Champion?”

Jean was too deeply in earnest to be aware that Hadyn’s face was
flushing, or of the strange expression creeping into his eyes: a light
of wonderful tenderness and yearning. He looked steadily into the eyes
regarding him so earnestly as he said:

“Little Sister, do you realize that your home is the only real home I
have known in many years? That when you and Eleanor and Constance agreed
to share with me ‘a part of Mother,’ as you so sweetly expressed it, you
made me your debtor forever and ever? Can you understand how very dear
that little Mother of yours is to me, or how much her daughters’ welcome
into their home has done to spare me a great many lonely hours? True,
there are many friends in the outer world, but that house was once my
Mother’s home, you know, and all my boyhood was spent in it. To go back
to it under almost any conditions would seem almost like entering my own
doors, but to be welcomed to it as I have been makes it—well, some day
you may understand just what it _does_ make it, little girl. And now I
want to tell you something else: You miss old Baltie, I know, and
nothing can ever quite fill his place for you, but your heart is big,
true and warm enough to hold another, isn’t it? For some time I have
been dissatisfied with the care given Comet down in that South Riveredge
boarding stable. They are careless in grooming him, and someone, I can’t
find out which man, is not treating him kindly. Comet never knew the
meaning of a harsh or impatient word until he went there, never feared a
blow——”

“Strike Comet!” cried Jean, all her sense of justice outraged.

“Not exactly strike him, I think, but there are many ways of making a
high-strung, thoroughbred horse’s life a torture. A sudden slap when
grooming him, a shout if he does not step around briskly, or even a blow
on his muzzle with the curry-comb. They may not inflict any great amount
of pain, but they soon get on his nerves, and the next thing we know we
have a horse that starts and plunges at the first sharp word; jerks his
head up if anyone raises a hand toward it; shrinks at the sight of a
curry-comb as from an instrument of torture. Comet never before
manifested any of those signs, but now I’m beginning to notice them, and
I don’t like it a little bit. I wouldn’t have that horse ruined for ten
times his price in dollars, and so I’m going to see what I can do to
place him where all chance of it will be removed.”

“Where, where are you going to send him?” cried Jean, clasping her hands
in her eagerness.

“How would you like to have him come and live down yonder with you?”
asked Hadyn, nodding toward Jean’s home, which could be seen from their
woodland nook.

“In our stable: Comet? To be there all the time so I could go out to see
him every single day, and he’d grow to love me just as Baltie did? Do
you really mean it? Could I?”

“I think Comet will meet your advances more than half way. He has been
treated like a child since his colthood, and you know how he understands
_me_. I’ve had a long talk with the little mother, and she has agreed to
let me keep Comet down there, and my man Parsons is to take care of him,
to sleep in the coachman’s room upstairs and board with Mammy. You know
most of his color find ‘just naturally doing nothing’ quite to their
liking; but Parsons seems to be of different clay, so we will make him
happy by keeping him busy. Good plan all around, don’t you think so?”

“I think you are just the splendidest, dearest man that ever lived, and
Comet shall have the best care in all the world, and if any living being
so much as points a finger at him I’ll—I’ll—well, I just tell you,
they’d better not! Now, let’s go right back home and tell Connie all
about it. You know she loves Comet as much as you or I love him, and
she’ll be tickled to death to have him right there,” and Jean bounded to
her feet all enthusiasm, her eyes shining and cheeks glowing, for
something to love and care for was absolutely essential to Jean’s
happiness.

And so it came to pass that about a week later Comet was installed in
the Carruth stable, and if ever a horse came into an earthly paradise,
Comet came into one in this new home.

Jean was in a rapture, and truly no horse-lover could fail to fall
complete victim to Comet’s charms. It was the balm needed for Jean’s
sorrow for Baltie, and when, in the course of the following weeks, a
granite shaft was placed over Baltie’s grave, the little girl was as
happy as she well could be.

The shaft bore the legend:

                        TO BALTIE.

    _For Thirty Years a Faithful Friend and Servitor._

            Perhaps in some more blissful realm
            Your eyes will beam on us again,
            And we shall find that great and small,
            God _is_ the father of us all.




CHAPTER XV

MAMMY MAKES A DISCOVERY.


June had come, and with June came Eleanor’s graduation. During her
various holidays Eleanor had returned to Riveredge, and with each return
of Eleanor there was vigorous renewal of visits from Homer Forbes.
Forbes seemed deeply occupied in the intervals, and those most
interested in the progress of affairs at the Irving School wondered at
his long absence during the afternoons and his frequent walks up the
mountain to a plateau at its summit. More than once had some of the
pupils of the Irving School met him as he strolled along toward it, head
bent in deepest meditation, hat drawn down over his eyes, hands clasped
behind him, and “munchin’, munchin’, munchin’, fer all de spi’t an’
image ob a goat,” said Mammy, who frequently came upon him as he passed
through the Arcade, for he never set forth upon his rambles without
fortifying himself with a box of Constance’s candies.

Since the fall Jean had not journeyed to the Irving School with her
candies, so the sweet-tooth Forbes was obliged to go after his sweeties
or do without them. But it did not seem to inconvenience him. The Arcade
lay upon his way, and nothing short of dynamite was ever likely to hurry
him. He would buy his box of chocolates and start off, leaving behind
him a little trail of the paraffin papers in which they had been
wrapped, and by which anyone so minded might have followed him miles.
Sometimes, if he had absent-mindedly forgotten to eat any luncheon, he
would supplement his box of candies with some of Mammy’s sandwiches, and
it was upon one of these occasions that his call at Mammy’s counter led
to a curious disclosure.

With the warm spring weather Charles’ health improved steadily; but
Mammy had no idea of risking a repetition of her recent experiences by
permitting Charles to take needless risks. On dull days or damp ones
Charles must bide at home in his cottage, or do little indoor jobs for
his mistress. True, Hadyn’s man left very little for the old man to do,
for Hadyn had been very careful to tell Parsons that Mrs. Carruth must
not want for any service he could render her, and at the same time
tactfully spare old Charles’ feelings. And Parsons was a clever young
negro, as well as a devoted one to Hadyn.

And it so fell out that Mammy went down to the Arcade rather oftener
than usual that spring, and consequently saw many things. Among others
was the frequency with which Mr. Elijah Sniffins haunted Arch Number
One.

Now, Mammy had absolutely no use for Mr. Elijah Sniffins, as may be
remembered. Of course, she conceded him the right to purchase all the
candy he wished; but why should he dawdle over his selection, and then
tarry to talk with Miss Boggs until the girl seemed almost panic
stricken? As near as Mammy could discover, she wished him anywhere but
in Arch Number One, and one Saturday morning Mammy took it upon herself
to keep a sharp lookout. Several times during the morning she made
excuses to go down to the counter for boxes of candy for some of her own
customers, and twice found Sniffins there engaged in a very confidential
conversation with Miss Boggs. Upon her approach he made most impressive
bows to the young lady, and departed with slow insolence.

“’Pears lak dat man powerful set ’pon dese hyer candies,” remarked
Mammy.

“Yes, I guess he does like them pretty well,” answered Miss Boggs.

“You know him quite a spell back?” was Mammy’s next question.

“Oh, yes, for some time,” was the hasty answer. “Did you want some more
of those pralines, Mammy?” and Miss Boggs fluttered nervously among the
boxes in the case, bending low to avoid Mammy’s sharp eyes. As Mammy
stood talking Homer Forbes came strolling up to the candy counter.

“Good-morning, Mammy Blairsdale. As usual, you have a watchful eye upon
Miss Constance’s interests, I see.”

“Mor’in’, Marsa Fo’bes. Yas, sir. Dat’s what ma eyes were done give me
fo’, an’ dey ain’t often playin’ me no tricks, neider. Dey’s good, sharp
eyes, if dey _is_ ol’ ones,” was Mammy’s sibyl-like answer.

“You proved that fact to me many months ago,” said Forbes, with one of
his whimsical, inscrutable smiles. “I should hate to have a guilty
conscience and have you cast your eyes upon me. I’d give myself away as
sure as shooting. I’d be sure you’d read my secret if I had one. Lucky I
haven’t!”

“Yas, sir, ’tis. Mos’ culled folks has de gif ob secon’ sight, dey say.
I ain’t rightly know what secon’ sight is mase’f, but I knows dis much
p’intedly: I knows dat dey ain’t many folks what kin fool me fer long.
Dey like ’nough fool me a little while, but I ketches dem sooner or
later. Yas, sah, I does. Yo’ gwine for one ob yo’ strolls terday? ’Pears
lak yo’ powerful taken wid dat mountain walk, yo’ go ’long up dat a-way
so f’equently. Better stop ter ma lunch counter an’ git a snack ter take
’long wid yo’.”

How innocent the words, yet what a strange effect they produced upon
Miss Boggs. Forbes did not notice it at all, but Mammy missed nothing.

“Good idea. I’ll be along presently,” said Forbes, as he selected his
box of chocolates, and reached into the pocket of his trousers for the
change, rather abstractedly staring at Miss Boggs as he did so. The girl
seemed greatly disconcerted by the look, though, as a matter of fact,
Forbes himself was barely aware of her presence. It was not lost upon
Mammy, who had given one swift, backward glance as she turned to go down
the Arcade. A moment later Forbes reached her counter.

“Give me a good snack to-day, Mammy Blairsdale. I’ve much on my mind
these days, and must keep the brain well fed.”

“Reckons yo’ll find _dat_ wholesome-lak,” returned Mammy, handing him a
neat little package.

“What’s the damage?” he asked.

“None ’tall lessen yo’ drap it, er sits on it. If yo’ does dat it’ll
squash.”

“Nonsense! How much?”

“Ain’t I say nothin’, sah?—wid de complements ob de firm,” was Mammy’s
grandiloquent answer. Then, coming closer, she asked:

“Massa Fo’bes, I wonner if yo’ kin he’p me wid somepin what’s pesterin’
ma min’ mightily?”

“I’ll help you if I can, Mammy Blairsdale. What is it?”

“Kin yo’ tell me who dat girl down yonder is?”

“Which girl?” asked Forbes, turning to look down the corridor.

“None yo’ kin _see_. I means de one dat’s yonder at Miss Constance’s
counter.”

“Oh, that one? Why, she is a Miss Boggs, isn’t she?”

“No, she _ain’t_,” contradicted Mammy, emphatically. “She may _call_
herse’f Miss Boggs if she wanter, but I’ll bait yo’ she ain’t Miss Boggs
no mo’n I’m Miss Brown! I’se seen dat girl somewhar’s else befo’, an’
I’se gwine ter fin’ more ’bout her dan I knows now. She favors someone
else I knows, an’ I ain’t got er mite er use fer dat someone else,
neider. Is yo’ know Mr. ’Lijer Sniffins?”

“The Fire Insurance Agent down on State Street?”

“Yas, sir, dat’s him I means.”

“Yes, by sight, and enough to have him insure the few worldly goods I
possess.”

“He’s at dat counter de hull endurin’ time, ’specially when he git a
notion Miss Constance gwine come down, and he’n dat girl jes’ as thick
as thieves.”

“He and Miss Constance?” cried Forbes, aghast.

“Gawd bress ma soul, _no_, sir. I means dat Miss Boggs; an’ what I wants
ter fin’ out is what fo’ he got any call ter jist na’chelly live dar.”

“Maybe it’s a charming romance right under your very eyes, Mammy
Blairsdale. Surely you do not wish to play the kill-joy?”

“Kill-joy! Huh!” retorted Mammy. “I ain’t gwine be no fool, neider. I
tells yo’ I never _is_ like dat man, an’ if he’s takin’ ter pesterin’
dat girl he gotter quit; an’ if ’tain’t de girl it’s some other
divilmint he got in his haid. I ain’ trus’ him no furder’n I kin see his
shadder; no, I ain’.”

“Has he been there when Miss Constance was at the counter?”

“If he ain’t bin dar, he bin whar he kin watch her ’thout her
s’pici’nin’ it. Time’n agin I’se done seen him tip in dat men’s
furnishin’ Arch, Number Six, pertendin’ lak he buyin’ neckties an’ all
kynds ob fummadiddles. Reckon he do buy a heap, too, for he jes’
splurgin’ fer fair dese days.”

“Dare say he is trying to make a good impression upon the lady of his
heart,” laughed Forbes.

“D’ssay he tryn’ fer ter mak’ a ’pression on someone else, an’ he better
quit if he knows what’s good fer him. Now, what dat girl scuttlin’ down
yonder fer?” was her quick exclamation. Over Forbes’ shoulder she had
caught sight of Miss Boggs hurrying down the corridor, ostensibly toward
the lavatory.

“Candy makes her fingers sticky, Mammy Blairsdale,” was Forbes’
half-idle comment as he turned to look over his shoulder in the
direction of Mammy’s glance. At that very instant Miss Boggs’ profile
was distinctly outlined against the white marble wall behind her, and,
strange coincidence, Elijah Sniffins, turning suddenly around the
corner, came face to face with her. For a brief second each face was
distinctly outlined, then the man and girl passed their opposite ways.

But in that instant Forbes had received an impression swift as an
electric shock. When he turned to look at Mammy, she remarked:

“Reckons yo’ ain’t so near-sighted as dem glasses ’ceivin’ folks inter
believin’, sah.”

“Where does Sniffins live, Mammy?”

“Don’ know no mo’n de daid,” scoffed Mammy.

“Where does _Miss Boggs_ live?”

“Bress de Lawd!” exclaimed the old woman, apparently apropos of nothing.

“Guess I’ll cut out the stroll up Mount Parnassus and look after my
insurance. I’m afraid I ought to renew that premium pretty soon.
Good-bye, Mammy Blairsdale. I’ll see you later.”

“Good-bye, sah! Yas, sah, reckon yo’ had better see me later.”

With his package of luncheon and box of candies, and, as usual, leaving
a trail of paraffin papers behind him, Forbes strolled out of the
Arcade, incidentally noting that Sniffins was selecting cigars at the
counter next Mammy’s. Once he was beyond the portals of the Arcade, his
accustomed deliberation of air and manner fell from him, and with a
muttered “I’ll learn what is back of all that or jump overboard” he sped
along toward State Street at a rate which would have startled his
friends had any chanced to meet him.

No one but the office boy was in Sniffins’ office.

“Where’s Mr. Sniffins?” demanded Forbes.

“Dunno.”

“When will he be back?”

“Dunno.”

“What in thunder _do_ you know, then?”

“Nothin’.”

“Right you are, son!” and turning Forbes pretended to leave the office.
Suddenly pausing, he whirled around to say:

“Give me Sniffins’ home address; I’ll ’phone to him there this evening.”
It was a venture, but worth while.

“Six-twenty Westbank Road.”

“Thanks. Good-day.”

“Day,” and the boy returned to the fascinations of “Tom, the
Cow-puncher.”

Then Forbes went his way up the mountains, having accomplished his
object much quicker than he had hoped to. Had anyone been watching him,
once he reached the summit, they might have questioned his sanity.
Deliberately placing his candy box and his luncheon upon a stump, he
began pacing off distances: twenty long strides toward the river, then
twenty at right-angles, pausing to peer toward the mighty stream flowing
six hundred feet below him, for the cliffs were precipitous at that
point.

“Good site. Magnificent view. Constant inspiration. Bound to succeed.
Purely classical. This will emphasize the illusion. But it must not
_prove_ an illusion; no, not for a moment. It will be a beautiful
reality—a crystallized dream. We will set up our Lares and Penates in
its very center—ahem! I mean—I mean—well I’ll try to persuade her to set
hers up beside mine. Wonderful girl! extraordinary, very! Fell in with
my idea at once—at least thought the plan—what was it she pronounced it?
Ah, I recall, ‘truly altruistic.’ Truly altruistic. Yes, that was it.
Excellent choice of words. Invariably apt and to the point. Yes, the
building shall face this way. Her window—my Lord!” and the monologue
came to an abrupt end as the speaker, turning a vivid scarlet, made a
grab for his edibles, and, seating himself upon a warm rock, began to
devour his luncheon with the dispatch of the animal Mammy insisted he
resembled. The sun was sinking into the West when Forbes came strolling
up to Mrs. Carruth’s piazza, where the family had gathered for their
afternoon tea which old Charles was serving. It was the delight of
Charles’ heart to serve this little repast.

This time it was iced tea and lemonade, with some of Mammy’s flaky
jumbles and a box of Constance’s candy. That piazza was an inviting
spot. Hammocks, lounging chairs and bamboo settees made it more than
luxurious, and the family spent all the time possible in this corner,
which seemed to catch every passing breeze from the river.

They rose to welcome their guest and offer him refreshment. It was
Eleanor who first reached him, and it was beside Eleanor he ensconced
himself upon one of the pillow-laden settees.

“Where on earth have you been, you tramp?” asked Hadyn where he swayed
idly back and forth in a hammock, Jean nestling beside him. Jean was
never ten feet from Hadyn if she could help it. His arm encircled her,
and her head rested against his shoulder as she watched Forbes. Jean was
growing into a very beautiful young girl, though still a child at heart.
“A thin slip of a girl like a new morn” exactly described her. Though
Jean was not thin. She was simply lithe and supple.

“Just on one of my strolls up the mountain. Great old mountain! Fine
view up there! Wonderful place for a residence!” replied Forbes,
devouring jumbles at an alarming rate and quenching his thirst with
glass after glass of lemonade.

“Great if you have an idea of perfecting an aeroplane. Personally, I’d
not relish rambling up there twice daily, and at present the trail
leaves something to be desired for vehicles which navigate upon this
mundane sphere,” laughed Hadyn.

“How do you know that Mr. Forbes hasn’t already invented an air-ship?”
asked Constance. “I hear he goes up there very often, and he may have
ways and means of which we are ignorant.”

“Only Shank’s mare,” answered Forbes, stretching out a pair of long,
dusty legs. “Jove! I am a sight. I didn’t know I was so disreputable.
Beg your pardon, Mrs. Carruth, for intruding upon you like this. Truth
is, I hurried down that trail like an avalanche, for I’d spent more time
at Mammy’s counter than usual. By the way, Miss Constance, Mammy asked
me to look up an address for her. Will you please give it to her for
me?”

“Certainly.”

“Tell her it is 620 Westbank Road.”

“Six-twenty Westbank Road!” repeated Constance, in a surprised voice.
“Why, that is Katherine Boggs’ address, and I am almost sure that Mammy
knows it. Why did she ask for Katherine’s address, I wonder?”

“Don’t know, I’m sure, for Mammy’s ways and wishes are beyond the ken of
the average mortal,” laughed Forbes, as he rose to take leave. As he was
about to descend the steps he turned to Eleanor.

“By the way, if you haven’t anything special on hand for to-morrow
afternoon, won’t you come for a stroll with me?” he asked.

“Now, don’t you do it, Eleanor,” broke in Hadyn. “He means to drag you
clear to the top of that mountain, and these July days are over-warm for
violent exertion. Can’t you see, Forbes, that the very thought of it is
making her cheeks flush?”

“Here, eat another jumble, quick!” cried Constance, catching up the
plate and rushing to the hammock.

Eleanor and Forbes had sauntered off down the terrace. Hadyn took a
jumble, and with a laugh crowded the whole cake into his mouth, his eyes
dancing with mischief.

At that moment Mammy popped her head out upon the piazza to ask:

“Is yo’ chillen all got ’nough jumbles?”

“One of them has more than he can manage,” was Constance’s merry reply.
“Look at him, Mammy. It was the only way I could close his mouth when he
was inclined to say more than was wise.”

“Don’ believe dat, nohow. Marse Hadyn ain’ never is ter say wha’ he no
b’isness ter,” asserted Mammy.

“Hah! I’ve _one_ champion, anyway,” choked Hadyn.

“Two,” corrected Jean.

“Oh, Mammy,” called Constance after the retreating figure. “Mr. Forbes
says the address you wanted is 620 Westbank Road.”

“Huh? Wha’ yo’ say?” cried Mammy, whirling about and coming out upon the
piazza again, her face a study.

“Yes, Miss Boggs’ address, Mammy. Why did you ask Mr. Forbes about it? I
could have given it to you, you know.”

“My Lawd!” was Mammy’s brief retort, and, turning as quickly as she had
come, she hurried indoors once more.

“I shall never understand Mammy if I live to be a hundred years old”
said Constance. “I often believe I’ve solved her riddle, then presto!
here comes a new phase.”

“Leave her alone, Constance. Don’t try to solve it. Just take her as she
is, and make sure that her ‘chillen’ come first in her thoughts,” said
Hadyn. “But, by the by, will you come for a ride to-morrow afternoon?”

“Gladly.”




CHAPTER XVI

MAMMY A SHERLOCK HOLMES.


During the following week Independence Day was celebrated, and such had
become the fame of both Mammy’s luncheons and Constance’s candies, that
these two busy women found every moment filled more than full.

Each had reason to remember another July Fourth, and Mary Willing most
reason of all. The Mary Willing of this year bore little resemblance to
the Mary Willing of that one, and a happier girl it would have been hard
to find. Fanny was now staying with Mary, sharing with her the pretty
little room in Mrs. Carruth’s home, and had quite won her way into Mrs.
Carruth’s heart by her sweet, gentle ways.

During the spring poor, shiftless Jim Willing had taken himself and his
family out West, thanks to Hadyn’s influence in securing for him a
position upon a large farm in Minnesota, where he was not only compelled
to work, but where also, thanks to Hadyn, he could not loaf and drink,
for the man whom he served was not to be trifled with. In May the family
had emigrated, to the intense satisfaction of those most deeply
interested in Mary and Fanny, and the boundless relief of their
neighbors.

In the course of the week which followed her suspicions concerning
Katherine Boggs, Mammy began to lay her plans, and, as usual, with her
accustomed shrewdness. She did not wish Constance to suspect her
interference, but she was fully resolved to get to the bottom of the
matter. Mammy had already formed her opinion, and Mammy was not often
wrong. Fate seemed to favor her, for one morning, when she happened to
be at her counter, Elijah Sniffins entered the Arcade, and going to the
cigar stand bought a cigar, which he lighted and began to smoke. He then
strolled down toward the candy counter. It was a warm, sultry day, with
scarcely a breath stirring. The window giving upon the street in the
Arch was open, as was the door leading from Constance’s little office,
to a short hall communicating with the side street. From her counter
Mammy watched Sniffins until he entered the candy Arch, and then
slipping out of the rear door of the Arcade made her way around the
block and entered Constance’s office by the side door.

For greater protection Constance had hung China silk curtains across the
grillwork, which divided her office from the counter, but these, while
affording her perfect seclusion, did not cut off the sound of a
customer’s footfalls.

Under ordinary circumstances, Mammy would have scorned to resort to such
measures to obtain her end, but she felt pretty sure that her Miss
Constance was being tricked for some purpose, and felt herself justified
in fighting fire with fire.

With exceptional wisdom for her years Constance had arranged with
Charles and Mammy a little code of signals on the electric buttons
beside her desk and under the counter in her Arch. The signals had
served to good purpose, as has already been shown, for old Charles had
come most opportunely when needed one morning. The code was simple: One
ring meant, “Are you there?”; two, “Come to my counter”; three, “Please
’phone up to Mr. Porter that Miss Carruth needs him at once.” This last
call was clearly an emergency call and had never been put to the test;
but both Mammy and Charles, as well as the young colored boy who served
at Mammy’s counter, knew that it must not be disregarded for one instant
if it did come. Constance never knew why she had added it to the simple
little code, for she certainly never anticipated any special need for
it. Still, it was a comfort to the young girl to feel that, should
anything serious occur, she could instantly turn to Mr. Porter.

Mammy entered the office unheard by the two people in the Arch, the
rumble of vehicles in the street drowning all sound of her footfalls.
Sniffins was standing at the counter in earnest conversation with Miss
Boggs. Presently Mammy overheard these words:

“Lige, I _can’t_! I just can’t any longer. She’s too lovely to me.”

“Ah, shut up that stuff. What does she do for you, anyway! Nothin’ mor’n
anybody else would, an’ she gets enough out o’ you for seven dollars a
week. Gosh, she’s makin’ seventy if she’s makin’ a cent. Here, lemme see
that last memorandum of sales made.”

“I haven’t got it here,” was the low-spoken reply.

“Then where have you got it? I want it, do you understand.”

“I don’t see why you want it. I don’t see what good it does you, anyway,
to know how much candy is sold here,” was the querulous answer.

“Ah, what do you know, anyway? You never did have enough sense to go in
out of the rain. _I_ know what I want it for. When I’m sure this
business is makin’ the right-sized pile, I’m goin’—well, never mind what
I’m going to do. But what I want you to do right now is to strike for
ten dollars a week—see? You’ve been here six months on seven dollars,
an’ that’s long and plenty. Now we’re going to have more of the
profits.”

Katherine merely shook her head stubbornly.

“Does that mean that you won’t?” asked Lige, in an ugly tone.

“Yes, it does.”

“All right, all right. Then you can dust your sweet self out of 620
mighty quick. No happy home for you of my puttin’ up unless you do as I
say, Miss Prude. Now where’s that memorandum I want?”

As he spoke Lige made a move as though he intended to go behind the
counter. Poor, simple little Katherine! She had never been intended to
play a double game.

At that moment Mammy pressed the button four times. Here was a situation
needing a firmer hand than hers. A moment later the boy at Mammy’s Arch
was ’phoning up to Mr. Porter’s office.

“Please, sir, I just got four rings from Miss Carruth’s candy Arch, and
Mrs. Blairsdale, she say if ever I git _that_, I must call you up right
smart, and ask you please to go there, ’cause Miss Constance ain’t never
goin’ to ring four rings unless she need you quick.”

“I’ll be there inside of two minutes, Fred,” and the receiver was
snapped back.

“Get away, Lige; are you crazy?” cried Katherine, under her breath, at
the same time foolishly making a dash for her pocketbook which lay upon
a shelf behind her. As she clasped it Lige caught her wrist in a grip
which made her cry aloud in pain. At that moment Mr. Porter entered the
Arch. Lige dropped Katherine’s arm and made a dash for Constance’s
sanctum, but Mammy had anticipated all this; she had shut and locked the
door leading to the side street.

“Mebby yo’ t’ink mos’ eve’ybody as big a fool as yo’ is, Mr. Sniffins,
but yo’ see dey’s _some_ wise an’ hones’ ones yit, don’ yo’? Now, sah,
yo’ set yo’sef right spang down on dat ar’ cheer t’will I ax yo’ a few
ques’ions, wha’ Massa Po’tah gwine hyar, an’ dat po’ li’l fool out
yonder gwine ’splain ef we ses-so. Yas, Massa Po’tah, _I’se_ runnin’
t’ings just now, an’, please, sah, keep yo’ eye on dat skunk, fo’ I
tells yo’ he ain’t nothin’ in de roun’ worl’ else. Now, _Miss Sniffins_,
yo’ please, ma’am, come on hyar, too, fo’ yo’s needed p’intedly.”

In spite of the serious side of the question, Mr. Porter could not help
smiling at Mammy’s generalship. Sniffins stood in the middle of the
room, glowering like a trapped animal, and Katherine entered it
trembling like a leaf. Notwithstanding her righteous wrath, Mammy could
not help pitying the shrinking little figure, and, placing a chair for
her, she said kindly:

“Dar, dar, chile, don’ yo’ git so pannicky. Nobody ain’ gwine kill yo’
whilst Massa Po’tah an’ me close by, dough, Gawd knows wha’ dat low-down
sumpin’-nurrer lak ter do if he git a chance; _I_ ain’ speculatin’.”

“Mammy, what is the meaning of all this?” interrupted Mr. Porter at this
juncture.

“Dat’s jist ’xactly what I don’ sent fo’ yo’ fer ter fin’ out, sah.
Dere’s been some sort of debbilmint gwine on hyar fer a right smart
while, an’ I’se made it ma b’isness fer ter git scent of it an’ trail
it, I has. Dat ar’—dat ar’, my Gawd! I spec’s I _gotter_ call him a man
kase dar don’ seem to be no yether name fo’ him, but _he’s_ at de bottom
ob it, an’ wha’ fo’ he is, is jist what I means fer ter fin’ out befo’ I
lets him outer dis hyar office. Now, sah, Massa Po’tah, yo’ kin hab de
bench an’ question de prisoner.”

Porter had seen enough upon entering the Arch to make him realize that
Mammy had pretty good grounds for her words and the rage which seemed to
almost consume her. Ordinarily Mammy’s face was wonderfully serene, but
Mammy was a pure-blooded African negro, born of an African slave
captured and brought to the United States when the slave trade was a
flourishing and disgraceful source of revenue, and Mammy was born not
long after her mother’s capture. In moments of excitement all her racial
characteristics dominated to a degree that transformed her. At the
present moment there was a fierce conflict between heredity and
tradition, and the environment and training of a lifetime.

“Mammy, tell me what took place before I came upon the scene,” said Mr.
Porter. “I mean within the last half hour, not before.”

Mammy repeated all she had seen and heard. As she talked Mr. Porter rang
the janitor’s bell. When the man appeared he said to him: “Get Terry and
wait with him out in the main corridor. Do it quickly, and don’t make a
fuss.” Terry was the house detective.

“Now, Sniffins, sit down and explain what I saw as I entered the Arch.
There is something wrong here, and I’ve got to get to the bottom of it
right off. It will be useless to beat about the bush now. Mammy has seen
and heard enough to make things very disagreeable for you, I fancy, and
certainly I’ve seen pleasanter spectacles than your conduct with Miss
Boggs as I entered——-”

“She ain’ Miss Boggs no mo’n I is,” broke in Mammy.

Sniffins would not answer. Mr. Porter turned to the trembling little
figure at the opposite side of the room, real pity in his kind eyes.
Sniffins glowered at her. Catching the look, Mr. Porter turned upon him
like lightning.

“If you try to intimidate that child, by the great Jehosaphat I’ll
either give myself the satisfaction of thrashing you, or turning you
over to Terry on an accusation you’ll not like. Now quit it! You haven’t
a thing in the world to fear, Miss Boggs; I guess it is all far less
grave than it seems to you this minute. So tell me the whole truth.”

Mr. Porter’s voice had changed rapidly from the severe tones directed
toward Sniffins, and now held only encouragement for the terrified girl.
After a few spasmodic sobs she faced him and said:

“No, Mr. Porter, I shall not try to keep up this deceit any longer. I
told Lige when I began it that it would be useless. I’m not the kind of
girl who can do such things; I’m not smart enough.”

“Reckons yo’s too smart fer ter try ter be what he is,” broke in Mammy.
Mr. Porter held up his hand to enjoin silence, but if Mammy consented to
keep her tongue still, she could still wag her head and use her eyes,
and to some purpose.

“My name isn’t Boggs, but Sniffins——”

“What I done tole yo’!” exploded Mammy.

“Lige is my brother. He wanted me to take the situation. At first I did
not know why he was so anxious for me to. I thought it was just because
he wanted me to have one which he believed might lead to something a
good deal better later on, because Miss Carruth’s candy business was
growing fast, and I might get to be a forewoman, or something like that.
You see, I used to know Mary Willing at school, and she and Fanny are
both doing so well, but——” and Katherine hesitated.

“Go on, Miss Sniffins,” said Mr. Porter, encouragingly; but the look
Elijah Sniffins gave his sister was not pleasant.

“Well, he just made me take this place, and wouldn’t let me tell my real
name; and I’ve been scared nearly to death every day of my life for fear
Mary Willing would come down here, and that would be the end of it all.
But that wasn’t the worst; pretty soon I guessed just why Lige wanted me
here, and—and—oh, it seemed as though I just couldn’t stand it another
minute; I was so ashamed. Miss Carruth is so kind to me, and has always
been.”

“And the true reason?” interrogated Mr. Porter.

“Oh, I _can’t_ tell it,” cried the girl, turning scarlet and burying her
face in her hands.

“It will be better to do so here than to do so elsewhere, will it not? I
am determined to get to the bottom of all this, now that I have begun,
and much prefer to keep it quiet for the sake of all concerned. I think
I already guess more than you realize. I shall ask a few questions to
make it easier for you?”

“She ain’t got to answer none if she don’t want ter,” was Elijah’s surly
remark.

“Will you kindly keep quiet until your information is desired?” said Mr.
Porter, quietly. “Your brother wished you to have this situation for two
reasons, I take it: The first for the income and prospective
advancement; the second because it brought you in close touch with Miss
Carruth and might prove a wedge for his social aspirations, which I hear
are ambitious.”

The girl nodded assent.

“You objected to the deceit practiced and rebelled. Was that the cause
of his anger and gross rudeness as I entered?”

“Partly.”

“And the rest?”

“He made me keep strict account of the sales and profits and give him a
memorandum each week,” whispered Katherine.

“Indeed. And to what end?”

“He said—he said, he’d make up his mind that he would get to know and
would marry Miss Carruth if the business got to be—to be—a big one——”

“My Gawd a-mighty!” cried Mammy, flying out of the chair upon the edge
of which she had been sitting, her old face the picture of consternation
and amazement. It was not surprising that Sniffins sprung from his
simultaneously and made toward the door, for Mammy certainly was wrath
and retribution incarnate.

Mr. Porter barred the way of one and said sternly: “Mammy, sit down!”

“But—but—but—Massa Po’tah, is yo’ hyar wha’ dat man a-sayin’? _Is_ yo’?
He—he marry ma Miss Jinny’s daughter? Why, he ain’, he ain’ fitten fer
ter bresh her shoes! Lemme jes’ lay ma hans on him an’ frazzle him out.”

Mammy was nearly beside herself with indignation.

“Mammy, do you wish to remain here and hear the rest of this ridiculous
story, or must I have Sniffins and his sister taken up to my office? It
is too public here for loud talking, and if you wish to save your little
girl deep mortification, and her mother the keenest distress, you will
control yourself. This is the greatest folly I could have believed any
sane being capable of, but if it gets noised abroad it will soon grow
into a scandal, as you must realize. Remember this, every one present,
Miss Carruth must never learn one word about it if we can keep it from
her. Now, go on, Miss Sniffins, and tell all the rest of this wretched
folly and, yes, downright rascality, for your brother has placed himself
in a very unenviable position.”

“You can’t _prove_ nothin’,” protested Sniffins.

“Prove anything! Man, are you altogether a fool? Intimidating your
sister into masquerading under an assumed name, to say nothing of
handing over a private memoranda of another person’s business affairs,
and, by the way, Miss Sniffins, I’ll take charge of that last
memorandum, if you please,” said Mr. Porter, extending his hand toward
Katherine.

“No, I’m hanged if you do,” blustered Sniffins, springing toward her.

With a grip like iron Mr. Porter forced him back upon his chair.
Katherine handed him a slip of paper from her purse.

“Thank you. Now, Sniffins, I’ve just a few concluding words to say to
you, but you will do well to heed them: In the first place, you have
made an ass of yourself pure and simple. In the second, you are pretty
close to being something far worse. You have done some queer things
lately, and tried some very questionable tricks down there on State
Street, as you know even better than I do, although, as I hinted to you
some time ago, I know enough, and a heap more than you suspect. I don’t
want to make trouble for you, or any other man just beginning his
career, but I won’t stand for rascality. Now here is your chance and you
have no choice but to take it: You gave your sister no choice, remember,
and now it’s your turn to eat a little of your own loaf. Ask to be
transferred to some other office—the further away the better.”

“Ah—what sort of a game are you puttin’ up?” snarled Sniffins.

“It is you, not I, who have put up the game, and since you’ve begun it
you may as well make up your mind to play it out. You can easily get
transferred, and that is just what you’ve got to do. This place has
grown too warm for you in a good many ways. Your mother is fairly
well-to-do, and your sister has this situation.”

“But I can’t keep it! I can’t!” lamented Katherine.

“You must. Once your brother is away you have nothing to apprehend.”

“But my name! What will Miss Carruth think?” deplored Katherine.

“Will you leave that to me?” asked Mr. Porter, real compassion in his
voice and face for this unhappy little victim of an unscrupulous will.

“I want to stay, oh, I _do_ want to, for Miss Carruth is always so
lovely to me.”

“You’s gwine fer ter stay, too,” announced Mammy, autocratically,
hastily going to Katherine’s side to soothe and pat as she would have
consoled a distressed child.

“Oh, Mammy, Mammy, she won’t let me stay,” sobbed the contrite little
soul.

“How she gwine know anything ’bout dese hyer doin’s?” demanded Mammy.

“I don’t see how she can help it.”

“Well, den, I does.”

“Keep your situation, Miss Sniffins, and also keep quiet. I shall tell
Miss Constance that you gave the assumed name because you feared she
might feel some prejudice against engaging you if she learned you were
Mr. Sniffins’ sister; I am sure that is a pretty valid reason, for she
has every reason to wish to avoid him; he has never figured pleasantly
in her affairs. And now I think we have had enough of all this. But
remember this, Sniffins: I mean exactly what I have said, and South
Riveredge is no place for your future business operations. You have come
pretty near making a serious mess of things for yourself and everyone
connected with you, and a halt has been called. Move on, and take a word
of advice from a business man of double your years—_move straight
hereafter_. Now go.”

Sniffins left the office by the side door, which Mammy unlocked and held
open with this parting shot:

“Ain’ I done told yo’ long time ergo dat _some_ day niggers gwine fer
ter hol’ open de do’ fo’ yo’ stid of yo’ fo’ _dem_?”

Mammy had never forgotten or forgiven the experience of her first visit
to Elijah Sniffins’ office, and she was settling an old score. Then,
turning to Katherine, she asked:

“Wha yo’ gwine spen’ de nex’ few days, honey? I would’n aim fer ter go
home ef I was yo’.”

“I shall stay with a friend here in South Riveredge. I believe Lige
would half kill me if I went home, he’s so awful mad.”

“Dat’s right, yo’ keep ’way f’om dat man.”

“Yes, it is wiser, Miss Sniffins. Don’t worry, all will come out right
in the end; he has just lost his head—that’s all. Now mind what I say,
both of you: Not one word of all this anywhere else. I wouldn’t have all
this folly come to that little girl’s ears for all I’m worth. It’s
almost incredible that anyone could act like such a fool. Paugh! it
makes me ill. I feel as though some loathsome beast had drawn near that
little girl of ours,” and with a quick “good-day” Mr. Porter turned and
strode from the office, out through the Arch and into the main corridor,
where the janitor and Terry stood quietly talking together. They glanced
up as he drew near.

“Oh, Donnely,” he said to the janitor, “just take a look at that faucet
in Arch Number One, will you? It’s leaking a little; and Terry, if
you’ll come up to my office with me you can get those papers now as well
as any time.” A word, a smile to those in the other Arches, and not a
thought was given by anyone to what might have been a very unpleasant
episode in Constance Carruth’s career.




CHAPTER XVII

CUPID IN SPECTACLES.


If Constance had any suspicion that a most unusual scene had taken place
in Arch Number One, she gave no sign of it.

Within a few days after that occurrence Mr. Porter ’phoned down to her
counter one morning, and asked her if she could come up to his office
before she returned to her home, giving as a reason his wish to talk
over some plans he had in mind for the Arch. She went up immediately,
and as simply as possible he told her of Katherine Sniffins’ unfortunate
deception, her reason for taking the position under an assumed name, and
her distress and remorse for having practiced such a deceit. He did his
best to spare Katherine and to convince Constance that her only reason
for such deceit had been her eagerness to secure the position, and her
fear that she could not do so if Constance knew her to be Elijah
Sniffins’ sister.

At first Constance was strongly inclined to resent it all, and to sever
relations with the victim of Elijah Sniffin’s scheming, but gradually,
as Mr. Porter talked, her sense of justice prevailed, and her resentment
changed to pity, and with that the day was won.

Perhaps Mr. Porter’s casually dropped remark regarding Mr. Elijah
Sniffins’ sudden departure from South Riveredge to take charge of one of
the company’s offices in the far West, and the added information that he
would not return to his former home, was the final straw which turned
the balance in Katherine’s favor. Constance was a generous-hearted girl,
to whom petty resentment was impossible. And so that chapter in the
lives of the girls, so utterly unlike in character, was closed, and
Constance never knew what an exceedingly unpleasant one it might have
been for her but for Mammy’s ceaseless vigilance and Mr. Porter’s
wisdom. For a few days, it is true, she was somewhat disturbed, and it
needed all her self-control and dignity to help her through the
half-hour’s talk with Katherine, but once that ordeal was over she
dismissed it all forever, and was the same sweet, gracious little
employer whom Katherine had always known. If Katherine had admired her
before, she openly adored her now, and confided to Mary Willing, whom
she met not long after, that she “didn’t know there _could_ be girls
like Constance Carruth,” and forthwith eulogized her until, had
Constance heard it, she might have been forgiven if she had begun to
feel around her own shoulder blades for sprouting wings.

Mary let her talk on, secretly rejoicing in every word spoken in praise
of her idol, then with a most superior
“why—anybody—could—have—told—you—that” air, she said:

“It’s all very well, I dare say, for people to work like everything to
reform girls who have actually _done_ wrong and are in disgrace, but
from my standpoint, if a few more people would do the things Mrs.
Carruth and Miss Constance are doing as a matter of course every day of
their lives, there wouldn’t be so many girls in need of reforming,
because they would be helped to have a little common sense and an idea
of the fitness of things before they went too far. Everybody knows what
a silly little fool I used to be whenever a man came near me, and I’d be
one yet if it hadn’t been for those blessed people; but I tell you they
made me sit up and take notice, and they did it so beautifully, and with
so much love and sweet fellowship thrown in, that I’d die to-morrow if
it could save just one hair of their dear heads. You may think I’m just
talking for effect, but I’m not. I mean every single word I say, and if
you ever get to know them as Fanny and I do, you will feel exactly the
same way, you see if you don’t.”

“I do already, though I can’t talk as you do,” answered Katherine,
simply.

“They have helped me that way, too,” added Mary. “My goodness, how I
used to talk and what awful words I used before I knew them! But they
teach you without letting you ever guess they are teaching, and you
learn because you can’t help it. Good-bye. Come down and see me some
time.”

“Can I come to see you down there?”

“Why not? The little sitting-room up over the candy kitchen is just like
our own. Miss Constance told me to invite any of my girl friends to
visit me whenever I wished to, and we have lovely times up there
evenings when the work is done. Sometimes Mrs. Carruth or Miss Constance
come out to sit with us a little while. They always say they have come
out to welcome their guests, because Fanny’s guests and mine are theirs,
too. Isn’t that a sweet way of putting it? We know, though, that they do
it because they want our friends to feel at home, and there hasn’t been
a single evening when they haven’t sent Mammy up with some cake, or
lemonade, or something nice, and I can always take a pound of candy if I
want to. Oh, there’s no place in all the world like the ‘Bee-hive,’ I
tell you!” And, with a happy smile, Mary went upon her way.

Not long after this something else came up that filled the Carruth
household with subject for thought.

Before leaving college, Eleanor had been offered a position in a girls’
school. The school was one widely known, and prepared a great many
pupils for Eleanor’s alma mater. She had been highly recommended by its
faculty, and had fully decided to accept the position. All that remained
to complete the arrangements was her final acceptance above her own
signature and that of the school’s principal. This she was on the point
of settling when she returned to Riveredge, then a trifle changed her
decision. Homer Forbes came home with her, and on the way she told him
of her plans.

He listened with great interest, although without comment, meanwhile
gazing abstractedly out of the Pullman car window until Eleanor began to
wonder if he heard one word she said, and, if the truth must be
confessed, was not a little piqued at his seeming unconcern.

As usual, when thinking deeply, he munched away upon something. This
time it happened to be a long spiral of paper he had absently torn from
a magazine and twisted into a lamplighter, and Eleanor found herself
subconsciously wondering how much of it would disappear before he
recovered his wits and spoke.

About four inches of it had vanished, and, had Mammy been present, her
theory of the goat would surely have been substantiated, when he gave
his paper fodder a toss, and, turning toward her, said:

“Don’t sign that contract until you get home and have thought it over a
week. Then if you _do_ sign it, do so for six months—one term—only.”

“But,” interrupted Eleanor, “that seems to me a most improvident step,
for right in the dead of the winter it would leave me without occupation
or the prospect of any.”

“No, it wouldn’t, either. Do you think I would suggest such a step if I
didn’t have something up my sleeve for you a mighty sight better—er,
ahem! I mean if I hadn’t been on the lookout for something desirable—or,
or, at least, something I feel you would consider.”

“What is it?” was Eleanor’s very natural and direct question.

“Eh? Ah, well, er—a little enterprise, a scheme, a—er—What station is
this we’re drawing into?” and this discussion was sidetracked instantly,
leaving Eleanor to wonder if Forbes had lost his senses.

She had been home a little more than a week when he asked her to take a
walk with him, and had led her a wild scramble to the top of the
mountain to the plateau heretofore mentioned, where he unfolded a plan
which caused Eleanor to collapse upon a nearby rock and sit looking at
him in a bewildered manner. Again and again during the ensuing weeks had
they toiled up the mountain, and each time had returned grimy, gratified
and garrulous, heads nodding, hands gesticulating and oblivious of any
other human being on top of the round world.

Mrs. Carruth watched developments with resignation; Constance with open
amusement; Mammy with a division between tolerance and contempt—the
saving grace in the cause being that Forbes could remotely claim kinship
with the Blairsdales. But it was upon Jean that the effect was the
funniest. Jean had spent all her life with people older than herself.
There had been no little children in her home, and her interests had
naturally centered upon her older sisters and around their affairs. She
had a wise little head upon her fourteen-year-old shoulders, and older
people would have been somewhat surprised could they have known the
“long, long thoughts” which passed through it. More than once had she
seen Forbes and Eleanor start off and toil up the mountain, and more
than once had she been an unobserved follower. She never followed close
enough to overhear their conversation; that would have been contrary to
her sense of honor. Still, she was determined to know where they went,
and, if her eyes could inform her, why they went, and her deductions
came nearer the mark than the two would have believed possible.

And so had passed the summer days, and now September was at hand, and in
a very short time Eleanor would start for Forest Lodge—the school in
which she had accepted a position for six months—_not longer_. Forbes’
influence had prevailed.

Early one morning the ’phone rang. Eleanor was wanted.

“I know what it is,” cried Jean, who happened to be near it and turned
to receive the message: “It’s Mr. Forbes, and he wants Eleanor to play
Pilgrim’s Progress with him again, I’ll bet a cookie.” The funny
one-sided conversation began only to be interrupted by Jean, who
exclaimed:

“What makes you think you’re talking to Eleanor? Are our voices so alike
as all that? Hold the wire while I call her, and don’t waste all those
nice speeches on me,” and with a chuckle Jean turned to call Eleanor.

That afternoon Forbes called for Eleanor, and just as they were about to
start upon their pilgrimage Jean came tearing out upon the piazza with
two gorgeously colored laundry bags, rose-flowered and highly
decorative, which she plumped down upon the piazza.

“Jean!” expostulated Mrs. Carruth. “What in this world?”

“Well, I don’t see any sense in playing a game unless you have the
‘impurtenances,’ as Mammy calls them: it must seem sort of half played.
So I’ve filled these bags full of newspapers, and if you’ll each sling
one over your shoulders you’ll be sure enough ‘pilgrims,’ and goodness
knows you climb up that mountain often enough to give ‘Pilgrim’s
Progress’ to the life!”

Then Jean fled, and so did Eleanor and Forbes.

Panting and hot, in the course of time they reached the summit of the
mountain and the plateau, every square foot of which should have been
known to them by this time. Seating themselves upon the log, which had
done duty many times before, Forbes at once began to unroll a great
blueprint which he held at arm’s length, and said:

“_Now_, I can show you the tangible evidence of my dreams. You see the
plan is this:”

But, alack! the best-_drawn_ plans, etc., and this plan was printed upon
the stiffest of architect’s paper, and had been rolled tightly for
several days: Forbes’ fingers were a trifle shaky for some reason; one
edge of the outspread roll slipped from them and quick as a flash coiled
up upon itself, sweeping his glasses from his nose and hurling them ten
feet away, where they crashed upon a rock and shivered to atoms.

Now, if anyone reading this is solely and entirely dependent upon a pair
of glasses to see anything ten inches beyond her own nose, she will
understand how Forbes felt at that particular moment—maybe.

They bounded to their feet and inanely rushed for the wrecked glasses,
knowing perfectly well that only bits of scattered crystal lay upon that
merciless rock. Eleanor dropped upon her knees and began frantically to
gather up the fragments, Forbes towering above her and blinking like an
owl which has suddenly been routed out of a hollow tree into the glaring
sunshine. A fragment, about two-thirds, of the lense of the right eye
still held to the nose-clip. Eleanor pounced upon this, crying:

“Ah, here is a little piece, a very little piece! Do you think you can
see with that? See just a little, little bit? Enough to look over the
plans? I’ll read the specifications to you. I’ll do anything, anything
to help you, I feel so terribly sorry. Let me be your eyes for just a
little while, for I know how disappointed you must be,” and there was
almost a sob in her voice as she rose to her feet and held the hopeless
bit of eyeglass toward him.

He took it, deliberately opened the patent clip and as deliberately
snapped it upon his nose, Eleanor watching him as though worlds trembled
in the balance.

If half a loaf is better than no bread, I dare say two-thirds of an
eyeglass are better than no eyeglass at all; and who in such a vital
moment would have dared hint that Forbes looked slightly batty as he
cocked one eye at the lady before him? Certainly not the lady, who was
the very picture of Dolores at that instant. Then Forbes came to the
front splendidly. Indeed, he came with a rush and a promptitude which no
one could have foreseen; he made one step forward, and the next instant
held the lady in his arms, as his words poured deliciously into the ear
so near his lips:

“My eyes! My eyes! You shall be my eyes, my ears, my soul!—yes, my very
body and boots. No! no! I don’t mean that! Oh, hang it all, what made me
say that foolish thing? I mean you _are_ my eyes and my very soul!
Without your inspiration my very mind would be a blank. With you the
dreams of my life will be crystallized into beautiful realities. Never,
never shall I let you leave me! Never depart from your home until this
one we have pictured and planned stands ready to receive you within its
walls, to be its cherished, adored light; its inner shrine, at which I
shall be the chief worshipper, my goddess of sweetness, light and
intellect! My inspiration to ideals beyond man’s conception.”

But let us draw down that thick fir bough as a curtain.

Off yonder, upon a moss-covered stone, sat a little figure, hugging his
knees and swaying backward and forward in an abandonment of hilarious
mirth. At his feet lay a bow, beside him an empty quiver. On his wee
nose the wreck of a pair of thick-lensed eyeglasses.




CHAPTER XVIII

HARVEST TIME.


The September days were exceptionally warm ones, but no one seemed to
mind them because the evenings were cool. The two pilgrims continued
their progress, advancing rapidly and in such a rosy atmosphere that the
millennium seemed close at hand. Whatever Homer Forbes’ plans were, and
as yet only he and Eleanor seemed to know much about them, they
evidently met the entire approval of the lady in the question, for she
threw herself into the process of perfecting them with an ardor that
nearly drove her family frantic. No matter where they turned, they found
plans and specifications lying about, and Eleanor’s room resembled an
architect’s drafting-office. Not long after that walk up the mountain
there had been a closeted hour’s talk with Mrs. Carruth, and when Homer
Forbes came out of the library at the end of it he was in such a
perturbed state of mind that he nearly fell over Mammy as he rushed
through the hall, out of the front door and across the piazza, to vanish
down the road and leave the family staring after him; at least, that
portion of the family which happened to be seated there. Hard upon his
heels followed Mammy, crying:

“Gawd bress ma soul! what Miss Jinny done ter dat man? ’Pears lak he
gone plum loony.” Then, turning to Mrs. Carruth, who followed not far
behind, Mammy continued: “Miss Jinny, is dat man gone cl’ar crazy?”

Mrs. Carruth smiled as she replied:

“They sometimes call it ‘a very mid-summer madness,’ Mammy, but
mid-summer has passed, hasn’t it? It’s not dangerous, however. You would
better go upstairs and ask Miss Nornie. I am sure she can tell you more
about Mr. Forbes than I can. At all events, she has decided to let him
guide her through life, so she must have an abiding faith in him, and I
have told him he may do so if she wishes it. By the spring you will have
to climb to the top of Mt. Parnassus if you wish to see your Miss
Nornie, I think.”

“Whar _dat_ place at?” demanded Mammy, while Hadyn gave a low whistle,
and Constance cried, “What did I tell you, Mumsey?” as Jean jumped up
and down in her excitement.

“You had better go upstairs and ask Miss Nornie, Mammy,” and straightway
Mammy whirled about and started upstairs to Eleanor’s room, where she
found her buried neck-deep in a pile of drafting papers, triangles,
compasses and pencils; though just what she was drawing plans for Mammy
could not guess. When questioned of late Eleanor had given negative,
abstracted replies which more than once nearly convulsed her hearers,
and upon one occasion she had brought consternation upon the family by
emptying a brimming washbowl of water into her scrap-basket instead of
her slop-jar. Evidently the scrap-basket had figured more prominently in
her thoughts of late than had her washbowl.

As Mammy appeared at the door Eleanor was bending over a great blueprint
plan which she had spread upon the floor. It was a tremendous affair,
fully two by four feet, and Eleanor was down upon her knees, hands
outspread and locks flying, too absorbed to be aware of Mammy’s
presence.

“Peripatos, peristyle penetralia,” murmured the engrossed one, tracing
with a slender forefinger the lines upon her plan, then repeating,
“Penetralia, penetralia. How interesting.”

“What in de name o’ man is you jabberin’ about, anyway, Miss Nornie?”

Eleanor came to an upright position with a start, crying:

“Goodness, Mammy, how you startled me!”

“Yo’ better had git up f’om dat floor ’stid o’ bendin’ ober dat sky-blue
sheet o’ paper what done look lak it got Chinee writin’ an’ drawin’ on
it. Yo’ face make out de res’ ob de colors fer de hull ’Merican flag:
red, white an’ blue alltergedder. ’Taint no kynd ob a day fer ter be
bendin’ ober lak yo’ is. Nex’ t’ing yo’ know yo’ gwine git rush o’ blood
ter de haid, an’ dat’s bad, I tells yo’! Wha’ yo’ gwine do wid all dat
blue stuff, anyway? Yo’ ain’ tell me one single t’ing ’bout it, an’ I
ain’ know wha’ ’tis. An’ I wants fer ter know, too, if yo’ gwine be home
ter lunch ter day.” Mammy’s sharp eye scrutinized the rosy face before
her.

“O, you needn’t bother about me, Mammy. Mr. Forbes will be over shortly
and we are going for a tramp.”

“Tromp! tromp!” echoed Mammy. “Tromp on sich a hot day as dis hyar wid
de fermom’ter jist nachelly climbin’ cl’ar out er sight? Is you done
gone silly, yo’ an’ dat Perfesser Fo’bes? Yo’ stay ter home in dis cool
house what I done darken up fer ter keep out de sizzlin’, billin’ heat.
It fa’r scoch de very skin off yo’ body. Don’ yo’ let dat man drag yo’
up dat mountain on sich a day, I tells yo’.”

“Oh, we don’t mind it, and the woods are so cool. Just put up one of
your delicious little luncheons for us, and we’ll be more than
supplied.”

“Cool in de woods! Yis, when yo’ gits to em, but yo’s got right smart
ter walk fo’ yo’ comes ter dem, an’ I ain’ pinin’ fer no sich ’xertion
on such a frazzlin’-out day. But I reckons I jist better save ma’ bref
dan spend it a-talkin’. Yo’ lunch gwine be ready fo’ yo’ when yo’ ready
fo’ it; but what I wants ter know now is, what all _dat_ meanin’,” and
Mammy pointed again to the big blueprint.

Eleanor was not given to emotion but there come times in every life when
one’s emotions are more easily played upon than at others. The past week
had held such moments for Eleanor. Of all Mammy’s children Eleanor had
been the least demonstrative. She rarely caressed the old woman as
Constance and Jean did. Now, however, she bounded to her feet and,
rushing to Mammy, cried:

“Oh, Mammy! Mammy! Do you believe in dreams? Don’t you think they come
true sometimes?”

“A heap o’ times!” interjected Mammy.

Eleanor sighed ecstatically. I _knew_ you would say so, Mammy. “And
_ours_ will, won’t it?”

“Who ‘ours?’” demanded Mammy, her lips pursed up, and distrust in her
eyes.

“Homer’s and mine! Homer! Isn’t that a name to inspire one? Fate must
have ordained that he should bear such a name. Only a classic poet’s
could be in harmony. It must be the purest, the best, the finest, the
most perfect,” rhapsodized Eleanor.

Mammy looked at her a little anxiously, and asked:

“Isn’t yo’ better lay down on dat baid yonder? Yo’s been a bendin’ ober
dose papers twell yo’ haid’s achin’, I’se feered.”

“Ah, no, Mammy, but think of it! To live in a Grecian dwelling! A
perfect reproduction of an Athenian temple. With the fountain of
Hippocrene in it’s center, from which a rill will flow murmuring all the
day. Helicon’s harmonious stream. We shall call it Helicon Hall, and
there we shall train the youthful mind to a deep appreciation of true
beauty. In the central court, overroofed with glass and filled with
tropical plants, will be our hearth stone, our altar, on either side of
which will stand our lares and penates. Could any other mind have
conceived this wonderful dream in this prosaic age? See, see our plans,
Mammy? How clear, how concise, how graphic. Ah, I can picture it
all—all.”

“Well den I cyant!” cried Mammy, losing patience, “and I don’ reckon yo’
Ma nor none ob de yethers kin. At any rate, I got sumpin else ter do
’sides standin’ hyar listenin’ at what I sets down as jist foolishness;
an’ ef I was yo’ Ma I’d tell yo’ not ter go a-climbin’ up dat mountain
no mo’ twell de wedder done cool off some,” and with this admonition
Mammy left the dreamer to her dreams. But before we take a long leave of
her, we will add, by the way, that in the course of time this dream
crystallized into a large building, in the form of the Parthenon,
wherein this modern Socrates, Professor Homer Forbes, and a charming
Hypatia, his wife, led the minds of affluent youths, whose parents were
willing to indulge them in such luxuries, along paths of learning
literally flower-strewn. Reclining at length upon the green sward of the
court of Helicon Hill, they drank in the words of wisdom falling from
the lips of their preceptors. Eleanor had achieved her ideals: Homer
Forbes his. What more could mortals ask?

And the lares and penates? Well, Jean was rather practical. Those old
Greek fireside gods might be all very well in their way, but Greece had
seen _her_ day. In the present one there was a quaint little grinning
“god of things, as they ought to be,” to which Jean pinned greater
faith; and when, one beautiful April day, Homer Forbes and his bride
returned from their wedding journey, and entered the inner court of
Helicon Hall, where the (let us hope) sacred fire burned upon the
hearth, the first thing upon which Eleanor’s eyes rested in these
classic surroundings was “Billykin,” perched above the blazing logs.

And in the interval between that warm September day and the lighting of
that hearth by loving hands for the home-coming of the idealists? Ah,
life holds some sweet moments, and this old world is not such a bad one,
after all. But we anticipate.

October came again, and all the world was beautiful in its golden haze.
With Eleanor’s engagement to Homer Forbes, and her complete absorption
in her demi-god, who had changed her plans so completely, her future so
entirely, Eleanor plunged headlong into consummating his dreams so far
as in her power lay. This left Constance largely to herself and her own
plans. All had gone well with her, and, with the beginning of the social
season in Riveredge and elsewhere, Constance’s business grew very brisk.
She was kept busy from morning to evening. It was a wonderfully happy
life for her. To be the chief support of her family, to give to her
mother the thousand little luxuries she had known in earlier life, to
give to Jean every possible advantage, both educational and social, and
still have time to enjoy life at its heyday herself—why—surely, no more
could be asked.

Mary and Fanny Willing were as happy and content as two girls well could
be, and worked and sang from dawn to twilight. With the autumn even more
help became necessary to keep abreast of the orders; and, through Hadyn,
Constance secured the services of a man in whom Hadyn was deeply
interested. He had known him in college days, but days of adversity had
overtaken him, and for two years he had seemed to be the very toy of an
adverse fate. In that interval his family had slipped into the Great
Beyond, and the small nest-egg left him had been swept from him by the
failure of the company in which it was invested, throwing Edward DeLaney
upon his own resources.

Upon Hadyn’s advice he was engaged by Constance as bookkeeper and a sort
of general superintendent, dividing his time between the Candy Kitchen,
the Arcade, and the other booths, which, in the course of time had been
established elsewhere. He was only twenty-five, but an able, manly
fellow, quick-witted and resourceful. He took firm hold of affairs
instantly, and, during the course of the ensuing winter, Constance more
than once thanked the lucky star which had guided this tall, clear-eyed,
finely-set-up six-foot laddie to her Candy Kitchen. No one could look
into those fine, hazel eyes without trusting them instantly, nor see the
lines of that resolute, yet tender mouth without reading the man’s
character. His skin was as fair and as clear as a child’s, and his smile
as winning. He speedily found his way into the home circle, and just the
degree of happiness it brought to him few guessed.

But this is dipping into the future by several months. At present we are
in October’s golden glow.

“What a day!” cried Hadyn, as he and Constance came out upon the piazza
one beautiful afternoon when luncheon was over.

“Isn’t it simply heavenly? It seems to me we never have such days
excepting during October. Look at the coloring over on that mountain and
on our own hills. It is perfectly intoxicating. It makes me feel like
doing something out of the usual order, and yet I ought to go out yonder
to the Candy Kitchen and lend a hand with the thousand and one things to
be attended to. I tell you, Hadyn Stuyvesant, I am rapidly becoming a
power in the commercial world,” laughed Constance.

“You are a greater power already than you guess. Before you know it that
business will have grown beyond its boundaries again, and even greater
expansion will be necessary. But just now let’s ‘forget it,’ and go for
a ride up that glorious mountain. I’ll ’phone down to Pringle’s for
Lightfoot, and we’ll have an afternoon fit for the gods.”

“Done! I’m only human, and the call of the woods on such a day as this
drowns the call of duty. But I hate to take Comet from you; you seem so
much a part of each other.”

“Since he came to live here he has become a part of you all, and more
nearly _human_ than ever. Jean has seen to that. How that child loves
animals! I’ve a little scheme in the back part of my head which I mean
shall take tangible form when her next birthday comes around.”

“Oh, what is it?” cried Constance, for everything concerning Jean held
the keenest interest for her.

“Tell you after we’ve had our ride. I’m off now for my togs. See you
inside half an hour. Tell Parsons to saddle Comet for you,” and with a
wave of his hand Hadyn hurried away to get into his riding clothes. An
hour later they rode away from the house, as bonny a pair as eyes could
rest upon, and upon which one pair did rest with the love and devotion
one often sees in the eyes of a dog; Mammy raised her apron, wiped a
tear from her lids, and said softly to herself:

“_Dem’s ma chillen._ Yis, jist ma own God-blessedest ones what ever _is_
live! Him, too. Miss Nornie kin tek up wid dat Perfesser man ef she
wanter, but _gimme dat one ridin’ ’way yonder_. He’s de very cream ob
all creation, an’ he gwine be mighty good ter ma baby, too. I ain’t need
no secon’ sight fer ter read _dat_ writin’. An’ he gwine fin’ out what a
pearl o’ price he gettin’, too, dough I reckons he got some notion o’
dat a’reddy. An’ he gwine git somepin’ he ain’ countin’ ’pon a mite, an’
would be clar _’bove_ countin’ ’pon anyhow; he gwine git a wife wha’ got
her _own nes’aig_. Charles an’ me ain’ run dat ar’ lunch counter all dis
time jist fer fun an’ de reppitation it done give us; no, sir-ee! We
done put ’side ’nough fer ter give each o’ ole Massa’s gran’chillen dey
_dots_, as dose French folks calls it. Yis, we is, an’ I’s proud ob it,
too. It’s de onlies’ way we kin eber show em dat dey’s ours, an’ we’s
deirs. Mebbe Massa Stuyvesant got a-plenty, an’ mebbe Massa Fo’bes is
got, too, a-plenty fer ’em bofe—I dunno—but I knows dis much: A ’omans a
mighty sight mo’ self-respectin’ an’, an’ sort o’ stan’in’ firm on her
own foots ef she knows dars a stockin’full o’ gol’ wha’ she kin turn
inside-out ef she want ter ’thout axin’ ’by yo’ leave, Mr. Man,’ no
matter how she love him or he love her. An’ me an’ Charles done fix dat
all right, so we has. Gawd bress ma chillen! Gawd bress em! Dey’s filled
ma soul wid joy all de days of ma life, and dey’s made Charles’ foots
fer ter walk in de green past’ers endurin’ his declinin’ years. Oh, we’s
happy, we is, wid de Gawd-blessedes’ white folks two ol’ cullered folks
ever is know.”




CHAPTER XIX

THREE LITTLE WOMEN’S SUCCESS
which causes them to believe that the Divinity is continually
interfering on their behalf at the cost of other people. It will be
noticed that the references given are all to the Old Testament, and
nearly all refer to acts of blood.

These doctrines were not, however, at all acceptable to Burgers' party,
or the more enlightened members of the community, and so bitter did the
struggle of rival opinions become that there is very little doubt that
had the country not been annexed, civil war would have been added to
its other calamities. Meanwhile the natives were from day to day
becoming more restless, and messengers were constantly arriving at the
Special Commissioner's camp, begging that their tribe might be put
under the Queen, and stating that they would fight rather than submit
any longer to the Boers.

At length on the 9th April, Sir T. Shepstone informed the Government of
the Republic that he was about to declare the Transvaal British
territory. He told them that he had considered and reconsidered his
determination, but that he could see no possible means within the State
by which it could free itself from the burdens that were sinking it to
destruction, adding that if he could have found such means he would
certainly not have hidden them from the Government. This intimation was
received in silence, though all the later proceedings with reference to
the Annexation were in reality carried out in concert with the
authorities of the Republic. Thus on the 13th March the Government
submitted a paper of ten questions to Sir T. Shepstone as regards the
future condition of the Transvaal under English rule, whether the debts
of the State would be guaranteed, &c. To these questions replies were
given which were on the whole satisfactory to the Government. As these
replies formed the basis of the proclamation guarantees, it is not
necessary to enter into them.

It was further arranged by the Republican Government that a formal
protest should be entered against the Annexation, which was accordingly
prepared and privately shown to the Special Commissioner. The
Annexation proclamation was also shown to President Burgers, and a
paragraph eliminated at his suggestion. In fact, the Special
Commissioner and the President, together with most of his Executive,
were quite at one as regards the necessity of the proclamation being
issued, their joint endeavours being directed to the prevention of any
disturbance, and to secure a good reception for the change.

At length, after three months of inquiry and negotiation, the
proclamation of annexation was on the 12th of April 1877 read by Mr.
Osborn, accompanied by some other gentlemen of Sir T. Shepstone's
staff. It was an anxious moment for all concerned. To use the words of
the Special Commissioner in his despatch home on the subject, "Every
effort had been made during the previous fortnight by, it is said,
educated Hollanders, and who had but lately arrived in the country, to
rouse the fanaticism of the Boers, and to induce them to offer 'bloody'
resistance to what it was known I intended to do. The Boers were
appealed to in the most inflammatory language by printed manifestoes
and memorials; ... it was urged that I had but a small escort, which
could easily be overpowered." In a country so full of desperadoes and
fanatical haters of anything English, it was more than possible that,
though such an act would have been condemned by the general sense of
the country, a number of men could easily be found who would think they
were doing a righteous act in greeting the "annexationists" with an
ovation of bullets. I do not mean that the anxiety was personal,
because I do not think the members of that small party set any higher
value on their lives than other people, but it was absolutely necessary
for the success of the act itself, and for the safety of the country,
that not a single shot should be fired. Had that happened it is
probable that the whole country would have been involved in confusion
and bloodshed, the Zulus would have broken in, and the Kafirs would
have risen; in fact, to use Cetywayo's words, "the land would have
burned with fire."

It will therefore be easily understood what an anxious hour that was
both for the Special Commissioner sitting up at Government House, and
for his staff down on the Market Square, and how thankful they were
when the proclamation was received with hearty cheers by the crowd. Mr.
Burgers' protest, which was read immediately afterwards, was received
in respectful silence.

And thus the Transvaal Territory passed for a while into the great
family of the English Colonies. I believe that the greatest political
opponent of the act will bear tribute to the very remarkable ability
with which it was carried out. When the variety and number of the
various interests that had to be conciliated, the obstinate nature of
the individuals who had to be convinced, as well as the innate hatred
of the English name and ways which had to be overcome to carry out this
act successfully, are taken into consideration, together with a
thousand other matters, the neglect of any one of which would have
sufficed to make failure certain, it will be seen what tact and skill
and knowledge of human nature was required to execute so difficult a
task. It must be remembered that no force was used, and that there
never was any threat of force. The few troops that were to enter the
Transvaal were four weeks' march from Pretoria at the time. There was
nothing whatsoever to prevent the Boers putting a summary stop to the
proceedings of the Commissioner if they had thought fit.

That Sir Theophilus played a bold and hazardous game nobody will deny,
but, like most players who combine boldness with coolness of head and
justice of cause, he won; and, without shedding a single drop of blood,
or even confiscating an acre of land, and at no cost, annexed a great
country, and averted a very serious war. That same country four years
later cost us a million of money, the loss of nearly a thousand men
killed and wounded, and the ruin of many more confiding thousands, to
surrender. It is true, however, that nobody can accuse the retrocession
of having been conducted with judgment or ability--very much the
contrary.

There can be no more ample justification of the issue of the Annexation
proclamation than the proclamation itself.

First, it touches on the Sand River Convention of 1852, by which
independence was granted to the State, and shows that the "evident
objects and inciting motives" in granting such guarantee were to
promote peace, free-trade, and friendly intercourse, in the hope and
belief that the Republic "would become a flourishing and
self-sustaining State, a source of strength and security to
neighbouring European communities, and a point from which Christianity
and civilisation might rapidly spread toward Central Africa." It goes
on to show how these hopes have been disappointed, and how that
increasing weakness in the State itself on the one side, and more than
corresponding growth of real strength and confidence among the native
tribes on the other, have produced their natural and inevitable
consequence ... that after more or less of irritating conflict with
aboriginal tribes to the north, there commenced about the year 1867
gradual abandonment to the natives in that direction of territory
settled by burghers of the Transvaal "in well-built towns and villages
and on granted farms."

It goes on to show that "this decay of power and ebb of authority in
the north is being followed by similar processes in the south under yet
more dangerous circumstances. People of this State residing in that
direction have been compelled within the last three months, at the
bidding of native chiefs, and at a moment's notice, to leave their
farms and homes, their standing crops ... all to be taken possession of
by natives, but that the Government is more powerless than ever to
vindicate its assumed rights or to resist the declension that is
threatening its existence." It then recites how all the other colonies
and communities of South Africa have lost confidence in the State, how
it is in a condition of hopeless bankruptcy, and its commerce
annihilated, whilst the inhabitants are divided into factions, and the
Government has fallen into "helpless paralysis." How also the prospect
of the election of a new President, instead of being looked forward to
with hope, would in the opinion of all parties be the signal for civil
war, anarchy, and bloodshed. How that this state of things affords the
very strongest temptation to the great neighbouring native powers to
attack the country, a temptation that they were only too ready and
anxious to yield to, and that the State was in far too feeble a
condition to repel such attacks, from which it had hitherto only been
saved by the repeated representations of the Government of Natal. The
next paragraphs I will quote as they stand, for they sum up the reasons
for the Annexation.

"That the Secocoeni war, which would have produced but little effect
on a healthy constitution, has not only proved suddenly fatal to the
resources and reputation of the Republic, but has shown itself to be a
culminating point in the history of South Africa, in that a Makatee or
Basuto tribe, unwarlike and of no account in Zulu estimation,
successfully withstood the strength of the State, and disclosed for the
first time to the native powers outside the Republic, from the Zambesi
to the Cape, the great change that had taken place in the relative
strength of the white and black races, that this disclosure at once
shook the prestige of the white man in South Africa, and placed every
European community in peril, that this common danger has caused
universal anxiety, has given to all concerned the right to investigate
its cause, and to protect themselves from its consequences, and has
imposed the duty upon those who have the power to shield enfeebled
civilisation from the encroachments of barbarism and inhumanity." It
proceeds to point out that the Transvaal will be the first to suffer
from the results of its own policy, and that it is for every reason
perfectly impossible for Her Majesty's Government to stand by and see a
friendly white State ravaged, knowing that its own possessions will be
the next to suffer. That Her Majesty's Government, being persuaded that
the only means to prevent such a catastrophe would be by the annexation
of the country, and, knowing that this was the wish of a large
proportion of the inhabitants of the Transvaal, the step must be taken.
Next follows the formal annexation.

Together with the proclamation, an address was issued by Sir T.
Shepstone to the burghers of the State, laying the facts before them in
a friendly manner, more suited to their mode of thought than it was
possible to do in a formal proclamation. This document, the issue of
which was one of those touches that insured the success of the
Annexation, was a powerful summing up in colloquial language of the
arguments used in the proclamation, strengthened by quotations from the
speeches of the President. It ends with these words: "It remains only
for me to beg of you to consider and weigh what I have said calmly and
without undue prejudice. Let not mere feeling or sentiment prevail over
your judgment. Accept what Her Majesty's Government intends shall be,
and what you will soon find from experience, is a blessing not only to
you and your children, but to the whole of South Africa through you,
and believe that I speak these words to you as a friend from my heart."

Two other proclamations were also issued, one notifying the assumption
of the office of Administrator of the Government by Sir T. Shepstone,
and the other repealing the war-tax, which was doubtless an unequal and
oppressive impost.

I have in the preceding pages stated all the principal grounds of the
Annexation and briefly sketched the history of that event. In the next
chapter I propose to follow the fortunes of the Transvaal, under
British Rule.




CHAPTER IV.

THE TRANSVAAL UNDER BRITISH RULE.


The news of the Annexation was received all over the country with a
sigh of relief, and in many parts of it with great rejoicings. At the
Gold Fields, for instance, special thanksgiving services were held, and
"God save the Queen" was sung in church. Nowhere was there the
slightest disturbance, but, on the contrary, addresses of
congratulation and thanks literally poured in by every mail, many of
them signed by Boers who have since been conspicuous for their bitter
opposition to English rule. At first, there was some doubt as to what
would be the course taken under the circumstances by the volunteers
enlisted by the late Republic. Major Clarke, R.A., was sent to convey
the news, and to take command of them, unaccompanied save by his Kafir
servant. On arrival at the principal fort, he at once ordered the
Republican flag to be hauled down and the Union Jack run up, and his
orders were promptly obeyed. A few days afterwards some members of the
force thought better of it, and having made up their minds to kill him,
came to the tent where he was sitting to carry out their purpose. On
learning their kind intentions, Major Clarke fixed his eye-glass in his
eye, and after steadily glaring at them through it for some time, said,
"You are all drunk, go back to your tents." The volunteers, quite
overcome by his coolness and the fixity of his gaze, at once slipped
off, and there was no further trouble. About three weeks after the
Annexation, the I-13th Regiment arrived at Pretoria, having been very
well received all along the road by the Boers, who came from miles
round to hear the band play. Its entry into Pretoria was quite a sight;
the whole population turned out to meet it; indeed the feeling of
rejoicing and relief was so profound that when the band began to play
"God save the Queen" some of the women burst into tears.

Meanwhile the effect of the Annexation on the country was perfectly
magical. Credit and commerce were at once restored; the railway bonds
that were down to nothing in Holland rose with one bound to par, and
the value of landed property nearly doubled. Indeed it would have been
possible for any one, knowing what was going to happen, to have
realised large sums of money by buying land in the beginning of 1877,
and selling it shortly after the Annexation.

On the 24th May, being Her Majesty's birthday, all the native chiefs
who were anywhere within reach were summoned to attend the first formal
hoisting of the English flag. The day was a general festival, and the
ceremony was attended by a large number of Boers and natives in
addition to all the English. At mid-day, amidst the cheers of the
crowd, the salute of artillery, and the strains of "God save the
Queen," the Union Jack was run up a lofty flagstaff, and the Transvaal
was formally announced to be British soil. The flag was hoisted by
Colonel Brooke, R.E., and the present writer. Speaking for myself, I
may say that it was one of the proudest moments of my life. Could I
have foreseen that I should live to see that same flag, then hoisted
with so much joyous ceremony, within a few years shamefully and
dishonourably hauled down and buried,[8] I think it would have been the
most miserable.

          [8] The English flag was during the signing of the Convention
          at Pretoria formally buried by a large crowd of Englishmen
          and loyal natives.

The Annexation was as well received in England as it was in the
Transvaal. Lord Carnarvon wrote to Sir T. Shepstone to convey "the
Queen's entire approval of your conduct since you received Her
Majesty's commission, with a renewal of my own thanks on behalf of the
Government for the admirable prudence and discretion with which you
have discharged a great and unwonted responsibility." It was also
accepted by Parliament with very few dissentient voices, since it was
not till afterwards, when the subject became useful as an
electioneering howl, that the Liberal party, headed by our "powerful
popular minister," discovered the deep iniquity that had been
perpetrated in South Africa. So satisfied were the Transvaal Boers with
the change that Messrs. Kruger, Jorissen, and Bok, who formed the
deputation to proceed to England and present President Burgers' formal
protest against the Annexation, found great difficulty in raising
one-half of the necessary expenses--something under one thousand
pounds--towards the cost of the undertaking. The thirst for
independence cannot have been very great when all the wealthy burghers
in the Transvaal put together would not subscribe a thousand pounds
towards retaining it. Indeed, at this time the members of the
deputation themselves seem to have looked upon their undertaking as
being both doubtful and undesirable, since they informed Sir T.
Shepstone that they were going to Europe to discharge an obligation
which had been imposed upon them, and if the mission failed, they would
have done their duty. Mr. Kruger said that if they did fail, he would
be found to be as faithful a subject under the new form of government
as he had been under the old; and Dr. Jorissen admitted with equal
frankness that "the change was inevitable, and expressed his belief
that the cancellation of it would be calamitous."

Whilst the Annexation was thus well received in the country immediately
interested, a lively agitation was commenced in the Western Province of
the Cape Colony, a thousand miles away, with a view of inducing the
Home Government to repudiate Sir T. Shepstone's act. The reason of this
movement was that the Cape Dutch party, caring little or nothing for
the real interests of the Transvaal, did care a great deal about their
scheme to turn all the white communities of South Africa into a great
Dutch Republic, to which they thought the Annexation would be a
deathblow. As I have said elsewhere, it must be borne in mind that the
strings of the anti-annexation agitation have all along been pulled in
the Western Province, whilst the Transvaal Boers have played the parts
of puppets. The instruments used by the leaders of the movement in the
Cape were, for the most part, the discontented and unprincipled
Hollander element, a newspaper of an extremely abusive nature called
the _Volkstem_, and another in Natal known as the _Natal Witness_,
lately edited by the notorious Aylward, which has an almost equally
unenviable reputation.

On the arrival of Messrs. Jorissen and Kruger in England, they were
received with great civility by Lord Carnarvon, who was, however,
careful to explain to them that the Annexation was irrevocable. In this
decision they cheerfully acquiesced, assuring his lordship of their
determination to do all they could to induce the Boers to accept the
new state of things, and expressing their desire to be allowed to serve
under the new Government.

Whilst these gentlemen were thus satisfactorily arranging matters with
Lord Carnarvon, Sir. T. Shepstone was making a tour round the country
which resembled a triumphal progress more than anything else. He was
everywhere greeted with enthusiasm by all classes of the community,
Boers, English, and natives, and numerous addresses were presented to
him couched in the warmest language, not only by Englishmen, but also
by Boers.

It is very difficult to reconcile the enthusiasm of a great number of
the inhabitants of the Transvaal for English rule, and the quiet
acquiescence of the remainder, at this time, with the decidedly
antagonistic attitude assumed later on. It appears to me, however, that
there are several reasons that go far towards accounting for it. The
Transvaal, when we annexed it, was in the position of a man with a
knife at his throat, who is suddenly rescued by some one stronger than
he, on certain conditions which at the time he gladly accepts, but
afterwards, when the danger is passed, wishes to repudiate. In the same
way the inhabitants of the South African Republic were in the time of
need very thankful for our aid, but after a while, when the
recollection of their difficulties had grown faint, when their debts
had been paid and their enemies defeated, they began to think that they
would like to get rid of us again, and start fresh on their own account
with a clean sheet. What fostered agitation more than anything else,
however, was the perfect impunity with which it was allowed to be
carried on. Had only a little firmness and decision been shown in the
first instance there would have been no further trouble. We might have
been obliged to confiscate half-a-dozen farms, and perhaps imprison as
many free burghers for a few months, and there it would have ended.
Neither Boers or natives understand our namby-pamby way of playing at
government; they put it down to fear. What they want, and what they
expect, is to be governed with a just but a firm hand. Thus when the
Boers found that they could agitate with impunity, they naturally
enough continued to agitate. Anybody who knows them will understand
that it was very pleasant to them to find themselves in possession of
that delightful thing, a grievance, and, instead of stopping quietly at
home on their farms, to feel obliged to proceed, full of importance and
long words, to a distant meeting, there to spout and listen to the
spouting of others. It is so much easier to talk politics than to sow
mealies. Some attribute the discontent among the Boers to the
postponement of the carrying out of the Annexation proclamation
promises with reference to the free institutions to be granted to the
country, but in my opinion it had little or nothing to do with it. The
Boers never understood the question of responsible government, and
never wanted that institution; what they did want was to be free of all
English control, and this they said twenty times in the most outspoken
language. I think there is little doubt the causes I have indicated are
the real sources of the agitation, though there must be added to them
their detestation of our mode of dealing with natives, and of being
forced to pay taxes regularly, and also the ceaseless agitation of the
Cape wire-pullers, through their agents the Hollanders, and their
organs in the press.

On the return of Messrs. Kruger and Jorissen to the Transvaal, the
latter gentleman resumed his duties as Attorney-General, on which
occasion, if I remember aright, I myself had the honour of
administering to him the oath of allegiance to Her Majesty, that he
afterwards kept so well. The former reported the proceedings of the
deputation to a Boer meeting, when he took a very different tone to
that in which he addressed Lord Carnarvon, announcing that if there
existed a majority of the people in favour of independence, he still
was Vice-President of the country.

Both these gentlemen remained for some time in the pay of the British
Government, Mr. Jorissen as Attorney-General, and Mr. Kruger as member
of the Executive Council. The Government, however, at length found it
desirable to dispense with their services, though on different grounds.
Mr. Jorissen had, like several other members of the Republican
Government, been a clergyman, and was quite unfit to hold the post of
Attorney-General in an important colony like the Transvaal, where legal
questions were constantly arising requiring all the attention of a
trained mind; and after he had on several occasions been publicly
admonished from the bench, the Government retired him on liberal terms.
Needless to say, his opposition to English rule then became very
bitter. Mr. Kruger's appointment expired by law in November 1877, and
the Government did not think it advisable to re-employ him. The terms
of his letter of dismissal can be found on page 135 of Blue-book (c.
144), and involving as they do a serious charge of misrepresentation in
money matters, are not very creditable to him. After this event he also
pursued the cause of independence with increased vigour.

During the last months of 1877 and the first part of 1878 agitation
against British rule went on unchecked, and at last grew to alarming
proportions, so much so that Sir T. Shepstone, on his return from the
Zulu border in March 1878, where he had been for some months discussing
the vexed and dangerous question of the boundary line with the Zulus,
found it necessary to issue a stringent proclamation warning the
agitators that their proceedings and meetings were illegal, and would
be punished according to law. This document, which was at the time
vulgarly known as the "Hold-your-jaw" proclamation, not being followed
by action, produced but little effect.

On the 4th April 1878 another Boer meeting was convened, at which it
was decided to send a second deputation to England, to consist this
time of Messrs. Kruger and Joubert, with Mr. Bok as secretary. This
deputation proved as abortive as the first, Sir. M. Hicks Beach
assuring it, in a letter dated 6th August 1878, that it is "impossible,
for many reasons, ... that the Queen's sovereignty should now be
withdrawn."

Whilst the Government was thus hampered by internal disaffection, it
had also many other difficulties on its hands. First, there was the
Zulu boundary question, which was constantly developing new dangers to
the country. Indeed, it was impossible to say what might happen in that
direction from one week to another. Nor were its relations with
Secocoeni satisfactory. It will be remembered that just before the
Annexation this chief had expressed his earnest wish to become a
British subject, and even paid over part of the fine demanded from him
by the Boer Government to the Civil Commissioner, Major Clarke. In
March 1878, however, his conduct towards the Government underwent a
sudden change, and he practically declared war. It afterwards appeared,
from Secocoeni's own statement, that he was instigated to this step
by a Boer, Abel Erasmus by name--the same man who was concerned in the
atrocities in the first Secocoeni war--who constantly encouraged him
to continue the struggle. I do not propose to minutely follow the
course of this long war, which, commencing in the beginning of 1878,
did not come to an end till after the Zulu war: when Sir Garnet
Wolseley attacked Secocoeni's stronghold with a large force of
troops, volunteers, and Swazi allies, and took it with great slaughter.
The losses on our side were not very heavy, so far as white men were
concerned, but the Swazis are reported to have lost 400 killed and 500
wounded.

The struggle was, during the long period preceding the final attack,
carried on with great courage and ability by Major Clarke, R.A.,
C.M.G., whose force, at the best of times, only consisted of 200
volunteers and 100 Zulus. With this small body of men he contrived,
however, to keep Secocoeni in check, and to take some important
strongholds. It was marked also by some striking acts of individual
bravery, of which one, performed by Major Clarke himself, whose
reputation for cool courage and presence of mind in danger is
unsurpassed in South Africa, is worthy of notice; and which, had public
attention been more concentrated on the Secocoeni war, would
doubtless have won him the Victoria Cross. On one occasion, on visiting
one of the outlying forts, he found that a party of hostile natives,
who were coming down to the fort on the previous day with a flag of
truce, had been accidentally fired on, and had at once retreated. As
his system in native warfare was always to try and inspire his enemy
with perfect faith in the honour of Englishmen, and their contempt of
all tricks and treachery even towards a foe, he was very angry at this
occurrence, and at once, unarmed and unattended save by his native
servant, rode up into the mountains to the kraal from which the white
flag party had come on the previous day, and apologised to the chief
for what had happened. When I consider how very anxious Secocoeni's
natives were to kill or capture Clarke, whom they held in great dread,
and how terrible the end of so great a captain would in all probability
have been had he been taken alive by these masters of refined torture,
I confess that I think this act of gentlemanly courage is one of the
most astonishing things I ever heard of. When he rode up those hills he
must have known that he was probably going to meet his death at the
hands of justly incensed savages. When Secocoeni heard of what Major
Clarke had done he was so pleased that he shortly afterwards released a
volunteer whom he had taken prisoner, and who would otherwise, in all
probability, have been tortured to death. I must add that Major Clarke
himself never reported or alluded to this incident, but an account of
it can be found in a despatch written by Sir O. Lanyon to the Secretary
of State, dated 2d February 1880.

Concurrently with, though entirely distinct from, the political
agitation that was being carried on among the Boers having for object
the restoration of independence, a private agitation was set on foot by
a few disaffected persons against Sir T. Shepstone, with the view of
obtaining his removal from office in favour of a certain Colonel
Weatherley. The details of this impudent plot are so interesting, and
the plot itself so typical of the state of affairs with which Sir T.
Shepstone had to deal, that I will give a short account of it.

After the Annexation had taken place, there were naturally enough a
good many individuals who found themselves disappointed in the results
so far as they personally were concerned; I mean that they did not get
so much out of it as they expected. Among these was a gentleman called
Colonel Weatherley, who had come to the Transvaal as manager of a
gold-mining company, but getting tired of that had taken a prominent
part in the Annexation, and who, being subsequently disappointed about
an appointment, became a bitter enemy of the Administrator. I may say
at once that Colonel Weatherley seems to me to have been throughout the
dupe of the other conspirators.

The next personage was a good-looking desperado, who called himself
Captain Gunn of Gunn, and who was locally somewhat irreverently known
as the very Gunn of very Gunn. This gentleman, whose former career had
been of a most remarkable order, was, on the annexation of the country,
found in the public prison charged with having committed various
offences, but on Colonel Weatherley's interesting himself strongly on
his behalf, he was eventually released without trial. On his release,
he requested the Administrator to publish a Government notice declaring
him innocent of the charges brought against him. This Sir T. Shepstone
declined to do, and so, to use his own words, in a despatch to the High
Commissioner on the subject, Captain Gunn of Gunn at once became "what
in this country is called a patriot."

The third person concerned was a lawyer, who had got into trouble on
the Diamond Fields, and who felt himself injured because the rules of
the High Court did not allow him to practise as an advocate. The
quartette was made up by Mr. Celliers, the editor of the patriotic
organ, the _Volkstem_, who, since he had lost the Government printing
contract, found that no language could be too strong to apply to the
_personnel_ of the Government, more especially its head. Of course,
there was a lady in it; what plot would be complete without? She was
Mrs. Weatherley, now, I believe, Mrs. Gunn of Gunn. These gentlemen
began operations by drawing up a long petition to Sir Bartle Frere as
High Commissioner, setting forth a string of supposed grievances, and
winding up with a request that the Administrator might be "promoted to
some other sphere of political usefulness." This memorial was forwarded
by the "committee," as they called themselves, to various parts of the
country for signature, but without the slightest success, the fact of
the matter being that it was not the Annexor but the Annexation that
the Boers objected to.

At this stage in the proceedings Colonel Weatherley went to try and
forward the good cause with Sir Bartle Frere at the Cape. His letters
to Mrs. Weatherley from thence, afterwards put into Court in the
celebrated divorce case, contained many interesting accounts of his
attempts in that direction. I do not think, however, that he was
cognisant of what was being concocted by his allies in Pretoria, but
being a very vain, weak man, was easily deceived by them. With all his
faults he was a gentleman. As soon as he was gone a second petition was
drawn up by the "committee," showing "the advisability of immediately
suspending our present Administrator, and temporarily appointing and
recommending for Her Majesty's royal and favourable consideration an
English gentleman of high integrity and honour, in whom the country at
large has respect and confidence."

The English gentleman of high integrity and honour of course proves to
be Colonel Weatherley, whose appointment is, further on, "respectfully
but earnestly requested," since he had "thoroughly gained the
affections, confidence, and respect of Boers, English, and other
Europeans in this country." But whilst it is comparatively easy to
write petitions, there is sometimes a difficulty in getting people to
sign them, as proved to be the case with reference to the documents
under consideration. When the "committee" and the employés in the
office of the _Volkstem_ had affixed their valuable signatures it
was found to be impossible to induce anybody else to follow their
example. Now, a petition with some half dozen signatures attached would
not, it was obvious, carry much weight with the Imperial Government,
and no more could be obtained.

But really great minds rise superior to such difficulties, and so did
the "committee," or some of them, or one of them. If they could not get
genuine signatures to their petitions, they could at any rate
manufacture them. This great idea once hit out, so vigorously was it
prosecuted that they, or some of them, or one of them, produced in a
very little while no less than 3883 signatures, of which sixteen were
proved to be genuine, five were doubtful, and all the rest fictitious.
But the gentleman, whoever he was, who was the working partner in the
scheme--and I may state, by way of parenthesis, that when Gunn of Gunn
was subsequently arrested, petitions in process of signature were found
under the mattress of his bed--calculated without his host. He either
did not know, or had forgotten, that on receipt of such documents by a
superior officer, they are at once sent to the officer accused to
report upon. This course was followed in the present case, and the
petitions were discovered to be gross impostures. The ingenuity
exercised by their author or authors was really very remarkable, for it
must be remembered that not one of the signatures was forged; they were
all invented, and had, of course, to be written in a great variety of
hands. The plan generally pursued was to put down the names of people
living in the country, with slight variations. Thus "De _V_illiers"
became "De _W_illiers," and "Van Z_y_l" "Van Z_u_l." I remember that my
own name appeared on one of the petitions with some slight alteration.
Some of the names were evidently meant to be facetious. Thus there was
a "Jan Verneuker," which means "John the Cheat."

Of the persons directly or indirectly concerned in this rascally plot,
the unfortunate Colonel Weatherley subsequently apologised to Sir T.
Shepstone for his share in the agitation, and shortly afterwards died
fighting bravely on Kambula. Captain Gunn of Gunn and Mrs. Weatherley,
after having given rise to the most remarkable divorce case I ever
heard--it took fourteen days to try--were, on the death of Colonel
Weatherley, united in the bonds of holy matrimony, and are, I believe,
still in Pretoria. The lawyer vanished I know not where, whilst Mr.
Celliers still continues to edit that admirably conducted journal the
_Volkstem_; nor, if I may judge from the report of a speech made
by him recently at a Boer festival, which, by the way, was graced by
the presence of our representative, Mr. Hudson, the British Resident,
has his right hand forgotten its cunning, or rather his tongue lost the
use of those peculiar and _recherché_ epithets that used to adorn
the columns of the _Volkstem_. I see that he, on this occasion,
denounced the English element as being "poisonous and dangerous" to a
State, and stated, amidst loud cheers, that "he despised" it. Mr.
Cellier's lines have fallen in pleasant places; in any other country he
would long ago have fallen a victim to the stern laws of libel. I
recommend him to the notice of enterprising Irish newspapers. Such is
the freshness and vigour of his style that I am confident he would make
the fortune of any Hibernian journal.

Some little time after the Gunn of Gunn frauds a very sad incident
happened in connection with the government of the Transvaal. Shortly
after the Annexation, the Home Government sent out Mr. Sergeaunt,
C.M.G., one of the Crown Agents for the Colonies, to report on the
financial Condition of the country. He was accompanied, in an
unofficial capacity, amongst other gentlemen, by Captain Patterson and
his son, Mr. J. Sergeaunt; and when he returned to England, these two
gentlemen remained behind to go on a shooting expedition. About this
time Sir Bartle Frere was anxious to send a friendly mission to Lo
Bengula, king of the Matabele, a branch of the Zulu tribe, living up
towards the Zambesi. This chief had been making himself unpleasant by
causing traders to be robbed, and it was thought desirable to establish
friendly relations with him, so it was suggested to Captain Patterson
and Mr. Sergeaunt that they should combine business with pleasure, and
go on a mission to Lo Bengula, an offer which they accepted, and
shortly afterwards started for Matabeleland with an interpreter and a
few servants. They reached their destination in safety; and having
concluded their business with the king, started on a visit to the
Zambesi Falls on foot, leaving the interpreter with the waggon. The
falls were about twelve days' walk from the king's kraal, and they were
accompanied thither by young Mr. Thomas, the son of the local
missionary, two Kafir servants, and twenty native bearers supplied by
Lo Bengula. The next thing that was heard of them was that they had all
died through drinking poisoned water, full details of the manner of
their deaths being sent down by Lo Bengula.

In the first shock and confusion of such news it was not very closely
examined, at any rate by the friends of the dead men, but, on
reflection, there were several things about it that appeared strange.
For instance, it was well known that Captain Patterson had a habit, for
which, indeed, we had often laughed at him, of, however thirsty he
might be, always having his water boiled when he was travelling, in
order to destroy impurities, and it seemed odd that he should on this
one occasion have neglected the precaution. Also, it was curious that
the majority of Lo Bengula's bearers appeared to have escaped, whereas
all the others were, without exception, killed; nor even in that
district is it usual to find water so bad that it will kill with the
rapidity it had been supposed to do in this case, unless indeed it had
been designedly poisoned. These doubts of the poisoning-by-bad-water-story
resolved themselves into certainty when the waggon returned in charge
of the interpreter, when, by putting two and two together, we were able
to piece out the real history of the diabolical murder of our poor
friends with considerable accuracy, a story which shows what
blood-thirsty wickedness a savage is capable of when he fancies his
interests are threatened.

It appeared that, when Captain Patterson first interviewed Lo Bengula,
he was not at all well received by him. I must, by way of explanation,
state that there exists a pretender to his throne, Kruman by name, who,
as far as I can make out, is the real heir to the kingdom. This man
had, for some cause or other, fled the country, and for a time acted as
gardener to Sir T. Shepstone in Natal. At the date of Messrs. Patterson
and Sergeaunt's mission to Matabeleland he was living, I believe, in
the Transvaal. Captain Patterson, on finding himself so ill received by
the king, and not being sufficiently acquainted with the character of
savage chiefs, most unfortunately, either by accident or design,
dropped some hint in the course of conversation about this Kruman. From
that moment Lo Bengula's conduct towards the mission entirely changed,
and, dropping his former tone, he became profusely civil; and from that
moment, too, he doubtless determined to kill them, probably fearing
that they might forward some scheme to oust him and place Kruman, on
whose claim a large portion of his people looked favourably, on the
throne.

When their business was done, and Captain Patterson told the king that
they were anxious, before returning, to visit the Zambesi Falls, he
readily fell in with their wish, but, in the first instance, refused
permission to young Thomas, the son of the missionary, to accompany
them, only allowing him to do so on the urgent representations of
Captain Patterson. The reason of this was, no doubt, that he had kindly
feelings towards the lad, and did not wish to include him in the
slaughter.

Captain Patterson was a man of extremely methodical habits, and,
amongst other things, was in the habit of making notes of all that he
did. His note-book had been taken off his body, and sent down to
Pretoria with the other things. In it we found entries of his
preparations for the trip, including the number and names of the
bearers provided by Lo Bengula. We also found the chronicle of the
first three days' journey, and that of the morning of the fourth day,
but there the record stopped. The last entry was probably made a few
minutes before he was killed; and it is to be observed that there was
no entry of the party having been for several days without water, as
stated by the messengers, and then finding the poisoned water.

This evidence by itself would not have amounted to much, but now
comes the curious part of the story, showing the truth of the old
adage, "Murder will out." It appears that when the waggon was coming
down to Pretoria in charge of the interpreter, it was outspanned
one day outside the borders of Lo Bengula's country, when some
Kafirs--Bechuanas, I think--came up, asked for some tobacco, and fell
into conversation with the driver, remarking that he had come up with a
full waggon, and now he went down with an empty one. The driver replied
by lamenting the death by poisoned water of his masters, whereupon one
of the Kafirs told him the following story:--He said that a brother of
his was out hunting, a little while back, in the desert for ostriches,
with a party of other Kafirs, when hearing shots fired some way off,
they made for the spot, thinking that white men were out shooting, and
that they would be able to beg meat. On reaching the spot, which was by
a pool of water, they saw the bodies of three white men lying on the
ground, and also those of a Hottentot and a Kafir, surrounded by an
armed party of Kafirs. They at once asked the Kafirs what they had been
doing killing the white men, and were told to be still, for it was by
"order of the king." They then learned the whole story. It appeared
that the white men had made a mid-day halt by the water, when one of
the bearers, who had gone to the edge of the pool, suddenly shouted to
them to come and look at a great snake in the water. Captain Patterson
ran up, and, as he leaned over the edge, was instantly killed by a blow
with an axe; the others were then shot and assegaied. The Kafir further
described the clothes that his brother had seen on the bodies, and also
some articles that had been given to his party by the murderers, that
left little doubt as to the veracity of his story. And so ended the
mission to Matabeleland.

No public notice was taken of the matter, for the obvious reason that
it was impossible to get at Lo Bengula to punish him; nor would it have
been easy to come by legal evidence to disprove the ingenious story of
the poisoned water, since anybody trying to reach the spot of the
massacre would probably fall a victim to some similar accident before
he got back again. It is devoutly to be hoped that the punishment he
deserves will sooner or later overtake the author of this devilish and
wholesale murder.

The beginning of 1879 was signalised by the commencement of operations
in Zululand and by the news of the terrible disaster at Isandhlwana,
which fell on Pretoria like a thunderclap. It was not, however, any
surprise to those who were acquainted with Zulu tactics and with the
plan of attack adopted by the English commanders. In fact, I know that
one solemn warning of what would certainly happen to him if he
persisted in his plan of advance was addressed to Lord Chelmsford,
through the officer in command at Pretoria, by a gentleman whose
position and long experience of the Zulus and their mode of attack
should have carried some weight. If it ever reached him, he took, to
the best of my recollection, no notice of it whatever.

But though some such disaster was daily expected by a few, the majority
both of soldiers and civilians never dreamed of anything of the sort,
the general idea being that the conquest of Cetywayo was a very easy
undertaking; and the shock produced by the news of Isandhlwana was
proportionately great, especially as it reached Pretoria in a much
exaggerated form. I shall never forget the appearance of the town that
morning; business was entirely suspended, and the streets were filled
with knots of men talking, with scared faces, as well they might: for
there was scarcely anybody but had lost a friend, and many thought that
their sons or brothers were among the dead on that bloody field. Among
others, Sir T. Shepstone lost one son, and thought for some time that
he had lost three.

Shortly after this event Sir Theophilus went to England to confer with
the Secretary of State on various matters connected with the Transvaal,
carrying with him the affection and respect of all who knew him, not
excepting the majority of the malcontent Boers. He was succeeded by
Colonel, now Sir Owen Lanyon, who was appointed to administer the
Government during the absence of Sir T. Shepstone.

By the Boers, however, the news of our disaster was received with great
and unconcealed rejoicing, or at least by the irreconcilable portion of
that people. England's necessity was their opportunity, and one of
which they certainly meant to avail themselves. Accordingly, notices
were sent out summoning the burghers of the Transvaal to attend a mass
meeting on the 18th March, at a place about thirty miles from Pretoria.
Emissaries were also sent to native chiefs, to excite them to follow
Cetywayo's example, and massacre all the English within reach, of whom
a man called Solomon Prinsloo was one of the most active The natives,
however, notwithstanding the threats used towards them, one and all
declined the invitation.

It must not be supposed that all the Boers who attended these meetings
did so of their own free will; on the contrary, a very large number
came under compulsion, since they found that the English authorities
were powerless to give them protection. The recalcitrants were
threatened with all sorts of pains and penalties if they did not
attend, a favourite menace being that they should be made "biltong" of
when the country was given back (_i.e._, be cut into strips and hung
in the sun to dry). Few, luckily for themselves, were brave enough
to tempt fortune by refusing to come, but those who did have had to
leave the country since the war. Whatever were the means employed, the
result was an armed meeting of about 3000 Boers, who evidently meant
mischief.

Just about this time a corps had been raised in Pretoria, composed, for
the most part, of gentlemen, and known as the Pretoria Horse, for the
purpose of proceeding to the Zulu border, where cavalry, especially
cavalry acquainted with the country, was earnestly needed. In the
emergency of the times officials were allowed to join this corps, a
permission of which I availed myself, and was elected one of the
lieutenants.[9] The corps was not, after all, allowed to go to Zululand
on account of the threatening aspect adopted by the Boers, against whom
it was retained for service. In my capacity as an officer of the corps
I was sent out with a small body of picked men, all good riders and
light weights, to keep up a constant communication between the Boer
camp and the Administrator, and found the work both interesting and
exciting. My headquarters were at an inn about twenty-five miles from
Pretoria, to which our agents in the meeting used to come every evening
and report how matters were proceeding, whereupon, if the road was
clear, I despatched a letter to headquarters; or, if I feared that the
messengers would be caught _en route_ by Boer patrols and searched, I
substituted different coloured ribbons according to what I wished to
convey. There was a relief hidden in the trees or rocks every six
miles, all day and most of the night, whose business it was to take the
despatch or ribbon and gallop on with it to the next station, in which
way we used to get the despatches into town in about an hour and a
quarter.

          [9] It is customary in South African volunteer forces to
          allow the members to elect their own officers, provided the
          men elected are such as the Government approves. This is
          done, so that the corps may not afterwards be able to declare
          that they have no confidence in their officers in action, or
          to grumble at their treatment by them.

On one or two occasions the Boers came to the inn and threatened to
shoot us, but as our orders were to do nothing unless our lives were
actually in danger, we took no notice. The officer who came out to
relieve me had not, however, been there more than a day or two before
he and all his troopers were hunted back into Pretoria by a large mob
of armed Boers whom they only escaped by very hard riding.

Meanwhile the Boers were by degrees drawing nearer and nearer to the
town, till at last they pitched their laagers within six miles, and
practically besieged it. All business was stopped, the houses were
loopholed and fortified, and advantageous positions were occupied by
the military and the various volunteer corps. The building, normally in
the occupation of the Government mules, fell to the lot of the Pretoria
Horse, and, though it was undoubtedly a post of honour, I honestly
declare that I have no wish to sleep for another month in a mule stable
that has not been cleaned out for several years. However, by sinking a
well, and erecting bastions and a staging for sharpshooters, we
converted it into an excellent fortress, though it would not have been
of much use against artillery. Our patrols used to be out all night,
since we chiefly feared a night attack, and generally every preparation
was made to resist the onset that was hourly expected, and I believe
that it was that state of preparedness that alone prevented it.

Whilst this meeting was going on, and when matters had come to a point
that seemed to render war inevitable, Sir Bartle Frere arrived at
Pretoria and had several interviews with the Boer leaders, at which
they persisted in demanding their independence, and nothing short of
it. After a great deal of talk the meeting finally broke up without any
actual appeal to arms, though it had, during its continuance, assumed
many of the rights of government, such as stopping post-carts and
individuals, and sending armed patrols about the country. The principal
reason of its break-up was that the Zulu war was now drawing to a
close, and the leaders saw that there would soon be plenty of troops
available to suppress any attempt at revolt, but they also saw to what
lengths they could go with impunity. They had for a period of nearly
two months been allowed to throw the whole country into confusion, to
openly violate the laws, and to intimidate and threaten Her Majesty's
loyal subjects with war and death. The lesson was not lost on them; but
they postponed action till a more favourable opportunity offered.

Sir Bartle Frere before his departure took an opportunity at a public
dinner given him at Potchefstroom of assuring the loyal inhabitants of
the country that the Transvaal would never be given back.

Meanwhile a new Pharaoh had arisen in Egypt, in the shape of Sir Garnet
Wolseley, and on the 29th June 1879 we find him communicating the fact
to Sir 0. Lanyon in very plain language, telling him that he
disapproved of his course of action with regard to Secocoeni, and
that "in future you will please take orders only from me."

As soon as Sir Garnet had completed his arrangements for the
pacification of Zululand, he proceeded to Pretoria, and having caused
himself to be sworn in as Governor, set vigorously to work. I must say
that in his dealings with the Transvaal he showed great judgment and a
keen appreciation of what the country needed, namely, strong
government; the fact of the matter being, I suppose, that being very
popular with the Home authorities he felt that he could more or less
command their support in what he did, a satisfaction not given to most
governors, who never know but that they may be thrown overboard in
emergency to lighten the ship.

One of his first acts was to issue a proclamation, stating that,
"Whereas it appears that, notwithstanding repeated assurances of
contrary effect given by Her Majesty's representatives in this
territory, uncertainty or misapprehension exists amongst some of Her
Majesty's subjects as to the intention of Her Majesty's Government
regarding the maintenance of British rule and sovereignty over the
territory of the Transvaal: and whereas it is expedient that all
grounds for such uncertainty or misapprehension should be removed once
and for all beyond doubt or question: now therefore I do hereby
proclaim and make known, in the name and on behalf of Her Majesty
the Queen, that it is the will and determination of Her Majesty's
Government that this Transvaal territory shall be, _and shall
continue to be for ever_, an integral portion of Her Majesty's
dominions in South Africa."

Alas! Sir G. Wolseley's estimate of the value of a solemn pledge thus
made in the name of Her Majesty, whose word has hitherto been held to
be sacred, differed greatly to that of Mr. Gladstone and his
Government.

Sir Garnet Wolseley's operations against Secocoeni proved eminently
successful, and were the best arranged bit of native warfare that I
have yet heard of in South Africa. One blow was struck, and only one,
but that was crushing. Of course the secret of his success lay in the
fact that he had an abundance of force; but it was not ensured by that
alone, good management being very requisite in an affair of the sort,
especially where native allies have to be dealt with. The cost of the
expedition, not counting other Secocoeni war expenditure, amounted to
over £300,000, all of which is now lost to this country.

Another step in the right direction undertaken by Sir Garnet was the
establishment of an Executive Council and also of a Legislative
Council, for the establishment of which Letters Patent were sent from
Downing Street in November 1880.

Meanwhile the Boers, paying no attention to the latter proclamation,
for they guessed that it, like other proclamations in the Transvaal,
would be a mere _brutum fulmen_, had assembled for another mass
meeting, at which they went forward a step, and declared a Government
which was to treat with the English authorities. They had now learnt
that they could do what they liked with perfect impunity, provided they
did not take the extreme course of massacring the English. They had yet
to learn that they might even do that. At the termination of this
meeting, a vote of thanks was passed to "Mr. Leonard Courtney of
London, and other members of the British Parliament." It was wise of
the Boer leaders to cultivate Mr. Courtney of London. As a result of
this meeting, Pretorius, one of the principal leaders, and Bok, the
secretary, were arrested on a charge of treason, and underwent a
preliminary examination; but as the Secretary of State, Sir M. Hicks
Beach, looked rather timidly on the proceeding, and the local
authorities were doubtful of securing a verdict, the prosecution was
abandoned, and necessarily did more harm than good, being looked upon
as another proof of the impotence of the Government.

Shortly afterwards, Sir G. Wolseley changed his tactics, and, instead
of attempting to imprison Pretorius, offered him a seat on the
Executive Council, with a salary attached. This was a much more
sensible way of dealing with him, and he at once rose to the bait,
stating his willingness to join the Government after a while, but that
he could not publicly do so at the moment lest he should lose his
influence with those who were to be brought round through him. It does
not, however, appear that Mr. Pretorius ever did actually join the
Executive, probably because he found public opinion too strong to allow
him to do so.

In December 1879 a new light broke upon the Boers, for in the previous
month Mr. Gladstone had been delivering his noted attack on the policy
of the Conservative Government. Those Mid-Lothian speeches did harm, it
is said, in many parts of the world; but I venture to think that they
have proved more mischievous in South Africa than anywhere else; at any
rate, they have borne fruit sooner. It is not to be supposed that Mr.
Gladstone really cared anything about the Transvaal or its independence
when he was denouncing the hideous outrage that had been perpetrated by
the Conservative Government in annexing it. On the contrary, as he
acquiesced in the Annexation at the time (when Lord Kimberley stated
that it was evidently unavoidable), and declined to rescind it when he
came into power, it is to be supposed that he really approved of it, or
at the least looked on it as a necessary evil. However this may be, any
stick will do to beat a dog with, and the Transvaal was a convenient
point on which to attack the Government. He probably neither knew nor
cared what effect his reckless words might have on ignorant Boers
thousands of miles away; and yet, humanly speaking, many a man would
have been alive and strong to-day whose bones now whiten the African
Veldt had those words never been spoken. Then, for the first time, the
Boers learnt that, if they played their cards properly and put on
sufficient pressure, they would, in the event of the Liberal party
coming to office, have little difficulty in coercing it as they wished.

There was a fair chance at the time of the utterance of the Mid-Lothian
speeches that the agitation would, by degrees, die away; Sir G.
Wolseley had succeeded in winning over Pretorius, and the Boers in
general were sick of mass meetings. Indeed, a memorial was addressed to
Sir. G. Wolseley by a number of Boers in the Potchefstroom district,
protesting against the maintenance of the movement against Her
Majesty's rule, which, considering the great amount of intimidation
exercised by the malcontents, may be looked upon as a favourable sign.

But when it slowly came to be understood among the Boers that a great
English Minister had openly espoused their cause, and that he would
perhaps soon be all-powerful, the moral gain to them was incalculable.
They could now go to the doubting ones and say,--we must be right about
the matter, because, putting our own feelings out of the question, the
great Gladstone says we are. We find the committee of the Boer
malcontents, at their meeting in March 1880, reading a letter to Mr.
Gladstone, "in which he was thanked for the great sympathy shown in
their fate," and a hope expressed that, if he succeeded in getting
power, he would not forget them. In fact, a charming unanimity
prevailed between our great Minister and the Boer rebels, for their
interests were the same, the overthrow of the Conservative Government.
If, however, every leader of the Opposition were to intrigue or
countenance intrigues with those who are seeking to undermine the
authority of Her Majesty, whether they be Boers or Irishmen, in order
to help himself to power, the country might suffer in the long run.

But whatever feelings may have prompted Her Majesty's Opposition, the
Home Government, and their agent, Sir Garnet Wolseley, blew no
uncertain blast, if we may judge from their words and actions. Thus we
find Sir Garnet speaking as follows at a banquet given in his honour at
Pretoria:--

"I am told that these men (the Boers) are told to keep on agitating in
this way, for a change of Government in England may give them again the
old order of things. Nothing can show greater ignorance of English
politics than such an idea; I tell you that there is no Government,
Whig or Tory, Liberal, Conservative, or Radical, _who would dare
under any circumstances to give back this country_. They would not
dare, because the English people would not allow them. To give back the
country, what would it mean? To give it back to external danger, to the
danger of attack by hostile tribes on its frontier, and who, if the
English Government were removed for one day, would make themselves felt
the next. Not an official of Government paid for months; it would mean
national bankruptcy. No taxes being paid, the same thing recurring
again which had existed before would mean danger without, anarchy and
civil war within, every possible misery; the strangulation of trade,
and the destruction of property."

It is very amusing to read this passage by the light of after events.
On other occasions Sir Garnet Wolseley will probably not be quite so
confident as to the future when it is to be controlled by a Radical
Government.

This explicit and straightforward statement of Sir Garnet's produced a
great effect on the loyal inhabitants of the Transvaal, which was
heightened by the publication of the following telegram from the
Secretary of State:--"You may fully confirm explicit statements made
from time to time as to inability of Her Majesty's Government to
entertain _any proposal_ for withdrawal of the Queen's sovereignty."

On the faith of these declarations many Englishmen migrated to the
Transvaal and settled there, whilst those who were in the country now
invested all their means, being confident that they would not lose
their property through its being returned to the Boers. The excitement
produced by Mr. Gladstone's speeches began to quiet down and be
forgotten for the time, arrear taxes were paid up by the malcontents,
and generally the aspect of affairs was such, in Sir Garnet Wolseley's
opinion, as justified him in writing, in April 1880, to the Secretary
of State expressing his belief that the agitation was dying out.[10]
Indeed, so sanguine was he on that point that he is reported to have
advised the withdrawal of the cavalry regiment stationed in the
territory, a piece of economy that was one of the immediate causes of
the revolt.

          [10] In Blue-Book No. (C. 2866) of September 1881, which is
          descriptive of various events connected with the Boer rising,
          is published, as an appendix, a despatch from Sir Garnet
          Wolseley, dated October 1879. This despatch declares the
          writer's opinion that the Boer discontent a on the increase.
          Its publication thus--_apropos des bottes_--nearly two
          years after it was written, is rather an amusing incident. It
          certainly gives one the idea that Sir Garnet Wolseley,
          fearing that his reputation for infallibility might be
          attacked by scoffers for not having foreseen the Boer
          rebellion, and perhaps uneasily conscious of other despatches
          very different in tenor and subsequent in date: and, mindful
          of the withdrawal of the cavalry regiment by his advice, had
          caused it to be tacked on to the Blue-Book as a documentary
          "I told you so," and a proof that, whoever else was blinded,
          he foresaw. It contains, however, the following remarkably
          true passage:--"Even were it not impossible, for many other
          reasons, to contemplate a withdrawal of our authority from
          the Transvaal, the position of insecurity in which we should
          leave this loyal and important section of the community (the
          English inhabitants), by exposing them to the certain
          retaliation of the Boers, would constitute, in my opinion, an
          insuperable obstacle to retrocession. Subjected to the same
          danger, moreover, would be those of the Boers, whose superior
          intelligence and courageous character has rendered them loyal
          to our Government"

          As the Government took the trouble to republish the despatch,
          it is a pity that they did not think fit to pay more
          attention to its contents.

The reader will remember the financial condition of the country at the
time of the Annexation, which was one of utter bankruptcy. After three
years of British rule, however, we find, notwithstanding the constant
agitation that had been kept up, that the total revenue receipts for
the first quarter of 1879 and 1880 amounted to £22,773 and £47,982
respectively. That is to say, that, during the last year of British
rule, the revenue of the country more than doubled itself, and amounted
to about £160,000 a year, taking the quarterly returns at the low
average of £40,000. It must, however, be remembered that this sum would
have been very largely increased in subsequent years, most probably
doubled. At any rate the revenue would have been amply sufficient to
make the province one of the most prosperous in South Africa, and to
have enabled it to shortly repay all debts due to the British
Government, and further to provide for its own defence. Trade also,
which, in April 1877, was completely paralysed, had increased
enormously. So early as the middle of 1879, the Committee of the
Transvaal Chamber of Commerce pointed out, in a resolution adopted by
them, that the trade of the country had in two years risen from almost
nothing to the considerable sum of two millions sterling per annum, and
that it was entirely in the hands of those favourable to British rule.
They also pointed out that more than half the land-tax was paid by
Englishmen, or other Europeans adverse to Boer Government. Land, too,
had risen greatly in value, of which I can give the following instance.
About a year after the Annexation I, together with a friend, bought a
little property on the outskirts of Pretoria, which, with a cottage we
put up on it, cost some £300. Just before the rebellion we fortunately
determined to sell it, and had no difficulty in getting £650 for it. I
do not believe that it would now fetch a fifty-pound note.

I cannot conclude this chapter better than by drawing attention to a
charming specimen of the correspondence between the Boer leaders and
their friend Mr. Courtney. The letter in question, which is dated 26th
June, purports to be written by Messrs. Kruger and Joubert, but it is
obvious that it owes its origin to some member or members of the Dutch
party at the Cape, from whence, indeed, it is written. This is rendered
evident both by its general style, and also by the use of such terms as
"Satrap," and by references to Napoleon III. and Cayenne, about whom
Messrs. Kruger and Joubert know no more than they do of Peru and the
Incas.

After alluding to former letters, the writers blow a blast of triumph
over the downfall of the Conservative Government, and then make a
savage attack on the reputation of Sir Bartle Frere. The "stubborn
Satrap" is throughout described as a liar, and every bad motive imputed
to him. Really, the fact that Mr. Courtney should encourage such
epistles as this is enough to give colour to the boast made by some of
the leading Boers, after the war, that they had been encouraged to
rebel by a member of the British Government.

At the end of this letter, and on the same page of the Blue-Book, is
printed the telegram recalling Sir Bartle Frere, dated 1st August 1880.
It really reads as though the second document was consequent on the
first. One thing is very clear, the feelings of Her Majesty's new
Government towards Sir Bartle Frere differed only in the method of
their expression from those set forth by the Boer leaders in their
letter to Mr. Courtney, whilst their object, namely, to be rid of him,
was undoubtedly identical with that of the Dutch party in South Africa.




CHAPTER V.

THE BOER REBELLION.


When the Liberal ministry became an accomplished fact instead of a
happy possibility, Mr. Gladstone did not find it convenient to adopt
the line of policy with reference to the Transvaal that might have been
expected from his utterances whilst leader of the Opposition. On the
contrary, he declared in Parliament that the Annexation could not be
cancelled, and on the 8th June 1880 we find him, in answer to a Boer
petition, written with the object of inducing him to act up to the
spirit of his words and rescind the Annexation, writing thus:--"Looking
to all the circumstances, both of the Transvaal and the rest of South
Africa, and to the necessity of preventing a renewal of disorders which
might lead to disastrous consequences, not only to the Transvaal, but
to the whole of South Africa, our judgment is, that the _Queen cannot
be advised to relinquish her sovereignty over the Transvaal_; but,
consistently with the maintenance of that sovereignty, we desire that
the white inhabitants of the Transvaal should, without prejudice to the
rest of the population, enjoy the fullest liberty to manage their local
affairs. We believe that this liberty may be most easily and promptly
conceded to the Transvaal as a member of a South African
confederation."

Unless words have lost their signification, this passage certainly
means that the Transvaal must remain a British colony, but that England
will be prepared to grant it responsible government, more especially if
it will consent to a confederation scheme. Mr. Gladstone, however, in a
communication dated 1st June 1881, and addressed to the unfortunate
Transvaal loyals, for whom he expresses "respect and sympathy,"
interprets his meaning thus: "It is stated, as I observe, that a
promise was given by me that the Transvaal never should be given back.
There is no mention of the terms or date of this promise. If the
reference be to my letter, of 8th June 1880, to Messrs. Kruger and
Joubert, I do not think the language of that letter justifies the
description given. Nor am I sure in what manner or to what degree the
fullest liberty to manage their local affairs, which I then said Her
Majesty's Government desired to confer on the white population of the
Transvaal, differs from the settlement now about being made in its
bearing on the interests of those whom your Committee represents."

Such twisting of the meaning of words would, in a private person, be
called dishonest. It will also occur to most people that Mr. Gladstone
might have spared the deeply wronged and loyal subjects of Her Majesty
whom he was addressing the taunt he levels at them in the second
paragraph I have quoted. If asked, he would no doubt say that he had
not the slightest intention of laughing at them; but when he
deliberately tells them that it makes no difference to their interests
whether they remain Her Majesty's subjects under a responsible
Government, or become the servants of men who were but lately in arms
against them and Her Majesty's authority, he is either mocking them, or
offering an insult to their understandings.

By way of comment on his remarks, I may add that he had, in a letter
replying to a petition from these same loyal inhabitants, addressed to
him in May 1880, informed them that he had already told the Boer
representatives that the Annexation could not be rescinded. Although
Mr. Gladstone is undoubtedly the greatest living master of the art of
getting two distinct and opposite sets of meanings out of one set of
words, it would try even his ingenuity to make out, to the satisfaction
of an impartial mind, that he never gave any pledge about the retention
of the Transvaal.

Indeed, it is from other considerations clear that he had no intention
of giving up the country to the Boers, whose cause he appears to have
taken up solely for electioneering purposes. Had he meant to do so, he
would have carried out his intention on succeeding to office, and,
indeed, as things have turned out, it is deeply to be regretted that he
did not; for, bad as such a step would have been, it would at any rate
have had a better appearance than our ultimate surrender after three
defeats. It would also have then been possible to secure the repayment
of some of the money owing to this country, and to provide for the
proper treatment of the natives, and the compensation of the loyal
inhabitants who could no longer live there: since it must naturally
have been easier to make terms with the Boers before they had defeated
our troops.

On the other hand, we should have missed the grandest and most
soul-stirring display of radical theories, practically applied, that
has as yet lightened the darkness of this country. But although Mr.
Gladstone gave his official decision against returning the country,
there seems to be little doubt that communications on the subject were
kept up with the Boer leaders through some prominent members of the
Radical party, who, it was said, went so far as to urge the Boers to
take up arms against us. When Mr. White came to this country on behalf
of the loyalists, after the surrender, he stated that this was so at a
public meeting, and said further that he had in his possession proofs
of his statements. He even went so far as to name the gentleman he
accused, and to challenge him to deny it I have not been able to gather
that Mr. White's statements were contradicted.

However this may be, after a pause, agitation in the Transvaal suddenly
recommenced with redoubled vigour. It began through a man named
Bezeidenhout, who refused to pay his taxes. Thereupon a waggon was
seized in execution under the authority of the court and put up to
auction, but its sale was prevented by a crowd of rebel Boers, who
kicked the auctioneer off the waggon and dragged the vehicle away. This
was on the 11th November 1880. When this intelligence reached Pretoria,
Sir Owen Lanyon sent down a few companies of the 21st Regiment, under
the command of Major Thornhill, to support the Landdrost in arresting
the rioters, and appointed Captain Raaf, C.M.G., to act as special
messenger to the Landdrost's Court at Potchefstroom, with authority to
enrol special constables to assist him to carry out the arrests. On
arrival at Potchefstroom Captain Raaf found that, without an armed
force, it was quite impossible to effect any arrest. On the 26th
November Sir Owen Lanyon, realising the gravity of the situation,
telegraphed to Sir George Colley, asking that the 58th Regiment should
be sent back to the Transvaal. Sir George replied that he could ill
spare it on account of "daily expected outbreak of Pondos and possible
appeal for help from Cape Colony," and that the Government must be
supported by the loyal inhabitants.

It will be seen that the Boers had, with some astuteness, chosen a very
favourable time to commence operations. The hands of the Cape
Government were full with the Basuto war, so no help could be expected
from it; Sir G. Wolseley had sent away the only cavalry regiment that
remained in the country, and lastly, Sir Owen Lanyon had quite recently
allowed a body of 300 trained volunteers, mostly, if not altogether,
drawn from among the loyalists, to be raised for service in the Basuto
war, a serious drain upon the resources of a country so sparsely
populated as the Transvaal.

Meanwhile a mass meeting had been convened by the Boers for the 8th
January to consider Mr. Gladstone's letter, but the Bezeidenhout
incident had the effect of putting forward the date of assembly by a
month, and it was announced that it would be held on the 8th December.
Subsequently the date was shifted to the 15th, and then back again to
the 8th. Every effort was made, by threats of future vengeance, to
secure the presence of as many burghers as possible; attempts were also
made to persuade the native chiefs to send representatives, and to
promise to join in an attack on the English. These entirely failed. The
meeting was held at a place called Paarde Kraal, and resulted in the
sudden declaration of the Republic and the appointment of the famous
triumvirate Kruger, Joubert, and Pretorius. It then moved into
Heidelberg, a little town about sixty miles from Pretoria, and on the
16th December the Republic was formally proclaimed in a long
proclamation, containing a summary of the events of the few preceding
years, and declaring the arrangements the malcontents were willing to
make with the English authorities. The terms offered in this document
are almost identical with those finally accepted by Her Majesty's
Government, with the exception that in the proclamation of the 16th
December the Boer leaders declare their willingness to enter into
confederation, and to guide their native policy by general rules
adopted in concurrence "with the Colonies and States of South Africa."
This was a more liberal offer than that which we ultimately agreed to,
but then the circumstances had changed.

This proclamation was forwarded to Sir Owen Lanyon with a covering
letter, in which the following words occur:--"We declare in the most
solemn manner that we have no desire to spill blood, and that from our
side we do not wish war. It lies in your hands to force us to appeal to
arms in self-defence.... We expect your answer within twice twenty-four
hours."

I beg to direct particular attention to these paragraphs, as they have
a considerable interest in view of what followed.

The letter and proclamation reached Government House, Pretoria, at
10.30 on the evening of Friday the 17th December. Sir Owen Lanyon's
proclamation, written in reply, was handed to the messenger at noon on
Sunday, 19th December, or within about thirty-six hours of his arrival,
and could hardly have reached the rebel camp, sixty miles off, before
dawn the next day, the 20th December, on which day, at about one
o'clock, a detachment of the 94th was ambushed and destroyed on the
road between Middleburg and Pretoria, about eighty miles off, by a
force despatched from Heidelberg for that purpose some days before. On
the 16th December, or the _same day_ on which the Triumvirate had
despatched the proclamation to Pretoria containing their terms, and
expressing in the most solemn manner that they had no desire to shed
blood, a large Boer force was attacking Potchefstroom.

So much then for the sincerity of the professions of their desire to
avoid bloodshed.

The proclamation sent by Sir O. Lanyon in reply recited in its preamble
the various acts of which the rebels had been guilty, including that of
having "wickedly sought to incite the said loyal native inhabitants
throughout the province to take up arms against Her Majesty's
Government," announced that matters had now been put into the hands of
the officer commanding Her Majesty's troops, and promised pardon to all
who would disperse to their homes.

It was at Potchefstroom, which town had all along been the nursery of
the rebellion, that actual hostilities first broke out. Potchefstroom
as a town is much more Boer in its sympathies than Pretoria, which is,
or rather was, almost purely English. Sir Owen Lanyon had, as stated
before, sent a small body of soldiers thither to support the civil
authorities, and had also appointed Major Clarke, C.M.G., an officer of
noted coolness and ability, to act as Special Commissioner for the
district.

Major Clarke's first step was to try, in conjunction with Captain Raaf,
to raise a corps of volunteers, in which he totally failed. Those of
the townsfolk who were not Boers at heart had too many business
relations with the surrounding farmers, and perhaps too little faith in
the stability of English rule after Mr. Gladstone's utterances, to
allow them to indulge in patriotism. At the time of the outbreak,
between seventy and eighty thousand sterling was owing to firms in
Potchefstroom by neighbouring Boers, a sum amply sufficient to account
for their lukewarmness in the English cause. Subsequent events have
shown that the Potchefstroom shopkeepers were wise in their generation.

On the 15th December a large number of Boers came into the town and
took possession of the printing-office in order to print the
proclamation already alluded to. Major Clarke made two attempts to
enter the office and see the leaders, but without success.

On the 16th a Boer patrol fired on some of the mounted infantry, and
the fire was returned. These were the first shots fired during the war,
and they were fired by Boers. Orders were thereupon signalled to Clarke
by Lieutenant-Colonel Winsloe, 21st Regiment, now commanding at the
fort which he afterwards defended so gallantly, that he was to commence
firing. Clarke was in the Landdrost's office on the Market Square with
a force of about twenty soldiers under Captain Falls and twenty
civilians under Captain Raaf, C.M.G., a position but ill-suited for
defensive purposes, from whence fire was accordingly opened, the Boers
taking up positions in the surrounding houses commanding the office.
Shortly after the commencement of the fighting, Captain Falls was shot
dead whilst talking to Major Clarke, the latter having a narrow escape,
a bullet grazing his head just above the ear. The fighting continued
during the 17th and till the morning of the 18th, when the Boers
succeeded in firing the roof, which was of thatch, by throwing
fire-balls on to it. Major Clarke then addressed the men, telling them
that, though personally he did not care about his own life, he did not
see that they could serve any useful purpose by being burned alive, so
he should surrender, which he did, with a loss of about six killed and
wounded. The camp meanwhile had repulsed with loss the attack made on
it, and was never again directly attacked.

Whilst these events were in progress at Potchefstroom, a much more
awful tragedy was in preparation on the road between Middleburg and
Pretoria.

On the 23d November, Colonel Bellairs, at the request of Sir Owen
Lanyon, directed a concentration on Pretoria of most of the few
soldiers that there were in the territory, in view of the disturbed
condition of the country. In accordance with these orders, Colonel
Anstruther marched from Lydenburg, a town about 180 miles from
Pretoria, on the 5th December, with the headquarters and two companies
of the 94th Regiment, being a total of 264 men, three women, and two
children, and the disproportionately large train of thirty-four
ox-waggons, or an ox-waggon capable of carrying five thousand pounds'
weight to every eight persons. And here I may remark that it is this
enormous amount of baggage, without which it appears to be impossible
to move the smallest body of men, that renders infantry regiments
almost useless for service in South Africa except for garrisoning
purposes. Both Zulus and Boers can get over the ground at thrice the
pace possible to the unfortunate soldier, and both races despise them
accordingly. The Zulus call our infantry "pack oxen." In this
particular instance, Colonel Anstruther's defeat, or rather,
annihilation, is to a very great extent referable to his enormous
baggage train; since, in the first place, had he not lost valuable days
in collecting more waggons, he would have been safe in Pretoria before
danger arose. It must also be acknowledged that his arrangements on the
line of march were somewhat reckless, though it can hardly be said that
he was ignorant of his danger. Thus we find that Colonel Bellairs wrote
to Colonel Anstruther, warning him of the probability of an attack, and
impressing on him the necessity of keeping a good look-out, the letter
being received and acknowledged by the latter on the 17th December.

To this warning was added a still more impressive one that came to my
knowledge privately. A gentleman well known to me received, on the
morning after the troops had passed through the town of Middleburg on
their way to Pretoria, a visit from an old Boer with whom he was on
friendly terms, who had purposely come to tell him that a large patrol
was out to ambush the troops on the Pretoria road. My informant having
convinced himself of the truth of the statement, at once rode after the
soldiers, and catching them up some distance from Middleburg, told
Colonel Anstruther what he had heard, imploring him, he said, with all
the energy he could command, to take better precautions against
surprise. The Colonel, however, laughed at his fears, and told him that
if the Boers came "he would frighten them away with the big drum."

At one o'clock on Sunday, the 20th December, the column was marching
along about a mile and a half from a place known as Bronker's Splint,
and thirty-eight miles from Pretoria, when suddenly a large number of
mounted Boers were seen in loose formation on the left side of the
road. The band was playing at the time, and the column was extended
over more than half a mile, the rearguard being about a hundred yards
behind the last waggon. The band stopped playing on seeing the Boers,
and the troops halted, when a man was seen advancing with a white flag,
whom Colonel Anstruther went out to meet, accompanied by Conductor
Egerton, a civilian. They met about one hundred and fifty yards from
the column, and the man gave Colonel Anstruther a letter, which
announced the establishment of the South African Republic, stated that
until they heard Lanyon's reply to their proclamation they did not know
if they were at war or not; that, consequently, they could not allow
any movements of troops, which would be taken as a declaration of war.
This letter was signed by Joubert, one of the Triumvirate. Colonel
Anstruther replied that he was ordered to Pretoria, and to Pretoria he
must go.

Whilst this conference was going on, the Boers, of whom there were
quite five hundred, had gradually closed round the column, and took up
positions behind rocks and trees which afforded them excellent cover,
whilst the troops were on a bare plain, and before Colonel Anstruther
reached his men a murderous fire was poured in upon them from all
sides. The fire was hotly returned by the soldiers. Most of the
officers were struck down by the first volley, having, no doubt, been
picked out by the marksmen. The firing lasted about fifteen minutes,
and at the end of that time seven out of the nine officers were down
killed and wounded; an eighth (Captain Elliot), one of the two who
escaped, untouched, being reserved for an even more awful fate. The
majority of the men were also down, and had the hail of lead continued
much longer it is clear that nobody would have been left. Colonel
Anstruther, who was lying badly wounded in five places, seeing what a
hopeless state affairs were in, ordered the bugler to sound the cease
firing, and surrendered. One of the three officers who were not much
hurt was, most providentially, Dr. Ward, who had but a slight wound in
the thigh; all the others, except Captain Elliot and one lieutenant,
were either killed or died from the effects of their wounds. There were
altogether 56 killed and 101 wounded, including a woman, Mrs. Fox.
Twenty more afterwards died of their wounds. The Boer loss appears to
have been very small.

After the fight Conductor Egerton, with a sergeant, was allowed to walk
into Pretoria to obtain medical assistance, the Boers refusing to give
him a horse, or even to allow him to use his own. The Boer leader also
left Dr. Ward eighteen men and a few stores for the wounded, with which
he made shift as best he could. Nobody can read this gentleman's report
without being much impressed with the way in which, though wounded
himself, he got through his terrible task of, without assistance,
attending to the wants of 101 sufferers. Beginning the task at 2
P.M., it took him till six the next morning before he had seen
the last man. It is to be hoped that his services have met with some
recognition. Dr. Ward remained near the scene of the massacre with his
wounded men till the declaration of peace, when he brought them down to
Maritzburg, having experienced great difficulty in obtaining food for
them during so many weeks.

This is a short account of what I must, with reluctance, call a most
cruel and carefully planned massacre. I may mention that a Zulu driver,
who was with the rearguard, and escaped into Natal, stated that the
Boers shot all the wounded men who formed that body. His statement was
to a certain extent borne out by the evidence of one of the survivors,
who stated that all the bodies found in that part of the field (nearly
three-quarters of a mile away from the head of the column), had a
bullet hole through the head or breast in addition to their other
wounds.

The Administrator of the Transvaal in council thus comments on the
occurrence in an official minute:--"The surrounding and gradual hemming
in under a flag of truce of a force, and the selection of spots from
which to direct their fire, as in the case of the unprovoked attack by
the rebels upon Colonel Anstruther's force, is a proceeding of which
very few like incidents can be mentioned in the annals of civilised
warfare."

The Boer leaders, however, were highly elated at their success, and
celebrated it in a proclamation of which the following is an
extract:--"Inexpressible is the gratitude of the burghers for this
blessing conferred on them. Thankful to the brave General F. Joubert
and his men who have upheld the honour of the Republic on the
battlefield. Bowed down in the dust before Almighty God, who had thus
stood by them, and, with a loss of over a hundred of the enemy, only
allowed two of ours to be killed."

In view of the circumstances of the treacherous hemming in and
destruction of this small body of unprepared men, most people would
think this language rather high-flown, not to say blasphemous.

On the news of this disaster reaching Pretoria, Sir Owen Lanyon issued
a proclamation placing the country under martial law. As the town was
large, straggling, and incapable of defence, all the inhabitants,
amounting to over four thousand souls, were ordered up to camp, where
the best arrangements possible were made for their convenience. In
these quarters they remained for three months, driven from their
comfortable homes, and cheerfully enduring all the hardships, want, and
discomforts consequent on their position, whilst they waited in
patience for the appearance of that relieving column that never came.
People in England hardly understand what these men and women went
through because they chose to remain loyal. Let them suppose that all
the inhabitants of an ordinary English town, with the exception of the
class known as poor people, which can hardly be said to exist in a
colony, were at an hour's notice ordered--all, the aged and the sick,
delicate women, and tiny children--to leave their homes to the mercy of
the enemy, and crowd up in a little space under shelter of a fort, with
nothing but canvas tents or sheds to cover them from the fierce summer
suns and rains, and the coarsest rations to feed them; whilst the
husbands and brothers were daily engaged with a cunning and dangerous
enemy, and sometimes brought home wounded or dead. They will then have
some idea of what was gone through by the loyal people of Pretoria, in
their weak confidence in the good faith of the English Government.

The arrangements made for the defence of the town were so ably and
energetically carried out by Sir Owen Lanyon, assisted by the military
officers, that no attack upon it was ever attempted. It seems to me
that the organisation that could provide for the penning up of four
thousand people for months, and carry it out without the occurrence of
a single unpleasantness or expression of discontent, must have had
something remarkable about it. Of course, it would have been impossible
without the most loyal co-operation on the part of those concerned.
Indeed everybody in the town lent a helping hand; judges served out
rations, members of the Executive inspected nuisances, and so forth.
There was only one instance of "striking;" and then, of all people in
the world, it was the five civil doctors who, thinking it a favourable
opportunity to fleece the Government, combined to demand five guineas
a-day each for their services. I am glad to say that they did not
succeed in their attempt at extortion.

On the 23d December, the Boer leaders issued a second proclamation in
reply to that of Sir O. Lanyon of the 18th, which is characterised by
an utter absence of regard for the truth, being, in fact, nothing but a
tissue of impudent falsehoods. It accuses Sir O. Lanyon of having
bombarded women and children, of arming natives against the Boers, and
of firing on the Boers without declaring war. Not one of these
accusations has any foundation in fact, as the Boers well knew; but
they also knew that Sir Owen, being shut up in Pretoria, was not in a
position to rebut their charges, which they hoped might, to some
extent, be believed, and create sympathy for them in other parts of the
world. This was the reason of the issue of the proclamation, which well
portrays the character of its framers.

Life at Pretoria was varied by occasional sorties against the Boer
laagers, situated at different points in the neighbourhood, generally
about six or eight miles from the town. These expeditions were carried
out with considerable success, though with some loss, the heaviest
incurred being when the Boers, having treacherously hoisted the white
flag, opened a heavy fire on the Pretoria forces, as soon as they,
beguiled into confidence, emerged from their cover. In the course of
the war, one in every four of the Pretoria mounted volunteers was
killed or wounded.

But perhaps the most serious of all the difficulties the Government had
to meet was that of keeping the natives in check. As has before been
stated, they were devotedly attached to our rule, and, during the three
years of its continuance, had undergone what was to them a strange
experience, they had neither been murdered, beaten, or enslaved.
Naturally they were in no hurry to return to the old order of things,
in which murder, flogging, and slavery were events of everyday
occurrence. Nor did the behaviour of the Boers on the outbreak of the
war tend to reconcile them to any such idea. Thus we find that the
farmers had pressed a number of natives from Waterberg into one of
their laagers (Zwart Koppies); two of them tried to run away, a Boer
saw them and shot them both. Again, on the 7th January, a native
reported to the authorities at Pretoria that he and some others were
returning from the Diamond Fields driving some sheep. A Boer came and
asked them to sell the sheep. They refused, whereupon he went away, but
returning with some other Dutchmen fired on the Kafirs, killing one.

On the 2d January information reached Pretoria that on the 26th
December some Boers fired on some natives who were resting outside
Potchefstroom and killed three; the rest fled, whereupon the Boers took
the cattle they had with them.

On the 11th January some men, who had been sent from Pretoria with
despatches for Standerton, were taken prisoners. Whilst prisoners they
saw ten men returning from the Fields stopped by the Boers and ordered
to come to the laager. They refused and ran away, were fired on, five
being killed and one getting his arm broken.

These are a few instances of the treatment meted out to the unfortunate
natives, taken at haphazard from the official reports. There are plenty
more of the same nature if anybody cares to read them.

As soon as the news of the rising reached them, every chief of any
importance sent in to offer aid to Government, and many of them,
especially Montsioa, our old ally in the Keate Award district, took the
loyals of the neighbourhood under their protection. Several took charge
of Government property and cattle during the disturbances, and one had
four or five thousand pounds in gold, the product of a recently
collected tax, given him to take care of by the Commissioner of his
district, who was afraid that the money would be seized by the Boers.
In every instance the property entrusted to their charge was returned
intact. The loyalty of all the native chiefs under very trying
circumstances (for the Boers were constantly attempting to cajole or
frighten them into joining them) is a remarkable proof of the great
affection of the Kafirs, more especially those of the Basuto tribes,
who love peace better than war, for the Queen's rule. The Government of
Pretoria need only have spoken one word to set an enormous number of
armed men in motion against the Boers, with the most serious results to
the latter. Any other Government in the world would, in its extremity,
have spoken that word, but, fortunately for the Boers, it is against
English principles to set black against white under any circumstances.

Besides the main garrison at Pretoria there were forts defended by
soldiery and loyals at the following places:--Potchefstroom,
Rustenburg, Lydenburg, Marabastad, and Wakkerstroom, none of which were
taken by the Boers.[11]

          [11] Colonel Winsloe, however, being short of provisions, was
          beguiled by the fraudulent representations and acts of the
          Boer commander into surrendering the fort at Potchefstroom
          daring the armistice.

One of the first acts of the Triumvirate was to despatch a large force
from Heidelberg with orders to advance into Natal Territory, and seize
the pass over the Drakensberg known as Lang's Nek, so as to dispute the
advance of any relieving column. This movement was promptly executed,
and strong Boer troops patrolled Natal country almost up to Newcastle.

The news of the outbreak, followed as it was by that of the Bronker's
Spruit massacre, and Captain Elliot's murder, created a great
excitement in Natal. All available soldiers were at once despatched up
country, together with a naval brigade, who, on arrival at Newcastle,
brought up the strength of the Imperial troops of all arms to about a
thousand men. On the 10th January Sir George Colley left Maritzburg to
join the force at Newcastle, but at this time nobody dreamt that he
meant to attack the Nek with such an insignificant column. It was known
that the loyals and troops who were shut up in the various towns in the
Transvaal had sufficient provisions to last for some months, and that
there was therefore nothing to necessitate a forlorn hope. Indeed the
possibility of Sir George Colley attempting to enter the Transvaal was
not even speculated upon until just before his advance, it being
generally considered as out of the question.

The best illustration I can give of the feeling that existed about the
matter is to quote my own case. I had been so unfortunate as to land in
Natal with my wife and servants just as the Transvaal troubles began,
my intention being to proceed to a place I had near Newcastle. For some
weeks I remained in Maritzburg, but finding that the troops were to
concentrate on Newcastle, and being besides heartily wearied of the
great expense and discomfort of hotel life in that town, I determined
to go on up country, looking on it as being as safe as any place in the
colony. Of course the possibility of Sir George attacking the Nek
before the arrival of the reinforcements did not enter into my
calculations, as I thought it a venture that no sensible man would
undertake. On the day of my start, however, there was a rumour about
the town that the General was going to attack the Boer position. Though
I did not believe it, I thought it as well to go and ask the Colonial
Secretary, Colonel Mitchell, privately, if there was any truth in it,
adding that if there was, as I had a pretty intimate knowledge of the
Boers and their shooting powers, and what the inevitable result of such
a move would be, I should certainly prefer, as I had ladies with me, to
remain where I was. Colonel Mitchell told me frankly that he knew no
more about Sir George's plans than I did; but he added I might be sure
that so able and prudent a soldier would not do anything rash. His
remark concurred with my own opinion; so I started, and on arrival at
Newcastle a week later was met by the intelligence that Sir George had
advanced that morning to attack the Nek. To return was almost
impossible, since both horses and travellers were pretty nearly knocked
up. Also, anybody who has travelled with his family in summer-time over
the awful track of alternate slough and boulders between Maritzburg and
Newcastle, known in the colony as a road, will understand that at the
time the adventurous voyagers would far rather risk being shot than
face a return journey.

The only thing to do under the circumstances was to await the course of
events, which were now about to develop themselves with startling
rapidity. The little town of Newcastle was at this time an odd sight,
and remained so all through the war. The hotels were crowded to
overflowing with refugees, and on every spare patch of land were
erected tents, mud huts, canvas houses, and every kind of covering that
could be utilised under the pressure of necessity, to house the many
homeless families who had succeeded in effecting their escape from the
Transvaal, many of whom were reduced to great straits.

On the morning of the 28th January, anybody listening attentively in
the neighbourhood of Newcastle could hear the distant boom of heavy
guns. We were not kept long in suspense, for in the afternoon news
arrived that Sir George had attacked the Nek, and failed with heavy
loss. The excitement in the town was intense, for, in addition to other
considerations, the 58th Regiment, which had suffered most, had been
quartered there for some time, and both the officers and men were
personally known to the inhabitants.

The story of the fight is well known, and needs little repetition, and
a very sad story it is. The Boers, who at that time were some 2000
strong, were posted and entrenched on steep hills, against which Sir
George Colley hurled a few hundred soldiers. It was a forlorn hope, but
so gallant was the charge, especially that of the mounted squadron led
by Major Bronlow, that at one time it nearly succeeded. But nothing
could stand under the withering fire from the Boer schanses, and as
regards the foot soldiers, they never had a chance. Colonel Deane tried
to take them up the hill with a rush, with the result that by the time
they reached the top, some of the men were actually sick from
exhaustion, and none could hold a rifle steady. There on the bare
hill-top they crouched and lay, whilst the pitiless fire from redoubt
and rock lashed them like hail, till at last human nature could bear it
no longer, and what was left of them retired slowly down the slope. But
for many that gallant charge was their last earthly action. As they
charged they fell, and where they fell they were afterwards buried. The
casualties, killed and wounded, amounted to 195, which, considering the
small number of troops engaged in the actual attack, is enormously
heavy, and shows more plainly than words can tell the desperate nature
of the undertaking. Amongst the killed were Colonel Deane, Major Poole,
Major Hingeston, and Lieutenant Elwes. Major Essex was the only staff
officer engaged who escaped, the same officer who was one of the
fortunate four who lived through Isandhlwana. On this occasion his
usual good fortune attended him, for though his horse was killed and
his helmet knocked off, he was not touched. The Boer loss was very
trivial.

Sir George Colley, in his admirably lucid despatch about this
occurrence addressed to the Secretary of State for War, does not enter
much into the question as to the motives that prompted him to attack,
simply stating that his object was to relieve the besieged towns. He
does not appear to have taken into consideration, what was obvious to
anybody who knew the country and the Boers, that even if he had
succeeded in forcing the Nek, in itself almost an impossibility, he
could never have operated with any success in the Transvaal with so
small a column, without cavalry, and with an enormous train of waggons.
He would have been harassed day and night by the Boer skirmishers, his
supplies cut off, and his advance made practically impossible. Also the
Nek would have been re-occupied behind him, since he could not have
detached sufficient men to hold it, and in all probability Newcastle,
his base of supplies, would have fallen into the hands of the enemy.

The moral effect of our defeat on the Boers was very great. Up to this
time there had been many secret doubts amongst a large section of them
as to what the upshot of an encounter with the troops might be; and
with this party, in the same way that defeat, or even the anxiety of
waiting to be attacked, would have turned the scale one way, victory
turned it the other. It gave them unbounded confidence in their own
superiority, and infused a spirit of cohesion and mutual reliance into
their ranks which had before been wanting. Waverers wavered no longer,
but gave a loyal adherence to the good cause, and, what was still more
acceptable, large numbers of volunteers,--whatever President Brand may
say to the contrary,--poured in from the Orange Free State.

What Sir George Colley's motive was in making so rash a move is, of
course, quite inexplicable to the outside observer. It was said at the
time in Natal that he was a man with a theory: namely, that small
bodies of men properly handled were as useful and as likely to obtain
the object in view as a large force. Whether or no this was so, I am
not prepared to say; but it is undoubtedly the case that very clever
men have sometimes very odd theories, and it may be that he was a
striking instance in point.

For some days after the battle at Lang's Nek affairs were quiet, and it
was hoped that they would remain so till the arrival of the
reinforcements, which were on their way out. The hope proved a vain one
On the 7th February it was reported that the escort proceeding from
Newcastle to the General's camp with the post, a distance of about
eighteen miles, had been fired on and forced to return.

On the 8th, about mid-day, we were all startled by the sound of
fighting, proceeding apparently from a hill known as Scheins Hoogte,
about ten miles from Newcastle. It was not known that the General
contemplated any move, and everybody was entirely at a loss to know
what was going on, the general idea being, however, that the camp near
Lang's Nek had been abandoned, and that Sir George was retiring on
Newcastle.

The firing grew hotter and hotter, till at last it was perfectly
continuous, the cannon evidently being discharged as quickly as they
could be loaded, whilst their dull booming was accompanied by the
unceasing crash and roll of the musketry. Towards three o'clock the
firing slackened, and we thought it was all over, one way or the other,
but about five o'clock it broke out again with increased vigour. At
dusk it finally ceased. About this time some Kafirs came to my house
and told us that an English force was hemmed in on a hill this side of
the Ingogo River, that they were fighting bravely, but that "their arms
were tired," adding that they thought they would be all killed at
night.

Needless to say we spent that night with heavy hearts, expecting every
minute to hear the firing begin again, and ignorant of what fate had
befallen our poor soldiers on the hill. Morning put an end to our
suspense, and we then learnt that we had suffered what, under the
circumstances, amounted to a crushing defeat It appears that Sir George
had moved out with a force of five companies of the 60th Regiment, two
guns, and a few mounted men, to, in his own words, "patrol the road,
and meet and escort some waggons expected from Newcastle." As soon as
he passed the Ingogo he was surrounded by a body of Boers sent after
him from Lang's Nek, on a small triangular plateau, and sharply
assailed on all sides. With a break of about two hours, from three to
five, the assault was kept up till nightfall, with very bad results so
far as we were concerned, seeing that out of a body of about 500 men,
over 150 were killed and wounded. The reinforcements sent for from the
camp apparently did not come into action. For some unexplained reason
the Boers did not follow up their attack that night, perhaps because
they did not think it possible that our troops could effect their
escape back to the camp, and considered that the next morning would be
soon enough to return and finish the business. The General, however,
determined to get back, and scratch teams of such mules, riding-horses,
and oxen as had lived through the day being harnessed to the guns, the
dispirited and exhausted survivors of the force managed to ford the
Ingogo, now swollen by rain which had fallen in the afternoon, poor
Lieutenant Wilkinson, the adjutant of the 60th, losing his life in the
operation, and to struggle through the dense darkness back to camp.

On the hill-top they had lately held the dead lay thick. There, too,
exposed to the driving rain and bitter wind, lay the wounded, many of
whom would be dead before the rising of the morrow's sun. It must
indeed have been a sight never to be forgotten by those who saw it. The
night--I remember well--was cold and rainy, the great expanses of hill
and plain being sometimes lit by the broken gleams of an uncertain
moon, and sometimes plunged into intensest darkness by the passing of a
heavy cloud. Now and again flashes of lightning threw every crag and
outline into vivid relief, and the deep muttering of distant thunder
made the wild gloom more solemn. Then a gust of icy wind would come
tearing down the valleys to be followed by a pelting thunder
shower--and thus the night wore away.

When one reflects what discomfort, and even danger, an ordinary healthy
person would suffer if left after a hard day's work to lie all night in
the rain and wind on the top of a stony mountain, without food, or even
water to assuage his thirst, it becomes to some degree possible to
realise what the sufferings of our wounded after the battle of Ingogo
must have been. Those who survived were next day taken to the hospital
at Newcastle.

What Sir George Colley's real object was in exposing himself to the
attack has never transpired. It can hardly have been to clear the road,
as he says in his despatch, because the road was not held by the enemy,
but only visited occasionally by their patrols. The result of the
battle was to make the Boers, whose losses were trifling, more
confident than ever, and to greatly depress our soldiers. Sir George
had now lost between three and four hundred men out of his column of
little over a thousand, which was thereby entirely crippled. Of his
staff officers Major Essex now alone survived, his usual good fortune
having carried him safe through the battle of Ingogo. What makes his
repeated escapes the more remarkable is that he was generally to be
found in the heaviest firing. A man so fortunate as Major Essex ought
to be rewarded for his good fortune if for no other reason, though, if
reports are true, there would be no need to fall back on that to find
grounds on which to advance a soldier who has always borne himself so
well.

Another result of the Ingogo battle was that the Boers, knowing that we
had no force to cut them off, and always secure of a retreat into the
Free State, passed round Newcastle in Free State Territory, and
descended from fifteen hundred to two thousand strong into Natal for
the purpose of destroying the reinforcements which were now on their
way up under General Wood. This was on the 11th of February, and from
that date till the 18th the upper districts of Natal were in the hands
of the enemy, who cut the telegraph wires, looted waggons, stole herds
of cattle and horses, and otherwise amused themselves at the expense of
Her Majesty's subjects in Natal.

It was a very anxious time for those who knew what Boers are capable
of, and had women and children to protect, and who were never sure if
their houses would be left standing over their heads from one day to
another.

Every night we were obliged to place out Kafirs as scouts to give us
timely warning of the approach of marauding parties, and to sleep with
loaded rifles close to our hands, and sometimes, when things looked
very black, in our clothes, with horses ready saddled in the stable.
Nor were our fears groundless, for one day a patrol of some five
hundred Boers encamped on the next place, which by the way belonged to
a Dutchman, and stole all the stock on it, the property of an
Englishman. They also intercepted a train of waggons, destroyed the
contents, and burnt them. Numerous were the false alarms it was our
evil fortune to experience. For instance, one night I was sitting in
the drawing-room reading, about eleven o'clock, with a door leading on
to the verandah slightly ajar, for the night was warm, when suddenly I
heard myself called by name in a muffled voice, and asked if the place
was in the possession of the Boers. Looking towards the door I saw a
full-cocked revolver coming round the corner, and on opening it in some
alarm, I could indistinctly discern a line of armed figures in a
crouching attitude stretching along the verandah into the garden
beyond. It turned out to be a patrol of the mounted police, who had
received information that a large number of Boers had seized the place
and had come to ascertain the truth of the report. As we gathered from
them that the Boers were certainly near, we did not pass a very
comfortable night.

Meanwhile we were daily expecting to hear that the troops had been
attacked along the line of march, and knowing the nature of the country
and the many opportunities it affords for ambuscading and destroying
one of our straggling columns encumbered with innumerable waggons, we
had the worst fears for the result. At length a report reached us to
the effect that the reinforcements were expected on the morrow, and
that they were not going to cross the Ingagaan at the ordinary drift,
which was much commanded by hills, but at a lower drift on our own
place, about three miles from Newcastle, which is only slightly
commanded. We also heard that it was the intention of the Boers to
attack them at this point and to fall back on my house and the hills
behind. Accordingly, we thought it about time to retreat, and securing
a few valuables, such as plate, we made our way into the town, leaving
the house and its contents to take their chance. At Newcastle an attack
was daily expected, if for no other reason, to obtain possession of the
stores collected there.

The defences of the place were, however, in a wretched condition, no
proper outlook was kept, and there was an utter want of effective
organisation. The military element at the camp had enough to do to look
after itself, and did not concern itself with the safety of the town;
and the mounted police--a colonial force paid by the colony--had been
withdrawn from the little forts round Newcastle, as the General wanted
them for other purposes, and a message sent that the town must defend
its own forts. There were, it is true, a large number of able-bodied
men in the place who were willing to fight, but they had no
organisation. The very laager was not finished until the danger was
past.

Then there was a large party who were for surrendering the town to the
Boers, because if they fought it might afterwards injure their trade.
With this section of the population the feeling of patriotism was
strong, no doubt, but that of pocket was stronger. I am convinced that
the Boers would have found the capture of Newcastle an easy task, and I
confess that what I then saw did not inspire me with great hopes of the
safety of the colony when it gets responsible government, and has to
depend for protection on burgher forces. Colonial volunteer forces are,
I think, as good troops as any in the world; but an unorganised
colonial mob, pulled this way and that by different sentiments and
interests, is as useless as any other mob, with the difference that it
is more impatient of control.

For some unknown reason the Boer leaders providentially changed their
minds about attacking the reinforcements, and their men were withdrawn
to the Nek as swiftly and silently as they had been advanced, and on
the 17th February the reinforcements marched into Newcastle, to the
very great relief of the inhabitants, who had been equally anxious for
their own safety and that of the troops. Personally, I was never in my
life more pleased to see Her Majesty's uniform; and we were equally
rejoiced on returning home to find that nothing had been injured. After
this we had quiet for a while.

On the 21st February, we heard that two fresh regiments had been sent
up to the camp at Lang's Nek, and that General Wood had been ordered
down country by Sir George Colley to bring up more reinforcements. This
item of news caused much surprise, as nobody could understand why, now
that the road was clear, and that there was little chance of its being
again blocked, a General should be sent down to do work which could, to
all appearance, have been equally well done by the officers in command
of the reinforcing regiments, with the assistance of their transport
riders. It was, however, understood that an agreement had been entered
into between the two Generals that no offensive operations should be
undertaken till Wood returned.

With the exception of occasional scares, there was no further
excitement till Sunday the 27th February, when, whilst sitting on the
verandah after lunch, I thought I heard the sound of distant artillery.
Others present differed with me, thinking the sound was caused by
thunder, but as I adhered to my opinion, we determined to ride into
town and see. On arrival there we found the place full of rumours, from
which we gathered that some fresh disaster had occurred; and that
messages were pouring down the wires from Mount Prospect camp. We then
went on to camp, thinking that we should learn more there, but they
knew nothing about it, several officers asking us what new "shave" we
had got hold of. A considerable number of troops had been marched from
Newcastle that morning to go to Mount Prospect, but when it was
realised that something had occurred, they were stopped, and marched
back again. Bit by bit we managed to gather the truth. At first we
heard that our men had made a most gallant resistance on the hill,
mowing down the advancing enemy by hundreds, till at last, their
ammunition failing, they fought with their bayonets, using stones and
meat tins as missiles. I wish that our subsequent information had been
to the same effect.

It appears that on the evening of the 26th, Sir George Colley, after
mess, suddenly gave orders for a force of a little over six hundred
men, consisting of detachments from no less than three different
regiments, the 58th, 60th, 92d, and the Naval Brigade, to be got ready
for an expedition, without revealing his plans to anybody until late in
the afternoon; and then without more ado, marched them up to the top of
Majuba--a great square-topped mountain to the right of, and commanding
the Boer position at Lang's Nek. The troops reached the top about three
in the morning, after a somewhat exhausting climb, and were stationed
at different points of the plateau in a scientific way. Whilst the
darkness lasted, they could, by the glittering of the watch-fires,
trace from this point of vantage the position of the Boer laagers that
lay 2000 yards beneath them, whilst the dawn of day revealed every
detail of the defensive works, and showed the country lying at their
feet like a map.

On arrival at the top, it was represented to the General that a rough
entrenchment should be thrown up, but he would not allow it to be done
on account of the men being wearied with their marching up. This was a
fatal mistake. Behind an entrenchment, however slight, one would think
that 600 English soldiers might have defied the whole Boer army, and
much more the 200 or 300 men by whom they were hunted down at Majuba.
It appears that about 10.15 A.M., Colonel Stewart and Major Fraser
again went to General Colley "to arrange to start the sailors on an
entrenchment." ... "Finding the ground so exposed, the General did not
give orders to entrench."

As soon as the Boers found out that the hill was in the occupation of
the English, their first idea was to leave the Nek, and they began to
inspan with that object, but discovering that there were no guns
commanding them, they changed their mind, and set to work to storm the
hill instead. As far as I have been able to gather, the number of Boers
who took the mountain was about 300, or possibly 400; I do not think
there were more than that. The Boers themselves declare solemnly that
they were only 100 strong, but this I do not believe. They slowly
advanced up the hill till about 11.30, when the real attack began, the
Dutchmen coming on more rapidly and confidently, and shooting with
ever-increasing accuracy, as they found our fire quite ineffective.

About a quarter to one, our men retreated to the last ridge, and
General Colley was shot through the head. After this, the retreat
became a rout, and the soldiers rushed pell-mell down the precipitous
sides of the hill, the Boers knocking them over by the score as they
went, till they were out of range. A few were also, I heard, killed by
the shells from the guns that were advanced from the camp to cover the
retreat, but as this does not appear in the reports, perhaps it is not
true. Our loss was about 200 killed and wounded, including Sir George
Colley, Drs. Landon and Cornish, and Commander Romilly, who was shot
with an explosive bullet, and died after some days' suffering. When the
wounded Commander was being carried to a more sheltered spot, it was
with great difficulty that the Boers were prevented from massacring him
as he lay, they being under the impression that he was Sir Garnet
Wolseley. As was the case at Ingogo, the wounded were left on the
battlefield all night in very inclement weather, to which some of them
succumbed. It is worthy of note that after the fight was over they were
treated with considerable kindness by the Boers.

Not being a soldier, of course, I cannot venture to give any military
reasons as to how it was that what was after all a considerable force
was so easily driven from a position of great natural strength; but I
think I may, without presumption, state my opinion as to the real
cause, which was the villainous shooting of the British soldier. Though
the troops did not, as was said at the time, run short of ammunition,
it is clear that they fired away a great many rounds at men who, in
storming the hill, must necessarily have exposed themselves more or
less, of whom they managed to hit--certainly not more than six or
seven--which was the outside of the Boer casualties. From this it is
clear that they can neither judge distance nor hit a moving object, nor
did they probably know that when shooting down hill it is necessary to
aim low. Such shooting as the English soldier is capable of may be very
well when he has an army to aim at, but it is useless in guerilla
warfare against a foe skilled in the use of the rifle and the art of
taking shelter.

A couple of months after the storming of Majuba, I, together with a
friend, had a conversation with a Boer, a volunteer from the Free State
in the late war, and one of the detachment that stormed Majuba, who
gave us a circumstantial account of the attack with the greatest
willingness. He said that when it was discovered that the English had
possession of the mountain, they thought that the game was up, but
after a while bolder counsels prevailed, and volunteers were called for
to storm the hill. Only seventy men could be found to perform the duty,
of whom he was one. They started up the mountain in fear and trembling,
but soon found that every shot passed over their heads, and went on
with greater boldness. Only three men, he declared, were hit on the
Boer side; one was killed, one was hit in the arm, and he himself was
the third, getting his face grazed by a bullet, of which he showed us
the scar. He stated that the first to reach the top ridge was a boy of
twelve, and that as soon as the troops saw them they fled, when, he
said, he paid them out for having nearly killed him, knocking them over
one after another "like bucks" as they ran down the hill, adding that
it was "alter lecker" (very nice). He asked us how many men we had lost
during the war, and when we told him about seven hundred killed and
wounded, laughed in our faces, saying he knew that our dead amounted to
several thousands. On our assuring him that this was not the case, he
replied, "Well, don't let's talk of it any more, because we are good
friends now, and if we go on you will lie, and I shall lie, and then we
shall get angry. The war is over now, and I don't want to quarrel with
the English; if one of them takes off his hat to me I always
acknowledge it." He did not mean any harm in talking thus; it is what
Englishmen have to put up with now in South Africa; the Boers have
beaten us, and act accordingly.

This man also told us that the majority of the rifles they picked up
were sighted for 400 yards, whereas the latter part of the fighting had
been carried on within 200.

Sir George Colley's death was much lamented in the colony, where he was
deservedly popular; indeed, anybody who had the honour of knowing that
kind-hearted English gentleman, could not do otherwise than deeply
regret his untimely end. What his motive was in occupying Majuba in the
way he did has never, so far as I am aware, transpired. The move, in
itself, would have been an excellent one, had it been made in force, or
accompanied by a direct attack on the Nek, but, as undertaken, seems to
have been objectless. There were, of course, many rumours as to the
motives that prompted his action, of which the most probable seems to
be that, being aware of what the Home Government intended to do with
reference to the Transvaal, he determined to strike a blow to try and
establish British supremacy first, knowing how mischievous any apparent
surrender would be. Whatever his faults may have been as a General, he
was a brave man, and had the honour of his country much at heart.

It was also said by soldiers who saw him the night the troops marched
up Majuba, that the General was "not himself," and it was hinted that
continual anxiety and the chagrin of failure had told upon his mind. As
against this, however, must be set the fact that his telegrams to the
Secretary of State for War, the last of which he must have despatched
only about half an hour before he was shot, are cool and collected, and
written in the same unconcerned tone--as though he were a critical
spectator of an interesting scene--that characterises all his
communications, more especially his despatches. They at any rate give
no evidence of shaken nerve or unduly excited brain, nor can I see that
any action of his with reference to the occupation of Majuba is out of
keeping with the details of his generalship upon other occasions. He
was always confident to rashness, and possessed by the idea that every
man in the ranks was full of as high a spirit, and as brave as he was
himself. Indeed, most people will think, that so far from its being a
rasher action, the occupation of Majuba, bad generalship as it seems,
was a wiser move than either the attack on the Nek or the Ingogo
fiasco.

But at the best, all his movements are difficult to be understood by a
civilian, though they may, for ought we know, have been part of an
elaborate plan, perfected in accordance with the rules of military
science, of which, it is said, he was a great student.




CHAPTER VI.

THE RETROCESSION OF THE TRANSVAAL.


When Parliament met in January 1881, the Government announced, through
the mediumship of the Queen's Speech, that it was their intention to
vindicate Her Majesty's authority in the Transvaal. I have already
briefly described the somewhat unfortunate attempts to gain this end by
force of arms; and I now propose to follow the course of the diplomatic
negotiations entered into by the ministry with the same object.

As soon as the hostilities in the Transvaal took a positive form,
causing great dismay among the Home authorities, whose paths, as we all
know, are the paths of peace--at any price; and whilst, in the first
confusion of calamity, they knew not where to turn, President Brand
stepped upon the scene in the character of "Our Mutual Friend," and, by
the Government at any rate, was rapturously welcomed.

This gentleman has for many years been at the head of the Government of
the Orange Free State, whose fortunes he had directed with considerable
ability. He is a man of natural talent and kind-hearted disposition,
and has the advancement of the Boer cause in South Africa much at
heart. The rising in the Transvaal was an event that gave him a great
and threefold opportunity: first, of interfering with the genuinely
benevolent object of checking bloodshed; secondly, of advancing the
Dutch cause throughout South Africa under the cloak of amiable
neutrality, and striking a dangerous blow at British supremacy over the
Dutch and British prestige with the natives; and, thirdly, of putting
the English Government under a lasting obligation to him. Of this
opportunity he has availed himself to the utmost in each particular.

So soon as things began to look serious, Mr. Brand put himself into
active telegraphic communication with the various British authorities
with the view of preventing bloodshed by inducing the English
Government to accede to the Boer demands. He was also earnest in his
declarations that the Free State was not supporting the Transvaal;
which, considering that it was practically the insurgent base of
supplies, where they had retired their women, children, and cattle, and
that it furnished them with a large number of volunteers, was perhaps
straining the truth.

About this time also we find Lord Kimberley telegraphing to Mr. Brand
that "if _only_ the Transvaal Boers will desist from armed opposition
to the Queen's authority," he thinks some arrangement might be made.
This is the first indication made public of what was passing in the
minds of Her Majesty's Government, on whom its Radical supporters were
now beginning to put the screw, to induce or threaten them into
submitting to the Boer demands.

Again, on the 11th January, the President telegraphed to Lord Kimberley
through the Orange Free State Consul in London, suggesting that Sir H.
de Villiers, the Chief Justice at the Cape, should be appointed a
Commissioner to go to the Transvaal to settle matters. Oddly enough,
about the same time the same proposition emanated from the Dutch party
in the Cape Colony, headed by Mr. Hofmeyer, a coincidence that inclines
one to the opinion that these friends of the Boers had some further
reason for thus urging Sir Henry de Villiers' appointment as
Commissioner beyond his apparent fitness for the post, of which his
high reputation as a lawyer and in his private capacity was a
sufficient guarantee.

The explanation is not hard to find, the fact being that, rightly or
wrongly, Sir Henry de Villiers, who is himself of Dutch descent, is
noted throughout South Africa for his sympathies with the Boer cause,
and both President Brand and the Dutch party in the Cape shrewdly
suspected that, if the settling of differences were left to his
discretion, the Boers and their interests would receive very gentle
handling. The course of action adopted by him, when he became a member
of the Royal Commission, went far to support this view, for it will be
noticed in the Report of the Commissioners that in every single point
he appears to have taken the Boer side of the contention. Indeed so
blind was he to their faults, that he would not even admit that the
horrible Potchefstroom murders and atrocities, which are condemned both
by Sir H. Robinson and Sir Evelyn Wood in language as strong as the
formal terms of a report will allow, were acts contrary to the rules of
civilised warfare. If those acts had been perpetrated by Englishmen on
Boers, or even on natives, I venture to think Sir Henry de Villiers
would have looked at them in a very different light.

In the same telegram in which President Brand recommends the
appointment of Sir Henry de Villiers, he states that the allegations
made by the Triumvirate in the proclamation in which they accused Sir
Owen Lanyon of committing various atrocities, deserve to be
investigated, as they maintain that the collision was commenced by the
authorities. Nobody knew better than Mr. Brand that any English
official would be quite incapable of the conduct ascribed to Sir Owen
Lanyon, whilst, even if the collision had been commenced by the
authorities, which as it happened it was not, they would under the
circumstances have been amply justified in so commencing it. This
remark by President Brand in his telegram was merely an attempt to
throw an air of probability over a series of slanderous falsehoods.

Messages of this nature continued to pour along the wires from day to
day, but the tone of those from the Colonial Office grew gradually
humbler. Thus we find Lord Kimberley telegraphing on the 8th February,
that if the Boers would desist from armed opposition all reasonable
guarantees would be given as to their treatment after submission, and
that a scheme would be framed for the "permanent friendly settlement of
difficulties." It will be seen that the Government had already begun to
water the meaning of their declaration that they would vindicate Her
Majesty's authority. No doubt Mr. Chamberlain, Mr. Courtney, and their
followers had given another turn to the Radical screw.

It is, however, clear that at this time no idea of the real aims of the
Government had entered into the mind of Sir George Colley, since on the
7th February he telegraphed home a plan which he proposed to adopt on
entering the Transvaal, which included a suggestion that he should
grant a complete amnesty only to those Boers who would sign a
declaration of loyalty.

In answer to this he was ordered to do nothing of the sort, but to
promise protection to everybody and refer everything home.

Then came the battle of Ingogo, which checked for the time the flow of
telegrams, or rather varied their nature, for those despatched during
the next few days deal with the question of reinforcements. On the 13th
February, however, negotiations were reopened by Paul Kruger, one of
the Triumvirate, who offered, if all the troops were ordered to
withdraw from the Transvaal, to give them a free passage through the
Nek, to disperse the Boers, and to consent to the appointment of a
Commission.

The offer was jumped at by Lord Kimberley, who, without making
reference to the question of withdrawing the soldiers, offered, if only
the Boers would disperse, to appoint a Commission with extensive powers
to develop the "permanent friendly settlement" scheme. The telegram
ends thus: "Add, that if this proposal is accepted, you now are
authorised to agree to suspension of hostilities on our part." This
message was sent to General Wood, because the Boers had stopped the
communications with Colley. On the 19th, Sir George Colley replies in
these words, which show his astonishment at the policy adopted by the
Home Government, and which, in the opinion of most people, redound to
his credit--

"Latter part of your telegram to Wood not understood. There can be no
hostilities if no resistance is made, but am I to leave Lang's Nek in
Natal territory in Boer occupation, and our garrisons isolated and
short of provisions, or occupy former and relieve latter?" Lord
Kimberley hastens to reply that the garrisons must be left free to
provision themselves, "but we do not mean that you should march to the
relief of garrisons or occupy Lang's Nek if an arrangement proceeds."

It will be seen that the definition of what vindication of Her
Majesty's authority consisted grew broader and broader; it now included
the right of the Boers to continue to occupy their positions in the
colony of Natal.

Meanwhile the daily fire of complimentary messages was being kept up
between President Brand and Lord Kimberley, who alternately gave
"sincere thanks to Lord Kimberley" and "fully appreciated the friendly
spirit" of President Brand, till on the 21st February the latter
telegraphs through Colley: "Hope of amicable settlement by negotiation,
but this will be greatly facilitated if somebody on spot and friendly
disposed to both could by personal communication with both endeavour to
smooth difficulties. Offers his services to Her Majesty's Government,
and Kruger and Pretorius and Joubert are willing." Needless to say his
services were accepted.

Presently, however, on 27th February, Sir George Colley made his last
move, and took possession of Majuba. His defeat and death had the
effect of causing another temporary check in the peace negotiations,
whilst Sir Frederick Roberts with ample reinforcements was despatched
to Natal. It had the further effect of increasing the haughtiness of
the Boer leaders, and infusing a corresponding spirit of pliability or
generosity into the negotiations of Her Majesty's Government.

Thus on 2d March, the Boers, through President Brand and Sir Evelyn
Wood, inform the Secretary of State for the Colonies that they are
willing to negotiate, but decline to submit on cease opposition. Sir
Evelyn Wood, who evidently did not at all like the line of policy
adopted by the Government, telegraphed that he thought the best thing
to do would be for him to engage the Boers, and disperse them _vi et
armis_, without any guarantees, "considering the disasters we have
sustained," and that he should, "if absolutely necessary," be empowered
to promise life and property to the leaders, but that they should be
banished from the country. In answer to this telegram, Lord Kimberley
informs him that Her Majesty's Government will amnesty _everybody_
except those who have committed acts contrary to the rules of civilised
warfare, and that they will agree to anything, and appoint a Commission
to carry out the details, and "be ready for friendly communications
with _any persons_ appointed by the Boers."

Thus was Her Majesty's authority finally re-established in the
Transvaal.

It was not a very grand climax, nor the kind of arrangement to which
Englishmen are accustomed, but perhaps, considering the circumstances,
and the well-known predilections of those who made the settlement, it
was as much as could be expected.

The action of the Government must not be considered as though they were
unfettered in their judgment; it can never be supposed that they acted
as they did because they thought such action right or even wise, for
that would be to set them down as men of a very low order of
intelligence, which they certainly are not.

It is clear that no set of sensible men, who had after much
consideration given their decision that under all the circumstances the
Transvaal must remain British territory, and who, on a revolt
subsequently breaking out in that territory, had declared that Her
Majesty's rule must be upheld, would have, putting aside all other
circumstances, deliberately stultified themselves by almost
unconditionally, and of their own free will, abandoning the country,
and all Her Majesty's subjects living in it. That would be to pay a
poor tribute to their understanding, since it is clear that if reasons
existed for retaining the Transvaal before the war, as they were
satisfied there did, those reasons would exist with still greater force
after a war had been undertaken and three crushing defeats sustained,
which if left unavenged must, as they knew, have a most disastrous
effect on our prestige throughout the South African continent.

I prefer to believe that the Government was coerced into acting as it
did by Radical pressure, both from outside and from its immediate
supporters in the House, and that it had to choose between making an
unconditional surrender in the Transvaal and losing the support of a
very powerful party. Under these circumstances it, being Liberal in
politics, naturally followed its instincts, and chose surrender.

If such a policy was bad in itself, and necessarily mischievous in its
consequences, so much the worse for those who suffered by it; it was
clear that the Government could not be expected to lose votes in order
to forward the true interests of countries so far off as the South
African Colonies, which had had the misfortune to be made a party
question of, and must take the consequences.

There is no doubt that the interest brought to bear on the Government
was very considerable, for not only had they to deal with their own
supporters, and with the shadowy caucus that was ready to let the lash
of its displeasure descend even on the august person of Mr. Gladstone,
should he show signs of letting slip so rich an opportunity for the
vindication of the holiest principles of advanced Radicalism, but also
with the hydra-headed crowd of visionaries and professional
sentimentalists who swarm in this country, and who are always ready to
take up any cause, from that of Jumbo or of a murderer to that of
oppressed peoples, such as the Bulgarians or the Transvaal Boers.

These gentlemen, burning with zeal, and filled with that confidence
which proverbially results from the hasty assimilation of imperfect and
erroneous information, found in the Transvaal question a great
opportunity of making a noise; and--as in a disturbed farmyard the bray
of the domestic donkey, ringing loud and clear among the utterances of
more intelligent animals, overwhelms and extinguishes them--so, and
with like effect, amongst the confused sound of various English
opinions about the Boer rising, rose the trumpet-note of the Transvaal
Independence Committee and its supporters.

As we have seen, they did not sound in vain.

On the 6th of March an armistice with the Boers had been entered into
by Sir Evelyn Wood, which was several times prolonged up to the 21st
March, when Sir Evelyn Wood concluded a preliminary peace with the Boer
leaders, which, under certain conditions, guaranteed the restoration of
the country within six months, and left all other points to be decided
by a Royal Commission.

The news of this peace was at first received in the colony in the
silence of astonishment. Personally, I remember, I would not believe
that it was true. It seemed to us, who had been witnesses of what had
passed, and knew what it all meant, something so utterly incredible
that we thought there must be a mistake.

If there had been any one redeeming circumstance about it, if the
English arms had gained a single decisive victory, it might have been
so, but it was hard for Englishmen, just at first, to understand that
not only had the Transvaal been to all appearance wrested from them by
force of arms, but that they were henceforth to be subject, as they
well knew would be the case, to the coarse insults of victorious Boers,
and the sarcasms of keener-witted Kafirs.

People in England seem to fancy that when men go to the colonies they
lose all sense of pride in their country, and think of nothing but
their own advantage. I do not think that this is the case, indeed, I
believe that, individual for individual, there exists a greater sense
of loyalty, and a deeper pride in their nationality, and in the proud
name of England, among colonists, than among Englishmen proper.
Certainly the humiliation of the Transvaal surrender was more keenly
felt in South Africa than it was at home; but, perhaps, the
impossibility of imposing upon people in that country with the farrago
of nonsense about blood-guiltiness and national morality, which was
made such adroit use of at home, may have made the difference.

I know that personally I would not have believed it possible that I
could feel any public event so keenly as I did this; indeed, I quickly
made up my mind that if the peace was confirmed, the neighbourhood of
the Transvaal would be no fit or comfortable residence for an
Englishman, and that I would, at any cost, leave the country,--which I
accordingly did.

Newcastle was a curious sight the night after the peace was declared.
Every hotel and bar was crowded with refugees, who were trying to
relieve their feelings by cursing the name of Gladstone with a vigour,
originality, and earnestness that I have never heard equalled; and
declaring in ironical terms how proud they were to be citizens of
England--a country that always kept its word. Then they set to work
with many demonstrations of contempt to burn the effigy of the Bight
Honourable Gentleman at the head of Her Majesty's Government, an
example, by the way, that was followed throughout South Africa.

Even Sir Evelyn Wood, who is very popular in the colony, was hissed as
he walked through the town, and great surprise was expressed that a
soldier who came out expressly to fight the Boers should consent to
become the medium of communication in such a dirty business. And,
indeed, there was some excuse for all this bitterness, for the news
meant ruin to very many.

But if people in Natal and at the Cape received the news with
astonishment, how shall I describe its effect upon the unfortunate
loyal inhabitants in the Transvaal, on whom it burst like a
thunderbolt?

They did not say much, however, and indeed there was nothing to be
said. They simply began to pack up such things as they could carry with
them, and to leave the country, which they well knew would henceforth
be utterly untenable for Englishmen or English sympathisers. In a few
weeks they come pouring down through Newcastle by hundreds; it was the
most melancholy exodus that can be imagined. There were people of all
classes, officials, gentlefolk, work-people, and loyal Boers, but they
had a connecting link; they had all been loyal, and they were all
ruined.

Most of these people had gone to the Transvaal since it became a
British colony, and invested all they had in it, and now their capital
was lost and their labour rendered abortive; indeed, many of them whom
one had known as well to do in the Transvaal, came down to Natal hardly
knowing how they would feed their families next week.

It must be understood that so soon as the Queen's sovereignty was
withdrawn the value of landed and house property in the Transvaal went
down to nothing, and has remained there ever since. Thus a fair-sized
house in Pretoria brought in a rental varying from ten to twenty pounds
a month during British occupation, but after the declaration of peace,
owners of houses were glad to get people to live in them to keep them
from falling into ruin. Those who owned land or had invested money in
businesses suffered in the same way; their property remains neither
profitable or saleable, and they themselves are precluded by their
nationality from living on it, the art of "Boycotting" not being
peculiar to Ireland.

Nor were they the only sufferers. The officials, many of whom had taken
to the Government service as a permanent profession, in which they
expected to pass their lives, were suddenly dismissed, mostly with a
small gratuity, which would about suffice to pay their debts, and told
to find their living as best they could. It was indeed a case of _vae
victis_,--woe to the conquered loyalists.[12]

          [12] The following extract is clipped from a recent issue
          of the _Transvaal Advertiser_. It describes the present
          condition of Pretoria:--

          "The streets grown over with rank vegetation; the
          water-furrows uncleaned and unattended, emitting offensive
          and unhealthy stenches; the houses showing evident signs of
          dilapidation and decay; the side paths, in many places,
          dangerous to pedestrians--in fact, everything the eye can
          rest upon indicates the downfall which has overtaken this
          once prosperous city. The visitor can, if he be so minded,
          betake himself to the outskirts and suburbs, where he will
          perceive the same sad evidences of neglect, public grounds
          unattended, roads uncared for, mills and other public works
          crumbling into ruin. These palpable signs of decay most
          strongly impress him. A blight seems to have come over this
          lately fair and prosperous town. Rapidly it is becoming a
          'deserted village,' a 'city of the dead.'"

The Commission appointed by Her Majesty's Government consisted of Sir
Hercules Robinson, Sir Henry de Villiers, and Sir Evelyn Wood,
President Brand being also present in his capacity of friend of both
parties, and to their discretion were left the settlement of all
outstanding questions. Amongst these, were the mode of trial of those
persons who had been guilty of acts contrary to the rules of civilised
warfare, the question of severance of territory from the Transvaal on
the eastern boundary, the settlement of the boundary in the Keate-Award
districts, the compensation for losses sustained during the war, the
functions of the British Resident, and other matters. Their place of
meeting was at Newcastle in Natal, and from thence they proceeded to
Pretoria.

The first question of importance that came before the Commission was
the mode of trial to be adopted in the cases of those persons accused
of acts contrary to the usages of civilised warfare, such as murder.
The Attorney-General for the Transvaal strongly advised that a special
tribunal should be constituted to try these cases, principally because
"after a civil war in which all the inhabitants of a country, with very
few exceptions, have taken part, a jury of fair and impartial men,
truly unbiassed, will be very difficult to get together." It is
satisfactory to know that the Commissioners gave this somewhat obvious
fact "their grave consideration," which, according to their Report,
resulted in their determining to let the cases go before the ordinary
court, and be tried by a jury, because in referring them to a specially
constituted court which would have done equal justice without fear or
favour, "the British Government would have made for itself, among the
Dutch population of South Africa, a name for vindictive oppression,
which no generosity in other affairs could efface."

There is more in this determination of the Commissioners, or rather of
the majority of them--for Sir E. Wood, to his credit be it said,
refused to agree in their decision--than meets the eye, the fact of the
matter being that it was privately well known to them, that though the
Boer leaders might be willing to allow a few of the murderers to
undergo the form of a trial, neither they nor the Boers themselves
meant to permit the farce to go any further. Had the men been tried by
a special tribunal they would in all probability have been condemned to
death, and then would have come the awkward question of carrying out
the sentence on individuals whose deeds were looked on, if not with
general approval, at any rate without aversion by the great mass of
their countrymen. In short, it would probably have become necessary
either to reprieve them or to fight the Boers again, since it was very
certain that they would not have allowed them to be hung. Therefore the
majority of the Commissioners, finding themselves face to face with a
dead wall, determined to slip round it instead of boldly climbing it,
by referring the cases to the Transvaal High Court, cheerfully
confident of what the result must be.

After all, the matter was, much cry about little wool, for of all the
crimes committed by the Boers--a list of some of which will be found in
the Appendix to this book--in only three cases were a proportion of the
perpetrators produced and put through the form of trial. Those three
were--the dastardly murder of Captain Elliot, who was shot by his Boer
escort whilst crossing the Vaal river on parole; the murder of a man
named Malcolm, who was kicked to death in his own house by Boers, who
afterwards put a bullet through his head to make the job "look better;"
and the murder of a doctor named Barber, who was shot by his escort on
the border of the Free State. A few of the men concerned in the first
two of these crimes were tried in Pretoria; and it was currently
reported at that time, that in order to make their acquittal certain
our Attorney-General received instructions not to exercise his right of
challenging jurors on behalf of the Crown. Whether or not this is true
I am not prepared to say, but I believe it is a fact that he did not
exercise that right, though the counsel for the prisoners availed
themselves of it freely, with the result that in Elliot's case, the
jury was composed of eight Boers and one German, nine being the full
South African jury. The necessary result followed; in both cases the
prisoners were acquitted in the teeth of the evidence. Barber's
murderers were tried in the Free State, and were, as might be expected,
acquitted.

Thus it will be seen that of all the perpetrators of murder and other
crimes during the course of the war not one was brought to justice.

The offence for which their victims died was, in nearly every case,
that they had served, were serving, or were loyal to Her Majesty the
Queen. In no single case has England exacted retribution for the murder
of her servants and citizens; but nobody can read through the long list
of these dastardly slaughters without feeling that they will not go
unavenged. The innocent blood that has been shed on behalf of this
country, and the tears of children and widows, now appeal to a higher
tribunal than that of Mr. Gladstone's Government, and assuredly they
will not appeal in vain.

The next point of importance dealt with by the Commission was the
question whether or no any territory should be severed from the
Transvaal, and kept under English rule for the benefit of the native
inhabitants. Lord Kimberley, acting under pressure put upon him by
members of the Aborigines Protection Society, instructed the Commission
to consider the advisability of severing the districts of Lydenburg and
Zoutpansberg, and also a strip of territory bordering on Zululand and
Swaziland, from the Transvaal, so as to place the inhabitants of the
first two districts out of danger of maltreatment by the Boers, and to
interpose a buffer between Zulus, and Swazis, and Boer aggression, and
_vice versâ_.

The Boer leaders had, it must be remembered, acquiesced in the
principle of such a separation in the preliminary peace signed by Sir
Evelyn Wood and themselves. The majority of the Commission, however
(Sir Evelyn Wood dissenting), finally decided against the retention of
either of these districts, a decision which, I think, was a wise one,
though I arrive at that conclusion on very different grounds to those
adopted by the majority of the Commission.

Personally, I cannot see that it is the duty of England to play
policeman to the whole world. To have retained these native districts
would have been to make ourselves responsible for their good
government, and to have guaranteed them against Boer encroachment,
which I do not think that we were called upon to do. It is surely not
incumbent upon us, having given up the Transvaal to the Boers, to
undertake the management of the most troublesome part of it, the Zulu
border. Besides, bad as the abandonment of the Transvaal is, I think
that if it was to be done at all, it was best to do it thoroughly,
since to have kept some natives under our protection, and to have
handed over the rest to the tender mercies of the Boers, would only be
to render our injustice more obvious, whilst weakening the power of the
natives themselves to combine in self-defence, since those under our
protection would naturally have little sympathy with their more
unfortunate brethren--their interests and circumstances being
different.

The Commission do not seem to have considered the question from these
points of view; but putting them on one side, there are many other
considerations connected with it which are ably summed up in their
Report. Amongst these is the danger of disturbances commenced between
Zulus or Swazis and Boers spreading into Natal, and the probability of
the fomenting of disturbances amongst the Zulus by Boers. The great
argument for the retention of some territory, if only as a symbol that
the English had not been driven out of the country, is, however, set
forth in the forty-sixth paragraph of the Report, which runs as
follows:--"The moral considerations that determine the actions of
civilised governments are not easily understood by barbarians, in whose
eyes successful force is alone the sign of superiority, and it appeared
possible that the surrender by the British Crown of one of its
possessions to those who had been in arms against it, might be looked
upon by the natives in no other way than as a token of the defeat and
decay of the British power, and that thus a serious shock might be
given to British authority in South Africa, and the capacity of Great
Britain to govern and direct the vast native population within and
without her South African dominions--a capacity resting largely on the
renown of her name--might be dangerously impaired."

These words, coming from so unexpected a source, do not, though couched
in such mild language, hide the startling importance of the question
discussed. On the contrary, they accurately and with double weight
convey the sense and gist of the most damning argument against the
policy of the retrocession of the Transvaal in its entirety; and
proceeding from their own carefully chosen Commissioners, can hardly
have been pleasant reading to Lord Kimberley and his colleagues.

The majority of the Commission then proceeds to set forth the arguments
advanced by the Boers against the retention of any territory, which
appear to have been chiefly of a sentimental character, since we are
informed that "the people, it seemed certain, would not have valued the
restoration of a mutilated country. Sentiment in a great measure had
led them to insurrection, and the force of such it was impossible to
disregard." Sir Evelyn Wood, in his dissent, states that he cannot even
agree with the premises of his colleagues' argument, since he is
convinced that it was not sentiment that had led to the outbreak, but a
"general and rooted aversion to taxation." If he had added, and a
hatred not only of English rule, but of all rule, he would have stated
the complete cause of the Transvaal rebellion. In the next paragraph of
the Report, however, we find the real cause of the pliability of the
Commission in the matter, which is the same that influenced them in
their decision about the mode of trial of the murderers and other
questions--they feared that the people would appeal to arms if they
decided against their wishes.

Discreditable and disgraceful as it may seem, nobody can read this
Report without plainly seeing that the Commissioners were, in treating
with the Boers on these points, in the position of ambassadors from a
beaten people getting the best terms they could. Of course, they well
knew that this was not the case but whatever the Boer leaders may have
said, the Boers themselves did not know this, or even pretend to look
at the matter in any other light. When we asked for the country back,
said they, we did not get it; after we had three times defeated the
English we did get it; the logical conclusion from the facts being that
we got it because we defeated the English. This was their tone, and it
is not therefore surprising that whenever the Commission threatened to
decide anything against them, they, with a smile, let it know that if
it did, they would be under the painful necessity of re-occupying
Lang's Nek. It was never necessary to repeat the threat, since the
majority of the Commission would thereupon speedily find a way to meet
the views of the Boer representatives.

Sir Evelyn Wood, in his dissent, thus correctly sums up the
matter:--"To contend that the Royal Commission ought not to decide
contrary to the wishes of the Boers, because such decision might not be
accepted, is to deny to the Commission the very power of decision that
it was agreed should be left in its hands." Exactly so. But it is
evident that the Commission knew its place, and so far from attempting
to exercise any "power of decision," it was quite content with such
concessions as it could obtain by means of bargaining. Thus, as an
additional reason against the retention of any territory, it is urged
that if this territory was retained "the majority of your Commissioners
... would have found themselves in no favourable position for obtaining
the concurrence of the Boer leaders as to other matters." In fact, Her
Majesty's Commission, appointed, or supposed to be appointed, to do Her
Majesty's will and pleasure, shook in its shoes before men who had
lately been rebels in arms against her authority, and humbly submitted
itself to their dicta.

The majority of the Commission went on to express their opinion, that
by giving way about the retention of territory they would be able to
obtain better terms for the natives generally, and larger powers for
the British Resident. But, as Sir Evelyn Wood points out in his Report,
they did nothing of the sort, the terms of the agreement about the
Resident and other native matters being all consequent on and included
in the first agreement of peace. Besides, they seem to have overlooked
the fact that such concessions as they did obtain are only on paper,
and practically worthless, whilst all _bonâ fide_ advantages remained
with the Boers.

The decision of the Commissioners in the question of the Keate Award,
which next came under their consideration, appears to have been a
judicious one, being founded on the very careful Report of Colonel
Moysey, R.E., who had been for many months collecting information on
the spot. The Keate Award Territory is a region lying to the south-west
of the Transvaal, and was, like many other districts in that country,
originally in the possession of natives of the Baralong and Batlapin
tribes. Individual Boers having, however, _more suo_ taken possession
of tracts of land in the district, difficulties speedily arose between
their Government and the native chiefs, and in 1871 Mr. Keate,
Lieutenant-Governor of Natal, was by mutual consent called in to
arbitrate on the matter. His decision was entirely in favour of the
natives, and was accordingly promptly and characteristically repudiated
by the Boer Volksraad. From that time till the rebellion the question
remained unsettled, and was indeed a very thorny one to deal with. The
Commission, acting on the principle _in medio tutissimus ibis_, drew a
line through the midst of the disputed territory, or, in other words,
set aside Mr. Keate's award, and interpreted the dispute in favour of
the Boers.

This decision was accepted by all parties at the time, but it has not
resulted in the maintenance of peace. The principal chief, Montsioa, is
an old ally and staunch friend of the English, a fact which the Boers
are not able to forget or forgive, and they appear to have stirred up
rival chiefs to attack him, and to have allowed volunteers from the
Transvaal to assist them. Montsioa has also enlisted some white
volunteers, and several fights have taken place, in which the loss of
life has been considerable. Whether or no the Transvaal Government is
directly concerned it is impossible to say, but from the fact that
cannon are said to have been used against Montsioa it would appear that
it is, since private individuals do not, as a rule, own Armstrong
guns.[13]

          [13] I beg to refer any reader interested in this matter to
          the letter of "Transvaal" to the _Standard_, which I have
          republished in the Appendix to this book.

Amongst the questions remaining for the consideration of the
Commissioners was that of what compensation should be given for losses
during the war. Of course, the great bulk of the losses sustained were
of an indirect nature, resulting from the necessary and enormous
depreciation in the value of land and other property, consequent on the
retrocession. Into this matter the Home Government declined to enter,
thereby saving its pocket at the price of its honour, since it was upon
English guarantees that the country would remain a British possession
that the majority of the unfortunate loyals invested their money in it.
It was, however, agreed by the Commission (Sir H. de Villiers
dissenting) that the Boers should be liable for compensation in cases
where loss had been sustained through commandeering seizure,
confiscation, destruction, or damage of property. The sums awarded
under these heads have already amounted to about £110,000, which sum
has been defrayed by the Imperial Government, the Boer authorities
stating that they were not in a position to pay it.

In connection with this matter I will pass to the financial clauses of
the Report. When the country was annexed, the public debt amounted to
£301,727. Under British rule this debt was liquidated to the extent of
£150,000, but the total was brought up by a Parliamentary grant, a loan
from the Standard Bank, and sundries to £390,404, which represented the
public debt of the Transvaal on the 31st December 1880. This was
further increased by moneys advanced by the Standard Bank and English
Exchequer during the war, and till the 8th August 1881, during which
time the country yielded no revenue, to £457,393. To this must be added
an estimated sum of £200,000 for compensation charges, pension
allowances, &c., and a further sum of £383,000, the cost of the
successful expedition against Secocoeni, that of the unsuccessful one
being left out of account, bringing up the total public debt to over a
million, of which about £800,000 is owing to this country.

This sum, with the characteristic liberality that distinguished them in
their dealings with the Boers, but which was not so marked where loyals
were concerned, the Commissioners (Sir Evelyn Wood dissenting) reduced
by a stroke of the pen to £265,000, thus entirely remitting an
approximate sum of £500,000, or £600,000. To the sum of £265,000 still
owing must be added say another £150,000 for sums lately advanced to
pay the compensation claims, bringing up the actual amount now owing to
England to something under half a million, of which I say with
confidence she will never see a single £10,000. As this contingency was
not contemplated, or if contemplated, not alluded to by the Royal
Commission, provision was made for a Sinking Fund, by means of which
the debt, which is a second charge on the revenues of the States, is to
be extinguished in twenty-five years.

It is a strange instance of the proverbial irony of fate, that whilst
the representatives of the Imperial Government were thus showering
gifts of hundreds of thousands of pounds upon men who had spurned the
benefits of Her Majesty's rule, made war upon her forces, and murdered
her subjects, no such consideration was extended to those who had
remained loyal to her throne. Their claims for compensation were passed
by unheeded; and looking from the windows of the room in which they sat
in Newcastle, the members of the Commission might have seen them
flocking down from a country that could no longer be their home; those
that were rich among them made poor, and those that were poor reduced
to destitution.

The only other point which it will be necessary for me to touch on in
connection with this Report is the duties of the British Resident and
his relations to the natives. He was to be invested as representative
of the Suzerain with functions for securing the execution of the terms
of peace as regards--(1) the control of the foreign relations of the
State; (2) the control of the frontier affairs of the State; and (3)
the protection of the interests of the natives in the State.

As regards the first of these points, it was arranged that the
interests of subjects of the Transvaal should be left in the hands of
Her Majesty's representatives abroad. Since Boers are, of all people in
the world, the most stay-at-home, our ambassadors and consuls are not
likely to be troubled much on their account. With reference to the
second point, the Commission made stipulations that would be admirable
if there were any probability of their being acted up to. The Resident
is to report any encroachment on native territory by Boers to the High
Commissioner, and when the Resident and the Boer Government differ, the
decision of the Suzerain is to be final. This is a charming way of
settling difficulties, but the Commission forgets to specify how the
Suzerain's decision is to be enforced. After what has happened, it can
hardly have relied on awe of the name of England to bring about the
desired obedience!

But besides thus using his beneficent authority to prevent subjects of
the Transvaal from trespassing on their neighbour's land, the Resident
is to exercise a general supervision over the interests of all the
natives in the country. Considering that they number about a million,
and are scattered over a territory larger than France, one would think
that this duty alone would have taken up the time of any ordinary man;
and, indeed, Sir Evelyn Wood was in favour of the appointment of
sub-residents to assist him. The majority of the Commission refused,
however, to listen to any such suggestion--believing, they said, "that
the least possible interference with the independent Government of the
State would be the wisest." Quite so, but I suppose it never occurred
to them to ask the natives what their views of the matter were! The
Resident was also to be a member of a Native Location Commission, which
was at some future time to provide land for the natives to live on.

In perusing this Report it is easy to follow with more or less accuracy
the individual bent of its framers. Sir Hercules Robinson figures
throughout as a man who has got a disagreeable business to carry out,
in obedience to instructions that admit of no trifling with, and who
has set himself to do the best he can for his country, and those who
suffer through his country's policy, whilst obeying those instructions.
He has evidently choked down his feelings and opinions as an
individual, and turned himself into an official machine, merely
registering in detail the will of Lord Kimberley. With Sir Henry de
Villiers the case is very different. One feels throughout that the task
is to him a congenial one, and that the Boer cause has in him an
excellent friend. Indeed, had he been an advocate of their cause
instead of a member of the Commission, he could not have espoused their
side on every occasion with greater zeal. According to him they were
always in the right, and in them he could find no guile. Mr. Hofmeyer
and President Brand exercised a wise discretion from their own point of
view when they urged his appointment as Special Commissioner. I now
come to Sir Evelyn Wood, who was in the position of an independent
Englishman, neither prejudiced in favour of the Boers, or the reverse,
and on whom, as a military man, Lord Kimberley would find it difficult
to put the official screw. The results of his happy position are
obvious in the paper attached to the end of the Report, and signed by
him, in which he totally and entirely differs from the majority of the
Commission on every point of any importance. Most people will think
that this very outspoken and forcible dissent deducts somewhat from the
value of the Report, and throws a shadow of doubt on the wisdom of its
provisions.

The formal document of agreement between Her Majesty's Government and
the Boer leaders, commonly known as the Convention, was signed by both
parties at Pretoria on the afternoon of the 3d August 1881, in the same
room in which, nearly four years before, the Annexation Proclamation
was signed by Sir T. Shepstone.

Whilst this business was being transacted in Government House, a
curious ceremony was going on just outside, and within sight of the
windows. This was the ceremonious burial of the Union Jack, which was
followed to the grave by a crowd of about 2000 loyalists and native
chiefs. On the outside of the coffin was written the word "Resurgam,"
and an eloquent oration was delivered over the grave. Such
demonstrations are, no doubt, foolish enough, but they are not entirely
without political significance.

But a more unpleasant duty awaited the Commissioners than that of
attaching their signatures to a document,--consisting of the necessity
of conveying Her Majesty's decision as to the retrocession to about a
hundred native chiefs, until now Her Majesty's subjects, who had been
gathered together to hear it. It must be borne in mind that the natives
had not been consulted as to the disposal of the country, although they
outnumber the white people in the proportion of twenty to one, and
that, beyond some worthless paper stipulations, nothing had been done
for their interests.

Personally, I must plead guilty to what I know is by many, especially
by those who are attached to the Boer cause, considered as folly, if
not worse, namely, a sufficient interest in the natives, and sympathy
with their sufferings, to bring me to the conclusion that in acting
thus we have inflicted a cruel injustice upon them. It seems to me,
that as they were the original owners of the soil, they were entitled
to some consideration in the question of its disposal, and consequently
and incidentally, of their own. I am aware that it is generally
considered that the white man has a right to the black man's
possessions and land, and that it is his high and holy mission to
exterminate the wretched native and take his place. But with this
conclusion I venture to differ. So far as my own experience of natives
has gone, I have found that in all the essential qualities of mind and
body they very much resemble white men, with the exception that they
are, as a race, quicker-witted, more honest, and braver than the
ordinary run of white men. Of them might be aptly quoted the speech
Shakespeare puts into Shylock's mouth: "Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not a
Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions?" In the
same way I ask, Has a native no feelings or affections? does he not
suffer when his parents are shot, or his children stolen, or when he is
driven a wanderer from his home? Does he not know fear, feel pain,
affection, hate, and gratitude? Most certainly he does; and this being
so, I cannot believe that the Almighty, who made both white and black,
gave to the one race the right or mission of exterminating or even of
robbing or maltreating the other, and calling the process the advance
of civilisation. It seems to me, that on only one condition, if at all,
have we the right to take the black men's land; and that is, that we
provide them with an equal and a just Government, and allow no
maltreatment of them, either as individuals or tribes, but, on the
contrary, do our best to elevate them, and wean them from savage
customs. Otherwise, the practice is surely undefensible.

I am aware, however, that with the exception of a small class, these
are sentiments which are not shared by the great majority of the
public, either at home or abroad. Indeed, it can be plainly seen how
little sympathy they command, from the fact that but scanty
remonstrance was raised at the treatment meted out to our native
subjects in the Transvaal, when they were, to the number of nearly a
million, handed over from the peace, justice, and security that on the
whole characterise our rule, to a state of things and possibilities of
wrong and suffering which I will not try to describe.

To the chiefs thus assembled Sir Hercules Robinson, as President of the
Royal Commission, read a statement, and then retired, refusing to allow
them to speak in answer. The statement informed the natives that "Her
Majesty's Government, with that sense of justice which befits a great
and powerful nation," had returned the country to the Boers, "whose
representatives, Messrs. Kruger, Pretorius, and Joubert, I now," said
Sir Hercules, "have much pleasure in introducing to you." If reports
are true, the native chiefs had, many of them personally, and all of
them by reputation, already the advantage of a very intimate
acquaintance with all three of these gentlemen, so that an introduction
was somewhat superfluous.

Sir Hercules then went on to explain to them that locations would be
allotted to them at some future time; that a British Resident would be
appointed, whose especial charge they would be, but that they must bear
in mind that he was not ruler of the country, but the Government,
"subject to Her Majesty's suzerain rights." Natives were, no doubt,
expected to know by intuition what suzerain rights are. The statement
then goes on to give them good advice as to the advantages of indulging
in manual labour when asked to do so by the Boers, and generally to
show them how bright and happy is the future that lies before them.
Lest they should be too elated by such good tidings, they are, however,
reminded that it will be necessary to retain the law relating to
passes, which is, in the hands of a people like the Boers, about as
unjust a regulation as a dominant race can invent for the oppression of
a subject people, and had, in the old days of the Republic, been
productive of much hardship. The statement winds up by assuring them
that their "interests will never be forgotten or neglected by Her
Majesty's Government." Having read the document the Commission hastily
withdrew, and after their withdrawal the chiefs were "allowed" to state
their opinions to the Secretary for Native Affairs.

In availing themselves of this permission, it is noticeable that no
allusion was made to all the advantages they were to reap under the
Convention, nor did they seem to attach much importance to the
appointment of the British Resident. On the contrary, all their
attention was given to the great fact that the country had been ceded
to the Boers, and that they were no longer the Queen's subjects. We are
told, in Mr. Shepstone's Report, that they "got very excited," and
"asked whether it was thought that they had no feelings or hearts, that
they were thus treated as a stick or piece of tobacco, which could be
passed from hand to hand without question." Umgombarie, a Zoutpansberg
chief, said: "I am Umgombarie. I have fought with the Boers, and have
many wounds, and they know that what I say is true.... I will never
consent to place myself under their rule. I belong to the English
Government. I am not a man who eats with both sides of his jaw at once;
I only use one side. I am English, I have said." Silamba said: "I
belong to the English. I will never return under the Boers. You see me,
a man of my rank and position; is it right that such as I should be
seized and laid on the ground and flogged, as has been done to me and
other chiefs?"

Sinkanhla said: "We hear and yet do not hear, we cannot understand. We
are troubling you, Chief, by talking in this way; we hear the chiefs
say that the Queen took the country because the people of the country
wished it, and again that the majority of the owners of the country did
not wish their rule, and that therefore the country was given back. We
should like to have the man pointed out from among us black people who
objects to the rule of the Queen. We are the real owners of the
country; we were here when the Boers came, and without asking leave,
settled down and treated us in every way badly. The English Government
then came and took the country; we have now had four years of rest and
peaceful and just rule. We have been called here to-day, and are told
that the country, our country, has been given to the Boers by the
Queen. This is a thing which surprises us. Did the country, then,
belong to the Boers? Did it not belong to our fathers and forefathers
before us, long before the Boers came here? We have heard that the
Boers' country is at the Cape. If the Queen wishes to give them their
land, why does she not give them back the Cape?"

I have quoted this speech at length, because, although made by a
despised native, it sets forth their case more powerfully and in
happier language than I can do.

Umyethile said: "We have no heart for talking. I have returned to the
country from Sechelis, where I had to fly from Boer oppression. Our
hearts are black and heavy with grief to-day at the news told us, we
are in agony, our intestines are twisting and writhing inside of us,
just as you see a snake do when it is struck on the head.... We do not
know what has become of us, but we feel dead; it may be that the Lord
may change the nature of the Boers, and that we will not be treated
like dogs and beasts of burden as formerly, but we have no hope of such
a change, and we leave you with heavy hearts and great apprehension as
to the future." In his Report, Mr. Shepstone (the Secretary for Native
Affairs) says: "One chief, Jan Sibilo, who has been, he informed me,
personally threatened with death by the Boers after the English leave,
could not restrain his feelings, but cried like a child."

I have nothing to add to these extracts, which are taken from many such
statements. They are the very words of the persons most concerned, and
will speak for themselves.

The Convention was signed on the 3d August 1881, and was to be formally
ratified by a Volksraad or Parliament of the Burghers within three
months of that date, in default of which it was to fall to the ground
and become null and void.

Anybody who has followed the course of affairs with reference to the
retrocession of the Transvaal, or who has even taken the trouble to
read through this brief history, will probably come to the conclusion
that, under all the circumstances, the Boers had got more than they
could reasonably expect. Not so, however, the Boers themselves. On the
28th September the newly-elected Volksraad referred the Convention to a
General Committee to report on, and on the 30th September the Report
was presented. On the 3d October a telegram was despatched through the
British Resident to "His Excellency W. E. Gladstone," in which the
Volksraad states that the Convention is not acceptable--

(1.) Because it is in conflict with the Sand River Treaty of 1852.

(2.) Because it violates the peace agreement entered into with Sir
Evelyn Wood, in confidence of which the Boers laid down their arms.

The Volksraad consequently declared that modifications were desirable,
and that certain articles _must_ be altered.

To begin with, they declare that the "conduct of foreign relations does
not appertain to the Suzerain, only supervision," and that the articles
bearing on these points must consequently be modified. They next attack
the native question, stating that "the Suzerain has not the right to
interfere with our Legislature," and state that they cannot agree to
Article 3, which gives the Suzerain a right of veto on Legislation
connected with the natives; to Article 13, by virtue of which natives
are to be allowed to acquire land; and to the last part of Article 26,
by which it is provided that whites of alien race living in the
Transvaal shall not be taxed in excess of the taxes imposed on
Transvaal citizens.

They further declare that it is _infra dignitatem_ for the President of
the Transvaal to be a member of a Commission. This refers to the Native
Location Commission, on which he is, in the terms of the Convention, to
sit, together with the British Resident, and a third person jointly
appointed.

They next declare that the amount of the debt for which the Commission
has made them liable should be modified. Considering that England had
already made them a present of from £600,000 to £800,000, this is a
most barefaced demand. Finally, they state that "Articles 15, 16, 26,
and 27 are superfluous, and only calculated to wound our sense of
honour" (_sic_).

Article 15 enacts that no slavery or apprenticeship shall be tolerated.

Article 16 provides for religious toleration.

Article 26 provides for the free movement, trading, and residence of
all persons, other than natives, conforming themselves to the laws of
the Transvaal.

Article 27 gives to all the right of free access to the Courts of
Justice.

Putting the "sense of honour" of the Transvaal Volksraad out of the
question, past experience has but too plainly proved that these
Articles are by no means superfluous.

In reply to this message, Sir Hercules Robinson telegraphs to the
British Resident on the 21st October in the following words:--

"Having forwarded Volksraad Resolution of 15th to Earl of Kimberley, I
am desired to instruct you in reply to repeat to the Triumvirate that
Her Majesty's Government cannot entertain any proposals for a
modification of the Convention _until after it has been ratified_,
and the necessity for further concession proved by experience."

I wish to draw particular attention to the last part of this message,
which is extremely typical of the line of policy adopted throughout in
the Transvaal business. The English Government dared not make any
further concession to the Boers, because they felt that they had
already strained the temper of the country almost to breaking in the
matter. On the other hand, they were afraid that if they did not do
something, the Boers would tear up the Convention, and they would find
themselves face to face with the old difficulty. Under these
circumstances, they have fallen back upon their temporising and
un-English policy, which leaves them a back-door to escape through,
whatever turn things take. Should the Boers now suddenly turn round and
declare, which is extremely probable, that they repudiate their debt to
us, or that they are sick of the presence of a British Resident, the
Government will be able to announce that "the necessity for further
concession" has now been "proved by experience," and thus escape the
difficulty. In short, this telegram has deprived the Convention of
whatever finality it may have possessed, and made it, as a document, as
worthless as it is as a practical settlement. That this is the view
taken of it by the Boers themselves, is proved by the text of the
Ratification which followed on the receipt of this telegram.

The tone of this document throughout is, in my opinion, considering
from whom it came, and against whom it is directed, very insolent. And
it amply confirms what I have previously said, that the Boers looked
upon themselves as a victorious people making terms with those they
have conquered. The Ratification leads off thus: "The Volksraad is not
satisfied with this Convention, and considers that the members of the
Triumvirate performed a fervent act of love for the Fatherland when
they upon their own responsibility signed such an unsatisfactory state
document." This is damning with faint praise indeed. It then goes on to
recite the various points of objection, stating that the answers from
the English Government proved that they were well founded. "The English
Government," it says, "acknowledges indirectly by this answer (the
telegram of 21st October, quoted above) that the difficulties raised by
the Volksraad are neither fictitious nor unfounded, inasmuch _as it
desires from us the concession_ that we, the Volksraad, shall submit
it to a practical test." It will be observed that England is here
represented as begging the favour of a trial of her conditions from the
Volksraad of the Transvaal Boers. The Ratification is in these words:
"Therefore is it that the Raad here unanimously resolves not to go into
further discussion of the Convention, _and maintaining all objections
to the Convention_ as made before the Royal Commission or stated in
the Raad, and for the purpose of showing to everybody that the love
of peace and unity inspires it, _for the time and provisionally_
submitting the articles of the Convention to a practical test, _hereby
complying with the request of the English Government_ contained in
the telegram of the 13th October 1881, proceeds to ratify the
Convention."

It would have been interesting to have seen how such a Ratification as
this, which is no Ratification but an insult, would have been accepted
by Lord Beaconsfield. I think that within twenty-four hours of its
arrival in Downing Street, the Boer Volksraad would have received a
startling answer. But Lord Beaconsfield is dead, and by his successor
it was received with all due thankfulness and humility. His words,
however, on this subject still remain to us, and even his great rival
might have done well to listen to them. It was in the course of what
was, I believe, the last speech he made in the House of Lords, that
speaking about the Transvaal rising, he warned the Government that it
was a very dangerous thing to make peace with rebellious subjects in
arms against the authority of the Queen. The warning passed unheeded,
and the peace was made in the way I have described.

As regards the Convention itself, it will be obvious to the reader that
the Boers have not any intention of acting up to its provisions, mild
as they are, if they can possibly avoid them, whilst, on the other
hand, there is no force at hand to punish their disregard or breach. It
is all very well to create a Resident with extensive powers; but how is
he to enforce his decisions? What is he to do if his awards are laughed
at and made a mockery of, as they are and will be? The position of Mr.
Hudson at Pretoria is even worse than that of Mr. Osborn in Zululand.
For instance, the Convention specifies in the first article that the
Transvaal is to be known as the Transvaal State. The Boer Government
have, however, thought fit to adopt the name of "South African
Republic" in all public documents. Mr. Hudson was accordingly directed
to remonstrate, which he did in a feeble way; his remonstrance was
politely acknowledged, but the country is still officially called the
South African Republic, the Convention and Mr. Hudson's remonstrance
notwithstanding. Mr. Hudson, however, appears to be better suited to
the position than would have been the case had an Englishman, pure and
simple, been appointed, since it is evident that things that would have
struck the latter as insults to the Queen he represented, and his
country generally, are not so understood by him. In fact, he admirably
represents his official superiors in his capacity of swallowing
rebuffs, and when smitten on one cheek delightedly offering the other.

Thus we find him attending a Boer meeting of thanksgiving for the
success that had waited on their arms and the recognition of their
independence, where most people will consider he was out of place. To
this meeting, thus graced by his presence, an address was presented by
a branch of the Africander Bond, a powerful institution, having for its
object the total uprootal of English rule and English customs in South
Africa, to which he must have listened with pleasure. In it he, in
common with other members of the meeting, is informed that "you took up
the sword and struck the Briton with such force" that "the Britons
through fear revived that sense of justice to which they could not be
brought by petitions," and that the "day will soon come that we shall
enter with you on one arena for the entire independence of South
Africa," _i.e._, independence from English rule.

On the following day the Government gave a dinner, to which all those
who had done good service during the late hostilities were invited, the
British Resident being apparently the only Englishman asked. Amongst
the other celebrities present I notice the name of Buskes. This man,
who is an educated Hollander, was the moving spirit of the
Potchefstroom atrocities; indeed, so dark is his reputation that the
Royal Commission refused to transact business with him, or to admit him
to their presence. Mr. Hudson was not so particular. And now comes the
most extraordinary part of the episode. At the dinner it was necessary
that the health of Her Majesty as Suzerain should be proposed, and with
studied insolence this was done last of all the leading political
toasts, and immediately after that of the Triumvirate. Notwithstanding
this fact, and that the toast was couched by Mr. Joubert, who stated
that "he would not attempt to explain what a Suzerain was," in what
appear to be semi-ironical terms, we find that Mr. Hudson "begged to
tender his thanks to the Honourable Mr. Joubert for the kind way in
which he proposed the toast."

It may please Mr. Hudson to see the name of the Queen thus
metaphorically dragged in triumph at the chariot wheels of the
Triumvirate, but it is satisfactory to know that the spectacle is not
appreciated in England: since, on a question in the House of Lords, by
the Earl of Carnarvon, who characterised it as a deliberate insult,
Lord Kimberley replied that the British Resident had been instructed
that in future he was not to attend public demonstrations unless he had
previously informed himself that the name of Her Majesty would be
treated with proper respect. Let us hope that this official reprimand
will have its effect, and that Mr. Hudson will learn therefrom that
there is such a thing as _trop de zéle_--even in a good cause.

The Convention is now a thing of the past, the appropriate rewards have
been lavishly distributed to its framers, and President Brand has at
last prevailed upon the Volksraad of the Orange Free State to allow him
to become a Knight Grand Cross of Saint Michael and Saint George,--the
same prize looked forward to by our most distinguished public servants
at the close of the devotion of their life to the service of their
country. But its results are yet to come--though it would be difficult
to forecast the details of their development. One thing, however, is
clear: the signing of that document signalised an entirely new
departure in South African affairs, and brought us within a measurable
distance of the abandonment, for the present at any rate, of the
supremacy of English rule in South Africa.

This is the larger issue of the matter, and it is already bearing
fruit. Emboldened by their success in the Transvaal, the Dutch party at
the Cape are demanding, and the demand is to be granted, that the Dutch
tongue be admitted _pari passu_ with English, as the official
language in the Law Courts and the House of Assembly. When a country
thus consents to use a foreign tongue equally with its own, it is a
sure sign that those who speak it are rising to power. But "the Party"
looks higher than this, and openly aims at throwing off English rule
altogether, and declaring South Africa a great Dutch republic. The
course of events is favourable to their aspiration. Responsible
Government is to be granted to Natal, which country, not being strong
enough to stand alone in the face of the many dangers that surround
her, will be driven into the arms of the Dutch party to save herself
from destruction. It will be useless for her to look for help from
England, and any feelings of repugnance she may feel to Boer rule will
soon be choked by necessity, and a mutual interest. It is, however,
possible that some unforeseen event, such as the advent to power of a
strong Conservative Ministry, may check the tide that now sets so
strongly in favour of Dutch supremacy.

It seems to me, however, to be a question worthy of the consideration
of those who at present direct the destinies of the Empire, whether it
would not be wise, as they have gone so far, to go a little further and
favour a scheme for the total abandonment of South Africa, retaining
only Table Bay. If they do not, it is now quite within the bounds of
sober possibility that they may one day have to face a fresh Transvaal
rebellion, only on a ten times larger scale, and might find it
difficult to retain even Table Bay. If, on the other hand, they do, I
believe that all the White States in South Africa would confederate of
their own free-will, under the pressure of the necessity for common
action, and the Dutch element being preponderant, at once set to work
to exterminate the natives on general principles, in much the same way,
and from much the same motives that a cook exterminates black beetles,
because she thinks them ugly, and to clear the kitchen.

I need hardly say that such a policy is not one that commands my
sympathy, but Her Majesty's Government having put their hand to the
plough, it is worth their while to consider it. It would at any rate be
in perfect accordance with their declared sentiments, and command an
enthusiastic support from their followers.

As regards the smaller and more immediate issue of the retrocession,
namely, its effect on the Transvaal itself, it cannot be other than
evil. The act is, I believe, quite without precedent in our history,
and it is difficult to see, looking at it from those high grounds of
national morality assumed by the Government, what greater arguments can
be advanced in its favour, than could be found to support the
abandonment of,--let us say,--Ireland. Indeed a certain parallel
undoubtedly exists between the circumstances of the two countries.
Ireland was, like the Transvaal, annexed, though a long time ago, and
has continually agitated for its freedom. The Irish hate us, so did the
Boers. In Ireland, Englishmen are being shot, and England is running
the awful risk of blood-guiltiness, as it did in the Transvaal. In
Ireland, smouldering revolution is being fanned into flame by Mr.
Gladstone's speeches and acts, as it was in the Transvaal. In Ireland,
as in the Transvaal, there exists a strong loyal class that receives
insults instead of support from the Government, and whose property, as
was the case there, is taken from them without compensation, to be
flung as a sop to stop the mouths of the Queen's enemies. And so I
might go on, finding many such similarities of circumstances, but my
parallel, like most parallels, must break down at last Thus--it
mattered little to England whether or no she let the Transvaal go, but
to let Ireland go would be more than even Mr. Gladstone dare attempt.

Somehow, if you follow these things far enough, you always come to
vulgar first principles. The difference between the case of the
Transvaal and that of Ireland is a difference not of justice of cause,
for both causes are equally unjust or just according as they are
viewed, but of mere common expediency. Judging from the elevated
standpoint of the national morality theory, however, which, as we know,
soars above such truisms as the foolish statement that force is a
remedy, or that if you wish to retain your prestige you must not allow
defeats to pass unavenged, I cannot see why, if it was righteous to
abandon the Transvaal, it would not be equally righteous to abandon
Ireland!

As for the Transvaal, that country is not to be congratulated on its
success, for it has destroyed all its hopes of permanent peace, has
ruined its trade and credit, and has driven away the most useful and
productive class in the community. The Boers, elated by their success
in arms, will be little likely to settle down to peaceable occupations,
and still less likely to pay their taxes, which, indeed, I hear they
are already refusing to do. They have learnt how easily even a powerful
Government can be upset, and the lesson is not likely to be forgotten,
for want of repetition to their own weak one.

Already the Transvaal Government hardly knows which way to turn for
funds, and as, perhaps fortunately for itself, quite unable to borrow,
through want of credit.

As regards the native question, I agree with Mr. H. Shepstone, who, in
his Report on this subject, says that he does not believe that the
natives will inaugurate any action against the Boers, so long as the
latter do not try to collect taxes, or otherwise interfere with them.
But if the Boer Government is to continue to exist, it will be bound to
raise taxes from the natives, since it cannot collect much from its
white subjects. The first general attempt of the sort will be the
signal for active resistance on the part of the natives, whom, if they
act without concert, the Boers will be able to crush in detail, though
with considerable loss. If, on the other hand, they should have
happened, during the last few years, to have learnt the advantages of
combination, as is quite possible, perhaps they will crash the Boers.

The only thing that is at present certain about the matter is that
there will be bloodshed, and that before long. For instance, the
Montsioa difficulty in the Keate Award has in it the possibilities of a
serious war, and there are plenty such difficulties ready to spring
into life within and without the Transvaal.

In all human probability it will take but a small lapse of time for the
Transvaal to find itself in the identical position from which we
relieved it by the Annexation.

What course events will then take it is impossible to say. It may be
found desirable to re-annex the country, though, in my opinion, that
would be, after all that has passed, an unfortunate step; its
inhabitants may be cut up piecemeal by a combined movement of native
tribes, as they would have been, had they not been rescued by the
English Government in 1877, or it is possible that the Orange Free
State may consent to take the Transvaal under its wing: who can say?
There is only one thing that our recently abandoned possession can
count on for certain, and that is trouble, both from its white
subjects, and the natives, who hate the Boers with a bitter and a
well-earned hatred.

The whole question can, so far as its moral aspect is concerned, be
summed up in a few words.

Whether or no the Annexation was a necessity at the moment of its
execution--which I certainly maintain it was--it received the
unreserved sanction of the Home authorities, and the relations of
Sovereign and subject, with all the many and mutual obligations
involved in that connection, were established between the Queen of
England and every individual of the motley population of the Transvaal.
Nor was this change an empty form, for, to the largest proportion of
that population, this transfer of allegiance brought with it a
priceless and a vital boon. To them it meant freedom and justice--for
where, on any portion of this globe over which the British ensign
floats, does the law even wink at cruelty or wrong?

A few years passed away, and a small number of the Queen's subjects in
the Transvaal rose in rebellion against her authority, and inflicted
some reverses on her arms. Thereupon, in spite of the reiterated
pledges given to the contrary--partly under stress of defeat, and
partly in obedience to the pressure of "advanced views"--the country
was abandoned, and the vast majority who had remained faithful to the
Crown, was handed to the cruel despotism of the minority who had
rebelled against it.

Such an act of treachery to those to whom we were bound with double
chains--by the strong ties of a common citizenship, and by those claims
to England's protection from violence and wrong which have hitherto
been wont to command it, even where there was no duty to fulfil, and no
authority to vindicate--stands, I believe, without parallel on our
records, and marks a new departure in our history.

I cannot end these pages without expressing my admiration of the
extremely able way in which the Boers managed their revolt, when once
they felt that, having undertaken the thing, it was a question of life
and death with them. It shows that they have good stuff in them
somewhere, which, under the firm but just rule of Her Majesty, might
have been much developed, and it makes it the more sad that they should
have been led to throw off that rule, and have been allowed to do so by
an English Government.

In conclusion, there is one point that I must touch on, and that is the
effect of the retrocession on the native mind, which I can only
describe as most disastrous. The danger alluded to in the Report of the
Royal Commission has been most amply realised, and the prevailing
belief in the steadfastness of our policy, and the inviolability of our
plighted word, which has hitherto been the great secret of our hold on
the Kafirs, has been rudely shaken. The motives that influenced, or are
said to have influenced, the Government in their act, are naturally
quite unintelligible to savages, however clever, who do believe that
force is a remedy, and who have seen the inhabitants of a country ruled
by England defeat English soldiers and take possession of it, whilst
those who remained loyal to England were driven out of it. It will not
be wonderful if some of them, say the natives of Natal, deduce
therefrom conclusions unfavourable to loyalty, and evince a desire to
try the same experiment.

It is, however, unprofitable to speculate on the future, which must be
left to unfold itself.

The curtain is, so far as this country is concerned, down for the
moment on the South African stage; when it rises again, there is but
too much reason to fear that it will reveal a state of confusion,
which, unless it is more wisely and consistently dealt with in the
future than it has been in the past, may develop into chaos.




CHAPTER VII.


The following pages, extracted from an introduction to a new edition to
"Cetywayo and His White Neighbours," written in 1888, are reprinted
here, because they contain matter of interest concerning the more
recent history of the Transvaal Boers.


    _Extract from Introduction to New Edition of 1888._

The recent history of the Transvaal, now once more a republic, will
fortunately admit of brief treatment. It is, so far as England is
concerned, very much a history of concession. For an account of the
first Convention I must refer my readers to the remarks which I have
made in the chapter of this book headed "The Retrocession of the
Transvaal." It will there be seen that the Transvaal Volksraad only
ratified the first convention, which was wrung from us (Sir Evelyn
Wood, to his honour be it said, dissenting) after our defeats at Lang's
Nek, Ingogo, and Majuba, as a favour to the British Government, which
in its turn virtually promised to reconsider the convention, if only
the Volksraad would be so good as to ratify it. This convention was
ratified in October 1881. In June 1883 the Transvaal Government[14]
telegraphs briefly to Lord Derby through the High Commissioner that the
Volksraad has "resolved that time has come to reconsider convention."
Lord Derby quickly telegraphs back that "Her Majesty's Government
consent to inquire into the working of convention." Human nature is
frail, and it is impossible to help wishing that Lord Palmerston or
Disraeli had been appointed by the Fates to answer that telegram. But
we have fallen upon different days, and new men have arisen who appear
to be suited to them; and so the convention was reconsidered, and on
the 27th of February 1884 a new one was signed, which is known as the
convention of London. It begins by defining boundaries to which the
"Government of the South African Republic will strictly adhere, ... and
will do its utmost to prevent any of its inhabitants from making any
encroachments upon the said boundaries." The existence of the New
Republic in Zululand is a striking and practical comment on this
article. Article ii. also provides for the security of the amended
southwest boundary. The proclamation of 16th September 1884 (afterwards
disallowed by the English Government), by which the South African
Republic practically annexed the territories of Montsioa and Moshette,
already for the most part in the possession of its freebooters, very
clearly illustrates its anxiety to be bound by this provision. Art xii.
provides for the independence of the Swazis; and by way of illustrating
the fidelity with which it has been observed, we shall presently have
occasion to remark upon the determined attempts that have continually
been made by Boer freebooters to obtain possession of Swaziland--and so
on.

          [14] [C. 3659], 1883.

In order to make these severe restrictions palatable to the burghers of
a free and haughty Republic, Lord Derby recommends Her Majesty's
Government to remit a trifling sum of £127,000 of their debt due to the
Imperial Treasury, which was accordingly done. On the whole, the
Transvaal had no reason to be dissatisfied with this new treaty, though
really the whole affair is scarcely worth discussing. Convention No. 2
is almost as much a farce and a dead letter as was Convention No. 1. It
is, however, impossible to avoid being impressed with the really
remarkable tone, not merely of equality, but of superiority, adopted by
the South African Republic and its officials towards this country. To
take an instance. The Republic had found it convenient to wage a war of
extermination upon some Kafir chiefs. Two of these, Mampoer and Njabel,
fell into its hands. Her Majesty's Government was, rightly or wrongly,
so impressed with the injustice of the sentence of death passed upon
these unfortunates, that, acting through Mr. Hudson, the British
Resident at Pretoria, it strained every nerve to save them. This was
the upshot of it. In a tone of studied sarcasm, His Honour the State
President "observes with great satisfaction the great interest in these
cases which has been manifested by your Honour and Her Majesty's
Government." He then goes on to say that, notwithstanding this
interest, Mampoer will be duly and effectually hung, giving the exact
time and place of the event, and Njabel imprisoned for life, with hard
labour. Finally, he once more conveys "the hearty thanks of the
Government and the members of the Executive Council for the interest
manifested in these cases,"[15] and remains, &c.

          [15] [C. 3841], 1884, p 148.

The independence of Swaziland was guaranteed by the convention of 1884.
Yet the Blue-books are full of accounts of various attempts made by
Boers to obtain a footing in Swaziland. Thus in November 1885
Umbandine, the king of Swaziland, sends messengers to the Governor of
Natal through Sir T. Shepstone, in which he states that in the winter
Piet Joubert, accompanied by two other Boers and an interpreter, came
to his kraal and asked him to sign a paper "to say that he and all the
Swazis agreed to go over and recognise the authority of the Boer
Government, and have nothing more to do with the English."[16] Umbandine
refused, saying that he looked to and recognised the English
Government. Thereon the Boers, growing angry, answered, "Those fathers
of yours, the English, act very slowly; and if you look to them for
help, and refuse to sign this paper, we shall have scattered you and
your people, and taken possession of the land before they arrive. Why
do you refuse to sign the paper? You know we defeated the English at
Majuba." Umbandine's message then goes on to say that he recognises the
English Government only, and does not wish to have dealings with the
Boers. Also, in the following month, we find him making a direct
application to the Colonial Office through Mr. David Forbes,[17] praying
that his country may be taken under the protection of Her Majesty's
Government.

          [16] [C. 4645], 1886, p. 64.

          [17] Ibid. p. 70.

More than one such attempt to secure informal rights of occupation in
Swaziland appears to have been made by the Transvaal Boers. Mr. T.
Shepstone, C.M.G., is at present acting as Resident to Umbandine,
though he has not, it would seem, any regular commission from the Home
Government authorising him to do so, probably because it does not
consider that its rights in Swaziland are such as to justify such an
assumption of formal authority over the Swazis. However this may be,
Umbandine could not have found a better man to protect his interests.
Of course, when acts like that of Piet Joubert are reported to the
Government of the South African Republic and made the subject of a
remonstrance by this country, all knowledge of them is repudiated, as
it was repudiated in the case of the invasion of Zululand.

It is part of the policy of the Transvaal only to become an accessory
after the fact. Its subjects go forth and stir up trouble among the
natives, and then probably the Boer Government intervenes "in the
interests of humanity," and takes, or tries to take, the country. This
process is always going on, and, unless the British Government puts a
stop to it, always will go on. We shall probably soon hear that it is
developing itself in the direction of Matabeleland. A country the size
of France, which could without difficulty accommodate a population of
from eight to ten millions of industrious folk, is not large enough for
the wants of a Boer people, numbering something under fifty thousand
souls. Every young Boer must have his six or more thousand acres of
land on which to lord it. It is his birthright, and if it is not
forthcoming he goes and takes it by force from the nearest native
tribe. Hence these continual complaints. Of course, there are two ways
of looking at the matter. There is a party that does not hesitate to
say that the true policy of this country is to let the Boers work their
will upon the natives, and then, as they in turn fly from civilisation
towards the far interior, to follow on their path and occupy the lands
that they have swept. This plan is supported by arguments about the
superiority of the white races and their obvious destiny of rule. It
is, I confess, one that I look upon as little short of wicked. I could
never discern a superiority so great in ourselves as to authorise us,
by right divine as it were, to destroy the coloured man and take his
lands. It is difficult to see why a Zulu, for instance, has not as much
right to live in his own way as a Boer or an Englishman. Of course,
there is another extreme. Nothing is more ridiculous than the length to
which the black brother theory is sometimes driven by enthusiasts. A
savage is one thing, and a civilised man is another; and though
civilised men may and do become savages, I personally doubt if the
converse is even possible. But whether the civilised man, with his gin,
his greed, and his dynamite, is really so very superior to the savage
is another question, and one which would bear argument, although this
is not the place to argue it. My point is, that his superiority is not
at any rate so absolutely overwhelming as to justify him in the
wholesale destruction of the savage and the occupation of his lands, or
even in allowing others to do the work for him if he can prevent it.
The principle might conceivably be pushed to inconvenient and indecent
lengths. Savagery is only a question of degree. When all true savages
have been wiped out, the most civilised and self-righteous among the
nations may begin to give the term to those whom they consider to be on
a lower scale than themselves, and apply the argument also. Thus there
are "cultured" people in another land who do not hesitate to say that
the humble writers of these islands are rank and rude barbarians not to
be endured. Supposing that, being the stronger, they also _applied
the argument_, it would be inconvenient for some of us, and perhaps
the world would not gain so very much after all. But this is a
digression, only excusable, if excusable at all, in one who has endured
a three weeks' course of unmitigated Blue-book. To return.

The process of absorption attempted in Swaziland, and brought to a
successful issue in Zululand, also went forward merrily in
Bechuanaland, till recently, under the rule of Mankorane, chief of the
Batlapins, and Montsioa, chief of the Baralongs. These two chiefs have
always been devoted friends and adherents of the English Government,
and consequently are not regarded with favour by the Boers. Shortly
after the retrocession of the Transvaal, a rival to Mankorane rose up
in the person of a certain Massou, and a rival to Montsioa named
Moshette. Both Massou and Moshette were supported by Boer fillibusters,
and what happened to Usibepu in Zululand happened to these unfortunate
chiefs in Bechuanaland. They were defeated after a gallant struggle,
and two Republics called Stellaland and Goschen were carved out of
their territories and occupied by the fillibusters. Fortunately for
them, however, they had a friend in the person of the Rev. John
Mackenzie, to whose valuable work, "Austral Africa," I beg to refer the
reader for a fuller account of these events. Mr. Mackenzie, who had for
many years lived as a missionary among the Bechuanas, had also mastered
the fact that it is very difficult to do anything for South Africa in
this country unless you can make it a question of votes, or, in other
words, unless you can bring pressure to bear upon the Government.
Accordingly he commenced an agitation on behalf of Mankorane and
Montsioa, in which he was supported by various religious bodies, and
also by the late Mr. Forster and the Aborigines Protection Society. As
a result of this agitation he was appointed Deputy to the High
Commissioner for Bechuanaland, whither he proceeded early in 1884 to
establish a British protectorate. He was gladly welcomed by the
unfortunate chiefs, who were now almost at their last gasp, and who
both of them ceded their rights of government to the Queen. Hostilities
did not, however, cease, for on the 31st July 1884 the fillibusters
again attacked Montsioa, routed him, and cruelly murdered Mr. Bethell,
his English adviser. Meanwhile Mr. Mackenzie's success was viewed with
very mixed feelings at the Cape. To the English party it was most
acceptable, but the Dutch,[18] and more numerous party, looked on it
with alarm and disgust. They did not at all wish to see the Imperial
power established in Bechuanaland; so pressure was put upon Sir
Hercules Robinson, and through him on Mr. Mackenzie, to such an extent
indeed as to necessitate the resignation of the latter. Thereon the
High Commissioner despatched a Cape politician, Mr. Cecil Rhodes, and
his own private secretary, Captain Bower, R.N., to Bechuanaland. These
gentlemen at once set to work to undo most of what Mr. Mackenzie had
done, and, generally speaking, did not advance either British or native
interests in Bechuanaland. At this point, taking advantage of the
general confusion, the Government of the South African Republic issued
a proclamation placing both Montsioa and Moshette under its protection,
as usual "in the interests of humanity."

          [18] By the Dutch party I mean the anti-Imperial and
          retrogressive party. It must be remembered that many of the
          now educated and progressive Boers do not belong to this.

But the agitation in England had, fortunately for what remained of the
Bechuana people, not been allowed to drop. Her Majesty's Government
disallowed the Boer proclamation, under Article iv. of the convention
of London, and despatched an armed force to Bechuanaland, commanded by
Sir Charles Warren. This good act, I believe I am right in saying, we
owe entirely to the firmness of Sir Charles Dilke and Mr. Chamberlain,
who insisted upon its being done. Meanwhile Messrs. Upington and
Sprigg, members of the Cape Government, hastened to Bechuanaland to
effect a settlement before the arrival of Sir Charles Warren's force.
This settlement, though it might have been agreeable to the
fillibusters and the anti-Imperialists generally, was disallowed by Her
Majesty's Government as unsatisfactory, and Sir Charles Warren was
ordered to occupy Bechuanaland. This he accordingly did, taking Mr.
Mackenzie with him, very much against the will of the anti-English
party, and, be it added, of Sir Hercules Robinson. Indeed, if we may
accept Mr. Mackenzie's version of these occurrences, which seems to be
a fair one, and adequately supported by documentary evidence, the
conduct of Sir Hercules Robinson towards Mr. Mackenzie would really
admit of explanation. As soon as the freebooters saw that the Imperial
Government was really in earnest, of course there was no more trouble.
They went away, and Sir Charles Warren took possession of Bechuanaland
without striking a single blow. He remained in the country for nearly a
year arranging for its permanent pacification and government, and as a
result of his occupation, on the 30th September 1885, all the territory
south of the Molopo River was declared to be British territory, and
made into a quasi crown colony, the entire extent of land, including
the districts ruled over by Khama, Sechele, and Gasitsive, being about
160,000 square miles in area. I believe that the new colony of British
Bechuanaland is proving a very considerable success. Every provision
has been made for native wants, and its settlement goes on apace. There
is no reason why, with its remarkable natural advantages, it should not
one day become a great country, with a prosperous white, and a loyal
and contented native population. When this comes about it is to be
hoped that it will remember that it owes its existence to the energy
and firmness of Mr. Mackenzie, Sir Charles Dilke, Mr. Chamberlain, and
Sir Charles Warren.

It is probably by now dawning upon the mind of the British public that
when we gave up the Transvaal we not only did a cowardly thing and
sowed a plentiful crop of future troubles, we also abandoned one of the
richest, if not the richest, country in the world. The great
gold-fields which exist all over the surface of the land are being
opened up and pouring out their treasures so fast that it is said that
the Transvaal Government, hitherto remarkable for its impecuniosity,
does not know what to do with its superfluous cash. To what extent this
will continue it is impossible to say, but I for one shall not be
surprised if the output should prove to be absolutely unprecedented.
And with gold in vast quantities, with iron in mountains, and coal-beds
to be measured by the scores of square miles, with lead and copper and
cobalt, a fertile soil, water, and one of the most lovely climates in
the world, what more is required to make a country rich and great? Only
one thing, an Anglo-Saxon Government, and that we have taken away from
the Transvaal. Whether the English flag has vanished for ever from its
borders is, however, still an open question. The discovery of gold in
such quantities is destined to exercise a very remarkable influence
upon the future of the Transvaal. Where gold is to be found, there the
hardy, enterprising, English-speaking diggers flock together, and
before them and their energy the Boer retreats, as the native retreats
and vanishes before the rifle of the Boer. Already there are many
thousands of diggers in the Transvaal; if the discoveries of gold go
on and prove as remunerative as they promise to be, in a few more years
their number will be vastly increased. Supposing that another five
years sees sixty or seventy thousand English diggers at work in the
Transvaal, is it to be believed that these men will in that event allow
themselves to be ruled by eight or nine thousand hostile-hearted Boers?
Is it to be believed, too, that the Boers will stop to try and rule
them? From such knowledge as I have of their character I should say
certainly not. They will _trek_, anywhere out of the way of the
Englishman and his English ways, and those who do not _trek_ will
be absorbed.[19] Should this happen, it is, of course, possible, and
even probable, that for some time the diggers, fearing the vacillations
of Imperial policy, would prefer to remain independent with a
Republican form of Government. But the Englishman is a law-abiding and
patriotic creature, and as society settled itself in the new community,
it would almost certainly desire to be united to the Empire and
acknowledge the sovereignty of the Queen. So far as a judgment can be
formed, if only the gold holds out the Transvaal will as certainly fall
into the lap of the Empire as a green apple will one day drop from the
tree--that is, if it is not gathered.

          [19] The occupation of Rhodesia has now made it impossible
          for the Boers to trek out of reach of the English and their
          flag.--H. R. H.

Now it is quite possible that the Germans, or some other power, may try
to gather the Transvaal apple. The Boers are not blind to the march of
events, and they dislike us and our rule. Perhaps they might think it
worth their while to seek German protection, and unless we are prepared
to say "no" very firmly indeed--and who knows, in the present condition
of Home politics, what we are prepared to do from one day to
another?--Germany would in such a case almost certainly think it worth
her while to give it. Very likely the protection, when granted, would
in some ways resemble that which the Boer himself, his breast aglow
with love of peace and the "interests of humanity," is so anxious to
extend to the misguided native possessor of desirable and well-watered
lands. Very likely, in the end, the Boer would be sorry that he did not
accept the ills he knew of. But that is neither here nor there. So far
as we are concerned, the mischief would be done. In short, should the
position arise, everything will depend upon our capacity of saying
"no," and the tone in which we say it. It will not do to rely upon our
London convention, by which the Transvaal is forbidden to conclude
treaties with outside powers without the consent of this Government.
The convention has been broken before now, and will be broken again, if
the Boers find it convenient to break it, and know that they can do so
with impunity. Meanwhile we must rest on our oars and watch events. One
thing, however, might and should be done. Some person having weight and
real authority--if he were quite new to South Africa so much the
better--should be appointed as our Consul to watch over the welfare of
Englishmen and our Imperial interests at Pretoria, and properly paid
for doing so. It is difficult to find a suitable man unless he is
adequately salaried and supported.

But quite recently this country has awakened to the knowledge that
Delagoa Bay is important to its South African interests, though how
important it perhaps does not altogether realise. For years and years
the colony of Natal has been employed in the intermittent construction
of a railway with a very narrow gauge, which is now open as far as
Ladysmith, or to within a hundred miles of the Transvaal border. Natal
is very poor, and in common with the rest of South Africa, and indeed
of the world, has lately been passing through a period of great
commercial depression. The Home Government has refused to help it to
construct its railways (if it had done so, how many hundreds of
thousand pounds would have been saved to the British taxpayer during
the Zulu and Boer wars!), and has equally refused to allow it to borrow
sufficient money to get them constructed, with the result that a large
amount of the interior trade has already been deflected into other
channels. And now a fresh and very real danger, not only to Natal, but
to all Imperial interests in South Africa, has sprung into sudden
prominence, that is, in this country, for in Africa it has been
foreseen for many years. Above Zululand is situated Amatongaland, which
reaches to the southern shore of one of the finest harbours in the
world, Delagoa Bay. This great bight, in which half a dozen navies
could ride at anchor, the only really good haven on the coasts of South
Africa, is fifty-five miles in width and twenty in depth, that is, from
east to west It is separated from the Transvaal, of which it is the
natural port, by about ninety miles of wild and sparsely inhabited
country.

The ownership of this splendid port was for many years in dispute
between this country and the Portuguese, with whose dominions of
Mozambique it is connected by a strip of coast, and who have a small
fort upon it. This dispute was finally referred by Lord Granville in
1872 to the decision of Marshal MacMahon, and on this occasion, as on
every other in which this country has been weak enough to go to
arbitration, that decision was given against us. Into the merits of the
case it is not necessary to enter, further than to say, as has already
been recently pointed out by a very able and well-informed correspondent
of the _Morning Post_, that it is by no means clear by what right the
matter was referred to arbitration at all. The Amatongas are in
possession of the southern shore of the bay, including, I believe, the
Inyack Peninsula and Inyack Island, and they are an independent people.
The Swazis also abut on it, and they are independent. What warrant had
we to refer their rights to the arbitration of Marshal MacMahon? The
evidence of the exercise of any Portuguese sovereignty over these
countries is so shadowy that it may be said never to have existed;
certainly it does not exist now. This is a point, but it is nothing
more. We must take things as we find them, and we find that the
Portuguese have been formally declared and admitted by us to be the
owners of Delagoa Bay.

Now, so long as we held the Transvaal it did not so much matter who had
the sovereignty of the Bay, since a railway constructed from there
could only run to British territory. But we gave up the Transvaal,
which is now virtually a hostile state, and the contingency which has
been so long foreseen in South Africa, and so blindly overlooked at
home, has come to pass--the railway is in course of rapid completion.
What does this mean to us? At the best, it means that we lose the
greater part of the trade of South-eastern Africa; at the worst, that
we lose it all. In other words, it means, putting aside the question of
our Imperial needs and status in Africa, a great many millions a year
in hard cash out of the national pocket. Let us suppose that the worst
happens, and that the Germans get a footing either in the Transvaal or
Delagoa Bay. Obviously they will stop our trade in favour of their own.
Or let us suppose that the Transvaal takes advantage of one of our
spasms of Imperial paralysis, such as afflicted us during the
_régime_ of Lord Derby, and defies the provision in the convention
which forbids them to put a heavier tax upon our goods than upon those
of any other nation. In either event our case would be a bad one, for
our road from the eastern coast to the vast interior is blocked. But it
is of little use crying over spilt milk, or anticipating evils which it
is our duty to try to avert, and which in all probability still could
be averted by a sound and consistent policy.

To begin with, both Swaziland and Amatongaland can be annexed to the
Empire. It is true that the independence of the first of these
countries is guaranteed by Article xii. of the convention of London of
1884. Here is the exact wording:--"The independence of the Swazis
within the boundary-line of Swaziland, as indicated in the first
article of this convention, will be fully recognised." But England has
for years exercised a kind of protective right over Swaziland--a right,
as I have already shown, fully acknowledged and frequently appealed to
by the Swazis themselves. And for the rest, what is the obvious meaning
of this provision? It means that the independence of Swaziland is
guaranteed against Boer encroachments; its object was to protect the
Swazis from extermination at the hands of the Boers. Further, the Boers
have again and again broken this article of the convention in their
repeated attempts to get a foothold in Swaziland. It has now become
necessary to our interests that the Swazis should come under our rule,
as indeed they are most anxious to do, and a way should be found by
which this end can be accomplished.

Then as to Amatongaland, or Maputaland, as it is sometimes called, only
a month or two ago an embassy from the Queen of that country waited on
the Colonial Office, praying for British protection. It is not known
what answer they received; let us trust that it was a favourable
one.[20] The protection that should be accorded to the Amatongas, both
in their interests and our own, is annexation to the British Empire
upon such terms as might be satisfactory to them. The management of
their country might be left to them, subject to the advice of a
Resident, and the enforcement of the ordinary laws respecting life and
property common to civilised states. Drink and white men might be
strictly excluded from it, unless the Amatongas should wish to welcome
the latter. But the country, with its valuable but undefined rights
over Delagoa Bay, should belong to England, for whoever owns Swaziland
and Amatongaland will in course of time be almost certain to own the
Bay also. It must further be remembered that circumstances have already
given us certain rights over the Amatongas. They regarded Cetywayo as
their suzerain, and it was, I believe, at his instance that Zambila was
appointed regent during the minority of her son. As we have annexed
what remains of Zululand, Cetywayo's suzerainty has consequently passed
to us.

          [20] I understand that the treaty which we have concluded
          with Amatongaland (where, by the way, it is said a new
          harbour has been discovered) binds the authorities of that
          country not to cede territory to any other Power. But there
          is nothing in such a treaty to prevent, say Portugal or the
          Boers, from taking possession of the land by force of arms.
          Were the country annexed to the Crown, or a British
          Protectorate established, they would not dare to do this.

          _Note._--This has since been done.--H. R. H.

Meanwhile, can nothing be done by direct treaty with the Portuguese? A
little while ago the Bay could no doubt have been acquired for a very
moderate consideration, but those golden opportunities have been
allowed to slip from hands busy weaving the web of party politics. Now
it is a different affair. Delagoa Bay is of no direct value to Portugal
except for the honour and glory of the thing. Portugal has never done
anything with it, any more than she has with her other African
possessions, and never will do anything with it. But it has become very
valuable, indeed, so far as its South African interests are concerned,
almost vital, to this country, and of that fact Portugal is perfectly
well aware. Consequently, if we want the Bay we must pay for it, if not
in cash, at the offer of which the Portuguese national pride might be
revolted, then in some other equivalent. Surely a power like England
could find a way of obliging one like Portugal in return for this small
concession. Or an exchange of territory might be effected. Perhaps
Portugal might be inclined to accept of some of our possessions on the
West Coast or an island or two in the West Indies. It is hard to
suppose that there is no way out of the trouble; but if indeed there is
none, why, then, one must be found, or we must be content to lose a
great part of our African trade.

The reader who has followed me through this brief and imperfect summary
of recent events in South Africa will see how varied are its interests,
how enormous its areas, and how vast its wealth. In that great country
England is still the paramount power. Her prestige has, indeed, been
greatly shaken, and she is sadly fallen from her estate of eight or
nine years gone. But she is still paramount; and if she has to face the
animosity of a section of the Boers, she can, notwithstanding her many
crimes against them, set against it the love and respect of every
native in the land, with the exception, perhaps, of a few self-seekers
and intriguers. The history of the next twenty years, and perhaps of
the next ten, will decide whether this country is to remain paramount
or whether South Africa is to become a great Dutch, English-hating
Republic. There are some who call themselves Englishmen, and who
possessed by that strange itch which prompts them to desire any evil
that can humble their country in the face of her enemies, or can bring
about the advantage of the rebel to the injury of the loyal subject, to
whom this last event would be most welcome, and who have not hesitated
to say that it would be welcome. To such there is nothing to be said.
Let them follow their false lights and earn the wonder of true-hearted
men and the maledictions of posterity.

But, addressing those of other and older doctrines, I would ask what
such an event would mean? It would mean nothing less than a great
national calamity; it would mean the utter ruin of the native tribes;
and, to come to a reason which has a wider popularity, for as I think
Mr. S. Little says in his work on South Africa, "the argument to the
pocket is the best argument to the man," it would mean the loss of a
vast trade, which, if properly protected, will be growing while we are
sleeping. And this calamity can yet be averted; the mistakes and
cowardice of the past can still be remedied, at any rate to a great
extent; the door is yet open. We have many difficulties to face, among
the chief of which are the Transvaal, the question of Delagoa Bay, and
last, but not least, the question of the Dutch party at the Cape, which
may be numerically the strongest party. When, in our mania for
representative institutions, we thrust responsible government upon the
Cape, we placed ourselves practically at the mercy of any chance
anti-English majority. It is possible that in the future we may find
some such majority urging upon an English Ministry the desirability of
the separation of the Cape Colony from the Empire, and may find also
that the prayer meets with favourable attention from those to whom
there is but one thing sacred, the rights of a majority, and especially
of an agitating majority.

But let not the country be deceived by any such representations. The
natives too have a right to a voice in the disposal of their fortunes
and their lands. They are the majority in the proportion of three to
one, and let any doubter go and ask of them, anywhere from the Zambesi
to Cape Agulhas, whether they would rather be ruled by the Queen or by
a Boer Republic, and hear the answer. When it was a question of
surrendering the Transvaal we heard a great deal of the rights of some
thirty thousand Boers, and very little, or rather nothing, of the
rights of the million natives who lived in the country with them, and
to whom that country originally belonged. And yet, if the reader will
turn to that part of this book which deals with the question, he will
find that they had an opinion, and a strong one. No settlement of South
African questions that does not receive adequate consideration from a
native point of view can be a just settlement, or one which the Home
Government should sanction. Moreover, the Cape is not by any means
entirely anti-English at heart, as was shown clearly enough by the
number and enthusiasm of the loyalist meetings when its Ministry was
attempting to undo Mr. Mackenzie's work in Bechuanaland in the
interests of the Patriot-party.

Still, it is possible that movements may arise under the fostering care
of the Africander Bond and its sympathisers, having for object the
separation of the colony from the Empire, or other ends fatal to
Imperial interests; and in this case the Home Government should be
prepared to disallow and put a final stop to them. We cannot afford to
lose our alternative route to India and to throw these great
territories into the hands of enemies, from which they would very
probably pass into those of commercial rivals. In such an event all
that would be required is a show of firmness. If once it was known that
an English Ministry really meant what it said, and that its promises
made in the Queen's name were not liable to be given the lie by a
succeeding set of politicians elected on another platform, there would
be an end to disloyalty and agitation in South Africa. As it is,
loyalists, remembering the experiences of the last few years, are
faint-hearted, never knowing if they will meet with support at home,
while agitators and enemies wax exceeding bold.

Our system of party government, whatever may be its merits, if any, as
applied to Home politics, is a great enemy to the welfare and progress
of our Colonies, the affairs of which are, especially of late years,
frequently used as stalking-horses to cover an attack upon the other
side. Could not the two great parties agree to rule Colonial affairs,
and especially South African affairs, out of the party game? Could not
the policy of the Colonial Office be guided by a Commission composed of
members of different political opinions, and responsible not to party,
but to Parliament and the country, instead of by a succession of
Ministers as variable and as transitory as shadows? Lord Rosebery and
Mr. Chamberlain, for instance, are Radicals; but, putting aside party
tactics and exigencies, are their views upon Colonial matters so widely
different from those of, let us say, Sir Michael Hicks Beach and Lord
Carnarvon that it would be impossible for these four gentlemen to act
together on such a Commission? Surely they are not; and perhaps a day
may come when the common-sense of the country will lead it to adopt
some such system which would give to the Colonies a fixed and
intelligent control aiming at the furtherance of the joint interests of
the Empire and its dependencies. If it ever does, that day will be a
happy one for all concerned.

Meanwhile, there is, so far as South Africa is concerned, a step that
might be taken to the great benefit of that country, and also of our
Imperial aims, and that is the appointment of a High Commissioner who
would have charge of all Imperial as distinguished from the various
Colonial interests. This appointment has already been advocated with
ability by Mr. Mackenzie in the last chapter of his book, "Austral
Africa," and it is undoubtedly one that should receive the
consideration of the Government. Such an officer would not supersede
the Governors of the various colonies or the administrators of the
native territories, although, so far as Imperial interests were
concerned, they would be primarily responsible to him. At present there
is no central authority except the Colonial Office, and Downing Street
is a long way off and somewhat overworked. Each Governor must
necessarily look at South African affairs from his own standpoint and
through local glasses. What is wanted is a man of the first ability,
whose name would command respect abroad and support at home; and
several such men could be found, who would study South African politics
as a whole as an engineer studies a map, and who would set himself to
conciliate and reconcile all interests for the common welfare and the
welfare of the mother-country. Such a man, or rather a succession of
such men, might, if properly supported, succeed in bringing about a
very different state of affairs from that which has been briefly
reviewed and considered in these pages. They might, little by little,
build up a South African Confederation, strong in itself and loyal to
England, that shall in time become a great empire. For my part,
notwithstanding the difficulties and dangers which we have brought upon
ourselves, and upon the various South African territories and their
inhabitants, I believe that such an empire is destined to arise, and
that it will not take the form of a Dutch Republic.




APPENDIX.




I.

THE POTCHEFSTROOM ATROCITIES, &c.


There were more murders and acts of cruelty committed during the war at
Potchefstroom, where the behaviour of the Boers was throughout both
deceitful and savage, than at any other place.

When the fighting commenced a number of ladies and children, the wives
and children of English residents, took refuge in the fort. Shortly
after it had been invested they applied to be allowed to return to
their homes in the town till the war was over. The request was refused
by the Boer commander, who said that as they had gone there, they might
stop and "perish" there. One poor lady, the wife of a gentleman well
known in the Transvaal, was badly wounded by having the point of a
stake, which had been cut in two by a bullet, driven into her side. She
was at the time in a state of pregnancy, and died some days afterwards
in great agony. Her little sister was shot through the throat, and
several other women and children suffered from bullet wounds, and fever
arising from their being obliged to live for months exposed to rain and
heat, with insufficient food.

The moving spirit of all the Potchefstroom atrocities was a cruel
wretch of the name of Buskes, a well-educated man, who, as an advocate
of the High Court, had taken the oath of allegiance to the Queen.

One deponent swears that he saw this Buskes wearing Captain Fall's
diamond ring, which he had taken from Sergeant Ritchie, to whom it was
handed to be sent to England, and also that he had possessed himself of
the carriages and other goods belonging to prisoners taken by the
Boers.[21] Another deponent (whose name is omitted in the Blue Book for
precautionary reasons) swears, "That on the next night the patrol again
came to my house accompanied by one Buskes, who was secretary of the
Boer Committee, and again asked where my wife and daughter were. I
replied, in bed; and Buskes then said, 'I must see for myself.' I
refused to allow him, and he forced me, with a loaded gun held to my
breast, to open the curtains of the bed, when he pulled the bedclothes
half off my wife, and altogether off my daughter. I then told him if I
had a gun I would shoot him. He placed a loaded gun at my breast, when
my wife sprang out of bed and got between us."

          [21] Buskes was afterwards forced to deliver up the ring.

I remember hearing at the time that this Buskes (who is a good
musician) took one of his victims, who was on the way to execution,
into the chapel and played the "Dead March in Saul," or some such
piece, over him on the organ.

After the capture of the Court House a good many Englishmen fell into
the hands of the Boers. Most of these were sentenced to hard labour and
deprivation of "civil rights." The sentence was enforced by making them
work in the trenches under a heavy fire from the fort. One poor fellow,
F. W. Finlay by name, got his head blown off by a shell from his own
friends in the fort, and several loyal Kafirs suffered the same fate.
After these events the remaining prisoners refused to return to the
trenches till they had been "tamed" by being thrashed with the butt end
of guns, and by threats of receiving twenty-five lashes each.

But their fate, bad as it was, was not so awful as that suffered by Dr.
Woite and J. Van der Linden.

Dr. Woite had attended the Boer meeting which was held before the
outbreak, and written a letter from thence to Major Clarke, in which he
had described the talk of the Boers as silly bluster. He was not a paid
spy. This letter was, unfortunately for him, found in Major Clarke's
pocket-book, and because of it he was put through a form of trial,
taken out and shot dead, all on the same day. He left a wife and large
family, who afterwards found their way to Natal in a destitute
condition.

The case of Van der Linden is somewhat similar. He was one of Raaf's
Volunteers, and as such had taken the oath of allegiance to the Queen.
In the execution of his duty he made a report to his commanding officer
about the Boer meeting, and which afterwards fell into the hands of the
Boers. On this he was put through the form of trial, and, though in the
service of the Queen, was found guilty of treason and condemned to
death. One of his judges, a little less stony-hearted than the rest,
pointed out that "when the prisoner committed the crime martial law had
not yet been proclaimed, nor the State," but it availed him nothing. He
was taken out and shot.

A Kafir named Carolus was also put through the form of trial and shot,
for no crime at all that I can discover.

Ten unarmed Kafir drivers, who had been sent away from the fort, were
shot down in cold blood by a party of Boers. Several witnesses depose
to having seen their remains lying together close by Potchefstroom.

Various other Kafirs were shot. None of the perpetrators of these
crimes were brought to justice. The Royal Commission comments on these
acts as follows:--

"In regard to the deaths of Woite, Van der Linden, and Carolus, the
Boer leaders do not deny the fact that those men had been executed, but
sought to justify it. The majority of your Commissioners felt bound to
record their opinion that the taking of the lives of these men was an
act contrary to the rules of civilised warfare. Sir H. de Villiers was
of opinion that the executions in these cases, having been ordered by
properly constituted court martial of the Boers' forces after due
trial, did not fall under the cognisance of your Commissioners.

"Upon the case of William Finlay the majority of your Commissioners
felt bound to record the opinion that the sacrifice of Finlay's life,
through forced labour under fire in the trenches, was an act contrary
to the rules of civilised warfare. _Sir H. de Villiers did not feel
justified by the facts of the case in joining in this expression of
opinion_ (sic). As to the case of the Kafir Andries, your Commissioners
decided that, although the shooting of this man appeared to them, from
the information laid before them, to be not in accordance with the
rules of civilised warfare, under all the circumstances of the case, it
was not desirable to insist upon a prosecution."

"The majority of your Commissioners, although feeling it a duty to
record emphatically their disapproval of the acts that resulted in the
deaths of Woite, Van der Linden, Finlay, and Carolus, yet found it
impossible to bring to justice the persons guilty of these acts."

It will be observed that Sir H. de Villiers does not express any
disapproval, emphatic or otherwise, of these wicked murders.

But Potchefstroom did not enjoy a monopoly of murder.

In December 1880, Captain Elliot, who was a survivor from the Bronker
Spruit massacre, and Captain Lambart, who had been taken prisoner by
the Boers whilst bringing remounts from the Free State, were released
from Heidelberg on parole on condition that they left the country. An
escort of two men brought them to a drift of the Vaal river, where they
refused to cross, because they could not get their cart through, the
river being in flood. The escort then returned to Heidelberg and
reported that the officers would not cross. A civil note was then sent
back to Captain Elliot and Lambart, signed by P. J. Joubert, telling
them "to pass the Vaal river immediately by the road that will be shown
to you." What secret orders, if any, were sent with this letter has
never transpired; but I decline to believe that, either in this or in
Barber's case, the Boer escort took upon themselves the responsibility
of murdering their prisoners, without authority of some kind for the
deed.

The men despatched from Heidelberg with the letter found Lambart and
Elliot wandering about and trying to find the way to Standerton, They
presented the letter, and took them towards a drift in the Vaal.
Shortly before they got there the prisoners noticed that their escort
had been reinforced. It would be interesting to know, if these extra
men were not sent to assist in the murder, how and why they turned up
as they did and joined themselves to the escort. The prisoners were
taken to an old and disused drift of the Vaal river and told to cross.
It was now dark, and the river was much swollen with rain; in fact,
impassable for the cart and horses. Captains Elliot and Lambart begged
to be allowed to outspan till the next morning, but were told that they
must cross, which they accordingly attempted to do. A few yards from
the bank the cart stuck on a rock, and whilst in this position the Boer
escort poured a volley into it. Poor Elliot was instantly killed, one
bullet fracturing his skull, another passing through the back, a third
shattering the right thigh, and a fourth breaking the left wrist. The
cart was also riddled, but strange to say, Captain Lambart was
untouched, and succeeded in swimming to the further bank, the Boers
firing at him whenever the flashes of lightning revealed his
whereabouts. After sticking some time in the mud of the bank he managed
to effect his escape, and next day reached the house of an Englishman
called Groom, living in the Free State, and from thence made his way to
Natal.

Two of the murderers were put through a form of trial, after the
conclusion of peace, and acquitted.

The case of the murder of Dr. Barber is of a somewhat similar character
to that of Elliot, except that there is in this case a curious piece of
indirect evidence that seems to connect the murder directly with Piet
Joubert, one of the Triumvirate.

In the month of February 1881, two Englishmen came to the Boer laager
at Lang's Nek to offer their services as doctors. Their names were Dr.
Barber, who was well known to the Boers, and his assistant, Mr. Walter
Dyas, and they came, not from Natal, but the Orange Free State. On
arrival at the Boer camp they were at first well received, but after a
little while seized, searched, and tied up all night to a disselboom
(pole of a waggon). Next morning they were told to mount their horses,
and started from the camp escorted by two men who were to take them
over the Free State line.

When they reached the Free State line the Boers told them to get off
their horses, which they were ordered to bring back to the camp. They
did so, bade good-day to their escort, and started to walk on towards
their destination. When they had gone about forty yards Dyas heard the
report of a rifle, and Barber called out, "My God, I am shot!" and fell
dead.

Dyas went down on his hands and knees and saw one of the escort
deliberately aim at him. He then jumped up, and ran dodging from right
to left, trying to avoid the bullet. Presently the man fired, and he
felt himself struck through the thigh. He fell with his face to the
men, and saw his would-be assassin put a fresh cartridge into his rifle
and aim at him. Turning his face to the ground he awaited his death,
but the bullet whizzed past his head. He then saw the men take the
horses and go away, thinking they had finished him. After waiting a
while he managed to get up and struggled to a house not far off; where
he was kindly treated and remained till he recovered.

Some time after this occurrence a Hottentot, named Allan Smith, made a
statement at Newcastle, from, which it appears that he had been taken
prisoner by the Boers and made to work for them. One night he saw
Barber and Dyas tied to the disselboom, and overheard the following,
which I will give in his own words:--

"I went to a fire where some Boers were sitting; among them was a
low-sized man, moderately stout, with a dark brown full beard,
apparently about thirty-five years of age I do not know his name.
_He was telling his comrades that he had brought an order from Piet
Joubert_ to Viljoen, to take the two prisoners to the Free State
line _and shoot them there_. He said, in the course of conversation,
'Piet Joubert het gevraacht waarom was de mensche neet dood geschiet
toen hulle bijde eerste laager gekom het' ('Piet Joubert asked why were
the men not shot when they came to the first laager.') They then saw me
at the fire, and one of them said, 'You must not talk before that
fellow; he understands what you say, and will tell everybody.

"Next morning Viljoen told me to go away, and gave me a pass into the
Free State. He said (in Dutch), 'You must not drive for any Englishman
again. If we catch you doing so we will shoot you, and if you do not go
away quick, and we catch you hanging about when we bring the two men to
the line, we will shoot you too.'"

Dyas, who escaped, made an affidavit with reference to this statement
in which he says, "I have read the foregoing affidavit of Allan Smith,
and I say that the person described in the third paragraph thereof as
bringing orders from Piet Joubert to Viljoen, corresponds with one of
the Boers who took Dr. Barber and myself to the Free State, and to the
best of my belief he is the man who shot Dr. Barber."

The actual murderers were put on their trial in the Free State, and, of
course, acquitted. In his examination at the trial, Allan Smith says,
"It was a young man who said that Joubert had given orders that Barber
had to be shot.... It was not at night, but in the morning early, when
the young man spoke about Piet Joubert's order."

Most people will gather, from what I have quoted, that there exists a
certain connection between the dastardly murder of Dr. Barber (and the
attempted murder of Mr. Dyas) and Piet Joubert, one of that "able"
Triumvirate of which Mr. Gladstone speaks so highly.

I shall only allude to one more murder, though more are reported to
have occurred, amongst them that of Mr. Malcolm, who was kicked to
death by Boers,--and that is Mr. Green's.

Mr. Green was an English gold-digger, and was travelling along the main
road to his home at Spitzcop. The road passed close by the military
camp at Lydenburg, into which he was called. On coming out he went to a
Boer patrol with a flag of truce, and whilst talking to them was shot
dead. The Rev. J. Thorne, the English clergyman at Lydenburg, describes
this murder in an affidavit in the following words:--

"That I was the clergyman who got together a party of Englishmen and
brought down the body of Mr. Green who was murdered by the Boers and
buried it. I have ascertained the circumstances of the murder, which
were as follows:--Mr. Green was on his way to the gold-fields. As he
was passing the fort, he was called in by the officers, and sent out
again with a message to the Boer commandant. Immediately on leaving the
camp, he went to the Boer guard opposite with a flag of truce in his
hand; while parleying with the Boers, who proposed to make a prisoner
of him, he was shot through the head."

No prosecution was instituted in this case. Mr. Green left a wife and
children in a destitute condition.




II.

PLEDGES GIVEN BY MR GLADSTONE'S GOVERNMENT AS TO THE RETENTION OF
THE TRANSVAAL AS A BRITISH COLONY.


The following extracts from the speeches, despatches, and telegrams of
members of the present Government, with reference to the proposed
retrocession of the Transvaal, are not without interest:--

During the month of May 1880, Lord Kimberley despatched a telegram to
Sir Bartle Frere, in which the following words occur: "_Under no
circumstances can the Queen's authority in the Transvaal be
relinquished._"

In a despatch dated 20th May, and addressed to Sir Bartle Frere, Lord
Kimberley says, "That the sovereignty of the Queen in the Transvaal
could not be relinquished."

In a speech in the House of Lords on the 24th May 1880, Lord Kimberley
said:--

"There was a still stronger reason than that for not receding; it was
impossible to say what calamities such a step as receding might not
cause. We had, at the cost of much blood and treasure, restored peace,
and the effect of our now reversing our policy would be to leave the
province in a state of anarchy, and possibly to cause an internecine
war. For such a risk, he could not make himself responsible. The number
of the natives in the Transvaal was estimated at about 800,000, and
that of the whites less than 50,000. Difficulties with the Zulus and
frontier tribes would again arise, and, looking as they must to South
Africa as a whole, the Government, after a careful consideration of the
question, came to the conclusion _that we could not relinquish the
Transvaal_. Nothing could be more unfortunate than uncertainty in
respect to such a matter."

On the 8th June 1880, Mr. Gladstone, in reply to a Boer memorial, wrote
as follows:--

"It is undoubtedly a matter for much regret that it should, since the
Annexation, have appeared that so large a number of the population of
Dutch origin in the Transvaal are opposed to the annexation of that
territory, but it is impossible now, to consider that question as if it
were presented for the first time. We have to do with a state of things
which has existed for a considerable period, during which _obligations
have been contracted, especially, though not exclusively, towards the
native population, which cannot be set aside_. Looking to all the
circumstances, both of the Transvaal and the rest of South Africa, and
to the necessity of preventing a renewal of disorders, which might lead
to disastrous consequences, not only to the Transvaal but to the whole
of South Africa, _our judgment it that the Queen cannot be advised to
relinquish the Transvaal_."

Her Majesty's Speech, delivered in Parliament on the 6th January 1881,
contains the following words: "A rising in the Transvaal has recently
imposed upon me the duty of _vindicating my authority_."

These extracts are rather curious reading in face of the policy adopted
by the Government, after our troops had been defeated.




III.

A BOER ON BOER DESIGNS.


I reprint here a letter published in _The Times_ of 14th October
1899, together with a prefatory note added by the editor of that
journal. This epistle seems to me worthy of the study of thinking men.
Much of it, most of it indeed, is mere brutal vapouring, false in its
facts, false in its deductions; remarkable only for the livid hues of
hate with which it is coloured. Yet in this vile concoction, the work
evidently of a half-educated member of the Cape Dutch party, or perhaps
of an Afrikander Irishman of the stamp of the late notorious Fenian
Aylward, appear statements built upon a basis of truth which we should
do well to lay to heart. I allude principally to the question of our
food supply and to the possible behaviour of the electorate in the
event of a great war under pressure of want and high prices. (See
paragraph 3 of the letter of "P. S.") In a very different work, "A
Farmer's Year," pages 179 and 380, I have attempted to treat of this
great matter which elsewhere has been dealt with also by others more
able and perhaps better qualified. Until it is reasonably certain that
under any circumstances which we can conceive the price of food stuffs
will not be raised to a prohibitive point, it can never be said that
the future of Great Britain is assured beyond all probable doubt. When
will this problem receive the attention it deserves at the hands of our
Governments and of those over whom they rule?


We have received the following letter, appropriately headed "Boer
Ignorance." The writer bears a well-known Dutch name, and gives as his
late address the name of a well-known town in a Dutch district of Cape
Colony:--

    _To the Editor of the "Times."_

    SIR,--In your paper you have often commented on what you are
    pleased to call the ignorance of my countrymen, the Boers. We are
    not so ignorant as the British statesmen and newspaper writers, nor
    are we such fools as you British are. We know our policy, and we do
    not change it. We have no opposition party to fear nor to truckle
    to. Your boasted Conservative majority has been the obedient tool
    of the Radical minority, and the Radical minority has been the
    blind tool of our farseeing and intelligent, President. We have
    desired delay, and we have had it, and we are now practically
    masters of Africa from the Zambezi to the Cape. All the Afrikanders
    in Cape Colony have been working for years for this end, for they
    and we know the facts.

     1. The actual value of gold in the Transvaal is at least 200,000
    millions of pounds, and this fact is as well known to the Emperors
    of Germany and Russia as it is to us. You estimate the value of the
    gold at only 700 millions of pounds, or, at least, that is what you
    pretend to estimate it at. But Germany, Russia, and France do not
    desire you to get possession of this vast mass of gold, and so,
    after encouraging you to believe that they will not interfere in
    South Africa they will certainly do so, and very easily find a
    _casus belli_, and they will assist us directly and indirectly
    to drive you out of Africa.

     2. We know that you dare not take any precautions in advance to
    prevent the onslaught of the Great Powers, as the Opposition, the
    great peace party, will raise the question of expense, and this
    will win over your lazy, dirty, drunken working classes, who will
    never again permit themselves to be taxed to support your Empire,
    or even to preserve your existence as a nation.

     3. We know from all the military authorities of the European and
    American continents that you exist as an independent Power merely
    on sufferance, and that at any moment the great Emperor William can
    arrange with France or Russia to wipe you off the face of the
    earth. They can at any time starve you into surrender. You must
    yield in all things to the United States also, or your supply of
    corn will be so reduced by the Americans that your working classes
    would be compelled to pay high prices for their food, and rather
    than do that they would have civil war, and invite any foreign
    Power to assist them by invasion, for there is no patriotism in the
    working classes of England, Wales, or Ireland.

     4. We know that your country has been more prosperous than any
    other country during the last fifty years (you have had no civil
    war like the Americans and French to tone up your nerves and
    strengthen your manliness), and consequently your able-bodied men
    will not enlist in your so-called voluntary army. Therefore you
    have to hire the dregs of your population to do your fighting, and
    they are deficient in physique, in moral and mental ability, and in
    all the qualities that make good fighting men.

     5. Your military officers we know to be merely pedantic scholars or
    frivolous society men, without any capacity for practical warfare
    with white men.  The Afridis were more than a match for you, and
    your victory over the Sudanese was achieved because those poor
    people had not a rifle amongst them.

     6. We know that your men, being the dregs of your people, are
    naturally feeble, and that they are also saturated with the most
    horrible sexual diseases, as all your Government returns plainly
    show, and that they cannot endure the hardships of war.

     7. We know that the entire British race is rapidly decaying, your
    birth-rate is rapidly falling, your children are born weak,
    diseased, and deformed, and that the major part of your population
    consists of females, cripples, epileptics, consumptives, cancerous
    people, invalids, and lunatics of all kinds whom you carefully
    nourish and preserve.

     8. We know that nine-tenths of your statesmen and higher officials,
    military and naval, are suffering from kidney diseases, which
    weaken their courage and will-power and makes them shirk all
    responsibility as far as possible.

     9. We know that your Navy is big, but we know that it is not
    powerful, and that it is honeycombed with disloyalty--as witness
    the theft of the signal-books, the assaults on officers, the
    desertions, and the wilful injury of the boilers and machinery,
    which all the vigilance of the officers is powerless to prevent.

    10. We know that the Conservative Government is a mere sham, and
    that it largely reduced the strength of the British artillery in
    1888-89. And we know that it does nor dare now to call out the
    Militia for training, nor to mobilise the Fleet, nor to give
    sufficient grants to the Line and Volunteers for ammunition to
    enable them to become good marksmen and efficient soldiers. We
    know that British soldiers and sailors are immensely inferior as
    marksmen, not only to Germans, French, and Americans, but also to
    Japanese, Afridis, Chilians, Peruvians, Belgians, and Russians.

    11. We know that no British Government dares to propose any form of
    compulsory military or naval training, for the British people would
    rather be invaded, conquered, and governed by Germans, Russians, or
    Frenchmen than be compelled to serve their own Government.

    12. We Boers know that we will not be governed by a set of British
    curs, but that we will drive you out of Africa altogether, and the
    other manly nations which have compulsory military service--the
    armed manhood of Europe--will very quickly divide all your other
    possessions between them.

    Talk no more of the ignorance of the Boers or Cape Dutch; a few
    days more will prove your ignorance of the British position, and in
    a short space of time you and your Queen will be imploring the good
    offices of the great German Emperor to deliver you from your
    disasters, for your humiliations are not yet complete.

    For thirty years the Cape Dutch have been waiting their chance, and
    now their day has come; they will throw off their mask and your
    yoke at the same instant, and 300,000 Dutch heroes will trample you
    under foot.

    We can afford to tell you the truth now, and in this letter you
    have got it.--Yours, &c.,

    P. S.

    _October 12._


    Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO.
    Edinburgh & London





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[Illustration: “If he wanted to fight, he’d hardly be in an office”]

------------------------------------------------------------------------

SECRET SERVICE

Being the Happenings of a Night in Richmond in the Spring of 1865
Done into Book Form from the Play by William Gillette

by

CYRUS TOWNSEND BRADY

Illustrated by the Kinneys







New York
Grosset & Dunlap
Publishers

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Copyright, 1912, by
Dodd, Mead and Company

Published, January, 1912

------------------------------------------------------------------------

              I DEDICATE MY SHARE OF THIS JOINT PRODUCTION
                                   TO

The many people of the stage, personally known and unknown by me, who
have so often interested, amused, instructed, and inspired me by their
presentations of life in all its infinite variety. They are a much
misunderstood people by the public generally, and I take this occasion
to testify that, in my wide acquaintance with stage people, I have found
them as gentle, as generous, as refined, and as considerate as any group
of people with whom I have associated in my long and varied career.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

                                PREFACE

Once upon a time a novel of mine was turned into a play. The dramatist
who prepared the story for stage production sent me a copy of his
efforts toward that end. About the only point of resemblance between his
production and mine was the fact that they both bore the same title, the
hero in each had the same name, and the action in both cases took place
on this earth.

I was a young author then, and timid. I ventured humbly to enquire why
the drama differed so entirely from the novel; and this ingenious, I
might almost say ingenuous, explanation was vouchsafed me:

“Well, to tell you the truth, after I had read a chapter or two of your
book, I lost it, and I just wrote the play from my own imagination.”

I do not wish to criticise the results of his efforts, for he has since
proved himself to be a dramatist of skill and ability, but to describe
that particular effort as a dramatisation of my book was absurd.
Incidentally, it was absurd in other ways and, fortunately for the
reputation of both of us, it never saw the light.

When my dear friends, the publishers, asked me to turn this play into a
novel, I recalled my experience of by-gone days, and the idea flashed
into my mind that here was an opportunity to get even, but I am a
preacher as well as a story-writer, and in either capacity I found I
could not do it. Frankly, I did not want to do it.

My experience, however, has made me perhaps unduly sensitive, and I
determined, since I had undertaken this work, to make it represent Mr.
Gillette’s remarkable and brilliant play as faithfully as I could, and I
have done so. I have used my own words only in those slight changes
necessitated by book presentation instead of production on the stage. I
have entered into as few explanations as possible and have limited my
own discussion of the characters, their motives, and their actions, to
what was absolutely necessary to enable the reader to comprehend. On the
stage much is left to the eye which has to be conveyed by words in a
book, and this is my excuse for even those few digressions that appear.

I have endeavoured to subordinate my own imagination to that of the
accomplished playwright. I have played something of the part of the old
Greek Chorus which explained the drama, and there has been a touch of
the scene-painter’s art in my small contribution to the book.

Otherwise, I have not felt at liberty to make any departure from the
setting, properties, episodes, actions, or dialogue. Mine has been a
very small share in this joint production. The story and the glory are
Mr. Gillette’s, not mine. And I am cheerfully determined that as the
author of the first, he shall have all of the second.

                                                   Cyrus Townsend Brady.

                                                   St. George’s Rectory,
                                       Kansas City, Mo., November, 1911.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

CONTENTS

                  BOOK I
      WHAT HAPPENED AT EIGHT O’CLOCK

    I The Battery Passes                     3
   II A Commission from the President       18
  III Orders to Captain Thorne              34
   IV Miss Mitford’s Intervention           49
    V The Unfaithful Servant                69
   VI The Confidence of Edith Varney        86

                 BOOK II
      WHAT HAPPENED AT NINE O’CLOCK

  VII Wilfred Writes a Letter              105
 VIII Edith Is Forced to Play the Game     133
   IX The Shot That Killed                 154

                BOOK III
      WHAT HAPPENED AT TEN O’CLOCK

    X Caroline Mitford Writes a Despatch   173
   XI Mr. Arrelsford Again Interposes      187
  XII Thorne Takes Charge of the Telegraph 204
 XIII The Tables Are Turned                217
  XIV The Call of the Key                  229
   XV Love and Duty at the Touch           247

                 BOOK IV
      WHAT HAPPENED AT ELEVEN O’CLOCK

  XVI The Tumult in Human Hearts           261
 XVII Wilfred Plays the Man                271
XVIII Captain Thorne Justifies Himself     292
  XIX The Drumhead Court-Martial           301
   XX The Last Reprieve                    318

      Afterword                            330

------------------------------------------------------------------------

                                 BOOK I

                     WHAT HAPPENED AT EIGHT O’CLOCK

------------------------------------------------------------------------

                               CHAPTER I

                           THE BATTERY PASSES


Outside, the softness of an April night; the verdure of tree and lawn,
the climbing roses, already far advanced in that southern latitude,
sweetly silvered in the moonlight. Within the great old house apparently
an equal calm.

Yet, neither within nor without was the night absolutely soundless. Far
away to the southward the cloudless horizon, easily visible from the
slight eminence on which the house stood, was marked by quivering
flashes of lurid light. From time to time, the attentive ear might catch
the roll, the roar, the reverberation of heavy sound like distant
thunder-peals intermingled with sharper detonations. The flashes came
from great guns, and the rolling peals were the sound of the cannon, the
detonations explosions of the shells. There was the peace of God in the
heaven above; there were the passions of men on the earth beneath.

Lights gleamed here and there, shining through the twining rose foliage,
from the windows of the old house, which stood far back from the street.
From a room on one side of the hall, which opened from the broad
pillared portico of Colonial fashion, a hum of voices arose.

A group of women, with nervous hands and anxious faces, working while
they talked, were picking lint, tearing linen and cotton for bandages.
Their conversation was not the idle chatter of other days. They “told
sad stories of the death of kings!” How “Tom” and “Charles” and “Allen”
and “Page” and “Burton” had gone down into the Valley of the Shadow of
Death, whence they had not come back. How this fort had been hammered
yesterday, the other, the day before. How So-and-So’s wounds had been
ministered to. How Such-a-One’s needs had been relieved. How the enemy
were drawing closer and closer and closer, and how they were being held
back with courage, which, alas! by that time was the courage of despair.
And much of their speech was of their own kind, of bereft women and
fatherless children. And ever as they talked, the busy fingers flew.

Upstairs from one of the front rooms the light shone dimly through a
window partly covered by a half-drawn Venetian blind. One standing at
the side of the house and listening would have heard out of the chamber
low moanings, muttered words from feverish lips and delirious brain. The
meaningless yet awful babble was broken now and again by words of
tenderness and anguish. Soft hands were laid on the burning brow of the
poor sufferer within, while a mother’s eyes dropped tears upon
bloodstained bandages and wasted frame.

And now the gentle wind which swept softly through the trees bore a
sudden sharper, stranger sound toward the old house in the garden. The
tramp of horse, the creak of wheels, the faint jingling of arms and
sabres drew nearer and rose louder. Sudden words of command punctured
the night. Here came a battery, without the rattle of drum or the blare
of bugles, with no sound but its own galloping it rolled down the
street. Lean, gaunt horses were ridden and driven by leaner and gaunter
men in dusty, worn, ragged, tattered uniforms. Only the highly polished
brass guns—twelve-pounder Napoleons—gleamed bright in the moonlight.

The sewing women came out on the porch and the blind of the window above
was lifted and a white-haired woman stood framed in the light.

No, those watchers did not cheer as the battery swept by on its way to
the front. For one thing, a soldier lay upstairs dying; for another,
they had passed the time when they cheered that tattered flag. Now they
wept over it as one weeps as he beholds for the last time the face of a
friend who dies. Once they had acclaimed it as the sunrise in the
morning, now they watched it silently go inevitably to the sunset of
defeat.

The men did not cheer either. They were not past cheering—oh, no! They
were made of rougher stuff than the women, and the time would come when,
in final action, they would burst forth into that strange, wild yell
that struck terror to the hearts of the hearers. They could cheer even
in the last ditch, even in the jaws of death—face the end better for
their cheering perhaps; but women are more silent in the crisis. They
bear and give no tongue.

The officer in command saw the little group of women on the porch. The
moonlight shone from the street side and high-lighted them, turning the
rusty black of most of the gowns, home-dyed mourning,—all that could be
come at in those last awful days in Richmond,—into soft shadows, above
which their faces shone angelic. He saw the woman’s head in the window,
too. He knew who lay upon the bed of death within the chamber. He had
helped to bring him back from the front several days before. He bit his
lips for a moment and then, ashamed of his emotion, his voice rang
harsh. With arm and sabre the battery saluted the women and passed on,
while from the window of the great drawing-room, opposite the room of
the lint-pickers and bandage-tearers, a slender boy stared and stared
after the disappearing guns, his eyes full of envy and vexatious tears
as he stamped his foot in futile protest and disappointment.

The noise made by the passing cannon soon died away in the distance.
Stillness supervened as before; workers whispered together, realising
that some of those passing upon whom they had looked would pass no more,
and that they would look upon them never again. Upstairs the moans of
the wounded man had died away, the only thing that persisted was the
fearful thundering of the distant guns around beleaguered Petersburg.
Within the drawing-room, the boy walked up and down restlessly,
muttering to himself, evidently nerving himself to desperate resolution.

“I won’t do it,” he said. “I won’t stay here any longer.”

He threw up his hands and turned to the portraits that adorned the room,
portraits that carried one back through centuries to the days of the
first cavalier of the family, who crossed the seas to seek his fortune
in a new land, and it was a singular thing that practically every one of
them wore a sword.

“You all fought,” said the boy passionately, “and I am going to.”

The door at the other end was softly opened. The great room was but
dimly lighted by candles in sconces on the wall; the great chandelier
was not lighted for lack of tapers, but a more brilliant radiance was
presently cast over the apartment by the advent of old Martha. She had
been the boy’s “Mammy” and the boy’s father’s “Mammy” as well, and no
one dared to speculate how much farther into the past she ran back.

“Is dat you, Mars Wilfred?” said the old woman, waddling into the room,
both hands extended, bearing two many-branched candle-sticks, which she
proceeded to deposit upon the handsome mahogany tables with which the
long drawing-room was furnished.

“Yes, it is I, Aunt Martha. Did you see Benton’s Battery go by?”

“Lawd lub you, chile, Ah done seed so many guns an’ hosses an’ soljahs
a-gwine by Ah don’t tek no notice ob ’em no mo’. ’Peahs lak dey keep on
a-passin’ by fo’ebah.”

“Well, there won’t be many more of them pass by,” said the boy in a
clear accent, but with that soft intonation which would have betrayed
his Southern ancestry anywhere, “and before they are all gone, I would
like to join one of them myself.”

“Why, my po’ li’l lamb!” exclaimed Martha, her arms akimbo, “dat Ah done
nussed in dese ahms, is you gwine to de fight!”

The boy’s demeanour was anything but lamb-like. He made a fierce step
toward her.

“Don’t you call me ‘lamb’ any more,” he said, “it’s ridiculous and——”

Mammy Martha started back in alarm.

“’Peahs mo’ lak a lion’d be better,” she admitted.

“Where’s mother?” asked the boy, dismissing the subject as unworthy of
argument.

“I reckon she’s upstaihs wid Mars Howard, suh. Yo’ bruddah——”

“I want to see her right away,” continued the boy impetuously.

“Mars Howard he’s putty bad dis ebenin’,” returned Martha. “Ah bettah go
an’ tell her dat you want her, but Ah dunno’s she’d want to leab him.”

“Well, you tell her to come as soon as she can. I’m awfully sorry for
Howard, but it’s living men that the Confederacy needs most now.”

“Yas, suh,” returned the old nurse, with a quizzical look out of her
black eyes at the slender boy before her. “Dey suah does need men,” she
continued, and as the youngster took a passionate step toward her, she
deftly passed out of the room and closed the door behind her, and he
could hear her ponderous footsteps slowly and heavily mounting the
steps.

The boy went to the window again and stared into the night. In his
preoccupation he did not catch the sound of a gentler footfall upon the
stairs, nor did he notice the opening of the door and the silent
approach of a woman, the woman with white hair who had stood at the
window. The mother of a son dead, a son dying, and a son living. No
distinctive thing that in the Confederacy. Almost any mother who had
more than one boy could have been justly so characterised. She stopped
half-way down the room and looked lovingly and longingly at the slight,
graceful figure of her youngest son. Her eyes filled with tears—for the
dying or the living or both? Who can say? She went toward him, laid her
hand on his shoulder. He turned instantly and at the sight of her tears
burst out quickly:

“Howard isn’t worse, is he?” for a moment forgetful of all else.

The woman shook her head.

“I am afraid he is. The sound of that passing battery seemed to excite
him so. He thought he was at the front again and wanted to get up.”

“Poor old Howard!”

“He’s quieter now, perhaps——”

“Mother, is there anything I can do for him?”

“No, my son,” answered the woman with a sigh, “I don’t think there is
anything that anybody can do. We can only wait—and hope. He is in God’s
hands, not ours.”

She lifted her face for a moment and saw beyond the room, through the
night, and beyond the stars a Presence Divine, to Whom thousands of
other women in that dying Confederacy made daily, hourly, and momentary
prayers. Less exalted, more human, less touched, the boy bowed his head,
not without his own prayer, too.

“But you wanted to see me, Wilfred, Martha said,” the woman presently
began.

“Yes, mother, I——”

The boy stopped and the woman was in no hurry to press him. She divined
what was coming and would fain have avoided it all.

“I am thankful there is a lull in the cannonading,” she said, listening.
“I wonder why it has stopped?”

“It has not stopped,” said Wilfred, “at least it has gone on all
evening.”

“I don’t hear it now.”

“No, but you will—there!”

“Yes, but compared to what it was yesterday—you know how it shook the
house—and Howard suffered so through it.”

“So did I,” said the boy in a low voice fraught with passion.

“You, my son?”

“Yes, mother, when I hear those guns and know that the fighting is going
on, it fairly maddens me——”

But Mrs. Varney hastily interrupted her boy. Woman-like she would thrust
from her the decision which she knew would be imposed upon her.

“Yes, yes,” she said; “I know how you suffered,—we all suffered,
we——” She turned away, sat down in a chair beside the table, leaned
her head in her hands, and gave way to her emotions. “There has been
nothing but suffering, suffering since this awful war began,” she
murmured.

“Mother,” said Wilfred abruptly, “I want to speak to you. You don’t like
it, of course, but you have just got to listen this time.”

Mrs. Varney lifted her head from her hands. Wilfred came nearer to her
and dropped on his knees by her side. One hand she laid upon his
shoulder, the other on his head. She stared down into his up-turned
face.

“I know—I know, my boy—what you want.”

“I can’t stay here any longer,” said the youth; “it is worse than being
shot to pieces. I just have to chain myself to the floor whenever I hear
a cannon-shot or see a soldier. When can I go?”

The woman stared at him. In him she saw faintly the face of the boy
dying upstairs. In him she saw the white face of the boy who lay under
the sun and dew, dead at Seven Pines. In him she saw all her kith and
kin, who, true to the traditions of that house, had given up their lives
for a cause now practically lost. She could not give up the last one.
She drew him gently to her, but, boy-like, he disengaged himself and
drew away with a shake of his head, not that he loved his mother the
less, but honour—as he saw it—the more.

“Why don’t you speak?” he whispered at last.

“I don’t know what to say to you, Wilfred,” faltered his mother,
although there was but one thing to say, and she knew that she must say
it, yet she was fighting, woman-like, for time.

“I will tell you what to say,” said the boy.

“What?”

“Say that you won’t mind if I go down to Petersburg and enlist.”

“But that would not be true, Wilfred,” said his mother, smiling faintly.

“True or not, mother, I can’t stay here.”

“Oh, Wilfred, Russell has gone, and Howard is going, and now you want to
go and get killed.”

“I don’t want to be killed at all, mother.”

“But you are so young, my boy.”

“Not younger than Tom Kittridge,” answered the boy; “not younger than
Ell Stuart or Cousin Steven or hundreds of other boys down there. See,
mother—they have called for all over eighteen, weeks ago; the seventeen
call may be out any moment; the next one after that takes me. Do you
want me to stay here until I am ordered out! I should think not. Where’s
your pride?”

“My pride? Ah, my son, it is on the battlefield, over at Seven Pines,
and upstairs with Howard.”

“Well, I don’t care, mother,” he persisted obstinately. “I love you and
all that, you know it,—but I can’t stand this. I’ve got to go. I must
go.”

Mrs. Varney recognised from the ring of determination in the boy’s voice
that his mind was made up. She could no longer hold him. With or without
her consent he would go, and why should she withhold it? Other boys as
young as hers had gone and had not come back. Aye, there was the rub:
she had given one, the other trembled on the verge, and now the last
one! Yes, he must go, too,—to live or die as God pleased. If they
wanted her to sacrifice everything on the altar of her country, she had
her own pride, she would do it, as hundreds of other women had done. She
rose from her chair and went toward her boy. He was a slender lad of
sixteen but was quite as tall as she. As he stood there he looked
strangely like his father, thought the woman.

“Well,” she said at last, “I will write to your father and——”

“But,” the boy interrupted in great disappointment, “that’ll take
  Because you saved my rice. Have you no thanks?

VIJAYA [_sings_]

  _Sing you of her, O first few stars,
  Whom Brahma, touching with his finger, praises, for you hold
  The van of wandering quiet; ere you be too calm and old,
  Sing, turning in your cars,
  Sing, till you raise your hands and sigh, and from your car heads peer,
  With all your whirling hair, and drop tear upon azure tear._

ANASHUYA.

  What know the pilots of the stars of tears?

VIJAYA.

  Their faces are all worn, and in their eyes
  Flashes the fire of sadness, for they see
  The icicles that famish all the north,
  Where men lie frozen in the glimmering snow;
  And in the flaming forests cower the lion
  And lioness, with all their whimpering cubs;
  And, ever pacing on the verge of things,
  The phantom, Beauty, in a mist of tears;
  While we alone have round us woven woods,
  And feel the softness of each other’s hand,
  Amrita, while—

ANASHUYA [_going away from him_].

  Ah me, you love another,

[_Bursting into tears_]

  And may some dreadful ill befall her quick!

VIJAYA.

  I loved another; now I love no other.
  Among the mouldering of ancient woods
  You live, and on the village border she,
  With her old father the blind wood-cutter;
  I saw her standing in her door but now.

ANASHUYA.

  Vijaya, swear to love her never more.

VIJAYA.

  Ay, ay.

ANASHUYA.

        Swear by the parents of the gods,
  Dread oath, who dwell on sacred Himalay,
  On the far Golden Peak; enormous shapes,
  Who still were old when the great sea was young;
  On their vast faces mystery and dreams;
  Their hair along the mountains rolled and filled
  From year to year by the unnumbered nests
  Of aweless birds, and round their stirless feet
  The joyous flocks of deer and antelope,
  Who never hear the unforgiving hound.
  Swear!

VIJAYA.

  By the parents of the gods, I swear.

ANASHUYA [_sings_].

  _I have forgiven, O new star!
  Maybe you have not heard of us, you have come forth so newly,
  You hunter of the fields afar!
  Ah, you will know my loved one by his hunter’s arrows truly,
  Shoot on him shafts of quietness, that he may ever keep
  An inner laughter, and may kiss his hands to me in sleep._

  Farewell, Vijaya. Nay, no word, no word;
  I, priestess of this temple, offer up
  Prayers for the land.

[VIJAYA _goes_]

                    O Brahma, guard in sleep
  The merry lambs and the complacent kine,
  The flies below the leaves, and the young mice
  In the tree roots, and all the sacred flocks
  Of red flamingo; and my love, Vijaya;
  And may no restless fay with fidget finger
  Trouble his sleeping: give him dreams of me.


THE INDIAN UPON GOD

  I PASSED along the water’s edge below the humid trees,
  My spirit rocked in evening light, the rushes round my knees,
  My spirit rocked in sleep and sighs; and saw the moorfowl pace
  All dripping on a grassy slope, and saw them cease to chase
  Each other round in circles, and heard the eldest speak:
  _Who holds the world between His bill and made us strong or weak
  Is an undying moorfowl, and He lives beyond the sky.
  The rains are from His dripping wing, the moonbeams from his eye._
  I passed a little further on and heard a lotus talk:
  _Who made the world and ruleth it, He hangeth on a stalk,
  For I am in His image made, and all this tinkling tide
  Is but a sliding drop of rain between His petals wide._
  A little way within the gloom a roebuck raised his eyes
  Brimful of starlight, and he said: _The Stamper of the Skies,
  He is a gentle roebuck; for how else, I pray, could He
  Conceive a thing so sad and soft, a gentle thing like me?_
  I passed a little further on and heard a peacock say:
  _Who made the grass and made the worms and made my feathers gay,
  He is a monstrous peacock, and He waveth all the night
  His languid tail above us, lit with myriad spots of light._


THE INDIAN TO HIS LOVE

  THE island dreams under the dawn
  And great boughs drop tranquillity;
  The peahens dance on a smooth lawn,
  A parrot sways upon a tree,
  Raging at his own image in the enamelled sea.

  Here we will moor our lonely ship
  And wander ever with woven hands,
  Murmuring softly lip to lip,
  Along the grass, along the sands,
  Murmuring how far away are the unquiet lands:

  How we alone of mortals are
  Hid under quiet boughs apart,
  While our love grows an Indian star,
  A meteor of the burning heart,
  One with the tide that gleams, the wings that gleam and dart,

  The heavy boughs, the burnished dove
  That moans and sighs a hundred days:
  How when we die our shades will rove,
  When eve has hushed the feathered ways,
  Dropping a vapoury footsole on the tide’s drowsy blaze.


THE FALLING OF THE LEAVES


  AUTUMN is over the long leaves that love us,
  And over the mice in the barley sheaves;
  Yellow the leaves of the rowan above us,
  And yellow the wet wild-strawberry leaves.

  The hour of the waning of love has beset us,
  And weary and worn are our sad souls now;
  Let us part, ere the season of passion forget us,
  With a kiss and a tear on thy drooping brow.


EPHEMERA

  ‘YOUR eyes that once were never weary of mine
  Are bowed in sorrow under their trembling lids,
  Because our love is waning.’

                         And then she:
  ‘Although our love is waning, let us stand
  By the lone border of the lake once more,
  Together in that hour of gentleness
  When the poor tired child, Passion, falls asleep:
  How far away the stars seem, and how far
  Is our first kiss, and ah, how old my heart!’
  Pensive they paced along the faded leaves,
  While slowly he whose hand held hers replied:
  ‘Passion has often worn our wandering hearts.’

  The woods were round them, and the yellow leaves
  Fell like faint meteors in the gloom, and once
  A rabbit old and lame limped down the path;
  Autumn was over him: and now they stood
  On the lone border of the lake once more:
  Turning, he saw that she had thrust dead leaves
  Gathered in silence, dewy as her eyes,
  In bosom and hair.
            ‘Ah, do not mourn,’ he said,
  ‘That we are tired, for other loves await us:
  Hate on and love through unrepining hours;
  Before us lies eternity; our souls
  Are love, and a continual farewell.’


THE MADNESS OF KING GOLL

  I SAT on cushioned otter skin:
  My word was law from Ith to Emen,
  And shook at Invar Amargin
  The hearts of the world-troubling seamen,
  And drove tumult and war away
  From girl and boy and man and beast;
  The fields grew fatter day by day,
  The wild fowl of the air increased;
  And every ancient Ollave said,
  While he bent down his fading head,
  ‘He drives away the Northern cold.’
  _They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the beech
            leaves old._

  I sat and mused and drank sweet wine;
  A herdsman came from inland valleys,
  Crying, the pirates drove his swine
  To fill their dark-beaked hollow galleys.
  I called my battle-breaking men,
  And my loud brazen battle-cars
  From rolling vale and rivery glen;
  And under the blinking of the stars
  Fell on the pirates by the deep,
  And hurled them in the gulph of sleep:
  These hands won many a torque of gold.
  _They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the
            beech leaves old._

  But slowly, as I shouting slew
  And trampled in the bubbling mire,
  In my most secret spirit grew
  A whirling and a wandering fire:
  I stood: keen stars above me shone,
  Around me shone keen eyes of men:
  I laughed aloud and hurried on
  By rocky shore and rushy fen;
  I laughed because birds fluttered by,
  And starlight gleamed, and clouds flew high,
  And rushes waved and waters rolled.
  _They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the
            beech leaves old._

  And now I wander in the woods
  When summer gluts the golden bees,
  Or in autumnal solitudes
  Arise the leopard-coloured trees;
  Or when along the wintry strands
  The cormorants shiver on their rocks;
  I wander on, and wave my hands,
  And sing, and shake my heavy locks.
  The grey wolf knows me; by one ear
  I lead along the woodland deer;
  The hares run by me growing bold.
  _They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the
            beech leaves old._

  I came upon a little town,
  That slumbered in the harvest moon,
  And passed a-tiptoe up and down,
  Murmuring, to a fitful tune,
  How I have followed, night and day,
  A tramping of tremendous feet,
  And saw where this old tympan lay,
  Deserted on a doorway seat,
  And bore it to the woods with me;
  Of some unhuman misery
  Our married voices wildly trolled.
  _They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the
            beech leaves old._

  I sang how, when day’s toil is done,
  Orchil shakes out her long dark hair
  That hides away the dying sun
  And sheds faint odours through the air:
  When my hand passed from wire to wire
  It quenched, with sound like falling dew,
  The whirling and the wandering fire;
  But lift a mournful ulalu,
  For the kind wires are torn and still,
  And I must wander wood and hill
  Through summer’s heat and winter’s cold.
  _They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the
            beech leaves old._


THE STOLEN CHILD

  WHERE dips the rocky highland
  Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
  There lies a leafy island
  Where flapping herons wake
  The drowsy water rats;
  There we’ve hid our faery vats.
  Full of berries,
  And of reddest stolen cherries.
  _Come away, O human child!
  To the waters and the wild
  With a faery, hand in hand,
  For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand._

  Where the wave of moonlight glosses
  The dim gray sands with light,
  Far off by furthest Rosses
  We foot it all the night,
  Weaving olden dances,
  Mingling hands and mingling glances
  Till the moon has taken flight;
  To and fro we leap
  And chase the frothy bubbles,
  While the world is full of troubles
  And is anxious in its sleep.
  _Come away, O human child!
  To the waters and the wild
  With a faery, hand in hand,
  For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand._

  Where the wandering water gushes
  From the hills above Glen-Car,
  In pools among the rushes
  That scarce could bathe a star,
  We seek for slumbering trout,
  And whispering in their ears
  Give them unquiet dreams;
  Leaning softly out
  From ferns that drop their tears
  Over the young streams.
  _Come away, O human child!
  To the waters and the wild
  With a faery, hand in hand,
  For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand._

  Away with us he’s going,
  The solemn-eyed:
  He’ll hear no more the lowing
  Of the calves on the warm hillside;
  Or the kettle on the hob
  Sing peace into his breast,
  Or see the brown mice bob
  Round and round the oatmeal-chest.
  _For he comes, the human child,
  To the waters and the wild
  With a faery, hand in hand,
  From a world more full of weeping than he can understand._


TO AN ISLE IN THE WATER

  SHY one, shy one,
  Shy one of my heart,
  She moves in the firelight
  Pensively apart.

  She carries in the dishes,
  And lays them in a row.
  To an isle in the water
  With her would I go.

  She carries in the candles
  And lights the curtained room,
  Shy in the doorway
  And shy in the gloom;

  And shy as a rabbit,
  Helpful and shy.
  To an isle in the water
  With her would I fly.


DOWN BY THE SALLEY GARDENS

  DOWN by the salley gardens my love and I did meet;
  She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white feet.
  She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;
  But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree.

  In a field by the river my love and I did stand,
  And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white hand.
  She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs;
  But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears.


THE MEDITATION OF THE OLD FISHERMAN

  YOU waves, though you dance by my feet like children at play,
  Though you glow and you glance, though you purr and you dart;
  In the Junes that were warmer than these are, the waves were more gay,
  _When I was a boy with never a crack in my heart_.

  The herring are not in the tides as they were of old;
  My sorrow! for many a creak gave the creel in the cart
  That carried the take to Sligo town to be sold,
  _When I was a boy with never a crack in my heart_.

  And ah, you proud maiden, you are not so fair when his oar
  Is heard on the water, as they were, the proud and apart,
  Who paced in the eve by the nets on the pebbly shore,
  _When I was a boy with never a crack in my heart_.


THE BALLAD OF FATHER O’HART

  GOOD Father John O’Hart
  In penal days rode out
  To a shoneen who had free lands
  And his own snipe and trout.

  In trust took he John’s lands;
  Sleiveens were all his race;
  And he gave them as dowers to his daughters,
  And they married beyond their place.

  But Father John went up,
  And Father John went down;
  And he wore small holes in his shoes,
  And he wore large holes in his gown.

  All loved him, only the shoneen,
  Whom the devils have by the hair,
  From the wives, and the cats, and the children,
  To the birds in the white of the air.

  The birds, for he opened their cages
  As he went up and down;
  And he said with a smile, ‘Have peace now’;
  And he went his way with a frown.

  But if when any one died
  Came keeners hoarser than rooks,
  He bade them give over their keening;
  For he was a man of books.

  And these were the works of John,
  When weeping score by score,
  People came into Coloony;
  For he’d died at ninety-four.

  There was no human keening;
  The birds from Knocknarea
  And the world round Knocknashee
  Came keening in that day.

  The young birds and old birds
  Came flying, heavy and sad;
  Keening in from Tiraragh,
  Keening from Ballinafad;

  Keening from Inishmurray,
  Nor stayed for bite or sup;
  This way were all reproved
  Who dig old customs up.


THE BALLAD OF MOLL MAGEE

  COME round me, little childer;
  There, don’t fling stones at me
  Because I mutter as I go;
  But pity Moll Magee.

  My man was a poor fisher
  With shore lines in the say;
  My work was saltin’ herrings
  The whole of the long day.

  And sometimes from the saltin’ shed,
  I scarce could drag my feet
  Under the blessed moonlight,
  Along the pebbly street.

  I’d always been but weakly,
  And my baby was just born;
  A neighbour minded her by day,
  I minded her till morn.

  I lay upon my baby;
  Ye little childer dear,
  I looked on my cold baby
  When the morn grew frosty and clear.

  A weary woman sleeps so hard!
  My man grew red and pale,
  And gave me money, and bade me go
  To my own place, Kinsale.

  He drove me out and shut the door,
  And gave his curse to me;
  I went away in silence,
  No neighbour could I see.

  The windows and the doors were shut,
  One star shone faint and green;
  The little straws were turnin’ round
  Across the bare boreen.

  I went away in silence:
  Beyond old Martin’s byre
  I saw a kindly neighbour
  Blowin’ her mornin’ fire.

  She drew from me my story—
  My money’s all used up,
  And still, with pityin’, scornin’ eye,
  She gives me bite and sup.

  She says my man will surely come,
  And fetch me home agin;
  But always, as I’m movin’ round,
  Without doors or within,

  Pilin’ the wood or pilin’ the turf,
  Or goin’ to the well,
  I’m thinkin’ of my baby
  And keenin’ to mysel’.

  And sometimes I am sure she knows
  When, openin’ wide His door,
  God lights the stars, His candles,
  And looks upon the poor.

  So now, ye little childer,
  Ye won’t fling stones at me;
  But gather with your shinin’ looks
  And pity Moll Magee.


THE BALLAD OF THE FOXHUNTER

  ‘NOW lay me in a cushioned chair
  And carry me, you four,
  With cushions here and cushions there,
  To see the world once more.

  ‘And some one from the stables bring
  My Dermot dear and brown,
  And lead him gently in a ring,
  And gently up and down.

  ‘Now leave the chair upon the grass:
  Bring hound and huntsman here,
  And I on this strange road will pass,
  Filled full of ancient cheer.’

  His eyelids droop, his head falls low,
  His old eyes cloud with dreams;
  The sun upon all things that grow
  Pours round in sleepy streams.

  Brown Dermot treads upon the lawn,
  And to the armchair goes,
  And now the old man’s dreams are gone,
  He smooths the long brown nose.

  And now moves many a pleasant tongue
  Upon his wasted hands,
  For leading aged hounds and young
  The huntsman near him stands.

  ‘My huntsman, Rody, blow the horn,
  And make the hills reply.’
  The huntsman loosens on the morn
  A gay and wandering cry.

  A fire is in the old man’s eyes,
  His fingers move and sway,
  And when the wandering music dies
  They hear him feebly say,

  ‘My huntsman, Rody, blow the horn,
  And make the hills reply.’
  ‘I cannot blow upon my horn,
  I can but weep and sigh.’

  The servants round his cushioned place
  Are with new sorrow wrung;
  And hounds are gazing on his face,
  Both aged hounds and young.

  One blind hound only lies apart
  On the sun-smitten grass;
  He holds deep commune with his heart:
  The moments pass and pass;

  The blind hound with a mournful din
  Lifts slow his wintry head;
  The servants bear the body in;
  The hounds wail for the dead.


THE BALLAD OF FATHER GILLIGAN

  THE old priest Peter Gilligan
  Was weary night and day;
  For half his flock were in their beds,
  Or under green sods lay.

  Once, while he nodded on a chair,
  At the moth-hour of eve,
  Another poor man sent for him,
  And he began to grieve.

  ‘I have no rest, nor joy, nor peace,
  For people die and die’;
  And after cried he, ‘God forgive!
  My body spake, not I!’

  He knelt, and leaning on the chair
  He prayed and fell asleep;
  And the moth-hour went from the fields,
  And stars began to peep.

  They slowly into millions grew,
  And leaves shook in the wind;
  And God covered the world with shade,
  And whispered to mankind.

  Upon the time of sparrow chirp
  When the moths came once more,
  The old priest Peter Gilligan
  Stood upright on the floor.

  ‘Mavrone, mavrone! the man has died,
  While I slept on the chair’;
  He roused his horse out of its sleep,
  And rode with little care.

  He rode now as he never rode,
  By rocky lane and fen;
  The sick man’s wife opened the door:
  ‘Father! you come again!’

  ‘And is the poor man dead?’ he cried.
  ‘He died an hour ago.’
  The old priest Peter Gilligan
  In grief swayed to and fro.

  ‘When you were gone, he turned and died
  As merry as a bird.’
  The old priest Peter Gilligan
  He knelt him at that word.

  ‘He who hath made the night of stars
  For souls, who tire and bleed,
  Sent one of His great angels down
  To help me in my need.

  ‘He who is wrapped in purple robes,
  With planets in His care,
  Had pity on the least of things
  Asleep upon a chair.’


THE LAMENTATION OF THE OLD PENSIONER

  I HAD a chair at every hearth,
  When no one turned to see,
  With ‘Look at that old fellow there,
  And who may he be?’
  And therefore do I wander now,
  And the fret lies on me.

  The road-side trees keep murmuring:
  Ah, wherefore murmur ye,
  As in the old days long gone by,
  Green oak and poplar tree?
  The well-known faces are all gone
  And the fret lies on me.


THE FIDDLER OF DOONEY

  WHEN I play on my fiddle in Dooney,
  Folk dance like a wave of the sea;
  My cousin is priest in Kilvarnet,
  My brother in Moharabuiee.

  I passed my brother and cousin:
  They read in their books of prayer;
  I read in my book of songs
  I bought at the Sligo fair.

  When we come at the end of time,
  To Peter sitting in state,
  He will smile on the three old spirits,
  But call me first through the gate;

  For the good are always the merry,
  Save by an evil chance,
  And the merry love the fiddle
  And the merry love to dance:

  And when the folk there spy me,
  They will all come up to me,
  With ‘Here is the fiddler of Dooney!’
  And dance like a wave of the sea.


THE DEDICATION TO A BOOK OF STORIES SELECTED FROM THE IRISH NOVELISTS

  THERE was a green branch hung with many a bell
  When her own people ruled in wave-worn Eire;
  And from its murmuring greenness, calm of faery,
  A Druid kindness, on all hearers fell.

  It charmed away the merchant from his guile,
  And turned the farmer’s memory from his cattle,
  And hushed in sleep the roaring ranks of battle,
  For all who heard it dreamed a little while.

  Ah, Exiles, wandering over many seas,
  Spinning at all times Eire’s good to-morrow!
  Ah, worldwide Nation, always growing Sorrow!
  I also bear a bell branch full of ease.

  I tore it from green boughs winds tossed and hurled,
  Green boughs of tossing always, weary, weary!
  I tore it from the green boughs of old Eire,
  The willow of the many-sorrowed world.

  Ah, Exiles, wandering over many lands!
  My bell branch murmurs: the gay bells bring laughter,
  Leaping to shake a cobweb from the rafter;
  The sad bells bow the forehead on the hands.

  A honeyed ringing: under the new skies
  They bring you memories of old village faces;
  Cabins gone now, old well-sides, old dear places;
  And men who loved the cause that never dies.




EARLY POEMS




II

_THE ROSE_




‘_Sero te amavi, Pulchritudo tam antiqua et tam nova! Sero te amavi._’

  S. AUGUSTINE.




TO LIONEL JOHNSON




EARLY POEMS: THE ROSE


TO THE ROSE UPON THE ROOD OF TIME

  _Red Rose, proud Rose, sad Rose of all my days!
  Come near me, while I sing the ancient ways:
  Cuchulain battling with the bitter tide;
  The Druid, gray, wood-nurtured, quiet-eyed,
  Who cast round Fergus dreams, and ruin untold;
  And thine own sadness, whereof stars, grown old
  In dancing silver-sandalled on the sea,
  Sing in their high and lonely melody.
  Come near, that no more blinded by man’s fate,
  I find under the boughs of love and hate,
  In all poor foolish things that live a day,
  Eternal beauty wandering on her way._

  _Come near, come near, come near—Ah, leave me still
  A little space for the rose-breath to fill!
  Lest I no more hear common things that crave;
  The weak worm hiding down in its small cave,
  The field mouse running by me in the grass,
  And heavy mortal hopes that toil and pass;
  But seek alone to hear the strange things said
  By God to the bright hearts of those long dead,
  And learn to chaunt a tongue men do not know.
  Come near; I would, before my time to go,
  Sing of old Eire and the ancient ways:
  Red Rose, proud Rose, sad Rose of all my days._


FERGUS AND THE DRUID

FERGUS.

  THE whole day have I followed in the rocks,
  And you have changed and flowed from shape to shape.
  First as a raven on whose ancient wings
  Scarcely a feather lingered, then you seemed
  A weasel moving on from stone to stone,
  And now at last you wear a human shape,
  A thin gray man half lost in gathering night.

DRUID.

  What would you, king of the proud Red Branch kings?

FERGUS.

  This would I say, most wise of living souls:
  Young subtle Conchubar sat close by me
  When I gave judgment, and his words were wise,
  And what to me was burden without end
  To him seemed easy, so I laid the crown
  Upon his head to cast away my care.

DRUID.

  What would you, king of the proud Red Branch kings?

FERGUS.

  I feast amid my people on the hill,
  And pace the woods, and drive my chariot wheels
  In the white border of the murmuring sea;
  And still I feel the crown upon my head.

DRUID.

  What would you, king of the proud Red Branch kings?

FERGUS.

  I’d put away the foolish might of a king,
  But learn the dreaming wisdom that is yours.

DRUID.

  Look on my thin gray hair and hollow cheeks,
  And on these hands that may not lift the sword,
  This body trembling like a wind-blown reed.
  No maiden loves me, no man seeks my help,
  Because I be not of the things I dream.

FERGUS.

  A wild and foolish labourer is a king,
  To do and do and do, and never dream.

DRUID.

  Take, if you must, this little bag of dreams;
  Unloose the cord, and they will wrap you round.

FERGUS.

  I see my life go dripping like a stream
  From change to change; I have been many things,
  A green drop in the surge, a gleam of light
  Upon a sword, a fir-tree on a hill,
  An old slave grinding at a heavy quern,
  A king sitting upon a chair of gold,
  And all these things were wonderful and great;
  But now I have grown nothing, being all,
  And the whole world weighs down upon my heart:
  Ah! Druid, Druid, how great webs of sorrow
  Lay hidden in the small slate-coloured thing!


THE DEATH OF CUCHULAIN

  A MAN came slowly from the setting sun,
  To Forgail’s daughter, Emer, in her dun,
  And found her dyeing cloth with subtle care,
  And said, casting aside his draggled hair:
  ‘I am Aleel, the swineherd, whom you bid
  Go dwell upon the sea cliffs, vapour-hid;
  But now my years of watching are no more.’

  Then Emer cast the web upon the floor,
  And stretching out her arms, red with the dye,
  Parted her lips with a loud sudden cry.

  Looking on her, Aleel, the swineherd, said:
  ‘Not any god alive, nor mortal dead,
  Has slain so mighty armies, so great kings,
  Nor won the gold that now Cuchulain brings.’

  ‘Why do you tremble thus from feet to crown?’

  Aleel, the swineherd, wept and cast him down
  Upon the web-heaped floor, and thus his word:
  ‘With him is one sweet-throated like a bird,
  And lovelier than the moon upon the sea;
  He made for her an army cease to be.’

  ‘Who bade you tell these things?’ and then she cried
  To those about, ‘Beat him with thongs of hide
  And drive him from the door.’ And thus it was;
  And where her son, Finmole, on the smooth grass
  Was driving cattle, came she with swift feet,
  And called out to him, ‘Son, it is not meet
  That you stay idling here with flocks and herds.’

  ‘I have long waited, mother, for those words;
  But wherefore now?’

                    ‘There is a man to die;
  You have the heaviest arm under the sky.’

  ‘My father dwells among the sea-worn bands,
  And breaks the ridge of battle with his hands.’

  ‘Nay, you are taller than Cuchulain, son.’

  ‘He is the mightiest man in ship or dun.’

  ‘Nay, he is old and sad with many wars,
  And weary of the crash of battle cars.’

  ‘I only ask what way my journey lies,
  For God, who made you bitter, made you wise.’

  ‘The Red Branch kings a tireless banquet keep,
  Where the sun falls into the Western deep.
  Go there, and dwell on the green forest rim;
  But tell alone your name and house to him
  Whose blade compels, and bid them send you one
  Who has a like vow from their triple dun.’

  Between the lavish shelter of a wood
  And the gray tide, the Red Branch multitude
  Feasted, and with them old Cuchulain dwelt,
  And his young dear one close beside him knelt,
  And gazed upon the wisdom of his eyes,
  More mournful than the depth of starry skies,
  And pondered on the wonder of his days;
  And all around the harp-string told his praise,
  And Conchubar, the Red Branch king of kings,
  With his own fingers touched the brazen strings.
  At last Cuchulain spake, ‘A young man strays
  Driving the deer along the woody ways.
  I often hear him singing to and fro;
  I often hear the sweet sound of his bow,
  Seek out what man he is.’

                          One went and came.
  ‘He bade me let all know he gives his name
  At the sword point, and bade me bring him one
  Who had a like vow from our triple dun.’

  ‘I only of the Red Branch hosted now,’
  Cuchulain cried, ‘have made and keep that vow.’

  After short fighting in the leafy shade,
  He spake to the young man, ‘Is there no maid
  Who loves you, no white arms to wrap you round,
  Or do you long for the dim sleepy ground,
  That you come here to meet this ancient sword?’

  ‘The dooms of men are in God’s hidden hoard.’

  ‘Your head a while seemed like a woman’s head
  That I loved once.’

                      Again the fighting sped,
  But now the war rage in Cuchulain woke,
  And through the other’s shield his long blade broke,
  And pierced him.

          ‘Speak before your breath is done.’

  ‘I am Finmole, mighty Cuchulain’s son.’

  ‘I put you from your pain. I can no more.’

  While day its burden on to evening bore,
  With head bowed on his knees Cuchulain stayed;
  Then Conchubar sent that sweet-throated maid,
  And she, to win him, his gray hair caressed;
  In vain her arms, in vain her soft white breast.
  Then Conchubar, the subtlest of all men,
  Ranking his Druids round him ten by ten,
  Spake thus, ‘Cuchulain will dwell there and brood
  For three days more in dreadful quietude,
  And then arise, and raving slay us all.
  Go, cast on him delusions magical,
  That he may fight the waves of the loud sea.’
  And ten by ten under a quicken tree,
  The Druids chaunted, swaying in their hands
  Tall wands of alder and white quicken wands.

  In three days’ time, Cuchulain with a moan
  Stood up, and came to the long sands alone:
  For four days warred he with the bitter tide;
  And the waves flowed above him, and he died.


THE ROSE OF THE WORLD

  WHO dreamed that beauty passes like a dream?
  For these red lips, with all their mournful pride,
  Mournful that no new wonder may betide,
  Troy passed away in one high funeral gleam,
  And Usna’s children died.

  We and the labouring world are passing by:
  Amid men’s souls, that waver and give place,
  Like the pale waters in their wintry race,
  Under the passing stars, foam of the sky,
  Lives on this lonely face.

  Bow down, archangels, in your dim abode:
  Before you were, or any hearts to beat,
  Weary and kind one lingered by His seat;
  He made the world to be a grassy road
  Before her wandering feet.


THE ROSE OF PEACE

  IF Michael, leader of God’s host
  When Heaven and Hell are met,
  Looked down on you from Heaven’s door-post
  He would his deeds forget.

  Brooding no more upon God’s wars
  In his Divine homestead,
  He would go weave out of the stars
  A chaplet for your head.

  And all folk seeing him bow down,
  And white stars tell your praise,
  Would come at last to God’s great town,
  Led on by gentle ways;

  And God would bid His warfare cease,
  Saying all things were well;
  And softly make a rosy peace,
  A peace of Heaven with Hell.


THE ROSE OF BATTLE

  ROSE of all Roses, Rose of all the World!
  The tall thought-woven sails, that flap unfurled
  Above the tide of hours, trouble the air,
  And God’s bell buoyed to be the water’s care;
  While hushed from fear, or loud with hope, a band
  With blown, spray-dabbled hair gather at hand.
  _Turn if you may from battles never done_,
  I call, as they go by me one by one,
  _Danger no refuge holds, and war no peace,
  For him who hears love sing and never cease,
  Beside her clean-swept hearth, her quiet shade:
  But gather all for whom no love hath made
  A woven silence, or but came to cast
  A song into the air, and singing past
  To smile on the pale dawn; and gather you
  Who have sought more than is in rain or dew
  Or in the sun and moon, or on the earth,
  Or sighs amid the wandering, starry mirth,
  Or comes in laughter from the sea’s sad lips;
  And wage God’s battles in the long gray ships.
  The sad, the lonely, the insatiable,
  To these Old Night shall all her mystery tell;
  God’s bell has claimed them by the little cry
  Of their sad hearts, that may not live nor die._

  Rose of all Roses, Rose of all the World!
  You, too, have come where the dim tides are hurled
  Upon the wharves of sorrow, and heard ring
  The bell that calls us on; the sweet far thing.
  Beauty grown sad with its eternity
  Made you of us, and of the dim gray sea.
  Our long ships loose thought-woven sails and wait,
  For God has bid them share an equal fate;
  And when at last defeated in His wars,
  They have gone down under the same white stars,
  We shall no longer hear the little cry
  Of our sad hearts, that may not live nor die.


A FAERY SONG

_Sung by the people of faery over Diarmuid and Grania, who lay in their
bridal sleep under a Cromlech._

  WE who are old, old and gay,
  O so old!
  Thousands of years, thousands of years,
  If all were told:

  Give to these children, new from the world,
  Silence and love;
  And the long dew-dropping hours of the night,
  And the stars above:

  Give to these children, new from the world,
  Rest far from men.
  Is anything better, anything better?
  Tell us it then:

  Us who are old, old and gay,
  O so old!
  Thousands of years, thousands of years,
  If all were told.


THE LAKE ISLE OF INNISFREE

  I WILL arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
  And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
  Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee,
  And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

  And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
  Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
  There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
  And evening full of the linnet’s wings.

  I will arise and go now, for always night and day
  I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
  While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
  I hear it in the deep heart’s core.


A CRADLE SONG

  THE angels are stooping
  Above your bed;
  They weary of trooping
  With the whimpering dead.

  God’s laughing in heaven
  To see you so good;
  The shining Seven
  Are gay with His mood.

  I kiss you and kiss you,
  My pigeon, my own;
  Ah, how I shall miss you
  When you have grown.


THE SONG OF THE OLD MOTHER

  I RISE in the dawn, and I kneel and blow
  Till the seed of the fire flicker and glow;
  And then I must scrub and bake and sweep
  Till stars are beginning to blink and peep;
  And the young lie long and dream in their bed
  Of the matching of ribbons for bosom and head,
  And their day goes over in idleness,
  And they sigh if the wind but lift a tress:
  While I must work because I am old,
  And the seed of the fire gets feeble and cold.


THE PITY OF LOVE

  A PITY beyond all telling
  Is hid in the heart of love:
  The folk who are buying and selling;
  The clouds on their journey above;
  The cold wet winds ever blowing;
  And the shadowy hazel grove
  Where mouse-gray waters are flowing
  Threaten the head that I love.


THE SORROW OF LOVE

  THE quarrel of the sparrows in the eaves,
  The full round moon and the star-laden sky,
  And the loud song of the ever-singing leaves,
  Had hid away earth’s old and weary cry.

  And then you came with those red mournful lips,
  And with you came the whole of the world’s tears,
  And all the trouble of her labouring ships,
  And all the trouble of her myriad years.

  And now the sparrows warring in the eaves,
  The curd-pale moon, the white stars in the sky,
  And the loud chaunting of the unquiet leaves,
  Are shaken with earth’s old and weary cry.


WHEN YOU ARE OLD

  WHEN you are old and gray and full of sleep,
  And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
  And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
  Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

  How many loved your moments of glad grace,
  And loved your beauty with love false or true;
  But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
  And loved the sorrows of your changing face.

  And bending down beside the glowing bars
  Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled
  And paced upon the mountains overhead
  And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.


THE WHITE BIRDS

  I WOULD that we were, my beloved, white birds on the foam of the sea!
  We tire of the flame of the meteor, before it can fade and flee;
  And the flame of the blue star of twilight, hung low on the rim of
            the sky,
  Has awaked in our hearts, my beloved, a sadness that may not die.

  A weariness comes from those dreamers, dew-dabbled, the lily and rose;
  Ah, dream not of them, my beloved, the flame of the meteor that goes,
  Or the flame of the blue star that lingers hung low in the fall of
            the dew:
  For I would we were changed to white birds on the wandering foam:
            I and you!

  I am haunted by numberless islands, and many a Danaan shore,
  Where Time would surely forget us, and Sorrow come near us no more;
  Soon far from the rose and the lily, and fret of the flames would
            we be,
  Were we only white birds, my beloved, buoyed out on the foam of
            the sea!


A DREAM OF DEATH

  I DREAMED that one had died in a strange place
  Near no accustomed hand:
  And they had nailed the boards above her face,
  The peasants of that land,
  And, wondering, planted by her solitude
  A cypress and a yew:
  I came, and wrote upon a cross of wood,
  Man had no more to do:
  _She was more beautiful than thy first love,
  This lady by the trees_:
  And gazed upon the mournful stars above,
  And heard the mournful breeze.


A DREAM OF A BLESSED SPIRIT

  ALL the heavy days are over;
  Leave the body’s coloured pride
  Underneath the grass and clover,
  With the feet laid side by side.

  One with her are mirth and duty;
  Bear the gold embroidered dress,
  For she needs not her sad beauty,
  To the scented oaken press.

  Hers the kiss of Mother Mary,
  The long hair is on her face;
  Still she goes with footsteps wary,
  Full of earth’s old timid grace.

  With white feet of angels seven
  Her white feet go glimmering;
  And above the deep of heaven,
  Flame on flame and wing on wing.


THE MAN WHO DREAMED OF FAERYLAND

  HE stood among a crowd at Drumahair;
  His heart hung all upon a silken dress,
  And he had known at last some tenderness,
  Before earth made of him her sleepy care;
  But when a man poured fish into a pile,
  It seemed they raised their little silver heads,
  And sang how day a Druid twilight sheds
  Upon a dim, green, well-beloved isle,
  Where people love beside star-laden seas;
  How Time may never mar their faery vows
  Under the woven roofs of quicken boughs:
  The singing shook him out of his new ease.

  He wandered by the sands of Lisadill;
  His mind ran all on money cares and fears,
  And he had known at last some prudent years
  Before they heaped his grave under the hill;
  But while he passed before a plashy place,
  A lug-worm with its gray and muddy mouth
  Sang how somewhere to north or west or south
  There dwelt a gay, exulting, gentle race;
  And how beneath those three times blessed skies
  A Danaan fruitage makes a shower of moons,
  And as it falls awakens leafy tunes:
  And at that singing he was no more wise.

  He mused beside the well of Scanavin,
  He mused upon his mockers: without fail
  His sudden vengeance were a country tale,
  Now that deep earth has drunk his body in;
  But one small knot-grass growing by the pool
  Told where, ah, little, all-unneeded voice!
  Old Silence bids a lonely folk rejoice,
  And chaplet their calm brows with leafage cool;
  And how, when fades the sea-strewn rose of day,
  A gentle feeling wraps them like a fleece,
  And all their trouble dies into its peace:
  The tale drove his fine angry mood away.

  He slept under the hill of Lugnagall;
  And might have known at last unhaunted sleep
  Under that cold and vapour-turbaned steep,
  Now that old earth had taken man and all:
  Were not the worms that spired about his bones
  A-telling with their low and reedy cry,
  Of how God leans His hands out of the sky,
  To bless that isle with honey in His tones;
  That none may feel the power of squall and wave,
  And no one any leaf-crowned dancer miss
  Until He burn up Nature with a kiss:
  The man has found no comfort in the grave.


THE TWO TREES

  BELOVED, gaze in thine own heart,
  The holy tree is growing there;
  From joy the holy branches start,
  And all the trembling flowers they bear.
  The changing colours of its fruit
  Have dowered the stars with merry light;
  The surety of its hidden root
  Has planted quiet in the night;
  The shaking of its leafy head
  Has given the waves their melody,
  And made my lips and music wed,
  Murmuring a wizard song for thee.
  There, through bewildered branches, go
  Winged Loves borne on in gentle strife,
  Tossing and tossing to and fro
  The flaming circle of our life.
  When looking on their shaken hair,
  And dreaming how they dance and dart,
  Thine eyes grow full of tender care:
  Beloved, gaze in thine own heart.
  Gaze no more in the bitter glass
  The demons, with their subtle guile,
  Lift up before us when they pass,
  Or only gaze a little while;
  For there a fatal image grows,
  With broken boughs, and blackened leaves,
  And roots half hidden under snows
  Driven by a storm that ever grieves.
  For all things turn to barrenness
  In the dim glass the demons hold,
  The glass of outer weariness,
  Made when God slept in times of old.
  There, through the broken branches, go
  The ravens of unresting thought;
  Peering and flying to and fro,
  To see men’s souls bartered and bought.
  When they are heard upon the wind,
  And when they shake their wings; alas!
  Thy tender eyes grow all unkind:
  Gaze no more in the bitter glass.


TO IRELAND IN THE COMING TIMES

  _Know, that I would accounted be
  True brother of that company,
  Who sang to sweeten Ireland’s wrong,
  Ballad and story, rann and song;
  Nor be I any less of them,
  Because the red-rose-bordered hem
  Of her, whose history began
  Before God made the angelic clan,
  Trails all about the written page;
  For in the world’s first blossoming age
  The light fall of her flying feet
  Made Ireland’s heart begin to beat;
  And still the starry candles flare
  To help her light foot here and there;
  And still the thoughts of Ireland brood
  Upon her holy quietude._

  _Nor may I less be counted one
  With Davis, Mangan, Ferguson,
  Because to him, who ponders well,
  My rhymes more than their rhyming tell
  Of the dim wisdoms old and deep,
  That God gives unto man in sleep.
  For the elemental beings go
  About my table to and fro.
  In flood and fire and clay and wind,
  They huddle from man’s pondering mind;
  Yet he who treads in austere ways
  May surely meet their ancient gaze.
  Man ever journeys on with them
  After the red-rose-bordered hem.
  Ah, faeries, dancing under the moon,
  A Druid land, a Druid tune!

  While still I may, I write for you
  The love I lived, the dream I knew.
  From our birthday, until we die,
  Is but the winking of an eye;
  And we, our singing and our love,
  The mariners of night above,
  And all the wizard things that go
  About my table to and fro,
  Are passing on to where may be,
  In truth’s consuming ecstasy,
  No place for love and dream at all;
  For God goes by with white foot-fall.
  I cast my heart into my rhymes,
  That you, in the dim coming times,
  May know how my heart went with them
  After the red-rose-bordered hem._




EARLY POEMS




III

_THE WANDERINGS OF OISIN_



  ‘_Give me the world if Thou wilt, but grant me an asylum
            for my affections._’
                                                    TULKA.




TO EDWIN J. ELLIS




BOOK I




THE WANDERINGS OF OISIN


S. PATRIC.

  YOU who are bent, and bald, and blind,
  With a heavy heart and a wandering mind,
  Have known three centuries, poets sing,
  Of dalliance with a demon thing.

OISIN.

  Sad to remember, sick with years,
  The swift innumerable spears,
  The horsemen with their floating hair,
  And bowls of barley, honey, and wine,
  And feet of maidens dancing in tune,
  And the white body that lay by mine;
  But the tale, though words be lighter than air,
  Must live to be old like the wandering moon.

  Caolte, and Conan, and Finn were there,
  When we followed a deer with our baying hounds,
  With Bran, Sgeolan, and Lomair,
  And passing the Firbolgs’ burial mounds,
  Came to the cairn-heaped grassy hill
  Where passionate Maeve is stony still;
  And found on the dove-gray edge of the sea
  A pearl-pale, high-born lady, who rode
  On a horse with bridle of findrinny;
  And like a sunset were her lips,
  A stormy sunset on doomed ships;
  A citron colour gloomed in her hair,
  But down to her feet white vesture flowed,
  And with the glimmering crimson glowed
  Of many a figured embroidery;
  And it was bound with a pearl-pale shell
  That wavered like the summer streams,
  As her soft bosom rose and fell.

S. PATRIC.

  You are still wrecked among heathen dreams.

OISIN.

  ‘Why do you wind no horn?’ she said.
  ‘And every hero droop his head?
  The hornless deer is not more sad
  That many a peaceful moment had,
  More sleek than any granary mouse,
  In his own leafy forest house
  Among the waving fields of fern:
  The hunting of heroes should be glad.’

  ‘O pleasant maiden,’ answered Finn,
  ‘We think on Oscar’s pencilled urn,
  And on the heroes lying slain,
  On Gavra’s raven-covered plain;
  But where are your noble kith and kin,
  And into what country do you ride?’

  ‘My father and my mother are
  Aengus and Edain, and my name
  Is Niamh, and my land where tide
  And sleep drown sun and moon and star.’

  ‘What dream came with you that you came
  To this dim shore on foam-wet feet?
  Did your companion wander away
  From where the birds of Aengus wing?’

  She said, with laughter tender and sweet:
  ‘I have not yet, war-weary king,
  Been spoken of with any one;
  For love of Oisin foam-wet feet
  Have borne me where the tempests blind
  Your mortal shores till time is done!’

  ‘How comes it, princess, that your mind
  Among undying people has run
  On this young man, Oisin, my son?’

  ‘I loved no man, though kings besought
  And many a man of lofty name,
  Until the Danaan poets came,
  Bringing me honeyed, wandering thought
  Of noble Oisin and his fame,
  Of battles broken by his hands,
  Of stories builded by his words
  That are like coloured Asian birds
  At evening in their rainless lands.’

  O Patric, by your brazen bell,
  There was no limb of mine but fell
  Into a desperate gulph of love!
  ‘You only will I wed,’ I cried,
  ‘And I will make a thousand songs,
  And set your name all names above,
  And captives bound with leathern thongs
  Shall kneel and praise you, one by one,
  At evening in my western dun.’

  ‘O Oisin, mount by me and ride
  To shores by the wash of the tremulous tide,
  Where men have heaped no burial mounds,
  And the days pass by like a wayward tune,
  Where broken faith has never been known,
  And the blushes of first love never have flown;
  And there I will give you a hundred hounds;
  No mightier creatures bay at the moon;
  And a hundred robes of murmuring silk,
  And a hundred calves and a hundred sheep
  Whose long wool whiter than sea froth flows,
  And a hundred spears and a hundred bows,
  And oil and wine and honey and milk,
  And always never-anxious sleep;
  While a hundred youths, mighty of limb,
  But knowing nor tumult nor hate nor strife,
  And a hundred maidens, merry as birds,
  Who when they dance to a fitful measure
  Have a speed like the speed of the salmon herds,
  Shall follow your horn and obey your whim,
  And you shall know the Danaan leisure:
  And Niamh be with you for a wife.’
  Then she sighed gently, ‘It grows late,
  Music and love and sleep await,
  Where I would be when the white moon climbs,
  The red sun falls, and the world grows dim.’

  And then I mounted and she bound me
  With her triumphing arms around me,
  And whispering to herself enwound me;
  But when the horse had felt my weight,
  He shook himself and neighed three times:
  Caolte, Conan, and Finn came near,
  And wept, and raised their lamenting hands,
  And bid me stay, with many a tear;
  But we rode out from the human lands.

  In what far kingdom do you go,
  Ah, Fenians, with the shield and bow?
  Or are you phantoms white as snow,
  Whose lips had life’s most prosperous glow?
  O you, with whom in sloping valleys,
  Or down the dewy forest alleys,
  I chased at morn the flying deer,
  With whom I hurled the hurrying spear,
  And heard the foemen’s bucklers rattle,
  And broke the heaving ranks of battle!
  And Bran, Sgeolan, and Lomair,
  Where are you with your long rough hair?
  You go not where the red deer feeds,
  Nor tear the foemen from their steeds.

S. PATRIC.

  Boast not, nor mourn with drooping head
  Companions long accurst and dead,
  And hounds for centuries dust and air.

OISIN.

  We galloped over the glossy sea:
  I know not if days passed or hours,
  And Niamh sang continually
  Danaan songs, and their dewy showers
  Of pensive laughter, unhuman sound,
  Lulled weariness, and softly round
  My human sorrow her white arms wound.

  On! on! and now a hornless deer
  Passed by us, chased by a phantom hound
  All pearly white, save one red ear;
  And now a maiden rode like the wind
  With an apple of gold in her tossing hand,
  And with quenchless eyes and fluttering hair
  A beautiful young man followed behind.

  ‘Were these two born in the Danaan land,
  Or have they breathed the mortal air?’

  ‘Vex them no longer,’ Niamh said,
  And sighing bowed her gentle head,
  And sighing laid the pearly tip
  Of one long finger on my lip.

  But now the moon like a white rose shone
  In the pale west, and the sun’s rim sank,
  And clouds arrayed their rank on rank
  About his fading crimson ball:
  The floor of Emen’s hosting hall
  Was not more level than the sea,
  As full of loving phantasy,
  And with low murmurs we rode on,
  Where many a trumpet-twisted shell
  That in immortal silence sleeps
  Dreaming of her own melting hues,
  Her golds, her ambers, and her blues,
  Pierced with soft light the shallowing deeps.
  But now a wandering land breeze came
  And a far sound of feathery quires;
  It seemed to blow from the dying flame,
  They seemed to sing in the smouldering fires.
  The horse towards the music raced,
  Neighing along the lifeless waste;
  Like sooty fingers, many a tree
  Rose ever out of the warm sea;
  And they were trembling ceaselessly,
  As though they all were beating time,
  Upon the centre of the sun,
  To that low laughing woodland rhyme.
  And, now our wandering hours were done,
  We cantered to the shore, and knew
  The reason of the trembling trees:
  Round every branch the song-birds flew,
  Or clung thereon like swarming bees;
  While round the shore a million stood
  Like drops of frozen rainbow light,
  And pondered in a soft vain mood,
  Upon their shadows in the tide,
  And told the purple deeps their pride,
  And murmured snatches of delight;
  And on the shores were many boats
  With bending sterns and bending bows,
  And carven figures on their prows
  Of bitterns, and fish-eating stoats,
  And swans with their exultant throats:
  And where the wood and waters meet
  We tied the horse in a leafy clump,
  And Niamh blew three merry notes
  Out of a little silver trump;
  And then an answering whisper flew
  Over the bare and woody land,
  A whisper of impetuous feet,
  And ever nearer, nearer grew;
  And from the woods rushed out a band
  Of men and maidens, hand in hand,
  And singing, singing altogether;
  Their brows were white as fragrant milk,
  Their cloaks made out of yellow silk,
  And trimmed with many a crimson feather:
  And when they saw the cloak I wore
  Was dim with mire of a mortal shore,
  They fingered it and gazed on me
  And laughed like murmurs of the sea;
  But Niamh with a swift distress
  Bid them away and hold their peace;
  And when they heard her voice they ran
  And knelt them, every maid and man,
  And kissed, as they would never cease,
  Her pearl-pale hand and the hem of her dress.
  She bade them bring us to the hall
  Where Aengus dreams, from sun to sun,
  A Druid dream of the end of days
  When the stars are to wane and the world be done.

  They led us by long and shadowy ways
  Where drops of dew in myriads fall,
  And tangled creepers every hour
  Blossom in some new crimson flower,
  And once a sudden laughter sprang
  From all their lips, and once they sang
  Together, while the dark woods rang,
  And made in all their distant parts,
  With boom of bees in honey marts,
  A rumour of delighted hearts.
  And once a maiden by my side
  Gave me a harp, and bid me sing,
  And touch the laughing silver string;
  But when I sang of human joy
  A sorrow wrapped each merry face,
  And, Patric! by your beard, they wept,
  Until one came, a tearful boy;
  ‘A sadder creature never stept
  Than this strange human bard,’ he cried;
  And caught the silver harp away,
  And, weeping over the white strings, hurled
  It down in a leaf-hid hollow place
  That kept dim waters from the sky;
  And each one said with a long, long sigh,
  ‘O saddest harp in all the world,
  Sleep there till the moon and the stars die!’

  And now still sad we came to where
  A beautiful young man dreamed within
  A house of wattles, clay, and skin;
  One hand upheld his beardless chin,
  And one a sceptre flashing out
  Wild flames of red and gold and blue,
  Like to a merry wandering rout
  Of dancers leaping in the air;
  And men and maidens knelt them there
  And showed their eyes with teardrops dim,
  And with low murmurs prayed to him,
  And kissed the sceptre with red lips,
  And touched it with their finger-tips.

  He held that flashing sceptre up.
  ‘Joy drowns the twilight in the dew,
  And fills with stars night’s purple cup,
  And wakes the sluggard seeds of corn,
  And stirs the young kid’s budding horn,
  And makes the infant ferns unwrap,
  And for the peewit paints his cap,
  And rolls along the unwieldy sun,
  And makes the little planets run:
  And if joy were not on the earth,
  There were an end of change and birth,
  And earth and heaven and hell would die,
  And in some gloomy barrow lie
  Folded like a frozen fly;
  Then mock at Death and Time with glances
  And waving arms and wandering dances.

  ‘Men’s hearts of old were drops of flame
  That from the saffron morning came,
  Or drops of silver joy that fell
  Out of the moon’s pale twisted shell;
  But now hearts cry that hearts are slaves,
  And toss and turn in narrow caves;
  But here there is nor law nor rule,
  Nor have hands held a weary tool;
  And here there is nor Change nor Death,
  But only kind and merry breath,
  For joy is God and God is joy.’
  With one long glance on maid and boy
  And the pale blossom of the moon,
  He fell into a Druid swoon.

  And in a wild and sudden dance
  We mocked at Time and Fate and Chance,
  And swept out of the wattled hall
  And came to where the dewdrops fall
  Among the foamdrops of the sea,
  And there we hushed the revelry;
  And, gathering on our brows a frown,
  Bent all our swaying bodies down,
  And to the waves that glimmer by
  That slooping green De Danaan sod
  Sang, ‘God is joy and joy is God,
  And things that have grown sad are wicked,
  And things that fear the dawn of the morrow,
  Or the gray wandering osprey Sorrow.’

  We danced to where in the winding thicket
  The damask roses, bloom on bloom,
  Like crimson meteors hang in the gloom,
  And bending over them softly said,
  Bending over them in the dance,
  With a swift and friendly glance
  From dewy eyes: ‘Upon the dead
  Fall the leaves of other roses,
  On the dead dim earth encloses:
  But never, never on our graves,
  Heaped beside the glimmering waves,
  Shall fall the leaves of damask roses.
  For neither Death nor Change comes near us,
  And all listless hours fear us,
  And we fear no dawning morrow,
  Nor the gray wandering osprey Sorrow.’

  The dance wound through the windless woods;
  The ever-summered solitudes;
  Until the tossing arms grew still
  Upon the woody central hill;
  And, gathered in a panting band,
  We flung on high each waving hand,
  And sang unto the starry broods:
  In our raised eyes there flashed a glow
  Of milky brightness to and fro
  As thus our song arose: ‘You stars,
  Across your wandering ruby cars
  Shake the loose reins: you slaves of God,
  He rules you with an iron rod,
  He holds you with an iron bond,
  Each one woven to the other,
  Each one woven to his brother
  Like bubbles in a frozen pond;
  But we in a lonely land abide
  Unchainable as the dim tide,
  With hearts that know nor law nor rule,
  And hands that hold no wearisome tool;
  Folded in love that fears no morrow,
  Nor the gray wandering osprey Sorrow.’

  O Patric! for a hundred years
  I chased upon that woody shore
  The deer, the badger, and the boar.
  O Patric! for a hundred years
  At evening on the glimmering sands,
  Beside the piled-up hunting spears,
  These now outworn and withered hands
  Wrestled among the island bands.
  O Patric! for a hundred years
  We went a-fishing in long boats
  With bending sterns and bending bows,
  And carven figures on their prows
  Of bitterns and fish-eating stoats.
  O Patric! for a hundred years
  The gentle Niamh was my wife;
  But now two things devour my life;
  The things that most of all I hate:
  Fasting and prayers.

S. PATRIC.

  Tell on.

OISIN.

                            Yes, yes,
  For these were ancient Oisin’s fate
  Loosed long ago from heaven’s gate,
  For his last days to lie in wait.

  When one day by the shore I stood,
  I drew out of the numberless
  White flowers of the foam a staff of wood
  From some dead warrior’s broken lance:
  I turned it in my hands; the stains
  Of war were on it, and I wept,
  Remembering how the Fenians stept
  Along the blood-bedabbled plains,
  Equal to good or grievous chance:
  Thereon young Niamh softly came
  And caught my hands, but spake no word
  Save only many times my name,
  In murmurs, like a frighted bird.
  We passed by woods, and lawns of clover,
  And found the horse and bridled him,
  For we knew well the old was over.
  I heard one say ‘his eyes grow dim
  With all the ancient sorrow of men’;
  And wrapped in dreams rode out again
  With hoofs of the pale findrinny
  Over the glimmering purple sea:
  Under the golden evening light.
  The immortals moved among the fountains
  By rivers and the woods’ old night;
  Some danced like shadows on the mountains,
  Some wandered ever hand in hand,
  Or sat in dreams on the pale strand;
  Each forehead like an obscure star
  Bent down above each hooked knee:
  And sang, and with a dreamy gaze
  Watched where the sun in a saffron blaze
  Was slumbering half in the sea ways;
  And, as they sang, the painted birds
  Kept time with their bright wings and feet;
  Like drops of honey came their words,
  But fainter than a young lamb’s bleat.
  ‘An old man stirs the fire to a blaze,
  In the house of a child, of a friend, of a brother;
  He has over-lingered his welcome; the days,
  Grown desolate, whisper and sigh to each other;
  He hears the storm in the chimney above,
  And bends to the fire and shakes with the cold,
  While his heart still dreams of battle and love,
  And the cry of the hounds on the hills of old.

  ‘But we are apart in the grassy places,
  Where care cannot trouble the least of our days,
  Or the softness of youth be gone from our faces,
  Or love’s first tenderness die in our gaze.
  The hare grows old as she plays in the sun
  And gazes around her with eyes of brightness;
  Before the swift things that she dreamed of were done
  She limps along in an aged whiteness;
  A storm of birds in the Asian trees
  Like tulips in the air a-winging,
  And the gentle waves of the summer seas,
  That raise their heads and wander singing,
  Must murmur at last “unjust, unjust”;
  And “my speed is a weariness,” falters the mouse;
  And the kingfisher turns to a ball of dust,
  And the roof falls in of his tunnelled house.
  But the love-dew dims our eyes till the day
  When God shall come from the sea with a sigh
  And bid the stars drop down from the sky,
  And the moon like a pale rose wither away.’




BOOK II




THE WANDERINGS OF OISIN


  NOW, man of croziers, shadows called our names
  And then away, away, like whirling flames;
  And now fled by, mist-covered, without sound,
  The youth and lady and the deer and hound;
  ‘Gaze no more on the phantoms,’ Niamh said,
  And kissed my eyes, and, swaying her bright head
  And her bright body, sang of faery and man
  Before God was or my old line began;
  Wars shadowy, vast, exultant; faeries of old
  Who wedded men with rings of Druid gold;
  And how those lovers never turn their eyes
  Upon the life that fades and flickers and dies,
  But love and kiss on dim shores far away
  Rolled round with music of the sighing spray:
  But sang no more, as when, like a brown bee
  That has drunk full, she crossed the misty sea
  With me in her white arms a hundred years
  Before this day; for now the fall of tears
  Troubled her song.

                    I do not know if days
  Or hours passed by, yet hold the morning rays
  Shone many times among the glimmering flowers
  Wove in her flower-like hair, before dark towers
  Rose in the darkness, and the white surf gleamed
  About them; and the horse of faery screamed
  And shivered, knowing the Isle of many Fears,
  Nor ceased until white Niamh stroked his ears
  And named him by sweet names.

                          A foaming tide
  Whitened afar with surge, fan-formed and wide,
  Burst from a great door marred by many a blow
  From mace and sword and pole-axe, long ago
  When gods and giants warred. We rode between
  The seaweed-covered pillars, and the green
  And surging phosphorus alone gave light
  On our dark pathway, till a countless flight
  Of moonlit steps glimmered; and left and right
  Dark statues glimmered over the pale tide
  Upon dark thrones. Between the lids of one
  The imaged meteors had flashed and run
  And had disported in the stilly jet,
  And the fixed stars had dawned and shone and set,
  Since God made Time and Death and Sleep: the other
  Stretched his long arm to where, a misty smother,
  The stream churned, churned, and churned—his lips apart,
  As though he told his never slumbering heart
  Of every foamdrop on its misty way:
  Tying the horse to his vast foot that lay
  Half in the unvesselled sea, we climbed the stairs
  And climbed so long, I thought the last steps were
  Hung from the morning star; when these mild words
  Fanned the delighted air like wings of birds:
  ‘My brothers spring out of their beds at morn,
  A-murmur like young partridge: with loud horn
  They chase the noon-tide deer;
  And when the dew-drowned stars hang in the air
  Look to long fishing-lines, or point and pare
  A larch-wood hunting spear.

  ‘O sigh, O fluttering sigh, be kind to me;
  Flutter along the froth lips of the sea,
  And shores the froth lips wet:
  And stay a little while, and bid them weep:
  Ah, touch their blue veined eyelids if they sleep,
  And shake their coverlet.

  ‘When you have told how I weep endlessly,
  Flutter along the froth lips of the sea
  And home to me again,
  And in the shadow of my hair lie hid,
  And tell me how you came to one unbid,
  The saddest of all men.’

  A maiden with soft eyes like funeral tapers,
  And face that seemed wrought out of moonlit vapours,
  And a sad mouth, that fear made tremulous
  As any ruddy moth, looked down on us;
  And she with a wave-rusted chain was tied
  To two old eagles, full of ancient pride,
  That with dim eyeballs stood on either side.
  Few feathers were on their dishevelled wings,
  For their dim minds were with the ancient things.

  ‘I bring deliverance,’ pearl-pale Niamh said.

  ‘Neither the living, nor the unlabouring dead,
  Nor the high gods who never lived, may fight
  My enemy and hope; demons for fright
  Jabber and scream about him in the night;
  For he is strong and crafty as the seas
  That sprang under the Seven Hazel Trees.
  And I must needs endure and hate and weep,
  Until the gods and demons drop asleep,
  Hearing Aed touch the mournful strings of gold.’

  ‘Is he so dreadful?’

                    ‘Be not over-bold,
  But flee while you may flee from him.’

                                    Then I:
  ‘This demon shall be pierced and drop and die,
  And his loose bulk be thrown in the loud tide.’

  ‘Flee from him,’ pearl-pale Niamh weeping cried,
  ‘For all men flee the demons’; but moved not,
  Nor shook my firm and spacious soul one jot;
  There was no mightier soul of Heber’s line;
  Now it is old and mouse-like: for a sign
  I burst the chain: still earless, nerveless, blind,
  Wrapped in the things of the unhuman mind,
  In some dim memory or ancient mood
  Still earless, nerveless, blind, the eagles stood.

  And then we climbed the stair to a high door,
  A hundred horsemen on the basalt floor
  Beneath had paced content: we held our way
  And stood within: clothed in a misty ray
  I saw a foam-white seagull drift and float
  Under the roof, and with a straining throat
  Shouted, and hailed him: he hung there a star,
  For no man’s cry shall ever mount so far;
  Not even your God could have thrown down that hall;
  Stabling His unloosed lightnings in their stall,
  He had sat down and sighed with cumbered heart,
  As though His hour were come.

                        We sought the part
  That was most distant from the door; green slime
  Made the way slippery, and time on time
  Showed prints of sea-born scales, while down through it
  The captives’ journeys to and fro were writ
  Like a small river, and, where feet touched, came
  A momentary gleam of phosphorus flame.
  Under the deepest shadows of the hall
  That maiden found a ring hung on the wall,
  And in the ring a torch, and with its flare
  Making a world about her in the air,
  Passed under a dim doorway, out of sight,
  And came again, holding a second light
  Burning between her fingers, and in mine
  Laid it and sighed: I held a sword whose shine
  No centuries could dim: and a word ran
  Thereon in Ogham letters, ‘Mananan’:
  That sea-god’s name, who in a deep content
  Sprang dripping, and, with captive demons sent
  Out of the seven-fold seas, built the dark hall
  Rooted in foam and clouds, and cried to all
  The mightier masters of a mightier race;
  And at his cry there came no milk-pale face
  Under a crown of thorns and dark with blood,
  But only exultant faces.

                      Niamh stood
  With bowed head, trembling when the white blade shone,
  But she whose hours of tenderness were gone
  Had neither hope nor fear. I bade them hide
  Under the shadows till the tumults died
  Of the loud crashing and earth-shaking fight,
  Lest they should look upon some dreadful sight;
  And thrust the torch between the slimy flags.
  A dome made out of endless carven jags,
  Where shadowy face flowed into shadowy face,
  Looked down on me; and in the self-same place
  I waited hour by hour, and the high dome
  Windowless, pillarless, multitudinous home
  Of faces, waited; and the leisured gaze
  Was loaded with the memory of days
  Buried and mighty: when through the great door
  The dawn came in, and glimmered on the floor
  With a pale light, I journeyed round the hall
  And found a door deep sunken in the wall,
  The least of doors; beyond on a dim plain
  A little runnel made a bubbling strain,
  And on the runnel’s stony and bare edge
  A dusky demon dry as a withered sedge
  Swayed, crooning to himself an unknown tongue:
  In a sad revelry he sang and swung
  Bacchant and mournful, passing to and fro
  His hand along the runnel’s side, as though
  The flowers still grew there: far on the sea’s waste;
  Shaking and waving, vapour vapour chased,
  While high frail cloudlets, fed with a green light,
  Like drifts of leaves, immovable and bright,
  Hung in the passionate dawn. He slowly turned:
  A demon’s leisure: eyes, first white, now burned
  Like wings of kingfishers; and he arose
  Barking. We trampled up and down with blows
  Of sword and brazen battle-axe, while day
  Gave to high noon and noon to night gave way;
  But when at withering of the sun he knew
  The Druid sword of Mananan, he grew
  To many shapes; I lunged at the smooth throat
  Of a great eel; it changed, and I but smote
  A fir-tree roaring in its leafless top;
  And I but held a corpse, with livid chop
  And dripping and sunken shape, to face and breast,
  When I tore down that tree; but when the west
  Surged up in plumy fire, I lunged and drave
  Through heart and spine, and cast him in the wave,
  Lest Niamh shudder.

                    Full of hope and dread
  Those two came carrying wine and meat and bread,
  And healed my wounds with unguents out of flowers,
  That feed white moths by some De Danaan shrine;
  Then in that hall, lit by the dim sea-shine,
  We lay on skins of otters, and drank wine,
  Brewed by the sea-gods, from huge cups that lay
  Upon the lips of sea-gods in their day;
  And then on heaped-up skins of otters slept.
  But when the sun once more in saffron stept,
  Rolling his flagrant wheel out of the deep,
  We sang the loves and angers without sleep,
  And all the exultant labours of the strong:

  But now the lying clerics murder song
  With barren words and flatteries of the weak.
  In what land do the powerless turn the beak
  Of ravening Sorrow, or the hand of Wrath?
  For all your croziers, they have left the path
  And wander in the storms and clinging snows,
  Hopeless for ever: ancient Oisin knows,
  For he is weak and poor and blind, and lies
  On the anvil of the world.

S. PATRIC.

                            Be still: the skies
  Are choked with thunder, lightning, and fierce wind,
  For God has heard, and speaks His angry mind;
  Go cast your body on the stones and pray,
  For He has wrought midnight and dawn and day.

OISIN.

  Saint, do you weep? I hear amid the thunder
  The Fenian horses; armour torn asunder;
  Laughter and cries: the armies clash and shock;
  All is done now; I see the ravens flock;
  Ah, cease, you mournful, laughing Fenian horn!

  We feasted for three days. On the fourth morn
  I found, dropping sea-foam on the wide stair,
  And hung with slime, and whispering in his hair,
  That demon dull and unsubduable;
  And once more to a day-long battle fell,
  And at the sundown threw him in the surge,
  To lie until the fourth morn saw emerge
  His new healed shape: and for a hundred years
  So warred, so feasted, with nor dreams, nor fears
  Nor languor nor fatigue: an endless feast,
  An endless war.

                The hundred years had ceased;
  I stood upon the stair: the surges bore
  A beech bough to me, and my heart grew sore,
  Remembering how I stood by white-haired Finn
  While the woodpecker made a merry din,
  The hare leaped in the grass.

                          Young Niamh came
  Holding that horse, and sadly called my name;
  I mounted, and we passed over the lone
  And drifting grayness, while this monotone,
  Surly and distant, mixed inseparably
  Into the clangour of the wind and sea:

  ‘I hear my soul drop down into decay,
  And Mananan’s dark tower, stone by stone,
  Gather sea-slime and fall the seaward way,
  And the moon goad the waters night and day,
  That all be overthrown.

  ‘But till the moon has taken all, I wage
  War on the mightiest men under the skies,
  And they have fallen or fled, age after age:
  Light is man’s love, and lighter is man’s rage;
  His purpose drifts and dies.’

  And then lost Niamh murmured, ‘Love, we go
  To the Island of Forgetfulness, for lo!
  The Islands of Dancing and of Victories
  Are empty of all power.’

                        ‘And which of these
  Is the Island of Content?’

                    ‘None know,’ she said;
  And on my bosom laid her weeping head.




BOOK III




THE WANDERINGS OF OISIN


  FLED foam underneath us, and round us, a wandering and milky smoke,
  High as the saddle girth, covering away from our glances the tide;
  And those that fled, and that followed, from the foam-pale distance
            broke;
  The immortal desire of immortals we saw in their faces, and sighed.

  I mused on the chase with the Fenians, and Bran, Sgeolan, Lomair,
  And never a song sang Niamh, and over my finger-tips
  Came now the sliding of tears and sweeping of mist-cold air,
  And now the warmth of sighs, and after the quiver of lips.

  Were we days long or hours long in riding, when rolled in a grisly
            peace,
  An isle lay level before us, with dripping hazel and oak?
  And we stood on a sea’s edge we saw not; for whiter than new-washed
            fleece
  Fled foam underneath us, and round us, a wandering and milky smoke.

  And we rode on the plains of the sea’s edge; the sea’s edge barren
            and gray,
  Gray sand on the green of the grasses and over the dripping trees,
  Dripping and doubling landward, as though they would hasten away
  Like an army of old men longing for rest from the moan of the seas.

  But the trees grew taller and closer, immense in their wrinkling bark;
  Dropping; a murmurous dropping; old silence and that one sound;
  For no live creatures lived there, no weasels moved in the dark:
  Long sighs arose in our spirits, beneath us bubbled the ground.

  And the ears of the horse went sinking away in the hollow night,
  For, as drift from a sailor slow drowning the gleams of the world and
            the sun,
  Ceased on our hands and our faces, on hazel and oak leaf, the light,
  And the stars were blotted above us, and the whole of the world was
            one.

  Till the horse gave a whinny; for, cumbrous with stems of the hazel
            and oak,
  A valley flowed down from his hoofs, and there in the long grass lay,
  Under the starlight and shadow, a monstrous slumbering folk,
  Their naked and gleaming bodies poured out and heaped in the way.

  And by them were arrow and war-axe, arrow and shield and blade;
  And dew-blanched horns, in whose hollow a child of three years old
  Could sleep on a bed of rushes, and all inwrought and inlaid,
  And more comely than man can make them with bronze and silver and gold.

  And each of the huge white creatures was huger than four-score men;
  The tops of their ears were feathered, their hands were the claws of
            birds,
  And, shaking the plumes of the grasses and the leaves of the mural glen,
  The breathing came from those bodies, long-warless, grown whiter than
            curds.

  The wood was so spacious above them, that He who had stars for His
            flocks
  Could fondle the leaves with His fingers, nor go from His dew-cumbered
            skies;
  So long were they sleeping, the owls had builded their nests in their
            locks,
  Filling the fibrous dimness with long generations of eyes.

  And over the limbs and the valley the slow owls wandered and came,
  Now in a place of star-fire, and now in a shadow place wide;
  And the chief of the huge white creatures, his knees in the soft
            star-flame,
  Lay loose in a place of shadow: we drew the reins by his side.

  Golden the nails of his bird-claws, flung loosely along the dim ground;
  In one was a branch soft-shining, with bells more many than sighs,
  In midst of an old man’s bosom; owls ruffling and pacing around,
  Sidled their bodies against him, filling the shade with their eyes.

  And my gaze was thronged with the sleepers; for nowhere in any clann
  Of the high people of Soraca nor in glamour by demons flung,
  Are faces alive with such beauty made known to the salt eye of man,
  Yet weary with passions that faded when the sevenfold seas were young.

  And I gazed on the bell-branch, sleep’s forebear, far sung by the
            Sennachies.
  I saw how those slumberers, grown weary, there camping in grasses deep,
  Of wars with the wide world and pacing the shores of the wandering seas,
  Laid hands on the bell-branch and swayed it, and fed of unhuman sleep.

  Snatching the horn of Niamh, I blew a lingering note;
  Came sound from those monstrous sleepers, a sound like the stirring of
            flies.
  He, shaking the fold of his lips, and heaving the pillar of his throat,
  Watched me with mournful wonder out of the wells of his eyes.

  I cried, ‘Come out of the shadow, king of the nails of gold!
  And tell of your goodly household and the goodly works of your hands,
  That we may muse in the starlight and talk of the battles of old;
  Your questioner, Oisin, is worthy, he comes from the Fenian lands.’

  Half open his eyes were, and held me, dull with the smoke of their
            dreams;
  His lips moved slowly in answer, no answer out of them came;
  Then he swayed in his fingers the bell-branch, slow dropping a sound in
            faint streams
  Softer than snow-flakes in April and piercing the marrow like flame.

  Wrapt in the wave of that music, with weariness more than of earth,
  The moil of my centuries filled me; and gone like a sea-covered stone
  Were the memories of the whole of my sorrow and the memories of the
            whole of my mirth,
  And a softness came from the starlight and filled me full to the bone.

  In the roots of the grasses, the sorrels, I laid my body as low;
  And the pearl-pale Niamh lay by me, her brow on the midst of my breast;
  And the horse was gone in the distance, and years after years ’gan flow;
  Square leaves of the ivy moved over us, binding us down to our rest.

  And, man of the many white croziers, a century there I forgot;
  How the fetlocks drip blood in the battle, when the fallen on fallen lie
            rolled;
  How the falconer follows the falcon in the weeds of the heron’s plot,
  And the names of the demons whose hammers made armour for Midhir of old.

  And, man of the many white croziers, a century there I forgot;
  That the spearshaft is made out of ashwood, the shield out of osier and
            hide;
  How the hammers spring on the anvil, on the spear-head’s burning spot;
  How the slow, blue-eyed oxen of Finn low sadly at evening tide.

  But in dreams, mild man of the croziers, driving the dust with their
            throngs,
  Moved round me, of seamen or landsmen, all who are winter tales;
  Came by me the Kings of the Red Branch, with roaring of laughter and
            songs,
  Or moved as they moved once, love-making or piercing the tempest with
            sails.

  Came Blanid, MacNessa, tall Fergus who feastward of old time slunk;
  Cook Barach, the traitor; and warward, the spittle on his beard never
            dry,
  Dark Balor, as old as a forest, car-borne, his mighty head sunk
  Helpless, men lifting the lids of his weary and death-making eye.

  And by me, in soft red raiment, the Fenians moved in loud streams,
  And Grania, walking and smiling, sewed with her needle of bone.
  So lived I and lived not, so wrought I and wrought not, with creatures
            of dreams,
  In a long iron sleep, as a fish in the water goes dumb as a stone.

  At times our slumber was lightened. When the sun was on silver or gold;
  When brushed with the wings of the owls, in the dimness they love going
            by;
  When a glow-worm was green on a grass leaf lured from his lair in the
            mould;
  Half wakening, we lifted our eyelids, and gazed on the grass with a
            sigh.

  So watched I when, man of the croziers, at the heel of a century fell,
  Weak, in the midst of the meadow, from his miles in the midst of the
            air,
  A starling like them that forgathered ’neath a moon waking white as
            a shell,
  When the Fenians made foray at morning with Bran, Sgeolan, Lomair.

  I awoke: the strange horse without summons out of the distance ran,
  Thrusting his nose to my shoulder; he knew in his bosom deep
  That once more moved in my bosom the ancient sadness of man,
  And that I would leave the immortals, their dimness, their dews dropping
            sleep.

  O, had you seen beautiful Niamh grow white as the waters are white,
  Lord of the croziers, you even had lifted your hands and wept:
  But, the bird in my fingers, I mounted, remembering alone that delight
  Of twilight and slumber were gone, and that hoofs impatiently stept.

  I cried, ‘O Niamh! O white one! if only a twelve-houred day,
  I must gaze on the beard of Finn, and move where the old men and young
  In the Fenians’ dwellings of wattle lean on the chessboards and play,
  Ah, sweet to me now were even bald Conan’s slanderous tongue!

  ‘Like me were some galley forsaken far off in Meridian isle,
  Remembering its long-oared companions, sails turning to thread-bare
            rags;
  No more to crawl on the seas with long oars mile after mile,
  But to be amid shooting of flies and flowering of rushes and flags.’

  Their motionless eyeballs of spirits grown mild with mysterious thought,
  Watched her those seamless faces from the valley’s glimmering girth;
  As she murmured, ‘O wandering Oisin, the strength of the bell-branch is
            naught,
  For there moves alive in your fingers the fluttering sadness of earth.

  ‘Then go through the lands in the saddle and see what the mortals do,
  And softly come to your Niamh over the tops of the tide;
  But weep for your Niamh, O Oisin, weep; for if only your shoe
  Brush lightly as haymouse earth pebbles, you will come no more to my
            side.

  ‘O flaming lion of the world, O when will you turn to your rest?’
  I saw from a distant saddle; from the earth she made her moan;
  ‘I would die like a small withered leaf in the autumn, for breast unto
            breast
  We shall mingle no more, nor our gazes empty their sweetness lone

  ‘In the isles of the farthest seas where only the spirits come.
  Were the winds less soft than the breath of a pigeon who sleeps on her
            nest,
  Nor lost in the star-fires and odours the sound of the sea’s vague drum,
  O flaming lion of the world, O when will you turn to your rest?’

  The wailing grew distant; I rode by the woods of the wrinkling bark,
  Where ever is murmurous dropping, old silence and that one sound;
  For no live creatures live there, no weasels move in the dark;
  In a reverie forgetful of all things, over the bubbling ground.

  And I rode by the plains of the sea’s edge, where all is barren and
            gray,
  Gray sands on the green of the grasses and over the dripping trees,
  Dripping and doubling landward, as though they would hasten away,
  Like an army of old men longing for rest from the moan of the seas.

  And the winds made the sands on the sea’s edge turning and turning go,
  As my mind made the names of the Fenians. Far from the hazel and oak
  I rode away on the surges, where, high as the saddle bow,
  Fled foam underneath me, and round me, a wandering and milky smoke.

  Long fled the foam-flakes around me, the winds fled out of the vast,
  Snatching the bird in secret; nor knew I, embosomed apart,
  When they froze the cloth on my body like armour riveted fast,
  For Remembrance, lifting her leanness, keened in the gates of my heart.

  Till fattening the winds of the morning, an odour of new-mown hay
  Came, and my forehead fell low, and my tears like berries fell down;
  Later a sound came, half lost in the sound of a shore far away,
  From the great grass-barnacle calling, and later the shore-weeds brown.

  If I were as I once was, the strong hoofs crushing the sand and the
            shells,
  Coming out of the sea as the dawn comes, a chaunt of love on my lips,
  Not coughing, my head on my knees, and praying, and wroth with the
            bells,
  I would leave no saint’s head on his body from Rachlin to Bera of
            ships.

  Making way from the kindling surges, I rode on a bridle-path
  Much wondering to see upon all hands, of wattles and woodwork made,
  Your bell-mounted churches, and guardless the sacred cairn and the
            rath,
  And a small and feeble race stooping with mattock and spade.

  Or weeding or ploughing with faces a-shining with much-toil wet;
  While in this place and that place, with bodies unglorious, their
            chieftains stood,
  Awaiting in patience the straw-death, croziered one, caught in their
            net:
  Went the laughter of scorn from my mouth like the roaring of wind in
            a wood.

  And because I went by them so huge and so speedy with eyes so bright,
  Came after the hard gaze of youth, or an old man lifted his head:
  And I rode and I rode, and I cried out, ‘The Fenians hunt wolves in
            the night,
  So sleep they by daytime.’ A voice cried, ‘The Fenians a long time are
            dead.’

  A whitebeard stood hushed on the pathway, the flesh of his face as dried
            grass,
  And in folds round his eyes and his mouth, he sad as a child without
            milk;
  And the dreams of the islands were gone, and I knew how men sorrow and
            pass,
  And their hound, and their horse, and their love, and their eyes that
            glimmer like silk.

  And wrapping my face in my hair, I murmured, ‘In old age they ceased’;
  And my tears were larger than berries, and I murmured, ‘Where white
            clouds lie spread
  On Crevroe or broad Knockfefin, with many of old they feast
  On the floors of the gods.’ He cried, ‘No, the gods a long time are
            dead.’

  And lonely and longing for Niamh, I shivered and turned me about,
  The heart in me longing to leap like a grasshopper into her heart;
  I turned and rode to the westward, and followed the sea’s old shout
  Till I saw where Maeve lies sleeping till starlight and midnight part.

  And there at the foot of the mountain, two carried a sack full of sand,
  They bore it with staggering and sweating, but fell with their burden at
            length:
  Leaning down from the gem-studded saddle, I flung it five yards with my
            hand,
  With a sob for men waxing so weakly, a sob for the Fenians’ old
            strength.

  The rest you have heard of, O croziered one; how, when divided the
            girth,
  I fell on the path, and the horse went away like a summer fly;
  And my years three hundred fell on me, and I rose, and walked on the
            earth,
  A creeping old man, full of sleep, with the spittle on his beard never
            dry.

  How the men of the sand-sack showed me a church with its belfry in air;
  Sorry place, where for swing of the war-axe in my dim eyes the crozier
            gleams;
  What place have Caolte and Conan, and Bran, Sgeolan, Lomair?
  Speak, you too are old with your memories, an old man surrounded with
            dreams.

S. PATRIC.

  Where the flesh of the footsole clingeth on the burning stones is their
            place;
  Where the demons whip them with wires on the burning stones of wide
            hell,
  Watching the blessed ones move far off, and the smile on God’s face,
  Between them a gateway of brass, and the howl of the angels who fell.

OISIN.

  Put the staff in my hands; for I go to the Fenians, O cleric, to chaunt
  The war-songs that roused them of old; they will rise, making clouds
            with their breath
  Innumerable, singing, exultant; the clay underneath them shall pant,
  And demons be broken in pieces, and trampled beneath them in death.

  And demons afraid in their darkness; deep horror of eyes and of wings,
  Afraid their ears on the earth laid, shall listen and rise up and weep;
  Hearing the shaking of shields and the quiver of stretched bowstrings,
  Hearing hell loud with a murmur, as shouting and mocking we sweep.

  We will tear out the flaming stones, and batter the gateway of brass
  And enter, and none sayeth ‘No’ when there enters the strongly armed
            guest;
  Make clean as a broom cleans, and march on as oxen move over young
            grass;
  Then feast, making converse of Eire, of wars, and of old wounds, and
            rest.

S. PATRIC.

  On the flaming stones, without refuge, the limbs of the Fenians are
            tost;
  None war on the masters of Hell, who could break up the world in their
            rage;
  But kneel and wear out the flags and pray for your soul that is lost
  Through the demon love of its youth and its godless and passionate age.

OISIN.

  Ah, me! to be shaken with coughing and broken with old age and pain,
  Without laughter, a show unto children, alone with remembrance and fear,
  All emptied of purple hours as a beggar’s cloak in the rain,
  As a grass seed crushed by a pebble, as a wolf sucked under a weir.

  It were sad to gaze on the blessed and no man I loved of old there;
  I throw down the chain of small stones! when life in my body has ceased,
  I will go to Caolte, and Conan, and Bran, Sgeolan, Lomair,
  And dwell in the house of the Fenians, be they in flames or at feast.




NOTES




THE WIND AMONG THE REEDS.


When I wrote these poems I had so meditated over the images that came
to me in writing ‘Ballads and Lyrics,’ ‘The Rose,’ and ‘The Wanderings
of Oisin,’ and other images from Irish folk-lore, that they had become
true symbols. I had sometimes when awake, but more often in sleep,
moments of vision, a state very unlike dreaming, when these images took
upon themselves what seemed an independent life and became a part of
a mystic language, which seemed always as if it would bring me some
strange revelation. Being troubled at what was thought a reckless
obscurity, I tried to explain myself in lengthy notes, into which I
put all the little learning I had, and more wilful phantasy than I now
think admirable, though what is most mystical still seems to me the
most true. I quote in what follows the better or the more necessary
passages.


THE HOSTING OF THE SIDHE (page 3).

The gods of ancient Ireland, the Tuatha De Danaan, or the Tribes of the
goddess Danu, or the Sidhe, from Aes Sidhe, or Sluagh Sidhe, the people
of the Faery Hills, as these words are usually explained, still ride
the country as of old. Sidhe is also Gaelic for wind, and certainly the
Sidhe have much to do with the wind. They journey in whirling winds,
the winds that were called the dance of the daughters of Herodias
in the Middle Ages, Herodias doubtless taking the place of some old
goddess. When the country people see the leaves whirling on the road
they bless themselves, because they believe the Sidhe to be passing by.
They are almost always said to wear no covering upon their heads, and
to let their hair stream out; and the great among them, for they have
great and simple, go much upon horseback. If any one becomes too much
interested in them, and sees them overmuch, he loses all interest in
ordinary things.

A woman near Gort, in Galway, says: ‘There is a boy, now, of the
Clorans; but I wouldn’t for the world let them think I spoke of him;
it’s two years since he came from America, and since that time he never
went to Mass, or to church, or to fairs, or to market, or to stand on
the cross roads, or to hurling, or to nothing. And if any one comes
into the house, it’s into the room he’ll slip, not to see them; and as
to work, he has the garden dug to bits, and the whole place smeared
with cow dung; and such a crop as was never seen; and the alders all
plaited till they look grand. One day he went as far as the chapel;
but as soon as he got to the door he turned straight round again, as
if he hadn’t power to pass it. I wonder he wouldn’t get the priest to
read a Mass for him, or something; but the crop he has is grand, and
you may know well he has some to help him.’ One hears many stories of
the kind; and a man whose son is believed to go out riding among them
at night tells me that he is careless about everything, and lies in
bed until it is late in the day. A doctor believes this boy to be mad.
Those that are at times ‘away,’ as it is called, know all things, but
are afraid to speak. A countryman at Kiltartan says, ‘There was one of
the Lydons—John—was away for seven years, lying in his bed, but brought
away at nights, and he knew everything; and one, Kearney, up in the
mountains, a cousin of his own, lost two hoggets, and came and told
him, and he knew the very spot where they were, and told him, and he
got them back again. But _they_ were vexed at that, and took away the
power, so that he never knew anything again, no more than another.’

Knocknarea is in Sligo, and the country people say that Maeve, still
a great queen of the western Sidhe, is buried in the cairn of stones
upon it. I have written of Clooth-na-Bare in ‘The Celtic Twilight.’
She ‘went all over the world, seeking a lake deep enough to drown her
faery life, of which she had grown weary, leaping from hill to hill,
and setting up a cairn of stones wherever her feet lighted, until, at
last, she found the deepest water in the world in little Lough Ia,
on the top of the bird mountain, in Sligo.’ I forget, now, where I
heard this story, but it may have been from a priest at Collooney.
Clooth-na-Bare would mean the old woman of Bare, but is evidently a
corruption of Cailleac Bare, the old woman of Bare, who, under the
names Bare, and Berah, and Beri, and Verah, and Dera, and Dhira,
appears in the legends of many places. Mr. O’Grady found her haunting
Lough Liath high up on the top of a mountain of the Fews, the Slieve
Fuadh, or Slieve G-Cullain of old times, under the name of the Cailleac
Buillia. He describes Lough Liath as a desolate moon-shaped lake, with
made wells and sunken passages upon its borders, and beset by marsh and
heather and gray boulders, and closes his ‘Flight of the Eagle’ with a
long rhapsody upon mountain and lake, because of the heroic tales and
beautiful old myths that have hung about them always. He identifies
the Cailleac Buillia with that Meluchra who persuaded Fionn to go
to her amid the waters of Lough Liath, and so changed him with her
enchantments, that, though she had to free him because of the threats
of the Fiana, his hair was ever afterwards as white as snow. To this
day the Tuatha De Danaan that are in the waters beckon to men, and
drown them in the waters; and Bare, or Dhira, or Meluchra, or whatever
name one likes the best, is, doubtless, the name of a mistress among
them. Meluchra was daughter of Cullain; and Cullain Mr. O’Grady
calls, upon I know not what authority, a form of Lir, the master of
waters. The people of the waters have been in all ages beautiful and
changeable and lascivious, or beautiful and wise and lonely, for water
is everywhere the signature of the fruitfulness of the body and of the
fruitfulness of dreams. The white hair of Fionn may be but another
of the troubles of those that come to unearthly wisdom and earthly
trouble, and the threats and violence of the Fiana against her, a
different form of the threats and violence the country people use, to
make the Aes Sidhe give up those that are ‘away.’ Bare is now often
called an ugly old woman, but in the ‘Song of Bare,’ which Lady Gregory
has given in her ‘Saints and Wonders,’ she laments her lost beauty
after the withering of seven hundred years; and Dr. Joyce says that
one of her old names was Aebhin, which means beautiful. Aebhin was the
goddess of the tribes of northern Leinster; and the lover she had made
immortal, and who loved her perfectly, left her, and put on mortality,
to fight among them against the stranger, and died on the strand of
Clontarf.


THE POET PLEADS WITH THE ELEMENTAL POWERS (p. 37). HE
THINKS OF HIS PAST GREATNESS WHEN A PART OF THE CONSTELLATIONS OF
HEAVEN (p. 40). HE HEARS THE CRY OF THE SEDGE (p. 28).

The Rose has been for many centuries a symbol of spiritual love and
supreme beauty. The lotus was in some Eastern countries imagined
blossoming upon the Tree of Life, as the Flower of Life, and is thus
represented in Assyrian bas-reliefs. Because the Rose, the flower
sacred to the Virgin Mary, and the flower that Apuleius’ adventurer
ate, when he was changed out of the ass’s shape and received into the
fellowship of Isis, is the western Flower of Life, I have imagined it
growing upon the Tree of Life. I once stood beside a man in Ireland
when he saw it growing there in a vision, that seemed to have rapt him
out of his body. He saw the Garden of Eden walled about, and on the top
of a high mountain, as in certain mediæval diagrams, and after passing
the Tree of Knowledge, on which grew fruit full of troubled faces, and
through whose branches flowed, he was told, sap that was human souls,
he came to a tall, dark tree, with little bitter fruits, and was shown
a kind of stair or ladder going up through the tree, and told to go
up; and near the top of the tree, a beautiful woman, like the Goddess
of Life, associated with the tree in Assyria, gave him a rose that
seemed to have been growing upon the tree. One finds the Rose in the
Irish poets, sometimes as a religious symbol, as in the phrase, ‘the
Rose of Friday,’ meaning the Rose of austerity, in a Gaelic poem in
Dr. Hyde’s ‘Religious Songs of Connacht’; and, I think, as a symbol
of woman’s beauty in the Gaelic song, ‘Roseen Dubh’; and a symbol of
Ireland in Mangan’s adaptation of ‘Roseen Dubh,’ ‘My Dark Rosaleen,’
and in Mr. Aubrey de Vere’s ‘The Little Black Rose.’ I do not know any
evidence to prove whether this symbol came to Ireland with mediæval
Christianity, or whether it has come down from older times. I have
read somewhere that a stone engraved with a Celtic god, who holds what
looks like a rose in one hand, has been found somewhere in England; but
I cannot find the reference, though I certainly made a note of it. If
the Rose was really a symbol of Ireland among the Gaelic poets, and if
‘Roseen Dubh’ is really a political poem, as some think, one may feel
pretty certain that the ancient Celts associated the Rose with Eire, or
Fotla, or Banba—goddesses who gave their names to Ireland—or with some
principal god or goddess, for such symbols are not suddenly adopted or
invented, but come out of mythology.

I have made the Seven Lights, the constellation of the Bear, lament for
the theft of the Rose, and I have made the Dragon, the constellation
Draco, the guardian of the Rose, because these constellations move
about the pole of the heavens, the ancient Tree of Life in many
countries, and are often associated with the Tree of Life in mythology.
It is this Tree of Life that I have put into the ‘Song of Mongan’
under its common Irish form of a hazel; and, because it had sometimes
the stars for fruit, I have hung upon it ‘the Crooked Plough’ and the
‘Pilot Star,’ as Gaelic-speaking Irishmen sometimes call the Bear and
the North star. I have made it an axle-tree in ‘Aedh hears the Cry of
the Sedge,’ for this was another ancient way of representing it.


THE HOST OF THE AIR (p. 6).

Some writers distinguish between the Sluagh Gaoith, the host of the
air, and Sluagh Sidhe, the host of the Sidhe, and describe the host
of the air as of a peculiar malignancy. Dr. Joyce says, ‘Of all the
different kinds of goblins .... air demons were most dreaded by the
people. They lived among clouds, and mists, and rocks, and hated the
human race with the utmost malignity.’ A very old Aran charm, which
contains the words ‘Send God, by his strength, between us and the
host of the Sidhe, between us and the host of the air,’ seems also
to distinguish among them. I am inclined, however, to think that the
distinction came in with Christianity and its belief about the prince
of the air, for the host of the Sidhe, as I have already explained, are
closely associated with the wind.

They are said to steal brides just after their marriage, and sometimes
in a blast of wind. A man in Galway says, ‘At Aughanish there were two
couples came to the shore to be married, and one of the newly married
women was in the boat with the priest, and they going back to the
island; and a sudden blast of wind came, and the priest said some
blessed words that were able to save himself, but the girl was swept.’

This woman was drowned; but more often the persons who are taken ‘get
the touch,’ as it is called, and fall into a half dream, and grow
indifferent to all things, for their true life has gone out of the
world, and is among the hills and the forts of the Sidhe. A faery
doctor has told me that his wife ‘got the touch’ at her marriage
because there was one of them wanted her; and the way he knew for
certain was, that when he took a pitchfork out of the rafters, and told
her it was a broom, she said, ‘It is a broom.’ She was, the truth is,
in the magical sleep, to which people have given a new name lately,
that makes the imagination so passive that it can be moulded by any
voice in any world into any shape. A mere likeness of some old woman,
or even old animal, some one or some thing the Sidhe have no longer a
use for, is believed to be left instead of the person who is ‘away’;
this some one or some thing can, it is thought, be driven away by
threats, or by violence (though I have heard country women say that
violence is wrong), which perhaps awakes the soul out of the magical
sleep. The story in the poem is founded on an old Gaelic ballad that
was sung and translated for me by a woman at Ballisodare in County
Sligo; but in the ballad the husband found the keeners keening his
wife when he got to his house. She was ‘swept’ at once; but the Sidhe
are said to value those the most whom they but cast into a half dream,
which may last for years, for they need the help of a living person in
most of the things they do. There are many stories of people who seem
to die and be buried—though the country people will tell you it is but
some one or some thing put in their place that dies and is buried—and
yet are brought back afterwards. These tales are perhaps memories of
true awakenings out of the magical sleep, moulded by the imagination,
under the influence of a mystical doctrine which it understands too
literally, into the shape of some well-known traditional tale. One does
not hear them as one hears the others, from the persons who are ‘away,’
or from their wives or husbands; and one old man, who had often seen
the Sidhe, began one of them with ‘Maybe it is all vanity.’

Here is a tale that a friend of mine heard in the Burren hills, and it
is a type of all:—

‘There was a girl to be married, and she didn’t like the man, and she
cried when the day was coming, and said she wouldn’t go along with
him. And the mother said, “Get into the bed, then, and I’ll say that
you’re sick.” And so she did. And when the man came the mother said to
him, “You can’t get her, she’s sick in the bed.” And he looked in and
said, “That’s not my wife that’s in the bed, it’s some old hag.” And
the mother began to cry and roar. And he went out and got two hampers
of turf, and made a fire, that they thought he was going to burn the
house down. And when the fire was kindled, “Come out, now,” says he,
“and we’ll see who you are, when I’ll put you on the fire.” And when
she heard that, she gave one leap, and was out of the house, and they
saw, then, it was an old hag she was. Well, the man asked the advice
of an old woman, and she bid him go to a faery-bush that was near,
and he might get some word of her. So he went there at night, and saw
all sorts of grand people, and they in carriages or riding on horses,
and among them he could see the girl he came to look for. So he went
again to the old woman, and she said, “If you can get the three bits
of blackthorn out of her hair, you’ll get her again.” So that night he
went again, and that time he only got hold of a bit of her hair. But
the old woman told him that was no use, and that he was put back now,
and it might be twelve nights before he’d get her. But on the fourth
night he got the third bit of blackthorn, and he took her, and she
came away with him. He never told the mother he had got her; but one
day she saw her at a fair, and, says she, “That’s my daughter; I know
her by the smile and by the laugh of her, and she with a shawl about
her head.” So the husband said, “You’re right there, and hard I worked
to get her.” She spoke often of the grand things she saw underground,
and how she used to have wine to drink, and to drive out in a carriage
with four horses every night. And she used to be able to see her
husband when he came to look for her, and she was greatly afraid he’d
get a drop of the wine, for then he would have come underground and
never left it again. And she was glad herself to come to earth again,
and not to be left there.’

The old Gaelic literature is full of the appeals of the Tuatha De
Danaan to mortals whom they would bring into their country; but the
song of Midher to the beautiful Etain, the wife of the king who was
called Echaid the ploughman, is the type of all.

‘O beautiful woman, come with me to the marvellous land where one
listens to a sweet music, where one has spring flowers in one’s hair,
where the body is like snow from head to foot, where no one is sad or
silent, where teeth are white and eyebrows are black ... cheeks red
like foxglove in flower.... Ireland is beautiful, but not so beautiful
as the Great Plain I call you to. The beer of Ireland is heady, but
the beer of the Great Plain is much more heady. How marvellous is the
country I am speaking of! Youth does not grow old there. Streams with
warm flood flow there; sometimes mead, sometimes wine. Men are charming
and without a blot there, and love is not forbidden there. O woman,
when you come into my powerful country you will wear a crown of gold
upon your head. I will give you the flesh of swine, and you will have
beer and milk to drink, O beautiful woman. O beautiful woman, come with
me!’


THE SONG OF WANDERING AENGUS (p. 11).

The Tuatha De Danaan can take all shapes, and those that are in the
waters take often the shape of fish. A woman of Burren, in Galway,
says, ‘There are more of them in the sea than on the land, and they
sometimes try to come over the side of the boat in the form of fishes,
for they can take their choice shape.’ At other times they are
beautiful women; and another Galway woman says, ‘Surely those things
are in the sea as well as on land. My father was out fishing one night
off Tyrone. And something came beside the boat that had eyes shining
like candles. And then a wave came in, and a storm rose all in a
minute, and whatever was in the wave, the weight of it had like to sink
the boat. And then they saw that it was a woman in the sea that had the
shining eyes. So my father went to the priest, and he bid him always to
take a drop of holy water and a pinch of salt out in the boat with him,
and nothing could harm him.’

The poem was suggested to me by a Greek folk song; but the folk belief
of Greece is very like that of Ireland, and I certainly thought, when
I wrote it, of Ireland, and of the spirits that are in Ireland. An old
man who was cutting a quickset hedge near Gort, in Galway, said, only
the other day, ‘One time I was cutting timber over in Inchy, and about
eight o’clock one morning, when I got there, I saw a girl picking nuts,
with her hair hanging down over her shoulders; brown hair; and she had
a good, clean face, and she was tall, and nothing on her head, and
her dress no way gaudy, but simple. And when she felt me coming she
gathered herself up, and was gone, as if the earth had swallowed her
up. And I followed her, and looked for her, but I never could see her
again from that day to this, never again.’

The county Galway people use the word ‘clean’ in its old sense of fresh
and comely.


HE MOURNS FOR THE CHANGE THAT HAS COME UPON HIM AND HIS BELOVED,
AND LONGS FOR THE END OF THE WORLD (p. 15).

My deer and hound are properly related to the deer and hound that
flicker in and out of the various tellings of the Arthurian legends,
leading different knights upon adventures, and to the hounds and to the
hornless deer at the beginning of, I think, all tellings of Oisin’s
journey to the country of the young. The hound is certainly related
to the Hounds of Annwvyn or of Hades, who are white, and have red
ears, and were heard, and are, perhaps, still heard by Welsh peasants,
following some flying thing in the night winds; and is probably related
to the hounds that Irish country people believe will awake and seize
the souls of the dead if you lament them too loudly or too soon. An
old woman told a friend and myself that she saw what she thought were
white birds, flying over an enchanted place; but found, when she got
near, that they had dogs’ heads, and I do not doubt that my hound and
these dog-headed birds are of the same family. I got my hound and deer
out of a last century Gaelic poem about Oisin’s journey to the country
of the young. After the hunting of the hornless deer, that leads him
to the seashore, and while he is riding over the sea with Niamh, he
sees amid the waters—I have not the Gaelic poem by me, and describe it
from memory—a young man following a girl who has a golden apple, and
afterwards a hound with one red ear following a deer with no horns.
This hound and this deer seem plain images of the desire of man ‘which
is for the woman,’ and ‘the desire of the woman which is for the desire
of the man,’ and of all desires that are as these. I have read them
in this way in ‘The Wanderings of Usheen’ or Oisin, and have made my
lover sigh because he has seen in their faces ‘the immortal desire of
immortals.’

The man in my poem who has a hazel wand may have been Aengus, Master of
Love; and I have made the boar without bristles come out of the West,
because the place of sunset was in Ireland, as in other countries, a
place of symbolic darkness and death.


THE CAP AND BELLS (p. 22).

I dreamed this story exactly as I have written it, and dreamed another
long dream after it, trying to make out its meaning, and whether I
was to write it in prose or verse. The first dream was more a vision
than a dream, for it was beautiful and coherent, and gave me the sense
of illumination and exaltation that one gets from visions, while the
second dream was confused and meaningless. The poem has always meant a
great deal to me, though, as is the way with symbolic poems, it has not
always meant quite the same thing. Blake would have said, ‘the authors
are in eternity,’ and I am quite sure they can only be questioned in
dreams.


THE VALLEY OF THE BLACK PIG (p. 24).

All over Ireland there are prophecies of the coming rout of the enemies
of Ireland, in a certain Valley of the Black Pig, and these prophecies
are, no doubt, now, as they were in the Fenian days, a political force.
I have heard of one man who would not give any money to the Land
League, because the Battle could not be until the close of the century;
but, as a rule, periods of trouble bring prophecies of its near coming.
A few years before my time, an old man who lived at Lisadill, in Sligo,
used to fall down in a fit and rave out descriptions of the Battle;
and a man in Sligo has told me that it will be so great a battle that
the horses shall go up to their fetlocks in blood, and that their
girths, when it is over, will rot from their bellies for lack of a hand
to unbuckle them. If one reads Professor Rhys’ “Celtic Heathendom”
by the light of Professor Frazer’s “Golden Bough,” and puts together
what one finds there about the boar that killed Diarmuid, and other
old Celtic boars and sows, one sees that the battle is mythological,
and that the Pig it is named from must be a type of cold and winter
doing battle with the summer, or of death battling with life. For the
purposes of poetry, at any rate, I think it a symbol of the darkness
that will destroy the world. The country people say there is no shape
for a spirit to take so dangerous as the shape of a pig; and a Galway
blacksmith—and blacksmiths are thought to be specially protected—says
he would be afraid to meet a pig on the road at night; and another
Galway man tells this story: ‘There was a man coming the road from Gort
to Garryland one night, and he had a drop taken; and before him, on
the road, he saw a pig walking; and having a drop in, he gave a shout,
and made a kick at it, and bid it get out of that. And by the time he
got home, his arm was swelled from the shoulder to be as big as a bag,
and he couldn’t use his hand with the pain of it. And his wife brought
him, after a few days, to a woman that used to do cures at Rahasane.
And on the road all she could do would hardly keep him from lying down
to sleep on the grass. And when they got to the woman she knew all that
happened; “and,” says she, “it’s well for you that your wife didn’t let
you fall asleep on the grass, for if you had done that but even for one
instant, you’d be a lost man.”’

Professor Rhys, who considers the bristleless boar a symbol of darkness
and cold, rather than of winter and cold, thinks it was without
bristles because the darkness is shorn away by the sun.

The Battle should, I believe, be compared with three other battles; a
battle the Sidhe are said to fight when a person is being taken away
by them; a battle they are said to fight in November for the harvest;
the great battle the Tuatha De Danaan fought, according to the Gaelic
chroniclers, with the Fomor at Moy Tura, or the Towery Plain.

I have heard of the battle over the dying both in County Galway and in
the Isles of Aran, an old Aran fisherman having told me that it was
fought over two of his children, and that he found blood in a box he
had for keeping fish, when it was over; and I have written about it,
and given examples elsewhere. A faery doctor, on the borders of Galway
and Clare, explained it as a battle between the friends and enemies
of the dying, the one party trying to take them, the other trying to
save them from being taken. It may once, when the land of the Sidhe was
the only other world, and when every man who died was carried thither,
have always accompanied death. I suggest that the battle between the
Tuatha De Danaan, the powers of light, and warmth, and fruitfulness,
and goodness, and the Fomor, the powers of darkness, and cold, and
barrenness, and badness upon the Towery Plain, was the establishment
of the habitable world, the rout of the ancestral darkness; that the
battle among the Sidhe for the harvest is the annual battle of summer
and winter; that the battle among the Sidhe at a man’s death is the
battle of life and death; and that the battle of the Black Pig is the
battle between the manifest world and the ancestral darkness at the
end of all things; and that all these battles are one, the battle of
all things with shadowy decay. Once a symbolism has possessed the
imagination of large numbers of men, it becomes, as I believe, an
embodiment of disembodied powers, and repeats itself in dreams and
visions, age after age.


THE SECRET ROSE (p. 32).

I find that I have unintentionally changed the old story of Conchubar’s
death. He did not see the crucifixion in a vision, but was told about
it. He had been struck by a ball, made of the dried brain of a dead
enemy, and hurled out of a sling; and this ball had been left in his
head, and his head had been mended, the ‘Book of Leinster’ says, with
thread of gold because his hair was like gold. Keating, a writer of
the time of Elizabeth, says, ‘In that state did he remain seven years,
until the Friday on which Christ was crucified, according to some
historians; and when he saw the unusual changes of the creation and the
eclipse of the sun and the moon at its full, he asked of Bucrach, a
Leinster Druid, who was along with him, what was it that brought that
unusual change upon the planets of Heaven and Earth. “Jesus Christ, the
Son of God,” said the Druid, “who is now being crucified by the Jews.”
“That is a pity,” said Conchubar; “were I in his presence I would kill
those who were putting him to death.” And with that he brought out
his sword, and rushed at a woody grove which was convenient to him,
and began to cut and fell it; and what he said was, that if he were
among the Jews, that was the usage he would give them, and from the
excessiveness of his fury which seized upon him, the ball started out
of his head, and some of the brain came after it, and in that way he
died. The wood of Lanshraigh, in Feara Rois, is the name by which that
shrubby wood is called.’

I have imagined Cuchulain meeting Fand ‘walking among flaming dew.’ The
story of their love is one of the most beautiful of our old tales.

I have founded the man ‘who drove the gods out of their Liss,’ or fort,
upon something I have read about Caolte after the battle of Gabra, when
almost all his companions were killed, driving the gods out of their
Liss, either at Osraighe, now Ossory, or at Eas Ruaidh, now Asseroe,
a waterfall at Ballyshannon, where Ilbreac, one of the children of the
goddess Danu, had a Liss. But maybe I only read it in Mr. Standish
O’Grady, who has a fine imagination, for I find no such story in Lady
Gregory’s book.

I have founded ‘the proud dreaming king’ upon Fergus, the son of Roigh,
the legendary poet of ‘the quest of the bull of Cuailgne,’ as he is
in the ancient story of Deirdre, and in modern poems by Ferguson. He
married Nessa, and Ferguson makes him tell how she took him ‘captive in
a single look.’

  ‘I am but an empty shade,
  Far from life and passion laid;
  Yet does sweet remembrance thrill
  All my shadowy being still.’

Presently, because of his great love, he gave up his throne to
Conchubar, her son by another, and lived out his days feasting, and
fighting, and hunting. His promise never to refuse a feast from a
certain comrade, and the mischief that came by his promise, and the
vengeance he took afterwards, are a principal theme of the poets. I
have explained my changing imaginations of him in ‘Fergus and the
Druid,’ and in a little song in the second act of ‘The Countess
Kathleen,’ and in ‘Deirdre.’

I have founded him ‘who sold tillage, and house, and goods,’ upon
something in ‘The Red Pony,’ a folk tale in Mr. Larminie’s ‘West Irish
Folk Tales.’ A young man ‘saw a light before him on the high road. When
he came as far, there was an open box on the road, and a light coming
up out of it. He took up the box. There was a lock of hair in it.
Presently he had to go to become the servant of a king for his living.
There were eleven boys. When they were going out into the stable at ten
o’clock, each of them took a light but he. He took no candle at all
with him. Each of them went into his own stable. When he went into his
stable he opened the box. He left it in a hole in the wall. The light
was great. It was twice as much as in the other stables.’ The king
hears of it, and makes him show him the box. The king says, ‘You must
go and bring me the woman to whom the hair belongs.’ In the end, the
young man, and not the king, marries the woman.




EARLY POEMS:


BALLADS AND LYRICS (p. 89). ‘THE ROSE’ (p. 139).
‘THE WANDERINGS OF OISIN’ (p. 175).

When I first wrote I went here and there for my subjects as my reading
led me, and preferred to all other countries Arcadia and the India of
romance, but presently I convinced myself, for such reasons as those
in ‘Ireland and the Arts,’ that I should never go for the scenery of
a poem to any country but my own, and I think that I shall hold to
that conviction to the end. I was very young; and, perhaps because I
belonged to a Young Ireland Society in Dublin, I wished to be as easily
understood as the Young Ireland writers, to write always out of the
common thought of the people.

I have put the poems written while I was influenced by this desire,
though with an always lessening force, into those sections which I
have called ‘Early Poems.’ I read certain of them now with no little
discontent, for I find, especially in the ballads, some triviality and
sentimentality. Mangan and Davis, at their best, are not sentimental
and trivial, but I became so from an imitation that was not natural
to me. When I was writing the poems in the second of the three, the
section called ‘The Rose,’ I found that I was becoming unintelligible
to the young men who had been in my thought. We have still the same
tradition, but I have been like a traveller who, having when newly
arrived in the city noticed nothing but the news of the market-place,
the songs of the workmen, the great public buildings, has come after
certain months to let his thoughts run upon some little carving in its
niche, some Ogham on a stone, or the conversation of a countryman who
knows more of the ‘Boar without Bristles’ than of the daily paper.

When writing I went for nearly all my subjects to Irish folklore and
legends, much as a Young Ireland poet would have done, writing ‘Down by
the Salley Garden’ by adding a few lines to a couple of lines I heard
sung at Ballisodare; ‘The Meditation of the Old Fisherman’ from the
words of a not very old fisherman at Rosses Point; ‘The Lamentation
of the Old Pensioner’ from words spoken by a man on the Two Rock
Mountain to a friend of mine; ‘The Ballad of the Old Foxhunter’ from
an incident in one of Kickham’s novels; and ‘The Ballad of Moll Magee’
from a sermon preached in a chapel at Howth; and ‘The Wanderings of
Oisin’ from a Gaelic poem of the Eighteenth Century and certain Middle
Irish poems in dialogue. It is no longer necessary to say who Oisin
and Cuchulain and Fergus and the other bardic persons are, for Lady
Gregory, in her ‘Gods and Fighting Men’ and ‘Cuchulain of Muirthemne’
has re-told all that is greatest in the ancient literature of Ireland
in a style that has to my ears an immortal beauty.


  _Printed by_ A. H. BULLEN, _at The Shakespeare Head Press,
                        Stratford-on-Avon_.

       *       *       *       *       *

Transcriber’s Notes:

Only the most obvious punctuation errors repaired. Repeated section
titles were removed. Varied hyphenation was retained.

Page 202, “multudinous” changed to “multitudinous” (pillarless,
multitudinous home)

Page 211, stanza break inserted above the line that begins (Till the
horse gave a whinny)














THE COLLECTED WORKS OF WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS




  THE KING’S THRESHOLD. ON
  BAILE’S STRAND. DEIRDRE.
  SHADOWY WATERS :: BEING
  THE SECOND VOLUME OF
  THE COLLECTED WORKS IN
  VERSE & PROSE OF WILLIAM
  BUTLER YEATS :: IMPRINTED
  AT THE SHAKESPEARE HEAD
  PRESS STRATFORD-ON-AVON
  MCMVIII




CONTENTS


                                                             PAGE
  THE KING’S THRESHOLD                                          1
  ON BAILE’S STRAND                                            69
  DEIRDRE                                                     125
  THE SHADOWY WATERS                                          179

  APPENDIX I:
  ACTING VERSION OF ‘THE SHADOWY WATERS’                      231

  APPENDIX II:
  A DIFFERENT VERSION OF DEIRDRE’S ENTRANCE                   251

  APPENDIX III:
  THE LEGENDARY AND MYTHOLOGICAL FOUNDATION OF THE PLAYS      254

  APPENDIX IV:
  THE DATES AND PLACES OF PERFORMANCE OF PLAYS                 256




  _The friends that have it I do wrong
  When ever I remake a song,
  Should know what issue is at stake:
  It is myself that I remake._




THE KING’S THRESHOLD




  TO FRANK FAY

  BECAUSE OF HIS BEAUTIFUL SPEAKING IN
  THE CHARACTER OF SEANCHAN




_PERSONS IN THE PLAY_


  KING GUAIRE
  SEANCHAN (_pronounced_ SHANAHAN)
  HIS PUPILS
  THE MAYOR OF KINVARA
  TWO CRIPPLES
  BRIAN (_an old servant_)
  THE LORD HIGH CHAMBERLAIN
  A SOLDIER
  A MONK
  COURT LADIES
  TWO PRINCESSES
  FEDELM




THE KING’S THRESHOLD.


    _Steps before the Palace of KING GUAIRE at Gort. A
    table in front of steps at one side, with food on it,
    and a bench by table. SEANCHAN lying on steps. PUPILS
    before steps. KING on the upper step before a curtained
    door._

KING.

  I WELCOME you that have the mastery
  Of the two kinds of Music: the one kind
  Being like a woman, the other like a man.
  Both you that understand stringed instruments,
  And how to mingle words and notes together
  So artfully, that all the Art’s but Speech
  Delighted with its own music; and you that carry
  The long twisted horn, and understand
  The heady notes that, being without words,
  Can hurry beyond Time and Fate and Change.
  For the high angels that drive the horse of Time—
  The golden one by day, by night the silver—
  Are not more welcome to one that loves the world
  For some fair woman’s sake.
                              I have called you hither
  To save the life of your great master, Seanchan,
  For all day long it has flamed up or flickered
  To the fast cooling hearth.

OLDEST PUPIL.

                              When did he sicken?
  Is it a fever that is wasting him?

KING.

  No fever or sickness. He has chosen death:
  Refusing to eat or drink, that he may bring
  Disgrace upon me; for there is a custom,
  An old and foolish custom, that if a man
  Be wronged, or think that he is wronged, and starve
  Upon another’s threshold till he die,
  The common people, for all time to come,
  Will raise a heavy cry against that threshold,
  Even though it be the King’s.

OLDEST PUPIL.

                               My head whirls round;
  I do not know what I am to think or say.
  I owe you all obedience, and yet
  How can I give it, when the man I have loved
  More than all others, thinks that he is wronged
  So bitterly, that he will starve and die
  Rather than bear it? Is there any man
  Will throw his life away for a light issue?

KING.

  It is but fitting that you take his side
  Until you understand how light an issue
  Has put us by the ears. Three days ago
  I yielded to the outcry of my courtiers—
  Bishops, Soldiers, and Makers of the Law—
  Who long had thought it against their dignity
  For a mere man of words to sit amongst them
  At my own table. When the meal was spread,
  I ordered Seanchan to a lower table;
  And when he pleaded for the poets’ right,
  Established at the establishment of the world,
  I said that I was King, and that all rights
  Had their original fountain in some king,
  And that it was the men who ruled the world,
  And not the men who sang to it, who should sit
  Where there was the most honour. My courtiers—
  Bishops, Soldiers, and Makers of the Law—
  Shouted approval; and amid that noise
  Seanchan went out, and from that hour to this,
  Although there is good food and drink beside him,
  Has eaten nothing.

OLDEST PUPIL.

                    I can breathe again.
  You have taken a great burden from my mind,
  For that old custom’s not worth dying for.

KING.

  Persuade him to eat or drink. Till yesterday
  I thought that hunger and weakness had been enough;
  But finding them too trifling and too light
  To hold his mouth from biting at the grave,
  I called you hither, and all my hope’s in you,
  And certain of his neighbours and good friends
  That I have sent for. While he is lying there
  Perishing, my good name in the world
  Is perishing also. I cannot give way,
  Because I am King. Because if I gave way,
  My Nobles would call me a weakling, and it may be
  The very throne be shaken.

OLDEST PUPIL.

                            I will persuade him.
  Your words had been enough persuasion, King;
  But being lost in sleep or reverie,
  He cannot hear them.

KING.

                        Make him eat or drink.
  Nor is it all because of my good name
  I’d have him do it, for he is a man
  That might well hit the fancy of a king,
  Banished out of his country, or a woman’s,
  Or any other’s that can judge a man
  For what he is. But I that sit a throne,
  And take my measure from the needs of the State,
  Call his wild thought that overruns the measure,
  Making words more than deeds, and his proud will
  That would unsettle all, most mischievous,
  And he himself a most mischievous man.

    [_He turns to go, and then returns again._

  Promise a house with grass and tillage land,
  An annual payment, jewels and silken ware,
  Or anything but that old right of the poets.

    [_He goes into palace._

OLDEST PUPIL.

  The King did wrong to abrogate our right;
  But Seanchan, who talks of dying for it,
  Talks foolishly. Look at us, Seanchan;
  Waken out of your dream and look at us,
  Who have ridden under the moon and all the day,
  Until the moon has all but come again,
  That we might be beside you.

SEANCHAN.

    [_Half turning round, leaning on his elbow, and
    speaking as if in a dream._]

                              I was but now
  In Almhuin, in a great high-raftered house,
  With Finn and Osgar. Odours of roast flesh
  Rose round me, and I saw the roasting-spits;
  And then the dream was broken, and I saw
  Grania dividing salmon by a stream.

OLDEST PUPIL.

  Hunger has made you dream of roasting flesh;
  And though I all but weep to think of it,
  The hunger of the crane, that starves himself
  At the full moon because he is afraid
  Of his own shadow and the glittering water,
  Seems to me little more fantastical
  Than this of yours.

SEANCHAN.

                      Why, that’s the very truth.
  It is as though the moon changed everything—
  Myself and all that I can hear and see;
  For when the heavy body has grown weak,
  There’s nothing that can tether the wild mind
  That, being moonstruck and fantastical,
  Goes where it fancies. I had even thought
  I knew your voice and face, but now the words
  Are so unlikely that I needs must ask
  Who is it that bids me put my hunger by.

OLDEST PUPIL.

  I am your oldest pupil, Seanchan;
  The one that has been with you many years—
  So many, that you said at Candlemas
  That I had almost done with school, and knew
  All but all that poets understand.

SEANCHAN.

  My oldest pupil? No, that cannot be,
  For it is some one of the courtly crowds
  That have been round about me from sunrise,
  And I am tricked by dreams; but I’ll refute them.
  At Candlemas I bid that pupil tell me
  Why poetry is honoured, wishing to know
  If he had any weighty argument
  For distant countries and strange, churlish kings.
  What did he answer?

OLDEST PUPIL.

                      I said the poets hung
  Images of the life that was in Eden
  About the child-bed of the world, that it,
  Looking upon those images, might bear
  Triumphant children. But why must I stand here,
  Repeating an old lesson, while you starve?

SEANCHAN.

  Tell on, for I begin to know the voice.
  What evil thing will come upon the world
  If the Arts perish?

OLDEST PUPIL.

                  If the Arts should perish,
  The world that lacked them would be like a woman,
  That looking on the cloven lips of a hare,
  Brings forth a hare-lipped child.

SEANCHAN.

                            But that’s not all:
  For when I asked you how a man should guard
  Those images, you had an answer also,
  If you’re the man that you have claimed to be,
  Comparing them to venerable things
  God gave to men before he gave them wheat.

OLDEST PUPIL.

  I answered—and the word was half your own—
  That he should guard them as the Men of Dea
  Guard their four treasures, as the Grail King guards
  His holy cup, or the pale, righteous horse
  The jewel that is underneath his horn,
  Pouring out life for it as one pours out
  Sweet heady wine.... But now I understand;
  You would refute me out of my own mouth;
  And yet a place at table, near the King,
  Is nothing of great moment, Seanchan.
  How does so light a thing touch poetry?

    [_SEANCHAN is now sitting up. He still looks dreamily
    in front of him._

SEANCHAN.

  At Candlemas you called this poetry
  One of the fragile, mighty things of God,
  That die at an insult.

OLDEST PUPIL.

    [_To other PUPILS._]

                    Give me some true answer,
  For on that day we spoke about the Court,
  And said that all that was insulted there
  The world insulted, for the Courtly life,
  Being the first comely child of the world,
  Is the world’s model. How shall I answer him?
  Can you not give me some true argument?
  I will not tempt him with a lying one.

YOUNGEST PUPIL.

  O, tell him that the lovers of his music
  Have need of him.

SEANCHAN.

                     But I am labouring
  For some that shall be born in the nick o’ time,
  And find sweet nurture, that they may have voices,
  Even in anger, like the strings of harps;
  And how could they be born to majesty
  If I had never made the golden cradle?

YOUNGEST PUPIL.

    [_Throwing himself at SEANCHAN’S feet._]

  Why did you take me from my father’s fields?
  If you would leave me now, what shall I love?
  Where shall I go? What shall I set my hand to?
  And why have you put music in my ears,
  If you would send me to the clattering houses?
  I will throw down the trumpet and the harp,
  For how could I sing verses or make music
  With none to praise me, and a broken heart?

SEANCHAN.

  What was it that the poets promised you,
  If it was not their sorrow? Do not speak.
  Have I not opened school on these bare steps,
  And are not you the youngest of my scholars?
  And I would have all know that when all falls
  In ruin, poetry calls out in joy,
  Being the scattering hand, the bursting pod,
  The victim’s joy among the holy flame,
  God’s laughter at the shattering of the world.
  And now that joy laughs out, and weeps and burns
  On these bare steps.

YOUNGEST PUPIL.

  O master, do not die!

OLDEST PUPIL.

  Trouble him with no useless argument.
  Be silent! There is nothing we can do
  Except find out the King and kneel to him,
  And beg our ancient right.
                           For here are some
  To say whatever we could say and more,
  And fare as badly. Come, boy, that is no use.

    [_Raises YOUNGEST PUPIL._

  If it seem well that we beseech the King,
  Lay down your harps and trumpets on the stones
  In silence, and come with me silently.
  Come with slow footfalls, and bow all your heads,
  For a bowed head becomes a mourner best.

    [_They lay harps and trumpets down one by one, and then
    go out very solemnly and slowly, following one another.
    Enter MAYOR, TWO CRIPPLES, and BRIAN, an old servant.
    The mayor, who has been heard, before he came upon
    the stage, muttering _‘Chief Poet,’ ‘Ireland,’ etc._,
    crosses in front of SEANCHAN to the other side of the
    steps. BRIAN takes food out of basket. The CRIPPLES are
    watching the basket. The MAYOR has an Ogham stick in
    his hand._

MAYOR.

    [_As he crosses._]

  ‘Chief Poet,’ ‘Ireland,’ ‘Townsman,’ ‘Grazing land,’
  Those are the words I have to keep in mind—
  ‘Chief Poet,’ ‘Ireland,’ ‘Townsman,’ ‘Grazing land.’
  I have the words. They are all upon the Ogham.
  ‘Chief Poet,’ ‘Ireland,’ ‘Townsman,’ ‘Grazing land.’
  But what’s their order?

    [_He keeps muttering over his speech during what
    follows._

FIRST CRIPPLE.

                   The King were rightly served
  If Seanchan drove his good luck away.
  What’s there about a king, that’s in the world
  From birth to burial like another man,
  That he should change old customs, that were in it
  As long as ever the world has been a world?

SECOND CRIPPLE.

  If I were king I would not meddle with him,
  For there is something queer about a poet.
  I knew of one that would be making rhyme
  Under a thorn at crossing of three roads.
  He was as ragged as ourselves, and yet
  He was no sooner dead than every thorn tree
  From Inchy to Kiltartan withered away.

FIRST CRIPPLE.

  The King is but a fool!

MAYOR.

  I am getting ready.

FIRST CRIPPLE.

  A poet has power from beyond the world,
  That he may set our thoughts upon old times,
  And lucky queens and little holy fish
  That rise up every seventh year——

MAYOR.

  Hush! hush!

FIRST CRIPPLE.

  To cure the crippled.

MAYOR.

  I am half ready now.

BRIAN.

  There’s not a mischief I’d begrudge the King
  If it were any other——

MAYOR.

  Hush! I am ready.

BRIAN.

  That died to get it. I have brought out the food,
  And if my master will not eat of it,
  I’ll home and get provision for his wake,
  For that’s no great way off. Well, have your say,
  But don’t be long about it.

MAYOR.

    [_Goes close to SEANCHAN._]

                              Chief Poet of Ireland,
  I am the Mayor of your own town Kinvara,
  And I am come to tell you that the news
  Of this great trouble with the King of Gort
  Has plunged us in deep sorrow—part for you,
  Our honoured townsman, part for our good town.

    [_Begins to hesitate; scratching his head._

  But what comes now? Something about the King.

BRIAN.

  Get on! get on! The food is all set out.

MAYOR.

  Don’t hurry me.

FIRST CRIPPLE.

                  Give us a taste of it.
  He’ll not begrudge it.

SECOND CRIPPLE.

                         Let them that have their limbs
  Starve if they will. We have to keep in mind
  The stomach God has left us.

MAYOR.

                               Hush! I have it!
  The King was said to be most friendly to us,
  And we have reason, as you’ll recollect,
  For thinking that he was about to give
  Those grazing lands inland we so much need,
  Being pinched between the water and the stones.
  Our mowers mow with knives between the stones;
  The sea washes the meadows. You know well
  We have asked nothing but what’s reasonable.

SEANCHAN.

  Reason in plenty. Yellowy white hair,
  A hollow face, and not too many teeth.
  How comes it he has been so long in the world
  And not found Reason out?

    [_While saying this he has turned half round. He hardly
    looks at the MAYOR._

BRIAN.

    [_Trying to pull MAYOR away._]

                          What good is there
  In telling him what he has heard all day!
  I will set food before him.

MAYOR.

    [_Shoving BRIAN away._]

                            Don’t hurry me!
  It’s small respect you’re showing to the town!
  Get farther off! [_To SEANCHAN._] We would not have you think,
  Weighty as these considerations are,
  That they have been as weighty in our minds
  As our desire that one we take much pride in,
  A man that’s been an honour to our town,
  Should live and prosper; therefore we beseech you
  To give way in a matter of no moment,
  A matter of mere sentiment—a trifle—
  That we may always keep our pride in you.

    [_He finishes this speech with a pompous air, motions
    to BRIAN to bring the food to SEANCHAN, and sits on
    seat._

BRIAN.

  Master, master, eat this! It’s not king’s food,
  That’s cooked for everybody and nobody.
  Here’s barley-bread out of your father’s oven,
  And dulse from Duras. Here is the dulse, your honour;
  It’s wholesome, and has the good taste of the sea.

    [_Takes dulse in one hand and bread in other and
    presses them into SEANCHAN’S hands. SEANCHAN shows by
    his movement his different feeling to BRIAN._

FIRST CRIPPLE.

  He has taken it, and there’ll be nothing left!

SECOND CRIPPLE.

  Nothing at all; he wanted his own sort.
  What’s honey to a cat, corn to a dog,
  Or a green apple to a ghost in a churchyard?

SEANCHAN.

    [_Pressing food back into BRIAN’S hands._]

  Eat it yourself, for you have come a journey,
  And it may be eat nothing on the way.

BRIAN.

  How could I eat it, and your honour starving!
  It is your father sends it, and he cried
  Because the stiffness that is in his bones
  Prevented him from coming, and bid me tell you
  That he is old, that he has need of you,
  And that the people will be pointing at him,
  And he not able to lift up his head,
  If you should turn the King’s favour away;
  And he adds to it, that he cared you well,
  And you in your young age, and that it’s right
  That you should care him now.

SEANCHAN.

    [_Who is now interested._]

                              And is that all?
  What did my mother say?

BRIAN.

                          She gave no message;
  For when they told her you had it in mind to starve,
  Or get again the ancient right of the poets,
  She said: ‘No message can do any good.
  He will not send the answer that you want.
  We cannot change him.’ And she went indoors,
  Lay down upon the bed, and turned her face
  Out of the light. And thereupon your father
  Said: ‘Tell him that his mother sends no message,
  Albeit broken down and miserable.’      [_A pause._
  Here’s a pigeon’s egg from Duras, and these others
  Were laid by your own hens.

SEANCHAN.

                              She has sent no message.
  Our mothers know us; they know us to the bone.
  They knew us before birth, and that is why
  They know us even better than the sweethearts
  Upon whose breasts we have lain.
                                   Go quickly! Go
  And tell them that my mother was in the right.
  There is no answer. Go and tell them that.
  Go tell them that she knew me.

MAYOR.

                                 What is he saying?
  I never understood a poet’s talk
  More than the baa of a sheep!

    [_Comes over from seat. SEANCHAN turns away._

                               You have not heard,
  It may be, having been so much away,
  How many of the cattle died last winter
  From lacking grass, and that there was much sickness
  Because the poor have nothing but salt fish
  To live on through the winter?

BRIAN.

                                 Get away,
  And leave the place to me! It’s my turn now,
  For your sack’s empty!

MAYOR.

                        Is it ‘get away’!
  Is that the way I’m to be spoken to!
  Am I not Mayor? Amn’t I authority?
  Amn’t I in the King’s place? Answer me that!

BRIAN.

  Then show the people what a king is like:
  Pull down old merings and root custom up,
  Whitewash the dunghills, fatten hogs and geese,
  Hang your gold chain about an ass’s neck,
  And burn the blessed thorn trees out of the fields,
  And drive what’s comely away!

MAYOR.

  Holy Saint Coleman!

FIRST CRIPPLE.

  Fine talk! fine talk! What else does the King do?
  He fattens hogs and drives the poet away!

SECOND CRIPPLE.

  He starves the song-maker!

FIRST CRIPPLE.

  He fattens geese!

MAYOR.

  How dare you take his name into your mouth!
  How dare you lift your voice against the King!
  What would we be without him?

BRIAN.

                                Why do you praise him?
  I will have nobody speak well of him,
  Or any other king that robs my master.

MAYOR.

  And had he not the right to? and the right
  To strike your master’s head off, being the King,
  Or yours or mine? I say, ‘Long live the King!
  Because he does not take our heads from us.’
  Call out, ‘Long life to him!’

BRIAN.

  Call out for him!

    [_Speaking at same time with MAYOR._

  There’s nobody’ll call out for him,
  But smiths will turn their anvils,
  The millers turn their wheels,
  The farmers turn their churns,
  The witches turn their thumbs,
  ’Till he be broken and splintered into pieces.

MAYOR.

    [_At same time with BRIAN._]

  He might, if he’d a mind to it,
  Be digging out our tongues,
  Or dragging out our hair,
  Or bleaching us like calves,
  Or weaning us like lambs,
  But for the kindness and the softness that is in him.

    [_They gasp for breath._

FIRST CRIPPLE.

  I’ll curse him till I drop!

    [_Speaking at same time as SECOND CRIPPLE and MAYOR and
    BRIAN, who have begun again._

  The curse of the poor be upon him,
  The curse of the widows upon him,
  The curse of the children upon him,
  The curse of the bishops upon him,
  Until he be as rotten as an old mushroom!

SECOND CRIPPLE.

    [_Speaking at same time as FIRST CRIPPLE and MAYOR and
    BRIAN._

  The curse of wrinkles be upon him!
  Wrinkles where his eyes are,
  Wrinkles where his nose is,
  Wrinkles where his mouth is,
  And a little old devil looking out of every wrinkle!

BRIAN.

    [_Speaking at same time with MAYOR and CRIPPLES._]

  And nobody will sing for him,
  And nobody will hunt for him,
  And nobody will fish for him,
  And nobody will pray for him,
  But ever and always curse him and abuse him.

MAYOR.

    [_Speaking at same time with CRIPPLES and BRIAN._]

  What good is in a poet?
  Has he money in a stocking,
  Or cider in the cellar,
  Or flitches in the chimney,
  Or anything anywhere but his own idleness?

    [_BRIAN seizes MAYOR._

MAYOR.

  Help! help! Am I not in authority?

BRIAN.

  That’s how I’ll shout for the King!

MAYOR.

  Help! help! Am I not in the King’s place?

BRIAN.

  I’ll teach him to be kind to the poor!

MAYOR.

  Help! help! Wait till we are in Kinvara!

FIRST CRIPPLE.

    [_Beating MAYOR on the legs with crutch._]

  I’ll shake the royalty out of his legs!

SECOND CRIPPLE.

    [_Burying his nails in MAYOR’S face._]

  I’ll scrumble the ermine out of his skin!

    [_The CHAMBERLAIN comes down steps shouting, ‘_Silence!
    silence! silence!_’_

CHAMBERLAIN.

  How dare you make this uproar at the doors,
  Deafening the very greatest in the land,
  As if the farmyards and the rookeries
  Had all been emptied!

FIRST CRIPPLE.

  It is the Chamberlain.

    [_CRIPPLES go out._

CHAMBERLAIN.

  Pick up the litter there, and get you gone!
  Be quick about it! Have you no respect
  For this worn stair, this all but sacred door,
  Where suppliants and tributary kings
  Have passed, and the world’s glory knelt in silence?
  Have you no reverence for what all other men
  Hold honourable?

BRIAN.

                 If I might speak my mind,
  I’d say the King would have his luck again
  If he would let my master have his rights.

CHAMBERLAIN.

  Pick up your litter! Take your noise away!
  Make haste, and get the clapper from the bell!

BRIAN.

    [_Putting last of food into basket._]

  What do the great and powerful care for rights
  That have no armies!

    [_CHAMBERLAIN begins shoving them out with his staff._

MAYOR.

                  My lord, I am not to blame.
  I’m the King’s man, and they attacked me for it.

BRIAN.

  We have our prayers, our curses and our prayers,
  And we can give a great name or a bad one.

    [_MAYOR is shoving BRIAN out before him with one hand.
    He keeps his face to CHAMBERLAIN, and keeps bowing. The
    CHAMBERLAIN shoves him with his staff._

MAYOR.

  We could not make the poet eat, my lord.

    [_CHAMBERLAIN shoves him with staff._

  Much honoured [_is shoved again_]—honoured to speak with you, my lord;
  But I’ll go find the girl that he’s to marry.
  She’s coming, but I’ll hurry her, my lord.
  Between ourselves, my lord [_is shoved again_], she is a great coaxer.
  Much honoured, my lord. O, she’s the girl to do it;
  For when the intellect is out, my lord,
  Nobody but a woman’s any good.

    [_Is shoved again._

  Much honoured, my lord [_is shoved again_], much honoured, much
        honoured!

    [_Is shoved out, shoving BRIAN out before him._

    [_All through this scene, from the outset of the
    quarrel, SEANCHAN has kept his face turned away, or
    hidden in his cloak. While the CHAMBERLAIN has been
    speaking, the SOLDIER and the MONK have come out of the
    palace. The MONK stands on top of steps at one side,
    SOLDIER a little down steps at the other side. COURT
    LADIES are seen at opening in the palace curtain behind
    SOLDIER. CHAMBERLAIN is in the centre._

CHAMBERLAIN.

    [_To SEANCHAN._]

  Well, you must be contented, for your work
  Has roused the common sort against the King,
  And stolen his authority. The State
  Is like some orderly and reverend house,
  Wherein the master, being dead of a sudden,
  The servants quarrel where they have a mind to,
  And pilfer here and there.

    [_Pause, finding that SEANCHAN does not answer._

                           How many days
  Will you keep up this quarrel with the King,
  And the King’s nobles, and myself, and all,
  Who’d gladly be your friends, if you would let them?

    [_Going near to MONK._

  If you would try, you might persuade him, father.
  I cannot make him answer me, and yet
  If fitting hands would offer him the food,
  He might accept it.

MONK.

                    Certainly I will not.
  I’ve made too many homilies, wherein
  The wanton imagination of the poets
  Has been condemned, to be his flatterer.
  If pride and disobedience are unpunished
  Who will obey?

CHAMBERLAIN.

    [_Going to other side towards SOLDIER._]

               If you would speak to him,
  You might not find persuasion difficult,
  With all the devils of hunger helping you.

SOLDIER.

  I will not interfere, and if he starve
  For being obstinate and stiff in the neck,
  ’Tis but good riddance.

CHAMBERLAIN.

                        One of us must do it.
  It might be, if you’d reason with him, ladies,
  He would eat something, for I have a notion
  That if he brought misfortune on the King,
  Or the King’s house, we’d be as little thought of
  As summer linen when the winter’s come.

FIRST GIRL.

  But it would be the greater compliment
  If Peter’d do it.

SECOND GIRL.

                  Reason with him, Peter.
  Persuade him to eat; he’s such a bag of bones!

SOLDIER.

  I’ll never trust a woman’s word again!
  There’s nobody that was so loud against him
  When he was at the table; now the wind’s changed,
  And you that could not bear his speech or his silence,
  Would have him there in his old place again;
  I do believe you would, but I won’t help you.

SECOND GIRL.

  Why will you be so hard upon us, Peter?
  You know we have turned the common sort against us,
  And he looks miserable.

FIRST GIRL.

                        We cannot dance,
  Because no harper will pluck a string for us.

SECOND GIRL.

  I cannot sleep with thinking of his face.

FIRST GIRL.

  And I love dancing more than anything.

SECOND GIRL.

  Do not be hard on us; but yesterday
  A woman in the road threw stones at me.
  You would not have me stoned?

FIRST GIRL.

  May I not dance?

SOLDIER.

  I will do nothing. You have put him out,
  And now that he is out—well, leave him out.

FIRST GIRL.

  Do it for my sake, Peter.

SECOND GIRL.

  And for mine.

    [_Each girl as she speaks takes PETER’S hand with her
    right hand, stroking down his arm with her left. While
    SECOND GIRL is stroking his arm, FIRST GIRL leaves go
    and gives him the dish._

SOLDIER.

  Well, well; but not your way. [_To SEANCHAN._] Here’s meat for you.
  It has been carried from too good a table
  For men like you, and I am offering it
  Because these women have made a fool of me.

    [_A pause._

  You mean to starve? You will have none of it?
  I’ll leave it there, where you can sniff the savour.
  Snuff it, old hedgehog, and unroll yourself!
  But if I were the King, I’d make you do it
  With wisps of lighted straw.

SEANCHAN.

                   You have rightly named me.
  I lie rolled up under the ragged thorns
  That are upon the edge of those great waters
  Where all things vanish away, and I have heard
  Murmurs that are the ending of all sound.
  I am out of life; I am rolled up, and yet,
  Hedgehog although I am, I’ll not unroll
  For you, King’s dog! Go to the King, your master.
  Crouch down and wag your tail, for it may be
  He has nothing now against you, and I think
  The stripes of your last beating are all healed.

    [_The SOLDIER has drawn his sword._

CHAMBERLAIN.

    [_Striking up sword._]

  Put up your sword, sir; put it up, I say!
  The common sort would tear you into pieces
  If you but touched him.

SOLDIER.

                        If he’s to be flattered,
  Petted, cajoled, and dandled into humour,
  We might as well have left him at the table.

    [_Goes to one side sheathing sword._

SEANCHAN.

  You must need keep your patience yet awhile,
  For I have some few mouthfuls of sweet air
  To swallow before I have grown to be as civil
  As any other dust.

CHAMBERLAIN.

                   You wrong us, Seanchan.
  There is none here but holds you in respect;
  And if you’d only eat out of this dish,
  The King would show how much he honours you.

    [_Bowing and smiling._

  Who could imagine you’d so take to heart
  Being put from the high table? I am certain
  That you, if you will only think it over,
  Will understand that it is men of law,
  Leaders of the King’s armies, and the like,
  That should sit there.

SEANCHAN.

                          Somebody has deceived you,
  Or maybe it was your own eyes that lied,
  In making it appear that I was driven
  From the King’s table. You have driven away
  The images of them that weave a dance
  By the four rivers in the mountain garden.

CHAMBERLAIN.

  You mean we have driven poetry away.
  But that’s not altogether true, for I,
  As you should know, have written poetry.
  And often when the table has been cleared,
  And candles lighted, the King calls for me,
  And I repeat it him. My poetry
  Is not to be compared with yours; but still,
  Where I am honoured, poetry is honoured—
  In some measure.

SEANCHAN.

                  If you are a poet,
  Cry out that the King’s money would not buy,
  Nor the high circle consecrate his head,
  If poets had never christened gold, and even
  The moon’s poor daughter, that most whey-faced metal,
  Precious; and cry out that none alive
  Would ride among the arrows with high heart,
  Or scatter with an open hand, had not
  Our heady craft commended wasteful virtues.
  And when that story’s finished, shake your coat
  Where little jewels gleam on it, and say,
  A herdsman, sitting where the pigs had trampled,
  Made up a song about enchanted kings,
  Who were so finely dressed, one fancied them
  All fiery, and women by the churn
  And children by the hearth caught up the song
  And murmured it, until the tailors heard it.

CHAMBERLAIN.

  If you would but eat something you’d find out
  That you have had these thoughts from lack of food,
  For hunger makes us feverish.

SEANCHAN.

                                Cry aloud,
  That when we are driven out we come again
  Like a great wind that runs out of the waste
  To blow the tables flat; and thereupon
  Lie down upon the threshold till the King
  Restore to us the ancient right of the poets.

MONK.

  You cannot shake him. I will to the King,
  And offer him consolation in his trouble,
  For that man there has set his teeth to die.
  And being one that hates obedience,
  Discipline, and orderliness of life,
  I cannot mourn him.

FIRST GIRL.

                      ’Twas you that stirred it up.
  You stirred it up that you might spoil our dancing.
  Why shouldn’t we have dancing? We’re not in Lent.
  Yet nobody will pipe or play to us;
  And they will never do it if he die.
  And that is why you are going.

MONK.

  What folly’s this?

FIRST GIRL.

  Well, if you did not do it, speak to him—
  Use your authority; make him obey you.
  What harm is there in dancing?

MONK.

                                Hush! begone!
  Go to the fields and watch the hurley players,
  Or any other place you have a mind to.
  This is not woman’s work.

FIRST GIRL.

                            Come! let’s away!
  We can do nothing here.

MONK.

                          The pride of the poets!
  Dancing, hurling, the country full of noise,
  And King and Church neglected. Seanchan,
  I’ll take my leave, for you are perishing
  Like all that let the wanton imagination
  Carry them where it will, and it’s not likely
  I’ll look upon your living face again.

SEANCHAN.

  Come nearer, nearer!

MONK.

  Have you some last wish?

SEANCHAN.

  Stoop down, for I would whisper it in your ear.
  Has that wild God of yours, that was so wild
  When you’d but lately taken the King’s pay,
  Grown any tamer? He gave you all much trouble.

MONK.

  Let go my habit!

SEANCHAN.

                  Have you persuaded him
  To chirp between two dishes when the King
  Sits down to table?

MONK.

  Let go my habit, sir!

    [_Crosses to centre of stage._

SEANCHAN.

  And maybe he has learnt to sing quite softly
  Because loud singing would disturb the King,
  Who is sitting drowsily among his friends
  After the table has been cleared. Not yet!

    [_SEANCHAN has been dragged some feet clinging to the
    MONK’S habit._

  You did not think that hands so full of hunger
  Could hold you tightly. They are not civil yet.
  I’d know if you have taught him to eat bread
  From the King’s hand, and perch upon his finger.
  I think he perches on the King’s strong hand.
  But it may be that he is still too wild.
  You must not weary in your work; a king
  Is often weary, and he needs a God
  To be a comfort to him.

    [_The MONK plucks his habit away and goes into palace.
    SEANCHAN holds up his hand as if a bird perched upon
    it. He pretends to stroke the bird._

                          A little God,
  With comfortable feathers, and bright eyes.

FIRST GIRL.

  There will be no more dancing in our time,
  For nobody will play the harp or the fiddle.
  Let us away, for we cannot amend it,
  And watch the hurley.

SECOND GIRL.

  Hush! he is looking at us.

SEANCHAN.

  Yes, yes, go to the hurley, go to the hurley,
  Go to the hurley! Gather up your skirts—
  Run quickly! You can remember many love songs;
  I know it by the light that’s in your eyes—
  But you’ll forget them. You’re fair to look upon.
  Your feet delight in dancing, and your mouths
  In the slow smiling that awakens love.
  The mothers that have borne you mated rightly.
  They’d little ears as thirsty as your ears
  For many love songs. Go to the young men.
  Are not the ruddy flesh and the thin flanks
  And the broad shoulders worthy of desire?
  Go from me! Here is nothing for your eyes.
  But it is I that am singing you away—
  Singing you to the young men.

    [_The TWO YOUNG PRINCESSES come out of palace. While he
    has been speaking the GIRLS have shrunk back holding
    each other’s hands._

FIRST GIRL.

                                Be quiet!
  Look who it is has come out of the house.
  Princesses, we are for the hurling field.
  Will you go there?

FIRST PRINCESS.

                    We will go with you, Aileen.
  But we must have some words with Seanchan,
  For we have come to make him eat and drink.

CHAMBERLAIN.

  I will hold out the dish and cup for him
  While you are speaking to him of his folly,
  If you desire it, Princess.

    [_He has taken dish and cup._

FIRST PRINCESS.

                            No, Finula
  Will carry him the dish and I the cup.
  We’ll offer them ourselves.

    [_They take cup and dish._

FIRST GIRL.

                            They are so gracious;
  The dear little Princesses are so gracious.

    [_PRINCESS holds out her hand for SEANCHAN to kiss it.
    He does not move._

  Although she is holding out her hand to him,
  He will not kiss it.

FIRST PRINCESS.

                      My father bids us say
  That, though he cannot have you at his table,
  You may ask any other thing you like
  And he will give it you. We carry you
  With our own hands a dish and cup of wine.

FIRST GIRL.

  O, look! he has taken it! He has taken it!
  The dear Princesses! I have always said
  That nobody could refuse them anything.

    [_SEANCHAN takes the cup in one hand. In the other he
    holds for a moment the hand of the PRINCESS._

SEANCHAN.

  O long, soft fingers and pale finger-tips,
  Well worthy to be laid in a king’s hand!
  O, you have fair white hands, for it is certain
  There is uncommon whiteness in these hands.
  But there is something comes into my mind,
  Princess. A little while before your birth,
  I saw your mother sitting by the road
  In a high chair; and when a leper passed,
  She pointed him the way into the town.
  He lifted up his hand and blessed her hand—
  I saw it with my own eyes. Hold out your hands;
  I will find out if they are contaminated,
  For it has come into my thoughts that maybe
  The King has sent me food and drink by hands
  That are contaminated. I would see all your hands.
  You’ve eyes of dancers; but hold out your hands,
  For it may be there are none sound among you.

    [_The PRINCESSES have shrunk back in terror._

FIRST PRINCESS.

  He has called us lepers.

    [_SOLDIER draws sword._

CHAMBERLAIN.

                        He’s out of his mind,
  And does not know the meaning of what he said.

SEANCHAN.

    [_Standing up._]

  There’s no sound hand among you—no sound hand.
  Away with you! away with all of you!
  You are all lepers! There is leprosy
  Among the plates and dishes that you have carried.
  And wherefore have you brought me leper’s wine?

    [_He flings the contents of the cup in their faces._

  There, there! I have given it to you again. And now
  Begone, or I will give my curse to you.
  You have the leper’s blessing, but you think
  Maybe the bread will something lack in savour
  Unless you mix my curse into the dough.

    [_They go out hurriedly in all directions. SEANCHAN is
    staggering in the middle of the stage._

  Where did I say the leprosy had come from?
  I said it came out of a leper’s hand,

    _Enter CRIPPLES._

  And that he walked the highway. But that’s folly,
  For he was walking up there in the sky.
  And there he is even now, with his white hand
  Thrust out of the blue air, and blessing them
  With leprosy.

FIRST CRIPPLE.

                He’s pointing at the moon
  That’s coming out up yonder, and he calls it
  Leprous, because the daylight whitens it.

SEANCHAN.

  He’s holding up his hand above them all—
  King, noblemen, princesses—blessing all.
  Who could imagine he’d have so much patience?

FIRST CRIPPLE.

    [_Clutching the other CRIPPLE._]

  Come out of this!

SECOND CRIPPLE.

    [_Pointing to food._]

                  If you don’t need it, sir,
  May we not carry some of it away?

    [_They cross towards food and pass in front of
    SEANCHAN._

SEANCHAN.

  Who’s speaking? Who are you?

FIRST CRIPPLE.

  Come out of this!

SECOND CRIPPLE.

  Have pity on us, that must beg our bread
  From table to table throughout the entire world,
  And yet be hungry.

SEANCHAN.

                      But why were you born crooked?
  What bad poet did your mothers listen to
  That you were born so crooked?

CRIPPLE.

                                Come away!
  Maybe he’s cursed the food, and it might kill us.

OTHER CRIPPLE.

  Yes, better come away.

    [_They go out._

SEANCHAN.

    [_Staggering, and speaking wearily._]

                        He has great strength
  And great patience to hold his right hand there,
  Uplifted, and not wavering about.
  He is much stronger than I am, much stronger.

    [_Sinks down on steps. Enter MAYOR and FEDELM._

FEDELM.

    [_Her finger on her lips._]

  Say nothing! I will get him out of this
  Before I have said a word of food and drink;
  For while he is on this threshold and can hear,
  It may be, the voices that made mock of him,
  He would not listen. I’d be alone with him.

    [_MAYOR goes out. FEDELM goes to SEANCHAN and kneels
    before him._

  Seanchan! Seanchan!

    [_He remains looking into the sky._

                      Can you not hear me, Seanchan?
  It is myself.

    [_He looks at her, dreamily at first, then takes her
    hand._

SEANCHAN.

                Is this your hand, Fedelm?
  I have been looking at another hand
  That is up yonder.

FEDELM.

  I have come for you.

SEANCHAN.

  Fedelm, I did not know that you were here.

FEDELM.

  And can you not remember that I promised
  That I would come and take you home with me
  When I’d the harvest in? And now I’ve come,
  And you must come away, and come on the instant.

SEANCHAN.

  Yes, I will come. But is the harvest in?
  This air has got a summer taste in it.

FEDELM.

  But is not the wild middle of the summer
  A better time to marry? Come with me now!

SEANCHAN.

    [_Seizing her by both wrists._]

  Who taught you that? For it’s a certainty,
  Although I never knew it till last night,
  That marriage, because it is the height of life,
  Can only be accomplished to the full
  In the high days of the year. I lay awake:
  There had come a frenzy into the light of the stars,
  And they were coming nearer, and I knew
  All in a minute they were about to marry
  Clods out upon the ploughlands, to beget
  A mightier race than any that has been.
  But some that are within there made a noise,
  And frighted them away.

FEDELM.

                          Come with me now!
  We have far to go, and daylight’s running out.

SEANCHAN.

  The stars had come so near me that I caught
  Their singing. It was praise of that great race
  That would be haughty, mirthful, and white-bodied,
  With a high head, and open hand, and how,
  Laughing, it would take the mastery of the world.

FEDELM.

  But you will tell me all about their songs
  When we’re at home. You have need of rest and care,
  And I can give them you when we’re at home.
  And therefore let us hurry, and get us home.

SEANCHAN.

  It’s certain that there is some trouble here,
  Although it’s gone out of my memory.
  And I would get away from it. Give me your help.      [_Trying to rise._
  But why are not my pupils here to help me?
  Go, call my pupils, for I need their help.

FEDELM.

  Come with me now, and I will send for them,
  For I have a great room that’s full of beds
  I can make ready; and there is a smooth lawn
  Where they can play at hurley and sing poems
  Under an apple-tree.

SEANCHAN.

                      I know that place:
  An apple-tree, and a smooth level lawn
  Where the young men can sway their hurley sticks.

[_Sings._]

  The four rivers that run there,
  Through well-mown level ground,
  Have come out of a blessed well
  That is all bound and wound
  By the great roots of an apple,
  And all the fowl of the air
  Have gathered in the wide branches
  And keep singing there.

    [_FEDELM, troubled, has covered her eyes with her
    hands._

FEDELM.

  No, there are not four rivers, and those rhymes
  Praise Adam’s paradise.

SEANCHAN.

                         I can remember now,
  It’s out of a poem I made long ago
  About the Garden in the East of the World,
  And how spirits in the images of birds
  Crowd in the branches of old Adam’s crabtree.
  They come before me now, and dig in the fruit
  With so much gluttony, and are so drunk
  With that harsh wholesome savour, that their feathers
  Are clinging one to another with the juice.
  But you would lead me to some friendly place,
  And I would go there quickly.

FEDELM.

    [_Helping him to rise._]

  Come with me.

    _He walks slowly, supported by her, till he comes to
    table._

SEANCHAN.

  But why am I so weak? Have I been ill?
  Sweetheart, why is it that I am so weak?

    [_Sinks on to seat._

FEDELM.

    [_Goes to table._]

  I’ll dip this piece of bread into the wine,
  For that will make you stronger for the journey.

SEANCHAN.

  Yes, give me bread and wine; that’s what I want,
  For it is hunger that is gnawing me.

    [_He takes bread from FEDELM, hesitates, and then
    thrusts it back into her hand._

  But, no; I must not eat it.

FEDELM.

                             Eat, Seanchan.
  For if you do not eat it you will die.

SEANCHAN.

  Why did you give me food? Why did you come?
  For had I not enough to fight against
  Without your coming?

FEDELM.

                      Eat this little crust,
  Seanchan, if you have any love for me.

SEANCHAN.

  I must not eat it—but that’s beyond your wit.
  Child! child! I must not eat it, though I die.

FEDELM.

    [_Passionately._]

  You do not know what love is; for if you loved,
  You would put every other thought away.
  But you have never loved me.

SEANCHAN.

    [_Seizing her by wrist._]

                              You, a child,
  Who have but seen a man out of the window,
  Tell me that I know nothing about love,
  And that I do not love you! Did I not say
  There was a frenzy in the light of the stars
  All through the livelong night, and that the night
  Was full of marriages? But that fight’s over,
  And all that’s done with, and I have to die.

FEDELM.

    [_Throwing her arms about him._]

  I will not be put from you, although I think
  I had not grudged it you if some great lady,
  If the King’s daughter, had set out your bed.
  I will not give you up to death; no, no!
  And are not these white arms and this soft neck
  Better than the brown earth?

SEANCHAN.

    [_Struggling to disengage himself._]

                              Begone from me!
  There’s treachery in those arms and in that voice.
  They’re all against me. Why do you linger there?
  How long must I endure the sight of you?

FEDELM.

  O, Seanchan! Seanchan!

SEANCHAN.

    [_Rising._]

                        Go where you will,
  So it be out of sight and out of mind.
  I cast you from me like an old torn cap,
  A broken shoe, a glove without a finger,
  A crooked penny; whatever is most worthless.

FEDELM.

    [_Bursts into tears._]

  O, do not drive me from you!

SEANCHAN.

    [_Takes her in his arms._]

                               What did I say,
  My dove of the woods? I was about to curse you.
  It was a frenzy. I’ll unsay it all.
  But you must go away.

FEDELM.

                        Let me be near you.
  I will obey like any married wife.
  Let me but lie before your feet.

SEANCHAN.

  Come nearer.

    [_Kisses her._

  If I had eaten when you bid me, sweetheart,
  The kiss of multitudes in times to come
  Had been the poorer.

    [_Enter KING from palace, followed by the two
    PRINCESSES._

KING.

    [_To FEDELM._]

  Has he eaten yet?

FEDELM.

  No, King, and will not till you have restored
  The right of the poets.

KING.

    [_Coming down and standing before SEANCHAN._]

                          Seanchan, you have refused
low, insolent laughter.

Maria was at her door instantly. Across the court, a man could be seen
for one moment, seated on Serena’s wash-bench; then behind him the door
closed with a bang, shutting off the shaft of firelight.

Maria crossed the court, and when she had reached the man’s side he
looked up. The moonlight fell upon his face. It was Crown.

“What yuh doin’ hyuh?” she asked him.

“Jus’ droppin’ in on a few ole frien’.”

“Come tuh de shop,” she commanded. “I gots tuh hab talk wid yuh.”

He arose obediently, and followed her.

Maria turned up the lamp and faced about as Crown entered the room. He
had to bend his head to pass under the lintel, and his shoulders brushed
the sides of the opening.

The big negress stood for a long moment looking at him. Her gaze took in
the straight legs with their springing thighs straining the fabric of
the cotton pants, the slender waist, and the almost unbelievable
outward flare of the chest to the high, straight span of the shoulders.

A look of deep sadness grew in her somber face.

“Wid uh body like dat!” she said at last, “why yuh is goin’ aroun’
huntin’ fuh deat’?”

Crown laughed uneasily, stepped into the room, and sat at a table. He
placed his elbows upon it, hunched his shoulders forward with a writhing
of muscle beneath the shirt, then dropped his chin in his hands, and
regarded the woman.

“I know dese hyuh niggers,” he replied. “Dey is a decent lot. Dey
wouldn’t gib no nigger away tuh de w’ite folks.”

“Dat de Gawd’ trut’. Only dey is odder way ob settlin’ up er debt.”

“Serena?” he asked, with a sidelong look, and a laugh. “Dat sister gots
de fear ob Gawd in she heart. I ain’t ’fraid none ob she.”

After a moment of silence he asked abruptly:

“Bess still libbin’ wid de cripple?”

“Yes; an’ she a happy, decent ’oman. Yuh bes’ leabe she alone.”

“Fer Gawd’ sake! Wut yuh tink I come tuh dis damn town fuh? I ain’t jus’
huntin’ fuh deat’! I atter my ’oman.”

Maria placed her hands on the table opposite the man and bent over to
look into his face.

“’Oman is all berry much de same,” she said in a low, persuasive voice.
“Dey comes an’ dey goes. One sattify a man quick as annuduh. Dey is lots
ob bettuh lookin’ gal dan Bess. She fix fuh life now wid dat boy. I ax
yuh go an’ lef she. Gib she uh chance.”

“It tek long time tuh learn one ’oman,” he said slowly. “Me an’ Bess
done fight dat all out dese fibe year gone.”

“Yuh ain’t goin’ leabe she den?” There was an unusual note of pleading
in the heavy voice.

“Not till Hell freeze.”

After a moment he arose and turned to her.

“I gots tuh go out now. I ain’t sho’ wedder I goin’ away tuhnight or
wait fuh tuhmorruh night. I goin’ look aroun’ an’ see how de lan’ lay;
but I’ll be seein’ yuh agin befo’ I goes.”

Maria regarded him for a long moment; the look of sadness in her face
deepened to a heavy melancholy; but she said nothing.

Crown started for the street with his long, swaggering stride. The big
woman watched him until he turned to the north at the entrance and
passed from view. Then she locked the door and, with a deep sigh,
walked to her own room.


§

Porgy opened his eyes suddenly. The window, which had been luminous when
he went to sleep, was now darkened. He watched it intently. Slowly he
realized that parts of the little square still showed the moonlit waters
of the bay, and that only the centre was blocked out by an intervening
mass. Then the mass moved, and Porgy saw that it was the torso and
shoulders of a man. The window was three feet in width, yet the
shoulders seemed to brush both sides of it as the form bent forward. The
sash was down, and presently there came a sound as though hands were
testing it to see whether it could be forced up.

Porgy was lying on his back. He reached his left hand over the covers
and let the fingers touch ever so lightly the sleeping faces of first
the baby, then the woman. His right hand slid beneath his pillow, and
his strong, slender fingers closed about the handle of a knife.

At the window the slight, testing noise continued.


§

It was certainly after midnight when Maria looked from her doorway; for
the moon was tottering on the western wall, and while she stood looking,
slowly it dropped over and vanished.

The vague forebodings that she had felt when she talked to Crown earlier
in the evening had kept sleep from her; with each passing hour her fears
increased, and with them a sense of imminence that finally forced her to
get up, slip on a wrapper, and prepare to make the rounds of the court.

But on opening her door, she was at once reassured. The square stood
before her like a vast cistern brimmed with misty dark and roofed with a
lid of sky. A cur grovelled forward on its belly from a near-by nook,
and licked one of her bare feet with its moist, warm tongue.

Above her, in the huge honeycomb of the building, someone was snoring in
a slow, steady rhythm.

The big negress drew a deep sigh of relief and turned back toward her
room.

A sound of cracking wood snapped the silence. Then, like a flurry of
small bells, came a shiver of broken glass on the stones.

Maria spun around, and tried to locate the sound; but no noise followed.
Silence flowed back over the court and settled palpably into its
recesses. The faint, not unpleasant rhythm of the snoring came
insistently forward.

Suddenly Maria turned, her face quick with apprehension. She drew her
wrapper closely about her, and crossed to Porgy’s door. With only half
of the distance traversed, she heard a sound from the room. It was more
of a muffled thump than anything else, and with it, something very like
a gasp.

When her hand closed over the knob all was silent again, except that she
could hear a long, slightly shuddering breath.

Then came a sound that caused her flesh to prickle with primal terror.
It was so unexpected, there in the chill, silent night. It was Porgy’s
laugh, but different. Out of the stillness it swelled suddenly, deep,
aboriginal, lustful. Then it stopped short.

Maria heard the baby cry out; then Bess’s voice, sleepy and mystified.
“Fuh Gawd’ sake, Porgy, what yuh laughin’ ’bout?”

“Dat all right, honey,” came the answer. “Don’t yuh be worryin’. Yuh
gots Porgy now, an’ he look atter he ’oman. Ain’t I done tells yuh: Yuh
gots er _man_ now.”

Maria turned the knob, entered the room, and closed the door quickly
behind her.

Night trailed westward across the city. In the east, out beyond the
ocean’s rim, essential light trembled upward and seemed to absorb rather
than quench the morning stars. Out of the sliding planes of mist that
hung like spent breath above the city, shapes began to emerge and assume
their proper values.

Far in the upper air over Catfish Row a speck appeared. It took a long,
descending spiral, and became two, then three. Around a wide circle the
specks swung, as though hung by wires from a lofty pivot. The light
brightened perceptibly. The specks dropped to a lower level, increased
in size, and miraculously became a dozen. Then some of them dropped in
from the circumference of the circle, cutting lines across like the
spokes of a wheel, and from time to time flapping indolent wings. Dark
and menacing when they flew to the westward, they would turn easily
toward the east, and the sun, still below the horizon, would gild their
bodies with ruddy gold, as they sailed, breast on, toward it.

Down, down they dropped, reaching low, and yet lower levels, until at
last they seemed to brush the water-front buildings with their sombre
wings. Then gradually they narrowed to a small circle that patrolled
the air directly over a shape that lay awash in the rising tide, across
the street from Catfish Row.

Suddenly from the swinging circle a single bird planed down and lit with
an awkward, hopping step directly before the object. For a moment he
regarded it with bleak, predatory eyes; then flew back to his fellows. A
moment later the whole flock swooped down, and the shape was hidden by
flapping wings and black awkward bodies that hopped about and fought
inward to the centre of the group.

A negro who had been sleeping under an overturned bateau awoke and
rubbed his eyes; then he sprang up and, seizing an oar, beat the birds
away with savage blows.

He bent over the object for a moment, then turned and raced for the
street with eyes showing white.

“Fuh Gawd’ sake, folks,” he cried, “come hyuh quick! Hyuh Crown, an’ he
done dead.”


§

A group of three white men stood over the body. One was the
plain-clothes man with the goatee and stick who had investigated the
Robbins’ murder. Behind him stood a uniformed policeman. The third, a
stout, leisurely individual, was stooping over the body, in the act of
making an examination.

“What do you make of it, Coroner?” asked the plain-clothes man.

“Knife between fifth and sixth ribs; must have gone straight through the
heart.”

“Well, he had it comin’ to him,” the detective observed. “They tell me
he is the nigger, Crown, who killed Robbins last April. That gives us
the widow to work on fer a starter, by the way; and Hennessy tells me
that he used to run with that dope case we had up last August. She’s
livin’ in the Row, too. Let’s go over and have a look.”

The Coroner cast an apprehensive glance at the forbidding structure
across the way.

“Can’t be so sure,” he cautioned. “Corpse might have been washed up.
Tide’s on the flood.”

“Well, I’m goin’ to have a look at those two women, anyway,” the
plain-clothes man announced. “That place is alive with crooks. I’d like
to get something on it that would justify closing it up as a public
nuisance, and throwing the whole lot of ’em out in the street. One
murder and a happy-dust riot already this summer; and here we are
again.”

Then turning to the policeman, he gave his orders.

“Get the wagon and take the body in. Then you had better come right
back. We might have some arrests. The Coroner and I’ll investigate while
you’re gone.”

He turned away toward the Row, assuming that he would be followed.

“All right, Cap; what do you say?” he called.

The Coroner shook his ponderous figure down into his clothes, turned
with evident reluctance, and joined him.

“All right,” he agreed. “But all I need is a couple of witnesses to
identify the body at the inquest.”

Across the street a small negro boy detached himself from the base of
one of the gateposts and darted through the entrance.

A moment later the white men strode into an absolutely empty square.
Their heels made a sharp sound on the flags, and the walls threw a clear
echo down upon them.

A cur that had been left napping in the sun woke with a start, looked
about in a bewildered fashion, gave a frightened yelp, and bolted
through a doorway.

It was all clearly not to the taste of the Coroner, and he cast an
uneasy glance about him.

“Where do we go?” he asked.

“That’s the widow’s room over there, if she hasn’t moved. We’ll give it
a look first,” said the detective.

The door was off the latch, and, without knocking, he kicked it open and
walked in.

The room was small, but immaculately clean. Beneath a patched white
quilt could be seen the form of a woman. Two other women were sitting in
utter silence beside the bed.

The form under the covers moaned.

“Drop that,” the detective commanded. “And answer some questions.”

The moaning stopped.

“Where were you yesterday and last night?”

The reply came slowly, as though speaking were great pain.

“I been sick in dis bed now t’ree day an’ night.”

“We been settin’ wid she, nursin’ she, all dat time,” one of the women
said.

And the other supplemented, “Dat de Gawd’ trut’.”

“You would swear to that?” asked the Coroner.

Three voices answered in chorus:

“Yes, Boss, we swear tuh dat.”

“There you are,” said the Coroner to the plain-clothes man, “an
air-tight alibi.”

The detective regarded him for a moment with supreme contempt. Then he
stepped forward and jerked the sheet from Serena’s face, which lay upon
the pillow as immobile as a model done in brown clay.

“You know damn well that you were out yesterday!” he snapped. “I have a
good mind to get the wagon and carry you in.”

Silence followed.

“What do you say to that?” he demanded.

But Serena had nothing to say, and neither had her handmaidens.

Then he turned a menacing frown upon them, as they sat motionless with
lowered eyes.

“Well!”

They jumped slightly, and their eyes showed white around the iris.
Suddenly they began to speak, almost in unison.

“We swear tuh Gawd, we done been hyuh wid she t’ree day.”

“Oh, Hell!” said the exasperated detective. “What’s the use? You might
as well argue with a parrot-cage.”

“That woman is just as ill at this moment as you are,” he said to his
unenthusiastic associate when they were again in the sunlight. “Her
little burlesque show proves that, if nothing else. But there is her
case all prepared. I don’t believe she killed Crown; she doesn’t look
like that kind. She is either just playing safe, or she has something
entirely different on her chest. But there’s her story; and you’ll never
break in without witnesses of your own; and you’ll never get ’em.”

The Coroner was not a highly sensitized individual; but as he moved
across the empty court, he found it difficult to control his nerves
under the scrutiny which he felt leveled upon him from behind a hundred
shuttered windows. Twice he caught himself looking covertly over his
shoulders; and, as he went, he bore hopefully away toward the entrance.

But the detective was intent upon his task, and presently called him
back.

“This is the cripple’s room,” he said. “He ain’t much of a witness. I
tried to break him in the Robbins case; but he wouldn’t talk. I want to
have a look at the woman, though.”

He kicked the door open suddenly. Porgy and Bess were seated by the
stove, eating breakfast from tin pans. On the bed in the corner the baby
lay.

Porgy paused, with his spoon halfway to his mouth, and looked up. Bess
kept her eyes on the pan, and continued to eat.

The Coroner stopped in the doorway, and made a businesslike show of
writing in a notebook.

“What’s your name?” he asked Porgy.

The cripple studied him for a long moment, taking in the ample
proportions of the figure and the heavy, but not unsympathetic, face.
Then he smiled one of his fleeting, ingenuous smiles.

“Jus’ Porgy,” he said. “Yuh knows me, Boss. Yuh is done gib me plenty ob
penny on King Charles Street.”

“Of course, you’re the goat-man. I didn’t know you without your wagon,”
he said amiably. Then, becoming businesslike, he asked:

“This nigger, Crown. You knew him by sight. Didn’t you?”

Porgy debated with himself for a moment, looked again into the Coroner’s
face, was reassured by what he saw there, and replied:

“Yes, Boss: I ’member um w’en he usen tuh come hyuh, long ago.”

“You could identify him, I suppose?”

Porgy looked blank.

“You’d know him if you saw him again?”

“Yes, Boss; I know um.”

The Coroner made a note in his book, closed it with an air of finality,
and put it in his pocket.

During the brief interview, the detective had been making an examination
of the room. The floor had been recently scrubbed, and was still damp in
the corners. He gave the clean, pine boards a close scrutiny, then
paused before the window. The bottom of the lower sash had been broken,
and several of the small, square panes were missing.

“So this is where you killed Crown, eh?” he announced.

The words fell into the silence and were absorbed by it, causing them to
seem theatrical and unconvincing. Neither Porgy nor Bess spoke. Their
faces were blank and noncommittal.

After a full moment, the woman said:

“I ain’t onduhstan’, Boss. Nobody hyuh ain’t kill Crown. My husban’ he
fall t’rough dat winduh yisterday when he leg gib ’way. He er cripple.”

“Any one see him do it?” enquired the Coroner from the door.

“Oh, yes, Boss,” replied Bess, turning to him. “T’ree or four ob de mens
was in de street; dey will tell yuh all ’bout um.”

“Yes, of course; more witnesses,” sneered the detective. Then turning to
the Coroner, he asked with a trace of sarcasm in his tone:

“That satisfies you fully, I suppose?”

The Coroner’s nerves were becoming edgy.

“For God’s sake,” he retorted, “do you expect me to believe that a
cripple could kill a two-hundred pound buck, then tote him a hundred
yards? Well, I’ve got what I need now anyway. As far as I’m concerned,
I’m through.”

They were passing the door of Maria’s shop when the detective caught
sight of something within that held his gaze.

“You can do as you please,” he told his unwilling companion. “But I’m
going to have a look in here. I have never been able to get anything on
this woman; but she is a bad influence in the neighborhood. I’d trust
her just as far as I could throw her.”

The Coroner heaved a sigh of resignation, and they stepped back, and
entered the shop.

Upon the flooring, directly before the door, and not far from it, was a
pool of blood. Standing over the pool was a table, and upon it lay the
carcass of a shark. Maria sat on a bench behind the table. As the men
entered she swung an immense cleaver downward. A cross-section of the
shark detached itself and fell away on a pile of similar slices. A thin
stream of blood dribbled from the table, augmenting the pool upon the
floor.

Maria did not raise her eyes from her task. Again the cleaver swung up,
and whistled downward.

From the street sounded the clatter of the returning patrol.

“I’ll wait for you in the wagon,” said the Coroner hastily, and stepped
back into the sunlight.

But he was not long alone. The uninterrupted swing of the dripping
cleaver was depressing, and the enthusiasm of his associate waned.

The bell clanged. Hoofs struck sparks from the cobbles, and the strong
but uncertain arm of the law was withdrawn, to attend to other and more
congenial business.


§

The sound from the retreating wagon dwindled and ceased.

For a moment Catfish Row held its breath; then its windows and doors
flew open, and poured its life out into the incomparable autumn weather.
The crisis had passed. There had been no arrests.

Serena stepped forth, her arms filled with the morning’s wash.

“‘Ain’t it hahd tuh be er nigger!’” someone sang in a loud, clear voice.
And everybody laughed.

Down the street, like an approaching freight train, came the drays,
jarring the building and rattling the windows, as the heavy tires rang
against the cobbles.

Bess and Porgy came out with the others, and seated themselves against
the wall in the gracious sunlight. Of the life, yet apart from it,
sufficient unto each other, they did not join in the loud talk and
badinage that was going on about them. Like people who had come on a
long, dark journey, they were content to sit, and breathe deeply of the
sun. The baby was sleeping in Bess’s arms, and from time to time she
would sing a stave to it in a soft, husky voice.

Into the court strode a group of stevedores. Their strong white teeth
flashed in the sunshine, and their big, panther-like bodies moved easily
among the women and children that crowded about them.

“Wey all de gals?” called one in a loud, resonant voice. “Mus’ be dey
ain’t know dat dis is pay-day.”

Two women who were sitting near Porgy and Bess rose and went forward,
with their arms twined about each other’s waists. In a few minutes they
were out of the crowd again, each looking up with admiring eyes into
the face of one of the men.

“Mens an’ ’omans ain’t de same,” said Porgy. “One mont’ ago dem gals
been libbin’ wid dey own mens. Den de storm tek um. Now dey is fuhgit um
a’ready, an’ gibbin’ dey lub tuh de nex’.”

“No; dey is diff’rent fuh true,” replied Bess. “An’ yuh won’t nebber
onduhstan’. All two dem gal gots baby fuh keep alibe.” She heaved a deep
sigh; and then added, “Dey is jus’ ’oman, an’ nigger at dat. Dey is
doin’ de bes’ dey kin--dat all.”

She was looking down at the baby while she spoke, and when she raised
her eyes and looked at Porgy, he saw that they were full of tears.

“But you, Bess; you is diff’rent f’om dat?” he said, with a gently
interrogating note in his voice.

“Dat ’cause Gawd ain’t mek but one Porgy!” she told him. “Any ’oman gots
tuh be decent wid you. But I gots fuh tell yuh de trut’, widout Porgy I
is jus’ like de res’.”

A shadow drifted across their laps, and they lifted their faces to the
sky.

A solitary buzzard had left the circle that had hung high in the air all
morning, and was swinging back and forth over the Row, almost brushing
the parapet of the roof as it passed. While Porgy and Bess looked, it
suddenly raised the points of its wings, reached tentative legs
downward, spread its feet wide, and lit on the edge of the roof directly
over their room.

“My Gawd!” exclaimed Maria, who was standing near. “Crown done sen’ he
buzzud back fuh bring trouble. Knock um off, Porgy. Fer Gawd’ sake,
knock um off befo’ he settle!”

The cripple reached out and picked up a brick-bat. The happiness had
left his face, and his eyes were filled with fear. With a swing of his
long, powerful arm, he sent the missile on its errand.

It struck the parapet directly beneath the bird.

With a spasmodic flap of wings, the black body lifted itself a few feet
from the building, then settled suddenly back. For a moment it hopped
awkwardly about, as though the roof were red hot beneath its feet, then
folded its wings, drew its nude head in upon its breast, and surveyed
the court with its aloof, malevolent eyes.

“T’row agin,” Maria called, handing Porgy another brick-bat. But he
seemed not to hear. His face quivered, and he hid it in his hands.

“Sonny,” the big negress called to a small boy who was standing near,
looking at the bird with his mouth open. “Git out on de roof wid uh
stick, an’ run dat bird away.”

But Porgy plucked at her skirt, and she looked down.

“Let um be,” he said in a hopeless voice. “It too late now. Ain’t yuh
see he done settle, an’ he pick my room fuh light ober? It ain’t no use
now. Yuh knows dat. It ain’t no use.”


§

The next morning Porgy sat in his accustomed place by Archdale’s door.
Autumn had touched the oaks in the park across the way, and they brushed
the hard, bright sky with a slow circling motion, and tossed handfuls of
yellow leaves down upon the pedestrians who stepped briskly along.

King Charles Street was full of hurrying men on their way to the cotton
offices and the big wholesale warehouses that fronted on the wharves.
Like the artery of a hale old man who has lain long asleep, but who
wakens suddenly and springs into a race, the broad thoroughfare seemed
to pound and sing with life.

The town was in a generous mood. Again and again the bottom of Porgy’s
cup gave forth its sharp, grateful click as a coin struck it and
settled. But the cripple had not even his slow glance of thanks for his
benefactors on that flashing autumn morning. Always he kept veiled,
apprehensive eyes directed either up or down the street, or lifted
frightened glances to the sky, as though fearing what he might see
there.

At noon a white man stopped before him. But he did not drop a coin and
pass on.

After a moment, Porgy brought his gaze back, and looked up.

The white man reached forward, and handed him a paper.

“Dat fuh me?” asked Porgy, in a voice that shook.

“You needn’t mind takin’ it,” the man assured him with a laugh. “It’s
just a summons as witness to the Coroner’s inquest. You knew that
nigger, Crown, didn’t you?”

He evidently took Porgy’s silence for assent, for he went on.

“Well, all you got to do is to view the body in the presence of the
Coroner, tell him who it is, and he’ll take down all you say.”

Porgy essayed speech, failed, tried again, and finally whispered:

“I gots tuh go an’ look on Crown’ face wid all dem w’ite folks lookin’
at me. Dat it?”

His voice was so piteous that the constable reassured him:

“Oh, cheer up; it’s not so bad. I reckon you’ve seen a dead nigger
before this. It will all be over in a few minutes.”

“Dey ain’t goin’ be no nigger in dat room ’cept me?” Porgy asked.

“Just you and Crown, if you still call him one.”

After a moment Porgy asked:

“I couldn’t jus’ bring a ’oman wid me? I couldn’t eben carry my--my
’oman?”

“No,” said the white man_ positively. “Now I’ve got to be gettin’ along,
I reckon. Just come over to the Court House in half an hour, and I’ll
meet you and take you in. Only be sure to come. If you don’t show up
it’s jail for you, you know.”

For a moment after the man had gone, Porgy sat immovable, with his eyes
on the pavement. Then a sudden change swept over him. He cast one glance
up and down the hard, clean street, walled by its uncompromising,
many-eyed buildings. Then in a panic he clambered into his cart, gave a
cruel twist to the tail of his astonished goat, and commenced a
spasmodic, shambling race up Meeting House Road in the direction in
which he knew that, miles away, the forests lay.


§

To many, the scene which ensued on the upper Meeting House Road stands
out as an exquisitely humorous episode, to be told and retold with
touching up of high lights and artistic embellishments. To these, in the
eyes of whom the negro is wholly humorous, per se, there was not the
omission of a single conventional and readily recognizable stage
property.

For, after all, what could have been funnier than an entirely serious
race between a negro in a dilapidated goat-cart, and the municipality’s
shining new patrol wagon, fully officered and clanging its bell for the
crowds to hear as it came.

The finish took place in the vicinity of the railway yards and
factories, and the street was filled with workmen who smoked against the
walls, or ate their lunch, sitting at the pavement’s edge--grand-stand
seats, as they were quite accurately described in the telling.

The street cars ran seldom that far out; and Porgy had the thoroughfare
almost entirely to himself. His face wore a demented look, and was
working pitifully. In his panic, he wrung the tail of his unfortunate
beast without mercy. The lunchers along the pavement saw him coming, and
called to friends further along; so that as he came, he was greeted with
shouts of laughter and witty sallies from the crowd.

Then the wagon appeared, a mere speck in the distance, but sending the
sound of its bell before it as an advertisement of its presence. It grew
rapidly until it reached the cheering crowds. Then it seemed that even
the sedate officers of the law were not above a sly humor of their own,
for the vehicle slackened its pace perceptibly and prolonged the final
moment of capture.

The big buildings had been left behind, and there lay before Porgy only
the scattered, cheap bungalows of the labor quarters; and beyond, as
elusive and desirable as the white man’s heaven, glimmered the far line
of the woods, misty and beautiful in the pink autumn haze.

The patrol forged ahead and came to a clanging stop. The officers leapt
out and, amid shouts of laughter from the crowd, lifted wagon, goat and
man into the vehicle. The driver jerked the horse back into its
breechings, swung the wagon with a dramatic snap that was not wasted
upon his gallery, and sent it clanging and rocking back in the
direction from which it had come.

Porgy fell forward, with his arms thrown out upon the back of the goat,
and buried his face between them in the shaggy, evil-smelling hair.

The workmen upon the sidewalks cheered and shouted with mirth. Surely it
had been a great day. They would not soon have another laugh to match
it.


§

When the wagon reached the down-town district, the inquest was over. It
had been a simple matter to secure another witness for the
identification of the body. The jury had made short work of their task,
and had found that Crown had come to his death as the result of a chest
wound at the hands of person or persons unknown.

Porgy was taken at once to the station house, where the charge of
“Contempt of Court” was formally entered against him on the blotter, and
he was locked up to await trial early the following morning.

Under the wheezing gas jet, the Recorder looked Porgy over with his
weary glance, brought the tips of his slender fingers together; gave him
“five days,” in his tired drawl, and raised his eyes to the next negro
on the morning’s list.

They hoisted the outfit, goat and all, into the patrol for the trip to
the jail, thus again brightening a day for a group of light-hearted
Nordics upon the pavement.

A large, red-faced policeman took his seat at the rear of the wagon.

“You sure beat all!” he confided to Porgy, with a puzzled frown.
“Runnin’ away like the devil was after you, from bein’ a witness; an’
now goin’ to jail with a face like Sunday mornin’.”


§

In the fresh beauty of an early October morning, Porgy returned home.
There were few of his friends about, as work was now plentiful, and most
of those who could earn a day’s wage were up and out. He drove through
the entrance, pulled his goat up short, and looked about him.

Serena was seated on her bench with a baby in her arms.

Porgy gave her a long look, and a question commenced to dawn in his
eyes. The child turned in her arms, and his suspicions were confirmed.
It was his baby--his and Bess’s.

Then Serena looked up and saw him. She arose in great confusion, clasped
the infant to her ample bosom, and, without a word of greeting, stepped
through her doorway. Then, as though struck by an afterthought, she
turned, thrust her head back through the opening, and called loudly:

“Oh, Maria! hyuh Porgy come home.”

Then she disappeared and the door slammed shut.

Mystified and filled with alarm, Porgy turned his vehicle toward the
cook-shop and arrived at the door just as Maria stepped over the
threshold.

She seated herself on the sill and brought her face level with his. Then
she looked into his eyes.

What Porgy saw there caused him to call out sharply:

“Where’s Bess? Tell me, quick, where’s Bess?”

The big negress did not answer, and after a moment her ponderous face
commenced to shake.

Porgy beat the side of his wagon with his fist.

“Where, where--” he began, in a voice that was suddenly shrill.

But Maria placed a steadying hand over his frantic one and held it
still.

“Dem dutty dogs got she one day w’en I gone out,” she said in a low,
shaken voice. “She been missin’ yuh an’ berry low in she min’ ’cause she
can’t fin’ out how long yuh is lock up fuh. Dat damn houn’ she knock off
de wharf las’ summer fin’ she like dat an’ git she tuh tek er swalluh ob
licker. Den half a dozen of de mens gang she, an’ mek she drunk.”

“But wuh she now?” Porgy cried. “I ain’t keer ef she wuz drunk. I want
she now.”

Maria tried to speak, but her voice refused to do her bidding. She
covered her face with her hands, and her throat worked convulsively.

Porgy clutched her wrist. “Tell me,” he commanded. “Tell me, now.”

“De mens all carry she away on de ribber boat,” she sobbed. “Dey leabe
word fuh me dat dey goin’ tek she all de way tuh Sawannah, an’ keep she
dey. Den Serena, she tek de chile, an’ say she is goin’ gib um er
Christian raisin’.”

Deep sobs stopped Maria’s voice. For a while she sat there, her face
buried in her hands. But Porgy had nothing to say. When she finally
raised her head and looked at him, she was surprised at what she saw.

The keen autumn sun flooded boldly through the entrance and bathed the
drooping form of the goat, the ridiculous wagon, and the bent figure of
the man in hard, satirical radiance. In its revealing light, Maria saw
that Porgy was an old man. The early tension that had characterized him,
the mellow mood that he had known for one eventful summer, both had
gone; and in their place she saw a face sagged wearily, and the eyes of
age lit only by a faint reminiscent glow from suns and moons that had
looked into them, and had already dropped down the west.

She looked until she could bear the sight no longer; then she stumbled
into her shop and closed the door, leaving Porgy and the goat alone in
an irony of morning sunlight.


THE END
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THE RUNAWAY BUNNY


      *      *      *      *      *      *

Books by LAURA ROUNTREE SMITH


    Bear and Bunny Book, The
    Bunny Boy and Grizzly Bear
    Bunny Bright Eyes
    Bunny Cotton-Tail Junior
    Candy-Shop Cotton-Tails, The
    Children’s Favorite Stories
    Circus Book, The
    Circus Cotton-Tails, The
    Cotton-Tail First Reader, The
    Cotton-Tail Primer, The
    Cotton-Tails in Toyland, The
    Drills and Plays for Patriotic Days
    Games and Plays
    Hawk-Eye, An Indian Story Reader
    Language Lessons from Every Land
    Little Bear
    Little Eskimo
    Merry Little Cotton-Tails, The
    Mother Goose Stories
    Primary Song Book
    Roly-Poly Book, The
    Runaway Bunny, The
    Seventeen Little Bears
    Snubby Nose and Tippy Toes
    Tale of Bunny Cotton-Tail, The
    Three Little Cotton-Tails

    Published by
    A. FLANAGAN COMPANY
    CHICAGO

      *      *      *      *      *      *


THE RUNAWAY BUNNY

by

LAURA ROUNTREE SMITH

Illustrated by Dorothy Dulin






1923
A. Flanagan Company
Chicago

Copyright, 1923, by A. Flanagan Company.

Printed in the United States of America




                                CONTENTS


Chapter I

TIME TO RUN AWAY 7


Chapter II

THE HUNGRY RABBIT 20


Chapter III

A LOAD OF EASTER EGGS 35


Chapter IV

MOTHER BUN’S VISITORS 48


Chapter V

THE ANIMALS’ FOURTH OF JULY 58


Chapter VI

THE COUNTY FAIR 66


Chapter VII

THE BUNNY SCHOOL 77


Chapter VIII

THE TELL-THE-TIME RABBIT 88


Chapter IX

THE THANKSGIVING DINNER 101


Chapter X

CHRISTMAS AT MOTHER BUN’S 112




[Illustration: “A very old Rabbit peeped out” (Page 35)]




                               Chapter I
                            TIME TO RUN AWAY


                 The Runaway Rabbit has formed the habit
                   Of running away, I see.
                 Oh, Runaway Rabbit, please form the habit
                   Of staying awhile with me.


The Runaway Rabbit sat on the doorstep of his own little house, saying,
“By my cottontail, it is time for me to run away!”

He took out his little brown traveling bag and packed it full.

[Illustration: “Packed it full”]

He was in such a hurry to run away that he did not even stop to clear
off his breakfast table. He did not even stop to wind his clock or lock
his front door!

Hippety-hop, lippety-lop, he went down the path, carrying his little
brown traveling bag.

“Where are you going?” asked the Whistling Wind.

“Where are you going?” asked the Smiling Sun.

To them both, the Runaway Bunny replied:

                   “Oho! I’m happy to have such fun;
                   It’s such a pleasure to run and run!”

He did not tell anyone where he was going. Many years ago he had made up
his mind that some day he would run away and visit his grandparents.

Now wasn’t it funny? At this very minute Old Mother Bun was saying:

                   “My old legs get so stiff; it’s funny!
                   I wish I had a little Bunny!”

She wanted a little Bunny to travel up and down the cellar stairs for
her.

At this very minute Old Father Bun was saying:

                        “I would pay a mint of money
                        If I had a visiting Bunny!”

He wanted a little Rabbit to bring in wood and water.

[Illustration: “Took out her field glasses”]

Suddenly, without any warning whatever, Old Mother Bun took out her
field glasses. And as she looked out of the window she remarked, “I
think I see a little figure away over in the field coming this way very
fast!”

Old Father Bun put his long ears close to the window to listen.

He had wonderful hearing, and he said, “I think I hear the far-off
patter, patter, patter of little feet. Some one is coming. He should be
here in five minutes.”

[Illustration: “Father Bun took out his watch”]

Father Bun took out his watch and kept looking at it, while he went
outdoors to wait. He had not long to wait, for the Runaway Bunny soon
came in sight. He cried:

              “I’m the Runaway Bunny. I’ve come all the way
              To say, ‘How do you do?’ and wish you good day.”

He set down his traveling bag and kissed his grandparents.

Old Mother Bun said, “You are our own dear grandson.”

Father Bun said, “Come right inside, my dear.”

The Runaway Bunny was glad to sit down by the kitchen stove and eat
cookies as fast as Old Mother Bun took them out of the oven.

Now he had heard the old Rabbits wishing before he had entered the
house. So he went pitter, patter, clitter, clatter, down to the cellar
and brought up a great green cabbage. He put it into a chopping bowl and
chopped it up for dinner.

Then he went pitter, patter, clitter, clatter, down to the cellar and
brought up many other good things.

Old Mother Bun said:

                   “You are such a little treasure,
                   To keep you here will be a pleasure.”

[Illustration: “The Runaway Bunny winked one eye”]

At this the Runaway Bunny winked one eye; for he never stayed anywhere
very long.

He had formed the habit of running away.

He next went with a hop and a skip and a bound, and brought in wood and
water.

Old Father Bun was delighted. He said:

                 “I swear, by my long and floppy ears,
                 I will keep you here for years and years!”

[Illustration: “Opened his traveling bag”]

The Runaway Bunny looked cross-eyed; but he had a merry time all day.

He said, “Grandmother Bun, what a fine pantry you have!” and
“Grandfather Bun, what a fine garden you have! Will you take me riding
in your wheelbarrow?”

When evening came he and his grandparents popped corn. And when it was
bedtime the Runaway Bunny opened his traveling bag and brought out a
brand new nightcap for Old Mother Bun and a brand new pipe for Old
Father Bun.

They said:

               “We love you so, we’ll keep you, honey.
               Please say you’ll live with us, little Bunny.”

The Runaway Bunny coughed politely and took his little brown traveling
bag and went pitter, patter, clitter, clatter, upstairs.

He put on his little white nightcap and night robe.

[Illustration: “Tucked him up snug and warm”]

Old Mother Bun tucked him up snug and warm in bed, and Old Father Bun
sang:

                   “Tra, la, la, la! To sing’s a habit.
                   Pleasant dreams, dear little Rabbit!”

When the little fellow was asleep, Old Mother Bun said:

                   “I hope he will stay a year and a day,
                   I think he forgot about running away.”

Old Father Bun remarked:

             “If he stays through one night, all will be well,
             But in Rabbit Land you never can tell.”

In the morning the Runaway Bunny was gone!

He left his little brown traveling bag, so it looked as though he
intended to come back some time. He also left a polite note to thank his
grandparents for their kindness.

                  *       *       *       *       *

                   Now if you really want to know
                   Where the Runaway Bunny will go,
                   Just take this book and read and read;
                   You’ll have a lively time, indeed!

[Illustration: The Bunny]




                               Chapter II
                           THE HUNGRY RABBIT


                    The Runaway Bunny went hippety-hop;
                      He was hungry as could be.
                    Oh, Runaway Bunny, will you stop
                      And take a bite with me?


The Runaway Bunny took out his little toy watch and looked at it. And,
though he could not tell time, he said, “My fur and cottontail! It seems
to be time for something to eat.”

He decided to ask the first animal he met for some breakfast.

He went hopping and skipping along until he met Pit-A-Pat, the Cat. He
told her how very hungry he was.

[Illustration: “Told her how very hungry he was”]

She said, “Come home with me and I’ll give you a saucer of milk.”

The Runaway Bunny replied:

              “I don’t drink milk, though you think it funny;
              I am a peculiar Runaway Bunny.”

Then he whispered to Pit-A-Pat that he wished he had stopped for Old
Mother Bun’s breakfast, and he went hopping down the path.

Pit-A-Pat remarked, “I ought to have asked who Mother Bun is. I might
want to know some day.”

My, how hungry the Runaway Bunny was! By and by he met Rough Coat, the
old tramp dog, and asked him for a tiny bite of breakfast.

[Illustration: “By and by he met Rough Coat”]

Rough Coat said, “If you come with me I will give you a fine bone I
buried last week.”

The Runaway Bunny bowed politely and said:

               “I can’t eat bones, though you think it funny;
               I am a peculiar Runaway Bunny.”

“What are you running away for?” asked Rough Coat.

But the little fellow was in too much of a hurry to stop to answer him.
He could not forget how hungry he was.

He sang:

                    “The Runaway Bunny is sad, you see,
                    For he is hungry as he can be.”

A wise old owl in the tree overhead, who said his name was Who-Who,
offered the Rabbit a juicy bat.

But the Runaway Bunny replied:

               “I can’t eat bats, though you think it funny;
               I am a peculiar Runaway Bunny.”

He went on hippety-hop, hippety-hop, until he met Old Brother Bear, who
offered him a taste of honey.

Now Old Brother Bear loved honey. So he was relieved when the Runaway
Bunny replied:

               “I can’t eat honey, though you think it funny;
               I am a peculiar Runaway Bunny.”

He went on his way, singing about Old Mother Bun’s coffee and rolls and
doughnuts.

He sang:

          “Oh, the best things to eat for a Bunny on the run
          Are the rolls and the doughnuts of our Grandmother Bun.”

Next he met Foxy-Lox, that sly old fellow! The Runaway Bunny fairly
shouted:

                “My fur and whiskers! I have to shout,
                I’m so hungry I don’t know what I’m about.”

Foxy-Lox crept up very, very close and whispered in the Runaway Bunny’s
right ear:

                  “Hungry for carrots and everything nice,
                  I can supply you in just a trice.”

Then Foxy-Lox, that crafty old fellow, crept up and whispered in the
Runaway Bunny’s left ear:

                “Hungry for cabbage and vegetables green,
                You’re the hungriest Bunny I’ve ever seen.”

No wonder the Runaway Bunny was hungry. No breakfast, no dinner, no
supper!

Foxy-Lox said:

                     “Come with me into my den,
                     My children are little gentlemen.”

The Runaway Bunny followed him, muttering:

                  “At the home of good Old Mother Bun,
                  There are plenty of meals for everyone.”

They went along until they came to the den.

There was a table set with carrots and cabbage and tender green
spring-flower shoots and everything else, in fact, that a hungry Bunny
would like to eat.

[Illustration: “Waiting their turn to be served”]

Sure enough, the six little Foxy-Loxies sat like little gentlemen round
the table, waiting their turn to be served.

Old Foxy-Lox invited the Runaway Bunny to eat a good square meal.

Nodding his head in the direction of the visitor, he whispered to his
little Foxes:

                     “You will make a meal, ’tis true,
                     Then we’ll make a meal of you!”

The Runaway Bunny had sharp ears. He began to twitch them nervously to
and fro.

He could not hear what Old Foxy-Lox was whispering about. But he thought
the old fellow was up to some mischief. So he said:

              “I won’t eat cabbage, though you think it funny;
              I am a peculiar Runaway Bunny.”

Then he looked at the carrots and said:

              “I won’t eat carrots, though you think it funny;
              I am a peculiar Runaway Bunny.”

Then he waved his paw toward the table of tempting things.

And he shouted:

              “I won’t eat at all, though you think it funny;
              I am a peculiar Runaway Bunny.”

Then he gave one bound and was out of the den before Foxy-Lox could wink
an eyelash.

His talkative little ticking Watch made this remark:

                  “We don’t care how hard the climb;
                  Friend Bunny, you got out just in time!”

The Runaway Bunny was thinking hard again, “No breakfast, no dinner, no
supper!” He sat down on a log to think.

Pitter, patter, clitter, clatter, came the sound of two little feet. And
another Bunny stood in the path before him.

This new friend now said:

                “I went to the side show and took in money,
                So you may call me a wee Circus Bunny.”

[Illustration: “Then he stood on his head”]

Then he stood on his head and did several circus tricks, as cunning as
could be. At any other time the Runaway Bunny would have laughed. But he
only said mournfully:

                  “The world is large, the world is wide,
                  And I am empty quite—inside!”

The Circus Bunny said:

                  “We’re very near a garden plot,
                  We shall find a good meal, like as not.”

[Illustration: “They had a fine meal”]

They went hippety-hop until they came to the garden. Here they ate the
tops of some early spring flowers and some bits of tender lettuce. They
had a fine meal before they were through with it. The Circus Bunny said:

            “Let’s live in the garden a night and a day.
            There’s plenty of lettuce; come, what do you say?”

            But the Runaway Bunny was off with a hop,
            With his ears and his tail going flippety-flop.
            The surprised Circus Bunny remarked, “That is funny!
            That rabbit is surely the Runaway Bunny.”




                              Chapter III
                         A LOAD OF EASTER EGGS


As the Runaway Bunny hopped along, it began to rain very hard.

He heard a voice singing:

                     “I like the thunderstorm and rain;
                     Just why I do I can’t explain.”

The voice came from a wee house in the woods. The Runaway Bunny stopped
and knocked politely at the door.

His little heart went thump, for he did not know what he should find
inside.

The door opened a little and a very old Rabbit peeped out and said:

                    “I am Old Mother Give-Away;
                    And now, sir, what have you to say?”

The Runaway Bunny hung his head, for he had never been generous enough
to give away anything in all his life. But as the rain was falling fast,
he wanted to go in and dry his fur and whiskers.

So he said:

                    “May I do any errands for you today?
                    I like to travel away, away.”

In answer to this, the door was opened wide and he hopped inside.

My, what a wonderful sight he saw!

There were Easter eggs on the table and Easter eggs on the floor, Easter
eggs on the window-sill and Easter eggs in baskets! They were painted in
gay colors—red, blue, and gold.

Old Mother Give-Away said:

                 “A messenger I thought I’d borrow;
                 You may help me take the eggs to-morrow.”

[Illustration: “Painting piles and piles of Easter eggs”]

Then she told him how she and Father Give-Away had spent many days
painting piles and piles of Easter eggs.

She said she wanted every Rabbit in the world to have an Easter egg on
Easter morning. She wanted the eggs well hidden, so it would be fun to
hunt for them.

[Illustration: “Splashing the colors upon them”]

She went on painting the eggs, dashing and splashing the colors upon
them. The Runaway Bunny planned where he would hide the Easter eggs in
every wee house he visited.

He thought he would put them back of books and in vases and back of
clocks and in cups and bowls and baskets. There are so many good places
to hide wee Easter eggs.

By and by the two Bunnies curled up on the rug and fell asleep.

Very early next day the Runaway Bunny woke up.

He said:

                  “May I start with the Easter eggs today?
                  Please let me go, Mother Give-Away.”

To his surprise Old Mother Give-Away answered, as though she were half
asleep:

                 “Speak to the Rubbers on the floor;
                 They’ve heard that question asked before.”

The Runaway Bunny laughed and slipped four little Rubbers on his four
little feet to keep them dry, this misty, moisty morning.

Then he asked again:

                 “May I start with the Easter eggs to-day?
                 Please let me go, Mother Give-Away.”

Then the Rubbers piped up to answer him:

                       “Ask the Umbrella in the hall;
                       It may not answer you at all.”

[Illustration: “The Umbrella was in a very good humor”]

The Umbrella was in a very good humor and, as the Runaway Bunny opened
it, said:

                     “Ask the Raincoat what he will say
                     About going out on a rainy day!”

The Runaway Bunny chuckled as he slipped on the Raincoat that hung on a
nail.

He asked as before:

                 “May I start with the Easter eggs to-day?
                 Please let me go, Mother Give-Away.”

The Raincoat replied:

                  “Ask the Rain Cap; perhaps he’ll explain
                  Why we’re happy when we hear the rain.”

The Runaway Bunny knew they were happy to get out in the rain. But he
asked again:

                 “May I start with the Easter eggs to-day?
                 Please let me go, Mother Give-Away.”

The Rain Cap replied:

                 “Ask the Wheelbarrow, for he knows
                 The home into which each Easter egg goes.”

Then the Runaway Bunny ran out into the yard and said to the
Wheelbarrow:

                 “Let’s start with the Easter eggs to-day;
                 Come, Mr. Wheelbarrow, what do you say?”

And the Wheelbarrow said, “I am ready to start this very minute.”

[Illustration: “About 246 Easter eggs in the Wheelbarrow”]

Then Mother Give-Away came out and helped the Runaway Bunny pile about
246 Easter eggs in the Wheelbarrow. She covered them well to keep them
dry.

The Runaway Bunny remarked:

                “Now I should call this perfect fun,
                If I’d had breakfast with Grandmother Bun.”

“Who is Grandmother Bun?” asked Old Mother Give-Away.

The wind whistled so hard that the Runaway Bunny did not hear the
question. But he went rolling the Wheelbarrow merrily along, singing:

                 “Perhaps you may think it very funny
                 That I should be called an Easter Bunny.”

[Illustration: “He left eggs at every Rabbit house”]

He left eggs at every Rabbit house he passed, and by and by the
Wheel-barrow was empty.

He left it in the road and went hippety-hop along, singing:

                    “I wish you all a glad Easter Day.
                    I’m running away! I’m running away!”




                               Chapter IV
                         MOTHER BUN’S VISITORS


                 Said Mother Bun, “You may think it funny,
                 But I miss my little Runaway Bunny.”

Old Father Bun thought a long time before speaking.

                  Then said Father Bun, “Would it be wise,
                  In all the papers to advertise?”

Old Father and Mother Bun talked on about the Runaway Bunny, saying:

                     “In every newspaper in the wood
                     We’ll advertise. It may do good.”

So Old Father Bun sat down by a table and said:

                 “By my stubby tail, I shall have to think
                 How to use paper and pen and ink.”

He was not used to doing much writing.

“Click, click, click,” went Old Mother Bun’s knitting needles.

“Puff, puff, puff,” went Old Father Bun’s pipe.

By and by he wrote the following:

                     “Rabbit lost, Rabbit lost!
                     Get him back at any cost.
                     He runs away o’er hill and dale,
                     He has long ears and stubby tail.”

Old Mother Bun said:

                       “I would nail that on a tree,
                       Where every animal can see.”

Old Father Bun did not agree with her. He knew it paid to advertise in
newspapers. So he put on his old felt hat, took his walking stick, and
started out to a real newspaper office. He took his notice to
Chatterbox, the Monkey newspaper man. So all the animals soon read in
their newspapers about the Runaway Bunny.

[Illustration: “He took his notice to Chatterbox”]

When Pit-A-Pat read the notice, she smacked her lips and said:

                    “Here is a chance to have some fun,
                    I’ll make a call on Old Mother Bun.”

So by and by it happened that Old Father Bun said, “I hear the patter,
patter of little feet.”

Old Mother Bun said, “Do look out and tell me who is coming.”

Pit-A-Pat came to the door and bowed politely, saying:

                 “I long for milk. May I have a drink?
                 I can help you find the Rabbit, I think.”

[Illustration: “Gave her a saucer of warm milk”]

They gladly let Pit-A-Pat in and gave her a saucer of warm milk in their
best blue-rimmed saucer.

While she was licking her chops, Old Father Bun said:

                   “To inquire of you seems rather funny,
                   But did you meet our Runaway Bunny?”

Old Mother Bun said:

                 “To call him Bunny we’ve formed the habit,
                 He is also known as the Runaway Rabbit.”

“Did he have long ears?” asked Pit-A-Pat, winking slyly. “Did he have a
tiny stubby tail?”

“Yes, yes,” shouted Father and Mother Bun eagerly.

“Did he have a habit of running away?” asked Pit-A-Pat, looking narrowly
out of her green eyes.

“Yes, yes,” shouted Old Father and Mother Bun again together.

Then the most astonishing thing happened!

Pit-A-Pat got up slowly, humped her back, and without another word
walked out of the open window!

Old Mother Bun remarked:

                  “No use to cry for spilled milk, I see:
                  Pit-A-Pat played a trick on me.”

Old Father Bun said:

                   “I think her actions are very funny.
                   She must have met our Runaway Bunny.”

“Rap-a-tap-tap,” sounded on the door.

And in walked Rough Coat, saying politely:

               “I’m a lonesome fellow; I live alone.
               Could you give me as much as a chicken bone?”

As luck would have it, they had a whole plate full of chicken bones in
the house. So Rough Coat had a wonderful meal.

Old Father Bun said, “Did you meet our Runaway Bunny?”

Rough Coat said, “Did he run as though he would never stop?”

“Yes, yes,” cried Father Bun excitedly.

“Did he sometimes say, ‘My fur and whiskers’?” asked Rough Coat.

“Yes, yes,” cried Father and Mother Bun together.

Rough Coat gave himself a great shake, remarking:

                    “I enjoyed my lunch, I do declare;
                    Ask your questions of Brother Bear.”

[Illustration: “Whisk! with a bound he was gone!”]

Whisk! with a bound he was gone!

Father Bun said:

               “We’ll have other visitors some fine day,
               No telling, though, what our guests will say.”

At this very minute the Runaway Bunny read in the newspaper about
himself.

He read, “‘Bunny lost.’ That must be I.”

He twitched his long ears to and fro and turned to look back at his
little stubby tail.

He did not want to go back and visit his grandparents yet. So he started
on, saying:

                 “I won’t stay still for a purse of money,
                 I am such a funny Runaway Bunny!”




                               Chapter V
                      THE ANIMALS’ FOURTH OF JULY


                  “We’ll have fun and frolic by and by,
                  For soon will come the Fourth of July.”

So sang all the wild animals in the woods.

The Runaway Bunny ran on and on until he could run no longer. Then he
set up a shout, for he had been traveling in a circle, and here he was
back at his own little house in the woods!

There was his wee spinning wheel in the corner. There were his dishes on
the table as he had left them.

[Illustration: “Then he began to spin furiously”]

He hopped into his wee bed and slept a week and a day. Then he went down
cellar and got a cabbage to eat. He felt very happy. He wanted to work.
Then he began to spin furiously, singing:

                 “I can spin quite well if I only try,
                 I will buy a flag for the Fourth of July.”

“Rap-a-tap,” sounded on his door and in walked Pit-A-Pat, big as life
and twice as natural! She told the story about her little kittens who
had lost their mittens. The Runaway Bunny listened earnestly, for he had
known what it was to be cold.

                “When I sell the goods I spin,” said Bunny,
                “For mittens I’ll give you a pile of money.”

Pit-A-Pat bowed her thanks and the Runaway Bunny began to spin again in
real earnest, saying:

              “I can spin quite well if I only try,
              “I’ll buy firecrackers for the Fourth of July.”

“Bowwow,” sounded outside the window.

[Illustration: “There stood Rough Coat, growling”]

There stood Rough Coat, growling, “I need a new collar. I want one with
my name and address upon it, so if I get lost some one can lead me
home.”

The Runaway Bunny knew how hard it was to want things. So he whistled,
and sang:

                  “When I sell the goods I spin to-morrow,
                  I shall have money for all to borrow.”

Rough Coat went away happy.

“Whir, whir, whir,” went the cunning little spinning wheel.

All day long the Runaway Bunny kept on spinning and telling what he
wanted to buy for himself with the money, after his goods were sold.

All day long the animals came and begged him for money.

At last he ran to the store and sold the cloth he had spun. When he had
given the animals the money they wanted, he said:

                 “I’m a Runaway Bunny and here I sigh,
                 I’ve nothing left for the Fourth of July.”

“No flag, no firecrackers, no fireworks,” called Old Who-Who, the Owl.

The Runaway Bunny dried his eyes, for he was so disappointed he had shed
a few tears. And he said:

                    “As long as I can make a rhyme,
                    I’ll run away and have a good time.”

[Illustration: “Pit-A-Pat came with a large flag”]

He was just starting to run away when there was a great noise and
Pit-A-Pat came with a large flag as a present, and Rough Coat brought
firecrackers. Soon all the animals gathered together for a surprise
party and they set off fireworks and drank red lemonade.

They all had a happy Fourth of July.

The Three Little Kittens wore their new mittens and Rough Coat wore a
new collar. All the animals hugged and kissed the Runaway Bunny and
begged him to stay with them in the woods.

Suddenly, without any warning whatever, he took his flag and, singing a
song to himself, went hippety-hop down the road.

He sang:

                  “The Fourth of July is a holiday;
                  And I’m running away, I’m running away!”

All the animals clapped their paws and cried:

                 “Please stay with us and forget the habit
                 Of running away, dear Runaway Rabbit!”




                               Chapter VI
                            THE COUNTY FAIR


The Runaway Bunny went hopping along, singing:

              “When I am lonesome I’m always singing
              Of a jolly old kite that used to fly
              At the end of the string I was often swinging,
              And I said to old earth, ‘Good-bye, good-bye!’”

“Good-bye, good-bye,” called a merry voice; and there in the path before
the Runaway Bunny stood the Circus Bunny.

The Circus Bunny said:

                “I’ll run along with you, if you don’t care;
                I’m off for a trip to the county fair.”

“To whom were you saying good-bye?” asked the Runaway Bunny.

“I will answer that question when you tell me about the wonderful ride
you had with the kite,” answered the Circus Bunny.

But the Runaway Bunny had already forgotten about the kite and could
think of nothing but the fair. He was delighted to have company on the
way; and he remarked:

                 “What shall we do when we get to the fair
                 And find all the animals gathered there?”

The Circus Bunny replied:

                 “Your question to me seems rather funny;
                 We shall hire a tent and make some money.”

What a fine trip they had!

Everyone was going to the fair. Some of the animals were going on foot
and some were going on horseback. Some of them rode in state in cars.
Some of the animals traveled alone and others took the whole family.

The Runaway Bunny said to everyone he passed:

                 “I’m off to the fair. Good day, good day!
                 I’m running away, I’m running away.”

The Circus Bunny kept saying a little rhyme over and over:

                 “Will you spend a penny and form the habit
                 Of calling to see the Circus Rabbit?”

They arrived at the fair. But just as they were going to set up a wee
tent of their own and make money for themselves, some one picked them up
by their long ears and put them in a wire cage.

[Illustration: “Picked them up by their long ears”]

The Circus Bunny whispered:

                   “Well, this is a pretty how-do-you-do!
                   I don’t know how to get out. Do you?”

The Runaway Bunny answered:

                     “I really haven’t a word to say,
                     This may cure me of running away!”

By and by a man came and called out:

                “Performing Rabbits! Step this way!
                Hear what the Bunnies have to say;
                Their tricks are funny, and each small Bunny
                Is well worth all your admission money.”

Now crowds and crowds gathered around the cage. The Circus Bunny stood
on his head and turned somersaults and said:

                 “Will you spend a penny and form the habit
                 Of calling to see the Circus Rabbit?”

All the animals in the crowd cheered and clapped, and cried, “Do it
again! Do it again!”

By and by the Circus Bunny grew tired of performing his tricks, and it
was the Runaway Bunny’s turn to entertain the crowd.

He had never done a trick in all his life and was wondering what to do,
when the Circus Bunny reminded him:

                   “You were singing a very comical song,
                   As I was coming along, along.”

So the Runaway Bunny sang:

              “When I am lonesome I’m always singing
              Of a jolly old kite that used to fly
              At the end of the string I was often swinging,
              And I said to old earth, ‘Good-bye, good-bye!’”

[Illustration: “Up, up, up he began to sail”]

At this very minute the most surprising thing happened!

The Runaway Bunny was so little that he squeezed out through the wires
in the cage door! He took hold of the string of a kite that was near,
and up, up, up he began to sail, higher and higher, until he soon looked
like a speck in the sky.

“Well,” remarked the Circus Bunny, “it was certainly fortunate that the
jolly old kite was waiting for him. That is a new way he has found of
running away. I believe I will squeeze out of this cage, too.”

So while the crowd was watching the Runaway Bunny, he tried to get out
of the cage. But he stuck halfway, until kind-hearted Old Mother Bun
pulled him out and tucked him safely in her market basket.

Old Father Bun said, “What is in your basket?”

Old Mother Bun said, “I will tell you when we get home.”

Up, up, up sailed the Runaway Bunny.

When he had sailed up a week and a day, down, down sailed the kite and
he arrived in his own little back yard, at home.

He said, “I shall have a fine kite story to tell my
great-great-grand-children some day. That was a fine ride I had!”

Then he repeated in a singsong way:

              “When I am lonesome I’m always singing
              Of a jolly old kite that used to fly
              At the end of the string I was often swinging,
              And I said to old earth, ‘Good-bye, good-bye!’”

He made himself a nice little supper and for once was contented to sit
in his wee house. But that night he dreamed that he was running away,
singing:

                   “For a county fair I do not care,
                   I can run away from anywhere,
                   Wherever I go this thing I say,
                   ‘I’m running away! I’m running away!’”




                              Chapter VII
                            THE BUNNY SCHOOL


The summer had passed and September had come. All the school bells were
ringing.

The Runaway Bunny said:

                    “There is one thing I can remember,
                    School begins in glad September.”

[Illustration: “Went hippety-hop down the path”]

He packed his neat little dinner pail and went hippety-hop down the
path, singing happy little songs like this:

                     The Runaway Bunny, as a rule,
                       Likes to run away,
                     The Runaway Bunny said, “To school
                       I go this September day.
                     “I don’t know the words,
                       I don’t know the tune.
                     I’m the Runaway Bunny;
                       I’ll get to school soon.”

“Don’t be so sure of that,” called Pit-A-Pat.

“Don’t be so sure you’ll get there soon,” said Rough Coat.

“You may not get there until afternoon,” growled Old Brother Bear.

                 “I never before have made a rhyme,
                 But I think you’ll not get there on time!”

whispered Old Foxy-Lox, peering at the Runaway Bunny from his hiding
place.

The school bells all sang:

                        “Come to school. Ding, dong!
                        Don’t be late. Run along!”

At this very minute the Runaway Bunny thought of something he had
forgotten.

He stopped short in the path, saying:

                  “I’ll hide my dinner pail in the wood
                  And get me a pencil as a rabbit should!”

He put his dinner pail down by a log and went hurrying home to get a
lead pencil. Soon he came back hippety-hop with his pencil in his
overalls pocket.

He stopped to look for his dinner pail. It was gone!

He shouted to Pit-A-Pat, who had gone on ahead:

                  “To get to school I will not fail,
                  But where, oh where is my dinner pail?”

Pit-A-Pat said she knew nothing about the lost dinner pail.

Soon the Runaway Bunny caught up with Rough Coat and said:

                     “It makes me shake my stubby tail
                     To think I lost my dinner pail.”

[Illustration: “Brother Bear came up and whispered softly”]

Then Brother Bear came up and whispered softly:

                       “Ask Foxy-Lox down in his den,
                       And his little gentlemen!”

The Runaway Bunny was very angry to think Foxy-Lox would take his dinner
pail. He wanted to go to Foxy-Lox’s house and get it back.

But Old Brother Bear said:

                     “I’d rather lose a pail or two
                     Than have him make a meal of you!”

The Runaway Bunny saw that Brother Bear was right. It would never do to
go to Foxy-Lox’s house for his dinner pail. Besides, that sly fox would
never give it back.

So the Runaway Bunny ran on to school and got there just two minutes
late.

[Illustration: “All the Bunnies were in their seats”]

All the Bunnies were in their seats, ready for work. The Runaway Bunny
took his seat and began to learn a rhyme the rest were studying.

He said it over to himself:

                     “September’s here to visit us,
                       In gold and russet gown;
                     And we’ve been busy Bunnies since
                       September’s come to town.”

The Runaway Bunny was a smart little fellow. He liked to learn his
ABC’s.

He learned to read very well and he went to school sixteen days in
September.

Then one bright afternoon he heard the birds singing:

                  “Good-bye, good-bye! To the South we go;
                  Autumn is coming, and winter with snow.”

He wished he could fly like his feathered friends.

Suddenly he remembered how fast he could run.

He did not wait for the close of school but went hippety-hop out of the
window, singing:

                 “Long ago I formed the habit
                 Of running away. I’m the Runaway Rabbit.”

He stayed in the woods all the rest of September.

[Illustration: “Learned the names of the flowers”]

From Old Brother Bear he learned the names of all the fall fruits and
flowers.

Suddenly he decided to go to town; and he left the wild woods, singing:

               “The Runaway Bunny was made for play,
               I’m running away! I’m running away!
               Soon comes November, but still I’ll remember
               The things I have learned in happy September.”

The Runaway Bunny was running away toward town.

[Illustration: The Bunny.]




                              Chapter VIII
                        THE TELL-THE-TIME RABBIT


               The Runaway Bunny could talk in rhyme,
               But for years and years he couldn’t tell time.

One day the Runaway Bunny woke up in his own little house and sang:

                   “It is such a pleasant autumn day,
                   I’m really thinking of running away.”

He put on his Wrist Watch for company, though he could not tell time to
save his little stubby tail!

He was going hippety-hop along when he met Old Brother Bear. The Bear
passed the time of day, but seemed to be in a terrible hurry and
growled:

                  “What is the real time? I fear I’m late,
                  But I must get there, at any rate!”

“Where are you going?” inquired the Runaway Bunny.

But Old Brother Bear only hurried on.

Next Foxy-Lox came along and chattered:

                   “What is the real time? I cannot wait,
                   But I must get there, at any rate!”

“Where are you going?” asked the Runaway Bunny.

But Foxy-Lox had no time to answer him, and went hurrying down the path
without even a backward glance.

The Runaway Bunny said to himself:

                  “To tell the time’s a convenient habit,
                  For even a funny Runaway Rabbit.”

“Tick, tick, tick,” went the little Wrist Watch and it sang:

                “To talk a little is my turn,
                I’ll teach the time, if you want to learn.”

[Illustration: “The Runaway Bunny was surprised”]

The Runaway Bunny was surprised, you may be sure, and put his ear down
close to the little watch to listen.

The little Wrist Watch continued:

                  “To learn some things is in your power,
                  The short hand tells us all the hour.”

The Runaway Bunny skipped this way and that way, and sang:

                “’Tis more fun making a simple rhyme,
                With a little Wrist Watch to tell the time.”

The little Wrist Watch continued:

                 “Let’s run a race. Come, who will win it?
                 My long hand tells you of each minute.”

Then the Runaway Bunny ran on faster than ever and the tiny hands of the
Wrist Watch ran round its face. Before he could believe it, the Runaway
Bunny was learning to tell time.

He shouted:

                   “A quarter of eight! I won’t be late;
                   I’ve learned a little, at any rate.”

He learned half past and a quarter past and a quarter of the hours.

He sang merrily:

                    “Over this garden fence I’ll climb;
                    I know it is my breakfast time.”

He sat down and began to eat cabbage leaves. My! how fresh and crisp
they were!

He began to wonder about the animals he had met. He wondered where they
could be going. Don’t you wonder, too?

All this time Old Brother Bear was on his way to the home of Father and
Mother Bun. When he came in, those two old Bunnies were sitting by the
fire.

[Illustration: “Sitting by the fire”]

He took off his cap politely and said:

                     “May I come in and warm my paws?
                     Its freezing cold until it thaws.”

[Illustration: “Gave him a plate of cakes”]

Seeing that Old Brother Bear was friendly, Old Father Bun allowed him to
sit in a rocking chair by the fire. Old Mother Bun gave him a plate of
cakes, smoking hot, with honey on them. Old Mother Bun said:

                  “I hope, kind sir, that you like honey;
                  It makes me think of our Runaway Bunny.”

“Did he have long ears and a tiny tail?” asked Old Brother Bear.

“Yes, yes,” shouted Old Mother Bun.

“Did he carry a little Wrist Watch?” asked Old Brother Bear.

“Yes, yes,” shouted Old Father Bun.

Then Old Brother Bear, who was something of a joker, smacked his lips
and said:

                   “Such fine cakes are worth much money,
                   I also thank you for the honey.”

So saying, he bowed politely and walked out of the door.

Old Mother Bun remarked:

                  “I really think it very funny,
                  He would not talk of the Runaway Bunny.”

Old Father Bun’s head went nid-nid-nodding.

[Illustration: “Up walked Old Foxy-Lox”]

Up walked Old Foxy-Lox, tapping on the window pane.

Foxy-Lox asked for cookies and honey, but Old Mother Bun would not let
him in.

He went off, shouting:

                     “I saw the Runaway Rabbit to-day,
                     And as usual he was running away.”

“Call him back! Call him back!” called Old Father Bun, who had waked up
in time to hear Foxy-Lox shout.

Mother Bun shook her head as she counted her silver spoons, saying:

                 “Though it may seem to you absurd,
                 He sometimes robs good folk, I’ve heard.”

Old Father Bun said:

                “Alackaday! What shall I say?
                Will the Runaway Bunny come back some day?”

While all this was going on, the Runaway Bunny continued to eat as much
cabbage as he wanted.

The little Wrist Watch said to him:

                 “To tell the time is a useful habit;
                 Let’s see you do it, you cunning Rabbit!”

The Runaway Bunny had really learned to tell the time. But he wanted to
tease, so he said:

                    “It is bedtime, bedtime,
                    O’er all the world in every clime.”

Then he curled up in a hole in a hollow tree and went to sleep.

All the time, his little Wrist Watch ticked busily on.

For all who wanted to hear, it sang:

                  “For hours and hours I tick away,
                  A-telling time by night and day.

                  “My long hand always points the minute;
                  And how much good can you do in it?

                  “My short hand always points the hour;
                  To learn it is within your power.

                  “For telling time’s an easy trick
                  If you have learned arithmetic.”

That night the Runaway Rabbit cried out in his sleep:

                 “It is warm in a hollow tree, I declare;
                 It is dream time, dream time everywhere!”




                               Chapter IX
                        THE THANKSGIVING DINNER


[Illustration: “The Market Basket cried out”]

One day late in November, the Runaway Rabbit sang:

                    “To Grandma Bun I’ll hurry away,
                    To help her keep Thanksgiving Day.”

He had gone hippety-hop only a little way when he sat down on a stone to
think.

To his surprise, the Market Basket he carried cried out:

                 “Will you buy a turkey while on your way,
                 For Old Mother Bun’s Thanksgiving Day?”

“Dear me! My fur and whiskers, I never thought about that!” he cried.
“Of course I will—now that you suggest it!”

He rattled the pennies in his little bead purse. He rattled the dimes
and quarters.

He went hippety-hop to the market and said:

               “Will you sell me a turkey of eighteen pounds?
               How very grand that order sounds!”

[Illustration: “Surprised the butcher”]

To see such a little fellow with so much money surprised the butcher.
But he weighed the turkey and it quite filled the Market Basket.

The Runaway Bunny was starting merrily down the road, when the Basket
cried:

                      “Each Thanksgiving people sigh
                      For rich and spicy pumpkin pie.”

The Runaway Bunny saw a nice yellow pumpkin in a field and he managed to
tuck it under his arm.

He arrived home and began to make a pumpkin pie. He measured this,
weighed that, and cut up and cooked the pumpkin.

He baked a wonderful pumpkin pie and was about ready to set out again,
when the Basket cried:

                    “Fine potatoes are a treat
                    On Thanksgiving, if they’re sweet.”

The Runaway Bunny threw his little red cap up in the air, shouting,
“Sweet potatoes, sweet potatoes!”

[Illustration: “He pared them and cut them up”]

So, leaving his turkey and pie, he ran hippety-hop to the grocer’s and
bought sweet potatoes and took them home. He pared them and cut them up.
He pared some carrots, too. Then he put them all on to cook.

He sang:

                  “I’m the Runaway Bunny; I talk in rhyme;
                  It is lucky I started out on time.”

The basket spoke again and said:

                “I don’t believe I have heard you say
                If you’ve cranberries for Thanksgiving Day.”

The Runaway Bunny ran quickly for cranberries.

He was back in less than no time, and began to pack his Basket to take
with him to spend the day with Old Mother Bun.

At this very minute “Rap-a-tap!” was heard on the door; and in walked
his old friends, Pit-A-Pat, Rough Coat, Old Brother Bear, and Foxy-Lox.

                Said Foxy-Lox, “Shall we be in the way,
                If we travel with you on Thanksgiving Day?”

Pit-A-Pat began to lick her chops as she smelled the gravy. For the
Runaway Bunny had the dinner all cooked to take with him, of course.

Rough Coat thought of the turkey legs. Old Brother Bear smelled the
sweet potatoes.

Old Foxy-Lox had a long head on him.

So he said:

                “Let’s set the table here just to see
                How fine your Thanksgiving dinner will be.”

The Runaway Bunny switched his ears to and fro. But he let the animals
help him set the table with turkey, gravy, sweet potatoes, cranberries,
and pumpkin pie. And every minute he grew more and more hungry himself.

[Illustration: “He grew more and more hungry”]

Foxy-Lox said:

                “Though we do not intend to be impolite,
                Let’s taste to see if the dinner is right.”

The Runaway Bunny enjoyed a joke as well as anyone.

So he said:

                 “I am really amused at what you say;
                 Come, help yourself on Thanksgiving Day!”

Then they all had a fine feast.

The visitors felt a little guilty and whispered among themselves:

                 “We think our conduct is rather shocking,
                 But we will fill his Christmas stocking.”

The Runaway Bunny excused himself, saying he wanted some exercise.

And he sang:

                 “I like to travel; I’ve formed the habit;
                 I am well named the Runaway Rabbit.”

He ran off through the woods away, away, away! Would he never stop?

[Illustration: The Bunny.]




                               Chapter X
                       CHRISTMAS AT MOTHER BUN’S


Old Mother Bun was very busy making Christmas presents and Old Father
Bun was very busy wrapping them up and putting the animals’ names upon
them.

Every once in awhile, Old Mother Bun would say, “Did you remember Old
Father Chipmunk?”

Then Old Father Bun would say, “Did you remember Old Grandfather
Weasel?”

“Click, click, click,” went Old Mother Bun’s knitting needles, as she
knitted scarfs and sweaters and caps for the animals.

One evening Old Father Bun said:

                 “Are the stockings ready to hang? Because
                 It is almost time for Santa Claus.”

[Illustration: “There were three stockings”]

Old Mother Bun got out a big stocking, a little stocking, and a
middle-sized stocking, saying:

              “We’ll hang up three, though it seems so funny;
              We’ll put one up for the Runaway Bunny.”

So there were three stockings hanging by the fireplace. And every hour
it grew nearer and nearer Christmas Eve.

Now wasn’t it odd? At this very minute the Runaway Bunny was saying:

                 “By my stubby tail, at least I remember
                 That Santa Claus comes late in December!”

He looked down the path that led to the woods toward Old Mother Bun’s
home, singing:

                    “Ha, ha! I must be off to-day.
                    I’m running away! I’m running away!”

He ran on happily.

Suddenly he stopped and remembered he had no presents for Old Mother Bun
and Old Father Bun. So back he went hippety-hop, hippety-hop, to his
little house; and up he went into the attic and looked in an old trunk.

[Illustration: “Looked in an old trunk”]

                   “Ha, ha!” he cried. “I call this fun;
                   Here is a pipe for Grandfather Bun.”

Sure enough, there was a brand new pipe in a red velvet case. He looked
down deeper in the trunk and found something else.

                “Ha, ha!” he cried. “Presents for everyone!
                Here are spectacles for Grandmother Bun.”

He put his presents in a little bag and went off hippety-hop, singing:

                 “I hope I shall get there by break of day;
                 I’m running away! I’m running away!”

Sometimes he stopped to rest and cried:

                  “My fur and whiskers! It’s cold as ice!
                  I forgot my mittens, so warm and nice.”

His little sweater did not keep him warm enough.

[Illustration: “He was getting colder every minute”]

His little paws were very cold! His long ears were even colder! He was
getting colder every minute as he went hippety-hop across the snow!

The next minute he jumped into such a deep snowdrift that only his long
ears stuck out. The snow got into his nose and eyes until he could
scarcely breathe. He tried to wriggle out, but the drift held him fast.

Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle went some sleigh bells. And a funny old man,
dressed in fur from top to toe and carrying a big pack on his back, came
riding along.

He was singing:

                     “I carry presents, as is my habit,
                     Aha! I think I see a rabbit.”

He got out of his sleigh and waded into the snowdrift from which the
Bunny’s ears stuck out.

[Illustration: “Pulled the Runaway Bunny out”]

Then he pulled the Runaway Bunny out by the ears.

The Runaway Bunny shook the snow from his fur and looked at the funny
old man.

“Why, it’s Santa Claus!” shouted that surprised Bunny. “Hurrah!”

“Tut, tut! This is no time of night for little Bunnies to be out in the
cold!” cried Santa Claus. “Come with me and you shall ride in my pack,
where you will be warm and dry.”

So the Runaway Bunny jumped into Santa’s pack and almost buried himself
among the toys. Then he rode away, singing:

                     “It’s fun to go in Santa’s sleigh,
                     I’m riding away! I’m riding away!”

They slid down many chimneys and climbed over many roofs. Then away they
rode until by and by they came to the home of Father and Mother Bun.
They peeped in at the window. There sat old Father and Mother Bun fast
asleep in their armchairs.

[Illustration: “Crept down the chimney”]

As Santa Claus crept down the chimney, he whispered to the Runaway
Bunny, “You may help me, little Bunny. You may trim the stockings with
holly.”

So he took a bunch of holly from his pack and the Runaway Bunny fastened
sprays of it on the stockings.

Then Santa whispered:

                 “Curl up in a stocking and go to sleep;
                 Be still as a mouse, and don’t you peep!”

So the Runaway Bunny took off his little sweater, so that he would not
be too hot in the warm stocking. Then Santa tucked him into Old Mother
Bun’s stocking. He put her presents on the floor. Then he filled Old
Father Bun’s stocking from top to toe.

He left a card on the table. He wrote on the card:

                     “Santa was here to pay a call;
                     A merry Christmas to one and all!”

Did they have a merry Christmas? Well, I should think they did!

Early Christmas morning, Old Mother Bun awoke and cried:

              “I don’t see well, but it seems funny—
              Those look like the ears of the Runaway Bunny!”

Next Old Father Bun awoke and said:

              “I see very well—I have formed the habit;
              Those look like the ears of the Runaway Rabbit.”

Then Father Bun took hold of one ear and Mother Bun took hold of the
other ear, and they pulled the Runaway Bunny out of the stocking.

[Illustration: “Pulled Bunny out by the ears”]

They all cried, “Merry Christmas!”

Then the Runaway Bunny gave Mother Bun her spectacles and Father Bun his
pipe. And they had a merry time with the presents Santa Claus had
brought them.

Old Mother Bun gave the Runaway Bunny a new cap and sweater, and Old
Father Bun gave him a new sled. Then the pair kissed him on both cheeks
and begged him to live with them always. He said he would.

Then the Runaway Bunny put on his new cap and sweater and went coasting
downhill on his new sled.

[Illustration: “Went coasting downhill”]

               The very last words that I heard him say
               Were, “With Grandpa and Grandma Bun I’ll stay,
               And if I live a year and a day,
               I’m entirely cured of running away!”

I wonder if he ever ran away after that. I forgot to ask him!

                If I were a Bunny, I do declare,
                I’d hang up a stocking with greatest care;
                And I’d always be very good because
                I’d hope for a visit from Santa Claus.
                And every winter I’d have the fun
                Of spending Christmas with Grandma Bun.

                Who’ll fill our stockings from top to toe?
                  Jolly Old Santa Claus!
                Who’ll laugh at the stockings all in a row?
                  Jolly Old Santa Claus!
                And all the children and bunnies cry,
                “Hurrah! hurrah! he is riding by!”






                            HISTOLOGY OF
                          MEDICINAL PLANTS

                                 BY

                  WILLIAM MANSFIELD, A.M., PHAR.D.


        Professor of Histology and Pharmacognosy, College of
                  Pharmacy of the City of New York
                         Columbia University


                     TOTAL ISSUE, FOUR THOUSAND


                              NEW YORK
                       JOHN WILEY & SONS, INC.
                   LONDON: CHAPMAN & HALL, LIMITED




                         Copyright, 1916, by
                          WILLIAM MANSFIELD




                               PREFACE


The object of the book is to provide a practical scientific course in
vegetable histology for the use of teachers and students in schools
and colleges.

The medicinal plants are studied in great detail because they
constitute one of the most important groups of economic plants. The
cells found in these plants are typical of the cells occurring in
the vegetable kingdom; therefore the book should prove a valuable
text-book for all students of histology.

The book contains much that is new. In Part II, which is devoted
largely to the study of cells and cell contents, is a new scientific,
yet practical, classification of cells and cell contents. The author
believes that his classification of bast fibres and hairs will clear
up much of the confusion that students have experienced when studying
these structures.

The book is replete with illustrations, all of which are from
original drawings made by the author. As most of these illustrations
are diagnostic of the plants in which they occur, they will prove
especially valuable as reference plates.

The material of the book is the outgrowth of the experience of the
author in teaching histology at the College of Pharmacy of the
City of New York, Columbia University, and of years of practical
experience gained by examining powdered drugs in the laboratory of a
large importing and exporting wholesale drug house.

The author is indebted to Ernest Leitz and Bausch & Lomb Optical
Company for the use of cuts of microscopic apparatus used in Part I
of the book.

The author also desires to express his appreciation to Professor
Walter S. Cameron, who has rendered him much valuable aid.

                                                   WILLIAM MANSFIELD.

  COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY,
    September, 1916.




                              CONTENTS


                               PART I

           SIMPLE AND COMPOUND MICROSCOPES AND MICROSCOPIC
                               TECHNIC


                              CHAPTER I

                       THE SIMPLE MICROSCOPES

                                                                   PAGE

  Simple microscopes, forms of                                       4


                             CHAPTER II

                        COMPOUND MICROSCOPES

  Compound microscopes, structure of                                 7
  Compound microscopes, mechanical parts of                          7
  Compound microscopes, optical parts of                             9
  Compound microscopes, forms of                                    12


                             CHAPTER III

                      MICROSCOPIC MEASUREMENTS

  Ocular micrometer                                                 19
  Stage micrometer                                                  19
  Mechanical stage                                                  21
  Micrometer eye-pieces                                             21
  Camera lucida                                                     22
  Drawing apparatus                                                 23
  Microphotographic apparatus                                       24


                             CHAPTER IV

                      HOW TO USE THE MICROSCOPE

  Illumination                                                      26
  Micro lamp                                                        27
  Care of the microscope                                            28
  Preparation of specimens for cutting                              28
  Paraffin imbedding oven                                           30
  Paraffin blocks                                                   31
  Cutting sections                                                  31
  Hand microtome                                                    31
  Machine microtomes                                                32


                              CHAPTER V

                              REAGENTS

  Reagent set                                                       39
  Measuring cylinder                                                40


                             CHAPTER VI

                       HOW TO MOUNT SPECIMENS

  Temporary mounts                                                  41
  Permanent mounts                                                  41
  Cover glasses                                                     43
  Glass slides                                                      44
  Forceps                                                           45
  Needles                                                           46
  Scissors                                                          46
  Turntable                                                         46
  Labeling                                                          47
  Preservation of mounted specimens                                 48
  Slide box                                                         48
  Slide tray                                                        48
  Slide cabinet                                                     49


                               PART II

                  TISSUES, CELLS AND CELL CONTENTS


                              CHAPTER I

                              THE CELL

  Typical cell                                                      53
  Changes in a cell undergoing division                             55
  Origin of multicellular plants                                    57


                             CHAPTER II

                     THE EPIDERMIS AND PERIDERM

  Leaf epidermis                                                    59
  Testa epidermis                                                   63
  Plant hairs                                                       66
  Forms of hairs                                                    67
  Papillæ                                                           67
  Unicellular hairs                                                 69
  Multicellular hairs                                               72
  Periderm                                                          80
  Cork periderm                                                     80
  Stone cell periderm                                               85
  Parenchyma and stone cell periderm                                85


                             CHAPTER III

                         MECHANICAL TISSUES

  Bast fibres                                                       89
  Crystal bearing bast fibres                                       90
  Porous and striated bast fibres                                   92
  Porous and non-striated bast fibres                               96
  Non-porous and striated bast fibres                               96
  Non-porous and non-striated bast fibres                           96
  Occurrence of bast fibres in powdered drugs                      103
  Wood fibres                                                      104
  Collenchyma cells                                                106
  Stone cells                                                      109
  Endodermal cells                                                 116
  Hypodermal cells                                                 118


                             CHAPTER IV

                          ABSORPTION TISSUE

  Root hairs                                                       121


                              CHAPTER V

                          CONDUCTING TISSUE

  Vessels and tracheids                                            126
  Annular vessels                                                  127
  Spiral vessels                                                   127
  Sclariform vessels                                               128
  Reticulate vessels                                               131
  Pitted vessels                                                   131
  Pitted vessels with bordered pores                               131
  Sieve tubes                                                      136
  Sieve plate                                                      138
  Medullary bundles, rays and cells                                138
  Medullary ray bundle                                             139
  The medullary ray                                                139
  The medullary ray cell                                           141
  Structure of the medullary ray cells                             142
  Arrangement of the medullary ray cells in the medullary ray      142
  Latex tubes                                                      142
  Parenchyma                                                       144
  Cortical parenchyma                                              147
  Pith parenchyma                                                  147
  Leaf parenchyma                                                  150
  Aquatic plant parenchyma                                         150
  Wood parenchyma                                                  150
  Phloem parenchyma                                                150
  Palisade parenchyma                                              150


                             CHAPTER VI

                           AERATING TISSUE

  Water pores                                                      151
  Stomata                                                          151
  Relation of stomata to the surrounding cells                     154
  Lenticels                                                        157
  Intercellular spaces                                             158


                             CHAPTER VII

                          SYNTHETIC TISSUE

  Photosynthetic tissue                                            163
  Glandular tissue                                                 164
  Glandular hairs                                                  164
  Secretion cavities                                               166
  Schizogenous cavities                                            168
  Lysigenous cavities                                              168
  Schizo-lysigenous cavities                                       168


                            CHAPTER VIII

                           STORAGE TISSUE

  Storage cells                                                    173
  Storage cavities                                                 176
  Crystal cavities                                                 176
  Mucilage cavities                                                176
  Latex cavities                                                   176
  Oil cavity                                                       178
  Glandular hairs as storage organs                                178
  Storage walls                                                    179


                             CHAPTER IX

                            CELL CONTENTS

  Chlorophyll                                                      182
  Leucoplastids                                                    183
  Starch grains                                                    183
      Occurrence                                                   184
      Outline                                                      185
      Size                                                         185
      Hilum                                                        185
      Nature of hilum                                              188
  Inulin                                                           194
  Mucilage                                                         194
  Hesperidin                                                       196
  Volatile oil                                                     196
  Tannin                                                           196
  Aleurone grains                                                  197
      Structure of aleurone grains                                 197
      Form of aleurone grains                                      197
      Description of aleurone grains                               198
      Tests for aleurone grains                                    198
  Crystals                                                         200
      Micro-crystals                                               200
      Raphides                                                     200
      Rosette crystals                                             202
      Solitary crystals                                            205
  Cystoliths                                                       210
      Forms of cystoliths                                          210
      Tests for cystoliths                                         215


                              PART III

             HISTOLOGY OF ROOTS, RHIZOMES, STEMS, BARKS,
                  WOODS, FLOWERS, FRUITS AND SEEDS


                              CHAPTER I

                         ROOTS AND RHIZOMES

  Cross-section of pink root                                       219
  Cross-section of ruellia root                                    219
  Cross-section of spigelia rhizome                                223
  Cross-section of ruellia rhizome                                 226
      Powdered pink root                                           227
      Powdered ruellia root                                        227


                             CHAPTER II

                                STEMS

  Herbaceous stems                                                 233
  Cross-section, spigelia stem                                     233
  Ruellia stem                                                     235
  Powdered horehound                                               237
  Powdered spurious horehound                                      237
  Insect flower stems                                              241


                             CHAPTER III

                             WOODY STEMS

  Buchu stem                                                       242
  Mature buchu stem                                                242
  Powdered buchu stem                                              245


                             CHAPTER IV

                                BARKS

  White pine bark                                                  248
  Powdered white pine bark                                         250


                              CHAPTER V

                                WOODS

  Cross-section quassia                                            254
  Radial-section quassia                                           254
  Tangential-section quassia                                       258


                             CHAPTER VI

                               LEAVES

  Klip buchu                                                       260
  Powdered klip buchu                                              262
  Mountain laurel                                                  264
  Trailing arbutus                                                 264


                             CHAPTER VII

                               FLOWERS

  Pollen grains                                                    270
  Non-spiny-walled pollen grains                                   273
  Spiny-walled pollen grains                                       273
  Stigma papillæ                                                   274
  Powdered insect flowers                                          278
  Open insect flowers                                              280
  Powdered white daisies                                           282


                            CHAPTER VIII

                               FRUITS

  Celery fruit                                                     285


                             CHAPTER IX

                                SEEDS

  Sweet almonds                                                    289


                              CHAPTER X

                   ARRANGEMENT OF VASCULAR BUNDLES

  Types of fibro-vascular bundles                                  292
  Radial vascular bundles                                          292
  Concentric vascular bundles                                      295
  Collateral vascular bundles                                      295
  Bi-collateral vascular bundles                                   298
  Open collateral vascular bundles                                 298


                                INDEX




                       TABLE OF ILLUSTRATIONS

                                                                   PAGE
  FIG.  1.  Tripod Magnifier                                         4
  FIG.  2.  Watchmaker’s Loupe                                       4
  FIG.  3.  Folding Magnifier                                        4
  FIG.  4.  Reading Glass                                            4
  FIG.  5.  Steinheil Aplanatic Lens                                 5
  FIG.  6.  Dissecting Microscope                                    5
  FIG.  7.  Compound Microscope of Robert Hooke                      8
  FIG.  8.  Compound Microscope                                     10
  FIG.  9.  Abbé Condenser                                          11
  FIG. 10.                                                          11
  FIG. 11.                                                          11
  FIG. 12.  Objectives                                              11
  FIG. 13.                                                          12
  FIG. 14.                                                          12
  FIG. 15.  Eye-Pieces.                                             12
  FIG. 16.  Pharmacognostic Microscope                              12
  FIG. 17.  Research Microscope                                     14
  FIG. 18.  Special Research Microscope                             14
  FIG. 19.  Greenough  Binocular Microscope                         15
  FIG. 20.  Polarization Microscope                                 16
  FIG. 21.  Ocular Micrometer                                       19
  FIG. 22.  Stage Micrometer                                        19
  FIG. 23.  Micrometer Eye-Piece                                    20
  FIG. 24.  Micrometer Eye-Piece                                    21
  FIG. 25.  Mechanical Stage                                        22
  FIG. 26.  Camera Lucida                                           22
  FIG. 27.  Camera Lucida                                           22
  FIG. 28.  Drawing Apparatus                                       23
  FIG. 29.  Microphotographic Apparatus                             24
  FIG. 30.  Micro Lamp                                              27
  FIG. 31.  Paraffin-embedding Oven                                 30
  FIG. 32.  Paraffin Blocks                                         31
  FIG. 33.  Hand Microtome                                          31
  FIG. 34.  Hand Cylinder Microtome                                 34
  FIG. 35.  Hand Table Microtome                                    34
  FIG. 36.  Base Sledge Microtome                                   35
  FIG. 37.  Minot Rotary Microtome                                  36
  FIG. 38.  Reagent Set                                             39
  FIG. 39.  Measuring Cylinder                                      40
  FIG. 40.  Staining Dish                                           40
  FIG. 41.  Round Cover Glass                                       44
  FIG. 42.  Square Cover Glass                                      44
  FIG. 43.  Rectangular Cover Glass                                 44
  FIG. 44.  Glass Slide                                             44
  FIG. 45.  Histological Forceps                                    45
  FIG. 46.  Forceps                                                 45
  FIG. 47.  Sliding-pin Forceps                                     45
  FIG. 48.  Dissecting Needle                                       46
  FIG. 49.  Scissors                                                46
  FIG. 50.  Scalpels                                                47
  FIG. 51.  Turntable                                               47
  FIG. 52.  Slide Box                                               48
  FIG. 53.  Slide Tray                                              48
  FIG. 54.  Slide Cabinet                                           49

  PLATE   1  THE ONION ROOT                                         56
  PLATE   2  LEAF EPIDERMIS                                         60
  PLATE   3  LEAF EPIDERMIS                                         61
  PLATE   4  TESTA EPIDERMAL CELLS                                  64
  PLATE   5  TESTA CELLS                                            65
  PLATE   6  PAPILLÆ                                                68
  PLATE   7  UNICELLULAR SOLITARY HAIRS                             70
  PLATE   8  CLUSTERED UNICELLULAR HAIRS                            71
  PLATE   9  MULTICELLULAR UNISERIATE NON-BRANCHED HAIRS            73
  PLATE  10  MULTICELLULAR MULTISERIATE NON-BRANCHED HAIRS          75
  PLATE  11  MULTICELLULAR UNISERIATE BRANCHED HAIRS                76
  PLATE  12  NON-GLANDULAR MULTICELLULAR HAIRS                      78
  PLATE  13  MULTICELLULAR MULTISERIATE BRANCHED HAIRS              79
  PLATE  14  MULTICELLULAR MULTISERIATE BRANCHED HAIRS              81
  PLATE  15  MULTICELLULAR MULTISERIATE BRANCHED HAIRS              82
  PLATE  16  PERIDERM OF CASCARA SAGRADA (_Rhamnus purshiana_,
               D.C.)                                                84
  PLATE  17  MANDRAKE RHIZOME and WHITE CINNAMON                    86
  PLATE  18  PERIDERM OF WHITE OAK (_Quercus alba_, L.)             87
  PLATE  19  CRYSTAL-BEARING FIBRES OF BARKS                        91
  PLATE  20  CRYSTAL-BEARING FIBRES OF BARKS                        93
  PLATE  21  CRYSTAL-BEARING FIBRES OF LEAVES                       94
  PLATE  22  BRANCHED BAST FIBRES                                   95
  PLATE  23  POROUS AND STRIATED BAST FIBRES                        97
  PLATE  24  POROUS AND NON-STRIATED BAST FIBRES                    98
  PLATE  25  NON-POROUS AND STRIATED BAST FIBRES                    99
  PLATE  26  NON-POROUS AND NON-STRIATED BAST FIBRES               101
  PLATE  27  GROUPS OF BAST FIBRES                                 102
  PLATE  28  WOOD FIBRES                                           105
  PLATE  29  CATNIP STEM and MOTHERWORT STEM                       107
  PLATE  30  COLLENCHYMA CELLS                                     108
  PLATE  31  BRANCHED STONE CELLS                                  110
  PLATE  32  POROUS AND STRIATED STONE CELLS                       113
  PLATE  33  POROUS AND NON-STRIATED STONE CELLS                   114
  PLATE  34  CINNAMON, RUELLA ROOT, CASCARA and CINNAMON           115
  PLATE  35  CROSS-SECTIONS OF ENDODERMAL CELLS OF                 117
  PLATE  36  LONGITUDINAL SECTIONS OF ENDODERMAL CELLS             119
  PLATE  37  HYPODERMAL CELLS                                      120
  PLATE  38  CROSS-SECTION OF SARSAPARILLA ROOT (_Smilax
               officinalis_, Kunth)                                123
  PLATE  39  ROOT HAIRS (Fragments)                                124
  PLATE  40  ANNULAR AND SPIRAL VESSELS                            129
  PLATE  41  SPIRAL VESSELS                                        130
  PLATE  42  SCLARIFORM VESSELS                                    132
  PLATE  43  RETICULATE VESSELS                                    133
  PLATE  44  PITTED VESSELS                                        134
  PLATE  45  VESSELS                                               135
  PLATE  46  SIEVE TUBE                                            137
  PLATE  47  RADIAL LONGITUDINAL SECTION OF WHITE SANDALWOOD
               (_Santalum album_, L.)                              140
  PLATE  48  KAVA-KAVA ROOT and WHITE PINE BARK                    143
  PLATE  49  BLACK INDIAN HEMP and BLACK INDIAN HEMP ROOT          145
  PLATE  50  LATEX VESSELS                                         146
  PLATE  51  PARENCHYMA CELLS                                      148
  PLATE  52  GRINDELIA STEM (longitudinal) and GRINDELIA STEM
               (cross-section)                                     149
  PLATE  53  ACONITE STEM and PEPPERMINT STEM                      152
  PLATE  54  TYPES OF STOMA                                        153
  PLATE  55  LEAF EPIDERMI WITH STOMA                              155
  PLATE  56  BELLADONNA LEAF, DEER TONGUE LEAF and WHITE PINE LEAF 156
  PLATE  57  ELDER BARK                                            159
  PLATE  58  INTERCELLULAR AIR SPACES                              160
  PLATE  59  IRREGULAR INTERCELLULAR AIR SPACES                    161
  PLATE  60  GLANDULAR HAIRS                                       165
  PLATE  61  STALKED GLANDULAR HAIRS                               167
  PLATE  62  CALAMUS RHIZOME and WHITE PINE BARK                   169
  PLATE  63  CANELLA ALBA BARK and KLIP BUCHU LEAF                 170
  PLATE  64  BITTER ORANCE PEEL and WHITE PINE LEAF                171
  PLATE  65  CINNAMON, CALUMBA, PARENCHYMA, SARSAPARILLA,
               LEPTANDRA, QUEBRACHO, BLACKBERRY                    174
  PLATE  66  MUCILAGE AND RESIN                                    175
  PLATE  67  CROSS-SECTION OF SKUNK-CABBAGE LEAF (_Symplocarpus
               fœtidus_, [L.] Nutt.)                               177
  PLATE  68  RESERVE CELLULOSE                                     180
  PLATE  69  RESERVE CELLULOSE                                     181
  PLATE  70  STARCH                                                186
  PLATE  71  STARCH                                                187
  PLATE  72  STARCH                                                189
  PLATE  73  STARCH                                                190
  PLATE  74  STARCH                                                191
  PLATE  75  STARCH GRAINS                                         192
  PLATE  76  STARCH MASSES                                         193
  PLATE  77  INULIN (_Inula helenium_, L.)                         195
  PLATE  77_a_  ALEURONE GRAINS                                    199
  PLATE  78  MICRO-CRYSTALS                                        201
  PLATE  79  RAPHIDES                                              203
  PLATE  80  ROSETTE CRYSTALS                                      204
  PLATE  81  INCLOSED ROSETTE CRYSTALS                             206
  PLATE  82  SOLITARY CRYSTAL                                      207
  PLATE  83  SOLITARY CRYSTALS                                     208
  PLATE  84  SOLITARY CRYSTALS                                     209
  PLATE  85  SOLITARY CRYSTALS                                     211
  PLATE  86  SOLITARY CRYSTALS                                     212
  PLATE  87  ROSETTE CRYSTALS AND SOLITARY CRYSTALS OCCURRING IN   213
  PLATE  88  CYSTOLITHS                                            214
  PLATE  89  CROSS-SECTION OF ROOT OF SPIGELIA MARYLANDICA, L.     220
  PLATE  90  RUELLIA ROOT (_Ruellia ciliosa_, Pursh.).             222
  PLATE  91  CROSS-SECTION OF RHIZOME OF SPIGELIA MARYLANDICA, L.  224
  PLATE  92  CROSS-SECTION OF RHIZOME OF RUELLIA CILIOSA, Pursh.   225
  PLATE  93  POWDERED SPIGELIA MARYLANDICA, L.                     228
  PLATE  94  POWDERED RUELLIA CILIOSA, Pursh.                      229
  PLATE  95  CROSS-SECTION OF STEM OF SPIGELIA MARYLANDICA, L.     234
  PLATE  96  CROSS-SECTION OF STEM OF RUELLIA CILIOSA, Pursh.      236
  PLATE  97  POWDERED HOREHOUND (_Marrubium vulgare_, L).          238
  PLATE  98  SPURIOUS HOREHOUND (_Marrubium peregrinum_, L.)       239
  PLATE  99  POWDERED INSECT FLOWER STEMS (_Chrysanthemum
               cinerariifolium_, [Trev.], Vis.)                    240
  PLATE 100  CROSS-SECTION OF BUCHU STEMS (_Barosma betulina_
               [Berg.], Barth, and Wendl.)                         243
  PLATE 101  BUCHU STEM and LEPTANDRA RHIZOME                      244
  PLATE 102  POWDERED BUCHU STEMS (_Barosma betulina_ [Berg.],
                Barth. and Wendl.).                                246
  PLATE 103  CROSS-SECTION OF UNROSSED WHITE PINE BARK (_Pinus
               strobus_, L.)                                       249
  PLATE 104  POWDERED WHITE PINE BARK (_Pinus strobus_, L.)        251
  PLATE 105  CROSS-SECTION OF QUASSIA WOOD (_Picræna excelsa_
               [Sw.], Lindl.)                                      255
  PLATE 106  TANGENTIAL SECTION OF QUASSIA WOOD (_Picræna
               excelsa_ [Sw.], Lindl.)                             256
  PLATE 107  RADIAL SECTION OF QUASSIA WOOD (_Picræna excelsa_
               [Sw.], Lindl.)                                      257
  PLATE 108  CROSS-SECTION OF KLIP BUCHU JUST OVER THE VEIN        261
  PLATE 109  POWDERED KLIP BUCHU                                   263
  PLATE 110  CROSS-SECTION MOUNTAIN LAUREL (_Kalmia latifolia_,
               L.)                                                 265
  PLATE 111  CROSS-SECTION TRAILING ARBUTUS LEAF (_Epigæa
               repens_, L.)                                        266
  PLATE 112  POWDERED INSECT FLOWER LEAVES                         268
  PLATE 113  SMOOTH-WALLED POLLEN GRAINS                           271
  PLATE 114  SPINY WALLED POLLEN GRAINS                            272
  PLATE 115  PAPILLÆ                                               275
  PLATE 116  PAPILLÆ OF STIGMAS                                    276
  PLATE 117  PAPILLÆ OF STIGMAS                                    277
  PLATE 118  POWDERED CLOSED INSECT FLOWER                         279
  PLATE 119  POWDERED OPEN INSECT FLOWER                           281
  PLATE 120  POWDERED WHITE DAISIES (_Chrysanthemum
               leucanthemum_, L.)                                  283
  PLATE 121  CROSS-SECTION OF CELERY FRUIT (_Apium
               graveolens_, L.)                                    286
  PLATE 121  CROSS-SECTION OF CELERY FRUIT (_Apium
               graveolens_, L.)                                    286
  PLATE 123  CROSS-SECTION SWEET ALMOND SEED                       290
  PLATE 124  CROSS-SECTION OF A RADIAL VASCULAR BUNDLE OF
               SKUNK CABBAGE ROOT                                  293
  PLATE 125  CROSS-SECTION OF A PHLOEM-CENTRIC BUNDLE OF
               CALAMUS RHIZOME (_Acorus calamus_, L.)              294
  PLATE 126  CROSS-SECTION OF A CLOSED COLLATERAL BUNDLE OF
               MANDRAKE STEM (_Podophyllum peltatum_, L.)          286
  PLATE 127  BI-COLLATERAL BUNDLE OF PUMPKIN STEM (_Curcurbita
               pepo_, L.)                                          297




                               Part I

       SIMPLE AND COMPOUND MICROSCOPES AND MICROSCOPIC TECHNIC




                              CHAPTER I

                       THE SIMPLE MICROSCOPES


The construction and use of the =simple microscope= (magnifiers)
undoubtedly date back to very early times. There is sufficient
evidence to prove that spheres of glass were used as burning spheres
and as magnifiers by people antedating the Greeks and Romans.

The simple microscopes of to-day have a very wide range of
application and a corresponding variation in structure and in
appearance.

Simple microscopes are used daily in classifying and studying crude
drugs, testing linen and other cloth, repairing watches, in reading,
and identifying insects. The more complex simple microscopes are used
in the dissection and classification of flowers.

The =watchmaker’s loupe=, the =linen tester=, the =reading glass=,
the =engraver’s lens=, and the simplest folding magnifiers consist
of a double convex lens. Such a lens produces an erect, enlarged
image of the object viewed when the lens is placed so that the object
is within its focal distance. The focal distance of a lens varies
according to the curvature of the lens. The greater the curvature,
the shorter the focal distance and the greater the magnification.

The more complicated simple microscope consists of two or more
lenses. The double and triple magnifiers consist of two and three
lenses respectively.

When an object is viewed through three lenses, the magnification is
greater than when viewed through one or two lenses, but a smaller
part of the object is magnified.


                     FORMS OF SIMPLE MICROSCOPES


                          TRIPOD MAGNIFIER

The =tripod magnifier= (Fig. 1) is a simple lens mounted on a
mechanical stand. The tripod is placed over the object and the focus
is obtained by means of a screw which raises or lowers the lens,
according to the degree it is magnified.


                         WATCHMAKER’S LOUPE

The =watchmaker’s loupe= (Fig. 2) is a one-lens magnifier mounted on
an ebony or metallic tapering rim, which can be placed over the eye
and held in position by frowning or contracting the eyelid.

[Illustration: FIG. 1.--Tripod Magnifier]

[Illustration: FIG. 2.--Watchmaker’s Loupe]


                          FOLDING MAGNIFIER

The =folding magnifier= (Fig. 3) of one or more lenses is mounted
in such a way that, when not in use, the lenses fold up like the
blade of a knife, and when so folded are effectively protected from
abrasion by the upper and lower surfaces of the folder.

[Illustration: FIG. 3.--Folding Magnifier]

[Illustration: FIG. 4.--Reading Glass]


                           READING GLASSES

=Reading glasses= (Fig. 4) are large simple magnifiers, often six
inches in diameter. The lens is encircled with a metal band and
provided with a handle.

[Illustration: FIG. 5.--Steinheil Aplanatic Lens]


                     STEINHEIL APLANATIC LENSES

=Steinheil aplanatic lenses= (Fig. 5) consist of three or four
lenses cemented together. The combination is such that the field is
large, flat, and achromatic. These lenses are suitable for field,
dissecting, and pocket use. When such lenses are placed in simple
holders, they make good dissecting microscopes.

[Illustration: FIG. 6.--Dissecting Microscope]


                        DISSECTING MICROSCOPE

The =dissecting microscope= (Fig. 6) consists of a Steinheil lens
and an elaborate stand, a firm base, a pillar, a rack and pinion,
a glass stage, beneath which there is a groove for holding a metal
plate with one black and one white surface. The nature of the object
under observation determines whether a plate is used. When the plate
is used and when the object is studied by reflected light it is
sometimes desirable to use the black and sometimes the white surface.
The mirror, which has a concave and a plain surface, is used to
reflect the light on the glass stage when the object is studied by
transmitted light. The dissecting microscope magnifies objects up to
twenty diameters, or twenty times their real size.




                             CHAPTER II

                        COMPOUND MICROSCOPES


The =compound microscope= has undergone wonderful changes since 1667,
the days of Robert Hooke. When we consider the crude construction
and the limitations of Robert Hooke’s microscope, we marvel at the
structural perfection and the unlimited possibilities of the modern
instrument. The advancement made in most sciences has followed the
gradual perfection of this instrument.

The illustration of Robert Hooke’s microscope (Fig. 7) will convey
to the mind more eloquently than words the crudeness of the early
microscopes, especially when it is compared with the present-day
microscopes.


                STRUCTURE OF THE COMPOUND MICROSCOPE

The parts of the compound microscope (Fig. 8) may be grouped
into--first, the mechanical, and, secondly, into the optical parts.


                        THE MECHANICAL PARTS

1. The =foot= is the basal part, the part which supports all the
other mechanical and optical parts. The foot should be heavy enough
to balance the other parts when they are inclined. Most modern
instruments have a three-parted or tripod-shaped base.

2. The =pillar= is the vertical part of the microscope attached to
the base. The pillar is joined to the limb by a hinged joint. The
hinges make it possible to incline the microscope at any angle, thus
lowering its height. In this way, short, medium, and tall persons
can use the microscope with facility. The part of the pillar above
the hinge is called the _limb_. The limb may be either straight
or curved. The curved form is preferable, since it offers a more
suitable surface to grasp in transferring from box or shelf to the
desk, and _vice versa_.

[Illustration: FIG. 7.--Compound Microscope of Robert Hooke]

3. The =stage= is either stationary or movable, round or square, and
is attached to the limb just above the hinge. The upper surface is
made of a composition which is not easily attacked by moisture and
reagents. The centre of the stage is perforated by a circular opening.

4. The =sub-stage= is attached below the stage and is for the purpose
of holding the iris diaphragm and Abbé condenser. The raising and
lowering of the sub-stage are accomplished by a rack and pinion.

5. The =iris diaphragm=, which is held in the sub-stage below the
Abbé condenser, consists of a series of metal plates, so arranged
that the light entering the microscope may be cut off completely or
its amount regulated by moving a control pin.

6. The =fine adjustment= is located either at the side or at the top
of the limb. It consists of a fine rack and pinion, and is used in
focusing an object when the low-power objective is in position, or in
finding and focusing the object when the high-power objective is in
position.

7. The =coarse adjustment= is a rack and pinion used in raising and
lowering the body-tube and in finding the approximate focus when
either the high- or low-power objective is in position.

8. The =body-tube= is the path traveled by the rays of light entering
the objectives and leaving by the eye-piece. To the lower part of the
tube is attached the nose-piece, and resting in its upper part is the
draw-tube, which holds the eye-piece. On the outer surface of the
draw-tube there is a scale which indicates the distance it is drawn
from the body-tube.

9. The =nose-piece= may be simple, double, or triple, and it is
protected from dust by a circular piece of metal. Double and triple
nose-pieces may be revolved, and like the simple nose-piece they hold
the objectives in position.


                          THE OPTICAL PARTS

1. The =mirror= is a sub-stage attachment one surface of which is
plain and the other concave. The plain surface is used with an Abbé
condenser when the source of light is distant, while the concave
surface is used with instruments without an Abbé condenser when the
source of light is near at hand.

[Illustration: FIG. 8.--Compound Microscope

  Eyepiece
  Draw Tube
  Body Tube
  Coarse
  Adjustment
  Revolving Nosepiece for three Objectives
  Fine Adjustment
  Stage
  Objectives
  Limb
  Abbi Condenser
  Iris Diaphragm
  Hinge for Inclining
  Substage Attachment
  Mirror
  Pillar
  Foot]

2. The =Abbé condenser= (Fig. 9) is a combination of two or more
lenses, arranged so as to concentrate the light on the specimen
placed on the stage. The condenser is located in the opening of the
stage, and its uppermost surface is circular and flat.

[Illustration: FIG. 9--Abbé Condenser]

3. =Objectives= (Figs. 10, 11, and 12). There are low, medium, and
high-power objectives. The low-power objectives have fewer and
larger lenses, and they magnify least, but they show more of the
object than do the high-power objectives. There are three chief
types of objectives: First, dry objectives; second, wet objectives,
of which there are the water-immersion objectives; and third, the
oil-immersion objectives. The dry objectives are used for most
histological and pharmacognostical work. For studying smaller objects
the water objective is sometimes desirable, but in bacteriological
work the oil-immersion objective is almost exclusively used. The
globule of water or oil, as the case may be, increases the amount of
light entering the objective, because the oil and water bend many
rays into the objective which would otherwise escape.

[Illustration: FIG. 10.]

[Illustration: FIG. 11.]

[Illustration: FIG. 12. Objectives.]

4. =Eye-pieces= (Figs. 13, 14, and 15) are of variable length, but
structurally they are somewhat similar. The eye-piece consists of a
metal tube with a blackened inner tube. In the centre of this tube
there is a small diaphragm for holding the ocular micrometer. In the
lower end of the tube a lens is fastened by means of a screw. This,
the field lens, is the larger lens of the ocular. The upper, smaller
lens is fastened in the tube by a screw, but there is a projecting
collar which rests, when in position, on the draw-tube.

[Illustration: FIG. 13.]

[Illustration: FIG. 14.]

[Illustration: FIG. 15. Eye-Pieces.]

The longer the tube the lower the magnification. For instance, a
two-inch ocular magnifies less than an inch and a half, a one-inch
less than a three-fourths of an inch, etc.

The greater the curvature of the lenses of the ocular the higher will
be the magnification and the shorter the tube-length.


                    FORMS OF COMPOUND MICROSCOPES

The following descriptions refer to three different models of
compound microscopes: one which is used chiefly as a pharmacognostic
microscope, one as a research microscope stand, while the third type
represents a research microscope stand of highest order, which is
used at the same time for taking microphotographs.

[Illustration: FIG. 16.--Pharmacognostic Microscope]


                     PHARMACOGNOSTIC MICROSCOPE

The =pharmacognostic microscope= (Fig. 16) is an instrument
which embodies only those parts which are most essential for the
examination of powdered drugs, bacteria, and urinary sediments. This
microscope is provided with a stage of the dimensions 105 × 105 mm.
This factor and the distance of 80 mm. from the optical centre to the
handle arm render it available for the examination of even very large
objects and preparations, or preparations suspended in glass dishes.
The stand is furnished with a side micrometer, a fine adjustment
having knobs on both sides, thereby permitting the manipulation of
the micrometer screw either by left or right hand. The illuminating
apparatus consists of the Abbé condenser of numerical aperture
of 1.20, to which is attached an iris diaphragm for the proper
adjustment of the light. A worm screw, mounted in connection with the
condenser, serves for the raising and lowering of the condenser, so
that the cone of illuminating pencils can be arranged in accordance
to the objective employed and to the preparation under observation.
The objectives necessary are those of the achromatic type, possessing
a focal length of 16.2 mm. and 3 mm. Oculars which render the best
results in regard to magnification in connection with the two
objectives mentioned are the Huyghenian eye-pieces II and IV so that
magnifications are obtained varying from 62 to 625. It is advisable,
however, to have the microscope equipped with a triple revolving
nose-piece for the objectives, so that provision is made for the
addition of an oil-immersion objective at any time later should the
microscope become available for bacteriological investigations.


                       THE RESEARCH MICROSCOPE

The =research microscope= used in research work (Fig. 17) must be
equipped more elaborately than the microscope especially designed for
the use of the pharmacognosist. While the simple form of microscope
is supplied with the small type of Abbé condenser, the research
microscope is furnished with a large illuminating apparatus of
which the iris diaphragm is mounted on a rack and pinion, allowing
displacement obliquely to the optical centre, also to increase
resolving power in the objectives when observing those objects which
cannot be revealed to the best advantage with central illumination.
Another iris is furnished above the condenser; this iris becomes
available the instant an object is to be observed without the aid
of the condenser, in which case the upper iris diaphragm allows
proper adjustment of the light. The mirror, one side plane, the
other concave, is mounted on a movable bar, along which it can be
slid--another convenience for the adjustment of the light. The
microscope stage of this stand is of the round, rotating and centring
pattern, which permits a limited motion to the object slide: The
rotation of the microscope stage furnishes another convenience in the
examination of objects in polarized light, allowing the preparation
to be rotated in order to distinguish the polarization properties of
the objects under observation.

[Illustration: FIG. 17.--Research Microscope]

[Illustration: FIG. 18.--Special Research Microscope]


                     SPECIAL RESEARCH MICROSCOPE

A =special research microscope= of the highest order (Fig. 18)
is supplied with an extra large body tube, which renders it of
special advantage for micro-photography. Otherwise in its mechanical
equipment it resembles very closely the medium-sized research
microscope stand, with the exception that the stand is larger in its
design, therefore offering universal application. In regard to the
illuminating apparatus, it is advisable to mention that the one in
the large research microscope stand is furnished with a three-lens
condenser of a numerical aperture of 1.40, while the medium-sized
research stand is provided with a two-lens condenser of a numerical
aperture of 1.20. The stage of the microscope is provided with a
cross motion--the backward and forward motion of the preparation is
secured by rack and pinion, while the side motion is controlled by a
micrometric worm screw. In cases where large preparations are to be
photographed, the draw-tube with ocular and the slider in which the
draw-tubes glide are removed to allow the full aperture of wide-angle
objectives to be made use of.

[Illustration: FIG. 19.--Greenough Binocular Microscope]


                        BINOCULAR MICROSCOPE

The =Greenough binocular microscope=, as shown in Fig. 19, consists
of a microscope stage with two tubes mounted side by side and moving
on the same rack and pinion for the focusing adjustment. Either tube
can be used without the other. The oculars are capable of more or
less separation to suit the eyes of different observers. In each
of the drub-like mountings, near the point where the oculars are
introduced, porro-prisms have been placed, which erect the image.
This microscope gives most perfect stereoscopic images, which are
erect instead of inverted, as in the monocular compound microscopes.
The Greenough binocular microscope is especially adapted for
dissection and for studying objects of considerable thickness.


                       POLARIZATION MICROSCOPE

The =polarization microscope= (Fig. 20) is used chiefly for the
examination of crystals and mineral sections as well as for the
observation of organic bodies in polarized light. It can, however,
also be used for the examination of regular biological preparations.

[Illustration: FIG. 20.--Polarization Microscope]

If compared with the regular biological microscope, the polarization
microscope is found characteristic of the following points: it is
supplied with a polarization arrangement. The latter consists of a
polarizer and analyzer. The polarizer is situated in a rotating mount
beneath the condensing system. The microscope, of which the diagram
is shown, possesses a triple “Ahrens” prism of calcite. The entering
light is divided into two polarized parts, situated perpendicularly
to each other. The so-called “ordinary” rays are reflected to one
side by total reflection, which takes place on the inner cemented
surface of the triple prism, allowing the so-called “extraordinary”
rays to pass through the condenser. If the prism is adjusted to
its focal point, it is so situated that the vibration plane of the
extra-ordinary rays are in the same position as shown in the diagram
of the illustration.

The analyzer is mounted within the microscope-tube above the
objective. Situated on a sliding plate, it can be shifted into
the optical axis whenever necessary. The analyzer consists of a
polarization prism after Glan-Thompson. The polarization plane of the
active extraordinary rays is situated perpendicularly to the plane as
shown in the diagram. The polarization prisms are ordinarily crossed.
In this position the field of the microscope is darkened as long as
no substance of a double refractive index has been introduced between
the analyzer and polarizer. In rotating the polarizer up to the mark
90, the polarization prisms are mounted parallel and the field of
the microscope is lighted again. Immediately above the analyzer and
attached to the mounting of the analyzer a lens of a comparatively
long focal length has been placed in order to overcome the difference
in focus created by the introduction of the analyzer into the optical
rays.

The condensing system is mounted on a slider, and, furthermore,
can be raised and lowered along the optical centre by means of a
rack-and-pinion adjustment. If lowered sufficiently, the condensing
system can be thrown to the side to be removed from the optical
rays. The condenser consists of three lenses. The two upper lenses
are separately mounted to an arm, which permits them to be tilted to
one side in order to be removed from the optical rays. The complete
condenser is used only in connection with high-power objectives.
As far as low-power objectives are concerned, the lower condensing
lens alone is made use of, and the latter is found mounted to the
polarizer sleeve. Below the polarizer and above the lower condensing
lens an iris diaphragm is found.

The microscope table is graduated on its periphery, and, furthermore,
carries a vernier for more exact reading.

The polarization microscope is not furnished with an objective
nose-piece. Every objective, however, is supplied with an individual
centring head, which permits the objective to be attached to
an objective clutch-changer, situated at the lower end of the
microscope-tube. The centring head permits the objectives to be
perfectly centred and to remain centred even if another objective is
introduced into the objective clutch-changer.

At an angle of 45 degrees to the polarization plane of polarizer and
analyzer, a slot has been provided, which serves for the introduction
of compensators.

Between analyzer and ocular, another slot is found which permits
the Amici-Bertrand lens to be introduced into the optical axis. The
slider for the Bertrand lens is supplied with two centring screws
whereby this lens can be perfectly and easily centred. The Bertrand
lens serves the purpose of observing the back focal plane of the
microscope objective. In order to allow the Bertrand lens to be
focused, the tube can be raised and lowered for this purpose. An iris
diaphragm is mounted above the Bertrand lens.

If the Bertrand lens is shifted out of the optical axis, one can
observe the preparation placed upon the microscope stage and,
depending on its thickness or its double refraction, the interference
color of the specimen. This interference figure is called the
orthoscopic image and, accordingly, one speaks of the microscope as
being used as an “orthoscope.”

After the Bertrand lens has been introduced into the optical axis,
the interference figure is visible in the back focal plane of the
objective. Each point of this interference figure corresponds to
a certain direction of the rays of the preparation itself. This
arrangement permits observation of the change of the reflection of
light taking place in the preparation, this in accordance with the
change of the direction of the rays. This interference figure is
called the conoscopic image, and, accordingly, the microscope is used
as a “conoscope.”

Many types of polarization microscopes have been constructed; those
of a more elaborate form are used for research investigations; others
of smaller design for routine investigations.




                             CHAPTER III

                      MICROSCOPIC MEASUREMENTS


In making critical examinations of powdered drugs, it is frequently
necessary to measure the elements under observation, particularly in
the case of starches and crystals.

[Illustration: FIG. 21.--Ocular Micrometer]


                          OCULAR MICROMETER

Microscopic measurements are made by the =ocular micrometer= (Fig.
21). This consists of a circular piece of transparent glass on the
centre of which is etched a one- or two-millimeter scale divided into
one hundred or two hundred divisions respectively. The value of each
line is determined by standardizing with a stage micrometer.


                          STAGE MICROMETER

[Illustration: FIG. 22.--Stage Micrometer]

The =stage micrometer= (Fig. 22) consists of a glass slide upon which
is etched a millimeter scale divided into one hundred equal parts or
lines: each line has a value of one hundredth of a millimeter.


    STANDARDIZATION OF OCULAR MICROMETER WITH LOW-POWER OBJECTIVE

Having placed the ocular micrometer in the eye-piece and the stage
micrometer on the centre of the stage, focus until the lines of the
stage micrometer are clearly seen. Then adjust the scales until the
lines of the stage micrometer are parallel with and directly under
the lines of the ocular micrometer.

Ascertain the number of lines of the stage micrometer covered by the
one hundred lines of the ocular micrometer. Then calculate the value
of each line of the ocular. This is done in the following manner:

If the one hundred lines of the ocular cover seventy-five lines
of the stage micrometer, then the one hundred lines of the ocular
micrometer are equivalent to seventy-five one-hundredths, or
three-fourths, of a millimeter. One line of the ocular micrometer
will therefore be equivalent to one-hundredth of seventy-five
one-hundredths, or .0075 part of a millimeter, and as a micron is the
unit for measuring microscopic objects, this being equivalent to one
one-thousandth of a millimeter, the value of each line of the ocular
will therefore be 7.5 microns.

[Illustration: FIG. 23.--Micrometer Eye-Piece]

With the high-power objective in place, ascertain the value of each
line of the ocular. If one hundred lines of the ocular cover only
twelve lines of the stage micrometer, then the one hundred lines of
the ocular are equivalent to twelve one-hundredths of a millimeter,
the value of one line being equivalent to one one-hundredth of twelve
one-hundredths, or twelve ten-thousandths of a millimeter, or .0012,
or 1.2_µ_.

It will therefore be seen that objects as small as a thousandth of a
millimeter can be accurately measured by the ocular micrometer.

In making microscopic measurements it is only necessary to find how
many lines of the ocular scale are covered by the object. The number
of lines multiplied by the equivalent of each line will be the size
of the object in microns, or _micromillimeters_.

[Illustration: FIG. 24.--Micrometer Eye-Piece]


                        MICROMETER EYE-PIECES

=Micrometer eye-pieces= (Figs. 23 and 24) may be used in making
measurements. These eye-pieces with micrometer combinations are
preferred by some workers, but the ocular micrometer will meet the
needs of the average worker.


                          MECHANICAL STAGES

Moving objects by hand is tiresome and unsatisfactory, first, because
of the possibility of losing sight of the object under observation,
and secondly, because the field cannot be covered so systematically
as when a mechanical stage is used for moving slides.

The =mechanical stage= (Fig. 25) is fastened to the stage by a screw.
The slide is held by two clamps. There is a rack and pinion for
moving the slide to left or right, and another rack and pinion for
moving the slide forward and backward.

[Illustration: FIG. 25. Mechanical Stage]


                            CAMERA LUCIDA

The =camera lucida= is an optical mechanical device for aiding the
worker in making drawings of microscopic objects. The instrument is
particularly necessary in research work where it is desirable to
reproduce an object in all its details. In fact, all reproductions
illustrating original work should be made by means of the camera
lucida or by microphotography.

[Illustration: FIG. 26.--Camera Lucida]

[Illustration: FIG. 27.--Camera Lucida]

A great many different types of camera lucidas or drawing apparatus
are obtainable, varying from simple-inexpensive to complex-expensive
forms. Figs. 26, 27, and 28 show simple and complex forms.

[Illustration: FIG. 28.--Drawing Apparatus]


                     MICROPHOTOGRAPHIC APPARATUS

The =microphotographic apparatus= (Fig. 29), as the name implies, is
an apparatus constructed in such a manner that it may be attached to
a microscope when we desire to photograph microscopic objects. It
consists of a metal base and a polished metal pillar for holding the
bellows, slide holder, ground-glass observation plate, and eye-piece.
In making photographs, the small end of the bellows is attached to
the ocular of the microscope, the focus adjusted, and the object or
objects photographed. More uniform results are obtained in making
such photographs if an artificial light of an unvarying candle-power
is used.

[Illustration: FIG. 29.--Microphotographic Apparatus]

There are obtainable more elaborate microphotographic apparatus than
the one figured and described, but for most workers this one will
prove highly satisfactory. It is possible, by inclining the tube of
the microscope, to make good microphotographs with an ordinary plate
camera. This is accomplished by removing the lens of the camera and
attaching the bellows to the ocular, focusing, and photographing.




                             CHAPTER IV

                      HOW TO USE THE MICROSCOPE


In beginning work with the compound microscope, place the base of the
microscope opposite your right shoulder, if you are right-handed; or
opposite your left shoulder, if you are left-handed. Incline the body
so that the ocular is on a level with your eye, if necessary; but
if not, work with the body of the microscope in an erect position.
In viewing the specimen, keep both eyes open. Use one eye for
observation and the other for sketching. In this way it will not be
necessary to remove the observation eye from the ocular unless it be
to complete the details of a sketch.

=Learn to use both eyes.= Most workers, however, accustom themselves
to using one eye; when they are sketching, they use both eyes,
although it is not necessary to do so.

=Open the iris diaphragm=, and incline the mirror so that white light
is reflected on the Abbé condenser. Place the slide on the centre
of the stage, and if the slide contains a section of a plant, move
the slide so as to place this specimen over the centre of the Abbé
condenser. Then lower the body by means of the coarse adjustment
until the low-power object, which should always be in position when
work is begun, is within one-fourth of an inch of the stage. Then
raise the body by means of the coarse adjustment until the object,
or objects, in case a powder is being examined, is seen. Open and
close the iris diaphragm, finally adjusting the opening so that the
best possible illumination is obtained for bringing out clearly
the structure of the object or objects viewed. Then regulate the
focus by moving the body up or down by turning the fine adjustment.
When studying cross-sections or large particles of powders, it is
sometimes desirable to make low-power sketches of the specimen. In
most cases, however, only sufficient time should be spent in studying
the specimen to give an idea of the size, structure, and general
arrangement or plan or structure if a section of a plant, or, if
a powder, to note its striking characters. All the finer details
of structure are best brought out with the high-power objective in
position.

In =placing the high-power objective in position=, it is first
necessary to raise the body by the coarse adjustment; then open the
iris diaphragm, and lower the body until the objective is within
about one-eighth of an inch of the slide. Now raise the tube by
the fine adjustment until the object is in focus, then gradually
close the iris diaphragm until a clear definition of the object is
obtained. Now proceed to make an accurate sketch of the object or
objects being studied.

In =using the water or oil-immersion objectives= it is first
necessary to place a drop of distilled water or oil, as the case may
be, immediately over the specimen, then lower the body by the coarse
adjustment until the lens of the objective touches the water or the
oil. Raise the tube, regulate the light by the iris diaphragm, and
proceed as if the high-power objectives were in position.

The water or oil should be removed from the objectives and from the
slide when not in use.

After the higher-powered objective has been used, the body should
be raised, and the low-power objective placed in position. If the
draw-tube has been drawn out during the examination of the object,
replace it, but be sure to hold one hand on the nose-piece so as to
prevent scratching the objective and Abbé condenser by their coming
in forceful contact. Lastly, clean the mirror with a soft piece of
linen. In returning the microscope to its case, or to the shelf,
grasp the limb, or the pillar, firmly and carry as nearly vertical as
possible in order not to dislodge the eye-piece.


                            ILLUMINATION

The illumination for microscopic work may be from natural or
artificial sources.

[Illustration: FIG. 30.--Micro Lamp]

It has been generally supposed that the best possible illumination
for microscopic work is diffused sunlight obtained from a northern
direction. No matter from what direction diffused sunlight is
obtained, it will be found suitable for microscopic work. In no case
should direct sunlight be used, because it will be found blinding
in its effects upon the eyes. Natural illumination--diffused
sunlight--varies so greatly during the different months of the
year, and even during different periods of the day, that individual
workers are resorting more and more to artificial illumination. The
particular advantage of such illumination is due to the fact that
its quality and intensity are uniform at all times. There are many
ways of securing such artificial illumination, no one of which has
any particular advantage over the other. Some workers use an ordinary
gas or electric light with a color screen placed in the sub-stage
below the iris diaphragm. In other cases a globe filled with a weak
solution of copper sulphate is placed in such a way between the
source of light and the microscope that the light is focused on the
mirror. Modern mechanical ingenuity has devised, however, a number of
more convenient micro lamps (Fig. 30). These lamps are a combination
of light and screen. In some forms a number of different screens come
with each lamp, so that it is possible to obtain white-, blue-, or
dark-ground illumination. The type of the screen used will be varied
according to the nature of the object studied.


                       CARE OF THE MICROSCOPE

If possible, the microscope should be stored in a room of the same
temperature as that in which it is to be used. In any case, avoid
storing in a room that is cooler than the place of use, because when
it is brought into a warmer room, moisture will condense on the
ocular objectives and mirrors.

Before beginning work remove all moisture, dust, etc., from the inner
and outer lenses of the ocular, the objectives, the Abbé condenser,
and the mirror by means of a piece of soft, old linen. When the work
is finished the optical parts should be thoroughly cleaned.

If reagents have been used, be sure that none has got on the
objectives or the Abbé condenser. If any reagent has got on these
parts, wash it off with water, and then dry them thoroughly with soft
linen.

The inner lenses of the eye-pieces and the under lens of the Abbé
condenser should occasionally be cleaned. The mechanical parts of the
stand should be cleaned if dust accumulates, and the movable surfaces
should be oiled occasionally. Never attempt to make new combinations
of the ocular or objective lenses, or transfer the objectives or
ocular from one microscope to another, because the lenses of any
given microscope form a perfect lens system, and this would not be
the case if they were transferred. Keep clean cloths in a dust-proof
box. Under no circumstances touch any of the optical parts with your
fingers.


                PREPARATION OF SPECIMENS FOR CUTTING

Most drug plants are supplied to pharmacists in a dried condition.
It is necessary, therefore, to boil the drug in water, the time
varying from a few minutes, in the case of thin leaves and herbs, up
to a half hour if the drug is a thick root or woody stem. If a green
(undried) drug is under examination, this first step is not necessary.

If the specimen to be cut is a leaf, a flower-petal, or other thin,
flexible part of a plant, it may be placed between pieces of elder
pith or slices of carrot or potato before cutting.


                       SHORT PARAFFIN PROCESS

In most cases, however, more perfect sections will be obtained if the
specimens are embedded in paraffin, by the quick paraffin process,
which is easily carried out.

After boiling the specimen in water, remove the excess of moisture
from the outer surface with filter paper or wait until the water has
evaporated. Next make a mould of stiff cardboard and pour melted
paraffin (melting at 50 or 60 degrees) into the mould to a height of
about one-half inch, when the paraffin has solidified. This may be
hastened by floating it on cool or iced water instead of allowing it
to cool at room temperature.

The specimens to be cut are now placed on the paraffin, with glue, if
necessary, to hold them in position, and melted paraffin poured over
the specimens until they are covered to a depth of about one-fourth
of an inch. Cool on iced water, trim off the outer paraffin to the
desired depth, and the Specimen will be in a condition suitable for
cutting.

Good workable sections may be cut from specimens embedded by this
quick paraffin method. After a little practice the entire process
can be carried out in less than an hour. This method of preparing
specimens for cutting will meet every need of the pharmacognosist.


                        LONG PARAFFIN PROCESS

In order to bring out the structure of the =protoplast= (living part
of the cell), it will be necessary to begin with the living part of
the plant and to use the long paraffin method or the collodion method.

Small fragments of a leaf, stem, or root-tip are placed in
chromic-acid solution, acetic alcohol, picric acid, chromacetic
acid, alcohol, etc., depending upon the nature of the specimen under
observation. The object of placing the living specimen in such
solutions is to kill the protoplast suddenly so that the parts of the
cell will bear the same relationship to each other that they did in
the living plant, and to fix the parts so killed.

After the fixing process is complete, the specimen is freed of the
fixing agent by washing in water. From the water-bath the specimens
are transferred successively to 10, 20, 40, 60, 70, 80, 90, and
finally 100 per cent alcohol. In this 100 per cent alcohol-bath the
last traces of moisture are removed. The length of time required to
leave the specimens in the different percentages of alcohols varies
from a few minutes to twenty-four hours, depending upon the size and
the nature of the specimen.

[Illustration: FIG. 31.--Paraffin-embedding Oven]

After dehydration the specimen is placed in a clearing
agent--chloroform or xylol--both of which are suitable when embedding
in paraffin. The clearing agents replace the alcohol in the cells,
and at the same time render the tissues transparent. From the
clearing agent the specimen is placed in a weak solution of paraffin,
dissolved xylol, or chloroform. The strength of the paraffin solution
is gradually increased until it consists of pure paraffin. The
temperature of the paraffin-embedding oven (Fig. 31) should not be
much higher than the melting-point of the paraffin.

The specimen is now ready to be embedded. First make a mould of
cardboard or a lead-embedding frame (Fig. 32), melt the paraffin, and
then place the specimen in a manner that will facilitate cutting.
Remove the excess of paraffin and cut when desired.

[Illustration: FIG. 32.--Paraffin Blocks]

In using the collodion method for embedding fibrous specimens,
as wood, bark, roots, etc., the specimen is first fixed with
picric acid, washed with water, cleared in ether-alcohol, embedded
successively in two, five, and twelve per cent ether-alcohol
collodion solution, and finally embedded in a pure collodion bath.


                          CUTTING SECTIONS

Specimens prepared as described above may be cut with a hand
microtome or a machine microtome.


                           HAND MICROTOME

In cutting sections by a =hand microtome=, it is necessary to place
the specimen, embedded in paraffin or held between pieces of elder
pith, carrot, or potato, over the second joints of the fingers,
then press the first joints firmly upon the specimen with the thumb
pressed against it. If they are correctly held, the specimens will be
just above the level of the finger and the end of the thumb, and the
joint will be below the level of the finger.

[Illustration: FIG. 33.--Hand Microtome]

Hold the section cutter (Fig. 33) firmly in the hand with the flat
surface next to the specimen. While cutting the section, press your
arm firmly against your chest, and bend the wrist nearly at right
angles to the arm. Push the cutting edge of the microtome toward the
body and through the specimen in such a way as to secure as thin a
section as possible. Do not expect to obtain nice, thin sections
during the first or second trials, but continued practice will enable
one to become quite efficient in cutting sections in this manner.

When the examination of drugs is a daily occurrence, the above method
will be found highly satisfactory.


                         MACHINE MICROTOMES

When a number of sections are to be prepared from a given specimen,
it is desirable to cut the sections on a machine microtome,
particularly when the sections are to be prepared for the use of
students, in which case they should be as uniform as possible.

Great care should be exercised in cutting sections with a machine
microtome--first, in the selection of the type of the microtome; and
secondly, in the style of knife used in cutting.

For soft tissues embedded in paraffin or collodion, the =rotary
microtome= with vertical knife will give best results. The thickness
of the specimen is regulated by mechanical means, so that in cutting
the sections it is only necessary to turn a crank and remove the
specimens from the knife-edge, unless there is a ribbon-carrier
attachment. If the sections are being cut from a specimen embedded
by the quick paraffin method, it is best to drop the section in a
metal cup partly filled with warm water. This will cause the paraffin
to straighten out, and the specimen will uncoil. After sufficient
specimens have been cut, the cup should be placed in a boiling-water
bath until the paraffin surrounding the sections melts and floats on
the water. Before removing the specimen from the water-bath, it is
advisable to shake the glass vigorously in order to cause as many
specimens as possible to settle to the bottom of the cup. The cup
is then placed in iced water or set aside until the paraffin has
solidified. The cake-like mass is then removed from the cup, and the
sections adhering to its under surface are removed by lifting them
carefully off with the flat side of the knife and transferring them,
together with the sections at the bottom of the cup, to a wide-mouth
bottle, and covered with alcohol, glycerine, and water mixture; or if
it is desired to stain the specimens, they should be placed in a weak
alcoholic solution.

Specimens having a hard, woody texture should be cut on a =sliding
microtome= by means of a special wood knife, which is especially
tempered to cut woody substances. Woody roots, wood, or thick bark
may be cut readily on this microtome when they have been embedded by
the quick paraffin process. The knife in the sliding microtome is
placed in a horizontal position, slanting so that the knife-edge is
drawn gradually across the specimen. After cutting, the sections are
treated as described above.

The thickness of the sections is regulated by mechanical means.
After a section has been cut, the block containing the specimen is
raised by turning a thumb-screw. In this microtome the knife, as in
the rotary type, is fixed, and the block containing the specimen is
movable.

If the specimen has been infiltrated with, and embedded in, paraffin
or collodion, the treatment of the sections after cutting should be
different.

In the case of paraffin, the sections are fastened directly to the
slide, and the paraffin is dissolved by either chloroform or xylol.
The specimen is then placed in 100, 95, and 45 per cent alcohol,
and then washed in water. These sections are now stained with
water-stains, brought back through alcohol, cleared, and mounted in
Canada balsam.

If alcoholic stains are used, it will not be necessary to dehydrate
before staining, and the dehydration after staining will also be
eliminated.

Sections infiltrated with collodion are either stained directly
without removing the collodion or after removal.


                         FORMS OF MICROTOMES

The =hand cylinder microtome= (Fig. 34) consists of a cylindrical
body. The clamp for holding the specimen is near the top below the
cutting surface. At the lower end is attached a micrometer screw with
a divided milled head. When moved forward one division, the specimen
is raised 0.01 mm. This micrometer screw has an upward movement of
10 mm. The cutting surface consists of a cylindrical glass ring.

[Illustration: FIG. 34.--Hand Cylinder Microtome]

[Illustration: FIG. 35.--Hand Table Microtome]

The =hand table microtome= (Fig. 35) is provided with a clamp, by
which it may be attached to the edge of a table or desk. The cutting
surface consists of two separated but parallel glass benches. The
object is held by a clamp and is raised by a micrometer screw, which,
when moved through one division by turning the divided head, raises
the specimen 0.01 mm.

The =sliding microtome= has a track of 250 mm. The object is held
by a clamp and its height regulated by hand. The disk regulating
the micrometer screw is divided into one hundred parts. When this
is turned through one division, the object is raised 0.005 mm. or
5 microns, at the same time a clock-spring in contact with teeth
registers by a clicking sound. If the disk is turned through two
divisions, there will be two clicks, etc. In this way is regulated
the thickness of the sections cut. When the micrometer screw has been
turned through the one hundred divisions, it must be unscrewed, the
specimen raised, and the steps of the process repeated. The knife is
movable and is drawn across the specimen in making sections.

[Illustration: FIG. 36.--Base Sledge Microtome]

The =base sledge microtome= (Fig. 36) has a heavy iron base which
supports a sliding-way on which the object-carrier moves. The
object-carrier is mounted on a solid mass of metal, and is provided
with a clamp for holding the object. The object is raised by turning
a knob which, when turned once, raises the specimen one to twenty
microns, according to how the feeding mechanism is set.

Sections thicker than twenty microns may be obtained by turning the
knob two or more times. The knife is fixed and is supported by two
pillars, the base of which may be moved forward or backward in such a
manner that the knife can be arranged with an oblique or right-angled
cutting surface.

[Illustration: FIG. 37.--Minot Rotary Microtome]

The =Minot rotary microtome= (Fig. 37) has a fixed knife, held in
position by two pillars, and a movable object-carrier. The object is
firmly secured by a clamp, and it is raised by a micrometer screw.
The screw is attached to a wheel having five hundred teeth on its
periphery. A pawl is adjusted to the teeth in such a way that, when
moved by turning a wheel to which it is attached, specimens varying
from one to twenty-five microns in thickness may be cut, according
to the way the adjusting disk is set. When the mechanism has been
regulated and the object adjusted for cutting, it is only necessary
to turn a crank in cutting sections.


                         CARE OF MICROTOMES

When not in use, microtomes should be protected from dust, and all
parts liable to friction should be oiled.

Microtome knives should be honed as often as is necessary to insure
a proper cutting edge. After cutting objects, the knives should be
removed, cleaned, and oiled.

It should be kept clearly in mind that special knives are required
for cutting collodion, paraffin, and frozen and woody sections. The
cutting edges of the different knives vary considerably, as is shown
in the preceding cuts.




                              CHAPTER V

                              REAGENTS


Little attention is given in the present work to micro-chemical
reactions for the reason that their value has been much overrated in
the past. A few reagents will be found useful, however, and these few
are given, as well as their special use. They are as follows:


                          LIST OF REAGENTS

=Distilled Water= is used in the alcohol, glycerine, and water
mixture as a general mounting medium. It is used when warm as a test
for inulin and it is used in preparing various reagents.

=Glycerine= is used in preparing the alcohol, glycerine, and water
mixture, in testing for aleurone grains, and as a temporary mounting
medium.

=Alcohol= is used in preparing the alcohol, glycerine, and water
mixture, in testing for volatile oils.

=Acetic Acid=. Both dilute and strong solutions are used in testing
for aleurone grains, cystoliths, and crystals of calcium oxalate.

=Hydrochloric Acid= is used in connection with phloroglucin as a test
for lignin and as a test for calcium oxalate.

=Ferric Chloride Solution= is used as a test for tannin.

=Sulphuric Acid= is used as a test for calcium oxalate.

=Tincture Alkana= is used when freshly prepared by macerating the
granulated root with alcohol and filtering, as a test for resin.

=Sodium Hydroxide=. A five per cent solution is used as a test for
suberin and as a clearing agent.

=Copper Ammonia= is used as a test for cellulose.

=Ammonical Solution of Potash= is used as a test for fixed oils.
The solution is a mixture of equal parts of a saturated solution of
potassium hydroxide and stronger ammonia.

=Oil of Cloves= is used as a clearing fluid for sections preparatory
to mounting in Canada balsam.

=Canada Balsam= is used as a permanent mounting medium for dehydrated
specimens, and as a cement for ringing slides.

=Paraffin= is used for general embedding and infiltrating.

=Lugol’s Solution= is used as a test for starch and for aleurone
grains and proteid matters.

=Osmic Acid=. A two per cent solution is used as a test for fixed
oils.

=Alcohol, Glycerine, and Water Mixture= is used as a temporary
mounting medium and as a qualitative test for fixed oils.

=Chlorzinc Iodide= is used as a test for suberin, lignin, cellulose,
and starch.

=Analine Chloride= is used as a test for lignified cell walls of bast
fibres and of stone cells.

=Phloroglucin=. A one per cent alcoholic solution is used in
connection with hydrochloric acid as a test for lignin.

=Hæmatoxylin-Delifields= is used as a test for cellulose.

[Illustration: FIG. 38.--Reagent Set]


                             REAGENT SET

Each worker should be provided with a set of =reagent bottles=
(Fig. 38). Such a set may be selected according to the taste of the
individual, but experience has shown that a 30 c.c. bottle with a
ground-in pipette and a rubber bulb is preferable to other types. In
such forms the pipettes are readily cleaned, and the rubber bulbs can
be replaced when they become old and brittle. The entire set should
be protected from dust by keeping it in a case, the cover of which
should be closed when the set is not in use.


                         MEASURING CYLINDER

In order accurately to measure micro-chemical reagents, it is
necessary to have a standard 50 c.c. cylinder (Fig. 39) graduated to
c.c.’s. Such a cylinder should form a part of the reagent set.

[Illustration: FIG. 39.--Measuring Cylinder]


                           STAINING DISHES

[Illustration: FIG. 40.--Staining Dish]

There is a great variety of =staining dishes= (Fig. 40), but for
general histological work a glass staining dish with groves for
holding six or more slides and a glass cover is most desirable.




                             CHAPTER VI

                       HOW TO MOUNT SPECIMENS


The method of procedure in mounting specimens for study varies
according to the nature of the specimen, its preliminary treatment,
and the character of the mount to be made. As to duration, mounts are
either temporary or permanent.


                          TEMPORARY MOUNTS

In preparing a =temporary mount=, place the specimen in the centre
of a clean slide and add two or more drops of the temporary mounting
medium, which may be water, or a mixture of equal parts of alcohol,
glycerine, and water, or some micro-chemical reagent, as weak Lugol’s
solution, solution of chloral hydrate, etc. Cover this with a cover
glass and press down gently. Remove the excess of the mounting
medium with a piece of blotting paper. Now place the slide on the
stage and proceed to examine it. Such mounts can of course be used
only for short periods of study; and when the period of observation
is finished, the specimen should be removed and the slide washed,
or the slide washing may be deferred until a number of such slides
have accumulated. At any rate, when the mounting medium dries, the
specimen is no longer suitable for observation.


                          PERMANENT MOUNTS

Permanent mounts are prepared in much the same way as temporary, but
of course the mounting medium is different. The kind of permanent
mounting medium used depends upon the previous treatment of the
specimen. If the specimen has been preserved in alcohol or glycerine
and water, it is usually mounted in glycerine jelly. If the specimen
in question is a powder, it is placed in the centre of the slide and
a drop or two of glycerine, alcohol, and water mixture added, unless
the powder was already in suspension in such a mixture. Cut a small
cube of glycerine jelly and place it in the centre of the powder
mixture. Lift up the slide by means of pliers, or grasp the two
edges between the thumb and finger and hold over a small flame of an
alcohol lamp, or place on a steam-bath until the glycerine jelly has
melted. Next sterilize a dissecting needle, cool, and mix the powder
with the glycerine jelly, being careful not to lift the point of the
needle from the slide during the operation. If the mixing has been
carefully done, few or no air-bubbles will be present; but if they
are present, heat the needle, and while it is white hot touch the
bubbles with its point, and they will disappear. Now take a pair of
forceps and, after securing a clean cover glass near the edge, pass
them three times through the flame of the alcohol lamp. While holding
it in a slanting position, touch one side of the powder mixture and
slowly lower the cover glass until it comes in complete contact with
the mixture. Now press gently with the end of the needle-handle, and
set it aside to cool. When it is cool, place a neatly trimmed label
on one end of the slide, on which write the name of the specimen,
the number of the series of which it is to form a part, etc. Any
excess of glycerine jelly, which may have been pressed out from the
edges of the cover glass, should not be removed at once, but should
be allowed to remain on the slide for at least one month in order to
allow for shrinkage due to evaporation. At the end of a month remove
the glycerine jelly by first passing the blade of a knife, held in
a vertical position, the back of the knife being next to the slide,
around the edge of the cover glass. After turning the knife-blade so
that the flat side is in contact with slide, remove the jelly outside
of the cover glass. Any remaining fragments should be removed with
a piece of old linen or cotton cloth. Finally, ring the edge of the
cover glass with microscopical cement, of which there are many types
to be had. If the cleaning has been done thoroughly, there is no
better ringing cement than Canada balsam.

In mounting cross-sections, the method of procedure is similar to the
above, with the exception that the glycerine jelly is placed at the
side of the specimen and not in the centre. While melting the jelly,
incline the slide in order to allow the melted glycerine jelly to
flow gradually over the specimen, thus replacing the air contained in
the cells and intercellular spaces. Finish the mounting as directed
above, but under no conditions should you stir the glycerine jelly
with the section.

If specimens, after having been embedded in paraffin or collodion,
are cut, cleared, stained, and dehydrated, they are usually mounted
in Canada balsam. A small drop of this substance, which may be
obtained in collapsible tubes, is placed at one side of the specimen.
While inclining the slide, gently heat until the Canada balsam covers
the specimen. Secure a cover glass by the aid of pliers, pass it
through the flame three times, and lower it slowly while holding it
in an inclined position. Press gently on the cover glass with the
needle-handle, and keep in a horizontal position for twenty-four
hours, then place directly in a slide box or cabinet, since no
sealing is required.

Glycerine is sometimes used to make permanent mounts, but it is
unsatisfactory, because the cover glass is easily removed and the
specimen spoiled or lost, unless ringed--a procedure which is not
easily accomplished. If the specimen is to be mounted in glycerine,
it must first be placed in a mixture of alcohol, glycerine, and
water, and then transferred to glycerine. Lactic acid is another
permanent liquid-mounting medium, which is unsatisfactory in the same
way as glycerine, but like glycerine, there are certain special cases
where it is desirable to use it. When this is used, the slides should
be kept in a horizontal position, unless ringed.


                            COVER GLASSES

Great care should be used In the selection of =cover glasses=,
however, not only as regards their shape but as to their thickness.
The standard tube length of the different manufacturers makes an
allowance of a definite thickness for cover glasses. It is necessary,
therefore, to use cover glasses made by the manufacturer of the
microscope in use.

Cover glasses are either square or round. Of each there are four
different thicknesses and two different sizes. The standard
thicknesses are: The small size is designated three-fourths and the
large size seven-eighths.

[Illustration: FIG. 41.--Round Cover Glass]

[Illustration: FIG. 42.--Square Cover Glass]

[Illustration: FIG. 43.--Rectangular Cover Glass]

=Cover glasses= are circular (Fig. 41), square (Fig. 42), or
rectangular (Fig. 43) pieces of transparent glass used in
covering the specimens mounted on glass slides. A few years ago
much difficulty was experienced in obtaining uniformly thick and
transparent cover glasses, but no such difficulty is experienced
to-day. The type of cover glass used depends largely upon the
character of the specimen to be mounted. The square and rectangular
glasses are selected when a series of specimens are to be mounted,
but in mounting powdered drugs and histological specimens the round
cover glasses are preferable because they are more sightly and more
readily cleaned and rinsed.


                            GLASS SLIDES

[Illustration: FIG. 44.--Glass Slide]

=Glass slides= (Fig. 44) are rectangular pieces of transparent glass
used as a mounting surface for microscopic objects. The slides are
usually three inches long by one inch wide, and they should be
composed of white glass, and they should have ground and beveled
edges. Slides should be of uniform thickness, and they should not
become cloudy upon standing.


                    SLIDE AND COVER-GLASS FORCEPS

Slides and cover glasses should be grasped by their edges. To the
beginner this is not easy. In order to facilitate holding slides and
cover glasses during the mounting process, one may use a slide and a
cover-glass =forceps=. The slide forceps consists of wire bent and
twisted in such a way that it holds a slide firmly when attached to
its two edges.

[Illustration: FIG. 45.--Histological Forceps]

[Illustration: FIG. 46.--Forceps]

[Illustration: FIG. 47.--Sliding-pin Forceps]

There are various forms of cover-glass holders, but only two types as
far as the method of securing the cover glass is concerned. First,
there are the bacteriological and the histological forceps (Fig. 45),
which are self-closing. The two blades of such forceps must be forced
apart by pressure in securing the cover glass. The second type of
forceps is that in which the two blades are normally separated (Fig.
46), it being necessary to press the blades to either side of the
cover glass in order to secure and hold it. There is a modification
of this type of forceps which enables one to lock the blades by means
of a sliding pin (Fig. 47), after the cover glass has been secured.
It is well to accustom oneself to one type, for by so doing one may
become dexterous in its use.


                               NEEDLES

[Illustration: FIG. 48.--Dissecting Needle]

Two =dissecting needles= (Fig. 48) should form a part of the
histologist’s mounting set. The handles may be of any material, but
the needle should be of tempered steel and about two inches long.


                              SCISSORS

[Illustration: FIG. 49.--Scissors]

Almost any sort of =scissors= (Fig. 49) will do for histology work,
but a small scissors with fine pointed blades, are preferred.
Scissors are useful in trimming labels and in cutting strips of
leaves and sections of fibrous roots that are to be embedded and cut.


                              SCALPELS

[Illustration: FIG. 50.--Scalpels]

=Scalpels= (Fig. 50) have steel blades and ebony handles. These vary
in regard to size and quality of material. The cheaper grades are
quite as satisfactory, however, as the more expensive ones, and for
general use a medium-sized blade and handle will be found most useful.


                              TURNTABLE

[Illustration: FIG. 51.--Turntable]

Much time and energy may be saved by ringing slides on a =turntable=
(Fig. 51). There is a flat surface upon which to rest the hand
holding the brush with cement, and a revolving table upon which the
slide to be ringed is held by means of two clips. In ringing slides,
it is only necessary to revolve the table, and at the same time to
transfer the cement to the edge of the cover glass from the brush
held in the hand.


                              LABELING

There are many ways of =labeling slides=, but the best method is to
place on the label the name of the specimen, the powder number, and
the box, the tray or cabinet number. For example:

                       Powdered Arnica Flowers
                         No. 80--Box A--600.


                  PRESERVATION OF MOUNTED SPECIMENS

[Illustration: FIG. 52.--Slide Box]

[Illustration: FIG. 53.--Slide Tray]

Accurately mounted, labeled, and ringed slides should be filed away
for future study and reference. Such =filing= may be done in slide
boxes, in slide trays, or in cabinets. Slide boxes are to be had
of a holding capacity varying from one to one hundred slides. For
general use, slide boxes (Fig. 52) holding one hundred slides will
be found most useful. Some workers prefer trays (Fig. 53), because
of the saving of time in selecting specimens. Trays hold twenty
slides arranged in two rows. The cover of the tray is divided into
two sections so that, if desired, only one row of slides is uncovered
at a time. Slide cabinets (Fig. 54) are particularly desirable for
storing large individual collections, particularly when the slides
are used frequently for reference. Large selections of slides should
be numbered and card indexed in order to facilitate finding.

[Illustration: FIG. 54.--Slide Cabinet]




                               Part II

                  TISSUES CELLS, AND CELL CONTENTS




                              CHAPTER I

                              THE CELL


The =cell= is the unit of structure of all plants. In fact the cell
is the plant in many of the lower forms--so called unicellular
plants. All plants, then, consist of one or more cells.

While cells vary greatly in size, form, color, contents, and
function, still in certain respects their structure is identical.


                            TYPICAL CELL

The typical vegetable cell is composed of a living portion or
=protoplast= and an external covering, or =wall=. The protoplast
includes everything within the wall. It is made up of a number of
parts, each part performing certain functions yet harmonizing with
the work of the cell as a whole. The protoplast (protoplasm) is a
viscid substance resembling the white of an egg. The protoplast, when
unstained and unmagnified, appears structureless, but when stained
with dyes and magnified, it is found to be highly organized. The
two most striking parts of the protoplast are the =cytoplasm= and
the =nucleus=. The part of the protoplast lining the innermost part
of the wall is the =ectoplast=, which is less granular and slightly
denser than most of the =cytoplasm=. The cytoplasm is decidedly
granular in structure.

In the cytoplasm occurs one or more cavities, =vacuoles=, filled with
=cell sap=. Embedded in the cytoplasm are numerous =chromatophores=,
which vary in color in the different cells, from colorless to yellow,
to red, and to green. The =nucleus= is the seat of the vital activity
of the cell, and the seat of heredity. The whole life and activity of
the cell centre, therefore, in and about the nucleus.

The outer portion of the nucleus consists of a thin
membrane or wall. The membrane encloses numerous granular
particles--=chromatin=--which are highly susceptible to organic
stains. Among the granules are thread-like particles or =linin=. Near
the centre of the nucleus are one or more small rounded nucleoli. The
liquid portion of the nucleus, filling the membranes and surrounding
the chromatin, linin, and nucleoli, is the =nuclear sap=.

Other cell contents characteristic of certain cells are crystals,
starch, aleurone, oil, and alkaloids. The detailed discussion of
these substances will be deferred until a later chapter.

The =cell wall= which surrounds the protoplast is a product of its
activity. The structure and composition of the wall of any given cell
vary according to the ultimate function of the cell. The walls may be
thin or thick, porous or non-porous, and colored or colorless. The
composition of cell walls varies greatly. The majority of cell walls
are composed of cellulose, in other cells of linin, in others of
cutin, and in still others of suberin, etc. In the majority of cells
the walls are laid down in a series of layers one over the other by
apposition, similar to the manner of building a pile of paper from
separate sheets. The first layer is deposited over the primary wall,
formed during cell division; to this is added another layer, etc. A
modification of this manner of growth is that in which the layers are
built up one over the other, but the building is gradually done by
the deposit of minute particles of cell-wall substance over the older
deposits. Such walls are never striated, as is likely to be the case
in cell walls formed by the first method. In other cells the walls
are increased in thickness by the deposition of new wall material in
the older membrane. The cell walls will be discussed more fully when
the different tissues are studied in detail.


                INDIRECT CELL DIVISION (KARYOKINESIS)

The purpose of cell division is to increase the number of cells
of a tissue, an organ, an organism, or to increase the number of
organisms, etc. Such cell divisions involve, first, an equal division
of the protoplast and, secondly, the formation of a wall between
the divided protoplasts. The first changes in structure of a cell
undergoing division occur in the nucleus.


                CHANGES IN A CELL UNDERGOING DIVISION

The =linin threads= become thicker and shorter. The =chromatin
granules= increase in size and amount; the threads and chromatin
granules separate into a definite number of segments or =chromosomes=
(Plate 1, Fig. 2). The nuclear membrane becomes invested with a
fibrous protoplasmic layer which later separates and passes into
either end of the cell, there forming the =polar caps= (Plate 1, Fig.
3).

The =nuclear membrane= and the =nucleoli= disappear at about this
time. Two fibres, one from each polar cap, become attached to
opposite sides of the individual chromosomes. Other fibres from
the two polar caps unite to form the =spindle fibres=, which thus
extend from pole to pole. All these spindle fibres form the =nuclear
spindle= (Plate 1, Fig. 5).

The chromosomes now pass toward the division centre of the cell or
=equatorial plane= and form, collectively, the =equatorial plate=
(Plate 1, Fig. 5). At this point of cell division, the chromosomes
are =U=-shaped, and the curved part of the chromosomes faces the
equatorial plane. The chromosomes finally split into two equal
parts (Plate 1, Fig. 6). The actual separation of the halves of
chromosomes is brought about by the attached polar fibres, which
contract toward the polar caps (Plate 1, Fig. 7). The chromosomes are
finally drawn to the polar caps (Plate 1, Fig. 8). The chromosomes
now form a rounded mass. They then separate into linin threads
and chromatin granules. Nucleoli reappear, and nuclear sap forms.
Finally, a nuclear membrane develops. The spindle fibres, which still
extend from pole to pole, become thickened at the equatorial plane
(Plate 1, Fig. 8), and finally their edges become united to form the
=cell-plate= (Plate 1, Fig. 9), which extends across the cell, thus
completely separating the mother cell into two daughter cells. After
the formation of the cell-plate, the spindle fibres disappear. The
cell becomes modified to form the =middle lamella=, on either side of
which the daughter protoplast adds a cellulose layer. The ultimate
composition of the middle lamella and the composition and structure
of the cell wall will differ according to the function which the cell
will finally perform.

[Illustration: PLATE 1

  Nine figures, showing stages in the cell-division common to the
  onion root (_Allium cepa_, L.)]


                   ORIGIN OF MULTICELLULAR PLANTS

All multicellular plants are built up by the repeated cell division
of one original cell. If the cells formed are similar in structure
and function, they form a tissue. In multicellular plants many
different kinds of tissues will be formed as a result of cell
division, since there are many different functions to be performed by
such an organism. When several of these tissues become associated and
their functions are correlated, they form an organ. The association
of several organs in one form makes an organism. The oak-tree is an
organism. It is made up of organs known as flowers, leaves, stems,
roots, etc. Each of these organs is in turn made up of several kinds
of tissue. In some cases it is difficult to designate a single
function to an aggregation of cells (tissue). In fact, a tissue may
perform different functions at different periods of its existence
or it may perform two functions at one and the same time; as an
example, stone cells, whose primary function is mechanical, in many
cases function as storage tissue. The cells forming the tissues of
the plant, in fact, show great adaptability in regard to the function
which they perform. Nevertheless there is a predominating function
which all tissues perform, and the structure of the cells forming
such tissues is so uniform that it is possible to classify them.

The functional classification of tissues is chosen for the purpose
of demonstrating the adaptation of cell structure to cell function.
If the cells performing a similar function in the different plants
were identical in number, distribution, form, color, size, structure,
and cell contents, there would not be a science of histology upon
which the art of microscopic pharmacognosy is based. It may be said,
however, with certainty, that the cells forming certain of the
tissues of any given species of plant will differ in a recognizable
degree from cells performing a similar function in other species of
plants. Often a tissue is present in one plant but absent in another.
For example, many aquatic plants are devoid of mechanical fibrous
cells. The barks of certain plants have characteristic stone cells,
while in many other barks no stone cells occur. Many leaves have
characteristic trichomes; others are free from trichomes, etc. Yet
all cells performing a given function will structurally resemble
each other. In the present work the nucleus and other parts of the
living protoplast will not be considered, for the reason that these
parts are not in a condition suitable for study, because most drugs
come to market in a dried condition, a condition which eliminates
the possibility of studying the protoplast. The general structure of
the cells forming the different tissues will first be considered,
then their variation, as seen in different plants, and finally their
functions.




                             CHAPTER II

                     THE EPIDERMIS AND PERIDERM


The epidermis and its modifications, the hypodermis and the periderm,
form the dermal or protective outer layer or layers of the plant.

The epidermis of most leaves, stems of herbs, seeds, fruits, floral
organs, and young woody stems consists of a single layer of cells
which form an impervious outer covering, with the exception of the
stoma.


                           LEAF EPIDERMIS

The cells of the =epidermis= vary in size, in thickness of the side
and end walls, in form, in arrangement, in character of outgrowths,
in the nature of the surface deposits, in the character of
wall--whether smooth or rough--and in size.

In cross-sections of the leaf the character of both the side and end
walls is easily studied.

In surface sections--the view most frequently seen in powders--the
side walls are more conspicuous than the end wall (Plates 2 and 3).
This is so because the light is considerably retarded in passing
through the entire length of the side walls, while the light is
retarded only slightly in passing through the end wall. The light in
this case passes through the width (thickness) of the wall only. The
outer walls of epidermal cells are characteristic only when they are
striated, rough, pitted, colored, etc. In the majority of leaves the
outer wall of the epidermal cells is not diagnostic in powders, or in
surface sections.

The thickness of the end and side walls of epidermal cells differs
greatly in different plants.

As a rule, leaves of aquatic and shade-loving plants, as well as the
leaves of most herbs have thinner walled epidermal cells than have
the leaves of plants growing in soil under normal conditions, or than
have the leaves of shrubs and trees.

[Illustration: PLATE 2

                           LEAF EPIDERMIS

  1. Uva-ursi (_Arctostaphylos uva-ursi_, [L.] Spring).
  2. Boldus (_Peumus boldus_, Molina).
  3. Catnip (_Nepeta cataria_, L.).
  4. Digitalis (_Digitalis purpurea_, L.).
  4-A. Origin of hair.]

[Illustration: PLATE 3

                           LEAF EPIDERMIS

  1. Upper striated epidermis of chirata leaf (_Swertia chirata_,
  [Roxb.] Ham.).
  2. Green hellebore leaf (_Veratrum viride_, Ait.).
  3. Boldus leaf (_Peumus boldus_, Molina).
  4. Under epidermis of India senna (_Cassia angustifolia_, Vahl.).]

The widest possible range of cell-wall thickness is therefore found
in the medicinal leaves, because the medicinal leaves are collected
from aquatic plants, herbs, shrubs, trees, etc.

The outer wall is always thicker than the side walls. Even the
side walls vary in thickness in some leaves, the wall next to the
epidermis being thicker than the lower or innermost portion of the
wall. Frequently the outermost part of the side walls is unequally
thickened. This is the case in the beaded side walls characteristic
of the epidermis of the leaves of laurus, myrcia, boldus, and
capsicum seed, etc. The thickness of the side walls of the epidermal
cells of most leaves varies in the different leaves.

In most leaves there are five typical forms of arrangement of
epidermal cells: First, those over the veins which are elongated
in the direction of the length of the leaf; and, secondly, those
on other parts of the leaf which are usually several-sided and not
elongated in any one direction. If the epidermis of the leaf has
stoma, then there is a third type of arrangement of the epidermal
cells around the stoma; fourthly, the cells surrounding the base of
hairs; and fifthly, outgrowths of the epidermis, non-glandular and
glandular hairs, etc.

It should be borne in mind that in each species of plant the five
types of arrangement are characteristic for the species.

The character of the outer wall of the epidermal cells differs
greatly in different plants. In most cases the wall is smooth; senna
is an example of such leaves. In certain other leaves the wall
is rough, the roughness being in the form of striations. In some
cases the striations occur in a regular manner; belladonna leaf is
typical of such leaves. In other instances the wall is striated in
an irregular manner as shown in chirata epidermis. Very often an
epidermis is rough, but the roughness is not due to striations.
In these cases the epidermis is unevenly thickened, the thin
places appearing as slight depressions, the thick places as slight
elevations. Boldus has a rough, but not a striated surface.

=Surface deposits= are not of common occurrence in medicinal plants;
waxy deposits occur on the stem of sumac, on a species of raspberry,
on the fruit of bayberry, etc. Resinous deposits occur on the leaves
and stems of grindelia species, and on yerba santa.

In certain leaves there are two or three layers of cells beneath the
epidermis that are similar in structure to the epidermal cells. These
are called hypodermal cells, and they function in the same way as the
epidermal cells.

Hypodermal cells are very likely to occur on the margin of the leaf.
Uva-ursi leaf has a structure typical of leaves with hypodermal
marginal cells. Uva-ursi, like other leaves with hypodermal cells has
a greater number of hypodermal cells at the leaf margin than at any
other part of the leaf surface.

The cutinized walls of epidermal cells are stained red with saffranin.


                           TESTA EPIDERMIS

=Testa epidermal cells= form the epidermal layers of such seeds as
lobelia, henbane, capsicum, paprika, larkspur, belladonna, scopola,
etc.

In surface view the end walls are thick and wavy in outline;
frequently the line of union--middle lamella--of two cells is
indicated by a dark or light line, while in others the wall between
two cells appears as a single wall. The walls are porous or
non-porous, and the color of the wall varies from yellow to brown, to
colorless. These cells always occur in masses, composed partially of
entire and partially of broken fragments.

In lobelia seed (Plate 4, Fig. 2) the line of union of adjacent cell
walls appears as a dark line. The walls are wavy in outline, of a
yellowish-red color and not porous.

In henbane seed (Plate 4, Fig. 3) the line of union between the cells
is scarcely visible; the walls are decidedly wavy, more so than in
lobelia, and no pits are visible.

In capsicum seed (Plate 4, Fig. 1) the cells are very wavy and
decidedly porous, the line of union between the cell walls being
marked with irregular spaces and lines.

In belladonna seed (Plate 5, Fig. 1) the walls between two adjacent
cells are non-striated and non-porous, and extremely irregular in
outline.

[Illustration: PLATE 4

                        TESTA EPIDERMAL CELLS

  1. Capsicum seed (_Capsicum frutescens_, L.).
  2. Lobelia seed (_Lobelia inflata_, L.).
  3. Henbane seed (_Hyoscyamus niger_, L.).]

[Illustration: PLATE 5

                             TESTA CELLS

  1. Belladonna seed (_Atropa belladonna_, L.).
  2. Star-aniseed (_Illicium verum_, Hooker).
  3. Stramonium seed (_Datura stramonium_, L.).]

In star-anise seed (Plate 5, Fig. 2) the walls are irregularly
thickened and wavy in outline.

In stramonium seed (Plate 5, Fig. 3) the walls are very thick, wavy
in outline, and striated.


                       PLANT HAIRS (TRICHOMES)

In histological work plant hairs are of great importance, as they
offer a ready means of distinguishing and differentiating between
plants, or parts of plants, when they occur in a broken or finely
powdered condition. There is no other element in powdered drugs which
is of so great a diagnostic value as the plant hair. The same plant
will always have the same type of hair, the only noticeable variation
being in the size. In microscopical drug analysis the presence of
hairs is always noted, and in many cases the purity of the powder
can be ascertained from the hairs. Botanists seem to have given
little attention to the study of plant hairs. This accounts for the
fact that information concerning them is very meagre in botanical
literature, and, as far as the author can learn, no one has attempted
to classify them. In systematic work, plant hairs could be used to
great advantage in separating genera and even species. Hairs are,
of course, a factor now in systematic work. The lack of hairs is
indicated by the term glabrous. Their presence is indicated by such
terms as hispid, villous, etc. In certain cases the term indicates
position of the hair as ciliate when the hair is marginal. When hairs
influence the color of the leaf, such terms as cinerous and canescent
are used. In all the cases cited no mention is made of the real
nature of the hair.

In systematic work, as in pharmacognosy, we must work with dried
material, and it is only those hairs which retain their form under
such conditions which are of classification value.

Hairs are the most common outgrowths of the epidermal cells. They
are classified as glandular or non-glandular, according to their
structure and function. The glandular hairs will be considered under
synthetic tissue.

Each group is again subdivided into a number of secondary groups,
depending upon the number of cells present, their form, their
arrangement, their size, their color, the character of their walls,
whether rough or smooth, whether branched or non-branched, whether
curved, twisted, straight, or twisted and straight, whether pointed,
blunt, or forked.


                           FORMS OF HAIRS

                               PAPILLÆ

=Papillæ= are epidermal cells which are extended outward in the form
of small tubular outgrowths.

Papillæ occur on the following parts of the plant: flower-petals,
stigmas, styles, leaves, stems, seeds, and fruits. Papillæ occur on
only a few of the medicinal leaves.

The under surface of both Truxillo (Plate 6, Fig. 3) and Huanuca coca
have very small papillæ. The outermost wall of these papillæ are much
thicker than the side walls. The papillæ of klip buchu (Plate 6, Fig.
4), an adulterant of true buchu, has large thick-walled papillæ.

The velvety appearance of most flower-petals (Plate 6, Figs. 2 and
5) is due to the presence of papillæ. The papillæ of flower-petals
are very variable. In calendula flowers (Plate 6, Fig. 1) they
are small, yellowish in color, and the outer wall is marked with
parallel striations which appear as small teeth in cross-section.
The ray petal papillæ of anthemis consist of rather large, broad,
blunt papillæ with slightly striated walls. The papillæ of the ray
petals of the white daisy consist of papillæ which have medium sized,
cone-shaped papillæ with finely striated walls. The papillæ of the
flower stigma vary greatly in different flowers. In some cases two or
more types of papillæ occur, but even in these cases the papillæ are
characteristic of the species.

The papillæ differ greatly in the case of the flowers of the
compositæ, where two types of flowers are normally present--namely,
the ray flowers and the disk flowers.

In all cases observed the papillæ of the stigma of the ray flowers
are always smaller than the papillæ of the stigma of the disk

“No, I would ride Roy. I asked for him just to see what Dick would
say, and when he didn’t want me to have him, I persisted, simply to
tease him. And it has saved my life!” she cried hysterically.

“Not much doubt who stood to benefit by the plot!” muttered one of the
men who had stood behind Mabel at the Gymkhana, but Fitz nudged the
speaker fiercely.

“I don’t know what we’re all standing here for--in case our deceased
friend’s sorrowing relations like to come back and wipe us out, I
suppose. Let me mount you, Miss North. Are you fellows going to stop
out all night? Had we better bring _that_ along, do you think?”

This was added in a lower tone, as he pointed to the robber’s corpse.
After some demur it was decided to lay it across the saddle of
Brendon’s pony, which had found its way back to the rest with a pair
of broken knees, and they rode back towards the gorge, the last man
leading the laden pony, so that it might be kept out of Mabel’s sight.
As they approached the entrance to the ravine Dr Tighe came forward
hastily to meet them.

“Look here,” he said, “I want some one to ride on to Alibad at once.
The Commissioner has broken his knee-cap and a few other things, and
Major North’s is the nearest house, but Mrs North mustn’t be
frightened. Milton, your pony’s a good one, I know, so just take it
out of him. Say nothing about Miss North or Brendon or anything, but
tell Mrs North the Commissioner has had a nasty fall, and I am
bringing him to her house with a fractured patella and a pair of
smashed ribs. She can get things ready, and send on to my house for
anything she doesn’t happen to have.”

“Surely the ladies had better go back with me, Doctor?” asked Milton,
pausing as he was about to start.

“No, we don’t want any more kidnapping to-night. We must travel
slowly, all of us, but they’ll be safer than with you. Feel shaky,
Miss North? Drink this,” and he handed her a flask-cup. “Miss Graham
is waiting to weep tears of joy over you. What, aren’t you gone yet,
Milton?”

“Tell Major North to arrest the syce,” Fitz shouted after the
messenger as he disappeared in the darkness.

“Off with your coats, you young fellows!” cried Dr Tighe, as the thud
of the pony’s steps upon the sand died away. “The Commissioner has to
be carried home somehow, and there’s not so much as a stick to make a
stretcher of. We must tie the coats together by the sleeves, and
manufacture a litter in that way.”

No one dared to scoff, although no one could understand what the
doctor meant to do; but working energetically under his directions,
they succeeded in framing a sufficiently practicable litter. Six of
the party were chosen as bearers, and the others were to relieve them,
their duty in the meantime being to lead the riderless horses and keep
watch against a surprise. Mabel and Flora, who had been enjoying the
luxury of shedding a few tears together in private, were placed at the
head of the procession, and the march began. At first the litter
containing the wounded man followed close after the two girls; but
presently Fitz, who was one of the bearers, felt his arm grasped.

“Let the ladies get ahead of us, please. I--I can’t stand this very
well.”

Fitz understood. Mr Burgrave was suffering acutely in being carried
over the rough ground, and he feared lest some sound extorted from him
by the pain should acquaint Mabel with the fact. The litter and its
bearers dropped behind, and if now and then a groan was forced from
the Commissioner’s lips, his rival, at any rate, felt no contempt for
the involuntary weakness. Before half of the journey had been
accomplished, a relief party, headed by Dick, met them, and Mr
Burgrave was transferred to a charpoy carried by natives, after Dr
Tighe had made rough and ready use of the splints and strapping
Georgia had sent. A little later a detachment of the Khemistan Horse
passed at a smart trot in the direction of the gorge. It was not now
the rule, as in the early days of General Keeling’s reign, for the
regiment to sleep in its boots, but it was still supposed to be ready
day and night to trace the perpetrators of any outrage and bring them
to justice--rough justice, sometimes, but none the less impressive for
that. The sight gave Mabel a sense of safety and comfort, and she
scouted Flora’s proposal that she should come home with her for the
night.

“As if I would leave Georgie alone, with all this extra work on her
hands!” she said, as they turned in at the gate.

“Oh, Mab, is it true about the Commissioner?” cried Georgia, coming
out to meet them on the verandah.

“Yes; I am afraid he’s dreadfully hurt, poor man!”

“Was he riding with you when he fell?”

“He--he was riding after me,” said Mabel cautiously.

Georgia threw up her hands. “Oh, if you could only have hurt any other
man, or taken him to any house but this!” she cried; and Mabel thought
it both unkind and unfair, considering the circumstances.




 CHAPTER VIII.
 WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION.

Hark! what was that? Mabel sprang up in bed, her heart beating
furiously, her hands clammy with fear. There was the sound of horses’
feet, the rattling of bridles, on every side. A wild impulse seized
her to creep under the dressing-table--to hide herself anywhere, but a
moment later she laughed aloud. The very last thing before going to
bed, Dick had told her for her comfort that not only would the usual
Sikh sentry keep guard over the Commissioner’s slumbers, but the
compound would be patrolled all night by the Khemistan Horse. She
crept to the window and peered out between the slats of the venetians.
Yes; there they were--splendid men with huge turbans, and
accoutrements glittering in the moonlight--pacing slowly to and fro
upon their stout little horses. But how was it that there were two of
them at that far corner of the compound, where she could scarcely
distinguish their figures, and why had they paused as though to listen
for something? Mabel listened too, and presently, above the nearer
noises of trampling hoofs and jingling bits, she heard the approach of
a galloping horse. Was it a scout coming in to give warning of a
threatened attack? But no; the two men at the corner sat motionless on
their horses, and as the sound came nearer and nearer she saw the
flash of their tulwars. They were saluting--whom or what? Mabel
strained her eyes to see, but could distinguish nothing. Then she
remembered. It was General Keeling to whom they were doing honour, as
he rode his periodical rounds, watchful for the safety of his old
province. A cold sweat broke out all over her, and in a panic of which
she was heartily ashamed even at the moment, she scurried back to bed
and gave herself up to more and more violent paroxysms of horror. Of
what use were sentinels against such a visitant as this? Suppose it
was his will to come closer, to come up to the house, to enter? What
could be more likely? She lifted her head for a moment and listened
again. Surely that was a horse’s tread upon the drive, approaching the
door? In reality, the intruder was only one of the patrols, but in the
state of ungovernable terror in which Mabel was plunged this did not
occur to her, and she buried her head under the bed-clothes and
screamed.

The ayah, roused from her heavy slumbers by her mistress’s shrieks,
came shivering to her side and tried to quiet her, but finding her
entreaties of no avail, ran for help. Presently Georgia glided in,
looking like a reproachful ghost herself, in a white dressing-gown,
and proffered Mabel three tabloids and a glass of water, as sternly as
if she had been Queen Eleanor handing Rosamund the poison.

“I’ll sit by you till you are asleep,” she whispered; “but you mustn’t
make such a noise. You’ll wake the Commissioner, and he has only just
dropped off to sleep, poor man!”

“I know I’m a fearful baby,” confessed Mabel, restored to calmness by
the eminently practical nature of Georgia’s benevolence, “but I was so
horribly frightened. Is poor Mr Burgrave very bad?”

“It was a nasty accident,” replied Georgia, with professional caution.

“What have you done to him?”

“Strapped up the broken ribs, and applied ice to the leg and slung it
up.”

“Ugh, cruel creature! ice this cold night? I suppose it’s because you
hate him so much?”

“Hate him? What nonsense! How could we hate a man who has got hurt in
trying to save you? He’s so brave about it, too.”

“And he didn’t mind having you for a doctor?”

“Of course I was only helping Dr Tighe. But even if Mr Burgrave
disliked my being there, he wouldn’t show it. When Dr Tighe told him
he had better stay in this house until the splint is taken off, and
not run the risk of jarring the limb, he looked at me, and said, ‘If
my presence is not too troublesome to my kind surgeon here.’”

“And smiled at you like a father. _I_ know,” said Mabel, with sleepy
sarcasm. “Georgie,” she roused herself suddenly, “I want to know--how
is----”

“Now, I will not answer another question to-night,” said Georgia
resolutely. “I am going to read to you till you fall asleep.”



When Mabel awoke in the morning she felt oppressed by an intolerable
burden. Body and mind seemed to be alike tired out, and it was an
effort even to open her eyes. Georgia and Dr Tighe were in the room
looking at her, and the sight of them reminded her that there was some
question she wanted to ask, but she could not remember what it was.

“Well, Miss North,” said Dr Tighe, “nerves a bit jumpy this morning,
eh? We’ll allow you a day in bed to settle them a little, but after
that you must get up and help Mrs North to look after her patient.”

“Oh, I’ll get up to-day,” said Mabel faintly.

“No, no; don’t be in too great a hurry. Your brother will come in to
ask you a question or two in a few minutes, and afterwards you shall
try what a little more sleep and a little more slumber will do for
you. It’s quite evident that nature never meant you for a
frontierswoman.”

“Oh, Doctor,” expostulated Georgia, “think what she has gone through
since she came here, and only out from home such a short time!
Besides, nothing so bad as this has ever happened in our neighbourhood
before.”

“At any rate, it’s the sort of thing you want to take to young if
you’re to shine in it,” said the doctor. “Life in these parts is not
exactly pretty, but it has its exciting moments. Nothing like what it
had once, though. A predecessor of mine under General Keeling used to
head cavalry charges and take forts in the intervals of his medical
duties. I have no pleasant little recreations of that sort for my
leisure hours. Now, Miss North, don’t let me see you dare to smile at
the thought of my heading a cavalry charge. There was some object in
training in those days, but naturally a man puts on weight when
there’s nothing to do but potter about an hospital.”

“You see you’re not the only person in the world who hankers after
thrilling experiences, Mab,” said Georgia, as she left the room with
the doctor, and the words recalled to Mabel their conversation of
three weeks since. Stretching out her hand, she took a mirror from the
toilet-table and glanced at herself in it, only to drop the glass in
horror. What a hollow-eyed wreck she looked! Was it possible that one
night could work such a change? She had had her wish and tried
experiments in reality, and she recoiled from the result.

“On the whole, I think I prefer the pleasing fictions of ordinary
English life,” she said to herself.

“Good-morning, Mab,” said Dick’s voice, following a knock at the door.
“I’m not going to disturb you long, but I want you to tell Tighe and
me what you can remember about last night’s business. It’s necessary
for me to know, or I wouldn’t bother you.”

With a shudder Mabel let her thoughts return to that homeward ride for
a moment, then looked up suddenly. “Oh, now I remember!” she said. “My
head is so stupid, I couldn’t think of it before. How is Mr Brendon?”

Both men had expected her to ask after the Commissioner, and Brendon’s
name took them by surprise. “Brendon? Oh, he’s--he’s as well as he can
be,” said Dr Tighe hastily, recovering himself first.

“But how can he possibly be well? His arm must have been nearly cut
off. He fell down under the horses’ feet. Oh, you don’t mean--he can’t
be----?”

The silence was a sufficient answer, and she turned her face to the
wall with a moan. Brendon dead--for whom her kindliest feeling the
evening before had been a more or less good-natured contempt--and he
had practically given his life for her!

“Look here, Mab,” said Dick earnestly; “it won’t do the poor fellow
any good to cry about him just now. What we want is evidence to
convict the villains who did it.”

“Have you caught them?” came in a muffled voice from the bed.

“I hope so. Winlock, who went out to track them last night, had his
own ideas on the subject, and posted part of his detachment in hiding
among the rocks round Dera Gul. A little before dawn three men rode
up, coming from Nalapur way--not from our direction--but they and
their horses were all dead-beat. Winlock arrested them, feeling pretty
certain they were the men he wanted, and had made a long round to
avert suspicion before going home. They were Bahram Khan’s servants,
sure enough, but he said they had been to Nalapur for him, and he
offered no objection to their being arrested. When you are better we
must see if you can identify any of them, but now all I want is to
know roughly what happened, on account of the--inquiry, which must
take place to-day.”

Thus stimulated, Mabel told her tale, helped out by questions from
Dick, but breaking down more than once. He took down what she said,
and the doctor signed it as a witness, and then they left her to
Georgia’s ministrations. Georgia found her patient excited and
tearful, and sent Rahah at once to the surgery to make up a composing
draught.

“Now, Mab, lie down and try to be quiet,” she said.

“No, I won’t lie down. I can’t sleep,” cried Mabel. “Isn’t it
dreadful, my having to identify those men? I can’t bear to think of
it. And it brings it all back so vividly--the horrible helplessness--I
could do nothing--_nothing_--to save myself. I think I should have
gone mad in another moment if Mr Anstruther had not come up. And now
to have to go and look at them in cold blood, and say that I recognise
them! Isn’t there any way out of it? Oh, Georgie, can’t Dick make my
syce turn Queen’s evidence?”

“I’m afraid not,” said Georgia reluctantly. “The fact is, Mab, your
syce didn’t wait to be caught. He went off while we were at the
picnic.”

“Oh, well,” said Mabel despairingly, “then I must do it, I suppose. It
seems a kind of duty, as poor Mr Brendon was killed in trying to save
me, to have the men who killed him punished. But it’s awful to think
that three men will be hanged just because I saw their faces! They
will be hanged, won’t they?”

“I don’t know, really. It is very dreadful, Mab, but there is one good
thing about the whole affair. It may put things right on the frontier.
Both Dick and I think Bahram Khan was so confident of Mr Burgrave’s
support that he ventured on this outrage feeling sure that he would
see him through. If these three men are proved to be his agents, it
must open the Commissioner’s eyes. He’s an Englishman and an
honourable man, though dreadfully mistaken, and he can’t go on backing
him up after that. In fact, I’m sure he wouldn’t want to.”

“No, I don’t think he would. And I suppose there is no question about
it really? What do other people think?”

“None of the men here have a doubt that it was Bahram Khan’s doing. As
for the regiment, they are so indignant over the insult offered to
Dick in attempting to carry off his sister, that they would like to
raze Dera Gul to the ground forthwith.”

“Oh, that’s the light in which they look at it? They don’t think of my
feelings in the matter at all?”

“I’m afraid not. You and I are merely Dick’s chattels in their eyes,
you see.”

“I may be, but you are not. My ayah Tara tells me all sorts of
wonderful things about you, Georgie, which she picks up from the other
servants. Do you know that when you kiss Dick before he starts in the
morning, they think you are putting a spell upon him to keep him safe
all day, and bring him back to you all right at night?”

Georgia blushed like a girl. “That is really rather sweet,” she said.
“Rahah despises the people round here too much to tell me anything
they say about us.”

“Oh, Georgie,” cried Mabel, with sudden envy, “I would give anything
to care for any one as you do for Dick! You look quite different when
you talk about him. If only I wasn’t such a cold-hearted wretch! I
wish I had cared for poor Mr Brendon, even; that would be better than
caring for no one but myself.”

She broke into a storm of tearless sobs, and Georgia hailed the
appearance of Rahah with the sleeping-draught, which she was obliged
to administer almost by force. It was some time in taking effect, but
at last the sobs died away, and she was able to leave the patient in
charge of her own ayah, while she went about her other duties. Not
until the morning of the next day did Mabel wake again, very much
ashamed of her behaviour, which she was conscious had not been exactly
in accordance with the high aspirations she had formerly confided to
Georgia. Resolved to redeem her character, she sprang out of bed at
once, and when Georgia came into her room on tiptoe, expecting to find
her asleep, she was already dressed.

“Let me do something to help you,” she said eagerly. “You must have
had a fearful amount of extra work thrown on you yesterday. What can I
do?”

“Well, if you are so benevolently inclined, you might sit with the
Commissioner a little,” said Georgia. “He was asking for you all day,
and rather suspected us of concealing something dreadful from him.”

“Very well,” said Mabel readily. The proposal exactly fell in with her
wishes, for she had conceived a magnificent idea while dressing. By
her diplomacy she would induce the Commissioner to reverse his
frontier policy.

“Miss North!” Mr Burgrave started up from his pillows as Mabel entered
the sickroom, but becoming suddenly conscious of his injuries, he sank
back again stiffly. “Excuse my left hand,” he added. “The other is off
work just now. And how are you? Really not much the worse?”

“I had no business to be any the worse,” returned Mabel. “Nothing
happened to me, thanks to you and--the others.”

“Ah, but the shock to the nerves must have been exceedingly severe,”
said Mr Burgrave soothingly. “As I remarked to Tighe yesterday, Mrs
North would have got over anything of the kind in an hour or two, but
you are much more highly strung.”

Mabel was vaguely aware that the comparison was intended to be in her
own favour, but she could not agree that the advantage was on her
side, and she changed the subject hastily. “I don’t know how to thank
you for what you did. Every time I think of that evening I feel more
and more how grateful I ought to be. And I am, indeed, but I can’t say
what I should like.”

Mr Burgrave raised his hand. “Please don’t, Miss North, or you will
make me more miserable than I am already. How can I forget that I did
nothing to help you? Mr Anstruther had that happiness, while I was
lying on the ground under my horse.”

“But you tried--you did all you could--you are so terribly hurt!”
protested Mabel.

“Yes, and that is my only comfort. I was hurt, and therefore I am
here. No, on second thoughts, I don’t even envy Anstruther. He did the
work, but I have basely annexed the reward. To have rescued you was
happiness enough for him. I, who was unsuccessful, am consoled by
finding myself under the same roof with you for a fortnight. That is
enough for me.”

“How nice of you to say so!” Mabel rose. “Then I can leave you alone
quite happily, and go and help Georgia?”

“Miss North, you are not going already? What have I said to drive you
out of the room? Do you want me to pine away in melancholy solitude?
After all, I did try to rescue you, as you were kind enough to say
just now; but it will need your constant society and conversation to
keep me from brooding over my failure.”

“I’m afraid my society won’t be very cheerful,” said Mabel, resuming
her seat with a sigh. “You see, I can’t help feeling that what
happened was a good deal my fault. If I had only told what I knew----”

“Well?” asked Mr Burgrave anxiously, as she paused.

“Ah, but if I had, you would not have believed it,” was the unexpected
response, “any more than you would now.”

“Do you think I should be so rude as to question your word?”

“You will when I tell you that I know the men who tried to carry me
off were agents of Bahram Khan’s.”

“You have evidence to support this very serious charge, I presume? Are
you able to identify the men?”

“I suppose so; I haven’t tried yet. But, Mr Burgrave, I’m going to
tell you something that only my sister-in-law knows--not even my
brother, for I wouldn’t let her say anything to him. Bahram Khan did
want to--to marry me.”

“What?” cried the Commissioner, starting up again. “You don’t mean to
say that he has ever ventured to--to suggest such a thing to you?”
Rage and disgust strove for the mastery in his voice.

“Oh no, he has never said anything to me; but the day I was at Dera
Gul the women talked of nothing else.”

“Oh, the women!” Mr Burgrave spoke quite calmly again, and with
evident relief. “You must remember that Bahram Khan is a good deal
more advanced in his notions than the other Sardars of the province,
and would like to imitate our ways with regard to ladies--English
ladies, I mean. That is just the sort of thing that native women can’t
understand. Any polite attention he might offer you would be
misconstrued by them into a cause for violent jealousy. Their mistake
made things extremely unpleasant for you at the moment, no doubt; but
you need not torment yourself with thinking that he had any such
preposterous idea in his head.”

Mr Burgrave did not actually say that a lady accustomed to universal
admiration was liable to perceive it even where it did not exist, but
this was what Mabel understood his slightly repressive tone to imply.
Ignorant of the Eye-of-the-Begum’s secret mission to Georgia, she
could not defend herself against the suggestion, and she grew crimson.

“Why don’t you say that I imagined the whole thing?” she demanded.
“It’s not an experience I am proud of, I assure you. I told it you
purely in the hope that it might open your eyes a little, but since
you prefer to regard Bahram Khan as an interesting martyr----”

“Pray don’t mistake me, Miss North. If I believed that Bahram Khan had
really devised this dastardly plot against you, I would hunt him down
like a bloodhound until he was delivered up to justice, though that
would mean the death of all my hopes for this frontier. In one way, of
course, it would simplify matters a good deal. I am not in the habit
of bothering ladies with politics, but there can be no harm in saying
that it gives me great pain to differ from a man I respect as I do
your brother. He has done so much for the frontier that it seems
almost presumption in me, a new-comer, to set my opinion above his.
However, I have formed that opinion after long and careful study of
the Khemistan problem, and only the very strongest proof that I had
been mistaken could induce me to alter it. But if you should be able
to identify Bahram Khan’s servants as your assailants, it would be
conclusive evidence that he is not the man I take him to be.”

“And then you would see that Dick was right, and leave him to manage
things in his own way?”

“My dear Miss North, we are now soaring into the domain of
improbabilities. If my opinion were once modified, it is possible that
your brother’s view might prevail, or again, it might not.”

“I am certain he would not be sorry if Bahram Khan was proved to be
untrustworthy,” was Mabel’s mental comment. “It would show him a way
out of his difficulty. And now I shall be able to do it.”

Mabel was particularly cheerful all the rest of the day, as indeed she
had a right to be, for was she not about to secure the safety of the
frontier? Warned by her experience of the morning, she made no further
attempt to entrap Mr Burgrave into a political discussion, but
contented herself with showing in numberless little ways her gratitude
for the concession he was prepared to make. She even welcomed his
offer to introduce her to the beauties of Robert Browning, a poet
whose works she had been wont to regard with the mingled alarm and
dislike which, in the case of a modern young lady, can only spring
from ignorance of them. He sent a servant back to the bungalow he had
occupied to fetch the two portly volumes which, as he told her, always
formed a part of his travelling library, and she read aloud to him
without a murmur a considerable portion of “Paracelsus.” Under the
combined influence of his favourite poet and the reader’s voice, the
Commissioner forgot alike his injuries and the difficulties which
beset his policy, and the household fairly basked in his smiles. This,
at least, was what Fitz Anstruther said, but he had happened to
intrude upon the reading as the bearer of an important message from
Dick, and was adversely affected by the peaceful scene.

The next morning, as Dick was going to his office, Mabel intercepted
him in the verandah. “I am ready to identify those men as soon as you
like, Dick,” she said.

He looked at her in surprise. “Wouldn’t you rather wait until you have
recovered a little from the shock?” he asked.

“Oh no, I’m all right now. I should like to get it over, Dick.”

“Well, you certainly seem to have picked up wonderfully. I suppose
there’s no doubt of your knowing them again?”

Mabel shuddered. “How could I help recognising them? The red light,
and those awful faces--it seems as if the whole thing was photographed
on my mind. I should know them anywhere.”

“Oh, all right. It would be far worse, you know, to try to identify
them and fail than to let the thing go altogether.”

“You needn’t be afraid. Only I should be glad not to have to look
forward to it much longer.”

“Very well. No doubt it’s better to do it before the impression has a
chance of fading from your mind. It’s a bother about the Commissioner,
though. He insists on being present, and Georgie and Tighe say he
mustn’t on any account be allowed to move until they have wired his
knee. We shall have to carry his bed out on the verandah, I suppose.
Just like him to think the show can’t go on without him. Of course
he’s afraid we shall contrive to bring his precious _protégé_ in
guilty in some underhand way.”

Mabel smiled as Dick went down the steps, for she knew better. Mr
Burgrave’s anxiety was not so much for Bahram Khan personally as for
his own schemes, and not so much for them as for the continuance of
his friendship with the North family. This knowledge, and the pleasing
conviction that she alone possessed it, sustained her when she was
summoned in the afternoon to identify her three surviving assailants.

“Come along,” said Dick, entering the drawing-room; “they’re all here,
and Tighe has superintended the removal of the distinguished patient.
They’re in the verandah outside his room. Don’t be frightened, Mab.
Georgia shall come too, and support you.”

In spite of her resolution, Mabel trembled a little as she entered the
improvised police-court, realising once more what issues hung upon her
words. Fitz was there, and a Hindu clerk, and the Commissioner,
propped up in bed. Before them stood a dozen natives with turbans and
clothes of various degrees of picturesque dirt and raggedness, guarded
by as many dismounted troopers armed to the teeth.

“Now, Mab, pick ’em out,” murmured Dick, from behind his sister.

“But there are too many men here. There were only three left,”
objected Mabel, in a hasty whisper.

“Well, and you have to tell us which they were. You didn’t think we
were going to parade the three prisoners and invite you to swear to
them, did you? Now don’t waste the time of the court.”

Absolute despair seized upon Mabel as she stood in front of the line
of men, and looked shrinkingly into their faces. How was it possible
that so many natives, differing presumably in origin and
circumstances, could be so much alike? Not one of them blenched under
her timid scrutiny. Some looked stolid and some bored, and one or two
even amused, but this gave her no help. At last, however, it struck
her that there was something familiar in one or two of the faces. She
moved a step or so in order to examine them more carefully, and then
looked round at Dick and the rest.

“This man,” she said, pointing to one, “and that one, and this.”

“You are certain?” asked Mr Burgrave.

“Yes; I know their faces quite well.”

This time an undisguised smile ran momentarily along the line of
swarthy countenances, only to disappear before Dick’s frown.

“Take them away,” he said to the troopers, and with a clanking of
chains here and there, the prisoners and their guard departed.

“What is the matter?” asked Mabel in bewilderment, as she looked from
one to the other of the three chagrined faces before her. “What have I
done?”

“Oh, only identified as your assailants one of the _chaprasis_ and a
sowar in mufti and the gardener’s son, who were all peacefully going
about their lawful business at the time of the outrage,” said Dick
bitterly. “You have made us the laughing-stock of the frontier.”

“But--but weren’t the real men there at all?”

“Of course they were, but you passed them over.”

“And what will happen to them now?”

“They’ll be discharged for lack of evidence, that’s all. Bahram Khan
will testify that they had been to Nalapur on an errand for him, and
other witnesses will swear that they saw and spoke to them there, and
we can say nothing.”




 CHAPTER IX.
 WOUNDED HERO AND MINISTERING ANGEL.

 “‘Are we not halves of one dissevered world,
 Whom this strange chance unites once more? Part? never!
 Till thou, the lover, know; and I, the knower,
 Love--’”

read Mabel, and paused, since it was evident that her auditor had some
remark to make.

“It has always seemed to me,” said Mr Burgrave, “that in this meeting
between Paracelsus and Aprile, whose characteristics are so
essentially feminine, the poet has typified for all time the union of
the masculine and feminine elements in human nature. Woman--the
creature of feeling, man--the creature of reason, neither complete
without the other. Before perfection can be attained, the lover must
learn to know, the knower to love.”

“All women are not creatures of feeling,” said Mabel.

“But you would scarcely say that any woman was a creature of reason?
Such a--a person would not be a woman. She would be a monstrosity.”

“I mean that I don’t think you can divide people by hard and fast
lines in that way. It’s perfectly possible for a man to be a creature
of feeling, and I know women who are quite as reasonable as any man.”

“Pardon me; you don’t altogether follow my argument. I yield to no one
in my admiration of the conclusions at which women arrive. They are
often--one might say very often--astonishingly correct, but they are
purely the result of a leap in the dark, and not of any process of
reasoning. And since this is so, no wise man can feel safe in acting
upon them, while where the lady--as is not infrequently the case with
her charming sex--is biassed by her personal feelings, they are liable
to be dangerously deceptive.”

Mabel closed the book with a bang. “I wonder,” she said angrily, “at
your talking in this way, as if I wasn’t horribly humiliated enough
already. It was simply a chance that I didn’t identify the right men,
and I _know_ just the same that it was Bahram Khan who employed them.”

Mr Burgrave raised his eyebrows slightly. “Indeed, my dear Miss North,
you must pardon my maladroitness. I assure you that I had no intention
whatever of alluding to the--let us say the disagreeable incident of
yesterday. I was dealing purely with generalities.”

“But you yourself know perfectly well--though you pretend not to think
so--that it was Bahram Khan,” persisted Mabel.

The Commissioner raised himself on his elbow and looked straight at
her, and Mabel quailed. “And is it possible,” he demanded, “that you
believe I am deliberately sheltering from justice, contrary to the
dictates of my own conscience, a wretch who has dared to raise his
hand against an Englishwoman--against a lady for whom I have the
highest regard? No, Miss North, you must be good enough to withdraw
those words. Even your brother and his wife are sufficiently just to
believe me an honourable man, although we differ on so many points.”

The stern blue eyes under the lowering brows seemed to pierce Mabel
through and through. She half rose from her chair, then sat down
again, and repressed with difficulty a threatened burst of tears.

“I--I didn’t mean that,” she faltered. “All I meant was that I didn’t
see how you could think anything else when we are all so sure of it.”

“Allow me to say that I credit you with the sincerity you refuse to
recognise in me. Your brother has a strong prejudice--there is no
other word for it--against Bahram Khan, which he has transmitted to
you, and you look at the facts in the light of that prejudice. I was
perfectly willing to be convinced of the young man’s guilt by the
merest shred of anything that could be called evidence, but none was
produced. The case against him broke down completely. Would you have
me withdraw my countenance from a man whom I conscientiously believe
to be innocent, and ruin all his prospects, simply on the score of an
unf-- unsupported opinion of yours? No, Miss North, I won’t believe it
of you. You must perceive that I am right.”

“But you said our intuitions were wonderfully correct, and that your
judgment was incomplete by itself,” urged Mabel.

“To be of any real value, the feminine intuition must be confirmed by
the masculine judgment. Its use is purely supplementary.”

“Oh, Mr Burgrave, you can’t really mean that! Why, my brother would
never dream of doing anything without consulting his wife. He thinks
most highly of her judgment.”

“Surely Major North is the best judge of his own affairs?” suggested
Mr Burgrave dryly. “If he has confidence in his wife’s judgment, it is
only natural he should wish to avail himself of it. Such would not be
my case, I confess, but then, the confidence would be wanting.”

“But, according to you, I ought to model my opinions on some one’s,”
said Mabel--“Dick’s, I suppose--and that’s just what you have been
scolding me for doing.”

“Dick’s?” said the Commissioner reflectively. “No, not Dick’s, I
think. That was not at all what I had in my mind, Miss North. And have
I been scolding you, or is that another mistaken intuition? You know
how gladly I would have accepted your view of Bahram Khan’s guilt, if
that had been possible?”

“I know you said so, and I hoped so much----” Mabel’s eyes were full
of tears.

“And do you know why that was?”

“No, indeed, I can’t imagine.” She spoke hastily, scenting danger. The
Commissioner smiled paternally.

“No? Then will you do me the favour to consider the matter? Ask
yourself why I was willing, even anxious, to be converted from my own
opinion. When you have arrived at the answer, I shall know.”

He smiled at her again from his pillows, but Mabel muttered something
incoherent and fled.

“I don’t know what to do!” she cried, in the seclusion of her own
room. “Does he think I am a baby, or a little school-girl? If he wants
to propose, why can’t he do it straight out, and take his refusal like
a man? I know how to manage that sort of thing. But to break the idea
to me gradually in this way, as if I was--oh, I don’t know what--a
sort of fairy that must be handled gently for fear it should vanish
into thin air--it’s insufferable! And the worst of it is, I can’t
quite make out how to stop it. I seem somehow to have got myself into
his power.”

To see as little of Mr Burgrave as possible, and to confine the
conversation to safe subjects when she did meet him, was the remedy
which naturally suggested itself, and Mabel did her best to apply it;
but, to her dismay, it did not appear to produce any effect. She had
even a distinct feeling that it was just what Mr Burgrave had
expected. Moreover, it was extremely difficult to put in practice. Now
that the operation had been performed on the patient’s knee, and the
leg fixed immovably in a splint, he was allowed to be lifted on a
couch, and thus to spend his days in the society of his hosts. Dick
was out as much as ever, and when Georgia was busy, it was obviously
Mabel’s duty to entertain the invalid. It is sad to relate that when
escape proved impossible, she was reduced to assuming an intense
interest in the study of Browning, toiling through “Sordello” with
astonishing patience. But if any valid excuse offered itself for
leaving Mr Burgrave to his own reflections, she embraced it gladly,
and when the arrival in the neighbourhood of one of the nomadic tribes
brought Georgia a sudden rush of patients, she volunteered at once to
help her in dealing with them.

The surgery in which Georgia received her visitors was a building
standing by itself in the compound, and approached by a special gate
in the wall, so that the ladies might come to see their doctor without
fear of encountering any rude masculine gaze. As an additional
precaution, when the wives of any of the chief men came to the
surgery, they brought a youth with them as attendant, who mounted
guard over a motley array of slippers at the door, and completed the
security against profane intrusion. Inside, Georgia dealt with the
cases individually in a small room at one end, while in the large room
the visitors sat on the floor in rows, looking at the pictures on the
walls, or listening casually to the Biblewoman, trained by Miss
Jenkins at the Bab-us-Sahel Mission, who sat among them and read or
talked. At the other end was another small room, where a patient and
her friends were occasionally accommodated when Georgia had any
special reason for wishing to keep the case under her own eye, and the
husband was more than usually indulgent. At other times there stood in
this room a spring bedstead, which was never used, but which the women
made up parties to inspect, personally conducted by Rahah. There was a
history attaching to this object of pilgrimage. Two years before a
lady globe-trotter of exalted rank, in the course of an adventurous
flying visit to the frontier, had spent a night at the Norths’, and
been stirred to enthusiasm by Georgia’s quiet but far-reaching work
among the women. Her Grace deplored sympathetically the absence of a
proper hospital, and offered to put her London drawing-room at Mrs
North’s disposal during her next visit home, that she might plead for
funds to establish one. Georgia pointed out, however, that the
smallness of the station, and the uncertain character of the
wanderings of the tribes, would probably result in leaving the
hospital empty for eleven months out of the year, while if Dick should
be transferred to another post, its _raison d’être_ would be gone.
The duchess was disappointed, but not crushed. Would Mrs North allow
her to send a gift, just one, to the surgery as it stood at present?
She could not bear to think of the terrible discomfort the poor sick
women must suffer.

Georgia consented, and after a time the gift arrived, brought
up-country at a vast expenditure of toil and money. It was a
regulation hospital bed, the very latest patent, which could be made
to roll itself the wrong way like a bucking horse, stand up on end,
kneel down like a camel, dislocate itself in unexpected places, and
perform other acrobatic feats, all by turning a handle. Rahah sat
before it in silent admiration for a whole morning, occasionally
pressing the wires gently down for the pleasure of seeing them rise
again. When she had drunk in this delight sufficiently, she ventured
to put the bedstead through its paces, rushing to summon her mistress
in joyful awe at each new trick she discovered. But so far, her
enjoyment was incomplete. To be perfect, the bed needed a patient to
occupy it, and at last one was brought in by her friends, crippled by
some rheumatic affection. Rahah herself laid her on the bed, only to
behold her leap from it immediately with the strength of perfect
health. There was an evil spirit in the bed, she declared. All other
beds sank when you lay down upon them, this one rose up. And in spite
of the wonderful cure of this first and only case, the bed was never
occupied again. It was talked of all along the frontier, the women
came for miles to see it, and watched in shuddering delight while
Rahah showed them what it could do; but it was only very rarely that a
heroine could be found bold enough even to touch it with a finger.
Meanwhile, the patients continued to sleep on their mats or their
charpoys, insisting that the bed should be turned out of the room
before they would take up their quarters there, lest the evil spirit
should seize upon them during the hours of darkness.

On this particular morning Rahah was exhibiting the wonders of the bed
to a party of new arrivals, and Mabel was deputed to see that the
patients were admitted into Georgia’s sanctum in proper order, and
only one at a time. Seeing that they were all comfortably seated
facing the Biblewoman, she thought it would be best to begin with
those nearest the door, thus going through the whole assemblage
methodically. The women, on the other hand, considered that the worst
cases ought to be seen first, and each woman was firmly convinced that
her own case was the worst of all. Hence arose an uproar, in which the
sympathising friends accompanying each would-be patient joined with
all the force of their lungs, besieging the unfortunate Mabel, who
could not understand a word, with a tumult of assertions,
contradictions, and maledictions. At last one woman, who carried a
baby, was seized with a bright idea. Flinging away a fold of her veil
from the child’s face, she held it out to Mabel, exhibiting the awful
condition of its eyes, which were almost sightless from neglected
ophthalmia, as an incontestable proof of her right to the first place.
The hint was not lost upon the other women, and in a moment Mabel was
surrounded by sights from which she recoiled in horror. At first she
was too much appalled to move, as each woman displayed triumphantly
the urgency of her own need, and then she turned sick and faint. The
agglomeration of so many miseries was too much for her. Rahah,
returning at the moment, left the outer door open, and this gave her
courage to escape. Pressing her hands over her eyes, she burst through
the astonished crowd, drank in a draught of pure fresh air, and then
fairly ran across the compound and back to the house. Mounting the
steps with difficulty, she staggered and caught at the rail to steady
herself, only avoiding a fall by a wild clutch at one of the pillars
when she reached the top. An exclamation of concern reached her ears,
and she became dimly conscious that Mr Burgrave was making desperate
efforts to rise from his couch.

“You are ill, Miss North! What is it? You don’t mean to say that
another attempt has been made----?”

“To carry me off? Oh no, not quite so near home.” Mabel laughed a
little, and as she began to see more clearly, noticed how the
remorseful anxiety in his face gave place to unfeigned relief. “No,
I’m not ill, only silly and faint.”

“Try a whiff of this, then.” He passed her a bottle of salts. “I was
allowed to revive myself with it when my doctors had been
investigating the inside of my knee a little more closely than was
pleasant.”

“Oh, don’t!” cried Mabel faintly. “I never want to hear a doctor
mentioned again.”

“Why, what has happened? Has Mrs North turned vivisectionist?”

“No, of course not. It was only that I was helping her with her
patients, and they had such awful things the matter with them that
I--well, I ran away.”

“And very wisely. Do I understand that Mrs North required you to
expose yourself to the sight of these horrors? It is monstrous!”

“She didn’t ask me to come; I offered to help her.”

“In the hope of pleasing her, of course. It is all the same. In the
abundant strength of mind and body she possesses, she forgets that
other people are more delicately organised than herself. I am amazed
at her lack of consideration.”

“I won’t have you say such things about Georgia!” cried Mabel. “She is
the best and dearest woman I know.”

“I honour your enthusiasm. Pray don’t mistake me. I have the highest
possible esteem myself for Mrs North, but she is a little too
strenuous for my taste.”

“I wouldn’t have her the least bit different. I wish I was like her,
instead of being so silly and cowardly.”

“No, Miss North, let me beg of you not to wish that. I would not have
_you_ different. Your sister-in-law’s training and her past
experiences account for many--er--remarkable points in her character,
but, believe me, your true friends would rather see in you this
womanly shrinking from the sight of suffering than a bold
determination to relieve it.”

“I hope I may consider you one of those true friends?” Mabel tried to
infuse a note of strong sarcasm into her voice.

“I hope you may. It is difficult, is it not, to feel confidence in one
who differs so totally from Mrs North and her husband? But this is a
question upon which we will not enter--yet.”

“Could I say that I preferred to enter upon it at once?” Mabel
demanded angrily of herself when she had made her escape. “Somehow he
gets such an advantage over me by putting me down in that lofty way,
and yet I don’t know how to stop it. The idea of his daring to
criticise Georgie to me!”

But Mr Burgrave was even bolder than Mabel imagined. Returning the
next morning from a ride with Fitz Anstruther, she was greeted by a
laugh from Georgia as she mounted the steps.

“Oh, Mab, I have been having quite a scolding, and all about you! It’s
clear that I am not worthy to have such a sister-in-law.”

“Georgie! you don’t mean that Mr Burgrave has been so rude as to----”

“Now, Mab, you know better than that. It would be impossible to him to
be rude. He simply took me to task, very mildly and calmly, about the
way I neglect you, though I stand to you in the place of a mother----”

“Nonsense!” exclaimed Mabel, her face scarlet.

“So he says. It seems I am lacking in the tenderness which should be
lavished upon you. Our rough frontier life ought to be tempered to you
by all sorts of sweetness and light which I have made no attempt to
supply. I have been inconsiderate in bringing you into contact with
the revolting details of my professional work, and a lot more. Do
forgive me, Mab. I really haven’t meant to do all these dreadful
things, but you did want to make acquaintance with realities, you
know.”

“That man is getting unbearable!” broke from Mabel. “I shall speak to
him--No, I shan’t,” she added wearily; “it’s no good. He gets the
better of me somehow or other. Can’t you put a little cold poison into
his medicine, Georgie? Surely it’s a case in which the end would
justify the means.”

She went indoors with rather a forced laugh, and Fitz, who had been
looking out over the desert without appearing to notice what was being
said, turned round suddenly to Georgia.

“Can you honestly expect me to stand all this much longer, Mrs North?”

“All what?” asked Georgia, in astonishment.

“The Commissioner’s intolerable assumption. Any one would think he was
Miss North’s guardian, or her father, or even”--with a fierce
laugh--“her husband. What right has he to take it upon himself to
defend her?--as if she needed any defending against you! It’s nothing
but his arrogant impudence.”

“But still”--Georgia spoke with some hesitation--“how does it affect
you?”

“Oh, Mrs North, you needn’t pretend not to have noticed. You know as
well as I do that the Commissioner and I are both--er--well, we are
both awfully gone on Miss North, and he isn’t playing fair. You have
seen it, haven’t you?”

“I have, indeed, but I hoped you hadn’t quite found out what your real
feelings were.”

“Surely you must have thought me a hopeless idiot? I found out all
about it the day she had that fall from her horse.”

“So long ago as that? Why, you had scarcely known her a fortnight!”

“But I met her first years ago, before we went to Kubbet-ul-Haj.
Besides, what does it signify if I had only known her an hour? It is
the kind of feeling one can only have for one woman in one’s life.”

“But you didn’t say anything?” asked Georgia anxiously.

Fitz laughed shamefacedly. “No, I have said nothing even yet. The fact
is, it seemed sacrilege even to think of it. She is so lovely, so
sweet, so far above me in every way! Oh, Mrs North, I could rave about
her for hours.”

“And so you shall,” was the cordial but unexpected response, “as often
as you like, and I will listen patiently, provided that you still say
nothing to her.”

“No, no; things can’t go on in this way. You see, the Commissioner has
changed all that. He goes in and fights for his own hand in the most
barefaced way, and I must get my innings too. After all, though it
sounds horribly low to say it, I did kill the fellow that was carrying
her off, and bring her back.”

“Of course you did. If that was all, you certainly deserve to win
her.”

“Yes; but then the Commissioner scores in having got hurt. He sees her
for ever so long every day, and she is so awfully kind, talking to him
and reading to him, and letting him prose away to her, that no wonder
he thinks he is making splendid running. I only wish I had got hurt
too.”

“Do you really?” asked Georgia, with meaning in her tone.

“No, Mrs North, you’re right; I don’t. If we had both been hurt there
would have been no one with the slightest chance of catching up the
rascals. Whether she takes him or me in the end, I did save her, at
any rate.”

“Good,” said Georgia encouragingly. “I like that spirit.”

“Well, now you know how things stand. You see what an advantage the
Kumpsioner Sahib is taking of her gratitude and your kindness, and you
can guess how I feel about it. Tell me candidly, do you think I have
the slightest chance? Why did you say that you hoped I had not
understood my own feelings?”

“Simply because a waiting game is your only chance. Since you ask me,
I will speak plainly. You are younger than Mabel, you know; it is
undeniable, unfortunately”--as Fitz made a gesture of impatience--“and
Dick and I have got into the way of treating you like a son or a
brother--a very much younger brother. We haven’t taken you seriously,
and I am very much afraid Mabel doesn’t either. Mr Burgrave holds a
very high position, and he is a man of great distinction. We on this
frontier cherish an unfortunate prejudice against him, of course, but
elsewhere he is considered most charming and fascinating. How can she
but feel flattered by his homage? And he has undoubtedly acquired a
great influence over her; I can’t help seeing that. And yet I can’t
make out that she cares for him, and I have watched her closely.”

“Well, that is one grain of comfort, at any rate,” said Fitz
disconsolately. “But he is not going to carry her off without my
having the chance to say a word to her first, I can tell him.”

Georgia looked up anxiously. “Don’t throw away your only hope,” she
entreated. “What you have to do is to make yourself necessary to her.
You have been managing very well hitherto--always ready to do anything
she wanted. Make yourself so useful to her as a friend that she would
rather keep you as a lover than lose you altogether.”

“Oh, I say, Mrs North, you don’t flatter a man’s vanity much!”

“Yes, I do. At least, I am showing that I think you capable of a great
deal of self-effacement for the sake of winning her.”

“And if the Commissioner carries her off meanwhile?”

“I don’t think he will, provided you let her alone. But if you worry
her to have you, she may accept him just to be rid of your attentions.
And then there will be nothing to be done but to bear it like a man.”

“You don’t disguise the taste of your medicines much, Mrs Dr North.
I’ll chew the bitter pill as I ride, and try to look as if I liked it.
I was to meet the Major at the old fort at ten o’clock. It’s awfully
good of you to have listened so patiently to my symptoms, and
prescribed for me so fully.”

He ran down the steps and rode away, arriving at the fort a little
late, to find that Dick was already discussing with Colonel Graham the
business on which they had come. A series of small thefts, irritating
rather than serious, had occurred on the club premises of late, and
the minds of the members were exercised over the question of their
prevention in future. As Fitz rode up Dick and Colonel Graham were
descending to the courtyard after making the round of the walls, and
the former signed to him to wait where he was.

“I never remember such a succession of petty robberies before,” said
Colonel Graham. “The natives must be in a very unsettled state.”

“I’m not sorry these things have happened,” returned Dick. “In fact,
I’m glad of it.”

Colonel Graham glanced at him. “What have you got in your head?” he
asked.

“Simply this. I suppose you believe, as I do, that the thief gets in
by climbing over the wall, while the watchman is busy guarding the
gateway and never thinks that there is any other means of entering?”

“That’s my idea. In a climate like this mud-brick is bound to go
pretty soon if it isn’t looked after, and for years the rain has
washed it down into these rubbish-heaps, till they are as good as so
many flights of steps. What with the grass and bushes growing all
about, it’s as easy as possible to get in. I could do it myself.”

“Then you agree that it would be as well to make it harder? I propose
that we call a club meeting and invite subscriptions for the purpose
of putting the walls into proper repair. Otherwise we shall soon have
the place down on our heads.”

“But that sort of thing will take a long time to organise.”

“It needn’t, since it’s only to keep the natives from thinking there’s
anything up. So far as I can see, there’s no particular reason why you
and I shouldn’t head the subscription list with a thousand rupees
each--so that the most pressing work may be begun at once--or why that
two thousand rupees shouldn’t last out better than such a sum ever did
before.”

“Good! Are we to take the young fellows into our confidence?”

“Runcorn may as well know all about it. A sapper will be useful in
deciding what it’s possible to do in the time. Happily he and the
canal people have kept the wall overlooking the water in tolerable
repair. As for the other sides, we must clear away the rubbish from
the foot of the walls, and build up the parapets where the bricks have
weathered away. The bushes must go, naturally, and the ramparts be
made a fairly safe promenade--for the ladies, of course. The tower
stairs are awfully dangerous, and it will be quite natural to have
them seen to, and the floors and loopholes may as well be looked after
while we are about it, though we shall never get a satisfactory
flanking fire without rebuilding the whole thing. I shall take it upon
myself to present the place with a new gate--not obtrusively martial
in appearance, but with a certain reserve strength about it. My wife
will think me a terrible Vandal for spoiling the beautiful ruin her
father left behind him, but it’s obvious that the _chaukidar_ will be
able to look after the place better when there’s a gate to shut.”

“I should say there won’t be much ruin left when you have done with
it,” said Colonel Graham. “It’s a mere coincidence that our largest
godown turns out to be in the way of the canal extension works, and
has been condemned. There would be no harm in storing the corn and a
few other little trifles in the vaults under the club-house, and it
would give us an excuse for posting a sentry here at night.”

“Good,” said Dick, in his turn. “What accomplished deceivers we shall
be by the time this is over, if we live to see it!”

“You think things are in a bad way?”

“What do you think yourself?”

“I? I have no opinion. You have been on this frontier much longer than
I have, and you are in political charge. I’ve seen enough to know that
there’s something queer going on, that’s all.”

“I’ll tell you one thing that’s going on. Five times in the last
fortnight I have received secret information of tribal gatherings
which were to be held without my knowledge. Of course I made a point
of turning up, and behaving just as if I had received an invitation in
due form.”

“Well, that was all right, so far.”

“Yes, but think of the _jirgahs_ that I did not hear of. What went on
at them?”

“I see; it looks bad. What do you propose doing?”

“What ought to be done is to revive the martial law proclamation,
which has been in abeyance for the last four years. But I am not
supreme here just now.”

“Surely the Commissioner would not interfere with the exercise of your
authority?”

“The Commissioner has imbibed so many horrors about the Khemistan
frontier that he is pleased every morning to find himself alive, and
the house not burnt over his head. I believe he regards the
improvement as due to his own presence here, and at the same time
considers it an additional proof that Khemistan may now be governed
like all the other provinces. If I had things my own way, my very
first move would be to deport Burgrave, preferably to Simla, where he
could both be happy himself and a cause of happiness to others, but as
it is, he will probably deport me.”

“Then you believe he has some trick on hand too?”

“I’m sure of it. He is in constant communication with Government.
Beardmore and his clerks come to him every day”--Beardmore was the
Commissioner’s private secretary, and a man after his chief’s own
heart, of the type that considers it has successfully surmounted a
crisis when it has drawn up a state-paper on the subject, and has no
inconvenient yearnings after energetic action--“and he is busy with
them for hours, concocting a report on the state of the frontier, I
suppose. When that is finished, we may expect the blow.”

“What is it that you expect exactly? A friend of mine at headquarters
tells me there’s a persistent rumour----”

“That they intend to withdraw the subsidy, and cut loose from Nalapur?
Just so. And that means the deluge for us. The blessed word
Non-intervention will bring about the need for intervention, as
usual.”

“Our people will rise?”

“Not at first. Bahram Khan will probably remove his uncle quietly, and
in order to still any unpleasant rumours, encourage raids on us, which
will serve the further purpose of awakening the appetite for blood and
loot. The Sardars will be got to believe that we have only drawn back
in order to advance better, and that their one chance is to make the
first move. They will cross the border, and our people will join
them.”

“And we shall be thankful for the fort? North, in view of all this,
what do you say to sending the ladies down to Bab-us-Sahel for a
while?”

“I don’t know,” answered Dick hesitatingly. “I thought of suggesting
to my wife that she should go down there and do some shopping.”

“But you fancied she’d see through it? Probably. She was born and bred
here, and knows the weather-signs as well as you do. What’s the good
of trying to throw dust in her eyes? Put it to her plainly that, as
things are, you would feel much happier if she was away, and she’ll go
like a shot. Your sister and my Flora will go with her, and they’ll be
a pleasant party.”

“She won’t like going when there’s no sign of danger, and it might
precipitate the crisis, too. Perhaps when Burgrave launches his
thunderbolt----”

“If you could only get him to escort the ladies down at once, we might
pull through yet.”

“No fear,” said Dick bitterly, “until he’s done his worst.”




 CHAPTER X.
 GAINING A LOVER AND KEEPING A FRIEND.

“No bathing to-day, Mab!” laughed Georgia, meeting Mabel in her
riding-habit in the hall.

“You mean that we can’t ride? Why not?”

“Now you look just like the prehistoric lady in the picture! Because
there’s a dust-storm coming on. I meant to tell you before, but you
rushed away from the breakfast-table so quickly. I have been hurrying
Dick off, that he may get to the office before it begins.”

“But how do you know there’s going to be a dust-storm at all? I
thought that before they came on the sky was copper-coloured, and the
air got like an oven?”

“Well, the sky is getting black, as you can see. Dust-storms here are
not confined to the hot weather, they come all the year round. It’s
the merest chance that there hasn’t been one yet since you arrived.”

“How horrid that it should come just to-day!” said Mabel snappishly.
“I told Mr Anstruther I was tired of riding Simorgh, and he must
really bring Laili back. He said he couldn’t be sure she was cured
yet, and I told him he might use a leading-rein if he liked, but that
I meant to ride her. We weren’t going at all near the frontier, or
anywhere in the direction of Dera Gul.”

“My beloved Mab, dust-storms don’t respect British territory, and if
you had once been out in one you wouldn’t wish to repeat the
experience, even if you were in a position to do it. Go and take your
habit off, and when Mr Anstruther comes, I will tell him to send the
horses to the stables, and wait here until the storm is over. Then you
will have some one to talk to. See that the servants shut all your
windows.”

But when Mabel emerged again from her darkened room into the lighted
hall, the disappointment caused by the loss of her ride was mingled
with a certain amount of ill-humour, due to an even more untoward
occurrence. The ayah Tara had chosen this particular morning for
passing in review all her mistress’s best gowns and hats, with an eye
to any little repairs that might be necessary, and having taken the
garments from their respective boxes and spread them out all over the
room, had sat down to contemplate them for a while before setting to
work. She was not accustomed to the peculiarities of the Khemistan
climate, and the gathering darkness appeared to her only as the
precursor of a thunderstorm. Hence, when the first gust of raging wind
whirled a cloud of gritty dust through the open windows, she was as
much astonished as Mabel herself, who was entering the room at the
moment, and was almost knocked down. Both mistress and maid flew at
once to shut the windows, but in the wind and darkness this was by no
means an easy task, and before it could be accomplished the dust lay
thick all over the room and its contents. Such a _contretemps_ was
enough to provoke a saint, Mabel said to herself angrily, when she had
left the weeping Tara to do what she could to repair the mischief, and
it would be idle to deny that she was feeling very cross indeed as she
entered the drawing-room with a bundle of letters in her hand.

The shutters were closed and the lamps lighted as if it were night,
and the dust pattered like hail on the verandah whenever the howling
of the wind would allow any other sound to be heard. Fitz Anstruther
was sitting near the fireplace, looking through an old magazine, and
Mabel, rejecting his suggestion of a game of chess, seated herself at
the writing-table, saying that she must finish her letters for the
mail. She found it difficult to write, however, for although she would
not look up, she could not help being conscious that her companion’s
eyes were much oftener fixed on her than on the printed page before
him. Accustomed though she was to such homage from men, this time it
made her nervous, and at last she could bear it no longer.

“Wouldn’t you like something to do?” she demanded suddenly, turning
round and catching him in the act of looking at her, but he was equal
to the occasion.

“Something to do? Something for you, do you mean? May I really write
your letters for you? I’m sure the Major has given me plenty of
practice in that sort of thing, and your friends would be so surprised
to find you had set up a private secretary.”

“Thanks, but I don’t seem to be in the mood for letter-writing, and
certainly not for dictating.”

“Then may I hold a skein of silk for you to wind? That’s the sort of
thing they set a mere man down to in books.”

“I don’t use silk of that sort. Is there nothing you would like to
do?”

“Yes, awfully. I should like to talk to you.”

“I think I shall go and read to the Commissioner,” severely.

“It would only be wasting sweetness on the desert air. He’s perfectly
happy at this moment, with Beardmore plotting treason in a
confidential report, and about six clerks writing away for him as hard
as they can write, and he wouldn’t appreciate an interruption.”

“I suppose you are judging Mr Burgrave by yourself when you say he
will be happier if I keep away?”

“I? Oh no; I was judging him by himself. The Kumpsioner Sahib doesn’t
think ladies and affairs of state go well together, you know.”

“Indeed?” Mabel was bitterly conscious that she bore a grudge against
the Commissioner for this very reason, but she had no intention of
admitting the fact.

“Why, do you mean that he vouchsafes to talk shop to you alone, out of
all the world of women? What an important person you are, Miss North!
Think of having the run of the Commissioner’s state secrets! But of
course one can see why he does it. How unfairly people are dealt with
in this world! Why have I no official secrets to confide? Supposing I
spy round and amass some, may I expound them to you for three or four
hours a day?”

“What nonsense!” said Mabel, with some warmth. “Mr Burgrave is only
teaching me to appreciate Browning.”

“And you fly to state secrets for relief in the intervals! Miss North,
won’t you teach me to appreciate Browning? I’ll wire to Bombay at once
for the whole twenty-nine volumes, if you will.”

“I really have no time to waste----”

“Oh, how unkind! Consider the crushing effect of your words. Do you
truly think me such an idiot that teaching me would be waste of time?”

Mabel laughed in spite of herself. “You didn’t let me finish my
sentence,” she said. “I was going to say that it would be only a waste
of your time, too, to try to learn anything from me.”

“Never! Say the word, and I enrol myself your pupil for ever.”

“You must have a very poor opinion of me as a teacher, I’m afraid, if
you think it would take a lifetime to turn you out a finished
scholar.”

“How you do twist a man’s words! The fault would be on my side, of
course. I was going to say the misfortune, but it would be good
fortune for me,” Fitz added, in a low voice.

(“Now, if I don’t keep my head, something will happen!” said Mabel to
herself, conscious that the atmosphere was becoming electric.) Aloud
she remarked lightly, “Ah, you have given yourself away. Do you think
I would have anything to do with a pupil who was determined not to
learn?”

“Not if he has learnt all you can teach him?” demanded Fitz, rising
and coming towards her. “Please understand that there is nothing more
for me to learn. I want to teach you.”

“Oh, thanks! but I haven’t offered myself as a pupil,” with a nervous
laugh.

“No, it’s the other way about. I want to teach you to care for me as
you have made me care for you. Well, not like that, perhaps; I
couldn’t expect it. But you do care for me a little, don’t you?”

“Mr Anstruther!--I am astonished--” stammered Mabel.

“Are you really? What a bad teacher I must be! I know all the other
men are wild after you, of course, but I thought it was different,
somehow, between you and me, as if--well, almost as if we were made
for each other, as people say. I have felt something of the sort from
the very first. I love you, Mabel, and I think you do like me rather,
don’t you? You have been so awfully kind in letting me do things for
you, and it has driven all the rest mad with envy. I believe I could
make you love me in time, if you would let me try. There’s nothing in
the whole world I wouldn’t do for you. If only you won’t shut your
heart up against me, I think you’ll have to give in.”

He was holding her hands tightly as he spoke, and Mabel trembled under
the rush of his words. Was she going to faint, or what was the meaning
of that wild throbbing at her heart? Clearly she must act decisively
and at once, or this tempestuous young man would think he had taken
her by storm. She summoned hastily the remnants of her pride.

“Please go and sit down over there,” she said, freeing her hands from
his grasp. “How can I think properly when you are towering over me
like that?” Fitz did not offer to move, and by way of redressing the
inequality, she rose also, supporting herself by laying a shaking hand
upon the writing-table. “I am so very sorry and--and surprised about
this. I had no idea----”

“None?” he asked.

“I mean I never thought it would go as far as this--that you would be
so persistent--so much in earnest.”

“A new light on the matter, evidently.” As she grew more agitated,
Fitz had become calmer.

“Because it’s impossible, you know.”

“Excuse me, I don’t know anything of the kind.”

“You are a great deal younger than I am, for one thing.”

“Barely three years, and it’s a fault that will mend.”

“No, it won’t. As you get older, I shall get old faster, and if there
is a thing I detest, it is to see a young man with an elderly wife. I
could not endure to feel that I was growing old while you were still
in the prime of life. You would hate it yourself, too, and you would
leave off caring for me, and we should both be miserable.”

“Try me!” said Fitz, with a light in his eyes that she could not meet.

“And then there’s another thing,” she went on hurriedly. “I know it
sounds horrid to say it, but--it’s not only that three years--you are
so young for your age. I’m not a reasonable creature like Georgia; I
simply long to be made to obey, whether I like it or not. I feel that
I want a master, but I could make you do what I liked.”

“Could you? But perhaps I could make you do what I liked. Just look at
me for a moment.”

But Mabel covered her eyes. “No, I won’t. It sounds as if I had been
inviting you to master me, which wouldn’t be at all what I meant.
Please understand, once for all, that I don’t care for you enough to
marry you.”

“Very well. But you will one day. If I am young, there’s one good
thing about it--I can wait.”

“It’s no good whatever your thinking that I shall change.”

“That is my business, please. I presume my thoughts are my own? and I
feel that I shall teach you to love me yet.”

“I shouldn’t have thought,” said Mabel indignantly, “that it was like
you to persecute a woman who had refused you.”

“Don’t be afraid. I shall not persecute you; I shall simply wait.”

“And try to make me miserable by looking doleful? I call that
persecution, just the same. No, really, if you are going to be so
disagreeable, I shall have to speak to my brother, and ask him to get
you transferred somewhere else, and that would be very bad for your
prospects.”

Mabel thought that this threat sounded extremely telling, but to Fitz,
who had declined excellent posts in other parts of the province,
rather than quit the frontier which grows to have such a strange
fascination for every Khemistan man, it was less alarming.

“Don’t trouble to get protection from the Major, Miss North. I assure
you it won’t be necessary.”

“But am I to be kept in perpetual dread of having to discuss
this--this unpleasant subject? I think it is very unkind of you,” said
Mabel, with tears in her eyes, “for I had come to like you so much as
a friend, and you were always so useful, and now----”

“And now I intend to be quite as useful, and just as much your friend,
I hope, as before. Let us make a bargain. You may feel quite safe. I
won’t attempt to approach the unpleasant subject without your leave.”

Mabel looked at him in astonishment. “But I should never give you
leave, you know,” she said.

“As you please. Then the subject will never be renewed. I am content
to wait.”

“But what is the good of waiting when I have told you----”

“Come, I don’t think you can deny me that consolation, can you, when
you have the whole thing in your own hands? Is it a bargain?”

“It doesn’t seem fair to let you go on hoping----”

“That’s my own lookout,” he said again. “If your friend is always at
hand when you want him, surely he may be allowed to nurse his foolish
hopes in private--provided that he never exhibits them?”

“Very well, then,” said Mabel reluctantly. “But I don’t feel----”

“If I am satisfied, surely you may be?”

The entrance of a servant to unbar the shutters dispensed with the
need of an answer. Preoccupied as they had been during the last
half-hour, neither Fitz nor Mabel had noticed that the dust had ceased
to patter and the wind to howl. The storm was over, and once again
there was daylight, although rain was descending in torrents.

“Mab, the Commissioner was asking for you,” said Georgia, pausing as
she passed the door. “He has finished his morning’s work, and wanted
to know if you were ready for some Browning.”

“Oh yes, I’ll go at once,” said Mabel, anxious only to escape from
Fitz and the memory of their agitating conversation. It had shaken her
a good deal, she felt, and this made her angry with him. What right
had he to disturb her so rudely, and make her feel guilty, when she
had done nothing? It was with distinct relief that she met Mr
Burgrave’s benignant smile, and returned his morning greeting. He did
not appear to notice any perturbation in her manner, and she took up
the book, and turned hastily to the page where they had left off,
while Mr Burgrave, pencil in hand, settled himself comfortably among
his cushions, ready to call attention to any beauties she might miss
in reading the lines. If he was like Fitz, in that his eyes were fixed
on the fair head bent over the pages of “Pippa Passes,” he was unlike
Fitz in that their gaze escaped unnoticed.

“‘You’ll love me yet!--and I can marry--’” read Mabel, totally
unconscious of the havoc she was making of the poet’s words, but her
auditor almost sprang from his couch.

“No, no!” he cried. “I beg your pardon, Miss North, but the storm has
shaken your nerves a little, hasn’t it? Allow me,” and he took the
book from her hands, and read the poem aloud in a voice so full of
feeling that it went to Mabel’s heart.

  “‘You’ll love me yet!--and I can tarry
   Your love’s protracted growing;
  June reared that bunch of flowers you carry
   From seeds of April’s sowing.

  ‘I plant a heartful now; some seed
   At least is sure to strike--’”

What malign influence had brought the reading to this point just now?
Fitz might have used those very words. Involuntarily Mabel rose and
stood at the edge of the verandah, looking out into the rain. Her eyes
were filled with tears, but she stood with her back to Mr Burgrave,
and he did not see them. He read on--

  “‘And yield--what you’ll not pluck indeed,
   Not love, but, maybe, like.

  ‘You’ll look at least on love’s remains,
   A grave’s one violet;
  Your look?--that pays a thousand pains.
   What’s death? You’ll love me yet!’”

Was the seed springing already? A tear splashed into the gritty dust
that lay on the verandah-rail, and Mabel dashed her hand across her
eyes in an agony of shame. Mr Burgrave must have seen; what would he
think? But before she could even reach her handkerchief, the book was
thrown down, and Mr Burgrave had seized his crutch, and was at her
side.

“Mabel, my dear little girl!” he cried tenderly.

“Oh no, no; not you!” she gasped, horror-stricken.

“And why not, dearest? Forgive me for blundering so brutally. How
could I guess that the seed I had dared to plant was blossoming
already? I have watched it growing slowly day by day, so slowly that I
was often afraid it had not struck at all, and now, when it is
actually in full flower, I pass by without seeing it, and bruise it in
this heartless way. Forgive me, dear.”

“Indeed, indeed you are making a mistake!” cried Mabel, in a panic.
“It really isn’t what you think, Mr Burgrave. I don’t care for you in
that way at all.”

“My dear girl must allow me to be the judge of that. I can read your
heart better than you can read it for yourself, dearest. Do you think
I haven’t noticed how naturally you turn to me for refuge against
trouble and unkindness? It has touched me inexpressibly. Again and
again you have sought sympathy from me, with the sweetest confidence.”

“It’s quite true!” groaned Mabel, seeing in a sudden mental vision all
the occasions to which Mr Burgrave alluded.

“Of course it is, dear. You hadn’t realised how completely you trusted
me, had you? Other people thought--no, I won’t tell you what they
said--but I knew better. I was sure of you, you see.”

“What did other people say?” asked Mabel, with faint interest.

“Er--well, it was a lady in the neighbourhood.” Mabel’s thoughts flew
to Mrs Hardy with natural apprehension. “She was good enough to warn
me that you were--no, I will not say the word--that you were amusing
yourself with me. She had noticed, naturally enough, how inevitably we
drew together, but she ascribed your sweet trustfulness to such vile
motives as could never enter your head. I said to her, ‘Madam, to
defend Miss North against your suspicions would be to insult her. In a
short time, when you realise their baselessness, you will suffer as
keenly as you deserve for having entertained them.’ I could trust my
little girl, you see.”

“Oh, you make me ashamed!” cried Mabel, abashed by the perfect
confidence with which this stern, self-sufficient man regarded her.
“Oh, Mr Burgrave, do please believe I am not good enough for you. It
makes me miserable to think how disappointed you will be.”

“I should like to hear you call me Eustace,” said Mr Burgrave softly,
unmoved by her protestations. It occurred to Mabel, with a dreadful
sense of helplessness, that he regarded them only as deprecating
properly the honour he proposed doing her.

“Well--please--Eustace--” But Mr Burgrave kissed her solemnly on the
forehead, and she could stand no more.

“It’s too much! I’ll come back presently,” she gasped, and succeeded
in escaping. As she fled through the hall she met Georgia.

“Perhaps you’ll be interested to know that I’m engaged to Mr Burgrave,
Georgie!” she cried hysterically, rushing into her own room and
locking the door.



“That wretched man!” cried Georgia. “After all Dr Tighe and I have
done for his leg!”

“Didn’t know Tighe had any grievance against him about this,” grumbled
Dick. He was sitting on the edge of the dressing-table, ruefully
contemplating his boots, with his hands dug deep in his pockets. On
ordinary occasions Georgia would have requested him, gently but
firmly, to move, but now she was too much perturbed in mind to think
of the furniture. Delayed in starting by the dust-storm, Dick had only
returned from a hard day’s riding late at night, to find himself
confronted on the threshold, so to speak, by the triumphant
Commissioner, and requested to give him his sister.

“Oh, but he would be on our side, of course,” said Georgia. “Dick, I
do think it is horrid of Mr Burgrave to have proposed under present
circumstances. It’s as if he wanted to rob us of everything--even of
Mab.”

“No, he’s doing us an honour. He all but told me so. But he really is
absolutely gone on Mab. His whole face changes when he speaks of her.
Fact is, Georgie, if the man didn’t come rooting about on our very own
frontier, I couldn’t help having a sneaking liking for him. His belief
in his own greatness is perfectly sincere, and he cherishes no
animosity against us for opposing his plans. He told me that he hoped
political differences would make no break in our friendly
intercourse--Hang it! this thing’s giving way. Why in the world don’t
you have stronger tables?”

“Sit here,” said Georgia, pointing to the wicker sofa. “Well, Dick?”

“Well? It’s coming, old girl, coming fast, and he’s mercifully trying
to soften the blow to us.”

Georgia looked round with a shiver. The shabby bungalow with its
makeshift furniture was the outward and visible sign of the life-work
which she and her husband had inherited from her father, and it was to
be taken from them by the action of the man who hoped that his
arbitrary decree would be no obstacle to their continuing to regard
him as a friend.

“And what I think is,” Dick went on, “that they had better be married
as soon as possible, before Burgrave goes down to the river again, and
the blow falls.”

“But, Dick,” Georgia almost screamed, “you’re giving her no time to
repent.”

“Repent? I’m not proposing to kill her. Surely it would be better for
her to be married from this house than from a Bombay hotel? Besides,
we should have no further anxiety about her----”

“No further anxiety? Dick, if she marries him I shall never know
another happy moment. She doesn’t care a straw for him--it’s a kind of
fascination, that’s all, a sort of deadly terror. I can’t tell you
what it’s been like all day. She couldn’t bear me to leave them alone
a moment, and there was he beaming at her, and not seeing it a bit. He
thinks it’s all right for her to be shy and tongue-tied, and not dare
to meet his eye--the pompous idiot! Mab shy--and with a man! She’s
miserable--in fear of her life.”

“No, no, Georgie, that’s a little too thick. Mab is not a school-girl,
to let herself be coerced into an engagement, and it won’t do to stir
her up to break it off. You mustn’t go and abuse him to her. Be
satisfied with relieving your feelings to me.”

“Now, Dick, is it likely? Am I the person to give her an extra reason
for sticking to him? If I abused him she would feel bound to defend
him, and might even end by caring for him. I can’t pretend to
congratulate her on her choice, but she shall have every facility for
seeing as much of him as she can possibly want.”

“Vengeful creature!”

“No, that’s not it. I have no patience with her.”

“Ah, she has proved you a false prophet, hasn’t she? That’s
unpardonable.”

“She has done worse; I’m perfectly convinced that she refused the
right man before accepting the wrong one. And though she doesn’t
deserve it, I think she ought to have time to get things put right, if
she can.”

“Very well. Then the deluge will come first, that’s all.”

“How soon do you expect it?”

“Well, I gather from what the Commissioner says that his report is
nearly drawn up. As it’s only a pretext for a predetermined move, they
won’t take long to consider it. The decision will be intimated to me,
and I shall submit my resignation in return.”

“And then we shall fold our tents like the Arabs, and silently steal
away?”

“Not quite at once. We must stick on until they send up a man to
replace me, and carry out the new policy. The worst of it will be that
Ashraf Ali will know why I am resigning, and unless I can get him to
keep quiet, he will think himself free to break the treaty before our
side does. If Bahram Khan once gets to know what’s on hand, it’s all
up, for nothing will persuade the Sardars that we are not repudiating
the treaty as the first step to an invasion and the annexation of
Nalapur, and he will be there to lead them, if the Amir won’t. I hope
to goodness that Burgrave will have removed the light of his
countenance from us before then, but I suppose that’s sure to be all
right. He would hardly like to look as if he was hounding his intended
brother-in-law out of the province. Unfortunately it’s pretty certain
that rumours of my impending departure will begin to get about in some
mysterious manner as soon as his unfavourable report goes up, for his
plans seem doomed to leak out into the bazaar. I’m inclined to think
he has a spy about him somewhere. By-the-bye, Georgie, who is the
sweetseller you’ve allowed to hang about the place lately?”

“I, Dick? He told me you had said he might come.”

“Something fishy there, evidently. But he must have an accomplice
inside.”

“One of the Commissioner’s Hindu clerks, perhaps.”

“Possibly. Well, we’ll deal with him to-morrow.”




 CHAPTER XI.
 BEHIND THE CURTAIN.

As soon as Dick awoke in the morning, his talk with Georgia recurred
to his mind, and looking out of his dressing-room window, he called to
Ismail Bakhsh, whom he saw in the compound. From his long connection
with the family, the old soldier was regarded as the head of the
household staff.

“Has that sweetseller turned up yet, Ismail Bakhsh?”

“No, sahib, I have not seen him this morning.”

“Well, when he does, you can detain him. I want to ask him a question
or two.”

“The thing is done, sahib. If the protector of the poor would listen
to a word from this unworthy one----”

“Yes; what is it?”

“It was in my mind yesterday, sahib, to examine all the verandahs,
lest the storm should have shaken the pillars, and in so doing I found
that the work of the rats under the floors has been great and very
evil. Surely there are many places in which the planks are loose and
easy to be moved, but on this side of the house it is the worst.
Before the Kumpsioner Sahib’s rooms a man might even squeeze himself
in and hide under the verandah floor.”

“We shall never get rid of the rats until we have proper cement
floors--and it’s no good thinking of that now,” added Dick, half to
himself. “But are you sure there’s nothing worse than rats about,
Ismail Bakhsh? I don’t like the idea of that hole.”

“I also suspected evil, sahib, but having sent two of the servants’
sons in with lights, I was content when they found nothing.”

“I hope you nailed the boards firmly into their places?”

“I put them back, sahib, but why fasten them? There was no man inside,
and in case any should seek to enter, the hole should be blocked up
from within, not from without. Moreover, if the protector of the poor
would invite Winlock Sahib to bring his sporting dog to the house,
with your honour’s own dogs we might succeed in killing all the rats
before mending the floors.”

“Good idea! Ask the memsahib to give you a _chit_ to Winlock Sahib.
No; it had better be to-morrow. I shall be out all to-day.”

Ismail Bakhsh salaamed and departed, and Dick returned to his
dressing, neither of them dreaming that they were separated by nothing
but a half-inch plank from a man who had listened to the whole of
their colloquy. The bungalow, which had never been intended for a
permanent dwelling, had been run up in haste. Hence the contrast of
its somewhat ramshackle appearance with that of the substantial stone
houses in the cantonments, and hence also the perpetual worry caused
by the colonies of rats inhabiting the space under the floors, which
should have been filled up with concrete. However, since innumerable
complaints and remonstrances had brought nothing but vague promises
and an occasional snub from those in authority, Dick and Georgia
continued to live on in their unsatisfactory dwelling, and to wage
intermittent warfare against the rats. But the rats could not fairly
be accused of the worst of the damage of which Ismail Bakhsh
complained, for crouched under the boards lay the sweetseller, who had
effected an entrance by sliding out one of the planks from the front
of the verandah and pulling another aside, returning them to their
places when he had crawled in. His dark face paled when Ismail Bakhsh
suggested bringing the dogs, but when he heard Dick postpone the
rat-hunt to the next day, he breathed freely again.

“To-day is all I want,” he said to himself. “When I have once got the
paper for Jehanara Bibi from that accursed half-blood my work is done,
and Nāth Sahib may set his dogs on my track as much as he likes--and
his sowars too.”

He remained crouched in his lair all morning, until the Commissioner
had dismissed his clerks and hobbled round to the other side of the
house to look for Mabel. As soon as the sound of his crutch had become
inaudible in the distance, there was a hesitating tap on one of the
loose boards. It was answered by a bolder knock from below, the board
was pushed slightly aside, and a yellow hand, trembling as if with
ague, passed a roll of papers through the crack. The sweetseller
seized it, and pressed the fingers of the transmitter, which were
hurriedly withdrawn. The hidden man secreted the papers carefully in
his clothing, and crawled round to the front of the house, whence he
could watch through a peep-hole all that went on in this part of the
compound. When noon was come, and the servants had all betaken
themselves to their own quarters, he removed the sliding plank and
slipped out, bringing with him his stock in trade, and replaced the
board carefully. Having assured himself that Dick was nowhere to be
seen, he crossed the compound boldly, climbed the wall at a point
where various projecting stones and convenient hollows afforded a
foothold, and walked with dignified haste to the nearest sandhill. On
the farther side of this he buried his tray and his sweets in the
sand, and then, girding up his loins, set out resolutely in the
direction of Dera Gul.

Dusk had already fallen when he reached the fortress, where he
received a respectful greeting from the ragged guards, who informed
him that the chief was in his zenana. As soon as the news was brought
that Narayan Singh had returned, however, Bahram Khan sent word that
he should be admitted immediately--a high honour which was not seldom
the reward of the indispensable spy. Committing himself to the
guidance of one of the slave-boys, Narayan Singh passed behind the
curtain and into the anteroom, to discover Bahram Khan reclining upon
the divan in the easiest possible undress. The pleasant murmur of the
hubble-bubble, as he approached, prepared the visitor to find the room
full of smoke, and his master seemed at first too much engrossed with
his pipe to notice his entrance. Cross-legged in the corner sat the
Eurasian Jehanara, shrouded in her veil, her glittering eyes
reflecting the faint light which was shed by a brazier of glowing
charcoal.

“Peace, Narayan Singh!” said the Prince at last, taking the mouthpiece
of the long leathern tube lazily from his lips. “Is all well?”

“All is well, Highness. I have here a copy of the report of Barkaraf
Sahib to the Sarkar, from the hands of his confidential clerk.”

Jehanara laughed harshly. “Thou hadst but little difficulty with
Antonio D’Costa?” she said.

“What knowest thou of the swine?” asked Bahram Khan jealously.

“I have not seen him for many years, Highness, but he is my cousin,
and I was acquainted with his character as a youth, and heard of his
doings as a man. Knowing thy desire to learn the intentions of the
Kumpsioner Sahib, and hearing that my cousin was in his employ, it
needed only that I should instruct the skilful Narayan Singh to
approach him in the right way.”

“And I,” said Narayan Singh, “needed but to hold before his eyes the
copies of the bonds I had obtained from certain money-lenders, and
threaten to show them to Barkaraf Sahib, when he fell down on his
knees before me, and was ready to do whatever I might desire, for fear
of the ruin that threatened him.”

“It is well,” growled Bahram Khan. “But what does the report say?”

Narayan Singh took out the papers which had been handed to him in his
hiding-place, and laid them on the floor before Jehanara. She took
them up, and leaning forward, scrutinised the contents eagerly by the
dim light of the brazier.

“In this report,” she said, with deep satisfaction, “which the
Kumpsioner Sahib has just finished drawing up, he recommends the
immediate withdrawal of the subsidy, and the recall of Beltring Sahib
from Nalapur, on the ground that the treaty was merely a temporary
arrangement, the necessity for which has passed away.” Bahram Khan
laughed, and she went on. “The Amir Sahib is to be assured of the
continuous friendship and good-will of the Sarkar, which with the one
hand will take away his rupees, and with the other present him with
the liberty to govern his people without interference or guidance.”

“Truly the infidels are delivered into our hands!” cried Bahram Khan.
“And when is the change to be announced?”

“The Kumpsioner Sahib desires an order, which may be carried out by
the political officer on the spot.”

“Then the fool himself is leaving the border? Let him go. I care not
to take his life. He has been a useful friend to me, and may be
permitted to carry his folly elsewhere. It is Nāth Sahib that I want,
and surely even my uncle will turn against him when he knows that the
Sarkar has determined to break the treaty.”

“Gently, Highness!” entreated Jehanara. “The Amir Sahib is ever
faithful to his friends, and not easily turned from his allegiance.
Such is his friendship for Nāth Sahib that the only thing that would
make him join in the plot would be the hope of benefiting him.”

“But,” put in Narayan Singh, who had been wondering uncomfortably
whether it would be better to tell his news at once, or to wait until
he had managed to secure a moment’s private conversation with
Jehanara. “I heard tidings yesterday, Highness, which seem to show
that the Kumpsioner Sahib is not the friend thou didst reckon him. I
could have told them sooner, but I fear they will not be pleasing in
thine ears.”

“Let us hear them,” cried Bahram Khan, while Jehanara shot an angry
glance at the spy. He ought to have known by this time that it was
generally wiser to soften and sweeten agitating news, and not to
administer it undiluted.

“It was said among the servant-people that Barkaraf Sahib had asked
Nāth Sahib for his sister, Highness, and that even now he has
betrothed her to him.”

There was a moment’s incredulous silence, and then Bahram Khan sprang
up from the divan, sending the heavy cut-glass bottle of the
water-pipe flying, and almost overturning the brazier. “And this is
the fruit of your counsel, both of you!” he shouted. “Who was it that
held me back when I would have fallen on the whole company of the
English as they returned from their fool’s dinner in the desert, and
killed them all, except Nāth Sahib’s sister? Who was it again that
bade me suffer my servants to be taken prisoners and held captive, and
be tried for their lives by a boy, and that told me to rejoice when I
received them back unharmed? Thou, O woman! thou, dog of an idolater!
Surely ye were in league with the Kumpsioner Sahib to steal the girl
from me, and he has bribed you to blacken my face in the eyes of all
my people.”

“Highness,” said Jehanara, with dignity, “thine anger has made thee
unjust to thy faithful servants. Fear not; I know the ways of the
English, and this betrothal need not lead to marriage for many months.
Nāth Sahib’s sister shall yet be thine, and the Kumpsioner Sahib may
wait in vain for his bride.”

“Wait!” cried Bahram Khan, sinking again upon his cushions, “nay, he
shall wait for nothing but death. He shall die by inches, and before
my eyes, because he has sought to befool me. If he escapes, the lives
of both of you shall pay for it.”

“As thou wilt, Highness. But was it not thy admiration of her beauty
which first showed the Kumpsioner Sahib that the girl was fair? Suffer
thy servant to consider the matter for a moment, and she will offer
thee her counsel.”

Leaving Bahram Khan to look at affairs in this new light, Jehanara
established herself again in her corner, gazing fixedly into the hot
coals. Both her life and that of Narayan Singh were at stake, and she
knew it; and she had no desire to die. Six years before she had played
a desperate game with Bahram Khan, conscious that in him she faced an
opponent as cunning and as faithless as herself. The conditions were
unequal, for she staked far more than he did, and he won, possibly
because her sense of the risk she was running had robbed her of the
perfect coolness necessary to ensure success. He had not married her,
even by Mohammedan rites, and nothing short of full legal recognition
could have vindicated in the eyes of her own people the course she had
pursued. Robbed of her anticipated triumph, she made no attempt to
escape the consequences, but set herself by every means in her power
to obtain that ascendency over the Prince’s mind which she had failed
to gain over his heart. Fresh failures and unspeakable mortifications
had awaited her. The women of the household, from the beautiful little
Ethiopian bride to whom was awarded the position Jehanara had intended
for herself, to the humblest hill-girl who had been kidnapped to
become at once a slave and a Muslimeh, saw to it that she ate the
bread of bitterness; but in spite of taunts and revilings she kept the
one end in view until her persistence was crowned with complete
success. Bahram Khan would listen to no advice but hers, having learnt
by experience that his confidence in her was justified. The intrigue
by which first the Commissioner, and then the Viceroy, had been
convinced of his wrongs, was of her devising, and had proved so
successful as to convince her that had it not been for Dick’s
opposition, she would already have seen Bahram Khan established as his
uncle’s heir. It followed that her hatred for Dick, heightened by his
cavalier treatment of herself, was at least as strong as that of the
disappointed claimant. As she sat brooding over the charcoal at this
moment, there was a cruel light in her eyes while she ran hastily over
the points of the scheme which had sprung full-grown into her mind
when Bahram Khan accused her of treachery.

“Highness,” she said at last, and Bahram Khan propped himself up on
his cushions with a muttered growl, while the trembling Narayan Singh
appeared to take fresh interest in life, “this perfidy of the
Kumpsioner Sahib’s provides thee with what was most needed, a means of
involving the Amir Sahib in our plans. Nay, through this treachery,
with the blessing of Heaven, thy servants will yet behold thee seated
upon his throne, with the sanction of the Sarkar.”

“Wonderful!” cried the Prince, with gleaming eyes. “Go on.”

“First of all, then, Highness, the Kumpsioner Sahib must not leave
Alibad before the treaty is broken--but we will consider presently by
what means he may be induced to remain on the border. Next,
instructions must be sent to the Vizier Ram Singh to represent thy
quarrel to his master, the Amir Sahib, in this wise. Thou wilt say
that the Kumpsioner Sahib, with a great show of friendliness, promised
to get thee Nāth Sahib’s sister for a wife, but that he has befooled
thee, and demanded the maiden for himself. Thine uncle may not
altogether believe that Barkaraf Sahib really offered thee his help in
the matter”--the half-caste could not restrain a touch of scorn as she
glanced through her eyelashes at the miserable native who had brought
himself to believe that an Englishman looked favourably on his desire
to marry an Englishwoman. “Still, he has doubtless heard through his
sister, thy mother, of thy love for the girl, and he will soon hear
also that she is betrothed to the Kumpsioner Sahib, so that he cannot
but believe in the enmity between him and thee. Next thou wilt say
that by setting spies on this enemy of thine thou hast learnt that he
has persuaded the Sarkar to withdraw the subsidy. This he does in
order to gain honour for himself by annexing the Nalapur state, and
also that he may overthrow Nāth Sahib, whom thine uncle loves, and
who, as we know through Ram Singh, has sworn to resign his office
rather than forsake his friend. Thus, then, thine uncle will be eager
to champion Nāth Sahib’s cause against Barkaraf Sahib, and thou,
forgetting thine old hatred in the new, will show him the way.
According to the words of this paper of my cousin’s, the Sarkar’s
change of policy will be announced at a durbar to be held by Nāth
Sahib in the Agency at Nalapur, and the Amir Sahib will do well to see
to it that this durbar is not held. If we devise a means for keeping
the Kumpsioner Sahib here, he must needs hold the durbar himself, and
while he and Nāth Sahib, and all the sahibs from Alibad, are
entangled in the mountains on the way to the city, they must be caught
in an ambush of the Amir Sahib’s troops. The Kumpsioner Sahib may well
be killed in the first onset, to save all further trouble, but Nāth
Sahib and the other friends of thine uncle need only be disarmed and
kept prisoners, the writing of the Sarkar being taken from them. Then
the Amir Sahib may send a peaceful message to the Sarkar that, hearing
rumours of evil intended against him, he has seized a number of its
officers and holds them as hostages, until he shall be assured that
his fears are groundless. So then the Sarkar, fearing for the lives of
its sahibs, will send some great person to reassure his Highness, and
explain that it was the evil doings of the dead Barkaraf Sahib alone
that caused the mischief, and Nāth Sahib will be put in his place,
and the subsidy continued, and all be well--save, perhaps, the payment
of a slight fine for the accidental slaying of the Kumpsioner Sahib.”

“But what is the good of all this to me?” bellowed Bahram Khan. “It
would rid me of the Kumpsioner Sahib, but no more--nay, it makes Nāth
Sahib the head where he is now the tail.”

“Seest thou not, Highness, that this is the plot as it must appear in
the eyes of thine uncle? Now lift the veil, and behold it as it is in
thine own mind. Who should naturally be chosen to command the force
lying in ambush but the Sardar Abd-ul-Nabi, and is he not a close
friend of the Vizier Ram Singh, and wholly devoted to thy cause? To
him the Amir Sahib will give orders that he is to slay no one but
Barkaraf Sahib, and that the lives of the rest are to be saved, even
at the risk of his own, but from thee he will receive the command to
slay all and spare none, not even the youngest.”

“Nay, I will ride with them, and smite them myself from behind!” cried
Bahram Khan.

“That must not be, Highness. Thou wilt be far away at the time.”

“Then Nāth Sahib and Barkaraf Sahib shall be saved alive and brought
to me that I may see them die.”

“The risk is too great, Highness. Hast thou forgotten the day when
Sinjāj Kīlin Sahib was attacked in a certain nullah and all his
escort slain, and how he fought his way out alone and rode back to his
camp, and returning, as if upon eagles’ wings, with a fresh body of
troops, fell upon the tribesmen when they were stripping the dead, and
slew them every one? Not a man shall live--be content with that, for
there is other work for thee than watching their blood flow.”

“And what is that, woman?”

“Thou wilt be waiting here, Highness, and as soon as a swift messenger
brings thee word that the sahibs have been attacked, thou wilt ride
with all speed to Alibad. Knowing that all the sahibs are away except
the Padri and two or three others who are not warriors, and that there
is no place of refuge for them, thou wilt hasten thither to save them
and the Memsahibs. If they believe in thy professions of friendship,
then all is well--they are delivered into our hands. But it is in my
mind that they will not trust thee, and that is even better, for then
all the evil that follows will spring from their own lack of
confidence. The men of the regiment who are left behind will fortify
themselves in their lines, but there is no need to attack them just
then. The bazaar and the European houses will be fired--by the
_badmashes_ of the place, doubtless--and in the turmoil and confusion
all the sahibs will be killed, but all men will behold thee rushing
hither and thither like one possessed, commanding thy soldiers with
curses to save the white men alive.”

Bahram Khan chuckled grimly, for the picture appealed to him.

“And at last,” went on Jehanara, “seeing that thou canst do nothing,
so few are thy men, thou wilt retire sorrowfully, taking with thee
such women and loot as may come in thy way--but only for safe
keeping.” Bahram Khan chuckled again. “The next day, when the Amir
Sahib learns that he has indeed raised his hand against the Sarkar,
and slain so many sahibs, he will be plunged in despair. He will find
it impossible to keep his army in check, and they will come to Alibad
and complete the work begun by thee, before ravaging the rest of the
frontier. All will be the deed of thine uncle, and he it is that will
have to answer to the Sarkar.”

“True, O woman. Trust me to see that his evil deeds shall blot out
mine. But how if Nāth Sahib’s sister should chance to be slain also?”

“Her safety is thy care, Highness. Before seeking to save the sahibs,
thou wilt have seized Nāth Sahib’s house, which is on the outskirts
of the town, and sent off his wife and sister here, for their better
protection, under a sufficient guard.”

“Who will see that Nāth Sahib’s Mem troubles us no more,” laughed
Bahram Khan.

“Not so, Highness. The doctor lady must find safety with the
Moti-ul-Nissa.”

“Nay, is she not Nāth Sahib’s wife?” cried Bahram Khan, much injured.

“There must be sanctuary for the doctor lady with thy mother,”
repeated Jehanara firmly. “What harm can she do thee, Highness?”

“She is Sinjāj Kīlin’s daughter. That is enough.”

“True, Highness, and for that very reason she must live. The Begum
must be warned to hide her in the inmost recesses of the zenana, since
the Amir Sahib clamours for her blood, and she herself must clearly
understand that thou art protecting her at the risk of thy life. See
here, Highness, and think not it is any love for thy foes that moves
me. Her testimony is the very crowning-point of our plan. When thou
hast made thyself master in Nalapur, and goest forth to meet the
armies of the Empress with the head of the Amir Sahib as a
peace-offering, there will yet be voices raised against thee. But when
it is known that thou didst save the doctor lady, the wife and
daughter of thine own and thy father’s enemies, and place her in
safety in thine own zenana, who shall judge thee too hardly that thou
couldst not save the town? Thou hast done all in thy power, and the
Memsahib will bear witness to thee. And as for sparing her--why, there
is Nāth Sahib’s sister left for thee still.”

“Aha!” laughed Bahram Khan, “and she is not of Sinjāj Kīlin’s blood.
She will not fight like the doctor lady.”

“Nay, but she is of Nāth Sahib’s blood,” said Jehanara, conscious
once more of an inconsistent thrill of perverted pride in her father’s
race, as she remembered what other Englishwomen had done before in
like circumstances; “but all will be well, Highness, whatever happens.
If she is found married to thee, she cannot, as a _pardah_ woman, be
brought into court to testify against thee, and if she is dead by that
time, why, she killed herself in her terror, not waiting to learn thy
merciful intentions towards her. And women pass, but the throne lasts,
Highness. The one is better than the other.”

“Truly, thou art a veritable Shaitan!” To Bahram Khan’s mind the
epithet conveyed a high compliment. “Set the matter in train, then.
Here is my seal.” He took off his heavy signet and handed it to her.
“Do thou and Narayan Singh see that all is in order, so that not one
of my enemies may escape. But what of Barkaraf Sahib? If he leaves the
border, I lose half my vengeance.”

“It may be, Highness”--the speaker was Narayan Singh, who had remained
silent in sheer astonishment at the daring and resourcefulness of his
co-plotter--“that the Hasrat Ali Begum might help us in the matter. If
her Highness were to hear that any evil threatened the doctor lady or
her husband, she would doubtless send a messenger to warn her. Might
she not become aware, through some indiscretion” (he looked across at
Jehanara), “that the Kumpsioner Sahib was departing from the border to
seek his own safety, leaving Nāth Sahib to carry out a dangerous and
disagreeable task? Her Highness would send the Eye-of-the-Begum
immediately to inform the doctor lady of what she had heard, and does
there live a woman upon earth who, having received such tidings, would
not at once fling the Kumpsioner Sahib’s cowardice in his teeth, and
taunt him until he was forced for very shame to remain and do his
business for himself?”

“By that saying,” interrupted Jehanara, vexed at being selected to
perpetrate an indiscretion, “thou betrayest thine ignorance, Narayan
Singh. There is such a woman, and the doctor lady is she. She would
tell the news to her husband, and leave him to reproach the Kumpsioner
Sahib if he thought fit, and there would be no taunts, for the English
are not wont to speak like the bazaar folk. But there is another woman
who would work for us, though ignorantly, and that is the wife of the
Padri Sahib.”

“The lady of the angry tongue!” cried Bahram Khan. “But how should we
persuade my mother to send a slave to her?”

“It would not be easy, Highness, and therefore the Begum shall not be
troubled in the matter. I will disguise myself and tell the Padri’s
Mem that her Highness, desiring to warn the doctor lady, was too
closely watched to allow of her sending her usual messenger. I will
say also that I succeeded in slipping away from Dera Gul, and in
crossing the desert with the message, but that I dared not approach
Nāth Sahib’s house, fearing there might be spies among his servants.
Thus, then, I will tell the news, and before very long the Padri’s Mem
will tell it also--in the ears of the Kumpsioner Sahib.”

“It is well thought of,” said Bahram Khan approvingly.




 CHAPTER XII.
 HONOUR AND DUTY.

Three or four days later, Mrs Hardy marched up the steps of the
Norths’ bungalow with a purposeful mien, and requested an interview
with the Commissioner. Mr Burgrave had finished his morning’s work
early, and his couch had been placed in the drawing-room verandah. A
table was close beside him, with a volume of Browning lying upon it,
and there was a chair close at hand ready for Mabel, but she was out
riding with Fitz, to whom Dick, in utter oblivion of the probable
awkwardness of the situation, had hastily turned her over on finding
that he himself was needed elsewhere. The Commissioner groaned
impatiently when Mrs Hardy was announced. A talk with her was not the
pleasure he had in view when he hurried through his work, but he
consoled himself with the thought that she would not stay long. No
doubt the Padri was anxious to get a new harmonium, or to enlarge the
church, and they wanted him to head the subscription-list.

“Excuse my getting up,” he said, as he shook hands with her. “My
sapient boy has put my crutch just out of reach.”

If the words were intended to convey a hint, Mrs Hardy did not choose
to take it, for she sat down deliberately between the crutch and its
owner. Then, without any attempt at leading up to the subject, she
said, with great distinctness--

“I have come to talk to you about your policy, Mr Burgrave.”

The Commissioner stared at her in undisguised astonishment. “Pardon
me; but that is a subject I do not discuss with--with outsiders,” he
said.

“I only want to lay a few facts before you,” pursued Mrs Hardy
unmoved.

“No, no; excuse me. I cannot consent to discuss affairs of state with
a lady.”

“I mean you to listen to what I have to say, Mr Burgrave, and I shall
stay here until you do.”

“I can’t run away,” said Mr Burgrave, with the best smile he could
muster, and a side glance at the crutch; “and when a lady is kind
enough to come and talk to me, it would be rude to stop my ears.
Perhaps you will be so good as to let me know your views at once,
then, that your valuable time may not be wasted?”

“I should like to ask you, first of all, whether you are aware that
your confidential report to the Government on the frontier question is
common property at Dera Gul? Of course, if you choose to tell your
secrets to Bahram Khan and leave Major North in ignorance of them, I
have nothing more to say.”

To her great joy, Mrs Hardy perceived that she had made an impression.
The Commissioner looked startled and disturbed. “Impossible!” he said.
“The report has been seen by no one but my secretary, and the clerks
who copied portions of it.”

“It is for you to find out which is to blame. I can only tell you what
is going on, just as it has been told to me. I was in my garden about
an hour ago, when a woman peeped out from behind the bushes--a
miserable, footsore creature. She told me she was a slave of the
Hasrat Ali Begum’s--Bahram Khan’s mother--who had sent her to warn the
Norths that you intend to withdraw the Nalapur subsidy, and leave
Major North to face the result. I have no idea how Bahram Khan
obtained the information, but he means to take advantage of it. Though
she could not tell me what his plan is exactly, she seemed quite sure
that it would end in a general rising, involving almost certain death
to the Europeans in places like this. It was clear that she regarded
you as a coward, running away from the consequences of your own acts,
and deliberately exposing others to danger. That is not my opinion, I
may say”--Mrs Hardy had seen the Commissioner wince--“but I thought
you could not have looked at things in this light, and as soon as the
poor creature was gone I came to you at once.”

“Confiding in Mrs North by the way, no doubt?”

“No, I came straight to you. Now let me ask you, have you realised
what will be the result of your action? You know that Major North will
resign rather than countenance what we all feel would be a gross
breach of faith, and yet you place him in a position in which he must
do one thing or the other. I don’t know what Miss North will think
about it, but I know what I----”

“We will leave Miss North’s name out of the conversation, if you
please.”

“Excuse me; we can’t. How do you expect her to feel towards you when
you have set yourself deliberately to ruin her brother? You think
worse of her than I do if you believe she will marry you after such a
piece of cruel, unprovoked oppression.”

“Mrs Hardy, a lady is privileged----”

“Yes, I have no doubt you think I am taking an outrageous liberty, but
I can’t and won’t be silent. All your interest in the frontier centres
in a pretty, flighty girl who has no business to be here at all, and
simply for the sake of showing your power you come and ride roughshod
over us, whose lives are bound up in it. I know you’re a proud man, Mr
Burgrave, and I don’t ask you to reverse your policy publicly, which
you would naturally find a hard thing to do. But if this dreadful
business has gone too far to be stopped, make Major North take a
month’s leave, and carry it through yourself. Then the people will see
that he is not responsible for the breach of faith, and he will come
back and be your right hand when you most need him. What good could a
stranger do when the tribes are out? Absolute ignorance of the country
is not always the qualification it was in your case, you know. I know
the frontier better than any other place in the world--we used to
itinerate in the district for years before we were allowed to settle
down--and I am _certain_ there’s trouble coming. I can see it in the
looks of the people, and hear it in the way they talk. And here on the
spot are the Norths, the very people to deal with a crisis, and you
have done your best to undermine their influence already. Can’t you
stop there? What have they done that you should persecute them like
this?”

“I assure you,” said Mr Burgrave slowly, “that I have the highest
possible respect for both Major and Mrs North personally, but
personality is not policy.”

“Up here it very often is. But come, Mr Burgrave, if you don’t
absolutely hate the Norths, why not do as I suggest?”

“I promise you that every suggestion you have made shall receive the
fullest consideration,” replied the Commissioner, in his best
Secretarial manner. “I may rely upon your silence as to the matter?”

Mrs Hardy thought she detected a relenting in his tone. “Of course you
may, if you are really going to do something. I am glad to find you
open to conviction, if only for Miss North’s sake and your own. You
will have a very pretty wife, and I trust a happy one. Ah, there she
is!” as the sound of horses’ feet was heard, and Mabel, cantering
past, waved her whip gaily to the watchers--“and riding with Mr
Anstruther!”

“And is there any reason why she should not ride with Mr Anstruther?”

“His peace of mind, that’s all. But perhaps you think he deserves no
mercy? I may tell you I was glad to hear of your engagement, since it
saved that fine young fellow for a more suitable woman.”

“A more fortunate woman, doubtless,” corrected Mr Burgrave, with
majestic forbearance. “A better there cannot be.”



Mabel was in the highest spirits as she mounted the steps after Fitz
had ridden away. When he had appeared with the message that Dick was
detained at the office, and had sent him to ride with her, her first
impulse was to refuse to go, but other counsels prevailed. Fitz had
offered no congratulations on her engagement, and the omission rankled
in her mind. She was nourishing a reckless determination to provoke a
scene by asking him what he meant by it, but her courage oozed away
very soon after starting. She would still have given much to know what
he thought of the whole situation, but she durst not venture upon an
inquiry. Fitz, on his part, made no allusion to the important event
which had occurred since their last ride, speaking of the Commissioner
as coolly as if she had no particular interest in him. Before they had
been out long, she was content to accept his ruling, and conscious of
a kind of horror in looking back upon the resolution with which she
had started. She was on good terms with herself once more, and to such
an extent did the gloom cast by Mr Burgrave’s impressive personality
seem to be lightened at this distance, that she returned home feeling
positively friendly towards him. It was unfortunate that Mrs Hardy’s
disapproving glance, when she encountered her on the steps, should
clash with this new mood of cheerfulness, and that another shock
should be awaiting her when she looked into the drawing-room verandah
on her way to take off her habit.

“Little girl,” said her lover, holding out his hand to draw her nearer
him, “would you mind very much if I said I had rather you didn’t take
these solitary rides with young Anstruther?”

The angry crimson leaped up into Mabel’s forehead.

“You have no right whatever to make such insinuations!” she cried
hotly.

“Now, dearest, you mistake me. I make no insinuations--I should not
dream of such a thing. All I say is--doesn’t it seem more suitable to
you, yourself, that until I am able to ride with you again you should
not go out except with your brother? You will do me the justice to
believe that I am not jealous--I would not insult you by such a
feeling--but other people will talk. Yes, I am jealous--for my little
girl, not of her. No one must have the chance even of passing a remark
upon her.”

Mabel stood playing with her whip, her face flushed and her lips
pressed closely together. “He would like to make life a prison for me,
with himself as jailer!” she thought, as she bent the lash to meet the
handle, making no attempt to listen to Mr Burgrave, who went on to
speak of the high position his wife would occupy, of the extreme
circumspection necessary in such a station, and of the unfortunate
love of scandal characterising the higher circles of Indian female
officialdom. He did not actually say that the future Mrs Burgrave must
be above suspicion, but this was the general idea underlying his
remarks.

“Why, you have broken your whip!” The words reached her ears at last.
“Never mind, you shall have the best in Bombay as soon as it can come
up here. You see what I mean, little girl, don’t you?”

“Oh yes,” said Mabel drearily. “You forbid me ever to ride with any
one but you, or to speak to a man under seventy.”

“Mabel!” he cried, deeply hurt, “can you really misjudge me so
cruelly?”

“It’s not that,” she said, kneeling down beside him with a sudden
burst of frankness. “I know how fond you are of me, and I can’t tell
you how grateful and ashamed it makes me. But you don’t understand
things. You want to treat me like a baby, and I have been grown-up a
long, long time. Think what I have gone through since I came here,
even.”

“I know, I know!” he said hoarsely. “Don’t speak of it, my dearest!
The thought of that evening in the nullah comes upon me sometimes at
night, and turns me into an abject coward. I mean to take you away
where you will be safe, and have no anxieties.”

“Then have you never any anxieties? Because they will be mine.”

“No,” he said, with something of sternness, “my anxieties shall never
touch my wife. I want to shake off my worries when I leave the office,
and come home to find you in a perfect house, with everything round
you perfectly in keeping, the very embodiment of rest and peace,
sitting there in a perfect gown, long and soft and flowing, for me to
feast my eyes upon.”

He lingered lovingly over the contemplation of this ideal picture, to
the details of which Mabel listened with a cold shudder. “My dear
Eustace,” she said brusquely, to hide her dismay, “please tell me how
you think the house and the servants are to be kept perfect, if I do
nothing but trail round and strike attitudes in a tea-gown?” She
caught his wounded look, and went on hastily, “And what did you mean
by that invidious glance you cast at my habit? I won’t have my things
sniffed at.”

“It’s so horribly plain,” pleaded the culprit.

“And why not?” demanded Mabel, touched in her tenderest point. “I’m
sure it’s most workmanlike.”

“That’s just it. Workmanlike--detestable! Why should a woman want to
wear workmanlike clothes? All her things ought to be like that gown
you wore at the Gymkhana, looking as if a touch would spoil them.”

“I shall remind you of this in future, you absurd man!” laughed Mabel,
regaining her cheerfulness as she thought she saw a way of
establishing her point; “but please remember, once for all, that I
shall choose my clothes myself--and they will be suitable for various
occasions, for business as well as pleasure. Your part will only be to
admire, and to pay.” There was a seriousness in her tone which belied
the jesting words. Surely he would understand, he must understand,
that there was a principle at stake.

“And that part will be punctually performed,” said Mr Burgrave
indulgently, gazing in admiration into her animated face. “I know that
you will remember my foolish prejudices, and gratify them to the
utmost extent of my desires, if not of my purse. That is all I ask of
you--to be always beautiful.”

In her bitter disappointment Mabel could have burst into tears.

“Oh, you won’t understand! you won’t understand!” she cried. “I don’t
want piles of clothes; I don’t want everything softened and shaded
down for me. I want to be a helpmate to my husband, as Georgia is to
Dick.”

“Dear child, I am sorry you have returned to this subject,” said Mr
Burgrave, taken aback. “I thought we had threshed it out fully long
ago.”

“Ah, but we can speak more freely now!” she cried. “Don’t you see that
I should hate to be stuck up on a pedestal for you to look at, or to
be a kind of pet, that you might amuse yourself smilingly with my
foolish little interests out of office hours? I want you to tell me
things, and let us talk them over together, as Dick and Georgia do.”

“I know they do,” said Mr Burgrave, trying to smile. “The walls here
are so thin that I hear them at it every evening. A prolonged growl is
your brother soliloquising, and a brief interlude of higher tones is
Mrs North giving her opinion of affairs. It is a little embarrassing
for me, knowing as I do that my doings are almost certainly the
subject of the conversation.”

“Well, and if they are?” cried Mabel. “It is only because you and Dick
don’t understand one another that he and Georgia criticise you. Now
think about this very matter of the frontier. If you would only talk
to me, and tell me what you thought was the proper thing to be done, I
could talk to them, and you might find out that your views were not so
much opposed after all. Do try, please; oh, do! I would give anything
to bring you to an agreement.”

Mr Burgrave’s brow was clouded as he looked into her eager eyes.

“Am I to understand,” he said, with dreadful distinctness, “that your
brother and Mrs North are trying to make use of you to extract
information from me? No, I will not suspect your brother. No man would
stoop to employ such an expedient--so degrading to my future wife, so
affronting to myself. It is Mrs North’s doing.”

Mabel, who had listened in horrified silence, sprang to her feet at
this point as if stung. “I think it will be as well for me to return
you this,” she said, laying upon the table the ring of “finest Europe
make,” which the Commissioner had been fain to purchase from the chief
jeweller in the bazaar as a makeshift until the diamond hoop for which
he had sent to Bombay could arrive. “You have grossly insulted both
Georgia and me, and--and I never wish to speak to you again.”

She meant to sweep impressively from the room, but the angry tears
that filled her eyes made her blunder against the table, and Mr
Burgrave, raising himself with a wild effort, caught her hand. “Mabel,
come here,” he said, and furious with herself for yielding, she
obeyed. “Give me that ring, please.” He restored it solemnly to its
place on her finger. “Now we are on speaking terms again. Dear little
girl, forgive me. I was wrong, unpardonably wrong, but I never thought
your generous little heart would lead you so far in opposing my
expressed wish. I admire the impulse, my darling, but when you come to
know me better you will understand how unlikely it is that I should
yield to it. Come, dear, look sunny again, or must I make a heroic
attempt to go down on my knees with one leg in splints?”

“Oh, if you would only understand!” sighed Mabel. She was kneeling
beside him again, occupying quite undeservedly, as she felt, the
position of suppliant. “If only I could make you see----”

“See what?” he asked, taking her face in his hands and kissing it. “I
see that my little girl thinks me an old brute. Won’t she believe me
if I assure her on my honour that I am trying to do the best I can for
her brother, and that I hope I have found a way of putting things
right?”

“Have you, really?” Her bright smile was a sufficient reward. “Oh,
Eustace, if it’s all settled happily, I shall love you for ever!”

The assurance did not seem to promise much that was new when the
relative position of those concerned was considered, but the
unsolicited kiss bestowed upon him was very grateful to Mr Burgrave,
and he smiled kindly as he released Mabel and bade her run away and
change her habit. She left the room gaily enough, but once outside, a
sudden wave of recollection swept over her, and she wrung her hands
wildly.

“I was free--_free_!” she cried to herself. “Just for a moment I was
free, and I let him fetch me back. Oh, what can I do? I believe I
could be quite fond of him if he would let me, but he won’t. And if he
wasn’t so good I should delight to break it off in the most insulting
way possible, but his virtues are the worst thing about him. I hate
them! Is this sort of thing to go on for a whole lifetime--beating
against a stone wall and bruising my hands, and then being kissed and
given a sweet, and told not to cry? Mabel Louisa North, you are a
silly fool, and you deserve just what you have got. I hate and despise
you, and with my latest breath I shall say, Serve you right!”



“Oh, Dick, has it come?” Georgia sprang up to meet her husband, as he
entered the room with a gloomy face.

“No, but so far as I can see, it’s close at hand. I can’t quite make
things out, but Burgrave seems to have altered his plans
astonishingly. Instead of travelling down to the coast at once, he is
going to stay here another week, and hold a durbar at Nalapur. I have
to send word to Beltring at once to get the big _shamiana_ put up in
the Agency grounds, and to see that all the Sardars have notice. What
does it mean?”

“He’s going to see the thing through on his own account,” said
Georgia, with conviction. “But it will make no difference to us, will
it, Dick?”

“Rather not! The breach of faith is the same, whether I announce it at
first, or merely come in afterwards to carry it out. I wish Burgrave
hadn’t such a mania for mysteries. Ismail Bakhsh tells me he has been
sending off official telegrams at a tremendous rate all day, and yet
when I ventured to hint that some idea of the proposed proceedings at
the durbar would be interesting, he turned rusty at once, and said he
had not received his instructions. This system of government by
thunderbolt doesn’t suit me. It’s enough to make a man chuck things up
now, without waiting for the final blow.”

“Oh, but you will stick on as long as you can? It’s some sort of
security for peace.”

“A wretchedly shaky one, then,” said Dick, with an angry laugh.
“Here’s the Amir sending his mullah Aziz-ud-Din to say that he learns
on incontestable authority that the subsidy is to be withdrawn, and
imploring me to say whether I have any hand in it. The poor old
fellow’s faith in me is quite touching, but what could I say except
that I knew nothing about it, and repeat the assurance I gave him
before?”

“But what could Ashraf Ali mean by incontestable authority?”

“How can I tell? Some spy, I suppose. By the way, though, it didn’t
strike me. That must be what the Commissioner meant!”

“Why, what did he say?”

“He doesn’t intend to stay on in this house. Now that he can be got
into a cart, he thinks it better to return to his hired bungalow. I
imagine I looked a bit waxy, for he graciously explained that he had
reason to believe we have spies among the servants here.”

“Dick! you don’t mean to say that he accused you----?”

“No, he was so good as to assure me that he had the best possible
means of knowing I had nothing to do with it. But when I reminded him
that all the servants, except those Mab brought with her from Bombay,
have been with us for years, he intimated that he made no accusations,
but official matters had got out, and he didn’t mean to allow that
sort of thing to go on. No doubt it was that sweetseller fellow, as we
thought.”

“Well, I think that to go is the best thing the Commissioner can do.
It will give Mab a little peace.”

“Yes, I shouldn’t say she looked exactly festive.”

“How could she? She feels that she has cut herself off from us, for of
course we can’t discuss things before her as we used to do, and I
don’t think she finds that he makes up for it. I have great hopes.”

“Now, no coming between them!” said Dick warningly, and Georgia
laughed.

“I trust it won’t be necessary,” she said.

A week later she happened to be again sitting alone in the
drawing-room, busy with the fine white work on which she expended so
many hours and such loving care at this time, when Dick came in. To
her astonishment, he was in uniform, and laid his sword upon the table
by the door as he entered.

“Why, Dick, you are not going to Nalapur with the Commissioner after
all?” she cried.

“Burgrave can’t go, and I have to hold the durbar instead.”

“But how--what----?”

“It seems that he had a fearful blow-up with Tighe this morning, after
taking it for granted all along that he would be allowed to leave off
his splints and go. Tighe absolutely howled at the idea, told him that
in moving from this house to his own he had jarred the knee so badly
as to throw himself back for a week, and that the splints must stay on
for some time yet. Of course he can’t ride in them, and to take him
through the mountains in a doolie would be madness.”

“I wondered at his being allowed to ride so soon,” said Georgia, “but
I thought Dr Tighe must have found him better than we expected. Of
course I haven’t seen the knee for some time lately. But did he tell
you what the object of the durbar was?”

“He did. It is just what we thought it would be, Georgie.”

“Nonsense!” cried Georgia sharply. “As if you would go to Nalapur in
that case! Are you joking, Dick?”

His set face brought conviction slowly to her mind.

“You are not joking, and yet you came home, and got ready, just as if
you meant to hold the durbar, and never told me!” she cried.

“I do mean to hold the durbar,” said Dick.

She sat stunned, and he went on: “I thought I wouldn’t tell you till
the last moment, because I knew how you would feel about it, and I
didn’t want to worry you more than could be helped.”

“To worry me!” she repeated. “And yet you come here and try to tease
me with this absurd, impossible story? You are not going.”

Dick looked her straight in the face. “But I am,” he said.

“But you said you would resign first.”

“I must resign afterwards, that’s all. There are some things a man
can’t do, Georgie, and one is to desert in the face of the enemy.”

“But it’s wrong--dishonourable!”

“It’s got to be done, and Burgrave has managed to engineer matters so
that I have to do it. I talked about resigning, and he said very
huffily that he wasn’t the person to receive my resignation, which is
quite true. He anticipates danger, I can see, for he tells me he has
had information that Bahram Khan has some sort of plot on hand, and do
you expect me to hang back after that?”

“I never thought you would care what people said. If it’s right to
resign, do it, and let them say what they like.”

“If I wasn’t a soldier I would, but I have no choice.”

“No choice between right and wrong?”

“Not as a soldier. It isn’t my business to criticise my orders, but to
execute them. Oh, I know all you are thinking. I see it perfectly
well, and from your point of view you are absolutely in the right, and
as an individual I agree with you, but I am not my own master.”

“And your personal honour?”

“I’m afraid it has got to look after itself. Don’t think me a brute,
Georgie. I want to be on your side, but I can’t.”

“Then I suppose it’s no use my saying anything more?”

“I really think it would be better not. You see, it would only make us
both awfully uncomfortable, and do no good.”

“Oh, don’t!” burst from Georgia. “I can’t bear to hear you talk like
that. Remember your promise to Ashraf Ali. The poor old man has relied
on that, and pledged himself to all the Sardars that the Government
doesn’t intend to forsake them. The whole honour of England is at
stake. Dick, these people have learnt from you and my father to
believe the word of an Englishman, and are you going to teach them to
distrust it now?”

“When you have quite finished----” began Dick.

“I can’t! I can’t! Oh, Dick, our own people, who know us and trust us!
Have you the heart to forsake them? Dick, won’t you listen to me? I
have never urged you to do anything against your will before, but when
it is a matter of right and conscience--! I know you believe you’re
right now, but how will you feel about it afterwards? Think of our
friends betrayed, our name disgraced, through you!”

“Hang it, Georgie!” cried Dick, losing his temper, “you make a man
feel such a cur. I tell you I have got to go.”

“I wish I had died when baby died at Iskandarbagh, rather than lived
to hear you say that.”

Dick turned away without answering, and took up his sword from the
table where he had laid it down. It was always Georgia’s privilege to
buckle the sword-belt for him, and she rose mechanically, rousing
herself with an effort from her stupor of dismay. He took the strap
roughly out of her hands.

“No,” he said, “you’d better have nothing to do with it. The blame is
all mine at present, and you can keep your own conscience clear.”

She sank upon a chair again and watched him miserably as he buckled on
the sword and went out. On the threshold he looked back, softening a
little.

“Graham has changed his mind, and is not coming to the durbar. If
there should be any attempt at a rising, you are to take refuge in the
old fort. Tighe will come and sleep in the house these two nights if
you are nervous.”

“I’m not nervous,” said Georgia indignantly.

“Oh, very well. After all, we shall be between you and Nalapur.”

He crossed the hall to the front door, Georgia’s strained nerves
quivering afresh as his spurs clinked at each step. Suddenly she
realised that he was gone, and without bidding her farewell.

“Dick!” she cried faintly, “you are not going--like this?”

There was no answer, and she moved slowly to the window, supporting
herself by the furniture. He was already mounted, and was giving his
final directions to Ismail Bakhsh. The sight gave Georgia fresh
strength, and stepping out on the verandah, she ran round the corner
of the house. There was one place where he always turned and looked
back as he rode out. He could not pass it unheeded even now, that
spot, close to the gate of the compound, where she had so often waited
for his return. As she stood grasping the verandah rail with both
hands, the consciousness that for the first time in their married life
he was leaving her in anger swept over her like a flood.

“Oh, it will kill me!” she moaned, seizing one of the pillars to
support herself, but almost immediately another thought flashed into
her mind. “No, he is not angry--my dear old Dick! he is only grieved.
He durst not be kind to me, lest I should persuade him any more, and
he should have to give way. God keep you, my darling!”

In the rush of happy tears that filled her eyes, the landscape was
blotted out, and when she could see distinctly again, Dick had passed
the gate. She could just distinguish the top of his helmet above the
wall as he rode. He had gone by while she was not looking. Would it
have been any comfort to her to know that he had looked back, and not
seeing her, had ridden on faster?

“I had to behave like a brute, or I should have given in--and she
didn’t see it,” he said to himself remorsefully. “Of course she was
right, bless her! She always is, but I couldn’t do anything else.”

Her pale reproachful face haunted him, and had there been time he
would have turned back, but he was obliged to hurry on. As he entered
the town, he came upon Dr Tighe.

“Doctor,” he said, laying a hand on the little man’s shoulder, “look
after my wife while I’m away. She’s awfully cut up at my going like
this.”

 [image: images/img_148.jpg
 caption: “LOOK AFTER MY WIFE WHILE I’M AWAY”]

“All right!” said the doctor cheerfully; “and don’t you be frightened
about her. Mrs North is a sensible woman, and knows better than to go
and make herself ill with fretting.”



“The Memsahib parted from the sahib without kissing him!” said one of
the servants wonderingly to the rest.

“What foolish talk is this?” asked Mabel’s bearer scornfully. “My last
Memsahib never kissed the Sahib unless he had gained her favour by a
gift of jewels.”

The tone implied that the subject might be dismissed as beneath
contempt, but the man’s actions did not altogether tally with it, for
after loftily waving aside the assurance of the first speaker that
this Sahib and Memsahib were not as others, he retired precipitately
to his own quarters. Here a lanky youth, who was slumbering peacefully
in the midst of a miscellaneous collection of goods, some of them
Mabel’s, and others the bearer’s own, was suddenly roused by a kick.

“Hasten to Dera Gul with a message of good omen!” said the bearer,
impelling his messenger firmly in the desired direction. “Nāth Sahib
and the doctor lady have quarrelled, and until they meet again he is
without the protection of her magic.”




 CHAPTER XIII.
 ONE NIGHT.

“Awake, Miss Sahib, awake!”

“Miss North! Miss North!”

Mabel sat up in bed. Her window was being shaken violently, and
outside on the verandah were those two persistent voices.

“See what it is, Tara,” she called to her ayah, but the woman was
crouching in a corner, her teeth chattering with terror. Seeing that
she was too frightened to move, Mabel threw on a dressing-gown and
went to the window. Outside stood Fitz Anstruther, his face pale in
the moonlight, and Ismail Bakhsh, who was armed with his old
regimental carbine and tulwar. Thus accoutred, he was wont to mount
guard over the house and its inmates when Dick was absent, patrolling
the verandahs at intervals; but he had never hitherto found it
necessary to alarm his charges at midnight.

“What is it?” asked Mabel, opening the window.

“You must get dressed at once, and bring anything that you
particularly value,” said Fitz hurriedly. “We were attacked on the way
to Nalapur, and there was no durbar. I’m come instead of the Major to
fetch you to the old fort, for Bahram Khan and his cut-throats may be
here at any moment. Will you speak to Mrs North, please? I was afraid
of startling her if I knocked at her window or came into the house.
Winlock is outside with twenty sowars, and he and I will see after the
papers in the Major’s study.”

Mabel dropped the blind and went towards Georgia’s room, twisting up
her hair mechanically as she did so. Rahah was already on the alert,
and met her at the door with gleaming eyes.

“I know, Miss Sahib. The evil is at hand at last. Awake, O my lady!”
She laid a hand gently on Georgia’s forehead. “The time has come to
take refuge in the fort. The Sahib bade me be prepared.”

“Dick has sent Mr Anstruther to fetch us, Georgie,” said Mabel,
unconsciously altering Fitz’s words, as Georgia, half awake, looked
sleepily from her to Rahah. “I think he wants us to be quick.”

“Of course,” said Georgia, rousing herself. “Now, Rahah, you will be
happy at last. We’ll come and help you, Mab, before Tara’s ready. Oh,
but the papers!--I must see that they are safe.”

“Mr Anstruther is looking after them,” said Mabel.

“I wonder whether Dick thought of giving him the key of the safe? Very
likely he forgot it in his hurry. He had better have my duplicate. Oh,
thanks, Mab! There’s a tin despatch-box standing by the safe which
will hold all the most important papers.”

With the key in her hand, Mabel hurried down the passage, her slippers
making no sound on the matting. There was a light in Dick’s den, and
Fitz and Captain Winlock were shovelling armfuls of papers and various
small articles into a huge camel-trunk which stood open in the middle
of the floor. As Mabel reached the door, Winlock held out something to
Fitz. “Not much good taking this, at any rate,” he said, and a cold
hand seemed to grip Mabel’s heart as she saw that it was Dick’s
tobacco-pouch, which Georgia, with what his sister considered a
reprehensible toleration of her husband’s pleasant vices, had worked
for him.

“No, put it in,” said Fitz gruffly. “It may comfort her to have it.”

A slight sound at the door, half gasp, half groan, made both men jump,
and looking round they saw Mabel, her eyes wide with terror.

“Mr Anstruther, what has happened to Dick?”

The words were barely audible. Fitz stood guiltily silent.

“Tell me,” she said.

“He was wounded,” growled Winlock.

“It’s worse than that, I know. Is he taken prisoner?”

“No,” was the unwilling reply.

“Then he’s killed! Oh!----” but before Mabel could utter another word,
Fitz’s hand was upon her mouth.

“Miss North, you mustn’t scream. For Heaven’s sake, think of his wife!
Remember what those two are--have been--to one another, and
remember--everything. Let us get her safe to the fort, and let Mrs
Hardy break it to her gently. A sudden shock like this might kill
her.”

Mabel freed herself from the restraining hand, and stood shivering as
if with cold. “Oh, Dick, Dick!” she wailed pitifully, in a tone that
went to the men’s hearts, and then she crept back in silence along the
passage. Once in her own room, she dropped helplessly into a chair and
sat rigid, staring straight before her. Dick dead! Georgia a widow!
that perfect comradeship at an end for ever!--and Georgia did not know
it. Mabel wrung her hands feebly. It was the only movement she had
strength to make. All power of thought and action seemed to have
forsaken her. Dick was dead and Georgia was left.

“My beloved Mab!” Georgia came hurrying in, equipped for driving. “I
said I should be ready first, but I didn’t expect to find you quite so
far behind. I believe Rahah keeps half my things packed, all ready for
a night alarm of this kind, but of course your ayah is not accustomed
to these little excitements. Are you quite overwhelmed by the amount
that has to be done?”

“Yes; I don’t know what to pack first,” said Mabel, with a forced
laugh, keeping her face turned away.

“Well, Rahah and I will see to that while you dress. We may be some
days in the fort, and you don’t want to go about in an amber
dressing-gown the whole time. We’ll begin with your jewel-case. Where
is it?”

“Oh, I don’t know! What’s the good of taking that sort of thing?”

“It might be invaluable--to buy food, or bribe the enemy, or ransom a
prisoner--or anything. Where _is_ it, Mab? I thought you kept it in
here?”

“Yes, I do.” Mabel looked up from the shoe she was tying, as Georgia
ransacked a drawer in vain. “But no doubt Tara has taken it out to the
cart already. She has always been instructed to save it first of all
if the house was on fire.”

Mabel spoke wearily. The awful irony of Georgia’s fussing over a box
of trinkets while Dick lay dead almost destroyed her self-control. How
was it that she did not guess the truth without being told?

“But why hasn’t she come back to help you to dress? I hope it’s all
right, Mab, but I doubt if you’ll see that jewel-case again. She has
had time to slip away with it and hide somewhere. Here, Rahah, put all
these things in the box. It’s well to take plenty of clothes, Mab, for
we are not likely to be able to get much washing done.”

“Don’t!” burst from Mabel.

“Why not?” asked Georgia, in astonishment.

“Why, it sounds as if you thought we were going to spend the rest of
our lives in the fort,” said Mabel lamely.

“I don’t see why. Surely you would like to save as many of your things
as possible, whether we stay there long or not?”

“Oh yes, of course.” Mabel turned away to fasten her dress at the
glass, conscious that in Georgia’s eyes she must be playing a sorry
part. Georgia thought her dazed with fright, whereas her mind was full
of that dreadful revelation which must be made sooner or later.

“Are you nearly ready, Mrs North?” asked Fitz’s voice in the passage.

“Quite,” replied Georgia, stuffing Mabel’s dressing-gown ruthlessly
into a full trunk. “Tell the servants to come and fetch the boxes,
please.”

“Well, I’m afraid the servants have stampeded to a certain extent.
Ismail Bakhsh and the rest of the _chaprasis_ and one or two others
are left, and that’s all, but of course they’ll make themselves
useful.”

“You see, Mab!” said Georgia, and Mabel understood that she need not
expect to see her jewel-case again. They followed Fitz out into the
verandah, in front of which were ranged all the vehicles belonging to
the establishment, drawn by everything that could be found even
remotely resembling a horse.

“I told Ismail Bakhsh to get them out,” said Fitz. “There are the
wives and children to bring, and I knew you wouldn’t mind.”

“Of course not,” said Georgia. “Wait a moment, please; I have
forgotten something,” and she ran back into the drawing-room. Mabel
knew what it was she had suddenly remembered.

“I hope she won’t be long,” said Fitz anxiously. “We’ve been here a
quarter of an hour already.”

Only a quarter of an hour! To Mabel it seemed hours since she had been
awakened by those voices on the verandah. She looked out beyond the
line of troopers sitting motionless on their horses, and noticed,
without perceiving the significance of the fact, that there were two
or three of their number acting as scouts farther off in the
moonlight.

“I daren’t lose any more time,” Fitz went on, fidgeting up and down
the steps. “I can’t think how it is they have left us so long.”

Ismail Bakhsh, stowing Mabel’s dressing-bag under the seat of the
dog-cart, looked round. “Sahib, _he_ rides to-night. They will not
cross the border until he has passed.”

“Then whoever or whatever _he_ may be, he has probably saved all our
lives,” said Fitz, as Georgia came out of the house. While he was
helping her into the dog-cart, Mabel caught once more the sound of the
tramp of the galloping horse, which the old trooper’s quick ear had
perceived some minutes before. The sowars straightened themselves
suddenly in their saddles, and the horses pricked their ears in the
direction of the noise.

“Old boy seems somewhat agitated to-night,” muttered Winlock to Fitz,
as the invisible rider pulled up abruptly, then galloped on again.

“There’s enough to make him so,” returned Fitz, who was helping to
hoist the last terrified native woman, with her burden of two children
and several brass pots, into the last cart. “All right now?” he
demanded, looking down the row of vehicles. “We had better be off,
then.”

Was it fancy, or did Mabel see the sparks struck from the stone on
which the unseen horse stumbled as the sound came nearer? She could
have screamed for sheer terror; but Rahah, who was her companion on
the back seat of the dog-cart, laughed aloud as she wrapped the end of
her _chadar_ round the great white Persian cat she held in her arms.

“What is there to fear, Miss Sahib? No man has ever stood against
Sinjāj Kīlin, and he is close at hand. The rule of the Sarkar will
continue.”

“Now do tell me what has happened,” Mabel heard Georgia saying to
Fitz, as he drove out of the gate. “I’m sure I am a model soldier’s
wife, for Dick suddenly sends me a bare message ordering me to abandon
all my household goods and take refuge in the fort, and I do it
without asking why! But I must confess I should like to know the
reason. Did the durbar break up in disorder, or were you attacked on
the way back?”

“There was no durbar at all. The attack came off on the way there. But
I say, Mrs North,” said Fitz desperately, anticipating Georgia’s
question, “I can’t tell you what happened then, for I wasn’t there.
Won’t it do if I recount my own experiences, and you ask the other
fellows about the rest of it when we get to the fort?” He left her no
time to answer, but went on hurriedly:--

“Yesterday we got as far as the entrance to the Akrab Pass, some way
beyond Dera Gul, and camped there for the night. The Major chose the
site of the camp himself, in an awfully good position commanding the
mouth of the pass, and arranged everything just as if it was war-time.
I knew, of course, that he was looking out for treachery of some sort,
and I was awfully sick when he told me this morning that I was to stay
and do camp-guard with Winlock, and not go with him to the durbar. I
yearned horribly to disobey orders, but, you see, he left me certain
things to do if--if anything went wrong.” Fitz cleared his throat,
muttered that he thought he must have got a cold, and hastened on.
“Beltring had come down from Nalapur to meet the Commissioner, as he
thought, and the Sardar Abd-ul-Nabi was waiting just inside the pass
with an escort of the Amir’s troops. We in camp had nothing to do but
kick our heels all day, for the Major left strict orders against going
out of sight of the pass. He meant to get through his work by
daylight, so as to sleep at the camp to-night, and come back here in
the morning, you see. There were no caravans passing, and the place
seemed deserted, which we thought a bad sign. But about eleven this
morning one of our scouts brought in a small boy, who had come tearing
down the pass and asked for the English camp. We had the little chap
up before us, and I recognised him as a slave-boy I saw at Dera Gul
the day Miss North and I were there. He knew me at once, and began to
pour out what he had to say so fast that we could scarcely follow him.
It seems that the Hasrat Ali Begum had managed in some way to get an
inkling of Bahram Khan’s plot, and she despatched one of her
confidential old ladies to warn you and the Major. Unfortunately, the
old lady got caught, and Bahram Khan was so enraged with his mother
that he promptly packed his whole zenana off to Nalapur, to be out of
mischief, I suppose. On the way through the pass this boy, by the
Begum’s orders, managed to hide among the rocks when they broke camp,
and so escaped with her message. He hoped to catch the Major before he
started, but, most unhappily, he durst not ask the only man he met
whether he had passed, and he was behind him instead of in front. So
he came down the pass, missing him entirely, of course, and warned us
instead. The Major’s force was to be attacked in the worst part of the
defile, he told us, and as soon as a messenger could reach Dera Gul to
say that the attack had taken place, Bahram Khan would set out to raid
Alibad. It was an awful dilemma for Winlock and me. It was no use
sending after the Major to warn him, for whatever was to happen must
have happened by that time, and if we tried to warn the town, Bahram
Khan was safe to intercept the messenger and start on his raid at
once, and of course we couldn’t evacuate the camp without orders. We
decided to strike the tents and get everything ready for a start at
any moment, and we posted our best shots on either side of the
entrance to the pass, in case the Major’s party should be pursued.
Then we waited, and at last the--the force turned up. Thanks to the
Major’s suspicions and precautions, the surprise was a good deal of a
fizzle. But as I said, I can’t tell you about that. Well, we had to
get back here. The enemy were supposed not to be far behind, so we
left Beltring and twenty-five men to hold the mouth of the pass at all
hazards, and see that no messenger got through until we were safely
past Dera Gul. After that it was left to them to seize the moment for
retreating on Shah Nawaz, which Haycraft was to evacuate, so that both
detachments might return here by the line of the canal. We put our
wounded and baggage in the middle, and started--”

“No, wait!” cried Georgia, for hitherto Fitz had spoken so fast that
she had found it impossible to get in a word. “Who were the wounded?
You said nothing about them before. Was any one killed?”

“I--I really can’t give you any particulars,” returned Fitz, at his
wits’ end. “Please let me finish my tale. I’m getting to the most
exciting part. It was fearfully thrilling when we had to pass under
the very walls of Dera Gul. Of course we were all ready for action at
a moment’s notice, but the men were told to ride at ease, and talk if
they liked, to give the impression that all was well. I know Winlock
and I exchanged the most appalling inanities at the top of our voices,
till the Dera Gul people must have thought we were drunk. As we
expected, pretty soon there came a hail from the walls, asking who we
were, and Ressaldar Badullah Khan, who was nearest, called out that we
were coming back from Nalapur without holding the durbar. ‘But what
has happened?’ asked the voice from the wall. ‘What should happen,
save that the Superintendent Sahib won’t hold the durbar?’ said the
Ressaldar, and we went on. Of course they must have been awfully
puzzled, for they couldn’t see our wounded in the dark, and the only
thing they could do was to send some one off to the pass to find out
what had happened. Beltring was to look out for that, and if possible
to seize the messenger and get his men away at once, before Bahram
Khan could come up and take him in the rear.”

“And I suppose Dick is helping to prepare the fort for defence?” asked
Georgia. “There must be a dreadful amount to do.”

“Oh, that reminds me, Miss North,” cried Fitz quickly, turning round
to Mabel. “The Commissioner was most anxious to come and fetch you
himself, but we pointed out to him that he could do no good, and being
so lame, might hinder us a good deal. Excuse me, Mrs North, but I
think I must give all my attention to driving just here. I don’t know
why the whole population should have turned their possessions out into
the street, unless it was to make it awkward for us.”

They were approaching the fort, and the roadway was almost blocked
with carts, cattle, household goods, and terrified people. Several
vedettes, to whom Winlock gave a countersign, had been passed at
various points, and it was evident that the sudden danger had not
taken the military authorities, at any rate, by surprise. The space in
front of the fort gates was a blaze of light from many torches, and
several officers in uniform were resolutely bringing order out of the
general chaos. Gangs of coolies, bearing sand-bags and loads of
furniture, fuel, provisions, and forage, seemed inextricably mixed up
with shrill-voiced women and crying children, ponies, camels, and
goats; and it needed a good deal of shouting and some diplomacy, with
not a little physical force, to separate the various streams and set
them flowing in the right directions. As the dog-cart stopped,
Woodworth, the adjutant, came up.

“We want volunteers to help destroy the buildings round the fort,” he
said. “You’ll go, Anstruther? What about your servants, Mrs North?”

“There are seven who have come with us, nearly all old soldiers,” said
Georgia. “If you will speak to Ismail Bakhsh, who is a host in
himself, I will see that their wives and children are safely lodged
while they set to work.”

“Awfully sorry to trouble you about this sort of thing just now,” said
Woodworth awkwardly.

“Trouble? I am delighted they should help, of course. Where shall I
find my husband?”

“Good heavens! You haven’t heard----?” The adjutant stopped suddenly.

“You blighted idiot!” muttered Fitz under his breath. “Fact is, Mrs
North, the Major’s hurt--rather badly--” this reluctantly; “but I
didn’t want to frighten you sooner than I could help----”

“Where is he? Take me to him at once,” was all she said.

Woodworth stepped forward mechanically to help her out of the cart,
but found himself forestalled. The Commissioner had come hurrying up,
preceded by two huge Sikhs, who cleared a passage for him through the
throng, and now, supporting himself upon his crutch, he held out his
hand to Georgia.

“Believe me, Mrs North,” he said, “you have the sympathy of every man
here at this terrible time. Surely it must be some consolation to you
that your noble husband fell fighting, as he would have wished, and
that the smallness of our losses is entirely owing to his prudence and
self-sacrifice?”

Georgia, on the ground now, looked about her like one dazed, finding,
wherever she looked, fresh confirmation of the cruel tidings. In Mr
Burgrave’s sympathising face, in Woodworth’s pitying eyes, in the
sorrowful glances of the stern troopers who had closed up round the
group, she read the truth of what she had just heard. Her hand went
quickly from her heart to her eyes, as though to shut out the sight.
Then it dropped again.

“Oh, you might have told me at once!” she cried bitterly to Fitz. “I
could have borne it better from you than from the man who has done it
all.”

“When you are more yourself, Mrs North, I know you will regret this
injustice,” said Mr Burgrave, without anger. “Allow me to take you to
your quarters in the fort.”

Georgia shook from head to foot as he offered her his arm. She was on
the point of refusing it, of yielding to the sickening sense of
aversion with which his presence inspired her, when the scowling gaze
of the mounted troopers arrested her attention, and awakened her to
the deadly peril in which the Commissioner stood. These men idolised
Dick, and they had heard her accuse Mr Burgrave of causing his death.
A word from her would mean that his last moment had come. Even to turn
her back upon him would be taken to show that she left him to their
vengeance, which might not follow immediately, but would be certain to
fall sooner or later. With a great effort she conquered her
repugnance, and laid her hand upon his arm.

“At a time like this there are no private quarrels,” she said
hoarsely, addressing the troopers rather than the Commissioner. “We
must all stand together for the honour of England.”

“Of course, of course!” agreed Mr Burgrave, wondering what on earth
had called forth such a melodramatic remark, for he had missed the
growl of disappointed rage with which the troopers let their ready
blades fall back into the scabbards. “Most admirable spirit, I’m
sure.”

“Upon my word!” muttered Woodworth to Fitz, “the man would have been
cut to pieces before our eyes in another moment, and he never saw it.”

“Oh, ignorance is bliss,” returned Fitz shortly. “What’s to happen to
the carts?”

“Broken up for firewood, I suppose. We can’t make room for
everything.”

“I fear you will find your quarters somewhat confined,” Mr Burgrave
was saying kindly to Georgia, as with the help of his Sikhs he piloted
her through the gateway, “but we cannot expect palatial accommodation
in our present circumstances. Our good friends Mrs Hardy and Miss
Graham are taking pains to make things comfortable for you, I know,
and you must be kind enough to excuse the deficiencies due to lack of
time and means.”

Georgia gave a short fierce laugh. The Commissioner’s tone suggested
that if he had been consulted sooner there would have been a perfect
Hôtel Métropole in readiness to receive the fugitives. She broke
away from him, and laid her hand lovingly upon one of the new gates,
for his presentation of which to a presumably ruined fort all the
newspapers of the province had made Dick their butt only the week
before. The echoes of their Homeric laughter were even at this moment
resounding in Bombay on the one hand and Lahore on the other.

“If your life--any of our lives--are saved, it will all be due to
him!” she cried, and the Commissioner marvelled at the lack of
sequence so characteristic of a woman’s mind. He led Georgia through
the labyrinth of curiously involved passages and courts at the back of
the club-house, in which Government stores and stray pieces of private
property were lying about pell-mell, until they could be separated and
reduced to some sort of order by the overworked officer in charge of
the housing arrangements. Mabel followed with Rahah, and at last they
reached a tiny oblong courtyard not far from the rear wall of the
fort. Here, in the middle of the paved space, was Mrs Hardy, sorting a
confused heap of her possessions with the assistance of an elderly
Christian native, Mr Hardy’s bearer.

“Oh, my dear! my poor dear!” she cried, running to Georgia, and for a
moment the two women held each other locked in a close embrace.

“This room,” said Mr Burgrave, who seemed to feel it incumbent upon
him to do the honours of the place, “has been allotted to Miss Graham,
as it communicates by a passage with the Colonel’s quarters in the
next courtyard. The two on the right are Mr and Mrs Hardy’s, the two
on the left are intended for you, Mrs North, and the one opposite is
for you, Mabel. I believe the arrangement was suggested to Colonel
Graham by Major North himself.”

Mrs Hardy raised her head and gave him a fiery glance. “Miss North,
will you be so kind as to request Mr Burgrave to go away?” she said
viciously.

“No; wait, please,” said Georgia. “Which of the officers were with my
husband when he--was hurt, Mr Burgrave?”

“There were several, I believe, but the only one not seriously wounded
was Mr Beltring, and he will not come in until the Shah Nawaz
contingent gets here--if at all.”

“If--when he comes, I should like to see him, please,” said Georgia,
and the Commissioner departed.

“Now come in, dear, and lie down,” said Mrs Hardy. “Your rooms are
ready, and I see Rahah, like a thoughtful girl, has even brought the
cat to make it look homelike. Anand Masih will bring you some tea in a
minute, and then I hope you will just go to bed again.”

“Dear Mrs Hardy, you have given us all your own furniture,” protested
Georgia, recognising a well-worn writing-table; but Mrs Hardy shook
her head vigorously.

“Nonsense, my dear, nonsense! We had far more brought in than we can
possibly use in this little place, and as soon as I have seen you
settled, Anand Masih and I will look after my two rooms. Mr Hardy is
helping Dr Tighe in the reading-room, which they have turned into a
hospital, or I know he would have come to see if he could do anything
for you.”

Never silent for a moment, Mrs Hardy administered tea without milk to
Mabel and Georgia, and then tried vainly again to induce them to go to
bed. Just as she was departing in despair, Flora Graham ran in.

“I am helping to arrange the hospital--I can’t stay,” she panted. “Oh,
Mrs North, Mabel darling, I am so sorry! I can’t tell you how much--”
She stopped, unable to speak. “I know a little what it is like,” she
added, with a sob; “Fred and his men are not in yet.”

She dashed away, and Georgia and Mabel sat silent, hand in hand, until
the sound of a cheer from the hard-worked garrison heralded the
arrival of the Shah Nawaz detachment. Presently the clink of spurs on
the verandah announced young Beltring, who was Dick’s most trusted
pupil among the military officers desiring political employment, and
as a man after his chief’s own heart, had been allowed to earn
experience, if not fame, as his assistant at Nalapur. He came in
slowly and reluctantly, scarcely daring to look at Georgia, his torn
and bloodstained clothes and bandaged head bearing eloquent testimony
to the fighting he had seen that day.

“Sit down, Mr Beltring,” said Georgia, holding out her hand to him.
“You got here without further loss, I hope?”

“Yes, the enemy were on both flanks, but they never came near enough
to do any harm,” he answered, dropping wearily into a chair.

“Now tell us, please. You were with him--at the end?”

“I was the nearest, but not with him. He was riding with that
treacherous scoundrel Abd-ul-Nabi, and we had orders to keep a few
paces to the rear. We thought he wanted to speak to Abd-ul-Nabi
privately, but now I believe it was because he foresaw what was
coming. The rest of us were still in that part of the pass where the
walls are too steep for any ambush, while he, on in front with
Abd-ul-Nabi, was rounding the corner where the track goes down
suddenly into a wide rocky nullah. He must have seen something that he
was not meant to see--the glitter of weapons among the rocks
perhaps--for he turned suddenly and shouted, ‘Back! back! an
ambuscade!’ Abd-ul-Nabi spurred his horse across the pathway to
prevent his getting back to us, but the Major came straight at him,
and the ruffian pulled out a pistol and fired at him point-blank. I
cut the wretch down the next moment, but the Major had dropped like a
log, and before we could get him up there was a rush round the corner
in front, while Abd-ul-Nabi’s escort, who had been riding last,
attacked us in the rear. Leyward took command, and the fellows behind
were soon disposed of, but in front we had a pretty hard time. At last
we drove them back far enough to get at the Major’s body. He was lying
under a heap of dead. I got him out, and his head fell back on my
shoulder. No, there could be no mistake, Mrs North. Do you think I
would ever have left him while there was any breath in his body? I
tried to get him on to my horse, and Badullah Khan helped me. Just as
we had got him up, there was another rush, and the wretched beast
broke away. I was thrown off on my head, and when I came to myself the
Ressaldar was holding me in front of him on his horse, and we were in
full retreat down the pass. We had lost eight killed beside the Major,
and Leyward and the two other fellows were all badly wounded, besides
almost every one of the men, and--and they wouldn’t go back.”

“No, no; it would have been wrong,” murmured Georgia. “Thank you for
telling me this. There could be no message.”

“No message,” repeated Beltring, answering the unasked question.

“He could not send me any message,” wailed Georgia, as the young man
went out, “and I parted from him in anger. Oh, Dick, my darling, my
darling--forgive me!”

“Oh, Georgie, don’t!” sobbed Mabel.

“Poor Mab! I forgot you were there. Lie down here on my bed. I can’t
sleep.”

“I’m sure I can’t,” protested Mabel.

It was not long before she cried herself to sleep, however, but
Georgia sat where she was until the morning.




 CHAPTER XIV.
 TO KEEP THE FLAG FLYING.

“Mab!” Mabel awoke from her uneasy slumbers to wonder where she was,
and why Georgia was sitting there, her face silhouetted against the
square of grey light that represented a window. “Mab! Dick is not
dead.”

“Why--oh, Georgie!--have you heard anything?”

“No; but I know it. We always agreed that if either of us died when
the other was not there, the one that was dead should come back to say
good-bye. And I have waited for him all night, and he has not come.”

Mabel gazed at her in dismay. “Oh, but you are not building upon that,
Georgie? How can it be any proof that he is alive? He might not be
allowed to come.”

“He promised. Besides, I know he is alive,” persisted Georgia
obstinately. “If he was dead, I should feel it.”

“Georgie dear, you mustn’t go on like this. You will make yourself
ill. Come and lie down a little, and try to go to sleep. I will tell
you if he comes.” Mabel ended with a sob.

“If he does, I shall know,” murmured Georgia, as she lay down.
“Thanks, Mab; I am so tired.”

Mabel waited only until she was asleep, and then, summoning Rahah to
watch beside her, went in search of Dr Tighe. It so happened that she
met him in the passage which led into the courtyard.

“Bad business this, Miss North. We can ill spare your brother. How is
his poor wife?”

“She has borne up wonderfully so far, but--oh, Dr Tighe, I’m afraid
her mind is going. She will persist that Dick is not dead.”

“Poor thing! can’t realise it yet,” said the doctor compassionately.

“No; it is quite a delusion. She says he is still alive, or she would
know it. What can we do? I thought perhaps if she could see his
body----”

“No, no. Better that the delusion should last for ever than she should
see his body after those fiends have had to do with it.”

“But she must give up hope soon, and it will be such a fearful
disappointment----”

“If the hope keeps her up through the next few days, so much the
better. Afterwards, please God, she’ll have more effectual comfort
than we could give her.”

“But I can’t help hoping too, and it will make the reality so much
worse,” confessed Mabel, with an irrepressible sob.

“Woman alive! who cares about you?” cried the doctor furiously. “What
do your little bits of feelings matter compared with hers? No, no; I
beg your pardon, Miss North,” his tone softening. “I’d get a fine
wigging if the Commissioner heard me, wouldn’t I? But you must
remember how much you have got left, and your sister has nothing. For
God’s sake, let her please herself with thinking that he’s all right
for the present, if that comforts her at all. By-and-by the truth will
come to her gradually, but she will have the child to think of, and
the worst bitterness will be gone. Come, now, you’re brave enough for
that, aren’t you? How is she--asleep just now? I’ll look in again
later on. Now make up your mind to be unselfish about this.”

“Does he mean that generally I am selfish?” mused Mabel. “It never
struck me before. But nobody seems to care about me. They all think
that I have Eustace left. As if he could ever make up to me for Dick!”
she laughed mirthlessly at the mere idea. “He will be coming in
presently and making appropriate remarks. Oh dear, oh dear! if he had
gone to the durbar and been killed instead of Dick, I believe I should
have been _glad_. How dreadful it is! How can I ever marry him? But I
know I shall never have the courage to tell him I want to give him up.
What can I do?”

“Mabel, my poor little girl!” Mr Burgrave emerged from the passage,
and limped towards her as she stood listlessly on the verandah. “You
have slept badly, I fear? How is Mrs North?”

“She won’t believe that he is dead.” And with her eyes full of tears,
Mabel repeated to him Georgia’s words.

“Very touching, very touching!” remarked the Commissioner, his tone
breathing the deepest sympathy. “Poor thing! it is unspeakably sad to
see so strong a mind overthrown. You must find it very trying, poor
child! I hope you are taking care of yourself?” His glance travelled
over her, and Mabel remembered for the first time that she had slept
in her clothes, and that her hair had not been touched since she had
twisted it up roughly the night before on the first alarm.

“Oh, I know I’m not fit to be seen!” she cried impatiently. “But what
does that signify?”

“It signifies very much. You must remember the natives in the fort.
Their endurance--even their loyalty--may hang upon our success in
keeping up appearances during the next few days. And we white men,
also--surely it is a poor compliment to us to make such a sorry
ob--figure--of yourself? Then there is your unfortunate sister. Is it
likely to restore her mental balance to see you in such a dishevelled
condition? Oblige me by changing your dress and doing something to
your hair. It is a public duty at such a time.”

“I wish you wouldn’t bother!” said Mabel, weeping weakly. “I have no
black things, and I can’t bear to put on colours.”

“My dear girl, is it for me to advise you as to your clothes?” The
tone, half severe and half humorous, stung Mabel with a recollection
of their conversation of ten days before. “Considering poor Mrs
North’s delusion, might it not be advisable to humour her, in so far
as not to insist upon wearing mourning immediately?”

“Oh, very well,” was the grudging reply, of which Mabel repented the
next moment, adding contritely, “I’m sorry to have been so cross,
Eustace. I will try to be brave.”

“That is what I expect of my little girl. She would never bring
discredit upon my choice by showing the white feather. I rely upon her
to set an example of cheerfulness to the whole garrison.”

He bestowed upon her what Mabel inwardly stigmatised as a lofty kiss
of encouragement before departing, and she obeyed him meekly, going at
once to her room to change her dress. She was so angry with herself
for having deserved his rebuke that she forgot to be angry with him.
After all, it was well for her to have this severe master to please,
if she was in danger of bringing reproach upon her country by her
faint-heartedness. She was taking herself to task in this strain, when
the sound of voices in the outermost of Georgia’s two rooms, which was
next to her own, interrupted her meditations.

“Oh dear! Georgie hasn’t slept long,” she lamented to herself. “Who is
that talking to her, I wonder? Oh, Mr Anstruther, of course.”

“I came in to see if there was anything I could do for you,” she heard
Fitz say. “I’m ashamed to have been so long in coming, but the fact
is, I was up all night knocking down houses and setting coolies to
cart away the remains, and when we had got the space all round pretty
clear and came in, I was so dead tired that I just lay down and went
to sleep where I was.”

“Oh, you should have gone on resting while you had the chance,” said
Georgia. “Everybody is only too kind to me, and there’s nothing I want
done. Then we are really besieged now?”

“I suppose we might say that we are in a state of siege. At present
all the tribes are holding _jirgahs_ to consider the matter. Our outer
circle of vedettes was driven in soon after we got here last night,
but we held the houses facing the fort against a few spasmodic rushes
until we had got the zone of fire cleared. The enemy are too close for
comfort as it is, but at any rate they have a space to cross before
they can get up to the walls.”

“Then they are occupying the town?”

“Decidedly, if that means looting all the houses and firing most of
them.”

“Is our house burnt?”

“Almost as soon as you were out of it. I noticed the fire when I
looked round once as we were driving. But I don’t think the enemy can
have been as close behind us as that. I fancy the servants who shirked
coming with us were looting, and some one had knocked over a lamp.”

“And how are things going with us here?”

“So-so. But you know, Mrs North, if it hadn’t been for the Major and
Colonel Graham, we might as well have taken refuge in a fowl-house as
in this place. Long ago they got in all the stores they could without
attracting attention, and everything else was ready to be moved at a
moment’s notice. They had their plans all cut and dried, too, and
every man found his post assigned to him. The walls are good against
anything but artillery, and the towers and loopholes and gates have
all been put into some sort of repair.”

“Yes,” said Georgia, “and that is the best of the situation. Now for
the worst.”

“Well, you know, it would all have been worst but for the Major, and
every soul inside the walls is blessing him. The worst is that we have
scraped together a preposterous number of non-combatants--some of them
the wives and children of the sowars, of course, but a good many of
them Hindus and bazaar-people of that sort, whom it would have been
sheer murder to leave outside, but who will be no good to us whatever.
All the old soldiers have been re-enlisted, and the boys are to make
themselves useful, but there is a helpless crowd of women and children
and elderly people to dispose of somehow. That’s the secret of your
close quarters here. We can’t have the poor wretches anywhere near the
walls, so they are put away in the central courts, where we can keep
an eye upon them, and overawe them if necessary.”

“Poor things! I must go and see after them,” murmured Georgia.

“Of course, with all these extra mouths, we are not provisioned for a
regular siege, unless we eat the horses, which ought to be saved in
case we have to cut our way out at last. But the worst thing is that
we have no artillery, not so much as a field-gun, and very little of
anything else. The regiment have their carbines, of course, but the
Commissioner’s Sikhs are the only men with rifles--except those of us
who go in for big game shooting. However, as a set-off against that,
the enemy have no big guns either. And then, it’s about the best
season of the year for moving troops on this frontier, so that we
ought to be relieved before very long.”

“But that’s only if the enemy don’t cut the canals.”

“Yes, I’m afraid they’re too sharp not to do that. It looks as if a
dust-storm was coming on, which would help them if they set to work at
once.”

“Have they made any pretence of offering terms?”

“The Amir sent his mullah this morning with a flag of truce. He
couldn’t be allowed inside, so the Commissioner and Colonel Graham
spoke to him from the walls. But there was no accepting what he
offered.”

“What was it?”

“Poor old Ashraf Ali was awfully cut up about--what happened
yesterday. He explained through the mullah that he arranged the
ambuscade entirely for the benefit of the Commissioner, whom he really
was anxious to have out of the way. It was a pure accident that the
very last thing he could have wished happened instead. However, in
order that his trouble mightn’t be wasted, he suggested that we should
hand him over the Commissioner now. He will see that he gives no more
trouble on this frontier, and it is open to the rest of us either to
stay here unmolested, or to return to civilisation under a
safe-conduct, just as we like.”

“You mean that he actually offers to guarantee the safety of every one
else if the Commissioner gives himself up?”

“Practically that. Doesn’t it strike you as a little quaint?”

“Was that the Commissioner’s view of it?”

“I believe so. He remarked what a preposterous demand it was, when he
had the responsibility of the fort and the whole community on his
shoulders. He doesn’t intend to shirk his duty. The Colonel said it
was a tremendous relief to hear how sensibly he took it. Some men
would have insisted on giving themselves up forthwith, but he has too
much to think of.”

A wan smile showed itself on Georgia’s face. “Well, if he intends to
interpret his duty very strictly, we may wish he had gone,” she said.

“I don’t believe he is even technically in the right, and certainly I
think the Colonel will have to organise a little mutiny if he insists
upon bossing the show. Couldn’t you turn on Miss North to induce him
to moderate his pretensions a bit?” Mabel, in the next room, shook her
fist unseen at the speaker.

“After all,” said Georgia, “it’s most unlikely that they would have
kept their promise to protect us, even if he had given himself up.”

“Very little doubt about that. From what the mullah said, it’s clear
that there are two parties in their camp, and I shouldn’t care to say
which is the stronger. Bahram Khan’s following, besides his own men,
who did all the looting last night, comprises the more troublesome of
the frontier tribes and the chiefs who have grudges against the Amir,
while Ashraf Ali has his loyal Sardars and the tribes which have
always been friendly to us. If only we had the Major here!”

“You mean that he would play them off against one another?”

“Yes, and there’s no one else to do it. Beltring and I wanted to try,
because there’s just the chance that the tribes would listen to us, as
we have been with him so much, but the Colonel won’t let us leave the
fort.”

“No, it would be no good. You would only be risking your lives
uselessly,” said Georgia. “He has more influence over them than any
man I ever knew, except my father.”

“Ah, but, Mrs North, there’s no time to lose. As soon as we have
killed two or three of the lot, they’ll all be against us, and the
longer we hold out the worse it will be. Even if Bahram Khan doesn’t
succeed in bringing them over to his side at once, he will be
intriguing against his uncle in secret.”

“I know, but what can we do? I dare not make inquiries about Dick, for
if the Amir is keeping him safe somewhere, it might put him into
Bahram Khan’s power. We can only wait.”

“Oh, Mrs North, don’t count on that,” pleaded Fitz sorrowfully. “It’s
no good, believe me. Ashraf Ali knows he is dead as well as we do.”

“But I know that he is not dead,” said Georgia, and Fitz went out
hastily. In the verandah he met Mabel.

“Oh, Miss North, I wanted to speak to you,” he said, but she beckoned
him imperiously aside.

“You seem to think it rather a fine thing to abuse a man who isn’t
there to defend himself,” she said.

“Indeed?” he said, in astonishment. “I wasn’t aware of it.”

“Perhaps you didn’t know that I could hear you when you were laughing
at Mr Burgrave?”

“I certainly didn’t know you were listening, but I was not laughing at
him. I merely said that he hadn’t given himself up. Would you wish me
to say that he had?”

“You hinted that it was wrong and cowardly of him, and that he was
saving himself at the expense of every one else here, when you ought
to know it was only his strong sense of duty that kept him back. Would
you have gone?”

“Certainly not, if the burden of the defence rested on me, as the
Commissioner fancies it does on him.”

“You see! And you said yourself it would probably have been no good.”

“So I say still. Bahram Khan has more on hand than a piece of private
revenge. If we trusted to his safe-conduct, we should be in for
Cawnpore over again.”

“And after that you still make fun of Mr Burgrave for not going! It’s
a shame! I know he has made mistakes in the past, from our point of
view, but I won’t hear him called a coward. He is the most noble,
lofty-minded man in the world, and I only wish I was more worthy of
him!”

“You can’t expect me to indorse that, any more than the Commissioner
himself would,” said Fitz. “If anything I have said about him has
pained you, Miss North, I humbly beg your pardon; but please remember
that I should never speak against him intentionally, simply because
you think so highly of him.”

“I only want you to understand that I am not going to ask him to
moderate his pretensions, as you call it,” went on Mabel, rather
confused. “For one thing, he wouldn’t do it, and for another, now that
Dick is gone, I must be guided by him.”

“Quite so,” said Fitz, somewhat dryly. Then his tone changed. “I
wanted to ask you what you thought about telling poor Mrs North
something the mullah said this morning. It struck me that perhaps we
ought to keep it dark for a bit, as the doctor thinks it a good thing
she can’t believe that the worst has happened. The poor old Amir wept
as if for his own son when he heard that the Major was dead, and went
himself to look for the body, intending to give it a state funeral.
But when they got to the pass, it was gone. The Hasrat Ali Begum, who
was in camp near, had broken _pardah_ with her women as soon as the
fight was over, and carried off the body and buried it. They were
afraid of what Bahram Khan would do with it, you see, and at present
they won’t tell even the Amir where the grave is, but he sent word
that he meant to build a tomb over it later on. Now, ought Mrs North
to know?”

“I shouldn’t think so, should you? I have never been much with people
in trouble--I don’t know how to deal with them. But I think it will be
better not to tell her unless she asks.”

“But she isn’t likely to ask, is she? Oh, Miss North, if she might
only be right! I don’t believe there’s a man in the fort that wouldn’t
gladly die to bring him back.”



The expected dust-storm did not begin until the afternoon, and in the
interval the besieged continued to strengthen their defences,
disturbed only by an intermittent rifle-fire. A party of the enemy had
taken possession of General Keeling’s old house, and lying down behind
the low wall which surrounded the roof, were firing at any one they
saw on the ramparts. Thanks to the efforts of Colonel Graham and Dick,
the ruined parapet here had been repaired, but when there were
messages to be sent from one point to another, the cry was “Heads
down!” So skilfully were the enemy posted that no response to their
annoying attentions was possible until a party of Sikhs, at
considerable risk to life and limb, scaled the turrets flanking the
gateway, the repair of which had not been completed owing to lack of
time, and succeeded in commanding the roof of the old house. They had
scarcely cleared it before the storm came on, and they were ordered
down again, since it was generally believed that an assault would be
attempted under cover of the wind and darkness. Nothing of the kind
took place, however, and the garrison, who were kept under arms,
chafed at their enforced inaction, and tried in vain to pierce the
obscurity which surrounded them, while the wind howled and the dust
rattled on the roofs. When, last of all, the rain poured down in
sheets, and the air cleared sufficiently to allow the buildings beyond
the zone of fire to become dimly visible, it was seen that the enemy
had taken advantage of the storm for a different purpose. On the roof
of General Keeling’s house was now a rough stone breastwork, so
constructed as to shelter its occupants even against the fire from the
towers, and provided with loopholes so arranged as to allow the barrel
of a rifle to be pointed through them in any direction.

“It looks to me as though we should have to rush the General’s house
and blow it up,” said the Commissioner to Colonel Graham, as they
stood in one of the turrets, peering into the sweeping rain, during
the last few minutes of daylight. “That sangar makes our walls
untenable.”

“Then we shall have to raise them,” was the laconic reply, as Colonel
Graham passed his field-glass to his companion. “You may not have
noticed that though the General’s old stone house is the only one
strong enough to support a sangar on the roof, the brick houses on
both sides of it have been loop-holed. The place is a regular
death-trap.”

“Do you mean to say that in this short time they have prepared a
position impregnable to our whole force?” asked Mr Burgrave
incredulously.

“Quite possibly, but that isn’t the question. Their numbers are
practically unlimited; ours are not. I should be glad if you and I
could come to an understanding at once. We are not here to exhibit
feats of arms, but to keep the flag flying until we can be relieved,
and to protect the unfortunate women and children down below there.
Nothing would please me better than to lead an assault on the house
yonder, but who’s to defend the fort when the butcher’s bill is paid?
If we had only ourselves to consider, I might cut my way out with the
troops, and make a historic march to Rahmat-Ullah, but with the
non-combatants it would be impossible. You see this?--or perhaps you
don’t see it, but I do. Well, are we to work together, or not?”

“You are asking me to subordinate my judgment to yours?”

“Politically, you are supreme here. From a military point of view----”

“You think you ought to be? Considering the office I hold, doesn’t
that strike you as rather a large order?”

“Would you propose to occupy an independent and superior position from
which to criticise my measures? Surely you must see that is out of the
question? You may be Commissioner for the province, but I am
commandant of this fort, and the troops are under my orders. The
conclusion is pretty obvious, isn’t it? In such a situation as this, a
single head is essential, and there must be no hint of divided
counsels. You and I have both got everything we prize in the world at
stake here. Can we squabble over our relative positions in face of
what lies before us?”

“The question would come more gracefully from me to you, in the
circumstances,” said Mr Burgrave, “but I see your point. Let it be
understood that the conduct of all military operations is vested in
you, then. I reserve, of course, the right of private criticism, and
of offering advice.”

“And of putting the blame on me if things go wrong!” thought Colonel
Graham, but he was too wise to give utterance to the remark. “Do you
care to make the round of the defences with me?” he asked. “I should
like to see how the new brickwork stands this deluge.”

As they emerged from the shelter of the tower into the rainy dusk,
they were met by Fitz, who, like the other civilians in the place, had
enrolled himself as a volunteer. When he first spoke, his voice was
inaudible, owing to a rushing, roaring sound which filled the air.

“Why, what’s this?” shouted the Colonel.

“The canal, sir,” answered Fitz, as loudly. “Winlock sent me to ask
you to come and look at it.”

“Is it in flood? Can the reservoir have burst?”

“We think the enemy have opened the sluices. The dead body of a white
man was washed down just now. We saw it, though we couldn’t reach it,
and some one said it was Western, who was in charge at the canal
works.”

The Colonel and Mr Burgrave hurried along the rampart, sheltered from
the enemy’s fire by the gathering darkness, to the rear wall of the
fort, the base of which was washed by the canal. The canal itself was
part of the great system of irrigation-works by means of which, as the
Commissioner had once complained, General Keeling had made Khemistan.
A huge reservoir was constructed in the hills to receive the torrents
of water which rushed down every ravine after a storm, and which,
after carrying ruin and destruction in their path, ran fruitlessly to
waste. By means of sluices the outflow was regulated with the minutest
care, and the precious water husbanded so jealously that even in the
hottest seasons it was possible to supply the canal which, with its
many effluents, had converted the immediate surroundings of Alibad
from a sandy waste into a garden. In view of the possible necessity of
coping with an occasional rush of water, the banks were artificially
raised, and the one opposite the south-west angle of the fort, where
the canal took a sudden bend, had been strengthened to a considerable
height with masonry, to protect the cultivated land beyond it from
inundation. This change in its course largely increased the force of
the current at this point.

After a storm the placid canal always became a rushing torrent, on
account of the accessions it received after leaving the reservoir, but
none of those in the fort had ever seen it rise to the height it had
reached on the present occasion. Colonel Graham uttered an exclamation
of dismay when he looked out over the turbid stream, which seemed to
be flung back from the opposite bank against the fort wall with even
increased violence. Presently there was a lull in the storm, and by
the aid of a lantern, which was lowered from the rampart, he was able
to see that the current was actually scouring away the lower courses
of the wall. The next moment the lantern was violently swept from the
hand of the man who held the cord, as another rush of water came
swirling round the tower at the angle of the wall, dashing its spray
into the faces of the watchers. Every one of them felt the wall shake
under the blow, and there was a murmur of uneasiness. Colonel Graham
recovered himself first.

“Turn out all the servants and coolies, Winlock,” he said, “and shore
up the wall with props and sand-bags as far as possible. We will stay
here and watch whether the water rises any higher. It’s clear they
hope that this south curtain will go,” he added to Mr Burgrave, “and
that then they will only have to walk in.”

“They must have a clever head among them,” said the Commissioner; “for
they are evidently letting the water out a little at a time.”

“Ah, that’s the native engineer, no doubt. They would keep him alive
to manage the machinery for them when they murdered poor Western. Look
out, here’s another!”

Again the wall trembled perceptibly, but by this time the courtyard
was full of eager workers, piling up earth and stones and beams and
bags of sand, and anything else that could be found. Presently the
Colonel called out to them to stop, for there was now the danger that
the wall might fall outwards instead of inwards, and they waited in
unwilling idleness, while the two men on the rampart watched the
current anxiously, and measured the distance of its surface from the
parapet. Then came a more violent rush of water than any before, and
to Colonel Graham and Mr Burgrave the wall seemed to rock backwards
and forwards under them. When they looked into each other’s faces once
more, they could scarcely believe that it was still standing.

“That’s the last, evidently,” said the Colonel, “a final effort. The
water’s getting lower already. We’re safe for to-night, but if they
had only had the patience to wait till this rain was over, we could
never have stood the force of water they could have turned on. And as
it is, a child’s popgun might almost account for this bit of wall
now.”




 CHAPTER XV.
 “THE OLD FIRST HEROIC LESSONS.”

“Why, Mrs North!” Disturbed in his task of supervising the
proceedings of a nervous native assistant, whose mind was less
occupied with his dispensing than with the bullets which flattened
themselves occasionally upon the pavement outside the surgery, Dr
Tighe had turned suddenly to find Georgia at his elbow. “Can I do
anything for you?” he asked kindly, looking with professional
disapproval at her pale face and weary eyes.

“I want you to let me help you in the hospital.”

“And I thought you were a sensible woman! Will you tell me if you call
this wise, now?”

“I think it would help me to have something to do.”

“But not this. What am I to say to the Major when--if--when I see him
again, if you overtask your strength?”

“I see you think I am mad,” she said earnestly, “but I _know_ he is
alive. But the suspense is so dreadful, doctor. It’s certain that he
is wounded, and I can scarcely doubt he is a prisoner; and what may be
happening to him at any moment? It is killing me, and I must live--for
both their sakes.” The doctor nodded quickly. “And I thought if I
could do something to help those who were suffering as he is, it
might--oh, I don’t know--it might make me tired enough to sleep
again.”

“A good idea!” said Dr Tighe, in his most matter-of-fact tones. “You
shall relieve me of half my dressings, by all means, and I’ll turn
over to you the out-patient work among these unfortunate women and
children. You can leave that dispensing, Babu”--the assistant, who had
been listening for the thud of the bullets, started violently--“and go
round the wards with the Memsahib.”

From his own cases on the opposite side of the improvised wards Dr
Tighe glanced across at Georgia several times, remarking with approval
that her face and figure were losing their look of utter weariness as
she went about her work. She was giving her whole mind to it, that was
evident, and for the time her own anxiety was pushed into the
background. The number of patients to be treated was considerable, for
besides the men who had been wounded at the fight in the Akrab Pass,
there were a good many casualties due to the enemy’s fire since the
siege had begun. The work was therefore heavy, but as soon as the
dressings were finished Dr Tighe bustled up to Georgia and pointed out
a new opening for her energies.

“The Colonel wants sacks made--millions of ’em--for sand-bags,” he
said. “He was at his wits’ end about it this morning, tried to get the
native women to sew them, and they wouldn’t.”

“Oh, why didn’t he ask us?” cried Georgia. “We would have worked our
fingers to the bone.”

“I’m sure you would, and it’s likely he’d ask it of you, isn’t it? But
why all the refugees should have board and lodging given them free, I
don’t know. Why, they wouldn’t even make the sacks for payment! A lot
of them said they couldn’t sew, and the rest seemed to think they were
being persecuted when they were asked to do it. But you know how to
get round them, Mrs North. We can’t very well say that if a woman
doesn’t sew a sack a day out she goes--sounds a bit brutal--but you’ll
manage to set them to work, I’m sure. I’ll tell Colonel Graham you’ve
taken the matter in hand, and he’ll be for ever grateful.”

Unpromising though the task seemed, Georgia succeeded in finding six
women who consented to sew if the Memsahibs would do so too, and a
working-party was organised in the little courtyard, from which Mr
Hardy and the men-servants were rigorously banished for the time.
Since the need of sand-bags--at any rate in such numbers--had not been
foreseen, the proper material was lacking, but all the tents in the
fort were promptly requisitioned, and their canvas utilised. The
regimental tailors cut out the sacks, delivering them into the charge
of Rahah, and inside the courtyard Mrs Hardy and Georgia superintended
the unskilled workers, while Flora and Mabel took a pride in proving
their willingness to blister their fingers for their country. It was
fortunate that fine needlework was not required, for the native
women’s ideas of sewing were rudimentary in the extreme, but their two
instructresses succeeded at last in convincing them, by precept and
example, that to sew one side only of a seam was unnecessary as a
decoration and not calculated materially to further the usefulness of
a sack. When this lesson had been sufficiently impressed upon the
pupils, Georgia sat down in the doorway of her room to divide the
_pice_ which Colonel Graham had entrusted to her for distribution
among them. The sun was setting over the hill beyond the fort, and the
women, as they sat cross-legged on the floor, seized the fact that the
light was in their eyes as an excuse for turning round to gaze
greedily at the money which Georgia was apportioning on a chair.
Suddenly there was a whizz and a noisy clatter. A bullet had grazed
Georgia’s hand and struck the chair, sending the coins flying, and it
was followed by a burst of firing, which caused the terrified
workwomen to drop their sacks and exclaim with one voice that they
were dead.

“Down! down!” cried Georgia, setting the example herself, “and crawl
round to the other verandah. They are firing from the hill, but they
won’t be able to see us there.”

Dragging with her one woman who was paralysed with fright, she induced
the others to follow her, and when they were out of the line of fire,
proceeded to examine the terrific wounds from which one and all
declared themselves to be suffering. Curiously enough, no one was
badly hurt. Two had scratches, and one a nasty bruise from a ricochet
shot, but of severe injuries there were none. Georgia dressed the
wounds and comforted the sufferers with one or two _pice_ extra, and
then sent them back to their own quarters, thus allowing admittance to
Colonel Graham, Mr Hardy, the Commissioner, and Fitz, who had been
informed by the horrified servants that the enemy were firing into the
Memsahibs’ courtyard. Their anxiety raised to the highest pitch by the
shrieks from within, the four gentlemen were held at bay in the
passage by the heroic Rahah, who informed them that they must pass
over her body before they should break the _pardah_ of the women
assembled under her mistress’s protection. Just as they were at last
admitted a cry from behind made them look round, to see an unfortunate
water-carrier who had been passing along the rampart falling into the
courtyard.

“We must get up a parados on that side,” said Colonel Graham, when the
wounded man had been sent to the hospital. “They command the inside of
the whole east curtain from that hill. Your sand-bags will be made
useful sooner than we expected, Mrs North.”

“But what is to happen to us?” cried Mabel. “Are we to stay here to be
shot at?”

“Calm yourself, my dear girl,” said Mr Burgrave, in gently reproving
tones. “You are in no danger at the present moment.”

“You see, Miss North,” said the Colonel, “I don’t want to have to put
you either in the hospital courtyard or among the native refugees, and
there is nowhere else. After all, this court is so small that the
enemy can’t possibly command more than the east side, and we’ll put
that right by hanging curtains along the verandah.”

“Why, what good would that be against bullets?”

“The curtain wouldn’t stop them, certainly, but our friends up there
are very careful of their ammunition, and never waste a shot. Not
being able to see whether any one is in the verandah, they won’t aim
at it. It was the sight of a whole party assembled here that was
irresistible.”

“But is Georgia to live in darkness?” demanded Georgia’s
self-constituted champion.

“Nonsense, Mab! There are three other verandahs to sit in. After all,
one expects bullets in a siege,” said Georgia.

“That’s the right spirit, Mrs North,” said Colonel Graham heartily.
“As soon as it’s dusk we’ll have the matting up from the
club-house--messroom, I mean--floor, and nail it along the roof of
this verandah and across the corner where the passage is. Then you’ll
be safe from anything but chance shots, and those, I’m afraid, we can
none of us guard against.”

“But are those fellows up there to pot at the ladies without our ever
having a chance to pay them back, sir?” cried Fitz.

“I was coming to that. Of course the plan is to clear us off the east
rampart so that a force from the town may rush it under cover of the
fire from the hill, and therefore the parados must be our first care.
Still, I think we can spare a few sand-bags for the two western
towers, and if we arrange a little sangar on the top of each when it
is dark, we can show our chivalrous friends the snipers to-morrow what
it feels like to be sniped. Tell Winlock to set all the servants to
work filling bags and baskets, and anything else they can find, with
earth at once.”

“We seem to hold our own fairly well at present,” said Mr Burgrave, as
Fitz departed, and the Colonel stood looking narrowly at the
threatened verandah and the scattered work-materials with which it was
strewn.

“We seem to--yes, but it is simply because we have not been tried as
yet. There is far too great a length of wall for us to hold against a
well-planned attack--say from two sides at once. Why they haven’t put
us to the test before I can’t imagine. It’s not like their usual
tactics to let things drag on in this way.”

“I am of opinion that they dislike crossing the cleared space, and
intend to remain at a discreet distance and starve us out. If only
they stick to that, we ought to be relieved long before matters come
to a crisis.”

“No, it’s not that!” cried the Colonel irritably. “There’s something
behind that we don’t see. If there was any possibility of their having
guns, I should say they were waiting for them. But where are they to
get them from unless they have surprised Rahmat-Ullah, which we have
no reason to suppose? They have some dodge on hand, though, I’m
certain.”

“Is there any weak point at which they could be aiming?”

“Man, this place is nothing but weak points. If those fellows on the
hill knew what they were about, they could enfilade our north and
south ramparts as well as cover the eastern one. The south curtain is
so weak now that an elephant or a battering-ram--let alone a
well-planted shell or two--could knock it over, and the canal on that
side is getting lower every day. The water-carriers have to go down a
dozen steps now, and it’s only the enemy’s fear for their own precious
skins that prevents their picking them off from the opposite bank. We
could pepper them from the rampart, they know that, and they haven’t
the sense to pour in an oblique fire from the hill. I suppose, too, it
hasn’t occurred to you that if they took it into their heads to blow
us up, one or two plucky fellows could get close up to the walls under
cover of a general attack, and lay a train at their leisure. It’s
impossible to fire transversely from the loopholes in the towers
without exposing pretty nearly one’s whole body, and as to depressing
a rifle and firing point-blank down from the parapet, well----”

Mr Burgrave understood the pause to mean that the consequences would
probably be very uncomfortable for the holder of the rifle, and said
no more. The night passed without further alarm, save that Georgia
found it would be dangerous to have a light in her rooms unless door
and shutters were both closed. The glimmer from the window, even when
only seen through the matting curtain, attracted two or three bullets
immediately, and it was evident that the choice must be made between
air and light. During the hours of darkness the besieged worked hard
at their defences, and succeeded in erecting a more or less effectual
shelter along the inside of the east rampart, and also a sand-bag
parapet at the summit of the two western towers. The gateway turrets
on the north-east, which were now exposed to the fire from the hill in
the rear as well as to that from General Keeling’s house in front,
were strengthened in the same way. Behind these shelters the best
marksmen of the garrison took up their posts, and as soon as the
bullets began to fly from the hill, seized the opportunity of pointing
out to the enemy that the state of things had altered to some extent
in the night. Since it was impossible for a man on either side to fire
without exposing himself slightly, a return shot was the instant
comment on this imprudence, and hence, before the morning was over,
both parties were lying low and glaring at their opponents’ sangars,
ready to shoot but not caring to be shot. Helmets on the one side and
turbans on the other, raised cautiously on rifle-barrels above the
breastwork, drew a few shots, but the nature of the trick was quickly
perceived by both parties, and the sniping continued to languish.

“Their rifles seem to carry as far as ours,” remarked Mr Burgrave to
Colonel Graham.

“So they ought,” was the grim reply. “Most of them, if not all, are
ours. They are stolen and smuggled wholesale into Ethiopia, and Bahram
Khan has borrowed them to arm his followers with. That’s how they
manage to give us so much trouble. In the matchlock days, when this
place was built, we could have laughed at their shooting from the
hill.”

“What is that?” said the Commissioner suddenly, putting up his
eye-glass; “a pile of cannon-balls? It was not there last night.”

They were standing in one of the gateway turrets, and the heap to
which he pointed was visible upon the cleared space, in front of the
entrance to a lane between two of the houses occupied by the enemy.
Colonel Graham laid down his field-glass with an exclamation of
disgust.

“Cannon-balls! It’s _heads_--human heads--heads of our men. Those
fiends have surprised one of our posts--Sultanibagh probably, beyond
Shah Nawaz. I telegraphed to the Jemadar in charge to retire upon
Rahmat-Ullah, as there was no chance of their getting here safely, but
the wires must have been cut before they got the message, or else the
men have been ambushed on their way. Well, Bahram Khan has put himself
beyond the pale of mercy this time, even with our Government, I should
imagine.”

As the light grew stronger the sickening trophy was perceived from
other parts of the fort, and the men of the Khemistan Horse began to
become impatient. It appeared that a deserter had ventured close under
the walls in the night, in order to taunt the garrison with some
unexplained reverse, the nature of which was now made manifest. They
were asked how long Sinjāj Kīlin’s sowars had been content to hide
behind stone walls, instead of coming out to fight on horseback in the
open, and a variety of interesting and savoury information was added
as to the precise nature of the tortures in store for all, whether
officers or men, who fell into Bahram Khan’s hands. To the men who had
so long dominated the frontier, this abuse was intolerably galling,
and the troopers were gathering in corners with sullen faces, and
asking one another why they were kept back from washing out the
disgrace in blood. They had now been in the fort the best part of a
week, no attack in force had been made, and yet there had not been the
slightest attempt to drive off the enemy or inflict any loss upon him.
Ressaldar Badullah Khan voiced this feeling to Colonel Graham a little
later, when the Colonel had passed with a judicious lack of apparent
notice the scowling groups of men who were discussing the state of
affairs.

“Our faces are black, sahib,” said the native officer, in response to
the question put to him. “Bahram Khan and his _badmashes_ laugh at our
beards, and we are pent up here like women. We are better men than
they--we have proved it in every fight since first Sinjāj Kīlin
Sahib raised the regiment--why then (so say the sowars) is it
forbidden to us to issue forth with our horses, and sweep the baseborn
rabble outside from the face of the earth?”

“Is the regiment complaining of the course I choose to take,
Ressaldar?”

“Nay, sahib; the sowars say that it is the will of the Kumpsioner
Sahib which is being done.”

“They are wrong. It is mine. What could the regiment do on horseback
in the streets of the town, with the enemy firing from roofs and
loopholes? We have not a man too many in the fort now, and yet,
Ressaldar, I anticipate a sortie in force before long, though not in
review order.”

The Ressaldar’s eyes gleamed. “May the news be told to the regiment,
sahib?” he asked.

“Could they refrain from shouting it to the next man who taunts them?
No, Ressaldar; tell them to trust me as they have always done
hitherto. There will be work to be done before many days, but I cannot
set mutinous men to do it.”

Badullah Khan went out, meeting Woodworth on the threshold.

“Would you mind coming up to the north-western tower, sir?” asked the
adjutant, when he had closed the door. “The enemy seem to be doing
something in that direction which I can’t quite make out.”

“What sort of thing?” asked Colonel Graham, rising.

“I would rather not give an opinion until you have seen what there is
to see, sir,” was the reply, so unwontedly cautious that the Colonel
prepared for a heavy blow. Woodworth followed him up the narrow
winding stairs in silence, and pointed to the stretch of desert on the
northern side of the town, across which two long strings of men and
animals were slowly passing in a westerly direction. The Colonel
started, examined the moving objects through his field-glass, and
called to his orderly--

“Ask Beltring Sahib to come here at once.”

Almost before Beltring, breathless, had mounted the staircase, he was
greeted by a question. “Beltring, are there any guns at Nalapur?”

“No, sir. At least, there are two old field-pieces in front of the
palace, but that’s all.”

“Are they in working order?”

“They use them for firing salutes, sir, not for anything else, I
believe.”

“Still, that shows they are safe to work, and here they are. Where
will they mount them, should you say, Woodworth?”

“On the hill, sir. The slope on the far side is comparatively easy for
getting them up.”

“True, and from the brow there they could knock the place about our
ears in a couple of hours. At all costs we must keep them from getting
the range to-day. They will have no range-finders, that’s one good
thing, and if we can secure a night’s respite, it’ll be a pity if we
don’t make good use of it. Tell our marksmen to fire at anything they
see moving up there. Those guns must not be placed in position before
sunset. And then tell all the other officers and volunteers to meet me
on the south rampart immediately.”

The council of war which assembled on the rampart, sheltered by the
south-western tower, was sufficiently informal to make the hair of any
stickler for military etiquette stand on end, but its proceedings were
absolutely practical. The Colonel, beside whom stood Mr Burgrave,
stated the situation briefly.

“You have seen the two guns which the enemy intend to mount on the
hill there. Once they get them into position and find our range, we
may as well retire into the vaults and wait until we are smoked out,
for there is no possible shelter above ground. With our small force it
is hopeless to detach a party to sally out and capture the guns in the
open--more especially since the enemy hold the town between us and
them. Still, they have plenty to do in getting the guns across the
canal and dragging them up the hill, and we must make it our business
to prevent them from opening fire to-day, and to-night those guns must
be taken. I propose to leave the Commissioner in charge of the fort,
with ten of his own Sikhs and fifty sowars under Ressaldar Ghulam
Rasul. Every civilian who can hold a weapon must also do duty. I shall
take a hundred and fifty dismounted sowars and thirty Sikhs, with all
the enrolled volunteers, and make a dash for the hill under cover of
darkness. If we succeed, we shall have averted a great danger; if we
fail, the fort will be no worse off than if we had hung about and done
nothing. I am confident that the Commissioner will fight to the end,
and not allow himself to be tempted by any offer of terms.”

“Know the beggars too well,” said Mr Burgrave laconically.

“That’s the main scheme; now for details. To reach the hill, the canal
must be crossed in any case. The most obvious plan would undoubtedly
be for the force to rendezvous silently in the shadow of the west
curtain, traverse the irrigated land, and restore the bridge at the
foot of the hill sufficiently to cross by it. But the enemy could
sweep the whole route from their positions both in the town and on the
hill, and they will be very much on the alert to-night. My idea is to
cross the canal here from the water-gate, and march the first part of
the distance along the bank, so as to come upon the enemy from the
side he won’t expect us. He knows we have neither boat nor bridge, and
the water is still deep enough along the wall to be impassable to any
but good swimmers.”

“Then how do you propose to cross?” asked Mr Burgrave.

“There I must invite suggestions. We have no time for building boats
or bridges, and the water-gate offers no facilities for it either. A
raft, possibly. What do you think, Runcorn?”

“A raft supported on inflated skins, sir?” asked the engineer officer.
“That might be practicable, but it would have to be very small, for
the passage to the gate is so narrow that all the materials must be
taken to the water’s edge separately and put together there. There is
no standing-ground of any sort but the wretched shaky steps that the
water-carriers use, so that we can’t well lower things from the wall.”

“And the time spent in ferrying the force over would be interminable,
not to mention the risk of discovery by the enemy,” said Colonel
Graham.

His subordinates looked at one another. Various suggestions had been
hazarded and rejected, when a hesitating voice made itself heard. The
speaker was Mr Hardy, who had joined the group a few minutes earlier,
with a message to the Colonel from one of the wounded officers in the
hospital.

“In my Oxford days,” he said, “I remember a pleasant walk through the
meadows--” His hearers gasped. Why should these peaceful recollections
be obtruded at such a moment? “There was one point at which the path
crossed a considerable stream, and a punt that ran on wires was placed
there. I’m afraid I am not very intelligible,” he smiled nervously. “I
can’t describe the mechanism in technical language, but the punt was
fastened to one wire, and the other was free and moved on pulleys, so
that you could pull yourself across, or draw the punt towards you if
it happened to be at the opposite bank.”

“Padri,” said Colonel Graham, “it’s clear that you are an unsuspected
mechanical genius. This is the very thing we want, though we must use
rope instead of wire.”

“But we have even got that, sir,” said Runcorn eagerly. “Timson was
boasting that he had saved all the stores of his department--miles of
telegraph wire amongst them. Now he’ll have to disgorge.”

“Then will you set about the construction of the ferry, Runcorn? You
can’t begin work on the spot until night, but you can get your
materials ready. Requisition anything you want, of course.”

“May we make a suggestion, sir?” said Fitz Anstruther, coming forward
with Winlock as the council broke up. Signals of intelligence had been
passing between the two for some time, and they had held a whispered
consultation while the ferry was being discussed.

“Why, what plot have you on hand?”

It was Winlock who answered. “We thought that it might make all the
difference to your success, sir, if a diversion could be arranged to
distract the enemy’s attention. We two know every foot of these hills
from _chikor_-shooting, and if we might pick out a dozen or so of the
sowars who have constantly gone with us out hunting as beaters, we
could make a sham attack. We know of a splendid place on the side of a
hill, inaccessible from below, which commands the camp of the hostile
tribes, and we thought if we sent up a signal rocket or two, to be
answered from the fort, and then poured in as many volleys as there
was time for, it might make a good impression. Of course, as soon as
they try to get round us and rush the hill, we must retire, to keep
them from finding out how few we are; but the main force ought to have
settled the guns by that time, and we might rendezvous on the hill and
march back together.”

“It sounds feasible,” said the Colonel slowly; “but how do you propose
to cross the canal?”

“We don’t mean to cross it in going, sir. Anstruther says we can
clamber along the base of this wall from the water-gate round the
south-western tower, so as to get on to dry land under the west
curtain.”

“I know it’s possible, sir,” said Fitz eagerly. “I’ve done it more
than once when the canal was low, and it’ll be easier now that the
bricks are so much washed away. And of course we shall be very careful
in crossing the irrigated land--all of us in khaki, you see, and
taking advantage of every bit of cover--and unless we run right into
one of the enemy’s outposts, I don’t see how they are to spot us. And
think of the benefit it will be to have their attention distracted
from your movement!”

“You realise that you are taking your lives in your hands? You will
probably have to swim the canal higher up to join us, and, after all,
we may not be able to wait for you. Your men will be volunteers, of
course? They must understand that it’s a desperate business.”

“Yes, sir; but they’ll come like a shot. They’ve been out with us
after _markhor_, and we’ve been in some tight places in the mountains.
May we have what rockets we want?”

“By all means. Good luck go with you! I wish I was coming too!”

“That’s really handsome of the C.O.,” said Fitz, dodging a bullet as
he clattered down the stairs into the courtyard with Winlock. “Grand
firework display to-night! What a pity that the ladies and all the
refugees can’t have front seats on the ramparts to watch the
_tamasha_!”




 CHAPTER XVI.
 THE DARKEST HOUR.

“Sahib, there is a man under the wall on the east side.”

“How did he come there?” demanded Colonel Graham angrily. “What are
the sentries doing?”

“The night is so dark, sahib, that he crept up unnoticed. He is the
holy mullah Aziz-ud-Din, and desires speech with your honour.”

“The Amir’s mullah? You are sure of it?”

“I know his voice, sahib. He is holding his hands on high, to show
that he has no weapons.”

“I suppose we may as well see what he has to say,” said the Colonel to
Mr Burgrave, with whom he had been making final arrangements, and the
two men climbed the steps to the east rampart. Once there, and looking
over into the darkness, it was some little time before their eyes
could distinguish the dim figure at the foot of the wall.

“Peace!” said Colonel Graham.

“It is peace, sahib. I bear the words of the Amir Ashraf Ali Khan. He
says, ‘It is now out of my power to save the lives of the sahibs, and
I will not deceive them, knowing that a warrior’s death amid the ruins
of their fortress will please them better than to fall into the hands
of my thrice-accursed nephew, who has stolen the hearts of my soldiers
from me. But this I can do. The houses next to the canal on this side
of the fort are held by my own bodyguard, faithful men who have eaten
of my salt for many years, and I have there six swift camels hidden.
Let the Memsahibs be entrusted to me, especially those of the
household of my beloved friend Nāth Sahib, and I will send them at
once to Nalapur, where they shall be in sanctuary in my own palace,
and I will swear--I who kept my covenant with the Sarkar until the
Sarkar broke it--that death shall befall me before any harm touches
them.’”

“Why is this message sent to-night?” asked Colonel Graham.

“Because Bahram Khan is preparing a great destruction, sahib, and the
heart of Ashraf Ali Khan bleeds to think that the houses of his
friends Sinjāj Kīlin Sahib and Nāth Sahib should both be blotted
out in one day.”

“Carry my thanks and those of the Commissioner Sahib to Ashraf Ali
Khan, but tell him that the Memsahibs will remain with us. Their
presence would only place him in greater danger, and he would not be
able to protect them. But we can. They will not fall into the hands of
Bahram Khan.”

“It is well, sahib.” The faint blur which represented the messenger
melted into the surrounding blackness, and Colonel Graham turned to
his companion.

“It will be your business to see to that, if the enemy break in.
Haycraft comes with me. We must leave Flora in your charge. Don’t let
her fall into their hands, any more than Miss North.”

“I promise,” said Mr Burgrave, and their hands met in the darkness.

“Thanks. I think we have settled everything now. We don’t start for an
hour yet, and if you like to explain things to Miss North----”

“I should prefer to say nothing unless the necessity arises.”

“I never thought of your going into details, but she must know
something, surely? Flora will learn the state of affairs from
Haycraft; Mrs North will pick it up from the Hardys and her ayah, and
Miss North will probably expect---- But please yourself, of course.”

“I will go and talk to her for a little while. I have scarcely seen
her all day.”

Mr Burgrave’s tone was constrained. It seemed to him almost impossible
to meet Mabel at this crisis, and abstain from any allusion to the
terrible duty which had just been laid upon him. He was not an
imaginative man, and no forecast of the scene burned itself into his
brain, as would have been the case with some people, but the
oppression of anticipation was heavy upon him. For him the dull horror
in his mind overshadowed everything, and it was with a shock that he
found Mabel to be in one of her most vivacious and aggressive moods.
She was walking up and down the verandah outside her room as if for a
wager, turning at each end of the course with a swish of draperies
which sounded like an angry breeze, and she hailed his arrival with
something like enthusiasm, simply because he was some one to talk to.

“Flora is crying on Fred’s--I mean Mr Haycraft’s--shoulder somewhere,”
she said; “and Mrs Hardy and Georgia are having a prayer-meeting with
the native Christians. They wanted me to come too; but I don’t feel as
if I could be quiet, and I shouldn’t understand, either. What is going
to happen, really?”

“The Colonel proposes to make a sortie and capture the two guns which
the enemy have brought up. There is, I trust, every prospect of his
succeeding.”

Mabel stamped her foot. “Why can’t you tell me the truth, instead of
trying to sugar things over?” she demanded. “It would be much more
interesting.”

“You must allow me to decide what is suitable for you to hear,” said
Mr Burgrave, his mind still so full of that final duty of his that he
spoke with a serene indifference which Mabel found most galling.

“I don’t allow you to do anything of the sort. I wish you wouldn’t
treat me as if I was a baby. It’s like telling me yesterday that all
the fresh milk in the place was to be reserved for us women and the
wounded, as if I wanted to be pilloried as a lazy, selfish creature,
doing nothing and demanding luxuries!”

“My dear little girl, I am sure there isn’t a man in the garrison who
would consent to your missing any comfort that the place can furnish.”

“That’s just it. I want to feel the pinch--to share the hardships. But
of course you don’t understand--you never do.” She stopped and looked
at him. “I don’t know how it is, Eustace, but you seem somehow to stir
up everything that is bad in my nature. I could die happy if I had
once shocked you thoroughly.”

He recoiled from her involuntarily. “Do you think it is a time to joke
about death when it may be close upon you?” he asked, with some
severity.

“That sounds as if you were a little shocked,” said Mabel
meditatively. “But you know, Eustace, whenever you tell me to do
anything--I mean when you express a wish that I should do anything--I
feel immediately the strongest possible impulse to do exactly the
opposite.”

“But the impulse has never yet been translated into action?” he asked,
with the indulgent smile which was reserved for Mabel when she talked
extravagantly.

“I’m ashamed to say it hasn’t.”

“Then I am quite satisfied. I can scarcely aspire to regulate your
thoughts just at present, can I? But so long as you respect my
wishes----”

“Oh, what a lot of trouble it would save if we were all comfortably
killed to-night!” cried Mabel, with a sudden change of mood. Mr
Burgrave was shocked, and showed it. “I’m in earnest, Eustace.”

“My dear child, you can hardly expect me to believe that you would
welcome the horrors which the storming of this place would entail?”

“Oh no; of course not. You are so horribly literal. Can’t you see that
my nerves are all on edge? I do wish you understood things. If you
won’t talk about what’s going to be done to-night, do go away, and
don’t stay here and be mysterious.”

“Dear child, do you think I shall judge you hardly for this feminine
weakness? You need not be afraid of hurting or shocking me. Say
anything you like; I shall put it down to the true cause. If your
varying moods have taught me nothing else, at least I have learnt
since our engagement to take your words at their proper valuation.”

“If you pile many more loads of obligation upon me, I shall expire!”
said Mabel sharply, only to receive a kind smile in return. Anything
more that she might have said, in the amiable design of shocking him
beyond forgiveness, was prevented by the appearance of Mrs Hardy.

“Is it true that you are going to arm all the civilians in the place,
Mr Burgrave?” she demanded of the Commissioner.

“It is thought well--merely as a precautionary measure.”

“Then I do beg and beseech you to give Mr Hardy a rifle that won’t go
off, or we shall all be shot.”

“We will get the Padri to go round and hand out fresh cartridges,
instead of giving him a gun,” said Mr Burgrave seriously, but Mabel
burst into a peal of hysterical laughter, which was effectual in
putting a stop to further conversation, and he returned to the outer
courtyard, where the men chosen for the forlorn hope were mustering in
readiness for the start. Fitz and Winlock and their small party had
left already, officers and men alike wearing the native grass sandals
instead of boots, as they had been accustomed to do in their hunting
expeditions, and it was known that they had scrambled along the wall
and round the base of the south-western tower in safety. The ferry had
by this time been successfully constructed by Runcorn and his
assistants, one of whom had undertaken the very unpleasant task of
swimming across the ice-cold canal to pass the first wire rope round
one of the posts which registered the height of the water on the
opposite bank. Ball ammunition in extra quantities was served out to
the whole force, for although Colonel Graham hoped to confine himself
entirely to cold steel, for the sake of quietness, he was determined
to be able to reply to the enemy’s fire, should their attention
unfortunately be aroused. The men were marched down in parties to the
water-gate, and ferried over as quickly as the confined space would
allow, and when all had crossed, the raft was drawn back to the
gateway, and the wire disconnected. It had been decided that this was
imperative, lest the enemy should take advantage of the ferry to cross
the canal while the attention of the garrison was occupied by an
attack in front. If the forlorn hope returned victorious, it would be
easy to reconstruct the ferry by throwing a rope to them from the
rampart, while if they were compelled to retreat, the raft was so
small that to employ it under fire would entail a useless sacrifice of
life, and the fugitives would do better to swim.

Then began a weary waiting-time for those in the fort. The night was
moonless, so that it was impossible to distinguish any movement,
whether on the part of friend or of foe. At last a rocket, rising from
the cliff which overhung the town on the north-west, and which Fitz
and Winlock had indicated as their goal, showed that they, at least,
had so far been successful. The rocket sent up from the fort in reply
was answered by another from the cliff, and this was immediately
followed by the distant sound of brisk firing, which seemed to cause
considerable perturbation in the parts of the town occupied by the
enemy. Lights moved about hurriedly from place to place, horns were
blown, and there was a confused noise of angry shouting. The garrison
did their best, by opening fire from the wall and towers, to increase
the effect of the surprise, but without much hope of hitting anything,
for the moving lights did not afford very satisfactory targets. In
reply, a dropping fire broke out from the houses opposite, which was
maintained for some time, but with little spirit, and slackened
gradually. Scarcely had Mr Burgrave given the order to cease fire,
however, when a heavy fusillade was heard on the west of the fort,
though not from the hill. The sound appeared to come from the point at
which the bridge, now in ruins, had crossed the canal, a point which
it had not hitherto been known that the enemy were occupying, and
which Colonel Graham had not intended to approach. His force should
have been far to the left of it by this time, and already mounting the
hill. The most probable explanation seemed to be that they had missed
their way in the darkness, and following the bank of the canal too
far, had fallen into an ambuscade posted at the ruins of the bridge to
guard against any attempt to cross for the purpose of capturing the
guns. The Commissioner and his garrison waited and listened in the
deepest anxiety, straining their eyes to try and perceive, from the
flashes of the rifles, which way the fight was tending. But the firing
ceased suddenly, as that on the farther side of the enemy’s position
had done some time before. There was nothing to do but wait.

Suddenly, after a long interval, a piteous wailing arose at the rear
of the fort, from the opposite bank of the canal. A native stood
there, one of the water-carriers who had accompanied the force,
abjectly entreating to be fetched over, since the enemy were at his
heels. To employ the ferry at such a moment was not to be thought of,
but a rope was thrown from the steps of the water-gate, and the
miserable wretch, plunging in, caught it, and was drawn across. He
told a terrible tale as he stood dripping and shivering in the passage
leading to the gate. Colonel Graham’s force had been attacked, shortly
after leaving the canal-bank, by overwhelming numbers of the enemy,
who had first poured in a withering fire, and then rushed forward to
complete the destruction with their knives and tulwars. The _bhisti_
himself was the only man who had escaped, and the enemy had pursued
him to the very edge of the canal. The sharpest-sighted men in the
fort, sent to the rampart to test the truth of this statement as far
as they could by starlight, were obliged to confirm it. There was
undoubtedly a large body of the enemy on the other side of the canal.
They were lying down behind the high bank, so as to be sheltered from
the fire of the garrison.

“To cut off fugitives, I suppose,” muttered Mr Burgrave, half to
himself and half to Ressaldar Ghulam Rasul. “That looks as though the
massacre were not quite so complete as--Hark! I thought I heard a
sound from the hill. Can our glorious fellows have made a last dash
for it after all--some few who escaped?”

The men on the rampart stood like statues to listen, but failed to
distinguish anything that might confirm the Commissioner’s surmise.
The air seemed full of sound--footfalls, a murmur from the town, a
stray shot or two from the same direction, and on the west a kind of
shuffling noise. The enemy were taking up their positions for the
attack. Mr Burgrave sent orders to the guard at the water-gate to let
the air out of the inflated skins which supported the raft, so as to
sink it to the level of the water, and this was at once done. When he
had posted a sentry in the passage and another on the rampart above
it, he was able to leave that side of the fort to defend itself, since
the enemy had no means of crossing to assail it. To occupy the whole
range of wall with the absurdly small force at his disposal was
obviously impossible, and he therefore placed ten men in each of the
larger towers, from which, with the usual amount of trouble and risk,
a flanking fire could be obtained, and twelve in the two gateway
turrets, retaining the Ressaldar and sixteen men as a reserve, ready
to make a dash for any point that might be specially threatened. If
the garrison should be driven from the walls, those who escaped were
to rush for the hospital, where the women and children would take
refuge, and the last stand was to be made. Having ordered his forces
to their stations, the Commissioner went the round of the towers to
encourage the men. His own Sikhs he could deal with well enough, but
he felt that it was the irony of fate which obliged him to urge the
sowars of the Khemistan Horse to show themselves worthy of their first
commander, General Keeling, and it seemed as if the same thought had
occurred to the men, for they scowled at him resentfully when they
heard the mighty name from his lips.

The bad news brought by the fugitive spread through the fort with
astonishing rapidity. The native women, whom Georgia had succeeded in
soothing into some sort of calmness before the departure of the
forlorn hope, filled the air with their wailings, until Ismail Bakhsh,
who was head of the civilian guard detailed for the defence of the
hospital, threatened to fire a volley among them if they were not
quiet. Flora Graham’s ayah was gossiping with a friend among these
women when the news arrived, and she rushed with it at once to her
mistress’s room. Poor Flora had shut herself up alone to pray for the
safety of her father and lover, and was following in thought every
step of their perilous march. She had just reached with them the
summit of the hill, and rushed upon the guard round the guns, when the
ayah burst in with the news that the worst had happened. The sudden
revulsion of feeling was too much for Flora. Her usual self-control
deserted her, and she ran wildly across the courtyard to Georgia’s
room. Georgia was lying down, talking softly in the dark to Mabel, who
sat beside her, and both sprang up at Flora’s entrance.

“What is it? Have they come back?” they demanded, with one voice.

“No, no; they are killed--all killed! Papa and Fred both--oh, Mrs
North, what can I do?” She dropped sobbing on the floor at Georgia’s
feet, and buried her face in her dress.

“Perhaps it isn’t true,” suggested Georgia faintly. She had sunk down
again on the bed.

“There’s no hope--one man has come back, the only survivor. Both of
them at once! and I was praying for them, and I felt so sure--and even
while I was praying they were being killed.”

“Is the whole force cut off?” asked Georgia, almost in a whisper.

“All but this one man.” Flora checked her sobs for a moment to answer.

“Fitz Anstruther too?” cried Mabel sharply.

“All, I tell you! It doesn’t signify to you, Mab; you have your
Eustace left, but I have lost everything. Oh, Mrs North, you know how
it feels. Help me to bear it.”

“Flora dear,” began Georgia, with difficulty. “I--I can’t breathe,”
she gasped, struggling to stand up. “Please ask Mrs Hardy to come. I
feel so faint. She will understand.”

Rahah, who had been crouched in the corner as usual, sprang up and ran
out, returning in a moment with Mrs Hardy, who fell upon both girls
immediately, and drove them out with bitter reproaches.

“You pair of selfish, thoughtless chatterboxes! I should have thought
you had more sense, Flora. Just be off, both of you. You can have my
rooms for the rest of the night; I shall stay here. Even if all our
poor fellows are killed, is that any reason for killing Mrs North
too?”

“Oh, please don’t, Mrs Hardy! I never thought--Mrs North is always so
kind, and I am so miserable,” sobbed Flora.

“You shouldn’t be miserable unless you’re quite certain it’s
necessary. You wouldn’t believe a native who told you he was dead, as
they are always doing; so why should you when he says other people are
dead?” demanded Mrs Hardy, with a brilliancy of logic which somehow
failed to satisfy. “I haven’t a doubt that the _bhisti_ took to his
heels in a panic at the sound of the first shot, and if he hadn’t
fortunately been in the rear, the panic might have spread to all the
rest. There, go away, do, and don’t cry so. We’ll hope all will go
well.”



“Why have you left your post, doctor?” asked Mr Burgrave, meeting Dr
Tighe crossing the courtyard.

“The hospital will have to look after itself a good deal to-night, but
I have left the Padri and my Babu in charge there. Mrs North is taken
ill.”

“Good heavens! It only needed this to make the horror of the situation
complete.”

“From our point of view, it may be the best thing that could happen.
It will make the men fight like demons. Here, you girl, where are you
going?” He had caught the shoulder of a veiled woman who ran up and
tried to slip past him into the passage, but she let her _chadar_ fall
aside, and disclosed herself as Rahah.

“I have been telling the men of the regiment, sahib, and they have all
sworn great oaths that so long as one of them has a spark of life left
Sinjāj Kīlin’s daughter shall not be without a protector in her
need, and that the corpses of foes without and friends within shall be
piled as high as the ramparts before the enemy shall gain a footing on
the wall. I told also those in the hospital”--there was a hint of
malice in Rahah’s voice--“and every wounded man who can sit up in bed
is crying out for a gun. They will serve as hospital guard, they say,
and set Ismail Bakhsh and his men free to fight on the walls.”

“Good idea, that!” said Dr Tighe, turning to the Commissioner. “You
see how the men take it. Well, I shall keep Mrs North in her own
quarters if I can, but there is a passage through to the hospital
courtyard, and we must carry her over if it’s necessary. But I don’t
think it will be, now.”

Mr Burgrave nodded, and returned to his station on the west curtain.
Why the enemy did not advance to the attack was a mystery. In the
opinion of Ghulam Rasul and his most experienced subordinates, they
had moved out from their position in the town, and were occupying the
irrigated land on both sides of the canal in large numbers, sheltered
against any volley from the walls by the rows of trees which marked
the lines of the water-courses. They could not be seen, nor could it
precisely be said that they were heard, but as the old soldiers in the
garrison said, it could be felt that they were there. The situation
was eerie in the extreme, and Mr Burgrave was unable to find comfort
in a phenomenon which made his men cheerful in a moment. It was the
Ressaldar who called his attention to it as they stood straining their
ears in the attempt to distinguish some definite sound in the
murmuring silence, and at once he himself heard clearly the faint
tramp of a galloping horse far away to the north-east.

“He rides!” breathed Ghulam Rasul in an ecstasy, and “He rides!” cried
the sowar nearest him, catching up the words from his lips. “He
rides!” went from man to man, until the defenders of the towers looked
at one another with glistening eyes, and even the unsympathetic Sikhs,
who held themselves loftily aloof from the contemptible local
superstitions of their Khemi comrades, repeated, with something of
enthusiasm, “He rides!” “He rides; all is well,” said Ismail Bakhsh,
puffing out his chest with pride, in his temporary guardroom on the
clubhouse verandah. “Sinjāj Kīlin Sahib is watching over his house
and over his children. The power of the Sarkar stands firm.”

 [image: images/img_198.jpg
 caption: “HE RIDES”]

All unconscious of the moral reinforcement which was doubling the
strength of the garrison, Mabel and Flora sat disconsolately over the
charcoal brazier in Mrs Hardy’s room, listening for the sounds of the
attack, which they expected to hear each moment. Mrs Hardy’s vigorous
rebuke had nerved them both to put a brave face on matters, and for
some time they vied with one another in discovering reasons for
refusing to credit the report of the fugitive, and deciding that all
might yet be well. But as time went on, and there was no sign of the
triumphant return of Colonel Graham and his force, their valiant
efforts at cheerfulness flagged perceptibly. Mrs Hardy, running across
to say that Georgia was doing pretty well, advised them to lie down
and try to sleep, but they scouted the idea with indignation, and
still sat looking gloomily into the glowing embers and listening to
the night wind, which wailed round the crazy old buildings in a
peculiarly mournful manner.

“Doesn’t it seem absurdly incongruous,” said Mabel at last, in a low
voice, “that you and I--two _fin de siècle_ High School girls, who
have taken up all the modern fads just like other people--should be
sitting here, expecting every moment that a band of savages will break
in and kill us--with swords? It feels so unnatural--so horribly out of
drawing.”

“How can you talk such nonsense?” snapped Flora, upon whose nerves the
strain of suspense was telling severely. “I never heard that a High
School career protected people against a violent death. Do you think
it felt natural to the women in the Mutiny to be killed--or the French
Revolution, or any time like that?”

“I don’t know. It really seems as if they must have been more
accustomed to horrors in those days. Just imagine, Flora, the little
paragraph there will be in the _South Central Magazine_: ‘We regret to
record the death of Miss Mabel North, O.S.C., who was murdered in the
late rising on the Indian frontier. Miss Flora Graham, a distinguished
student of St Scipio’s College, St Margarets, N.B., is believed to
have perished on the same sad occasion.’ Your school paper will have
just the same sort of thing in it, and the two editors will send each
other complimentary copies, and acknowledge the courtesy in the next
number. It will all be about you and me--and we shall be dead.”

“Of course we shall; you said that before. But I don’t see what good
it does to die many times before our deaths.”

“How horrid of you to call me a coward!” said Mabel pensively.

“I don’t call you anything of the sort. I think you must be fearfully
brave to look at things in this detached, artistic kind of way, but
what’s the good of it? Death must come when it will come, but
naturally no one could be expected to look forward with pleasure to
the mere fact of dying. Unless, of course”--Flora’s blue eyes shone as
she turned suddenly from the general to the particular--“my dying
would save papa or Fred. Then I should be glad to die.”

“You really mean that you wouldn’t mind being killed if somehow it
would save either of their lives?”

“Of course I do, just as you would gladly die to save your Eustace.”

“But I wouldn’t!” cried Mabel involuntarily, then tried to minimise
the effect of her admission by turning it into a joke. “I think it’s
his privilege to do that for me.”

“I wish you wouldn’t say that sort of thing!” said Flora
reproachfully. “Happily there’s no one else to hear it, but if I
didn’t know you, I should think you were perfectly horrid.”

“No, Flora, really,” cried Mabel, in a burst of honesty; “I can’t say
confidently that there is one person in the world I would die for. I
feel as if I could die to save Georgia, but I don’t know whether I
could do it when the time came. I used to think that people--English
people, at any rate--became heroic just as a matter of course when
danger happened, but now I begin to believe that it depends a good
deal on what they have been like before.”

“You always try to make the worst of yourself.”

“No, I don’t. I’m trying to look at myself as I really am. I have
never in all my life done a thing I didn’t like if I could help it.
What sort of preparation is that for being heroic? Flora,” with a
sudden change of subject, “suppose the enemy had stormed the fort
before this evening, would you have asked your father or Fred to kill
you?”

“No,” was the unexpected reply. “It would have been so awfully hard on
them. I keep a revolver in this pocket of my coat. You just put it to
your eye--and it’s done.”

“Oh, I wish I was like you! I know I should be wondering and worrying
whether it was right, and all that sort of thing, until it was too
late to do it.”

“I don’t care whether it would be right or not,” said Flora doggedly.
“I should do it. Do you think I would make things worse for papa and
Fred, or let them have the blame of it if it was wrong?”

“I suppose Eustace would do it for me,” drearily. “He would if he
thought it was the proper thing. He always does the proper thing.”

“I wish you wouldn’t talk in such a horrid voice. It makes me feel
creepy. And I don’t think it’s fair to say that sort of thing about
the Commissioner. He’s perfectly devoted to you, and you know it would
break his heart to have to--do what we were talking about. I don’t
believe you’re half as fond of him as he is of you.”

“Have you found that out now for the first time?”

“Then it’s a shame!” cried Flora. “Why do you let him think you care
for him? He worships you, and you pretend----”

“I don’t pretend. He took it into his head that I cared for him, and
wouldn’t let me say I didn’t. And he doesn’t worship me. He thinks
that I shall make a nice adoring sort of worshipper for him when he
has got me well in hand.”

“Well, I think you ought to be ashamed of yourself!” said Flora
crushingly.