MIRIAM'S SCHOOLING AND OTHER PAPERS

by

MARK RUTHERFORD

Edited by His Friend, Reuben Shapcott. 

London:Kegan Paul, Trench, Truebner, & Co. , Ltd. 

1890

TO STEPHEN WILLSHER. 

I dedicate this result of my editorial labours to you, because youwere dear to our friend who is dead, and are almost the only person nowalive, save myself, who knew him at the time these papers were written. A word of explanation is necessary with regard to the picture at thebeginning of the book. You will remember that Rutherford had in hispossession a seal, which originally belonged to some early ancestor. It was engraved with a device to illustrate a sentence from Lilly. Themeaning given to the sentence was not exactly Livy's, but still it mayvery well be a little extended, and there is no doubt that the Romanwould not have objected. This seal, as you know, was much valued byRutherford, and was curiously connected with certain events in his lifewhich happened when Miriam was at school. Nevertheless, it cannotanywhere be found. It has been described, however, to Mr. WalterCrane, and he has reproduced it with singular accuracy. It struck me, that although it has no direct relation with anything in the volume, itmight be independently interesting, especially considering the part themotto played in Rutherford's history. 

R. S. 

CONTENTS. 

GIDEON

SAMUEL

SAUL

MIRIAM'S SCHOOLING

MICHAEL TREVANION

GIDEON. 

_The story which Jotham told his children on the day before his deathconcerning the achievements of his father Gideon--His comments andthose of Time thereon. _

I am an old man, and I desire before I die to tell you more fully theachievements of your grandfather. Strange that this day much that Ihad forgotten comes back to me clearly. 

During his youth the children of the East possessed the land for sevenyears because we had done evil. We were driven to lodge in the cavesof the mountains, so terrible was the oppression. If we sowed corn, the harvest was not ours, for the enemy came over Jordan with theMidianites and the Amalekites and left nothing for us, taking away allour cattle and beasts of burden. We cried unto God, and He sent aprophet to us, who told us that our trouble came upon us because of oursins, but otherwise he did nothing to help us. One day yourgrandfather was threshing wheat, not near the threshing-floor, for theMidianites watched the threshing-floors to see if any corn was broughtthere, but close to the wine-press. It was at Ophrah in Manasseh, thehome of his father. While he threshed, thinking upon all his troublesand the troubles of his country, not knowing if he could hide enoughcorn to save himself and his household from hunger and death, the angelof the Lord descended and sat under the oak. He may have been therefor some time before my father was aware of him, for my father was busywith his threshing, and his heart was sore. At last he turned and sawthe angel bright and terrible, and before he could speak the angel saidto him, "The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour. " My father, as I have said, was threshing by the wine-press, on his guard eventhere lest he should be robbed or slain, and it seemed strange to himthat the angel should say the Lord was with him. So strange did itseem, that even before he fell down to worship, he turned and asked theseraph why, if the Lord was with him, all this mischief had befallenthem, and where were all the miracles which the Lord wrought to saveHis people from the land of Egypt. For there had been neither sign norwonder for many years--nothing to show that the Lord cared for us morethan He did for the heathen. My father had thought much over all thedeeds which the Lord had done for Israel; he had thought over thepassage of the sea when Israel could not find any way open before them, and the very waves which were to overwhelm them rose like a wall andbecame their safeguard. But he himself had seen nothing of this kind, and he almost doubted if the tales were true, and if times had notalways been as they were then, all events happening alike to all, andhardly believing that God had ever appeared to man. 

The angel did not answer him, but looked him in the face, and said, "Goin this thy might, and thou shalt save Israel from the hand of theMidianites: have not I sent thee?" My grandfather, Joash, was one ofthe poorest men of his tribe, and as for my father, nobody had everthought anything of him, nor had he thought anything of himself. _He_, a solitary labourer, unknown, with no friends, no arms; he to do whatthe princes could not do! he to lead these frightened slaves againstsoldiers who were as the sand for numbers! It was not to be believed, and yet--there sat the angel. It was broad noon; in the shade of theoak his light was like that of the sun. It was not a dream of thenight, and he could not be mistaken. Nay, the angel's voice was moresharp and clear than the voice in which we speak to one another--avoice like the command of a king who must not be disobeyed. Yet hecomforted my father. "Surely I will be with thee, " he added, "and thoushalt smite the Midianites as one man. " If the Lord was to be withhim, my father need not have hesitated, but in truth he did not carefor the duty which was thrust upon him. He would have been glad to doanything for his country which was within his power, but he did notfeel equal to the task of leading it against its oppressors, nor did hecovet it. He would rather have endured in silence and died unknownthan take such a weight upon his shoulders, for he was not one of thosewho desire power for power's sake. The apparition, too, was so sudden. The angel was there with his divine face looking steadily at him, witheyes so piercing that no secret in the inmost soul could remain hiddenfrom them, and the man upon whom they were turned could not even thinkwithout being sure that his thought was known. Yet my father doubted, and this dread of the task imposed on him increased his doubt. Yes; hedoubted an order given him at midday by a messenger sitting in front ofhim flaming with heavenly colour. It might after all be a delusion. He prayed, therefore, for a sign, and then as he prayed he thought hemight be smitten for his presumption. But the angel was tender to hismisgivings, and said he would wait for the offering which was to testhis authority. My father went into the house and brought out a kid andunleavened bread, and presented it. The angel directed him to put theflesh and the cake on the rock and pour out the broth. He did so, andthe angel then rose, and stretching out the staff that was in his hand, touched the flesh and cakes. No sooner had he touched themthan--wonder of wonders!--a fire leapt up out of the rock; they wereconsumed before his eyes, and the angel had departed. A great terrorovercame my father, for it had always been said that it was impossiblefor man to look upon a Spirit from the Lord and live. He was leftalone, too, with the message, but without the Comforter, and he criedunto God in despair, not knowing what to do. As he cried, a word wasspoken in his ear soft and sweet, like the voice of the aspen by thebrook; soft and sweet, and yet so sure: "Peace be unto thee; fear not:thou shalt not die. " Then he rose and built an altar, to mark thesacred spot where God had talked with him and he had received hisdivine commission. There it is to this day in Ophrah of theAbiezrites. As you pass it, remember that where those stones now standthe Most High conversed with him whose blood is in your veins. 

As yet Gideon was without any direct orders, but that night he heardagain the same soft, sweet voice, and it commanded him to build anotheraltar upon the highest point of Ophrah, to throw down Baal's altar, andupon the altar to the Holy One to sacrifice the second of the bullocksbelonging to Joash, the bullock of seven years old, burning it with thewood of the great idol. The angel under the oak was before my father'seyes, the soft, sweet voice, telling him he should not die, was in hisears; but not even the Lord God can conquer our fears, and although myfather was a brave man and saved Israel, no man ever had worse sinkingsof heart than he. It was as if he had more courage and more fear thanhis fellows. He did what the Lord said unto him, but he was afraid todo it by day, for not only was his tribe against him, but his father'shouse also. He took ten of his servants, and when the city awoke onemorning the altar of Baal was cast down, the altar to the Lord Godstood on the hill, and there lay on it the half-burnt logs of the imageof Baal. Our nation has never believed in Baal as it has believed inthe Lord God. How should it believe in Baal? Baal has done nothingfor it, but the Lord God brought us from Egypt through the desert, andwas the pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night. Nevertheless, when the altar of Baal was cast down and the idol was destroyed thepeople demanded the death of Gideon, and you know that at this day, though Baal is a false god, and in their hearts they confess it, theywould murder us if we said anything against him: they went therefore toJoash and told him to bring forth his son that they might slay him. These, my children, were not the Midianites nor the Amalekites, but ourown nation. At the very time when the heathen were upon us we turnedfrom the Lord to Baal, and sought to destroy the man who could haverescued us. Thus we have ever done, and we are surely a race accursed. But Joash secretly contemned Baal, although until now he had notventured to say anything against him. It made him bold to see how hisson and his servants had over-thrown the altar and burnt the idol whichlay there charred and unresisting. He stood up before the altar, andfacing the mob which howled at him; asked them why they should takeupon themselves to plead for Baal: "If he be a god, let him plead forhimself, because one hath cast down his altar. " The charred logs neverstirred; there was no sound in the sky; Joash was not struck dead; Baalwas proved to be nothing. That was a sight to see that morning: theashes smouldering in the sunlight, the raging crowd, Gideon and hisfellows behind Joash, and Joash calling on Baal to avenge himself if hewas a god as his worshippers pretended. Ah, if that had been Jehovah'saltar! When Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire before the Lord, firecame down from the Lord and devoured them. When Miriam spoke againstHis servant she became a leper; and when Korah, Dathan, and Abiramblasphemed, they were swallowed up in the pit. But Baal could not movea breath of heaven on his behalf. What kind of a god is he? A god whocannot punish those who insult him is but a word. 

As for Gideon, he grew in strength. Nothing happened to him because hehad thus dared Baal. He went about his work daily; no judgment fell onhim, and nobody dared to meddle with him. 

Soon afterwards the Midianites and Amalekites, who had withdrawn for awhile, overspread the land again, and pitched in the valley of Jezreel. Gideon having suffered nothing for his insult to Baal, had becomebolder. Moreover, his tribe, the Abiezrites, had seen that he hadsuffered nothing. Thus it came to pass that when the Spirit of theLord came upon him; and he blew a trumpet, all Abiezer followed him. Not only so; he sent messengers through Manasseh, Asher, Zebulun, andNaphtali, and they came up to meet him, the very people who a fewmonths before would have stoned him. They thronged after him, and nowprofessed themselves believers in Jehovah. They were not hypocrites. They really believed now, after a fashion, that Baal could not helpthem. Their fault was that they believed one thing one day and anotherthing the next. That has always been the fault of the people. Yourgrandfather did not despise them for their instability. So far as theywere not stable to Baal it was good, and he pitied them as they flockedto his standard, hoping that he could deliver them. He blew thetrumpet, and at the simple blast of that trumpet in each village andtown the nation seemed to rise as one man, such strength was there inits tones. These men had been idolaters, and it might have beenthought that to turn them all would have taken years of persuasion; butno, at the simple sound of the trumpet the religion of Baal vanished. 

Gideon was now at the head of a great host; he had been favoured withvisions from the Most High; the angel of the Lord had appeared to him;he had burnt the image; and yet now, when the army was round him, fearfell upon him again, and he doubted if he could save Israel, or if Godwould keep His promise. So it always was with him, as I have alreadysaid. He therefore prayed for another sign, and the Lord did notrebuke him, as a man would have done if his promise had beenmistrusted. Gideon's test was strange; he did not pray that he mightsee the angel again, for the thoughts that came into his mind werealways strange, not like those of other men, and were unaccountableeven to himself. That night the fleece of wool on the ground was wetand the earth was dry. He prayed yet again, and still God was tenderto him, for He knows the weakness of the creatures He has made. Thistime the fleece was dry and the earth was wet, and Gideon thereuponrose up early with all the host, and moved towards the host of Midian, till he came in sight of them as they lay in the valley by the hill ofMoreh. 

But the Lord would not have so many to do His work, and most of themwere afraid and useless. He therefore commanded Gideon to send awayall who were frightened, and ten thousand only were left. These tenthousand were still too many, for most of them were impatient, not ableto restrain themselves, and likely to fail, either through fear orfoolhardiness, in the stratagem the Lord designed. He thereforecommanded Gideon, when they were all thirsty, to bring them down to thewater. Nine thousand seven hundred were in such a hurry to reach itthat they dropped on their knees to drink, but three hundred werecollected and patient, and were content to lift their hands to theirmouths. The three hundred were kept and the rest sent home. Thatnight God, the ever merciful, had promised Gideon to deliver theMidianites into His servant's hands, and had confirmed His promise bymiracle, but nevertheless He directed Gideon to go down to the camp, sothat he might hear a man's dream and its interpretation, and be furtherstrengthened in his faith. Gideon went down and listened at a tentdoor; and when the dream was told, how a cake of barley bread tumbledinto the host of Midian, and came unto a tent and smote it that itfell, all fear departed, and he rose up and went back to the threehundred, and cried to them, "Arise; for the Lord hath delivered intoyour hand the host of Midian. "

Forthwith he divided his three hundred into three bands, and each mantook an empty pitcher and placed a torch inside it. In the dead of thenight they marched to the camp, this little three hundred, and placedthemselves round it. Then Gideon broke his pitcher and showed historch, and all the others did likewise, and shouted, "The sword of theLord, and of Gideon. "

The host cried and fled, for a terror from the Lord descended on them, and turned their own swords against them. When they were defeated allIsrael went out after them, and there was great slaughter, and Oreb andZeeb, two princes of Midian, were slain. 

As soon as the victory was achieved, and while he was yet in pursuit, the men of Ephraim turned upon him and abused him because he had nottaken them with him to fight the battle against the Midianites, butnever had they lifted a finger to save themselves before Gideonappeared. When, however, he had caught and destroyed Zebah andZalmunna, the two Midianitish kings, and had chastised Succoth andbeaten down the tower of Penuel, Israel came to him and asked him torule over them, but he would not. He cared not to be king. Heremembered with what difficulty he had believed the angel and thepromise, the sickly faintness which had overcome him on that nightbefore the Midianitish overthrow. Whatever he had done had not beenhis doing, but the Lord's; and how did he know that the Lord's helpwould continue? The thought of being king, and of having a set office, perhaps without the Lord's assistance, was too much for him. He wasright in his refusal. He was one of those men who can do much if leftto themselves, and if they are supported by the Most High, but whoshrink and tremble when something is expected from them. "The Lordshall be your King, " he said. He trusted that God would speak to thenation as He had spoken to him, and without any leader would guide themaright. That is not the Lord's way. But though Gideon would not beking, he desired some honour, and he asked that he might have theear-rings of the Midianites who had fallen. Therewith he made animage, a thing forbidden. It stood in his house, a record of what theLord had done for him; and yet this very record became a snare, andIsrael fell to worshipping it, and Jehovah was displaced by thetestimony of His own love for us. 

Your grandfather is now dead. Abimelech reigns in his place, and hasslain all the children of Gideon save myself. Israel has returned toBaal; its strength has departed; before long we shall be subdued underthe Philistines. Excepting in our own house, there are none that havenot gone a-whoring after Baal; the memory of the battle by the hillMoreh is clean forgotten; and soon the memory of my father will alsodisappear, and it will be as if he had never lived. To think that thevision of the angel in Ophrah and the night in the valley of Jezreelshould end in nothing!

 * * * * * *

That night Jotham died. 

_Fourteen Hundred Tears Later_. 

"The time would fail me to tell of Gideon, . . . Who throughfaith . . . Out of weakness was made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens. "--_Epistle to the Hebrews_. 

_Three Thousand Years Later_. 

"'The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon, ' answered Balfour as he parriedand returned the blow. "--_Old Mortality_. 

SAMUEL. 

_Samuel immediately before his death spoke thus at Bamah:--_

I am now old, and before many days are past I shall be gathered to myfathers. Behold, here I am: witness against me before the Lord: Whoseox have I taken? or whose ass have I taken? or whom have I defrauded?whom have I oppressed? or of whose hand have I received any bribe toblind mine eyes therewith, and I will restore it you. How could it bethat I could be other than that which I have been, seeing that from mychildhood upwards I have been the chosen of the Lord, the instrument todo His bidding?

There are none of you who remember the evil days of Eli. Many timesbefore then your fathers went astray after false gods, but when Eli washigh priest the Tabernacle itself was profaned by his sons, the sons ofBelial; for they robbed the people of their meat which they brought forthe sacrifice, so that men abhorred the offering, and they lay withloose women at the door of the Tabernacle, after the manner of thosewho worship the gods of the heathen. To turn aside from the Lord andserve these gods is wickedness, but to serve them in the presence ofthe Ark, and to defile the sanctuary itself, was an abomination worsethan any in Ashdod or Gaza. The Lord might assuredly have left Israelto the Philistines, but He desired that there should be a peoplepreserved to do honour to His name, and He called me, called me even asa child, and to Him have I been dedicate. What I have said and donehas not been mine but His, and if any have any fault to find, they mustfind it with Him and not with me. 

My father, Elkanah, was one of the faithful in Israel, and he went upyearly to Shiloh; my mother, Hannah, was his beloved wife, though itwas Peninnah who had given him children. I was born in answer to aprayer which my mother prayed in bitterness of soul, and she vowed thatif she should have a man child he should be the Lord's all the days ofhis life; no razor should come upon his head, neither should he drinkstrong drink. My mother redeemed her vow, and I was taken to Shiloh, and there I ministered before the Lord. I lived in the midst of theiniquity which was wrought by the sons of Eli; but although a youth, the vow which my mother had made for me protected me. The Lord hadthen withdrawn Himself from Israel, and no word had been spoken to usby Him for years, save a message from a prophet who prophesied the fallof Eli and his house. Still I served, although He gave no sign of Hispresence, for my mother visited me continually, and she kept me strongand pure. One night, when I had lain down to sleep, I suddenly heard avoice, which I took to be the voice of Eli, and it called me by name. This it did thrice, and each time I went to Eli and asked him what hewished with me, but he had not called. When the voice had come againand again, I answered, "Speak; for Thy servant heareth, " and then forthe first time was I bidden to execute a command from the Lord; and I, Samuel, a boy, was ordered to tell Eli, the high priest from the Lord, whose minister he was, that a deed was about to be done which shouldmake tingle the ears of every one who heard it, and that for theiniquity of his sons, and because he did not restrain them, nosacrifice should avail to protect him from judgment. Such was themessage given to me; to me, Samuel the child, and thus was I honouredeven then. I had never heard the voice before that night, and I layawake till the morning, fearing to tell Eli what had been said to me, and I went out and opened the doors. But Eli sent for me, and when hesaw me he perceived that the Lord had been with me, and he directed meto hide nothing from him of what had been said to me. I told him thevision every whit, and from that day forth I have been at the Lord'sbidding, and have interpreted His will to Israel. 

Although I had never heard the Lord's voice before, and it came with nosign nor miracle, I did not doubt that it was His, for there was thatin it which proclaimed Him. Nevertheless I wondered what His judgmentwould be, and in what manner it would come to pass. Soon afterwardsthe Israelites went out to battle against the Philistines in Aphek, andwere smitten with great slaughter. Then the elders of Israel, thinkingthat the Ark of the covenant would save them, sent to Shiloh andbrought it thence, and when it came into the camp they all shouted witha great shout, so that the earth rang again. Fools to believe that theArk was anything if the Living God was not with it! When He was withit, and the men of Bethshemesh did but look at it, they died; butwithout Him it is nothing. The Israelites were greatly heartened whenthe Ark came, and the Philistines were afraid, believing, idolaters asthey were, that God must be in it. But the Israelites were defeated;thirty thousand of them fell; the very Ark was taken; Hophni andPhinehas were also slain. When Eli heard the news he fell backward anddied, and his daughter-in-law, who was in travail, died also. Thus wasthe word delivered to me fulfilled suddenly in one day, and for thesins of the priests even the Ark whereon were the cherubim waspermitted to depart to the Philistines and keep company with Dagon. After that day, when Eli died and I looked into the empty sanctuary, could I hesitate to believe and obey the Lord's word?

The Lord had no mind that the Philistines, who were His scourge for theIsraelites, should vaunt themselves over Him, or should believe that oftheir own strength they had prevailed. Wonderful is He! He takes thewicked to punish His people, and the wicked are but tools in His hand, and He uses them for His own designs. The Ark came to Ashdod, and wasput in the house of Dagon; but when the men of Ashdod arose early onthe morrow, behold Dagon was fallen upon his face to the earth beforethe Ark. They took Dagon and set him in his place again; and when theyarose early on the morrow morning, behold Dagon was fallen upon hisface to the ground before the Ark, and the head of Dagon and both thepalms of his hands were cut off upon the threshold. Furthermore, themen of Ashdod were destroyed with a secret and dreadful disease. Theythereupon determined to get rid of the Ark, and they sent it to Gath. When it came to Gath the pestilence fell upon the men of Gath also, andthey sent it away to Ekron, and the pestilence fell also upon the menof Ekron. Then the wise men of the Philistines were called together, and they counselled that the Ark should be returned with atrespass-offering to Israel, and that it should be carried in a newcart by two milch kine on which there had come no yoke, and that theircalves should be brought home from them. Then if the kine of their ownaccord took the cart to Bethshemesh, it would be known that it was theGod of Israel who had plagued the land; but if they refused to go, thenit might be chance which had done it. The Ark was placed in the cart, and the Spirit of the Lord came upon the kine. Remembering theircalves, they nevertheless went straight along the road to Bethshemesh, lowing as they went, and turning not aside to the right hand or to theleft, and the lords of the Philistines went after them unto the borderof Bethshemesh. The men of Bethshemesh were reaping their wheatharvest in the valley, and they lifted up their eyes, and saw the Ark, and rejoiced to see it, and the cart came into the field of Joshua theBethshemite, and stood there, where there was a great stone, and theyclave the wood of the cart, and offered the kine as a burnt-offering. And the Levites took down the Ark, and the coffer that was with it, wherein the jewels of stone were, and put them on the great stone, andthe men of Bethshemesh offered burnt offering and sacrifices. When thePhilistines had seen all these things, and when they knew that theplague in their land was stayed, did they acknowledge the Lord God?How should they, seeing that they were not His elect?

The children of Israel continually turned aside to the lewd gods of theheathen, and at times it seemed as if the whole earth would be given upto the abominations of the Canaanites. The Lord had brought us out ofEgypt, and through the desert. He had appeared to us on Sinai, and hadgiven us His commandments, by which alone we could live. He hadrevealed unto us that we should be pure, and separate ourselves fromthe filth around us. He had roused up Moses, and Joshua, and theJudges, all of whom strove to preserve and ever build higher andstronger the wall which was to protect us, so that the sacred Law andthe service of the one God might continue. Israel was but a handful inthe midst of Philistines and Amalekites, nations which worshipped Baalwith fornication and all kinds of uncleanness, and Israel was ever atthe point of mingling with them. Then it would have been forgotten asthey will be forgotten; but if it will only abide in the Law, as givenin thunder and lightning in the wilderness, it will be great, when, except for their struggles with Israel, the recollection of Amalekiteand Philistine shall have perished. 

I often was alone amidst a people which had well nigh all gone astray, but I remembered the voice which I heard in the Temple when I was achild. I sought the Most High day and night, and He came very close tome, and it became clearer and clearer to me that all things were asnothing compared with the Law, and that everything was to be set asidefor its sake. Alone, I say, I testified on His behalf, but He kept me. Neither women nor wine have I ever known when men were given over towomen and wine: His Vision has filled me, dedicate to Him ere I wasborn. 

The Lord chastised Israel through their enemies, and I besought thepeople to turn away from the Philistine gods and their iniquities. Igathered them together in Mizpeh: the Philistines heard of it, and camedown upon Mizpeh, thinking that now they could wipe us out from theface of the earth. Kings have had their captains, but I had none, andwas not a man of war; the people were in a panic; their lasciviousidolatry of Baal had destroyed their strength, and the enemy layopposite us. That night I did not sleep, but went to the Lord inprayer. If I had had nothing but my own strength which I could trust Ishould have fainted, for what could I, unlearned in battle, do againstsuch an army, and with no soldiers save a frightened mob, which knewthat it deserved God's wrath. I wrestled with the Most High as Jacobwrestled, and I implored Him to remember His promise to our fathers. Icalled to mind that day by the borders of the sea, when His angel whichwent before the camp of the Israelites removed and went behind them, and the pillar of the cloud went from before their face and stoodbehind them, and how the waters were a wall on the right hand and onthe left, and in the morning watch the Lord looked unto the host of theEgyptians through the pillar of fire and of the cloud, and troubled thehost of the Egyptians. I called to mind the night when Gideon and histhree hundred stood round the Midianites, and the Lord set every man'ssword against his fellow, even throughout all the host. I called tomind the voice which spoke to me when as a child I lay on my bed in theLord's House. As I communed and wrestled, the tent was filled withlight, brighter than that of the sun at noon. No word was spoken, butI knew it was the light of Him whom to see is death, but whose light islife. All fear departed, and as the glory slowly waned, sleep overcameme--sleep like that of an infant; and when the morning dawned, and Iopened the doors of my tent and watched the sun rise, I was strong withthe strength of ten thousand men, and rejoiced, although thePhilistines were like the sand on the seashore for multitude. I causedthe trumpet to sound, and brought Israel together. On the hill therein Mizpeh, in sight of the people who stood round trembling, I buildedan altar and slew a lamb, and offered it as a sacrifice to Him who hadappeared unto me. I prayed again, for as the smoke of theburnt-offering rose in the clear air, the Philistines came up the hillto battle with us, and the people cried, and were on the point offleeing this way and that way, to be pursued and slain. I commandedthem to be still. The Philistines drew nearer and nearer, and I prayedever more and more earnestly. The smoke of the offering was beginningto die down, and yet I prayed. The fire was well nigh out to the lastspark, and for a moment I doubted, forgetful of the vision, for themusic of the army of Dagon could now be heard. Suddenly the fireflamed up on high from the grey ashes, as if a heap of the driest woodof summer had been thrown on it, and I saw a little cloud gather on theother side of the Philistine hosts, and I knew that my prayer wasanswered. The flame dropped instantly, but the cloud spread itselfeven as I looked, and the wind arose, and hither and thither across thecloud flashed the lightning. Onward it came till it rested over thePhilistines, and then it broke and descended on them, and they wereshut out from us in thick darkness. The thunder of the Lord crashedand rolled, and we saw His lightnings pierce down like swords. Silentwe stood, and presently the cloud lifted, and the Philistines, who, afew minutes before, marched against us in order, were a confused mass, struggling hither and thither, and many of them were lying dead on theground. Then, with one accord, Israel shouted, and ran and smote thePhilistines until they came under Bethcar. I went not with them; butwhen they had all departed, I took a stone and set it up between Mizpehand Shen, and wrote on it Ebenezer, for hitherto had the Lord helpedus--the Lord, I say, and never a man, as it was the Lord and never aman who has helped us since we left Egypt. 

After that defeat the Philistines troubled us no more, and the citieswhich they had taken from us were restored; but when I became old, thepeople grew restless, and desired a change. The Lord, to humble me, and prevent boasting by His servant, had afflicted me with two sons, who obeyed not His commandments; and the people put forward these twosons, who were judges under me, as a reason why a king should be giventhem. If, however, my sons did injustice, I was still alive to whomappeal could be made, and why should a king, because he was a king, bebetter? The Lord had brought us out of Egypt, and had ruled us throughHis ministers. We had no court, with women and with splendour; andthose who won our battles lived like those whom they led. Our gold andour silver were saved for the House of the Lord, which was His, and forall of us. The office of king was foreign to us: it was heathen andhateful to me. None more earnestly than I worshipped the Lord, andsubmitted myself to His direction, and imposed His will even to deathupon the people. But that a man, because he was called king, shouldrule, and send the people hither and thither for his own ends, andslaughter them, was horrible to me. I sought the Lord in prayer toknow how I should meet this request, and He counselled me to yield. 

I assembled the people together, and rehearsed unto them all that hadbeen done for them without the help of a king. I foretold to them thatthe king would be for himself, and not for them--that he would presstheir sons and daughters into his service; but the people would notlisten to me. The Lord had said unto me that they had not rejected me, but rejected Him that He should not reign over them, as they had everdone since the day when they were brought up out of Egypt. I carednot, however, for their rejection of me, but because it was He who wasrejected. I thought over it night and day, and it well nigh broke myheart. 

Those who had hitherto been placed over us had not been chosen becausethey were the sons of the rich, or of those who were chosen beforethem. Moses, Joshua, Gideon, Jephthah, were all of them select of theLord from the people. Nay, even a woman had been taken to judgeIsrael--Deborah the prophetess, who dwelt under the palm-tree herebetween Ramah and Bethel. It was Deborah who sent for Barak to leadthe host against Sisera, and Barak said to her that if she went hewould go, but if she went not he would not go, so mighty was herpresence. Sisera gathered together his army and all his chariots, ninehundred chariots of iron; but Deborah spoke a word in the ears ofBarak, when he was afraid, and Sisera was discomfited with all hischariots and his host. He fled, and it was a woman, Jael, the wife ofHeber, who slew him--for ever honoured be her name. In the days ofShamgar, the son of Anath, in the days of Jael, the highways wereunoccupied, and the travellers walked through byeways; the rulersceased in Israel; the people chose new gods; there was war in thegates; there was no shield or spear seen among forty thousand in Israeluntil Deborah arose. The family of Gideon also was the poorest inManasseh, and yet it was to him that the angel was sent, and he subduedthe Midianites and the children of the East. This hitherto had beenthe Lord's way with us; and now we were to abandon Him for a king, whose children, because they were king's children, were to be ourcommanders. It well nigh broke my heart, I say. The glory of theTabernacle was henceforth to be dim, overshadowed by the pomp of amonarch. I could not endure it, and again I went to the Lord, andbesought Him to turn the people or visit them with the thunder andlightning of Mizpeh, that they might repent of their iniquity and live. But He would not speak to them beyond what He had spoken through me, and I returned and sent the assembly away, every man to his own city. 

I called the people together in Mizpeh again, the place where they hadseen the Lord save them Himself, and yet even there they would notyield. Then I prophesied against them, because they had cast aside Himwho had delivered them out of all their adversities and tribulations;and I caused all their tribes to assemble before me. Saul the son ofKish was taken, and the fools shouted God save the king. I did my bestfor them. I wrote laws for them to protect them against him, and I putthem in a book and laid them up in the sanctuary. 

Henceforth I was in a measure more solitary than before. Saul was abrave man, and led the people to war, and they were pleased with hissuccess, but he was not single in his service of the Lord, and he hadfor a wife a Horite, one Rizpah, who worshipped false gods. Hebelieved he could make Israel a nation by battles, and he saw not whatI saw--that the one thing necessary for our salvation was to keepourselves pure and separate. The people complained that the Law was aburden, but it was their safeguard: it was the Law which marked themoff from the heathen, who were doomed to fall by their sins. I toileddaily to preserve the Law, and to insist upon the observance of itsceremonies, knowing full well that if the people let them go, theywould let go the commandments from Sinai; would let go the sobriety andthe chastity of their bodies; would mix in the worship of Baal, and belost. Saul was no observer of ceremonies, and considered them naught, the idiot, who forgot that they were ordained of God, with whom thereis no small nor great, and that through them the people are taught. More solitary than ever I was, I say; but I sought the Lord more thanever, and kept closer to me the memory of the Voice which first calledme. If Israel is to live, it will not be because Saul overcame theAmalekites and Philistines, but because the Lamp of God in my hands hasnot been extinguished. When the Philistines came against us atMichmash, Saul was in Gilgal, and I went to meet him there. Because Icame not at the time appointed, he, the impious one, took upon himselfto offer the sacrifice, pleading that the people were leaving him, andthat the Philistines were encamped against him. He forgot the thunderand lightning at Mizpeh, and that it was his duty to obey the leastword of the Lord, whatever might happen. It was a surer way to saveIsrael than to teach it by the king's example that the ordinances ofthe Lord could be set aside because it was convenient. I cared not formyself: how can he who is His messenger care for aught save His honour?But I saw by this act of Saul what was in him--that it was an exampleof his heart--that if he could conquer the Philistines he cared not forthe Law. His victories without the Law would have melted away likesnow in summer. They would have been as the victories of Philistinesover Amalekites, or Amalekites over Philistines. It was one of thefirst things he did after becoming king, and the Spirit of the Lordcame upon me, and I denounced him, and was directed to seek a successoroutside his house. If the kingdom had remained in the house of Saul, Israel would have become a heathen tribe, and it was not for this thatGod called it out of Egypt and led it through the Red Sea. 

I was commanded to send Saul against the Amalekites. What Amalek didto us when we came out of Egypt had been written down, and thedirection concerning him. He met us by the way, and smote the hindmostof us, even all that were feeble, when we were faint and weary; and ithad been said to our fathers that when we had rest from our enemiesround about us, we were to blot out the remembrance of Amalek fromunder heaven--"_Thou shalt not forget it_" was the word delivered tous. I had the record of the battle in Rephidim when Joshua discomfitedAmalek, not in his own strength, but in the strength of the upliftedarms of the aged Moses, the man of God. His arms, withered and feeble, defeated Amalek that day. Does not the altar still stand, Jehovah-nissi, to testify that we should war with Amalek fromgeneration to generation? Furthermore, Amalek feared not God, butworshipped strange gods with abominable rites, after which the sons anddaughters of Israel lusted. It was the Lord's desire that we shouldroot up Amalek, as a man roots up a weed, and fears to leave a threadof it in the ground, lest it should again grow. 

Saul was willing to arm himself against the Amalekites, and to do hisbest to defeat them after the manner of a king, and to bring them intosubjection; but he saw not with my eyes, and knew not what a Law of theLord was. Therein have I stood apart from Saul and his friends andthis nation. They also were not ignorant of the Law, but they thoughtit could be observed like the laws of men, not understanding that it isbinding to the last jot and tittle, and that if a man fails at the lastjot or tittle, he fails altogether. 

Saul smote the Amalekites, and everything that was vile and refuse heutterly destroyed with the edge of the sword, but he spared Agag andthe best of the spoil; and when he came to meet me, he saluted me, andsaid he had performed the commandment of the Lord. His commandmentsare not thus to be performed, and I asked him what meant then thebleating of the sheep and the lowing of the oxen. He had reservedthem, he said, as a sacrifice. I asked him whether the Lord had asgreat delight in burnt-offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voiceof the Lord, I told him that to obey is better than sacrifice, and tohearken than the fat of rams; and I denounced him there, and foretoldthat his kingdom should be given to a neighbour better than he. He wasthen greatly afraid, for although he feared not the Lord, and was bravebefore his enemies, he was at times much given to secret terror, and hebesought me to stay with him and pardon him. But I would not, and whenI had worshipped, I ordered Agag to be brought before me. He cametrembling and asking for mercy, but I hewed him in pieces. Mercy?Mercy to whom? Would it have been mercy to Israel to let him live andbecome a leader of the Amalekites against us? Moreover, a clearcommand had been given me, and was set plainly before me, as a candlein front of me in darkness, to which I was to walk, swerving not ahair's breadth, that the Amalekite was to be destroyed utterly; andalways when the Light was before me I strove to reach it, never lookingthis way nor that way. Before Saul also the Light was set, but he wentaside, thinking he could come to it if he bent his path and compassedother things, not knowing that the track is very narrow, and that if wediverge therefrom and take our eyes off the Light we are lost. Who wasAgag, that I should show any tenderness to him, a foul worshipper offalse gods? I rejoiced when he lay bound for the knife in the agony ofdeath, and his blood was a sacrifice with which God was well pleased. 

David now waits until Saul's death, for the king is still a strength inIsrael. I fear that David will dishonour himself with grievous sin, for he is a lover of women, and a man of words and of song: treacherousis he also at times. But he belongs to us; he fears the Lord and Hisprophets and priests; he may go a-whoring, but it will not be afterBaal; he will war against the heathen, and will not show mercy to them. Now I am about to die, and to descend into the darkness whither myfathers, and Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses have gone before me. Ibless the Lord that I have lived, for I have preserved the knowledge ofHim and His Law. My life ends, but the Lord liveth, all honour andglory to His sacred name. 

SAUL. 

_Rizpah, the Horite, in her old age, talks of Saul to the wife ofArmoni, her son_. 

This is the day on which your husband's father fell on the mountains ofGilboa. Though I was no Israelite, but born in the desert, I was hisbeloved before he became king. I am eighty years old now, but theblood moves in me, and I grow warm as I think of him. There was not agoodlier person than he--from his shoulders and upwards he was higherthan any of the people. Why did the Lord choose him? He never covetedthat honour, and he suffered because there was laid on him that whichhe did not seek. Yet the Lord was right, for there was not one in allIsrael so royal as he, and it was he who redeemed it and made it anation. Samuel had grown old--he was always a priest rather than acaptain--and his sons, whom he made judges, turned aside after lucre, took bribes, and perverted judgment. The people were weary of theiroppression and the hand of the Amalekites and the Philistines were veryheavy on the land. They therefore prayed for a king, and the thingdispleased Samuel, and he tried to turn them from it. But they refusedto listen to him, and when they came together at Mizpeh, Saul was theman upon whom the lot fell. Again, I say, he desired not to be king. He had hidden himself on that day, but he could not be hidden, and hewas dragged forth to glory and to ruin. I was there: I heard theshouts as they cried God save the king. I saw him no more that day, for the tumult was great, and there was much for him to do. But thatevening he came back to me at Gibeah; he, my Saul, came to me asanointed king. O that night! never to be forgotten, were I to live athousand years, when I held the king in my arms! Never--no, not evenon the night when I first became his--had I known such delight. I haveseen more misery than has fallen to the lot of any woman in this land, and it has not passed over me senseless. I am not one of those who cango through misfortune untouched, as a drop of oil can rise throughwater. I have taken it all in, felt it all, to the last sting therewas in it; and yet now, when I call to mind the night after he wascrowned, and its rapture of an hour--the strength and the eagerness ofhis love: the strength, the eagerness, and the pride of mine--I say itis good that I have lived. The next morning I saw him with his valiantmen--the men whose heart God had touched; how he set them in order, andhow they followed him--him higher than any of them, from the shouldersupwards; and I said to myself, he is mine, the king is mine, that bodyof his is mine, and I am his. 

Tell you all about him? How can I? But I will tell you a little--whatI have told you again and again before--so that you may tell it to yourchildren, and the name of Saul may never be forgotten. 

After he was chosen, the children of Belial said, How shall this mansave us? But he held his peace, for he foresaw what was at hand, Nahash the Ammonite came up and encamped against Jabesh-gilead; andwhen the men of Jabesh-gilead offered to become his slaves if he wouldbut make a covenant with them, he consented, but upon this condition, that they should thrust out their right eyes. Such thralls had thechildren of Israel become whom Saul had to save, that Nahash dared toput this upon them in mockery. They sent messengers to Gibeah, whereSaul was--not to him, but to tell the people there; and Saul heard themessage as he drove the herd out of the field after work, for he wasstill at his farm, his day not yet having come. When he listened tothe story of the men of Jabesh-gilead, the Spirit of God came upon him;and he took a yoke of his oxen and hewed them in pieces, and sent themthroughout all the coasts of Israel, saying, Whosoever cometh not afterSaul, and after Samuel, so shall it be done unto his oxen. The fear ofthe Lord fell on the people, such strength was there in Saul's command, and they came out with one consent. He numbered his men, divided theminto three bands, marched all night from Bezek, fell upon the Ammonitesin the morning watch, and so slaughtered and scattered them that two ofthem were not left together. Where now were the men of Belial who hadmocked him? The people cried out that they might be brought forth andput to death; but Saul, ever noble and great of heart, forbade it. "Not a man, " he said, "shall be put to death this day, for to-day theLord hath wrought salvation in Israel. "

The Philistines had for a long time oppressed the land, so that men whowere their neighbours hid themselves in caves, thickets, and rocks. They were not armed, for the Philistines had forbidden the working ofiron, lest their slaves should have anything wherewith they mightdefend themselves. Having defeated the Ammonites, Saul went up toGilgal, and a great crowd came after him trembling. He waited thereseven days for Samuel, and meanwhile the people began to slip away fromhim. What was he to do? He could wait no longer, and he commanded theburnt-offering to be brought to him. Just as he had made an end of thesacrifice, Samuel appeared, and Saul went out to meet him and take hisblessing. But Samuel turned upon him and doomed him, because he hadmeddled with the priest's office. He was to be cast out from hiskingship, and another was chosen in his place. That was the root ofall my lord's trouble, as we shall afterwards see--the seed of themadness which made his life worse than death. What had he done?Nothing, but set fire to that miserable beast. Had he slain a man, orrobbed the widow or the fatherless, or defrauded those who came to himfor judgment, his punishment would have been just; but that he shouldbe deposed because, in his extremity against the Lord's enemies, he hadtaken upon him to do what Samuel neglected to do, was a strangesentence from the Lord. Would you or I deal so with our friends? wouldwe give them no place for repentance? would we let the penalty endurewhen, the heart is changed and forgiveness is sought? The Lord's waysare wonderful. But it was Samuel's doing. If it had not been forSamuel, the Lord would have shown mercy. Samuel was ever the priest, and had no compassion in him. He had been chosen as a child, and henever forgot he was the Lord's selected servant. He hated Saul becauseSaul was king, and he loved to show his power over him. Before thatday in Gilgal, he had called down thunder and lightning from heaven toshow that Jehovah listened to him, and to prove that Jehovah resentedthe request that the people should have some one to command them otherthan the sons of Eli. He hated Saul because the people obeyed him andfled to him when they were in danger. Who could help obeying him; whowas there who knew him who did not love to obey? However, he wascursed--cursed for a ceremony of the Law; and that dancing David, theman who took Uriah's wife and basely murdered Uriah, was said to be theman after God's own heart. 

Soon afterwards the evil spirit fell upon my lord. Samuel hadcommanded him to smite the Amalekites, and to spare not men or women, infants or sucklings, oxen or sheep, camel or ass. Saul gathered hissoldiers together and lay in wait in the valley. In his mercy, for hewas ever tender-hearted, he warned the Kenites that they might escape. He then smote the Amalekites from Havilah to Shur, but he took Agagalive, and spared some of the spoil. When the battle was over, Samuelcame to meet him, and rebuked him as if he had been a child for what hecalled rebellion and stubbornness. The priest stood up before theking, and told him that his rebellion was as witchcraft, and hisstubbornness as idolatry. "Because thou hast rejected the word of theLord, " he cried, "He hath also rejected thee from being king. "Rebellion, stubbornness! Saul was neither rebellious nor stubborn. Hehad smitten the Amalekites; in obedience to Samuel's command, he haddone what he hated to do; he had slaughtered young and old, but he hadsaved Agag, and although he humbled himself before Samuel, and prayedhim to remain, he would not. Saul laid hold upon the skirt of hismantle; but he departed, and it was rent, and he cursed Saul, anddeclared that as the garment was rent, so had the Lord rent the kingdomof Israel from him that day, and given it to another better than he. Then Samuel called Agag unto him, and hewed the unarmed man in pieces, and declared he would see Saul no more. Now Saul was brave, thebravest of the brave, but he greatly feared at times what he called hisTerror. What it was which troubled him none ever rightly knew. He wasnot mad as others are mad, for his senses never left him, and he wasalways the counsel and the strength of the nation, whom they all soughtin their distress. But something had caught him of which he could notrid himself, and he would come to me with wild eyes, and clasp me inhis arms. I could not comfort him; and all I heard was a strange wordor two about a Face which haunted him and would not leave him. I couldnot comfort him, but it was to me nevertheless he always fled; andalthough he spoke so little, for he dared not name his Terror, he saidto me more than he has said to any man or woman: it was I, it was Imore than any other who knew the secrets of the king's soul. My beliefis that Samuel brought the Terror on him. He never forgot thatdreadful day when Agag was murdered, and it was always before his eyesthat he was doomed, and that there was another man in the land, who wasto rule in his stead. I tried to appease him. I told him that life toall of us is short, that in the grave there is forgetfulness, and badehim drink wine, lie in my bosom, and shut out the morrow, but it was ofno avail. There was nothing to be dreaded in the thought that some onewould supplant him, and other men would have endured it in peace; butit was the constant presence of the thought, the impossibility ofgetting rid of it, which darkened the sun for him. Day after day, night after night, this one thing was before him. It was as if he werebound to a corpse, and ever dragged it after him. Higher than any ofthe people from his shoulders and upwards, like a lion for courage, andyet he would have fled even to Death from this thing, for he could notface it. What a mockery is the strength of the strongest! A word fromthe Lord can cause the greatest to grovel in the dust! It was thoughtthat music would help him, and they brought to him David, who wasskilled with the harp, and had moreover a ruddy, cheerful countenance. Gay and light of heart was he, and as he sang and played the Terrorwould sometimes loosen its hold, and Saul was himself again, but itnever left him for long. 

Much has been made by Saul's enemies of his hatred of David. It camein this way. Saul loved David, and made him a captain, and they wentout together to war against the Philistines. When they returned, thewomen, smitten with his pretty face--they were always ready to go afterhim, and he after them--sang aloud in the streets that Saul had slainhis thousands and David his ten thousands. The Terror was on Saul; hebelieved David was Samuel's friend, and David and the Terror becameone. He eyed David from that day. He was not blameworthy. It was theEvil Spirit from God, and the Evil Spirit put a fixed thought in hismind, that if he could but remove David, the Terror would depart. Although I hated the son of Jesse from the beginning, I made light ofmy lord's dread of him, but who can reason against an Evil Spirit fromGod; and while David was playing the second time, my lord cast ajavelin at him to kill him. When the Evil Spirit departed, the desireto destroy David departed with it. After Saul had cast the javelin, Jonathan pleaded with his father for David, and Saul listened, andswore that no harm should befall him; but when David soon afterwardsreturned from another battle with the Philistines, the Spirit cameagain and turned David's music into an instrument of torture, and againput the javelin in Saul's hand, and strove through Saul to strike Davidwith it. Hard ridden was Saul by the Spirit at that time, and he wentto Ramah to see Samuel; and when he saw him, he, the king, my beloved, was so beset that he tore off his clothes, and lay down naked allnight. When he came back at the feast of the new moon, he sat down tomeat with his princes, and with Abner and Jonathan; but David was notthere. He asked the reason of his absence, and Jonathan explained thatDavid had leave to go to Bethlehem to visit his father. Jonathan saidnothing more, but the Evil Spirit descended even at the feast, in thecompany of all the lords, and Saul imagined that Jonathan was plottingagainst him; and in his fury, possessed by the Lord, he cast his spearagainst Jonathan also, his own best beloved son. That was the miseryof it; the Spirit brought him to violence, not only against those whowere his enemies, but against those whom he loved. To me, though, hewas ever tender, and over our love the Spirit had no power. Jonathan'sanger at the time was fierce; but Jonathan was noble of heart--hisfather's son, without his father's affliction; and he knew, when hecame to himself, that it was not the father whom he honoured who haddone this deed. He went out and warned David, but he did not go withhim, and presently he returned into the city and comforted his father. When David had gathered together his four hundred knaves in rebellion, Saul sat in Gibeah under the tree there, and his servants stood roundhim in council. They were all of them valiant and faithful, but hebroke out against them, and accused them of conspiring with Davidagainst him. "There is none, " he cried, "that sheweth me that my sonhath made a league with the son of Jesse, and there is none of you thatis sorry for me. " "None of you that is sorry!" His suffering was sogreat, and so little was it understood, that he believed no one caredfor him, and at times he said bitter things which kept men apart fromhim, and sent some of them to David. His anguish was all the greaterbecause he thought Jonathan, his son, whom he so much loved, had becomeestranged from him, and secretly communicated with David, and wascontent to give up his succession to the royal crown, and take thesecond place when David should be upon the throne. But again I say it, no harsh word ever came to me, although for days he would hardly speak;and then, suddenly, as he sat by me, he would lay his head upon myneck, and tears would come of which he was ashamed. 

The never-ceasing pursuit of David was sad even to me, and yet when theSpirit left him to himself Saul relented. When David was in Engedi, and hard pressed, he came out to Saul and submitted himself to him. Heboasted that he could have slain Saul--what a boast to make! that hehad spared the Lord's anointed and the father of Jonathan, his chosenfriend!

The king was much given to sudden change. Sometimes his mood wouldleave him, and his face become clear in a moment, like the heavens in athunderstorm when the lightning has spent itself, and the wind shifts, and the blue sky in an instant is revealed. Never, when this happened, did he resist, and by constraint remain in his sorrow, but sang and wasglad, and if I was beside him, delighted himself with me. The happiestof men would he have been, even as a king, if the Evil Spirit from theLord would have left him. He was overcome with his ancient love forDavid, and wept, and acknowledged, although it was false, that Davidwas more righteous than he, and prayed for the Lord's blessing uponhim. Yet even then the ever-present Fear was before him. "I knowwell, " he said, "that thou shalt surely be king, and that the kingdomof Israel shall be established in thine hand. " And he made David swearthat he would not cut off the seed of the royal house, so that the nameof Saul might live. And David sware: David sware, the blasphemingliar, who gave up to the Gibeonites my sons, and the sons of Merab. Itwas Jonathan, whom Saul had in mind when he caused David to swear; butSaul's prayer was but breath, for the Lord cut off Jonathan in battle, and Saul was the only king of the house of Kish. 

After Samuel's death, David, with his men, went over to thePhilistines, who gave him Ziklag as the place of his abode. He playedthe traitor to Achish as he had done to Saul, and he went out againstthe Geshurites, the Gezrites, and the Amalekites, the friends ofAchish, murdering both men and women, and returned and lied to Achish, telling him he had fought against Judah and its allies. Had it beenhis purpose to hide himself and to do good service to his master Saulin the war which the Philistines were preparing for him, his treacherymight have excused him; but he had no mind to assist Saul or Israel. He sang a song after Gilboa in memory of the king and Jonathan, but hecame not near them in the day of battle, and he profited by theiroverthrow. He brought his men to Achish, as if he would go down withhim to the fight; but the Philistines distrusted him, and sent him backto Ziklag. Who knows what he intended? He told Achish that he meantto take his part against Saul, but no word of his could ever bebelieved. Nevertheless, I doubt not that he would have been as good ashis promise if it had been permitted to him. It is certain that heknew what was about to happen, and that, if he had been loyal to hisprince, he would have striven to assist him. 

I remember that dreadful day before the day of Gilboa. The host of thePhilistines came and pitched in Shunem as the sand of the desert fornumber. Saul had gathered all Israel together, but they were fewerthan the Philistines, and disheartened. He knew, moreover, that Davidand his men were with the enemy; and as he went out that morning, andsaw the host of the Philistines lie upon the hillside, he greatlytrembled, not with fear of death, for he never feared to die, butbecause his Terror was upon him, and the Lord refused to speak to him. He inquired of Him, but the Lord answered him not. The high priest hadbrought the ephod, but was dumb, and the prophets heard nothing. Twonights before the day of the battle, he had sought the Lord for adream, and had lain down by my side in hope. The dream came, but itwas a dream of the Terror, and he shrieked and turned, and clasped mein his arms; and I soothed him, and asked him what he had dreamed, buthe could not tell--it was a horror, awful, shapeless, which he darednot try to utter; and he clasped me again, me wretched, clasped me forthe last time. He rose and went out in the morning early; went roundhis army by himself. He was alone, and he knew that God had forsakenhim. 

In his extremity he bethought him of witchcraft. In his zeal for God, which availed him nothing, he had cast out of the land all those whodealt with familiar spirits, but one was still left at Endor. To herhe went to obtain some voice from the unknown world, thinking that bychance light might shine in upon his despair. But when he came to thewoman, and she asked him what spirit she should call, he could donothing but ask for Samuel. He feared him, and yet he desired to seehim. It was always strange to me that he, such a king, should be sosubdued by Samuel's presence. It was so in life, and it was so indeath. The spirit of Samuel rose, and Saul humbled himself before theshadow. Alas, Samuel had learned no pity through death, and his ghostwas as fierce as the living man of years gone. He had passed into theland of emptiness and vanity, yet his wrath burnt as if mortal bloodhad been in him. Saul bowed unto him and told him his trouble, how hewas sore distressed, for the Philistines made war upon him, and God haddeparted from him, and answered him not. It was a dreadful sight, sothe woman herself told me afterwards, a king abasing himself before aspectre of a priest and craving mercy. The worst foe whom Saul had inthe land would have felt his heart touched, and the wicked womanherself was moved with great compassion. If success could not bepromised, at least some comfort might have been given, but Samuel wasbitterness itself; terrible he always was to me, so bitter and so hardthat I shuddered at him. He turned upon Saul and denounced him, he, the dead, denounced him who was about to die, and declared that theLord was his enemy. Enemy! for what, because he had spared Agag? Andyet that was, in a measure, the reason; for Saul was too much of a manfor the priest, and therefore the priest set up David against him. Theghost stood there, and doomed the king. "The Lord, " he cried, "hathrent the kingdom out of thine hand, and given it to thy neighbour, evento David, because thou obeyedst not the voice of the Lord, norexecutedst His fierce wrath upon Amalek, therefore hath the Lord donethis thing unto thee this day. Moreover, the Lord will also deliverIsrael with thee into the hand of the Philistines; and to-morrow shaltthou and thy sons be with me: the Lord also shall deliver the host ofIsrael into the hand of the Philistines. " For this cause Saul was tofall, and his three sons, and there was to be a great slaughter ofIsrael. When David the adulterer murdered Uriah, was that not a worsecrime, yet was his punishment as Saul's? And what punishment there wasfell not on David as it would have fallen upon my lord and upon me. After David's son died, he straightway rose up, eat and drank, and wentin unto Bathsheba the whore; and she, the wife of Uriah, whom he hadmurdered, submitted to be comforted by him. 

When Saul heard the words of Samuel, he fell straightway in thedarkness all along on the earth, and there was no strength in him, forhe had eaten no bread all the day nor all the night. The woman offeredhim bread, but he sat on the bed and would not eat. At last, as themorning was breaking, he consented to eat, and he went away to makeready for the fight. He was assured he would perish that day, and thatbefore the sun set he would be in Sheol with Samuel, bat he did notplay the coward and nee. He fought as the king he was, but thePhilistines were too many for him; the curse from the Lord was upon theIsraelites, so that they feared and fled. Jonathan, with Abinadab andMelchishua, his brothers, were around Saul to the last, but they wereslain. The men-at-arms dared not come near Saul, but the archerspressed him sorely from afar, and he could not close with them, and hesaw his end was at hand. He would not have the Philistines take himalive, wounded for sport, even if they might spare his life; and hetherefore prayed his armour-bearer to thrust him through, but hisarmour-bearer would not. Thereupon Saul took his sword, and fell uponit; and his armour-bearer fell likewise upon his sword, and died withhim. The next day, when the Philistines came to strip the slain, theyfound Saul and his sons dead on Gilboa, and carried off their bodies, shamefully using them. But though the alarm at the victory was great, there were men in Israel who dared do anything for their master, themen of Jabesh-gilead, who remembered what Saul had done for themagainst the Ammonites; and they went by night and rescued the bodies, and burnt them, and buried them under this tree in Jabesh, whence theyafterwards came to Zelah, where I shall lie. 

David, when he heard that Saul was dead, sang a song in hispraise--David turned everything into songs; but nevertheless he madehimself king, and warred against the house of his master. Ever singingand dancing! When the Ark was brought from the house of Obed-edom, David leaped, and danced, and played before it like an empty fool. Michal, who was her father's own daughter, despised her husband--aswell she might--for his folly, and rebuked him because he behaved as avain fellow rather than as a king; but she was abused, and he told herthat if she did not honour him, he would be honoured by her maids; andthis was true, for he never held back from a woman if she pleased him, and of concubines had a score. My lord never sang, nor danced, norplayed; it was as much as he could do if he smiled. Would to God hehad smiled oftener; and yet if he could not laugh, he could love. Ahme! how strait was his embrace. Was the love of that ruddy-faced, light-minded, lying dancer a thousandth part of Saul's? If David hadloved Bathsbeba, would he have sought by the basest of deceit to forceUriah to her after she had fallen, so that her son might be taken to behis? And yet if Samuel had been alive, would he have cursed David ashe did my lord? I think not, for the sin and the lie with Bathsheba, and the murder of Uriah, were not a crime like that of sparing theAmalekite Agag. Nevertheless the Lord visited him also, and he tastedthe bitterness of revolt, for Absalom, his own son, turned against him, and lay with his father's concubines in the sun in the sight of allIsrael, and sought his father's life. Why do I talk thus? I meant notto talk of David, but of my lord. One word more. We never speakwithout coming to that dreadful day. Your husband, Armoni, wasshamefully handed over to the Gibeonites and hung. May every messengerof evil that does the bidding of Baal and Jehovah for ever follow theman who consented to that deed because Saul had rooted out theGibeonites from the land in his zeal for the Lord. In his zeal for theLord! His zeal for the Israelitish Lord, and at Samuel's bidding! Itwas not the desire of Saul to deal thus with the Gibeonites, for he, the husband of a Horite, was never a fool in his wrath for his God; butSamuel, whom he dreaded more than the Philistines, bade him. And theplague came, and they said it was from the Lord, because of theseGibeonites whom the Lord, through Samuel, had directed should be slain. Ah me! I, a Horite, know not the ways of Jehovah. I sit here inJabesh and wait till I shall be with those whom I loved, with Saul, Armoni, and his brother. I go down into the darkness with them, but itwill be better than the light. Maybe though dark I shall see them, andbe something of a queen--I, Rizpah, the daughter of Aiah, queen of thefirst king of Israel, he who has made it a nation. 

MIRIAM'S SCHOOLING. 

"_He wrung the water from his dress, and, plunging into the moors, directed his course to the north-east by the assistance of the polarstar_. "--THE MONASTERY. 

"_That man amongst mortals who has acquiesced in Necessity is wise, andis acquainted with divine things_. "--EURIPIDES. 

Giacomo Tacchi was a watchmaker in Cowfold. He lived, not in thecentral square or market-place of the town, for a watchmaker's businessin Cowfold was scarcely of sufficient importance for such a position, but two or three doors round the corner. It was in Church Street, justbefore the private houses begin, a little low-roofed cottage, muchlower than its neighbours, for what reason nobody could tell--muchlower certainly; and yet there it was, a solid, indisputable, wedged-inassertion, not to be ousted in any way. It had two small bow windows, one belonging to a sitting-room, and the other to the shop. Across thecurve of the shop bow window a kind of counter was fixed. Here wereGiacomo's lamp, his glass-globe reflector, or light-condenser; herewere all his tools; here lay under tumblers or wine-glasses the worksof the watches on which he was operating, and here he wrought frommorning to night with a lens which slipped into its place in his eyewith such wonderful celerity and precision, that it was difficult tobelieve it had not by long acquaintance with the eye become as much apart of it as the eyelid itself. Inside the window, along the windowframes, hung perhaps twenty or thirty watches, some of which had beencleaned or repaired, and were waiting till their owners might call, whilst others had been acquired in different ways, by exchange or bypurchase, and were for sale. There were no absolutely brand newwatches in the collection. If a new watch was ordered as a weddingpresent or a gift to a son or daughter on the twenty-first birthday, itwas specially manufactured. Immediately to the left of Giacomo was hisregulator, of which he was justly proud, for it did not vary above aminute a month. Nevertheless its performance was checked every week bythe watch of the mail-coach guard, who brought the time from St. Paul'sas he started from St. Martin's-le-Grand, and communicated it to theCowfold mail-cart driver. All round the shop were clocks of numerouspatterns, but mostly of two types, one Dutch, and one with oak ormahogany case. Perhaps a dozen or so were generally going, and it wasrather distracting to a visitor to see the pendulums of the Dutchclocks wagging at different rates, some with excited haste, others withsolemn gravity, and no two at the same speed. Each seemed confident itwas in direct communication with Greenwich Observatory, and paid notthe slightest attention to the others. It was seldom that the footpathin front of the watchmaker's window was empty. Generally a boy or girlstood there with nose flattened against the panes staring at Giacomobusied with his craft. For it was a genuine mystery to the children, and he was a mysterious person in other ways. Under his care was thechurch clock. He went up into the tower, and into a great closet inwhich nobody else in Cowfold had ever been. Furthermore, as an adjunctto the watchmaking, he repaired barometers and thermometers, and it iscertain that not a farmer within ten miles of Cowfold knew what was atthe back of the plate of his weather-glass. 

How a man with such a name as Tacchi came to settle in Cowfold wasnever understood. Giacomo's father and mother appeared there about thebeginning of the century: a son was born within three years after theirarrival, and is the Tacchi now before us. 

It might have been supposed that his occupation would have inclined himto melancholy. Far from it. He was a brisk, active creature, aboutmiddle height, with jet black hair, and a quick circulation. He wasnever overcome, as he might reasonably have been, with meditations onthe flux of time. He never rose in the morning saddened by the thoughtthat the day would be just like the day before, or that the watcheswith which he had to deal would show just the same faults and just thesame carelessness on the part of their possessors. On the contrary, healways sprang out of bed with as much zest and buoyancy as if he were aColumbus confidently expecting that before noon the shores of a newworld would rise over the ocean's edge. 

Giacomo, when he succeeded to the business, married the daughter of asmall farmer in the neighbourhood. It all came about through a coupleof little oak wedges. He took a tall clock home after it had beenrepaired, and as the floor of the living-room on which it stood wasuneven, the front of the clock at the base was always wedged up tobring it perpendicular, and keep the top from overhanging. He wasobliged to ask Miriam, the eldest girl, to stand on a footstool, andpush the clock towards the wall. As she stretched her right arm upjust under the little gilt cherub who expanded his wings above thedial, holding the frame with her left, he stepped back a little, andwas suddenly struck with the beauty of her attitude. A lovely line itwas from the tips of her fingers down to her heel, and the slightstrain just lifted the hem of her gown, and showed the whitest of whitestockings, and a shapely foot. Giacomo instantly fell in love. 

"Is that right, Mr. Tacchi?" she said. 

"Quite right; nothing could be better. "

Giacomo would not, however, insert the wedges; they were soft, andmight be broader; he would cut some better ones out of mahogany or oak, and bring them the next day. The next day he brought them, and in avery short time married Miss Miriam solely on the strength of thelovely line, the white stockings, and the foot. When she came to liveat his house in Cowfold, he found that she did not always stand on thefootstool and display the same curve, but nevertheless she made him afairly good wife, and he and she lived together on the usual maritalterms, without any particular raptures, and without any particulardiscord, for five years, when unfortunately she died, after givingbirth to her second child, which was named Miriam, after its mother. Giacomo was left with an elder boy, Andrew, and with the infant. 

Andrew grew up something like his mother, a fairly average mortal wholearned his lessons tolerably, was distinguished by no eminent virtuesnor eminent vices, no eminent gratitude nor hatreds; and it seemed asif he would one day in the fulness of time do what Cowfold forcenturies had done before him--that is to say, succeed his father inhis business, marry some average Cowfold girl, beget more averageCowfold children, lead a life unvexed by any speculation or dreams, unenlightened by any revelation, and finally sleep in Cowfoldchurchyard with thousands of his predecessors, remembered for perhaps ayear, and then forgotten for ever. 

Miriam, however, was of a different stamp. Her real ancestry was apuzzle. In some respects she resembled her father. Knowing that shewas Giacomo's child, it was easy for the observer to trace the lineageof some of her qualities; but nevertheless they reappeared in her on adifferent scale, in different proportions, so that in action theybecame totally different, and there were others not inherited fromGiacomo which modified all the rest. It is impossible to throw a newcharacteristic into a given nature, and obtain as a result the originalnature _plus_ the characteristic added. The addition will most likelychange the whole mass, and often entirely degrade or translate it. Itis just possible, such are the wonders of spiritual chemistry, thatthere may have been nothing in Miriam but her father with a touch ofher mother, and that the combination of the two may have wrought thiscuriously diverse product; or the common explanation may have beencorrect, that in her there was a resurrection of some unknown ancestor, either on the father's or mother's side. She was a big girl--herfather was rather short and squat--with black hair and dark eyes, limbsloosely set, with a tendency to sprawl, large feet and hands. She hada handsome, regular face, a little freckled; but the mouth, although itwas beautifully curved, was a trifle too long, and except when she wasin a passion, was not sufficiently under the control of her muscles, sothat her words escaped not properly formed. Generally she was ratherlanguid in her attitudes, sitting in her chair in any way but theproper way, and often giving her father cause of correction on thispoint as she grew up, inasmuch as he properly objected that when shecame to be thirteen or fourteen she ought to show that she dulyappreciated the reasons why her frocks were lengthened. Her room wasnever in order. Nothing was ever hung up; nothing was put in itsplace. Shoes were here and there--one might be under thedressing-table and the other under the bed; but with, an oddinconsistency she was always personally particularly clean, andalthough bathing was then unknown in Cowfold, she had a tub, and usedit too with constant soap and water. With her lessons she did notsucceed, more particularly with arithmetic, which she abhorred. Sometimes they were done, sometimes left undone, but she never failedin history. Her voice was a contralto of most remarkable power, strongenough to fill a cathedral, but altogether undisciplined. She was fondof music, and the organist at the church offered to teach her with hisown daughters, if she would sing with them on Sundays; but she couldnot get through the drudgery of the exercises, and advanced only so faras to be able to take her proper part in a hymn. Here, however, shewas almost useless, from incapability of proper subordination, thesopranos, tenors, and basses being well nigh drowned. 

She was fond of live creatures, and had cats, canaries, white mice, andrabbits, which she treated with great tenderness; but they were neverkept clean, and caused much annoyance to her family. She was alsotruthful; but what distinguished her most was a certain originality inher criticisms on Cowfold men, women, and events, a certainrectification which she always gave to the conventional mode ofregarding them. There was a bit of sandstone rock near the town, bythe side of the road, which from time immemorial had been called theOld Man's Nose. It was something like a nose when seen at a certainangle, but why it should have been described as the nose of an old manrather than that of a young man, no mortal could have explained. Nevertheless all Cowfold had for ages said it was the Old Man's Nose;and when strangers came it was pointed out with a "don't you see, isn'tit hooked, just like a nose, and that is where his spectacles mightlie. " But Miriam made a small revolution in Cowfold. She never wouldadmit the likeness to a nose, but with a pleasant humour observed thatit was like a _mug_ upside down--"mug, " it must be explained, meaningnot only a drinking utensil, but in very vulgar language a human face. Cowfold gradually heard of Miriam's joke, and instantly saw that therock was really like a mug. There was the upper part, there was thehandle; the resemblance to the nose disappeared, and what was moststrange, could no more be imagined. Cowfold now repeated to visitorsthis little bit of not very brilliant smartness, elaborating it heavilyat times, till it would have become rather a weariness to the flesh, ifit had not been a peculiarity of Cowfold, that it was never tired ofsaying the same thing over and over again, and laughing at itperpetually. 

One day a great event happened. There was a fire in the town, and thehouse of Mr. Cutts, the saddler, was burnt down. A week afterwardssome very unpleasant rumours were abroad, and the Tacchis, with Mrs. And Mr. Cattle, and the two Misses Cattle, sat talking over them in Mr. Tacchi's parlour after supper. The Cattles were small farmers wholived about a mile out of Cowfold, on the way to Shott, but withinCowfold parish, and came to Cowfold Church. 

"If, " said Cattle, "they can prove as the fire broke out in threeplaces at once, the office has got him. "

"His stock, " continued his wife, "to my certain knowledge, warn't worthfifty pound, for I was in the shop a fortnight ago, and says I tomyself, 'What can the man have let it down like this for--who'd comehere for anything; and it _did_ cross my mind as it was very odd, and Iwent home a thinking and a thinking, but of course I never dreamed ashe was so awful wicked as this. "

"He was always very peculiar, mother, " said the elder Miss Cattle. "Doyou remember, Carry, " turning to her younger sister, "how he jumped outof the hedge that Sunday evening, just as we turned down our lane. Ohmy, I never had such a fright--you might have knocked me down with astraw; and he never spoke, but walked straight on. "

"He might have been nutting, " said Giacomo--"he was always going outnutting; and perhaps he didn't notice he had frightened you. "

"Not notice! I am sure he might have done; and then, why did he comeout just then, I should like to know. If he had come out just afterwe'd got by, I shouldn't have thought so much of it. "

"If the poor man was in the hedge, he must come out at some time, andit happened to be just then, " observed Giacomo reflectively. 

"Ah!" continued Carry, incapable of replying to Giacomo's philosophy, and judiciously changing her attack, "whenever you went to buy anythinghe never spoke up to you like--there was always an underhand look abouthim; and then his living alone as he did with nobody but that old womanwith him. "

"He always sold good leather, " continued Mr. Cattle, who planted bothhis elbows on the table, and placed his head in his hands in a fit ofabstraction, much perplexed by this apparent contradiction in Cutts'scharacter. 

"Sold good leather, " retorted his wife with great sharpness, as if incontempt of her husband's stupidity; "sold good leather--of course hedid. That was part of his plan to make people believe he was an honestman. Besides, if he hadn't, how could he have got rid of his stock ashe did. Do you recollect, " she proceeded with increasing asperity, asbecame a Cowfold matron, "as it was him as got up that petition forthat Catchpool gal as was going to be hanged for putting her baby inthe pond?"

"His father, " quoth Mr. Cattle, inclining again to his wife's side, "had a glass eye, and I've heerd his mother was a Papist. "

"Well, " interrupted Miriam at last, "what if he did set fire to hishouse?"

They all looked amazed. "What if he did! what if he did!" repeated Mr. Cattle; "why, it's arson, that's all. "

"Oh, that's saying the same thing over again. "

"He'll be transported, that's 'what if he did, '" interposed Mrs. Cattle. 

"I suppose, " said Miriam, "he wanted to get money out of the InsuranceOffice. It was wrong, but he hasn't done much harm except to theoffice, and they can afford it. "

They were all still more amazed, and justly, for Miriam, amongst herother peculiarities, did not comprehend how society necessarilyreadjusts the natural scale of reward and punishment. 

"'Pon--my--word, " exclaimed Mrs. Cattle, after a long pause, slowlydwelling on each syllable, "hasn't--done--much--harm; and for aught weknow, in a month, or at most six weeks, he'll be tried, and then afterthat, in a fortnight, he may be on his way to Botany Bay. What do youthink, Mr. Tacchi?"

Giacomo did not occupy the same position as his daughter. His eyeswere screwed very nearly, although not quite, to the conventionalangle; but he loved her, and had too much sense not to see that she wasoften right and Cowfold was wrong. Moreover, he enjoyed her antagonismto the Cattles, of whose intellect he had not, as a clock and barometermaker, a very high opinion. He evaded the difficulty. 

"He hasn't been convicted yet. "

"That's true, " said Mr. Cattle, to whom, as an Englishman, theprinciple of not passing sentence till both sides are heard was happilyfamiliar. It was a great thought with him, and he re-expressed it withearnestness--"That's true enough. "

But Miriam did not let them off. "I want to know if he is as bad asthose contractors that father was reading about in the newspaper lastweek, who filled up the soldiers' boots between the soles with clay. If they hadn't been found out, the poor soldiers would have gonemarching with those boots, and might have been out in the wet, andmight have died. "

"Ah!" retorted Miss Cattle, "that's all very well; but that isn'tarson. "

Miss Cattle was not quite so absurd as she seemed. The contractors'crime was not catalogued with an ugly name. It was fraud or breach ofcontract, and that of course made all the difference. 

Miriam did not notice her antagonist's argument, but proceededmusingly--"He was never unkind. He was very good to that old woman, his aunt. "

"Unkind!" Mrs. Cattle almost screamed, her harsh grating voicecontrasting most unpleasantly with the low, indistinct, mellow tones inwhich Miriam had uttered the last two or three words. "Unkind! What'sthat in a man as is a going to be brought up before the 'sizes. I cansee the judge a sentencing of him now. "

"He may have been very poor, and may have lost all his money, "continued Miriam; "anyhow, he wasn't cruel. I would sooner have hungold Scrutton, who flogged little Jack Marshall for stealing apples tillhis back was all covered with bloody weals. "

The clocks in the shop began at that moment to strike ten in a dozendifferent tones, as if they discerned the hopelessness of thediscussion, and were determined to cut it short. The companyconsequently separated, and Miriam went to bed; but not to sleep, forbefore her eyes, half through the night, was sailing the ship in whichshe thought poor Cutts would be exiled. Let it not for a moment besupposed that Mr. Cutts was a young man, and that Miriam was in lovewith him. He was about fifty. 

Next morning she was still more distressed. Sometimes the morningbrings forgetfulness of the trouble of the day before, and at othertimes it revives with peculiar power just at the moment when we wake, especially if it be dark. Miriam was confused. The belief that sheought to do something if possible to help Cutts was just dawning uponher; but although she was singularly liable to be set fast to anypurpose when once she had it clearly formed, it was always a long timebefore it became formed. She was not one of those happy persons whosethoughts are always beneath them, as the horses of a coach are beneaththe driver, and can be directed this way or that way at his bidding. She could not settle beforehand that she would think upon a givensubject, and step by step disentangle its difficulties, and pursue itto the end. That is the result of continuous training, and of this shehad had none. Ideas passed through her mind with great rapidity, butthey were spontaneous, and consequently disconnected, so that indifficulty the path was chosen without any balancing of the reasons onthis and on the other side, which, forced the conclusion that it wasthe proper path to take. 

A thousand things whirled through her brain. She had known all aboutCutts before the conversation with the Cattles, or with the Cattle, asshe generally called them; but the case had not struck her till theyand she began to talk about it. She was in a great turmoil, and planspresented themselves to her, were discarded, and then presentedthemselves again as if they were quite new. The next night she sleptwell. More than ever was she impressed with horror at what seemed tobe Cutts's certain fate--more than ever was she resolved to help him ifshe could; and now at last she was a little clearer, and had determinedto go over to the county town and see Messrs. Mortimer, Wake, Collinsand Mortimer, the solicitors in whose hands the defence lay. She didnot doubt it to be her duty to go, although Cutts was no more to herthan to any other person in Cowfold, and she had no notion of what shewas going to say to the lawyers when she saw them. On the followingmorning she started, under the pretence that she wanted something shecould not obtain in Cowfold. Having no mother, and being manageress ina small way at home, these trips were not unusual. Courageous as shewas, when she reached the office her heart sank, and she then firstremembered that she had no very solid ground for her visit. She hadbrooded in her bedroom over Cutts, and had thought what a grand thingit would be to save him, but when she stepped inside Messrs. Mortimer'sdoor, and was face to face with a raised desk, protected by rails, behind which clerks were busy writing, or answering questions, herdreams disappeared; she saw what a fool she was, and she would haveliked to retreat. However, it was too late, for one of the gentlemen, behind the rails asked what she wanted. 

"I've come about Mr. Cutts. "

"Oh yes; committed for arson at Cowfold. Sit down in that room for afew minutes. Mr. Mortimer will attend to you presently. "

Miriam was shown into a little box-like den, in which there was around, leather-covered table, with a couple of chairs, but no books, and no newspaper. She had to wait for twenty terrible minutes, inwhich her excitement increased to such a degree that once or twice shewas on the point of rushing out past the clerks, and running back toCowfold. But she did not do it, and after a while Mr. Mortimer entered. 

"Well, Miss Tacchi, what can I do for you?" He was gentle in hisbehaviour, and he soothed by his first words poor Miriam's flutter. 

"Oh, if you please, sir, Mr. Cutts is not guilty. "

"Why not?"

"It is a cruel thing that he should suffer. He is as kind a creatureas ever lived. You don't know how kind he has been to his old aunt. He always sold honest things. There are scores of people in Cowfoldwho deserve to be transported more than he. "

"That won't help him much. Good people are a queer set sometimes. Butwhy should _you_ interfere?"

"I cannot tell, " replied Miriam, her voice beginning to shake; "but Ithought and I thought over it, and it is so wrong, so unfair, sowicked, and I know the poor man so well. Why should they do anythingto him?" She would have proceeded in the same strain, and would havecompared the iniquity of arson with that of fraudulent contractors andthe brutal Scrutton, but she checked herself. "He is not guilty, " sheadded. 

Mr. Mortimer was perplexed. He was accustomed in his profession to allkinds of concealment of motives, and he conjectured that there must besome secret of which he was unaware. 

"Are you any relation?"

"No. "

"Have you ever visited at his house, or has he been in the habit ofcalling at yours?"

"No. "

He was still more perplexed. He could not comprehend, and might verywell be excused for not comprehending, why the daughter of arespectable tradesman in Cowfold should walk six miles on behalf of astranger, and be so anxious about him. 

"One more question. You have had nothing whatever to do with Mr. Cutts, except by going to his shop, and by talking to him now and thenas a neighbour?"

"Nothing;" and Miriam said it in such a manner, that the most hardenedsceptic must have believed her. 

"The fire broke out at a quarter to eight. Had you seen Cutts aboutthat time?"

"I had met him in the street that evening as I came home. "

"Where had you been?"

"Practising in the church. "

"What time was it when you met him? Be careful. "

Miriam now realised the importance of her answer. 

The exact truth was that she had reached home at half-past seven, andhad seen Cutts going into his house then. It must be remembered thatalthough, as before observed, she was naturally truthful, she was sobecause she was fearless, and had the instinctive tendency todirectness possessed by all forceful characters. Her veracity restedon no principle. She was not like Jeanie Deans, that triumph ofculture, in whom a generalisation had so far prevailed that it was ableto overcome the strongest of passions and prevent a lie even to save asister's life. Miriam had been brought up in no such divine school. She had heard that lying was wrong, but she had no religion, althoughshe listened to a sermon once every Sunday, and consequently therelation in which the several duties and impulses stood to one anotherwas totally different from that which was established in Sir Walter'sheroine. By some strange chance, too, tradition, which often takes theplace of religion, had no power over her; and although hatred ofoppression and of harsh dealing is a very estimable quality, and onewhich will go a long way towards constructing an ethical system for us, it will not do everything. 

She began to reflect. She had no watch with her. She had noticed theclocks when she returned, and she remembered that they showed half-pastseven. She could not at the moment deliberately say a quarter toeight, although really it did not much matter. Who would be the worseif she declared it was a quarter to eight? Nobody, and she knew thatCutts would be the better. She had not specially observed the clocks;how could she, for she had no notion that anything important dependedupon accuracy. She was short-sighted, and she had not seen theregulator. Nothing was actually before her eyes but a great Dutchkitchen clock, which showed half-past seven, and might have been wrong. Something struck when she left the church, and the strokes chimed againin her ears as she was shaping her reply to Mr. Mortimer. They soundedlike half-past, and in that case it must have been a quarter to eightwhen she stood on her doorstep. Finally, there was the reason ofreasons which superseded the necessity of any further attempt topersuade herself by any casuistry--she must save Cutts. 

"A quarter to eight, " she said decisively, "Odd that you should have seen him just at that time. In less thanfive minutes the place was in a blaze. He could hardly have lit it uphimself. Would you swear before the Court it was a quarter to eight?"

If she had been asked this at first she would have hesitated, but shenow boldly said "Yes. "

"Very well; I do not see what more I can do now. I will think over thematter, " and Miriam departed. 

The lawyer had his suspicions, and determined, after some inquiries inCowfold, that Miss Miriam should not be called. He told the story tohis partner, who laughed, and said he did not see anythingextraordinary in it. It was a common case of perjury. Mr. Mortimerwas not sure that it was common perjury. Externally it might be so, and yet there seemed to be a difference. Moreover, he could not findout anything in Cowfold to make him believe that there was any motivefor it. 

"Perfectly motiveless, " he replied. "A noteworthy instance, " for hewas a bit of a philosopher, "of an action performed without any motivewhatever. I have always maintained the possibility of such actions. "

As to Miriam, she went back to Cowfold without any self-accusation orself-applause. She did not know that there was anything criminal orgenerous in her attempt on behalf of Cutts. We may say in parting thathe was acquitted, to her great delight; and Mr. Cattle, with the prideof a British citizen who has served on a jury and knows the law, didnot cease to preach to his wife, whenever the opportunity offered, thatyou should never pronounce the verdict till you've heard the evidence. 

Soon after Mr. Cutts's return to Cowfold Mr. Tacchi one day surprisedhis household by telling them he meant to take another wife. Andrewwas silent, but Miriam at once flew into a violent passion, and therebygreatly incensed her father. There was no cause for her anger. Mrs. Brooks, whom Giacomo had chosen, was, as the second choice often is, just the woman who was necessary to him. She was about forty, a goodmanager, with an equable temper, a widow, with no children, not in theleast degree rigid, but, on the contrary, affectionate. She had seensome trouble with her first husband, who was a little farmer and drank, and consequently, although she was a churchwoman, had been driven tothe Bible, and had found much comfort therein. "Although she was achurchwoman" may sound rather strange, but still it is a fact that inthose days in Cowfold the church people, and for that matter theDissenters too, did not read their Bibles; but amongst the Dissentersthere was here and there a remnant of the ancient type to whom theBible was everything. Amongst the church people there were very few ornone. 

Why Miriam should be so wrathful with her father it is extremelydifficult to say. It is certain she did not object to her depositionas housekeeper. She never cared for her duties as mistress. Perhapsone reason was that she chose to resent the apparent displacement ofher own mother. She never knew her, and owed her nothing except herbirth; but she was _her_ mother, and she took sides with her, andconsidered her insulted, and became her partisan with perfect fury. Perhaps, too, Miriam was slightly jealous that her father, who was nownearing his half century, should show himself not altogether dead tolove. She would have liked to find him insensible, leaving all loveaffairs to his children, and she once even went so far as to use theword "disgusting" in conversing with Andrew on the subject. 

Giacomo, however, was very determined, notwithstanding his affectionfor his daughter, and disagreeable scenes took place between them. Sheshowed her displeasure in a thousand ways, and was positively rude toMrs. Brooks when she invited Miriam to her house. 

Giacomo had a sister, a Mrs. Dabb, who lived in London. She hadmarried a provision dealer in the Borough, and he employed not only astaff of assistants, but a couple of clerks. Mrs. Dabb, oddly enough, was a fair-haired woman, with blue eyes and a rosy complexion. She hadrather a wide, plump face, and wore her hair in ringlets. She lived atthe shop, but she had a drawing-room over it with a circular table inthe middle, and round it lay the "Keepsake" and "Friendship'sOffering, " in red silk, with Mrs. Hemans' and Mr. Montgomery's poetry. Into these she occasionally looked, and refreshed herself by comparingher intellect with that of the female kind generally. She desiredabove everything not to be considered commonplace, believed in love atfirst sight, was not altogether unfavourable to elopements, carefullyrepressed any tendency to unnecessary order, wore a loose dressing-gownall the morning, had her breakfast in bed, let her hair stray a littleover her face, cultivated a habit of shaking it off and pushing it backwith her fingers, and generally went as far to be thought a little"wild" as was possible for the wife of a respectable, solid, eminentlyBritish, close-fisted Borough tradesman. Nevertheless she had a hugeappetite, and always had ham or sausages for tea. Giacomo shedespised, on the ground that his occupation was so limited, that itcontracted the imagination, and that he did not "live in themetropolis, but vegetated in a country town. " She consequently veryseldom visited Cowfold, and very seldom wrote to her brother. Giacomo, however, thought it his duty to tell his sister of his approachingmarriage; and Mrs. Dabb, who was endowed with great curiosity, repliedthat, if it was quite agreeable, she would come to Cowfold for two orthree days to make the acquaintance of Mrs. Brooks and obtain a changeof air, as she had suffered somewhat from feelings of languor of lateand a little fever on the nerves. Accordingly she came, and in a shorttime saw what was the state of affairs between Miriam and her father. She rather liked Miriam, chiefly for her defects; and as Giacomo hadbeen a little freer than usual with his sister one evening, and hadexpressed his fears that Miriam and Mrs. Brooks would not agree, Mrs. Dabb gave him some advice. 

"Miriam, my dear Giacomo, is a bit of a genius, untamed and irregular, reminding me something of myself. "

Giacomo did not much believe in untamed irregular genius. It wascertainly of no use in clockmaking. 

"Well, what then?"

"I should say that she suffers through limitation of her sphere. Nosuffering like that, Giacomo. Ah me!"

Mrs. Dabb shook back her hair, and put both her hands to her forehead. 

"Does your head ache?"

"No; at least not more than usual. I always have a weight there; Ibelieve it is merely ideas. I asked a very eminent young man who livesnot far from us--he occupies a high position in the hospital--adresser, I think, they call him; and he said it was due tooverstrung--dear me, what was it! I remember putting it down, itseemed so exactly to coincide with my own views. "

Mrs. Dabb looked in her pocket-book. 

"Overstrung cerebration, that was it; overstrung cerebration. "

"What were you going to say about Miriam?"

"A little proposal. My husband wants a clerk. Why not let Andrew takethe place, and Miriam be his housekeeper? We have no room for them, but apartments are to be procured at a low rate. "

This was in reality Miriam's scheme. She had heard of the vacancy inMr. Dabb's establishment, and had implored her aunt to use herinfluence with Giacomo to gain his assent to Andrew's removal. Mrs. Dabb was not an unkind woman; she really thought she liked Miriam, andshe consented. She had even gone so far as to encourage her in thebelief that she "vegetated, " and the word opened up to her a new world. "Vegetate"--it stuck to her, and became a motive power. Great is thepower of a thought, but greater still is the power of a phrase, and itmay be questioned whether phrase is not more directly responsible thanthought for our religion, our politics, our philosophy, our love, ourhatred, our hopes and fears. 

"I do not think, " said Giacomo, "they could live on a clerk's salary. Andrew would not be worth much as a beginner. "

"It is astonishing, my dear Giacomo, upon how little people can live, if their wants are simple, like my own, for example; and then Andrewwould have the opportunity of acquiring animal food at a cheap rate. "

"I do not like the thought of parting with the children, and I fear thedangers of London, especially for a girl like Miriam. "

"I would take them, Giacomo, under my wing. Besides, as a dear friendonce observed to me, evil has no power over the pure soul. I feel itmyself; it cannot come near me; it dissolves, it departs. What is theBorough to me with all its snares? I am in a different world. "

Giacomo for some time refused; but Miriam was alternately so unpleasantand so coaxing, that at last he consented. Poor Andrew had really nowill of his own in the affair. He was a gentle, docile creature whomclockmaking suited, but he was pleased at the thought of the change, and who could tell? he might rise to a position at his uncle's farbeyond anything which he could attain in Cowfold. 

After some negotiation, therefore, Miriam and Andrew departed forLondon, the salary being fixed at thirty-eight shillings a week. Tothis Giacomo added twelve shillings a week--two pounds ten shillingsaltogether. It was a happy day for both of them when they journeyed tothe end of Cowfold Lane, and waited for the coach; they were happierstill when they were mounted on the top, and were at last on the greatLondon road, and already on the line which, was in direct communicationwith the great city. It was different altogether from the Cowfoldroads, and there was a metropolitan air about it. They continually metcoaches going away to York, Newcastle, and even to Edinburgh, and thedrivers mutely saluted by lifting their whips as they passed. Twodrivers had thus met for forty years, and had never spoken a singleword to one another. At last one died, and the other took his death somuch to heart that he sickened and died too. The inns were nothinglike the Cowfold inns. They were huge places, with stables likebarracks, and outside each of them were relays of beautiful horsesstanding ready for the change. The scenery from Huntingdon to Londonis not particularly attractive, but to Miriam and Andrew the Alps couldnot have been more fascinating. They wondered that others did notshare their excitement, and Andrew thought that a coachman must be thehappiest of men. 

At last they reached Barnet, the last stage, and immediately afterwardsthey saw the line of the smoke-cloud which lay over the goal of alltheir aspirations, the promised land in which nothing but goldenromance awaited them. Presently a waypost was passed, with the words_To the West End_ upon it, so that they might now be fairly said to beat least in a suburb. Ten minutes more brought them to HighgateArchway, and there, with its dome just emerging above the fog, was St. Paul's! They could hardly restrain themselves, and Miriam squeezedAndrew's hand in ecstasy. They rattled on through Islington, and madetheir first halt at the "Angel, " astonished and speechless at thecrowds of people, at the shops, and most of all at the infinity ofstreets branching off in all directions. Dingy Clerkenwell andAldersgate Street were gilded with a plentiful and radiant deposit ofthat precious metal of which healthy youth has such an infinitestore--actual metal, not the "delusive ray" by any means, for it is themost real thing in existence, more real than the bullion forks andspoons which we buy later on, when we feel we can afford them, and farmore real than the silver tea-service with which, still later, we arepresented amidst cheers by our admiring friends in the ward which werepresent in the Common Council, for our increasing efforts to upholdtheir interests. 

At the Bull and Mouth they saw that marvel, the General Post Office, but they had not much time to look at it, for here they were met by ayoung man from Mr. Dabb. They were disappointed that Mrs. Dabb had notcome, but a verbal excuse was offered that she was in bed with aheadache. Mr. Dabb, of course, was too busy to leave. The messengerwas commissioned to take them to their uncle's, where they were to havetea; and after tea they were to go to the lodgings which Mrs. Dabb hadprovisionally selected for them. In a few minutes they had crossedLondon Bridge, and drew up in front of Mr. Dabb's house. There was noprivate entrance, and they encountered their uncle on the pavement. Hewas short and thick, with a very florid complexion, and wore a brownjersey, and a white apron fastened at the back with a curious brasscontrivance. There were two or three people with him, and he had aknife in his hand. The doors were wide open; there seemed to be nowindows, and in fact Mr. Dabb's establishment was a portion of thestreet just a little recessed. He was in and out continually, now onthe pathway talking to a customer there, and then passing inside to theladies who were a little more genteel, and preferred to state theirwants under cover. At the back of the shop was a desk perched upaloft, just big enough for one person, and with a gaslight over it. Andrew noticed it, and thought of winter, and wondered how anybodycould sit there during a January day with the snow on the ground, orduring a cold thaw. 

Mr. Dabb put down his knife and shook hands with them. 

"Well, Mr. Andrew, so you've come to make your fortune--long hours, hard work, stick at nothing; cutting place the Borough. Better goinside. Put your traps up in that corner; you'll want 'em againdirectly. Aunt's abed upstairs; can't see you to-night. "

They went into a little greasy back parlour, lighted by a skylight, ifindeed a window could be so called whose connection with the sky was sofar from being immediate. 

Mr. Dabb looked in. "You'll have some tea in a minute. I myself can'tleave--shorthanded. "

They were not asked to wash or take off their travelling clothes. 

Presently a slut of a girl appeared with a tray on which there weresome ham, a shapeless mass of butter which looked as if it had beenscooped out of a pot, a loaf, a teapot, some cups and saucers, a milkjug, and two plates, with knives and forks. She went to a cupboard, put a black cruet-stand on the table, and as the milk had been spiltover the bread, she took the plate to the fender, emptied it amongstthe ashes, and wiped it with her apron. The apron was also used towipe the butter plate, on which there was an unusually black mark, withlines resembling the imprint of a very big thumb. In abouthalf-an-hour after they had refreshed themselves Uncle Dabb looked in. 

"Better be off before it gets dark. Eight o'clock sharp to-morrowmorning, Andrew. Sharp's the word. Breakfast before you come. My boywill show you your quarters. Needn't take them unless you like them. "

A cab was called, their luggage was put upon it, and they were landedin Nelson Square. The lodgings were three rooms at the back of thehouse, two of them garrets at the top, and the third a smallsitting-room on the ground floor, behind the front parlour. Theylooked rather dismal, and Miriam inquired whether they could not havefront rooms. 

"Oh yes, ma'am; but they would come more expensive. Mrs. Dabb told meshe didn't think you would like to pay more than thirteen shillings andsixpence a week without extras, which is exceedingly cheap for thispart, and the front rooms corresponding would be five-and-twentyshillings. "

This settled the question. They had fancied an outlook on a gaypromenade, and they had in its place a waste expanse of dirty dullroofs and smoking chimneys. If they looked down below, they saw aseries of small courtyards used for the purpose of storing refuse whichcould not be put in the dustbin--bottles, broken crockery, and odd bitsof rusty iron. The first thing was to provide the breakfast for thefollowing morning. This their landlady offered to do for them. Thenext thing was to go to bed utterly wearied and worn out. They bothslept soundly, and both woke much refreshed and full of buoyant hope. A pleasant and seductive vista lay before them--seductive and pleasant, although they were in Nelson Square, as that which we see in one ofTurner's Italian pictures--a temple at the side, a lake in front andbeyond it a valley embosomed in woods and mountains, basking in goldenlight. 

They planned the day. Miriam had to lay in her stock of eatables, andof course must call on her aunt. At twenty minutes to eight Andrewstarted. The way was easy to find, and he was at his uncle's fiveminutes before his time. The shopmen were already there, and Andrewhad rather a rough greeting. 

"An't yer brought yer warming-pan with yer, young 'un? You'll find itcool a sittin' still all day long. "

Andrew then found out that the desk up aloft was really his appointedpost. 

"Don't yer be so free, Bill, " said the other; "he's the govnor's nevvy. You'd better mind what you're at, old man, now we've got the nevvyhere. "

"I suppose you'll be a pardner next week, " continued the first with abow. 

The truth was that Mr. Dabb had told his men that he was expecting anephew "of his missus's, " and that "he was took on as a kind of charitylike. "

Mr. Dabb now appeared. 

"Here you are--all right. Sharp's the word--that's my motter. Keep onyour coat and hat--you'll want 'em, I can tell you. This isn't a placefor coddlin', is it, Bill?" Bill smiled. "You've got to take themoney--all ready money here, except a few weeklies. You get a ticket, see as you have the right amount; we keep a duplicate, and so we checkyou. Things as go in the books you put down. Three-quarters of anhour for your dinner and half-an-hour for tea--not like Cowfold, eh?You'll see life here--_life_, my boy;" and Mr. Dabb, full of ham, buttered toast, and hot coffee, and feeling very well that morning, began to chop with great vigour at the spine of a dead pig suspended byits hind-legs. "Life, " he said again--"there isn't such a place inLondon for life as the Borough; and though I say it, there aren't manymore places in the Borough where there's more life than at Dabb's. Nowthen, mount. "

Andrew assumed his new position. Fortunately for him, he was, likemany other youths of his bent, rather quick at arithmetic; Mr. Dabb wasnot very busy, and whatever his faults may have been, was by no meansdisposed to be hard upon a beginner. Still the day was insufferablylong, and he rejoiced with a foolish extravagance of delight when thehour came for going home. There was nothing exhilarating in thestreets through which he raced: there was no certainty of anythingparticularly pleasant in Nelson Square, and the morrow would inevitablybe as to-day. But still he was glad; and as for the morrow, he did notsee it. 

At three o'clock Miriam called on her aunt. As she passed through theshop she saw her brother, but it was full of people, and she could notspeak to him. She found Mrs. Babb still in bed with her nerves indisorder; other things were in disorder too, and Miriam particularlywondered at the dishevelled condition of Mrs. Dabb's hair, nightcapsbeing the custom at Cowfold for all people who were not girls nor boys. Miriam was not an orderly person, as we know, but Mrs. Dabb's room wasa surprise to her. In one corner was an old green sofa, on whichclothes were thrown; on the top of the clothes was a tray with somehalf-eaten bread and butter, a piece of bacon, and some tea things--wewill not, however, go any further. 

"I am glad you've come, my dear, " said Mrs. Dabb, "although I am afraidI shall not be able to see you so often as I could wish, for my healthis not good, and when I am better there is so much to be done. "

Miriam thought that if this might be true, there was no reason to putit in the forefront of the reception. 

"Your brother, I believe, will do very well. It must be a great reliefto him to be freed from his mechanical labours in a provincial town, and to find himself in a more extended circle. "

Miriam thanked her aunt, and said that she was sure her uncle would bekind. 

"Yes, he will be kind; although I should not say that kindness is theone thing prominent in him. In such large commercial undertakings thefeelings are not developed. I am often sensible of it. There is noresponse in your uncle to what is best in me, yet I must not complain. Perhaps if we had children it might have been different, and yet whoknows? Maternal solicitude might have destroyed the sentiment I nowpossess. But I must not weary myself by talking--I must bid yougood-bye. Come again soon. "

Miriam rose, ventured to kiss her aunt, and departed. 

Three months passed, and Miriam and Andrew agreed that there wasvegetation in London as well as in Cowfold. They began indeed to thinkit was even a little greener in Cowfold than in Nelson Square itself. 

Miriam had been out for walks--she had been as far as Regent Street;but Regent Street began to lose its charms, especially as she had nocompanions. Her landlady, Miss Tippit, was a demure little person ofabout fifty years, but looking rather younger, for her hair was light. It was always drawn very tightly over her forehead, and with extremeprecision under her ears. She invariably wore a very tight-fittingblack gown, and as her lips too were somewhat tightly set, she was avery tight Miss Tippit altogether. It was necessary to be so, forbeyond an annuity of 20 pounds a year, she had no means of support saveletting her lodgings. She was very good, but her goodness appeared tolack spontaneity. It seemed as if she did everything, and evenbestowed her rare kisses, under instructions from her conscience, andevery tendency to effusiveness was checked as a crime. Yet the truthwas that she was naturally kind and even generous, but disbelieving innature on the whole, she never would sanction any natural instinctunless she could give it the form of duty. She was an unpleasantcompanion at times, because she often felt bound to "set things right, "and made suggestions which were resented as interference. When shevisited her friends, for she had two or three, she invariably assumedthe reins, and was provocative by reason of her unauthorisedadmonitions to the servants or remarks upon defective management. Another odd thing was that Miss Tippit was a Christian. She went tochurch regularly twice every Sunday, and it was always her parishchurch. She might have found something to do her more good if she hadgone farther afield; but she considered it her duty to go to her ownchurch as she called it. The parson was not eminent, belonged to noschool, and said nothing which was specially helpful; but Miss Tippitlistened with respect, heard the Bible read, did her best to join inthe hymns with her little thin voice, and prayed the church prayers. She contrived, through what she heard, and what she sang, and what sheprayed, not only to provide herself with an explanation which she didnot doubt of the here and hereafter--an explanation which would notprobably have been secure against Strauss--but she obtained a fewprinciples by which she regulated this present life--principles ofextreme importance, which scepticism must admit if the world is not togo to ruin. In the church, too, in the corner against the wall, whenthe music sounded, or when the voice of the priest was heard asking forthe Divine mercy, the heart of Miss Tippit often moved, notwithstandingthe compression of her tight black dress, and something seemed to rebelin her throat against her bonnet-strings. What did she think in thosesacred moments? Let us not profane her worship with too minuteinquiry. Whatever she thought, those emotions were perfectly valid. She might be snappish, limited, and say ugly things during half theweek, but there was something underneath all that which was incommunication with the skies. The church was the only mental orspiritual education which Miss Tippit received. Books she neverread--she had not time; and if she tried to read one she was instantlyseized with a curious fidgetiness--directly she sat down with a volumein her hand it was just as if things went all awry, and compelled herinstantly to rise and adjust them. In church all this fidgetinessvanished, and no household cares intruded. It was strange, consideringher temper, and how people generally carry their secular world withthem wherever they go, but so it was. There was a secret in herhistory, her friends said, for though they knew nothing of her littlebit of private religion, and although she never admitted a soul intothe little oratory where the image of her Saviour hung, everybody wasaware that there was "a something about her" which took her out of theclass to which she externally and by much of her ordinary conductappeared to belong, and of course the theory was an early lovedisappointment, the only theory which the average human intellect iscapable of forming in such cases. It was utterly baseless; and MissTippit was touched with this faint touch of supernal grace just becauseher Maker had so decreed. 

Miriam disliked Miss Tippit on account of her primness and oldmaidishness, and the frequent hints which she gave to keep her room inorder. Miriam had picked up an epithet, perhaps from her aunt, perhapsfrom a book which seemed exactly to describe Miss Tippit--she was"conventional;" and having acquired this epithet, her antipathy to MissTippit increased every time she used it. It was really not coin of therealm, but gilded brass--a forgery; and the language is full of suchforgeries, which we continually circulate, and worst of all, pass offupon ourselves. Thus it happened that although Miss Tippit would havebeen glad to do Miriam many a service, her offers were treated with, something like disdain, and were instantly withdrawn. The only otherlodgers in the house were an old gentleman and his wife on the firstfloor, whom Miriam never saw, and about whom she knew nothing. 

Andrew at last began to feel the wear of London life. When he camehome in the evening he suffered from an exhaustion which he never feltin Cowfold. It was not that weariness of the muscles which was apleasure after a game at cricket or football, but a nervous distresswhich craved a stimulant. He had confined himself hitherto to a singleglass of beer at supper, but this was not enough, and a glass of whiskyand water afterwards was added to keep company with the pipe. Bydegrees also he dropped into a public-house as he left Mr. Dabb's forjust threepennyworth to support him on his way. Frequently when hewent there he met a man of about thirty who also was apparentlyenjoying a modest threepennyworth to help him home or help him awayfrom it or help him to do something which he could not do without it, and Andrew and he began gradually, under the influence of theirthreepennyworths, to talk to one another. He was clean shaven, hadglossy black hair, a white and somewhat sad face, was particularly neatbut rather shabby, and, what at first was a puzzle to Andrew, looked asif he was going to begin work rather than leave it, for his boots wereevidently just blacked. He was a music-hall comic singer. His fatherand mother--fathers and mothers, even the best of them, will do suchthings--had given him a fairish schooling, but had never troubledthemselves to train him for any occupation. They stuck their heads inthe sand, believed something would turn up, and trusted in Providence. Considering the kind and quantity of trust which is placed inProvidence, the most ambitious person would surely not aspire to itshigh office, and it may be pardoned for having laid down the inflexiblerule to ignore without exception the confidence reposed in it. PoorGeorge Montgomery found himself at eighteen without any outlook, although he was a gentleman, and his father was a clergyman. The onlyappointment he could procure was that of temporary clerk in the WarOffice during a "scare"--"a merely provisional arrangement, " as theRev. Mr. Montgomery explained, when inquiries were made after George. The scare passed away; the temporary clerks were discharged; the fatherdied; and George, still more unfitted for any ordinary occupation, camedown at last, by a path which it is not worth while to trace, to earn aliving by delighting a Southwark audience nightly with his finebaritone voice, good enough for a ballad in those latitudes, and goodenough indeed for something much better if it had been properlyexercised under a master. He was not downright dissolute, but hisexperience with his father, who was weak and silly, had given him adistaste for what he called religion; and he was loose, as might beexpected. Still, he was not so loose as to have lost his finerinstincts altogether, for he had some. He read a good deal, mostlyfiction, played the organ, and actually conducted the musical part of aservice every Sunday, heathen as he was. His vagrant life ofexcitement begot in him a love of liquor, which he took merely to quiethim, but unfortunately the dose required strengthening every now andthen. He was mostly in debt; prided himself on not dishonouringvirtuous women--a boast, nevertheless, not entirely justifiable; andthrough his profession had acquired a slightly histrionic manner, especially when he was reciting, an art in which he was accomplished. He found out that Andrew had a sister, and he gave him a couple oftickets for an entertainment which had been got up by some well-meaningpeople to draw the poor to his church. They were tickets for therespectable end of the schoolroom, and Andrew having obtainedpermission to leave an hour earlier, took Miriam in her very bestdress, and with one or two little additional and specially purchasedarticles of finery. It never entered Mr. Montgomery's head to inviteeven Andrew to the music hall. He was ashamed of it, and he saw thatAndrew was not exactly the person to be taken there. Mr. Montgomeryhad two classes of songs, both of which found favour with his ordinarynightly audience. One was coarse, and the other sentimental. 

Of the coarse, his always applauded "Hampstead-Heath Donkey and what hethought of his Customers" might be taken as a sample, but there wasjust as vigorous clapping when he produced his "Sackmaker's Dream, " andthis he now sang. Miriam was much affected by it, and dwelt upon it asthe three--the singer, Andrew, and herself--walked home to theirlodgings whither Mr. Montgomery had been invited to supper. 

"Did you write the Sackmaker's Dream yourself?" she asked, as they wentalong. 

"Yes; just by way of a change. It does not pay to sing nothing butcomic stuff. "

"It is very pathetic. Is it true?"

"Oh, I don't quite know. Founded on fact, as they say, dressed up abit by the author, " and Mr. Montgomery laughed. 

"But how did you ever hear of such a thing?"

"Oh, I've heard a good many strange things since I've been knockingabout town. "

"Then you had some particular person in your eye when you werecomposing it?"

"Yes, partly, but not much of her, " and Mr. Montgomery laughed again. 

"How much?"

"How inquisitive you are. Well, to tell you the truth, no more thanthis, that one night I saw one of these women coming out of a sackfactory. She looked awfully wretched, and I made up all the rest. "

Miriam was much astonished. She was actually in company with anauthor, and with one who could invent scenes, descriptions, andcharacters like those in the novels of which she was now so fond. Mr. Montgomery was a marvel to her. He, too, was somewhat struck withMiriam; with her beauty, and with a certain freshness in herobservations; but a man who had lived as he had lived in London is notlikely to admire any woman with much fervour, and indeed the incapacityfor genuine admiration of women is one of the strongest argumentsagainst such a life. 

They had their supper, and after supper some whisky was produced, andAndrew and Montgomery smoked. 

"Talking about sackmakers, " said Montgomery, "I can tell you a truestory of one, quite true, every word of it. I knew a fellow who hadbeen awfully wild when he was young, but he was converted, as they callit, and turned city missionary. He came to know in this way one ofthese sackmaking women. She was above the usual run, well-behaved, andvery good-looking. He fell desperately in love with her, and she withhim, but he always thought she held back a little. At last she toldhim she had lived with a man, and that he had left her. The missionarysaid he did not care, and would marry her, but she refused. She wasbound, she said, and nothing could get that notion out of her head. The missionary was in despair; he was trained for foreign service, andwent to India. There he married, well enough, I was told, and washappy; but the sackmaker was never forgotten. He became the ministerof a big chapel in Calcutta, but he always somehow, through somebody inLondon, managed to find out what the girl was doing. When he wasforty-five, his wife died. They had no children, and he came back toEngland. One fine morning he knocked at his old friend's door. Youmay imagine their meeting! The man with whom she had lived was dead. The missionary and she were married. He gave up his preaching; he hadsaved up a bit of money, and took his wife and himself off to America. What do you think of her, Andrew?"

Andrew's notions on social and moral questions were what are commonlycalled "views. " They were not thoughts, and furthermore they were"average views. " Having had some whisky, his views were veryaverage--that is to say, precisely what is usual and customary. "Isuppose it was the best thing he could do, " he somewhat sleepilyreplied. 

"The best thing he could do!" retorted Miriam, with much scorn. "Iwould have worn that woman like a jewel, if I had been her husband. Heought never to have married his first wife. "

Six months afterwards, the position of affairs in the little householdin Nelson Square had changed. Andrew, finding that vegetation inLondon was very slow work, had contracted the habit of taking whisky alittle more frequently, and had even--not unnoticed by Mr. Dabb--provided himself with a small flask, from which he was accustomedto solace himself by "nips" during business hours when he thought hewas not seen. Once or twice he had been late in the morning, and hadbeen reminded by Mr. Dabb. "Sharp's the word in my establishment, nephew, and I show no favour. "

Mr. Montgomery, too, had become a constant visitor at the Tacchis' onSunday, and Miriam had found herself beginning on the Monday morning tocount the hours till the next Sunday should arrive. She had told Mr. Montgomery that she should like to hear him sing in his own hall, buthe did not receive the proposal very graciously. 

"They are a rough set that go there, and you would not like to mix withthem. "

"If you do not mind, why should I? Besides, could you not find someplace apart where Andrew and myself could be quiet?"

"You would object to some of the songs; they are not adapted for yourears. "

"You know nothing about my ears. I do not suppose there will beanything wrong. Come now, promise. "

Mr. Montgomery thought a little, and reflected that he could easilyobtain a secluded seat; and as for the programme, he could perhaps foronce exclude everything offensive. He said he would write and fix anevening. 

"Andrew is out all day; perhaps you had better send the note to me, sothat I may have more time to make arrangements. " Miriam usually saidwhat she meant; but this was not what she meant. She was possessed nowby a passion which was stronger than her tendency to speak the truth. She longed for the pleasure of a letter to herself in Mr. Montgomery'sown writing. The next morning, when she went downstairs, she lookedanxiously at the breakfast table. It was utterly impossible that hecould have written, but she thought there was a chance. She listenedfor the postman's knock all day, but nothing came. How could it beotherwise, seeing that Mr. Montgomery must go to the music hall first. She knew he must go, and yet she listened. Reason has so little to dowith the conduct of life, even in situations in which its claim isincontestable. The next day she had a right to expect, but sheexpected in vain. 

Mr. Montgomery was not a stone, but he saw no reason why he should bein a hurry. Miriam was a bewitching creature, but he had beenfrequently bewitched, and had recovered. The notion, of course, thathe was wrecking Miriam's peace of mind by delaying a little businessnote, or by omitting to fix the earliest possible moment for the visit, was too absurd to present itself to him. At last he wrote, tellingMiss Tacchi that he hoped to have the pleasure of seeing her and Andrewat the hall on the day following. He would call for them both. Miriamhad not stirred from home since she last saw him, and was in the littleback room when the letter arrived. Miss Tippit brought it to her, andshe took it with an affected air of total unconcern. 

"Thank you, Miss Tippit. I am sorry to see you looking so poorly. "

"Thank you, Miss Tacchi; I am not well by any means, " and Miss Tippitdeparted. 

Miriam had not latterly inquired after Miss Tippit's health, but beingexcited and happy, she not only inquired, but actually felt a genuineinterest in Miss Tippit's welfare. She read the note twice--there wasnothing in it; but she took it upstairs and read it again in herbedroom, and finally locked it up in her desk, putting it in a littlesecret drawer which opened with a spring. She had in her possessionsomething in his hand--she was going out with him; and the outlook fromher back window over the tiles was not to be surpassed by that down aDevonshire glen in mid-summer, with Devonshire azure on the sea. 

The evening came, and Mr. Montgomery called before Andrew had arrived. Miriam was, nevertheless, ready. She asked him if he would likeanything; could she get him any tea? But he had prepared himself forhis night's work by a drop of whisky, and did not care for tea. He didnot, however, suggest any more whisky; he was always indeedparticularly careful not to overstep the mark before his performances, whatever he might do afterwards. 

"Really, Mr. Montgomery, this is too kind of you to take the trouble tocome here out of your way for Andrew and myself. "

"It is not out of my way, Miss Tacchi, and I do not believe that youcan honestly say that I, who have been idling about for three or fourhours, could find it a trouble to be here. "

"Do you think I deal in hypocritical compliments?"

"Of course not; but we are all of us liars a little bit--women morethan men; and perhaps they are never so delightful as when they aretelling their little bits of falsehoods. They speak the truth, butthey _do_ lie--truth and lie, lie and truth--the truest truth, the mostlying lie;" and Mr. Montgomery took up a couple of wax ornamentalapples which were on the mantelpiece and tossed them up alternatelywith one hand with the greatest dexterity, replacing them on themantelpiece with a smile. 

At that moment Andrew appeared at the door, and in a few moments theywere all three ready. Just as they were departing, a gentleman camedownstairs. 

"Pardon me, " he said, speaking to Miriam, "do you live in this house?"

"Yes. "

"Miss Tippit is very dangerously ill. I am her doctor. I do not liketo leave her alone with the little girl. I am going to fetch a nurse, and will probably be able to get one in an hour. Do you mind waitingtill I return?"

Miriam was almost beside herself. She was not simply vexed, but shecursed Miss Tippit, and would have raged at her if the presence ofothers had not restrained her. 

"It is extremely awkward. I have a most pressing engagement. "

Andrew stared. He did not see anything particularly pressing. 

"I will wait for you, Miriam. "

She now hated Andrew as much as she did Miss Tippit. 

"Absurd to talk of waiting. You know nothing about it. Go on. Don'tstay for me. Of course I must give it up altogether;" and she clutchedat her bonnet-strings, and tore her bonnet off her head. The doctorwas amazed, and doubted for a moment whether it would not be better todo without her help. 

"It doesn't matter, Miss Tacchi, " said Mr. Montgomery; "I shall not beon for an hour and a half, but I must be there. If you will come withyour brother, you will be in plenty of time. "

She sullenly went upstairs, and Andrew remained below. When sheentered the room she shut the door with some vehemence, and the littlemaid-of-all-work, who was at the head of the bed, came to meet her. 

"Oh, if you please, Miss Tacchi, the doctor said she was to be kept soquiet. Poor Miss Tippit; she is very bad, Miss; I think she'sinsensible. "

"You need not tell me what to do. I know just as well as yourself. "

The sufferer lay perfectly still, and apparently unconscious. Miriamlooked at her for a moment; and felt rebuked, but went and sat by thefire. 

"I don't mind doing anything for her, " she said to herself, "although, she is no particular friend of mine, and not a person whom it is apleasure to assist; but I really don't know whether, in justice tomyself and Andrew, I ought to remain, seeing how seldom we get a chanceof enjoying ourselves, and how important a change is for both of us. "

There is no person whom we can more easily deceive--no, not even thesilliest gull--than ourselves. We are always perfectly willing to denyourselves to any extent, or even to ruin ourselves, but unfortunatelyit does not seem right we should do so. It is not selfishness, but amoral obligation which intervenes. 

The man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among thieveswas left half-dead. The priest and the Levite, who came and looked andpassed by on the other side, assuredly convinced themselves that mostlikely the swooning wretch was not alive. They were on most importantprofessional errands. _Ought_ they to run the risk of entirelyupsetting those solemn, engagements by incurring the Levitical penaltyof contact with a corpse? There was but a mere chance that they coulddo any good. This person was entirely unknown to them; his life mightnot be worth saving, for he might be a rascal; and, on the other hand, there were sacred duties--duties to their God. What priest or Levite, with proper religious instincts, could possibly hesitate?

Was the Miriam who chafed at her disappointment, and inventedcasuistical arguments to excuse herself, the same Miriam who walkedover to see Mortimer, Wake, and Collins on behalf of Mr. Cutts?Precisely the same. 

The doctor kept his engagement, and in an hour returned with a nurse. When Miriam saw she was relieved, she became compassionate. 

"I am so grieved, " she said to the doctor, "to see Miss Tippit so ill. Is there really _nothing_ I can do for her?"

"Nothing, madam. "

Miriam, so grieved, rushed downstairs wild with excitement and delight, laid hold of Andrew, half asleep, twitched him merrily out of thechair, and they were off. In a few minutes they were at the hall, andfound that they were in ample time to hear Mr. Montgomery's first song. 

He had taken particular care not to include anything offensive or evenbroad, so that one of his audience who eat below Miriam and Andrewexclaimed in their hearing that it was "a d----d pious night, " andwondered "what Mont's little game was. "

One of Mr. Montgomery's most telling serious songs was sung in thecostume of a sailor. There was a description of his wanderings overthe "salt, salt sea, " which rhymed with something "free, " as it alwaysdoes, and there was a slightly veiled account of his exploits amongstthe damsels of different countries, always harmless, so at least ranthe version for the night, and yet he swore when he returned that

 "My lovely Poll at Portsmouth, When in my arms I caught her, Was worth a hundred foreign gals On the t'other side the water"--

a sentiment which was tumultuously applauded, although few of the menpresent had travelled, and those who were married were probably not sorapturously in love with their own domestic Polls. 

Andrew was not quite comfortable, but Miriam applauded with the rest. 

"How cleverly, " she said, "he manages, although he is a gentleman, bornand bred, to adapt himself to the people beneath him. It is a pity, though, that he hasn't a better sphere for his talents. "

When they came out, Mr. Montgomery accompanied them home; and as it wasnight, and the streets were crowded with rather rough and disorderlypersons, he offered Miriam his arm, Andrew walking on the other side ofher. 

"I was half ashamed, Miss Tacchi, that you should see me go throughsuch a performance. "

"There was nothing objectionable in it; and for that matter, we allhave to do what we do not quite like. I am sure it was very good ofyou to let us come, and I enjoyed myself very much. By the way, whenyou sing any of the songs, which are not comic, do you feel them? Ioften wonder if a professional gentleman who can produce such an effecton others, produces anything like the same effect on himself. "

"It depends upon the mood. Do you know now that when I was singingto-night that stupid thing about the sailor and his Portsmouth Poll, itall at once came to my mind that no Portsmouth Poll would ever wait forme. Did you ever hear anything so ridiculously absurd--such a bit ofmaudlin nonsense. I laughed at myself afterwards. It gave me a good, idea, though. I'll compose a burlesque, and the refrain shall be, weeping--

 "No Po-o-ortsmouth Poll is a-waiting for me. "

"I don't think it was absurd, " said Miriam gravely. 

"You don't?" he replied, in a suddenly changed tone. 

"No. "

"The path is rather narrow here; you had better come a little closer. "He took her hand, and pulled her arm a little further through his own. Was it fancy or not? He thought he detected that the pressure on hisarm was increased. When they reached Nelson Square they had supper, and after supper Andrew and Montgomery, according to custom, enjoyedthemselves over the tobacco and whisky. Miriam knew well enough, longbefore they separated, that it was time for Andrew at least to go tobed, but she was unwilling to break up the party. At last, when it waspast one, Mr. Montgomery rose. Andrew had had more whisky than wasgood for him, and Miriam went with their guest to the door. He had astrong head, and could drink a good deal of liquor without confusingit, but liquor altered him nevertheless. To-night it made him moreserious, and yet, strangely enough, strengthened the evil tendency inhim to cross his seriousness with instantaneous levity. He was muchgiven to mocking his own emotions, not only to others, but to himself. When the door opened, he looked out into the night, and if there hadbeen a lamp there Miriam would have seen that for a moment his face wasvery sad, but he at once recovered, or seemed to recover. 

"Ah, well, I must be off. It is dark, it is late, and it rains, andalas

 "No Po-o-ortsmouth Poll is a-waiting for me. "

Miriam was silent. She pitied him profoundly, and thought it wasnothing but pity. 

"Good-bye, Miss Tacchi. "

He took her hand in his, held it a little longer than was necessary foran ordinary farewell, then raised it to his lips and kissed it. Shedid not at once release him. "Good-bye, " she said. He had moved alittle farther from her, and was descending the step, but the handsstill held. One more "good-bye, " and they slowly parted their grasp, as things part under a strain which are not in simple contact, butintermingle their fibres. 

Mr. Montgomery in a quarter of an hour was at home, and in anotherquarter of an hour was asleep. Miriam, on the contrary, lay awake tilldaylight, with her brain on fire, and when she woke it was nineo'clock. Coming downstairs as soon as she was dressed, she was greatlysurprised to find that Andrew was still in bed. She was much alarmed, went to his room, and roused him. He complained of headache andsickness, and wished to remain at home for the day, but Miriam wouldnot listen to it--rather unwisely, for it would have been better if hehad not appeared before Mr. Dabb that morning. Mr. Dabb had in factbeen much provoked of late by small irregularities in Andrew'sattendance, and had at last made up his mind that on the next occasionhe would tell him, notwithstanding their relationship, that hisservices were no longer required. 

"Nice time to show yourself, Mr. Andrew, " observed Mr. Dabb, pullingout his watch. 

"I was not well. "

"I've got a word or two to say to you. Perhaps we'd better go into theparlour. "

Thither Mr. Dabb went, and Andrew followed him. 

"Look you here, Mr. Andrew, I know perfectly well what is the matterwith you. You don't think that I haven't got a nose, do you? You aremy nephew, but just for that very reason you shan't be with me. I'mnot agoing to have it said that I've got a relative in my business whodrinks. I won't turn you out into the street, as I might have done, with nothing but what was due to you. There's two months' pay, and nowwe're quits. You take my advice, and let this be a lesson to you, oryou'll go from bad to worse. "

Mr. Dabb produced the money, and handed it to Andrew. He wasconfounded, and almost dumb with terror. At last he found words, andimplored his uncle to forgive him. 

"Forgive you? Yes, I forgive you, if that will do you any good; butbusiness is business, and what I've settled to do that I do. Now, then, you'd better go; I can't stand here any longer. I don't bear anyill-will to you, but it's of no use your talking. "

He opened the door, and in another minute Andrew was in the street. 

Miriam heard his story. She had anticipated it, and for the moment shesaid nothing. Her first care was to prevent her uncle or aunt fromcommunicating with Cowfold. She foresaw that her father, if he knewher brother's disgrace, might possibly stop the allowance. She at onceput on her bonnet and called at the shop. She made no appeal forreconsideration of the sentence--all she asked was that there should besilence. To this Uncle Dabb assented willingly, for Miriam was half afavourite with him, and he even went so far as somewhat to apologisefor what he had done. 

"But you know, " said he, "this is a shop. As I have told him over andover again, business is business. I couldn't help it, and it's just aswell as he should have a sharpish lesson at first--nothing like thatfor curing a man. "

Mr. Dabb unfortunately did not know how much it takes to cure a man ofanything. 

Miriam felt it would be graceless not to see her aunt, although she hadno particular desire for an interview just then. 

"My dear Miriam, " began that lady, without waiting for a word, "I doregret so what has happened. I am so sorry I could not prevent it, butI never interfere in your uncle's commercial transactions, andreciprocally he never intrudes into my sphere. It is mostunfortunate--what do you think we can do to arrest this propensity inyour brother?"

Miriam was silent. 

"It is astonishing how much may be done by cultivating the fineremotions. Your brother has always seemed to me not sufficientlysusceptible. Supposing I were to lend you a book of my favouritepoetry, and you were to read to him, and endeavour to excite aninterest in him for higher and better things--who knows?"

Miriam had no special professional acquaintance with the theory ofsalvation, but she instinctively felt that a love of drink was not tobe put down by the "Keepsake" in red silk. 

She was still silent. At last she said--"I am much obliged to you, aunt; I will take anything you may like to lend. You have a good dealof influence, doubtless, over uncle. If you can persuade him to saywhat he can in case application is made to him for a character, I shallthink it very kind of you. "

"My dear Miriam, I have no influence over your uncle. His is not anature upon which I can exert myself. I think some pieces in thiswould be suitable;" and Mrs. Dabb offered Miriam a volume of Mrs. Hemans' works. 

Miriam took it, and bade her aunt good-bye. 

She was now face to face with a great trouble, and she had to encounterit alone, and with no weapons and with no armour save those whichNature provides. She was not specially an exile from civilisation;churches and philosophers had striven and demonstrated for thousands ofyears, and yet she was no better protected than if Socrates, Epictetus, and all ecclesiastical establishments from the time of Moses had neverexisted. 

She did not lecture her brother, for she had no materials for a sermon. She called him a fool when she came home; and having said this, she hadnothing more to say, except to ask him bitterly what he meant to do. What could he do?--a poor, helpless, weak creature, half a stranger inLondon; and without expostulating with her for her roughness with him, he sat still and cried. It was useless to think of obtaining asituation like the one he had lost. He could prove no experience, hedared not refer to his uncle, and consequently there was nothing beforehim but a return to clockmaking, or rather clock repairing. Hereagain, however, he was foiled, for his apprenticeship was barelyconcluded, and he had never taken to the business with sufficientseriousness to become proficient. After one or two inquiries, therefore, he found that in this department also he was useless. 

The affection of Miriam for her brother, never very strong, was notincreased by his ill-luck. She began, in fact, to dislike him becausehe was unfortunate. She imagined that her dislike was due to hisfaults, and every now and then she abused him for them; but his faultswould have been forgotten if he had been prosperous. She hated misery, and not only misery in the abstract, but miserable weak creatures. Shewas ready enough, as we have seen, to right a wrong, especially if thewrong was championed by those whom she despised; but for simpleinfirmity, at least in human beings, she had no more mercy than thewild animals which destroy any one of their tribe whom they finddisabled. There was more than a chance, too, that Andrew wouldinterfere with her own happiness. If he could not get anything to do, they must leave London, for living on the allowance from Cowfold wasimpossible. Reproof, when it is mixed with personal hostility, although the person reproving and the person reproved may beunconscious of it, is never persuasive; and as a tendency to whisky andwater requires a very powerful antidote, it is not surprising thatAndrew grew rather worse than better. 

One evening Montgomery called. He had come to ask them both to thehall. He was in a very quiet, rational humour, for he had not as yethad his threepennyworth. Andrew had been out all day, had come homenone the better for his excursion, and had gone to bed. 

"Your brother not at home?"

"Yes; but he is not very well, and is upstairs. "

"I've brought you a couple of tickets for next week. I hope you willbe able to go; that is to say, if you were not disgusted when you werelast there. "

"Disgusted! I am afraid, Mr. Montgomery, you have a very poor opinionof my 'gusts' and disgusts. "

It was unfortunate for Miriam that she had no work before her, such assewing or knitting. She abominated it; but in conversation, especiallybetween a man and a woman who find themselves alone, it is useful. Itnot only relieves awkwardness, but it prevents too much edge anddirectness during the interview. 

"Well, you might reasonably have been offended with both the songs andthe company. "

"Neither. As to the company, I did not see much of it, thanks to yourkindness in getting us such a good place; and as to the songs, to saynothing of the way in which they were sung, there was astraight-forwardness about them that I liked. 

"I don't quite know what you mean. "

"Well, " said Miriam, with a little laugh, which was not exactly thelight effervescence of gaiety, "your people, if they love one another, say so outright, without any roundaboutness. "

Mr. Montgomery was puzzled. He did not quite know what to make out ofthis girl. There was something in her way of speaking and in herfrankness which offered itself to him, and yet again there wassomething which stopped him from attempting any liberties. She did notclassify herself in any of the species with which he was familiar. 

At last he said--"You object, then, to all roundaboutness in suchmatters. "

"Well, yes; but perhaps I might be misunderstood. I should like peopleto be plain both ways, about their dislikes as well as their likes. "

"Good gracious me, Miss Tacchi, what a pretty world you would live in. There would be no fun in it. Half the amusement of life consists intrying to find out what we really think of one another underneath allour fine speeches. "

"I would rather amuse myself in some other way. I have often dreamt ofan island in which everybody should say exactly what was in his mind. Of course it would be very shocking, but I do really believe that inthe end we should be happier. It would be delightful to me if mycousins were to tell me, 'We hate you--you are dirty, disagreeable, andugly; and we do not intend to call upon you any more. ' For mind, people would then believe in expressions of affection. They do notbelieve in them now. "

"Yes; your island would be all very well for attractive young women, but what would it be for poor devils such as I am. I _know_ thatnobody can care twopence for me, but the illusion of politeness ispleasant. It is a wonderful thing how we enjoy being cheated, thoughwe know we are cheated. A man will give a cabman sixpence more thanhis fare for the humbug of a compliment, and I confess that if peoplewere to say to my face what I am certain they say behind my back, Ishould hang myself. Illusion, delusion--delusion, illusion, " he hummedit as if it were the refrain of a ballad; "it is nothing but that fromthe day we are born till the day we die, and the older we become themore preposterously are we deluded, until at last--but the Lord--tothink of preaching, " and he laughed--"you must have made me do it;" andhe rose and played with his favourite toys, the wax apples, pitchingthem up to the ceiling alternately and catching them in one hand. "Imust be off. "

Miriam did not appear to take any notice, "Pray, " said he, "if you lived in this island of which you dream, wouldyou tell me you hated me? I am beginning to be rather nervous. "

"We are not living in it just yet. "

"But in one just as disagreeable, for it is pouring with rain. "

Miriam gave a sudden start. She unconsciously looked that theconversation would prolong itself in the same interior strain. Reference to the outside world was impossible to her just then, andthat Mr. Montgomery was capable of it was a shock like that of coldwater. She came to herself, and went to the window. 

"Must you go out in this storm?"

"Must; and what is more, I haven't got a minute to spare. I may takeit for granted, then, you and Andrew will come. "

"Yes, certainly. "

He hastily put on his coat; shook hands--nothing more--and was off. 

Miriam ran upstairs into her bedroom, went to the little box in whichshe kept her treasures, unlocked it, took out the little note--the onlynote she had ever had from him--read it again and again, and then toreit into twenty pieces, each one of which she picked up and tried to puttogether. She then threw herself on the bed, and for the first time inher life was overcome with hysterical tears. She dared not confess toherself what she wanted. She would have liked to cast herself at hisfeet; but notwithstanding her disbelief in form and ceremony, she couldnot do it. She cursed the check which had held her so straitly whileshe was talking with him, and cursed him that he dealt with her solightly. The continued sobbing at last took the heat out of her, andshe rose from her bed, collected the pieces of the note, wentdownstairs, and put them one by one deliberately in the fire. 

It was time now that they should seriously consider how they stood. Andrew had nothing to do, and the wages paid him in advance were nearlyexhausted. They decided that they would move into cheaper lodgings. They had some difficulty in finding any that were decent but theyobtained three miserable rooms at the top of a house occupied by a manwho sold firewood and potatoes in one of the streets running out of theBlackfriars Road. They left Miss Tippit without bidding her good-bye, for she was still unwell, and in bed. They actually began to know whatpoverty was, but Miriam as yet did not feel its approach. There werethoughts and hopes in her which protected her against all apprehensionof the future, although the cloud into which they must almostinevitably enter was so immediately in front of her. 

The evening came on which she and Andrew were to go to the hall, butAndrew had gone out early to look for some employment, and had notreturned. Miriam's hatred rose again, and again assumed an outwardgarb of the purest virtue. She sat for some time in rapid debate withherself as to what she dare do. Even she recoiled a little from goingto a music hall without her brother, but passion prevailed. She didnot simply determine to go knowing it to be wrong, but with greatearnestness demonstrated to herself that she was right; and then, as akind of sop to any lingering suspicions, left a note on the mantelpiecefor Andrew, upbraiding him for delay, and directing him to follow. NoAndrew appeared. She now began to feel how strange her position was. She might easily before she started have conjectured that Andrew mightfail, and might have pictured to herself how difficult and awkward itwould be to sit there throughout the evening alone and return alone;but she did not possess the faculty of picturing uncertainties anydistance ahead, although the present was generally so vivid. She couldnever say to herself: "Probably this arrangement now proposed willbreak down, and if it does; I shall stand in such and such a situation;what, in that situation, ought I to do?" She had, in fact, nostrategical faculty--certainly none when temptation was strong. Shedreaded turning out into the street with the rough crowd, and shewondered if Montgomery would come to her assistance. The audiencegradually departed; she was nearly the last, and she determined thatshe would walk round to the door by which she knew Montgomery usuallyleft, and try to encounter him casually. She paced up and down a fewmoments, and he met her. He was much surprised, and she, with someexcitement, explained to him that she had left home a little beforeAndrew, expecting him to overtake her, but that she had seen nothing ofhim. 

"Of course you will let me accompany you to your lodgings?"

"Thank you; it is very kind of you. "

She took the arm he offered her. She thought she detected he was alittle unsteady, and after a word or two he became silent. 

She was not particularly well acquainted with the district round thehall, but she soon perceived that they were not on the straight roadfor her house. 

"Is this our nearest way?" she asked. 

"No, I can't say it is; but I thought you would not object to just aturn round. It's a lovely night--a lovely night!"

Presently they came into a very shabby street, and he stopped. Thecold air had begun to upset him a little. 

"These are my quarters, " he stammered. "I'm rather tired, and I shouldthink you must be tired too. Just come in for a moment and havesomething, and then we will go on. "

"Oh no, thank you, " said Miriam, who was becoming alarmed. "I must goback at once. "

"Won't you come? Do come; just a moment. "

But Miriam steadfastly refused. 

"Nonsense, come in just for a second till I----" and he used somelittle force to compel her. She looked round, and without any mentalprocess of which she was conscious determining her to action, instantlyslipped from him, and ran with furious haste. She inquired her way ofa policeman, but otherwise she saw nothing, thought nothing, and heardnothing till she was at her own door. She opened it softly--it waslate; she went into their little parlour, and there lay Andrew on thefloor. He had fallen against the fender, his head was cut open, and hewas senseless. A half empty whisky bottle told the rest of the story. There was nobody stirring--her landlord and landlady were strangers; ifshe called them, and they saw what was the matter, she might havesummary notice to quit. What was she to do? She took some cold water, washed his face, unfastened his neckcloth, and sat down. She imaginedit was nothing but intoxication, and that in a few hours at most hewould recover. So she remained through the dreadful night hearingevery quarter strike, hearing chance noises in the general quietude, adrunken man, a belated cart, and worse than anything, the slowawakening between four and five, the whistle of some early workman whohas to light the engine fire or get the factory ready for starting atsix--sounds which remind the sleepless watcher that happiness afterrest is abroad. 

She hid the whisky bottle and glass; and as her brother showed no signsof recovery, she went to seek advice and help as soon as she heardsomebody stirring. The woman of the house, not a bad kind of woman, although Miriam had feared her so much, came upstairs instantly. Andrew was lifted on the bed, and a messenger was despatched for thedoctor. Miriam recognised him at once: he was the doctor who had askedher to stay with Miss Tippit. He said there was concussion of thebrain--that the patient must be kept quiet, and watched night and day. To her surprise, her landlady instantly offered to share the duty withher. A rude, stout, hard person she was, who stood in the shop all daylong, winter and summer, amidst the potatoes and firewood, with awoollen shawl round her neck and over her shoulders. A rude, stout, hard person, we say, was Mrs. Joll, fond of her beer, rather grimy, given to quarrel a little with her husband, could use strong languageat times, had the defects which might be supposed to arise fromconstant traffic with the inhabitants of the Borough, and was utterlyunintelligent so far as book learning went. Nevertheless she was wellread in departments more important perhaps than books in the conduct ofhuman life, and in her there was the one thing needful--the one thingwhich, if ever there is to be a Judgment Day, will put her on the righthand; when all sorts of scientific people, religious people, studentsof poetry, people with exquisite emotions, will go on the left and bedamned everlastingly. Miriam was at once sent to bed, and it wasarranged that she should take charge during the following night. Afterwards the night duty was to fall equally between them. She was soshut up in herself that she did not recognise the full value of Mrs. Joll's self-sacrifice, but she did manage to express her thanks, andask how Mrs. Joll could leave the business. 

"That's nothing to you, Miss; my gal Maud has a head on her shoulders, and can keep an eye on the place downstairs. Besides, I've allus foundthat at a pinch things will bear a lot of squeezing. I remember whenmy good man were laid up with the low fever for six weeks, and I had ababy a month old, I thought to myself as I should be beaten; but Lord, I was young then, and didn't know how much squeezing things will take, and I just squeezed through somehow. "

"He ain't very strong, is he?" continued Mrs. Joll. "I don't mean inhis constitution, but here, " and she tapped her head. "Likes a drop ortwo now and then?"

Miriam was silent. 

"Ah! well, as I said about Joll's brother when I was a-nussing ofhim--he was rather a bad lot--it's nothing to me when people are illwhat they are. Besides; there ain't so much difference 'twixt any ofus. "

The night came. Miriam rose and went down to her brother's room. Shetried to read, but she could not, and her thoughts were incessantlyoccupied with her own troubles. Andrew lay stretched before her--hemight be dying for aught she knew; and yet the prospect of his deathdisturbed her only so far as it interfered with herself. Montgomerywas for ever in her mind. What was he that he should set the soul ofthis girl alight! He was nothing, but she was something, and he had bysome curious and altogether unaccountable quality managed to wake herslumbering forces. 

She was in love with him, but it was not desire alone which had tiredher, and made her pace up and down Andrew's sick chamber. Thousands ofmen with the blackest hair, the most piercing eyes, might have passedbefore her, and she would have remained unmoved. Neither was it loveas some select souls understand it. She did not know what it was whichstirred her; she was hungry, mad, she could not tell why. Nobody couldhave predicted beforehand that Montgomery was the man to act upon thisgirl so miraculously--nobody could tell, seeing the two together, whatit was in him which specially excited her--nobody who has made men andwomen, his study would have wasted much time in the inquiry, knowingthat the affinities, attractions, and repulsions of men and women arebeyond all our science. 

Brutally selfish is love, although so heroically self-sacrificing. Miriam thought that if Andrew had not been such an idiot, therelationship with Montgomery might have remained undisturbed. He mightstill have continued to call, but how could she see him now? Thesufferer lay there unconscious, pleading for pity, as everythinglifeless or unconscious seems to plead--no dead dog in a kennel failsto be tragic; but Miriam actually hated her brother, and cursed him inher heart as a stone over which she had stumbled in the pursuit; ofsomething madly coveted but flying before her. 

It was midnight. She went to the window and looked out. Thepublic-houses were being closed, and intoxicated or half-intoxicatedpersons were groping their way homewards. Suddenly she caught sight ofone man whom she thought she recognised. He was with a woman, and hisarm was round her waist. Softly she opened the window, and as it wasonly one story high, she caught a full view of him as he came under thegaslight. It was Montgomery beyond a doubt. He reeled just a trifle, and slowly disappeared in the gloom. The moment he had passed she wasnot quite sure it was he. She went downstairs in the dark, havingtaken off her shoes to prevent any noise. She put on her shoes again, drew back the bolts softly, left the door upon the latch, and crept outinto the street. Swiftly she walked, and in a few moments she waswithin half-a-dozen yards of those whom she followed. She could nothelp being sure now. She continued on their track, her whole existenceabsorbed in one single burning point, until she saw the pair disappearinto a house which she did not know. She stood stock still, till apoliceman was close upon her, and roused her from her reverie; and thenhardly knowing what she was doing, she went home, and returned to herroom. Every interest which she had in life had been allowed to dieunder the shadow of this one. Every thought had taken onedirection--everything had been bitter or sweet by reference to oneobject alone; and this gone, there followed utter collapse. She had nofriends, and probably if she had known any they would have been oflittle use to her, for hers was a nature requiring comfort of astronger kind than that which most friends can supply. It wasunfortunate, and yet she was spared that aggravation of torture whichis inflicted by people who offer vague commonplaces, or what they call"hopes;" she was spared also that savage disappointment to which manyare doomed who in their trouble find that all philosophy fails them, and the books on their shelves look so impotent, so beside the mark, that they narrowly escape being pitched into the fire. 

Andrew began to recover slowly, but he could do no work, and Miriam hadto think about some employment for herself in order to prevent deeperimmersion in debt. It was very difficult to find anything for a girlwho had been brought up to no trade; but at last, through the kindnessof her landlady, she obtained second-hand an introduction to themanager of an immense drapery firm which did a large business throughcirculars sent all over the country. Miriam was employed in addressingthe circulars. It was work which she could do at home, and by writingincessantly for about seven hours a day she could earn twelve shillingsa week. The occupation was detestable, and it was with the greatestdifficulty that she could persevere with it; but after some time itceased to be quite so repulsive. 

Her relief, however, was the relief of stupefaction and not ofreconciliation. Sorrow took the form of revolt. It had always been sowith her whenever anything was the matter with her: it was the sense ofwrong which made it so intolerable. What had she done, she said toherself a hundred times a day, that she should have been betrayed intowretched poverty, that she should have been deserted, and that herfortunes should have been linked with those of an imbecile brother. 

Andrew was still very weak--he could hardly speak; and as he lay thereimpassive, Miriam's hatred of his silent white face increased. She hadtoo much self-control to express herself; but at times she was almoston the point of breaking out, of storming at him, and asking himwhether he had no pity for her. One night, as she sat brooding at thewindow, and her trouble seemed almost too much for her, and she thoughtshe must give way under it, a barrel organ stopped and began playing amelody from an opera by Verdi. The lovely air wound its way intoMiriam's heart; but it did not console her. It only increased herself-sympathy. She listened till she could listen no longer, andputting her hands over her ears she rested her head upon the table, andwas overcome with unconquerable emotion. Poor Andrew stared at her, utterly incapable of comprehending the scene. When she had recovered, he quietly asked her what was the matter. 

"Matter!" she cried. "I don't believe you understand or care any morethan the bedstead on which you lie, " and she rose and flung herself outof the house. In those days there was, perhaps there is now, apath--it could not be called a road--from the southern end of LondonBridge to Bankside. It went past St. Saviour's Church, and thentrending towards the river, dived, scarcely four feet wide, underneathsome mill or mill offices, skirting a little dock which, ran up betweenthe mill walls. Barges sometimes lay moored in this dock, anddischarged into the warehouses which towered above it. The path thenemerged into a dark trench between lofty buildings connected overheadwith bridges, and finally appeared in Bankside amidst heaps of old ironand broken glass, the two principal articles of merchandise in thoseparts. A dismal, most depressing region, one on which the sun nevershone, gloomy on the brightest day. It was impossible to enter itwithout feeling an instantaneous check to all lightness of heart. Thespirits were smitten as if with paralysis directly St. Saviour's waspassed. Thither went Miriam aimlessly that night; and when she reachedthe dock, the temptation presented itself to her with fearful force tothrow herself in it and be at rest. Usually in our troubles there is aprospect of an untried resource which may afford relief, or a glimmerof a distance which we may possibly reach, and where we may find peace, but for Miriam there was no distance, no reserve: this was her firstacquaintance with an experience not rare, alas! but below it humanitycannot go, when all life ebbs from us, when we stretch out our arms invain, when there is no God--nothing but a brazen Moloch, worse than theSatan of theology ten thousand times, because it is dead. A Satan wemight conquer, or at least we should feel the delight of combat inresisting him; but what can we do against this leaden "order of things"which makes our nerves ministers of madness? Miriam did not know thather misery was partly a London misery, due to the change from fresh airand wholesome living to foul air and unnatural living. If she hadknown it, it would not have helped her. She could not have believedit, for it is the peculiarity of certain physical disorders that theirphysical character does not appear, and that they disguise themselvesunder purely mental shapes. Montgomery, her brother, the desperateoutlook in the future, it is true, were real; but her lack of healthwas the lens which magnified her suffering into hideous dimensions. The desire to get rid of it by one sudden plunge was strong upon her, and the friendly hand which at the nick of time intervenes in romancesdid not rescue her. Nevertheless, she held back and passed on. Afterwards the thought that she had been close to suicide was formonths a new terror. She was unaware that the distance between us anddreadful crimes is much greater often than it appears to be. The manwho looks on a woman with adulterous desire has already committedadultery in his heart if he be restrained only by force or fear ofdetection; but if the restraint, although he may not be conscious ofit, is self-imposed, he is not guilty. Nay, even the dread ofconsequences is a motive of sufficient respectability to make a largedifference between the sinfulness of mere lust and that of itsfulfilment. No friendly hand, we say, interrupted her purpose, but shewent on her way. Hardly had she reached the open quay, when there camea peal of thunder. In London the gradual approach of a thunderstormworking up from a long distance is not perceived, and the suddenness ofthe roar for a moment startled her. But from her childhood she hadalways shown a strange liking to watch a thunderstorm, and, ifpossible, to be in it. It was her habit, when others were alarmed andcovered their eyes, to go close to the window in order to see thelightning, and once she had been caught actually outside the doorpeering round the corner, because the strength of the tempest lay inthat direction. The rain in an instant came down in torrents, theflashes were incessant, and flamed round the golden cross of St. Paul'snearly opposite to her. She took off her bonnet and prayed that shemight be struck, and so released with no sin and no pain. She was notheard; a bolt descended within a few feet of her, blinding her, but itfell upon a crane, passed harmlessly down the chain into a lot of rustyold scrap, and so spent itself. She remained standing there alone andunnoticed, for the street was swept clear as if by grapeshot of thevery few persons who might otherwise have been in it at that hour. Gradually the tumult ceased, and was succeeded by a steady, dulldownpour; Miriam then put on her bonnet and walked home. 

The next day she was ill, unaccountably feverish and in great pain. Hers was one of those natures--happy natures, it may perhaps besaid--which hasten always to a crisis. She had nothing of thatmiserable temperament which is never either better or worse, andremains clouded with slow disease for months or years. She managed todo her work, but on the following morning she was delirious. Sheremembered nothing more till one afternoon when she seemed to wake. She looked up, and whose face was that which bent over her? It wasMiss Tippit's. Miss Tippit had learned through the doctor what was thestate of affairs, and had managed, notwithstanding the demand which thelodgings made upon her, to take her share in watching over thesufferer. Her stepmother had been summoned from Cowfold, and thesetwo, with the landlady, had tended her and had brought her back tolife. In an instant the scene in Miss Tippit's room when she was sickpassed through Miriam's brain, and she sobbed piteously, lifted up herarms as if to clasp her heroic benefactor, but the thought was toogreat for her, and she fainted. Nevertheless she was recovering, andwhen she came to herself again, Miss Tippit was ready with theintervention of some trifle to distract her attention. As her strengthreturned she was able to talk a little, and her first question was--

"Miss Tippit, why did you come here? Oh, if you but knew! What claimhave I on you?"

"Hush, my dear; those days are past. You did not love me then perhaps;but what of that? I am sure, you will not mind my saying it: 'If yelove them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even thepublicans the same?' But I know you did love me really. "

"Where is Andrew?"

"Quite well, at home in Cowfold. "

That was as much as Miriam could stand then. For weeks to come she waswell-nigh drained of all vitality, and it flowed into her gradually andwith many relapses. The doctor thought she ought to be moved into thecountry. Mrs. Tacchi had some friends in one of the villages lying bythe side of the Avon in Wiltshire, just where that part of SalisburyPlain on which stands Stonehenge slopes down to the river. Miriam knewnothing of the history of the Amesbury valley, but she was sensible--aswho must not be?--to its exquisite beauty and the delicacy of thecontrasts between the downs and the richly-foliaged fields throughwhich the Avon winds. It is a chalk river, clear as a chalk riveralways is if unpolluted; the downs are chalk, and though they arewide-sweeping and treeless, save for clusters of beech here and thereon the heights, the dale with its water, meadows, cattle, and densewoods, so different from the uplands above them, is in peculiar andlovely harmony with them. 

One day she contrived to reach Stonehenge. She was driven there by thefarmer with whom she was staying, and she asked to be left there whilehe went forward. He was to fetch her when he returned. It was a clearbut grey day, and she sat outside the outer circle on the turf lookingnorthwards over the almost illimitable expanse. She had been told asmuch as is known about that mysterious monument, --that it had beenbuilt ages before any record, and that not only were the names of thebuilders forgotten, but their purpose in building it was forgotten too. She was oppressed with a sense of her own, nothingness and thenothingness of man. If those who raised that temple had so utterlypassed away, for how long would the memory of her existence last?Stonehenge itself too would pass. The wind and the rain had alreadyworn perhaps half of it; and the place that now knows it will know itno more save by vague tradition, which also will be extinguished. 

Suddenly, and without any apparent connection with what had gonebefore, and indeed in contrast with it, it came into Miriam's mind thatshe must do something for her fellow-creatures. How came it there?Who can tell? Anyhow, there was this idea in the soul of Miriam Tacchithat morning. 

The next question was, What could she do? There was one thing shecould do, and she could not go astray in doing it. Whatever may bewrong or mistaken, it cannot be wrong or a mistake to wait upon thesick and ease their misery. She knew, however, that she could not takeup the task without training, and she belonged to no church orassociation which could assist her. Perhaps one of the bestrecommendations of the Catholic Church was that it held out a hand tomen who, having for some reason or other, learned to hold their liveslightly, were candidates for the service of humanity--men for whomdeath had no terrors--by whom it was even courted, and who were willingtherefore to wait upon the plague-smitten, or to carry the Crossamongst wild and savage tribes. Those who are skilled in quibbling maysay that neither in the case of the Catholic missionary nor in that ofthe Sister of Mercy is there any particular merit. What they do isdone not from any pure desire for man's welfare, but because there isno healthy passion for enjoyment. Nothing is idler than disputes aboutthe motives to virtuous deeds, or the proportion of praise to beassigned to the doers of them. It is a common criticism that a sweettemper deserves no commendation, because the blessed possessor of it isnaturally sweet-tempered, and undergoes no terrible struggle in orderto say the sweet word which he who is cursed with spite only justmanages to force himself to utter. What we are bound to praise orblame, however, is the result, and the result only--just as we praiseor blame perfect or imperfect flowers. If it comes to a remorselessprobing of motives, there are none of us who can escape a charge ofselfishness; and, in fact, a perfectly _abstract_ disinterestedness isa mere logical and impossible figment. 

To revert to what was said a moment ago, it may be urged that nosufficient cause is shown for Miriam's determination. What had sheundergone? A little poverty, a little love affair, a little sickness. But what brought Paul to the disciples at Damascus? A light in the skyand a vision. What intensity of light, what brilliancy of vision, would be sufficient to change the belief and the character of a modernman of the world or a professional politician? Paul had that in himwhich could be altered by the pathetic words of the Crucified One, "Iam He whom thou persecutest. " The man of the world or the politicianwould evade an appeal from the heaven of heavens, backed by the gloryof seraphim and archangel. Miriam had a vitality, a susceptibility orfluidity of character--call it what you will--which did not need greatprovocation. There are some mortals on this earth to whom nothing morethan a certain, summer morning very early, or a certain chance idea ina lane ages ago, or a certain glance from a fellow-creature dead foryears, has been the Incarnation, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection, orthe Descent of the Holy Ghost. 

A man now old and nearing his end is known to Miriam's biographer, whoone Sunday November afternoon, when he was but twenty years old, met awoman in a London street and looked in her face. Neither he nor shestopped for an instant; he looked in her face, passed on, and never sawher again. He married, had children, who now have children, but thatwoman's face has never left him, and the colours of the portrait whichhangs in his soul's oratory are as vivid as ever. A thousand times hashe appealed to it; a thousand times has it sat in judgment; and athousand times has its sacred beauty redeemed him. 

Miriam wrote to Miss Tippit expressing her newly-formed wish. MissTippit, with some doubts as to her friend's fitness for the duty, promised to do what she could; and at last, after complete recovery, Miriam was allowed to begin a kind of apprenticeship to the art ofnursing in a small hospital, recommended by Miss Tippit's friend, thedoctor. One morning, a bright day in June, she was taken there. Whenthe door opened, there was disclosed a long white room with beds oneither side, and a broad passage down the middle. The walls wererelieved by a few illuminated sentences, scriptural and secular; womendressed in a blue uniform were moving about noiselessly, and one of thephysicians on the staff, with some students or assistants, was standingbeside a patient happily unconscious, and demonstrating that he couldnot live. Round one of the beds a screen was drawn; Miriam did notquite know what it meant, but she guessed and shuddered. She passed onto a little room at the end, and here she was introduced to her newmistress, the lady-superintendent. She was a small, well-formed womanof about thirty, with a pale thin face, lightish brown hair, grey eyes, and thinnish lips. She also was dressed in uniform, but with aprecision and grace which showed that though the material might be thesame as that used by her underlings, it was made up at the West End. She was evidently born to command, as little women often are. It wasimpossible to be five minutes in her company without being affected byher domination. Her very clothes felt it, for not a rebellious wrinkleor crease dared to show itself. The nurses came to her almost everymoment for directions, which were given with brevity and clearness, andobeyed with the utmost deference. The furniture was like that of ayacht, very compact, scrupulously clean, and very handy. There was acomplete apparatus for instantaneously making tea, a luxurious littlearmchair specially made for its owner, a minute writing-case, and, fordecorations, there were dainty and delicate water-colours. Half-a-dozen books lay about, a novel or two of the best kind, and twoor three volumes of poems. 

"You wish to become a nurse?" said Miss Dashwood. 

"Yes. "

"I am afraid you hardly know what it is, and that when you do know youwill find it very disagreeable. So many young women come here withentirely false notions as to their duties. "

Miriam was silent; Miss Dashwood's manner depressed her. 

"However, you can try. You will have to begin at the very bottom. Ialways insist on this with my probationers. It teaches them how thework ought to be done, and, in addition, proper habits ofsubordination. For three months you will have to scrub the floors andassist in keeping the wards in order. "

Miriam had imagined that she would at once be asked to watch overgrateful patients, to give them medicine, and read to them. However, she was determined to go through with her project, and she assented. The next morning saw her in coarse clothes, busy with a pail and soapand water. It was very hard. She was not a Catholic novice; she wasnot penetrated with the great religious idea that, done in the serviceof the Master, all work is alike in dignity; she had, in fact, noreligion whatever, and she was confronted with a trial severe even toan enthusiast received into a nunnery with all the pomp of a gorgeousritual and sustained by the faith of ages. 

Specially troublesome was her new employment to Miriam, because she wasby nature so unmethodical and careless. Perhaps there are no habits sohard to overcome as those of general looseness and want of system. They are often associated with abundance of energy. The corners arenot shirked through fatigue, but there is an unaccountable persistencyin avoiding them, which resolution and preaching are alike unable toconquer. The root of the inconsistency is a desire speedily to achieveresults. To keep this desire in subjection, to shut the eyes toresults, but patiently to remove the dust to the last atom of it lyingin the dark angle, is a good part of self-culture. 

In a hospital Miriam's defect was one of the deadly sins, and many werethe admonitions which she received from Miss Dashwood. One evening, after a day in which they had been more frequent than usual, she wentto bed, but lay awake. She was obliged to confess to herself that thelight of three months ago, which had then shone round her great design, had faded. To conceive such a design is one thing, to go down on theknees and scour floors week after week is something different. 

She did not intend, however, to give up. When she rose in the morningshe looked out over the London tiles and through the smoke with amiserable sinking of heart, hoping, if she hoped for anything, for theend of the day, and still more for the end of life; but still shepersevered, and determined to persevere. 

One day a new case came into the ward. It was evidently serious. Aman returning home late at night, drunk or nearly so, had fallen undera cart in crossing a road and had been terribly crushed. He hadreceived some injury to the head and was unconscious. Miriam, to whomsuch events were now tolerably familiar, took no particular noticeuntil her work brought her near the bed, and then she saw to heramazement and horror that the poor wretch was Montgomery. Instantlyall that had slumbered in her, as fire slumbers in grey ashes, brokeout into flame. She continually crept as well as she could towardshim, and listened for any remark which might be dropped by nurse ordoctor upon his condition. Three days afterwards he died, withouthaving once regained his reason save just one hour before death. Hethen opened his eyes--they fell upon Miriam; he knew her, and with afaint kind of astonishment muttered her name. Before she could comeclose to him he had gone. 

Another month passed, and as Miriam's constitutional failings showed nosign of mitigation, Miss Dashwood found herself obliged to take seriousnotice of them. The experienced, professional superintendent knewperfectly well that the smart, neat, methodical girl, with no motive inher but the desire of succeeding and earning a good living, was worth adozen who were self-sacrificing but not soldierly. One morning, afterMiss Dashwood's patience had been more than usually tried, she sent forMiriam, and kindly but firmly told her that she was unsuitable for ahospital and must prepare to leave. She was not taken by surprise; shehad said the same thing to herself a dozen times before; but when itwas made certain to her by another person, it sounded differently. 

She sought her friend Miss Tippit. To Miss Tippit the experience wasnot new. She had herself in her humble way imagined schemes ofusefulness, which were broken through personal unfitness; she knew howat last the man who thinks he will conquer a continent has to becontent with the conquest of his own kitchen-garden, fifty feet bytwenty. She knew this in her own humble way, although her ambition, sofar from being continental, had never extended even to a parish. She, however, could do Miriam no good. She had learned how to vanquish herown trouble, but she was powerless against the very same trouble inanother person. She had the sense, too, for she was no bigot, to seeher helplessness, and she gave Miriam the best of all advice--to gohome to Cowfold. Alpine air, Italian cities, would perhaps have beenbetter, bat as these were impossible, Cowfold was the next best. Perhaps the worst effect of great cities, at any rate of Englishcities, is not the poverty they create and the misery which it brings, but the mental mischief which is wrought, often unconsciously, by theirdreariness and darkness. In Pimlico or Bethnal Green a man might havea fortune given him, and it would not stir him to so much gratitude asan orange if he were living on the South Downs, and the peculiarsourness of modern democracy is due perhaps to deficiency of oxygen andsunlight. Miriam had no objection to return. She was beaten andindifferent; her father and mother wrote to welcome her, and sherecollected her mother's devotion to her when she was ill. She had notthe heart to travel by the road on which she and Andrew came to London, and she chose a longer route by which she was brought to a point aboutten miles from Cowfold. She found affection and peace, and Andrew, whohad lost his taste for whisky, was quietly at work in his father's shopat his old trade. There was at the same time no vacant space for herin the household. There was nothing particular for her to do, andafter a while, when the novelty of return had worn off, she grew weary, and longed unconsciously for something on which fully to exercise heruseless strength. 

In Cowfold at that time dwelt a basketmaker named Didymus Farrow. Whyhe was called Didymus is a very simple story. 

His mother had once heard a sermon preached by a bishop from the text, "Then said Thomas, which is called Didymus, unto his fellow-disciples, Let us also go, that we may die with Him. " The preacher enlarged onthe blessed privilege offered by our Lord, and observed how happy heshould have been--how happy all his dear brethren in Christ would havebeen, if the same privilege had been extended to them. But, alas! Godhad not so decreed. When the day arrived on which they would see theirMaster in glory, they could then assure Him, and He would believe them, how willingly they would have borne His cross--aye, and even have hungwith Him on the fatal tree. 

Some weeks before Didymus Farrow was born, Mrs. Farrow remembered thebishop and part of his discourse, but what she remembered mostdistinctly was, "Thomas, which is called Didymus. " These words wereborne in upon her, she said, and accordingly the son was baptizedDidymus. When he grew up, he entered upon his father's trade, whichwas that of making the willow hampers for fruit-growers, of whom therewere a good many round Cowfold, and who sent their fruit to London, stacked high on huge broad-wheeled waggons. Didymus also manufacturedhand-baskets, all kinds of willow ware and white wood goods. He had apeculiar aptitude for the lathe, and some of his bread-plates werereally as neatly executed as any that could be seen in London. He hadeven turned in poplar some vases, which found their way to adrawing-master, and were used as models. He was now about thirty, hadyellow hair, blue eyes, a smiling face, widish mouth, always a littleopen, nose a little turned up, whistled a good deal, and walked with apeculiar dance-like lilt. He was a gay, innocent creature, honest inall his dealings, and fairly prosperous. He had been married early, but had lost his wife when he was about twenty-six, and had been leftwith one daughter, whom his sister had in charge. The sister was aboutto be married, and when her brother knew that the day for her departurewas fixed, it came into his head that he ought to be married again. Otherwise, who could manage his house and his family?

He was not a man to seek any recondite reasons for doing or not doinganything. He was not in the habit of pausing before he acted, anddemanding the production of every conceivable argument, yea or nay, andthen with toil adjusting the balance between them. If a lot of withieslooked cheap, he bought them straightway, and did not defer the bargainfor weeks till he could ascertain if he could get them cheaperelsewhere. 

Going home one evening, he passed his friend Giacomo's shop, andthrough the window saw Miriam talking to her father. Instantly itstruck him that Miriam was the girl for him, and he began to whistlethe air to "Hark the Lark, " for he was a member of the Cowfold GleeClub, and sang alto. This was on the 25th May. Miriam beingaccustomed to walk in the fields in the evening, and Mr. D. Farrowbeing fully aware of her custom, he met her on the 26th and after somepreliminary skirmishing requested her to take him for better or forworse. She was surprised, but did not say so, and asked time forconsideration. She did consider, but consideration availed nothing. It is so seldom even at the most important moments that our facultiesare permitted fully to help us. There is no free space allowed, and weare dragged hither and thither by a swarm of temporary impulses. Theresult has to stand, fixed for ever, but the operative forces whichdetermine it are those of the moment, and not of eternity. Miriam, moreover, just then lacked the strong instinct which mercifully for usso often takes us in hand. She was not altogether unhappy, but dulland careless as to what became of her. No oracle advised her. Thereis now no pillar of cloud or of fire to guide mortals; the heavenlyapparition does not appear even in extremities; and consequently a weekafterwards she said yes, and six months afterwards she was Mrs. Farrow. 

For some time the day went pleasantly enough. She had plenty to do asmistress of the house, and in entertaining the new friends who came tosee her. After a while, when the novelty had worn off, the oldinsuperable feeling of monotony returned, more particularly in theevening. Mr. Farrow never went near a public-house, but he neveropened a book, and during the winter, when the garden was closed, amused himself with an accordion, or in practising his part in a catch, or in cutting with a penknife curious little wooden chairs and tables. This mode of passing the time was entertaining enough to him, but notso to Miriam, who was fatally deficient, as so many of her countrymenand countrywomen are, in that lightness which distinguishes the Frenchor the Italians, and would have enabled her, had she been sofortunately endowed with it, to sit by the fire and prattle innocentlyto her husband, whatever he might be doing. When she came to her newabode and was turning out the corners, she discovered upstairs in acupboard a number of brown-looking old books, which had not beentouched for many a long day. Amongst them were Rollin's AncientHistory, some of Swift's Works with pages torn out, doubtless thosewhich some impatiently clean creature had justly considered too filthyfor perusal. There were also Paul and Virginia, Dryden's Virgil, Robinson Crusoe, and above all a Shakespeare. Miriam had never beenmuch of a reader; but now, having nothing better to do, she looked intothese books, and generally brought one downstairs in the afternoon. Swift she did not quite understand, and he frightened her; she never, in fact, got through anything but Gulliver and the Tale of a Tub; butsome of his sayings stuck to her and came up against her again andagain, until, like most of us who have had even a glimpse of the darkand dreadful caverns in that man's soul, she wished that he had neverbeen born. For years, even to the day of her death, the poison of onesentence in the Tale of a Tub remained with her--those memorable wordsthat "happiness is a perpetual possession of being well deceived. " Yetshe pitied him; who does not pity him? Who is there in English historywho excites and deserves profounder pity?

Of all her treasures, however, the one which produced the deepestimpression on her was "Romeo and Juliet. " She saw there thepossibilities of love. For the first time she became fully aware ofwhat she could have been. One evening she sat as in a trance. Cowfoldhad departed; she was on the balcony in Verona, Romeo was below. Sheleaned over and whispered to him--

 "My bounty is as boundless as the sea, My love as deep: the more I give to thee, The more I have, for both are infinite. "

She went on; the day was breaking; she heard the parting--

 "Farewell! farewell! one kiss and I'll descend, "

Her arms were round his neck with an ecstasy of passion; he was going;the morning star was flashing before the sun, and she cried after him--

 "Art thou gone so? love, lord, ay husband, friend! I must hear from thee every day in the hour, For in a minute there are many days. "

Ah, God! what is the count of all the men and women whom, since it wasfirst "plaid publiquely with great applause, " this tragedy has remindedof the _what might have been_!

Mr. Didymus Farrow, during his wife's absence in Verona, had been verymuch engaged in whittling a monkey which toppled over on a long pole, but being dissatisfied with its performance he had taken his accordionout of the box, and, just as Lady Capulet called, he struck up "Downamongst the dead men, " which, whatever its merit may be, is notparticularly well adapted to that instrument. Verona and Romeo werestraightway replaced by Cowfold and the Cowfold consort. He was in thebest of spirits, and he stooped down just as his wife was waking, tookthe cat--which was lying before the fire--and threw it on her lap. 

"Oh, please do not!" she exclaimed, a little angry, shocked, and sad. 

"I wish you would not sit and addle your brains over those books. Blessed if I don't burn them all! What good do they do? Why don't youtalk?"

"I've nothing particular to say. "

"You never have anything to say when you've been reading. Now if Iread a bit of the newspaper, I've always something to talk about. "

She was silent, and her husband continued his tune. 

"Miriam, my dear, you aren't well. Are you in pain?"

Mr. Farrow never understood any suffering unless it was an ache of somebind. 

"Let me get you just a drop of brandy with some ginger in it. "

"No, thank you. "

"Yes, you will have just a drop, " and he jumped up at once and went tothe cupboard. 

"I tell you I will not. "

The "not" came out with such emphasis that he desisted and sat down. The monkey lay on the table, the accordion lay there too; Mr. Farrowstopped his whistling and sat back in his chair with his finger to hismouth. At last, he took up the book, turned it over, and put it downagain. He loved his wife after his fashion, and could not bear to seeanybody distressed. He placed his chair beside hers, and lifting herarm, put it round his neck, she nothing resisting. 

"Tell me now, there's a dear, what's the matter, " and he kissed her. 

"Nothing, " she said, somewhat softened by his caresses. 

"That's right, my twopenny, " a name he used confidentially to her. "Alittle faint; the room is rather close, " and he opened the window atrifle at the top, returning to his seat, and embracing her again. 

Yet, though she yielded, it was not Mr. Farrow who held her in hisarms; she purposely strove to think an imaginary Romeo's head was onher neck--his face was something like the face of Montgomery--and shekept up the illusion all that night. When she came down to breakfastand sat opposite her husband, it struck her suddenly that she hadcheated him and was a sinner. 

In the afternoon she went out for a stroll through the streets, and upto the monument in the park. Cowfold was busy, for it was market-day. Sheep-pens were in the square full of sheep, and men were purchasingthem and picking them out as they were sold; dogs were barking; thewandering dealer who pitched his earthenware van at the corner wasringing his plates together to prove them indestructible; old MadgeCampion, who sold gooseberry-tarts and hot mutton-pies on her boardunder an awning supported by clothes-props, was surrounded by a shoalof children, as happy as the sunshine; the man with the panorama wasexhibiting, at one halfpenny a head, the murder of Lord William Russellto a string of boys and girls who mounted the stool in turn to lookthrough the glasses; and the cheapjack was expatiating on the merits ofcutlery, pictures, fire-irons, and proving that his brass candlestick, honestly-worth-ten-shillings-but-obtainable-at-one-and-four-pence-because-he-really-could-not-cart-it-about-any-longer answered thedouble purpose of a candlestick and burglar-alarm by reason of thetremendous click of the spring, which anybody might--if theyliked--mistake for a pistol. 

Through all the crowd Miriam walked unsympathetic. She cursed theconstitution with which she was born. She wished she had been endowedwith that same blessed thoughtlessness, and that she could be taken outof herself with an interest in pigs, pie-dishes, and Cowfold affairsgenerally. She went on up to her favourite resting-place; everythingwas so still, and her eye wandered over the illimitable distance butwithout pleasure. She recollected that she had an engagement; that twocousins of her husband were coming to tea, and she slowly returned. Athalf-past five they appeared. They chattered away merrily with Mr. Farrow, who was as lively as they were, until by degrees Miriam'ssilence began to operate, and they grew dull. Tea being over, shemanaged to escape, and as she went upstairs she heard the laughterrecommence, for it was she who had suppressed it. Lying down in herroom overhead, the noise continued, and it came into her mind thatwherever she went she cast a cold shadow. "They must wish me dead, "she thought. 

She had been married so short a time; to what a dreary length thefuture stretched before her, and she did not love the man she hadchosen, as she understood love. How was life to be lived? She did notreproach herself. If she could have done that, if she could haveaccused herself of deliberate self-betrayal, it would have been better;but she seemed to have been blindfolded, and led by some unknown forceinto the position in which she found herself. 

For some days she went on with her books, but the more she read themore miserable she became, because there was nobody with whom she couldinterchange what she thought about them. She was alarmed at last tofind that something very much like hatred to her husband was beginningto develop itself. She was alarmed because she was too much of anEnglishwoman to cherish the thought of any desperate remedy, such asseparation; and yet the prospect of increasing aversion, which appearedto grow she knew not how, terrified her. One Monday afternoon she hadgone out to her usual haunt in the park, and near the monument she sawsomebody whom she presently recognised to be Mr. Armstrong, the vicarof Marston-Cocking, a village about four miles from Cowfold. She knewhim because he had dealt with her husband, and she had met him in theshop. Marston-Cocking was really nothing better than a hamlet, with alittle grey squat church with a little square tower. Adjoining thechurchyard was Mr. Armstrong's house. It was not by any means a modelparsonage. It was a very plain affair of red brick with a door in themiddle, a window with outside shutters on either side, and one storyabove. There was a small garden in front, protected from the road bywhite palings and a row of laurels. At the back was a bigger garden, and behind that an orchard. It had one recommendation, worth to itstenant all the beauty of a moss-covered manse in Devonshire, and thatwas its openness. It was on a little sandy hill. For someunaccountable reason there was a patch of sand in that part of thecountry, delicious, bright, cheerful yellow and brown sand, liftingitself into little cliffs here and there, pierced with the holes of thesand-martin. It exhaled no fogs, and was never dull even on a Novemberday, when the clay-lands five miles away breathed a vapour which layblue and heavy on the furrows, and the miry paths, retaining in theirsullenness for weeks the impress of every footmark, almost pulled theboots off the feet as you walked along them. At Marston, on thecontrary, the rain disappeared in an hour; and the landscape alwaysseemed in the depths of winter to retain something of summer sunshine. The vicarage was open, open to every wind, and from the top rooms thestars could be seen to rise and set, no trees intercepting the view. Mr. Armstrong was a man of sixty, a widower with no children. Hisincome from his living was about two hundred pounds annually, and thenumber of his parishioners all told, men, women, and children, was, asnearly as may be, two hundred. He had been at Marston-Cocking forthirty-five years. He came just after his wife died--how he hardlyknew. The living was offered him; he thought the change would do himgood, although he did not intend to remain; but there he had stayed, and there was no chance of his removal. He was completely out of theworld, troubled himself with no church controversies, and preachedlittle short sermons telling his congregation not to tell lies nor beunkind to one another. Every now and then he introduced into hisdiscourses his one favourite subject, astronomy, and by degrees thelabourers in Marston-Cocking knew more about the sky and its daily andnightly changes than many a highly educated person in the city. Mr. Armstrong, otherwise a very plain, simple creature, always greweloquent on the common ignorance of the heavens. "Here, " he would say, "has God thrust upon us these marvellous sights. These are not thesecrets hidden in the mine--they are forced upon us; and yet we walkwith our heads to the earth; we do not know the morning star when wesee it, nor can we even recognise the Pleiads and Arcturus which Jobknew. " Mr. Armstrong had made all his instruments with his own hands, and had even used the top of the church-tower as an observatory. Mrs. Bullen, the wife of the one farmer in the parish, a lady who wrote thefinest of Italian pointed hands, who had been in a Brightonboarding-school for ten years, and had been through "Keith on the Useof the Globes, " was much scandalised at this "appropriation of thesacred edifice to secular purposes, " as she called it, but she met withno encouragement. The poor people somehow connected heaven with thestars, and Mr. Armstrong never undeceived them, so that they sawnothing improper in the big telescope under the weathercock. 

"Really, James, " said Mrs. Bullen one morning to Mr. Armstrong'sgardener and general man-of-all-work as he was carrying a chair fromthe house into the tower, "do you think this is quite right? Do youthink our Saviour would have sanctioned the erection of a profaneinstrument over the house of prayer?"

James was very thick-headed, and hardly knew the meaning of these longwords, bat he did not like Mrs. Bullen, and he resented her talking tohim, a servant, in that strain about his master. 

"Ah! Mrs. Bullen, you needn't bother yourself. He's all right withthe Saviour, --more so nor many other people, maybe. "

"Well, but, James, this is a church consecrated to the service of God. "

"Ah! how do you know? Very likely o' nights--for he's up there whenyou're abed and asleep--he's a looking into heaven through that thereglass, and, sees God and the blessed angels. "

"Really, James, can you be so ignorant as not to know that God is aSpirit? I am astonished at you. " And Mrs. Bullen passed on without asingle doubt in her mind that there was a single weak spot in hercreed, or that anybody could question its intelligibility and coherencewho would not also question the multiplication-table. She told herhusband when she got home that it was really dreadful to think that thepoor had such low views of the Divine Being. How degraded! No wonderthey were so immoral. Bullen, however, did not trouble himself muchabout these matters. He assented to what his wife said, but then hecalled "spirit" "sperrit, " to her annoyance, and she could not get himto comprehend what she meant by "entirely immaterial, " although it wasso plain. 

Mr. Armstrong, as we have said, was in front of Miriam. He had broughta small telescope to that point to be tested, for exactly eight milesaway was a church-tower with a clock, and he wished to see if he couldtell the time by it. Miriam was about to avoid him, but he recognisedher and beckoned to her. 

"Ah! Mrs. Farrow, is it you? Would yon like to look through my glass?"

He adjusted it for her, and she saw the hour quite plainly. 

"Oh, " she exclaimed, "that is wonderful!"

"Yes, it is pretty well. We will now put him in his box. For the boxI have to thank Mr. Farrow. He is one of the neatest hands at thatkind of work I know, although it is not exactly his trade. I never wasmuch of a joiner. "

Miriam was a little surprised. She knew that her husband was cleverwith his tools, but she had never set any value on his labours. Now, however, she was really struck with the well-polished mahogany and thepiece of brass neatly let into the lid, and when she heard Mr. Armstrong's praises she began to think a little differently. 

"Ah!" he continued, "it is so difficult now to get anybody to take anyinterest in such a job as that. I have got another box at home made bya professed cabinetmaker, and it is really disgraceful. It will neverbe right, although I have had it altered two or three times. When itwas shut it caught the object-glass inside. I remedied that defect, but only to create a worse, for then the instrument shook about. So itis, when once a thing is badly done, you had better get rid of it; itis of no use to bother with it. You may depend upon it, it is not badjust here or there, but is bad all through, and the attempt to mend itserves no other purpose than to bring to light hidden weakness. On theother hand, if you are fortunate enough to have work done like Mr. Farrow's, it is perfect all through. You can never surprise it, so tospeak. Just look at it. Look at that green baize rest. There is notthe thirty-second part of an inch to spare on either side, and the lidcomes down so evenly that you can hardly see where the edge is. Shakethe box, and you will not feel a single movement. You have never seenmy big telescope at Marston?"

"No. "

"Well, if you like, you can come over with your husband any brightnight, and I shall be happy to show it to you. "

Miriam thanked him, and they parted. 

A few days afterwards Mrs. And Mr. Farrow presented themselves at thevicarage. It was a lovely evening, and so clear that the outline ofthe constellations was obscured by the multitude of small stars, whichusually are not seen, or seen but imperfectly. In the south wasJupiter, mild, magnificent, like a god amongst the crowd of lesserdivinities. 

Mr. Armstrong, with all the ardour of an enthusiast for his science, began a little preliminary lecture. 

"I am not going to let you peep simply in order to astonish you. Iabominate what are called popular lectures for that very reason. Ifyou can be made to understand the apparent revolution of the heavens, that is better than all speculation. To understand is the great thing, not to gape. Now I assume you know that the earth goes round on itsaxis, and that consequently the stars seem to revolve round the earth. But the great difficulty is to realise _how_ they go round, because theaxis is not upright, nor yet horizontal, but inclined, and points tothat star up there, the pole-star. Consequently the stars describecircles which are not at right angles with the horizon, nor yetparallel to it. That is my first lesson. "

Mr. Farrow comprehended without the slightest difficulty, but Miriamcould not. She had noticed that some of the stars appear in the eastand disappear in the west, but beyond that she had not gone. Mr. Armstrong continued--

"The next thing you have to bear in mind is that the planets move aboutamongst the stars. Just think! They go round the sun, and so do we. The times of their revolution are not coincident with ours, and theirpath is sometimes forwards and sometimes backwards. Suppose we were inthe centre of the planetary system, all these irregularities woulddisappear; but we are outside, and therefore it looks so complicated. "

Again Mr. Farrow comprehended, but to Miriam it was all dark. 

"Now, " continued Mr. Armstrong, "these are the two great truths which Iwish you not simply to acknowledge, but to _feel_. If you can oncefrom your own observation _realise_ the way the stars revolve--why somenear the pole never set--why some never rise, and why Venus is seenboth before the sun and after it--you will have done yourselves morereal good than if you were to dream for years of immeasurabledistances, and what is beyond and beyond and beyond, and all thatnonsense. The great beauty of astronomy is not what isincomprehensible in it, but its comprehensibility--its geometricalexactitude. Now you may look. "

Miriam looked first. Jupiter was in the field. She could not suppressa momentary exclamation of astonished ecstasy at the spectacle. Whileshe watched, Mr. Armstrong told her something about the mighty orb. Hepointed out the satellites, contrasted the size of Jupiter with that ofthe earth, and explained to her the distances at which parts of theplanet are from each other as compared with those of New Zealand andAmerica from London. But what affected her most was to see Jupiter'ssolemn, still movement, and she gazed and gazed, utterly absorbed, until at last he had disappeared. The stars had passed thus before hereyes ever since she had been born, but what was so familiar had neverbefore been emphasised or put in a frame, and consequently had neverproduced its due effect. 

Afterwards Mr. Farrow had his turn, and Mr. Armstrong then observedthat they had had enough; that it was getting late, but that he hopedthey would come again. They started homewards, but their teacherremained solitary till far beyond midnight at his lonely post. Thehamlet lay asleep beneath him in profoundest peace. His study had astrange fascination for him. He never wrote anything about it; henever set himself up as a professional expert; he could not preach muchabout it; most of what he acquired was incommunicable atMarston-Cocking, or nearly so, and yet he was never weary. It was forsome inexplicable reason the food and the medicine which his mindneeded. It kept him in health, it pacified him, and contented him withhis lot. 

On the following evening Miriam and her husband sat at tea. 

"You didn't quite understand Mr. Armstrong, Miriam?"

"No, not quite. "

"Ah! it is not easy; it all lies in the axis not being perpendicular, and in our not being in the middle. Now look here!"

He took a long string; tied one end to the curtain-rod over the window, and brought the other down to the floor. He then took Miriam, placedher underneath it in the middle with her face to the window. 

"Now, that is the north, and the top of the string is the pole star. Just imagine the string the axis of a great globe in which the starsare fixed, and that it goes round from your right hand to your left. "But to Miriam, although she had so strong an imagination, it wasunimaginable. It was odd that she could create Verona and Romeo withsuch intense reality, and yet that she could not perform such a simplefeat as that of portraying to herself the revolution of an inclinedsphere. 

Mr. Farrow was not disappointed. 

"It will be all right, " he said, and the next morning he was busy inthe shed in the bottom of the garden. He came to his afternoon mealwith glee, and directly it was over, took his wife away to see what hehad been doing. The shed had two floors, with a trap-door in themiddle. To the topmost corner of the upper story he had fixed a polewhich descended obliquely through a hole in the floor. This was theaxis, and the floor was the horizon. He had also, by the help of somestoutish wire and some of his withies, fairly improvised a fewmeridians, so that when Miriam put her head through the trap-door, sheseemed to be in the centre of a half globe. 

"Now, my dear, it will all be plain. I cannot make the thing turn, butyou can fancy a star fixed down there in the east at the end of thatwithy, and if the withy were to go round, or if the star were to climbup it, it would just go so, " tracing its course with his finger, "andset there. Now, those stars near the pole, you see, would never set, and that is why we see them all night long. "

It all came to her in an instant. 

"Really, how clever you are!" she said. 

"Do you think so?" and there was a trace of something serious, something of a surprise on his countenance. 

"I have heard Mr. Armstrong talk about the stars before, although neverso much as he did that night, and then I've watched them a good bit, and noticed the way they go. As for the planets, they are not so easy, but I think I have got hold of it all. "

Miriam looked out of window when she went to bed, and felt a newpleasure. The firmament, instead of being a mere muddle--beautiful, indeed, she had always thought it--had a plan in it. She marked whereone particularly bright star was showing itself in the south-east--itwas Sirius; and in the night she rose softly, drew aside the blind, sawhim again due south, and recognised the similarity of the arc with thatwhich her husband had constructed with his withies and wire. She laydown again, thinking, as she went off to sleep, that still that silent, eternal march went on. At four she again awoke from light slumber, andcrept to the blind again. Another portion of the same arc had beentraversed, and Sirius with his jewelled flashes was beginning todescend. She thought she should like to see him actually sink, and shewaited and waited till he had disappeared, till the first tint of dawnwas discernible in the east, and that almost indistinguishable murmurwas heard which precedes the day. She then once more lay down, andwhen she rose, she was richer by a very simple conception, but stillricher. She felt as a novice might feel who had been initiated, andhad been intrusted at least with the preliminary secrets of hercommunity. She owed her initiation to Mr. Armstrong, but also to herhusband. Experts no doubt may smile, and so may the young people who, in these days of universal knowledge, have got up astronomy forexaminations, but nevertheless, in the profounder study of the sciencethere is perhaps no pleasure so sweet and so awful as that whicharises, not when books are read about it, but when the heavens arefirst actually watched, when the movement of the Bear is first actuallyseen for ourselves, and with the morning Arcturus is discernedpunctually over the eastern horizon; when the advance of the starswestwards through the year, marking the path of the earth in its orbit, is noted, and the moon's path also becomes intelligible. 

Mr. Armstrong had long desired to make an orrery for the purpose ofinstructing a few children and friends, but had never done anythingtowards it, partly for lack of time, and partly for lack of skill withjoinery tools. He now, however, had in Farrow at once a willing pupiland an artist, and the work went forward in Farrow's house, Miriamwatching its progress with great interest. She could even contributeher share, and the graduation of the rim was left to her, a task sheperformed with accuracy after a few failures in pencil. It was ahandsome instrument when it was completed. The relative distances ofthe planets from the sun could not be preserved, nor their relativemagnitudes; but what was of more importance, their relative velocitiesin their orbits were maintained. The day came when the machine was tobe first used. Miriam insisted that there should be no experimentswith it beforehand. She desired, even at the risk of disappointment, to see a dramatic start into existence. She did not wish her pleasureto be spoiled and her excitement to be diminished by trials. Herhusband humoured her, but secretly he took care that every preventiblechance of a breakdown should be removed. When she was absent, hetested every pinion and every cog, eased a wheel here and an axlethere, and in truth what he had to do in this way with file andsandpaper was almost equal to the labour spent upon saw and chisel. Infinite adjustment was necessary to make the idea a noiseless, smoothpractical success, and infinite precautions had to be taken and devicesinvented which were not foreseen when the drawing first appeared onpaper. With some of these difficulties Miriam, of course, wasacquainted. They would not probably have been so great to aprofessional instrument-maker, but they were very considerable to anamateur. Farrow selected the best-seasoned wood he could find, but itfrequently happened that after it was cut it warped a little, and theslightest want of truth threw all the connected part out of gear. Miriam learned something when she saw that a wheel whose revolution wasnot in a perfect plane could give rise to so much annoyance, and shelearned something also when she saw how her husband, in the true spiritof a genuine craftsman, remained discontented if there was theslightest looseness in a bearing. 

"Do you think it matters?" said she. 

"Matters! Don't you see that if it goes on it gets worse? Everywobble increases the next, and not only so, it sets the whole thingwobbling. "

"Couldn't you manage to put a piece on? Suppose you lined that holewith something. "

"Oh, no! Not the slightest use; out it must come, and a new one mustbe put in. "

At length the day came for the start. Farrow had made a trial byhimself the night before, and nothing could be better. Mr. Armstrongcame over, and after tea they all three went upstairs into the largegarret which had been used as a workshop. The great handle was takendown and fitted into its place, Mr. Armstrong standing at one end andMiriam and her husband at the other. Obedient to the impulse, everyplanet at once answered; Mercury with haste, and Saturn with suchdeliberation that scarcely any motion was perceptible. The Earth spunits diurnal round, the Moon went forward in her monthly orbit. Thelighted ground-glass globe which did duty for the sun showed night andday and the seasons. Miriam was transported, when suddenly there was ajerk and a stop. Something was wrong, and Farrow, who was fortunatelyturning with great caution, gave a cry such as a man might utter whowas suddenly struck a heavy blow. He recovered himself instantly, andluckily at the very first glance saw what was the matter. The nicetyof his own handicraft was the cause of the disaster. A shaving notmuch thicker than a piece of writing-paper had dropped between twocogs. A gentle touch of a quarter of an inch backwards released it. 

"Hooray!" he cried in his mad delight, and the mimic planetsrecommenced their journeys as silently almost as their great archetypesoutside. 

"Strange, " he said with a smile, "that such a chip as that should upsetthe whole solar system. "

Miriam looked at him for a moment inquiringly, and then fell towatching the orrery again. Slowly the moon waxed and waned. Slowlythe winter departed from our latitude on the little ball representingour dwelling-place, and the summer came; and as she still watched, slowly and almost unconsciously her arms crept round her husband'swaist. 

"That is a fair representation, " said Mr. Armstrong, "of all that isdirectly connected with us, excepting, of course, as I have told you, that we could not keep the distances. " A little later on, although hedisapproved of "gaping, " as he called it, he taught Miriam so much ofgeometry as was sufficient to make her understand what he meant when hetold her that a fixed star yielded no parallax, and that the earth wasconsequently the merest speck of dust in the universe. She found hissimple trigonometry very, very hard, but to her husband it was easy, and with his help she succeeded. 

One afternoon, wet and dreary, Miriam had taken up her book. There wasnothing to do in the shop, and Mr. Farrow entered the parlour in one ofhis idle moods, repeating the same behaviour which had so oftendistressed Miriam when she was reading anything for which he did notcare. She had recovered from the dust upstairs a ragged volume inpaper boards, and she was musing over the lines--

 "But bound and fixed in fettered solitude To pine, the prey of every changing mood. "

The poem was about as remote in its whole conception and treatment fromMr. Farrow as it could well be, and his monkey-tricks exasperated her. She shut her book in wrath and misery, left the room, dressed, and wentout. The sky had cleared, and just after the sunset there lay a longlake of tenderest bluish-green above the horizon in the west, boundedon its upper coast by the dark grey cloud which the wind was slowlybearing eastward. In the midst of that lake of bluish-green lay Venus, glittering like molten silver. Miriam's first thought was her husband. She always thought of him when she looked at planets or stars, becausehe was so intimately connected with them in her mind. She waited tillit was late and she then turned homewards. A man overtook her whom sherecognised at once as Fitchew the jobbing gardener, porter, roughcarpenter, creature of all work in Cowfold, one of the honestest soulsin the place. He had his never-failing black pipe in his mouth, whichhe removed for a moment in order to bid her good-night. She kept upwith him, for it was dusk, and she was glad to walk by his side. Fitchews had lived in Cowfold for centuries. An old parson alwaysmaintained that the name was originally Fitz-Hugh, but this particularrepresentative of the family was certainly not a Fitz-Hugh but aFitchew, save that he was as independent as a baron, and, notwithstanding his poverty, cared little or nothing what peoplethought about him. He could neither read nor write, and was full ofthe most obstinate and absurd prejudices. He was incredulous ofeverything which was said to him by people with any education, but whathe had heard from those who were as uneducated as himself, or thebeliefs, if such they can be called, which grew in his skullmysteriously, by spontaneous generation, he held most tenaciously. Hisliterature was Cowfold, the people, the animals, the inanimate objectsof which it was made up, and his criticism on these was often just. Henever could be persuaded to enter either church or chapel. Of thearguments for Christianity, of the undesigned coincidences in theBible, of the evidence from prophecy, of the metaphysical necessity foran incarnation and atonement, he knew nothing, and it was a marvel toall respectable young persons how Fitchew, whose ignorance woulddisgrace a charity child, and who did not know that the world wasround, or the date of the battle of Hastings, should set himself upagainst those who were so superior to him. 

"What should we say, " observed the superintendent of the DissentingSunday-school one day to one of his classes, having Fitchew in hismind, "of a man who, if he was on a voyage in a ship commanded by acaptain with a knowledge of navigation, should refuse in a storm toobey orders, affirming that they were all of no use, and should betakehimself to his own little raft?"

Curiously enough, the Sunday before, the vicar, having the Dissenter inhis mind, had said just the same of "unlettered schismatics, " as hecalled them. 

Fitchew always had one argument for those friends who strove to converthim. "I don't see as them that goes to church are any better than themas don't. What's he know about it?" meaning the parson or theminister, as the case might be. 

Fitchew was very rough and coarse, and rather grasping in his dealingswith those who employed him, not so much because he was naturally mean, but because he was always determined that well-dressed folk should not"put on him. " Nevertheless, he was in his way sympathetic and eventender, particularly to those persons who suffered as he did, for hewas afflicted with a kind of nervous dyspepsia, not infrequent evenamongst the poor, and it kept him awake at night and gave him the"horrors. "

"Well, Fitchew, are you any better?" said Miriam. 

"Bad just now. Ain't had no regular sleep for a fortnight. Last nightit was awful. I kicked about and sat up; the noise in my ears wassomething, I can tell you; and then the wind in me! It's my beliefthat that there noise in my ears is the wind a coming out through them. I couldn't stand it any longer, and I got up and walked up and down theroad. Would you believe it, the missus never stirred; there she laylike a stone, and when I came in she says to me, 'Wot's the matter withyou?' That's just like her. She goes to bed, turns round, and neverknows nothing of anything till the morning. I could, have druv my headagin the door-post. "

"Well, she cannot help sleeping. "

"No, " after a long pause, "that's true enough. I tell you what itis--_I_ don't want to live for ever. "

"Cannot you do anything to help yourself? Have you seen the doctor?"

"Doctor!" in great scorn. "He's no more use than that there dog behindme, nor yet half so much. I am better when I am at work, that's all asI can tell. "

"Have you had plenty to do lately?"

"No, not much. Folk are allers after me in the summer-time, but in thewinter, when their gardens don't want doing, they never have nothing tosay to me. There's one thing about my missus, though. She's preciouscareful. I never touches the money part of the business. So we get'salong. "

Miriam knew the "missus" well. She was a little thin-lipped woman, who, notwithstanding her poverty, was most particularly clean. Nospeck of dirt was to be seen on her person or in her cottage, but shewas as hard as flint. She never showed the least affection for herhusband. They had married late in life--why, nobody could tell--andhad one child, a girl, whom the mother seemed to disregard just as shedid her husband, saving that she dressed her and washed her with thesame care which she bestowed on her kettle and candlesticks. 

"It's a good thing for you, Fitchew, that she is what she is. "

Fitchew hesitated for some time. 

"Yes, well, I said to myself, after I'd had a cup of tea and somethingto eat this morning--I didn't say it afore then, though--that it mightbe wuss. If she was allus a slaverin' on me and a pityin' me, itwouldn't do me no good; and then we are as we are, and we must make thebest of it. "

When Miriam parted from Fitchew she had still ten minutes' walk. Before the ten minutes had expired the black veil of rain-cloud wasrolled still farther to the east, and the crescent of the young moongleamed in the dying twilight. 

It poured with rain nevertheless during the night Miriam lay andlistened, thinking it would be wet and miserable on the following day. She dropped off to sleep, and at four she rose and went to the windowand opened it wide. In streamed the fresh south-west morning air, pure, delicious, scented with all that was sweet from fields and woods, and the bearer inland even as far as Cowfold of Atlantic vitality, dissipating fogs, disinfecting poisons--the Life-Giver. 

She put on her clothes silently, went downstairs and opened theback-door. The ever-watchful dog, hearing in his deepest slumbers theslightest noise, moved in his kennel, but recognised her at once andwas still. She called to him to follow her, and he joyfully obeyed. He would have broken out into tumultuous barking if she had notsilenced him instantly, and he was forced to content himself withleaping up at her and leaving marks of his paws all over her cloak. Not a soul was to be seen, and she went on undisturbed till she came toher favourite spot where she had first met Mr. Armstrong. She pacedabout for a little while, and then sat down and once more watched thedawn. It was not a clear sky, but barred towards the east with cloud, the rain-cloud of the night. She watched and watched, and thoughtafter her fashion, mostly with incoherence, but with rapidity andintensity. At last came the first flash of scarlet upon the bars, andthe dead storm contributed its own share to the growing beauty. Therooks were now astir, and flew, one after the other, in an irregularline eastwards black against the sky. Still the colour spread, untilat last it began to rise into pure light, and in a moment more thefirst glowing point of the disc was above the horizon. Miriam fell onher knees against the little seat and sobbed, and the dog, wondering, came and sat by her and licked her face with tender pity. Presentlyshe recovered, rose, went home, let herself in softly before herhusband was downstairs, and prepared the breakfast. He soon appeared, was in the best of spirits, and laughed at her being able to leave theroom without waking him. She looked happy, but was rather quiet attheir meal; and after he had caressed the cat for a little while, hepitched her, as he had done before, on Miriam's lap. She was about toget up to cut some bread and butter, and she went behind him and kissedthe top of his head. He turned round, his eyes sparkling, and tried tolay hold of her, but she stepped backward and eluded him. He mused alittle, and when she sat down he said in a tone which for him wasstrangely serious--

"Thank you, my dear; that was very, very sweet. "

MICHAEL TREVANION. 

Michael Trevanion was a well-to-do stonemason in the town of Perran inCornwall. He was both working-man and master, and he sat at one end ofthe heavy stone-saw, with David Trevenna, his servant, at the other, eachunder his little canopy to protect them a trifle from the sun and rain, slowly and in full view of the purple Cornish sea, sawing the stone forhours together: the water dripped slowly on the saw from a little canabove to keep the steel cool, and occasionally they interchanged a wordor two--always on terms of perfect equality, although David took wagesweekly and Michael paid them. Michael was now a man of about five andforty. He had married young and had two children, of whom the eldest wasa youth just one and twenty. Michael was called by his enemiesAntinomian. He was fervently religious, upright, temperate, but givensomewhat to moodiness and passion. He was singularly shy of talkingabout his own troubles, of which he had more than his share at home, butoften strange clouds cast shadows upon him, and the reasons he gave forthe change observable in him were curiously incompetent to explain suchresults. David, who had watched him from the other end of the saw fortwenty years, knew perfectly what these attacks of melancholy or wrathmeant, and that, though their assigned cause lay in the block before themor the weather, the real cause was indoors. His trouble was made worse, because he could not understand why he received no relief, although hehad so often laid himself open before the Lord, and wrestled for help inprayer. In his younger days he had been subject to great temptation. One night he had nearly fallen, but an Invisible Power seized him. "Itwas no more I, " he said, "than if somebody had come and laid hold of meby the scruff of my neck, " and he was forced away in terror upstairs tohis bedroom, where he went on his knees in agony, and the Devil left him, and he became calm and pure. But no such efficient help was given him inthe trial of his life. He knew in his better moments, that the refusalof grace was the Lord's own doing, and he supposed that it was due to Hislove and desire to try him; but upon this assurance he could notcontinually rest. It slipped away from under him, and at times he felthimself to be no stronger than the merest man of the world. 

His case was very simple and very common--the simplest, commonest case inlife. He married, as we have said, when he was young, before he knewwhat he was doing, and after he had been married twelvemonths, he foundhe did not care for his wife. When they became engaged, he was in thepride of youth, but curbed by his religion. He mistook passion for love;reason was dumb, and had nothing to do with his choice; he made the one, irretrievable false step and was ruined. No strong antipathy developeditself; there were no quarrels, but there was a complete absence ofanything like confidence. Michael had never for years really consultedhis wife in any difficulty, because he knew he could not get any adviceworth a moment's consideration; and he often contrasted his lot with thatof David, who had a helpmate like that of the left arm to the right, whoknew everything about his affairs, advised him in every perplexity, andcheered him when cast down--a woman on whom he really depended. As Davidknew well enough, although he never put it in the form of a proposition, there is no joy sweeter than that begotten by the dependence of the manupon the woman for something she can supply but he cannot--not affectiononly, but assistance. 

Michael, as we have said, had two children, a girl and a boy, the boybeing the eldest. Against neither could he ever utter a word ofcomplaint. They were honest and faithful. But the girl, Eliza, althoughunlike her mother, was still less like her father, and had a plain mind, that is to say, a mind endowed with good average common sense, butunrelieved by any touch of genius or poetry. Her intellect was solid butordinary--a kind of homely brown intellect, untouched by sunset orsunrise tint. A strain of the mother was in her, modified by theinfluence of the father, and the result was a product like neither fathernor mother, so cunning are the ways of spiritual chemistry. The boy, Robert Trevanion, on the contrary, was his father; not only with noapparent mixture of the mother, but his father intensified. The outsidefact was of far less consequence to him than the self-created mediumthrough which it was seen, and his happiness depended much moreintimately on himself as he chanced to be at the time than on the worldaround him. He was apprenticed to his father, and the two were boundtogether by the tie of companionship and friendship, intertwined withfilial and paternal love. What Eliza said, although it was right andproper, never interested the father; but when Robert spoke, Michaelinvariably looked at him, and often reflected upon his words for hours. 

There was in the town of Perran a girl named Susan Shipton. Michael knewvery little of the family, save that her father was a draper and went tochurch. Susan was reputed to be one of the beauties of Perran, althoughopinion was divided. She had--what were not common in Cornwall--lightflaxen hair, blue eyes, and a rosy face, somewhat inclined to be plump. The Shiptons lay completely outside Michael's circle. They were mereformalists in religion, fond of pleasure, and Susan especially was muchgiven to gaiety, went to picnics and dances, rowed herself about in thebay with her friends, and sauntered about the town with her father andmother on Sunday afternoon. She was also fond of bathing, and was a goodswimmer. Michael hardly knew how to put his objection into words, but henevertheless had a horror of women who could swim. It seemed to him anungodly accomplishment. He did not believe for a moment that St. Paulwould have sanctioned it, and he sternly forbade Eliza the use of one ofthe bathing-machines which had lately been introduced into Perran for thebenefit of the few visitors who had discovered its charms. 

It was a summer's morning in June, and Robert had gone along the shore onbusiness to a house which was being built a little way out of the town. The tide was running out fast to the eastward. A small river came downinto the bay, and the current was sweeping round the rocks to the left ina great curve at a distance of about two hundred yards from the beach. Inside the curve was smooth water, which lay calmly rippling in the sun, while at its edge the buoys marking the channel were swaying to and fro, and the stream lifted itself against them, swung past them, with brightmultitudinous eddies, and went out to sea. Half-way in the shallows wasone of the bathing-machines, and Robert saw that a girl whom he could notrecognise was having a bathe. She swam well, and presently she startedoff straight outwards. Robert watched her for a moment, and saw her gocloser and closer to the dangerous line. He knew she could not see it sowell as he could, and he knew too that the buoys which were placed toguide small craft into the harbour were well in the channel, and that atleast twenty yards this side of them the ebb would be felt, and with suchforce that no woman could make headway against it. Suddenly he saw thather course was deflected to the left, and he knew that unless some helpcould arrive she would be lost. In an instant his coat, waistcoat, andboots were off, and he was rushing over the sandy shallows, whichfortunately stretched out a hundred yards before he was out of his depth. Susan--for it was Miss Shipton--had now perceived her peril and hadturned round, but she was overpowered, and he heard a shriek for help. Raising himself out of the water as far as he could, he called out andsignalled to her not to go dead against the tide, or even to try andreturn, but to go on and edge her way to its margin, and so make for thepoint. This she tried to do, but her strength began to fail--the driftwas too much for her. Meanwhile Robert went after her. He was one ofthe best swimmers in Perran, but when he felt the cooler, deeper water, he was suddenly seized with a kind of fainting and a mist passed over hiseyes. He looked at the land, and he was in a moment convinced he shouldnever set foot on it again. He was on the point of sinking, when hebethought himself that if he was to die, he might just as well die afterhaving put forth all his strength; and in an instant, as if touched bysome divine spell, the agitation ceased, and he was himself again. Inthree minutes more he was by Susan's side, had gripped her by thebathing-dress at the back of the neck, and had managed to avail himselfof a little swirl which turned inwards just before the rocks werereached. They were safe. She nearly swooned, but recovered herselfafter a fit of sobbing. 

"I owe you my life, Mr. Trevanion; you've saved me--you've saved me. "

"Nonsense, Miss Shipton!" He hardly knew what to say. "I would not goso near the tide again, if I were you. You had better get back to themachine as soon as you can and go home. You are about done up. " Sosaying, he ran away to the place where he had left his coat, and went upinto the town, thinking intently as he went. Very earnestly he thought;so earnestly that he saw nothing of Perran, and nothing of hisneighbours, who wondered at his dripping trousers; thinking veryearnestly, not upon his own brave deed, nor even upon his strange attackof weakness, and equally strange recovery, but upon Miss Shipton as shestood by his side at the rock very earnestly picturing to himself herwhite arms, her white neck, her long hair falling to her waist, and herbeautiful white feet, seen on the sand through the clear sun-sparklingwater. 

Robert Trevanion, although brought up in the same school of philosophy ashis father, belonged to another generation. The time of my history isthe beginning of the latter half of the present century, and Michael wasalready considered somewhat of a fossil. Robert was inconsistent, as theold doctrine when it is decaying, or the new at its advent always is; butthe main difference between Michael and Robert was not any distinctdivergence, but that truths believed by Michael, and admitted by Robert, failed to impress Robert with that depth and sharpness of cut with whichthey were wrought into his father. Mere assent is nothing; the questionof importance is whether the figuration of the creed is dull or vivid--asvivid as the shadows of a June sun on a white house. Brilliance ofimpression, is not altogether dependent on mere processes of proof, and afaultless logical demonstration of something which is of eternal importmay lie utterly uninfluential and never disturb us. 

Robert walked out the next morning to the house he went to visit the daybefore. Nobody save Miss Shipton and himself knew anything about hisadventure. He had made some excuse for his wet clothes. The beach ofthe little village in the early part of the day was almost alwaysdeserted, and the man who attended to the machine had been lying on hisback on the shingle smoking his pipe during the few minutes occupied inMiss Shipton's rescue. It was settled weather. The sky was cloudless, and the blue seemed on fire. What little wind there was, was from thesouth-south-east, and every outline quivered in the heat. The waterinshore was absolutely still, and of such an azure as nobody whose sea isthat of the Eastern Coast or the Channel can imagine. A boat lay hereand there idle, with its shadow its perfect double in unwavering detailand blackness. Just beyond this cerulean lake the river ebb, asyesterday, rippled swiftly round Deadman's Nose; the buoys, with theirheads all eastward, breaking the stream as it impatiently hurried pastthem on its mysterious errand. Beyond and beyond lay the ocean, unruffled, melting into the white haze which united it with the sky onthe horizon. Robert loved the summer, and especially a burning summer. The sun, of which other persons complained, some perhaps sincerely, butfor the most part hypocritically--can anybody really hate thesun?--rejoiced him. He loved to be out in it when the light on theunsheltered Cornish rocks and in the whitewashed street was so "glaring, "as silly people called it, that they put up parasols and umbrellas, andthe warmth which made him withdraw his hand smartly from the old anchorthat lay on the grass just above high-water-mark, exhilarated him likewine. He was not a poet, he knew nothing of Greek mythology; and yet onsummer days like these, the landscape and seascape were all changed forhim. To say that they were a dream would be untrue--they were thereality; the hideous winter, with its damp fogs and rain, were the dream;and yet upon seascape and landscape rested such a miraculous charm thatthey seemed visionary rather than actual. As he walked along, henaturally thought of yesterday, and the light, the heat, and the colournaturally also renewed in him the picture which he had been continuallyrepainting for himself since yesterday morning. He went to the house, saw the stonework was going on all right, and as he returned, whom shouldhe meet but Miss Shipton, who, undeterred by the fright of the daybefore, had just had another bathe, and was taking a turn along the cliffto dry her hair, which was hanging over her shoulders. She was not byany means what is called "fast, " but she knew how to dress herself. Shehad a straw hat with a very large brim, a plain brown holland dress, abrown holland parasol, and pretty white shoes; for nothing would everinduce Miss Shipton to put her feet into the yellow abominations whichmost persons wore at Perran in the summer. 

Robert took off his cap. 

"Oh, Mr. Trevanion, I am so glad to see you. You must have thought mesuch a queer creature. I have not half thanked you. But what could Ido? I couldn't write, and I couldn't call, and I thought you would notlike a noise being made about it. Yet you saved me from being drowned. "

"It was nothing, Miss Shipton, " said Robert, smiling. "You were in theebb there, and I pulled you out of it--just twenty yards, that was all. I hope you haven't told anybody. "

"No; as I have said, I thought you wouldn't like it; but nevertheless, although it is all very well for you to talk in that way, I owe you mylife. "

"Are you going any farther?"

"Just a few steps till my hair is dry. "

He turned and walked by her side. 

"You see that the buoys are beyond where the channel really begins. Ionce tried to swim round two of them, but it was as much as ever I coulddo to get back. If I were you, I would give them a wide berth again; butif you should be caught, go on and do what we did yesterday--try to turnoff into the back-stream just inside the point. "

"You may be sure I shall never go near them any more. "

"Unless you happen to see me, " said Robert, his face flushed with hishappy thought, "and then you will give me the pleasure of coming afteryou. "

She looked at him, shifted her parasol, and laughed a little. 

"Pleasure! really, Mr. Trevanion, were you not very much frightened?"

"Not for myself, except just for an instant. "

"Oh, I was awfully frightened! I thought I must give up. I never, nevershall forget that moment when you laid hold of me. "

"But you have been in the water again this morning. "

"Oh, yes! I do enjoy it so, and of course I did not go far. That stupidbathing-man, by the way, ought to have looked out yesterday. He mighthave come in the boat and have saved you a wetting. I believe he wasasleep. "

"He is old, and I am very, very glad he did not see you. Aren't youtired? Would you not like to sit down a moment before we go back?"

They sat down on one of the rocks near the edge of the water. 

"You are a very good swimmer, Mr. Trevanion. "

"No, not very; and yesterday I was particularly bad, for a kind offaintness came over me just before I reached you, and I thought I wasdone for. "

"Dear me! how dreadful! How did you conquer it?"

"Merely by saying to myself I would not give in, and I struggled with itfor a minute and then it disappeared. "

"How strong you must be! I am sure I could not do that. "

"Ah! there was something else, Miss Shipton. You see, I had you ahead ofme, and I thought I could be of some service to you. "

Miss Shipton made no direct reply, but threw some pebbles in the water. Robert felt himself gradually overcome, or nearly overcome, by what tohim was quite new. He could not keep his voice steady, and although whathe said was poor and of no importance, it was charged with expressionlessheat. For example, Miss Shipton's parasol dropped and she stooped topick it up. "Let me pick it up, " he said, and his lips quivered, and thelet me pick it up--a poor, little, thin wire of words--was traversed byan electric current raising them to white-hot glow, and as powerful asthat which flows through many mightier and more imposing conductors. What are words? "Good-bye, " for example, is said every morning bythousands of creatures in the London suburbs as they run to catch theirtrain, and the present writer has heard it said by a mother to herbeloved boy as she stepped on board the tug which was about to leave thebig steamer, and she knew she would never see him again. Robert handedher the parasol, and unconsciously, by that curious sympathy by which weare all affected, without any obvious channel of communication, she feltthe condition in which his nerves were. She was a little uncomfortable, and, rising, said she thought it was time she was at home. They rose andwalked back slowly till their paths parted. 

The next day Robert renewed his walk, but there was no Miss Shipton. Thesummer heat had passed into thunderstorms, and these were succeeded bymiserable grey days with mist, confusing sea, land, and sky, andobliterating every trace of colour. As he went backwards and forwards tothe house over the hill, he watched every corner and turned round ahundred times, although his reason would have told him that to expectMiss Shipton in the rain was ridiculously absurd. 

Michael Trevanion loved his son with a father's love, but with a mother'stoo. He rejoiced to talk with him as his father and friend, but therewas in him also that wild, ferocious passion for his child whichgenerally belongs to the woman, a passion which in its intense vitalityforecasts, apprehends, and truly discerns danger where, to the mereintellect, there is nothing. Michael wondered a little at Robert'sunusually frequent visits to his work over the hill, and as he was in thetown one morning, he determined to cross the hill himself and see how thehouse was going on. The mist, which had hung about for a week, hadgradually rolled itself into masses as the sun rose higher. It was nolonger without form and void, but was detaching itself into hugefragments, which let in the sun and were gradually sucked up by him. Rapidly everything became transformed, and lo! as if by enchantment, thewhole sky resumed once more its deepest blue, the perfect semicircle ofthe horizon sharply revealed itself, and vessels five miles off werevisible to their spars. Michael reached the end of his journey andwaited, looking out from one of the upper stories. He saw nothing of thesplendour of the scene before him. He was restless, he did not quiteknow why. He could not tell exactly why he was there, but neverthelesshe determined to remain. He generally carried a Bible in his pocket, andhe turned where he had turned so often before, to the fifteenth chapterof Luke, and read the parable of the prodigal son. He had affixed hisown interpretation to that story, and he always held that the point of itwas not the love of the father, but the magnificent repentance of the boywho could simply say, "_I have sinned against Heaven and before thee, andam no more worthy to be called thy son; make me as one of thy hiredservants_. " No wonder the fatted calf was killed for him. No excuses; anoble confession and a trust in his father's affection for him! His ownRobert would never go wrong, but if he did, it would cost nothing toforgive him. Then, as he often did, he fell on his knees, and, in frontof the space where the window was to come, which would open on a littlesouthern balcony looking over the sea, there, amid the lumps of plasterand shavings, he besought his Maker to preserve the child. Michael wassincere in his prayers, nakedly sincere, and yet there were some thingshe kept to himself even when he was with his God. He never mentioned hisdisappointment with his wife, never a word; but he assumed a right to theperfect enjoyment of Robert by way of compensation. Calvinist as he wasto the marrow, he would almost have impeached the Divine justice ifRobert had been removed from him. 

Robert, walking leisurely, turning to look behind him for the hundredthtime, had spied Miss Shipton on her road to the town from her accustomedplunge. He intercepted her by going round a meadow to the left at agreat rate, and found himself face to face with her as she was about topass the corner. The third side of the meadow round which he had racedwas an unfinished road, and was a way, though not the usual way, back toPerran. 

"Good morning, Miss Shipton. Are you going home?"

"Yes! I suppose you are going to your house. "

"Yes, " and Robert walked slowly back along the way he had come, MissShipton accompanying him, for it was the way home. When they came to thecorner, however, they both, without noticing it, went eastward, and notto the town. 

"Should you like to be a sailor, Mr. Trevanion?" said Miss Shipton, catching sight of the fishing vessels over the low sea-beaten hedge. 

"No, I think not. At least it would depend----"

"Depend on what?"

"I should not like to be away for weeks during the North Sea fishing, if----"

"If it were very cold?"

"Oh, no; that is not what I meant--if I had a wife at home who cared forme and watched for me!"

"Really, Mr. Trevanion, if you were a fisherman you would not take thingsso seriously. It would all come as a matter of course. Yon would bebusy with your nets, and have no time to think of her. "

"But she might think of me. "

"Oh, well, perhaps she might now and then; but she would have her houseto look after, and all her friends would be near her. "

"On stormy nights, " said Robert, musingly. 

"How very serious you are! Such a lovely day, too--a nice time to betalking about stormy nights! Of course there are stormy nights, but theboats can run into harbour, and if they cannot, the men are not alwaysdrowned. "

"Certainly not; how foolish, and to think of coming home after five orsix weeks on the Doggerbank--oh me! But here is the very rock where wesat the other morning. I am sure you are tired, let us sit down again;your hair is not dry yet. "

They sat down. 

"It is quite wet still, " and Robert ventured to touch it, putting hishand underneath it. 

"An awful plague it is! Horrid sandy-coloured stuff, and such a nuisancein the water! I think I shall have it cut short. "

"I am sure you won't. Sandy-coloured! it is beautiful. "

Miss Shipton tossed her parasol about, shaking her hair loose from hisfingers. 

"When it is spread out in the sunshine, " said Robert, as he separated alittle piece of it between his fingers, "the sun shows its varyingshades. How lovely they are!" His hand went a little higher, till ittouched the back of her neck. 

"On stormy nights. --on stormy nights, " he almost whispered, "I shouldthink of you if you did not think of me. "

The hand went a little farther under the hair, his head inclined to it, and he was intoxicated with its own rich scent mingled with, that of thesweet sea-water. He trembled with emotion from head to foot. What isthere in life like this? Old as creation, ever new; and under the almosttropical sun, fronting the ocean, in the full heat of youth, he drew herhead to his. She yielded, and in a moment his eyes and mouth were buriedin her loose-clustering tresses. Before, however, he could say anotherword he was interrupted. A sheep, feeding above them, alarmed by astranger's approach, rushed down past them; and hastily recoveringhimself, Robert looked up. There was nobody, but he saw that they werenear his house, and that his father, who had just come to the window, waslooking down straight upon them. Miss Shipton immediately said that itwas late, rose, and walked homewards; and Robert alone went up the cliff. Michael had seen the girl walk away and had recognised her, but he hadnot seen what had preceded her departure. Instantly, however, hepenetrated the secret, and his first words when Robert presented himselfwere--

"Why, Robert, that was Miss Shipton. "

"Yes, father. "

"What were she and you doing here?"

"We happened to meet. "

There was something in the tone in which Robert replied which showed thefather at once that his son's confidence in him was not illimitable, ashe had believed it to be hitherto. It is a heart-breaking time forfather and mother when they first become aware that the deepest secretsin their children are intrusted not to them, but to others. Michael feltrepelled and was silent; but after a while, as they both were leaningover the garden-wall and gazing upon the water, he said--

"Mere worldlings, those Shiptons, Robert!"

"I do not know much about them, but they seem an honest, good sort ofpeople. "

"Ah! yes, my son; they may be all that. But what is it? They are notthe Lord's. "

Robert made no reply, and presently father and son left the house andwent back to Perran to their work, uncommunicative. 

It was a peculiar misfortune for a man of Michael's temperament that hehad nobody save his son who could assist him in the shaping of hisresolves or in the correction of his conclusions. Brought up in a narrowsect, self-centred, moody, he needed continually that wholesome twist toanother point of the compass which intercourse with equals gives. He wascontinually prone to subjection under the rigorous domination of a singlethought, from which he deduced inference after inference, ending inabsurdity, which would have been dissipated in an instant by discussion. We complain of people because they are not original, but we do not askwhat their originality, if they had any, would be worth. Better athousand times than the originality of most of us is the averagecommon-sense which is not our own exclusively, but shared with millionsof our fellow-beings, and is not due to any one of them. Michael oughtto have talked over the events of the morning with his wife; but alas!his wife's counsel was never sought, and not worth having. He did seekcounsel at the throne of heavenly grace that night, but the answer givenby the oracle was framed by himself. He was in sore straits. Somethingseemed to have interposed itself between him and Robert, and when, instead of the old unveiled frankness, Robert was reticent and evensuspicious, Michael's heart almost broke, and he went up to his room, andshutting the door, wept bitter tears. His sorrow clothed itself, even atits uttermost, with no words of his own, but always in those of the Book. 

"O my son Absalom!" he cried, "my son, my son, Absalom! Would God I haddied for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!"

He remembered also what his own married life had been; he always trustedthat Robert would have a wife who would be a help to him, and he feltsure that this girl Shipton, with her pretty rosy face and blue eyes, hadno brains. To think that his boy should repeat the same inexplicableblunder, that she was _silly_, that he would never hear from her lips aserious word! What will she be if trouble comes on him? What will shebe when a twelvemonth has passed? What will _he_ be when he sits by hisfireside in long winter evenings, alone with her, and finds she cannotinterest him for a moment?

Worse still, she was not a child of God. He did not know that she eversought the Lord. She went to church once a day and read her prayers, andthat was all. She was not one of the chosen, and she might corrupt him, and he might fall away, and so commit the sin against the Holy Ghost "OLord, O Lord!" he prayed one evening, in rebellion rather than as asuppliant, "what has Thy servant done that Thou shouldst visit him thus?"He almost mutinied, but he was afraid, and his religion came to hisrescue, and he broke down into "And yet not my will, the will of themeanest of sinners, but Thine be done. " He made up his mind once ortwice that he would solemnly remonstrate with his son, but his aspect wassuch whenever the subject was approached, even from a distance, that hedared not. Hitherto the boy had joyfully submitted to be counselled, andhad sought his father's direction, but now, if the conversation turned ina certain direction, a kind of savage reserve was visible, at whichMichael was frightened. He was a man of exceedingly slow conception. For days and days he would often debate within himself, and at the endthe fog was as thick as ever. He complained once to David Trevenna ofthis failing, and David gave him a useful piece of practical advice. 

"Leave it alone, master. The more you thinks, the more you muddleyourself. Leave it alone, and when it comes into your head, try to getrid of it. In a week or so the thing will do more for itself than you'lldo for it. It will settle, like new beer, and come clear enough. That'swhat my missus has often said to me, and I know she's right. "

But, do what he might, Michael could not in this instance leave it alone. He cast about incessantly for some device by which he could break his sonloose from the girl. It was all in vain. She might be frivolous, butthere was nothing against her character, and he saw evident signs that ifhe attempted any exercise of authority he would lose Robert altogether inopen revolt. For Robert, it must be remembered, had never scattered hisstrength in loose love. He had grown up to manhood in perfect innocence, and all his stored-up passion spent itself in idealising the object whichby chance had provoked it. 

Michael one night--it was a Sunday night--he was always worse on Sundayswhen he had not been at work--was unable to sleep, and rose and read theBook. He turned to the Epistle to the Romans, a favourite epistle withhim, and deservedly so, for there we come face to face with the divineapostle, with a reality unobscured by miracle or myth. And such areality! Christianity becomes no longer a marvel, for a man with thatforce and depth of experience is sufficient to impose a religion on thewhole human race, no matter what the form of the creed may be. Michaelread in the ninth chapter, "_I could wish that myself were accursed fromChrist for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh_. " What didPaul mean? Accursed from Christ! What _could_ he mean save that he waswilling to be damned to save those whom he loved. Why not? Why shouldnot a man be willing to be damned for others? The damnation of a singlesoul is shut up in itself, and may be the means of saving not onlyothers, but their children and a whole race. Damnation! It is awful, horrible; millions of years, with no relief, with no light from the MostHigh, and in subjection to His Enemy. "And yet, if it is to save--if itis to save Robert, " thought Michael, "God give me strength--I couldendure it. Did not the Son Himself venture to risk the wrath of theFather that He might redeem man? What am I? what is my poor self?" AndMichael determined that night that neither his life in this world nor inthe next, if he could rescue his child, should be of any account. 

How sublime a thing is this dust or dirt we call man! We grovel in viewof the vast distances of the fixed stars and their magnitudes, but thesedistances and these dimensions are a delusion. There is nothing granderin Sirius than in a pebble, nor anything more worthy of admiration andastonishment in his remoteness than in the length of Oxford Street. Thetrue sublime is in the self-negation of the martyr, and it became doublymagnificent in the case of Michael, who was willing not merely to give upa finite existence for something other than himself--to be shot and soend, or to be burnt with a hope of following glory--but to submit forever to separation and torment, if only he might shield his child fromGod's displeasure. It may be objected that such a resolution isimpossible. Doubtless it is now altogether incredible; but it is sobecause we no longer know what religion means, or what is the effectproduced upon the mind by the constant study of one book and a perfectlyunconditional belief in it. Furthermore, as before said, Michael nevercorrected himself or preserved his sanity by constant intercourse withhis fellows. He incessantly brooded, and the offspring of a soul likehis, begotten on itself, is monstrous and grotesque. He questionedhimself and his oracle further. What could Paul mean exactly? God couldnot curse him if he did no wrong. He could only mean that he was willingto sin and be punished provided Israel might live. It was lawful then totell a lie or perpetrate any evil deed in order to protect his child. Something suddenly crossed his mind; what it was we shall see later on. And yet the thought was too awful. He could not endure to sin, not onlyagainst his Creator, but against his boy. Perhaps God might pardon himafter centuries of suffering; and yet He could not. The gates of hellhaving once closed upon him, there could be no escape. He struggled inagony, until at last he determined that, first of all, he would speak toRobert, although he knew it would be useless. He would conquer thestrange dread he had of remonstrance, and then, if that failed, hewould--do anything. 

On the Sabbath following, as they came out of the meeting-house in theevening, Michael proposed to Robert that they should walk down to theshore. It was a very unusual proposal, for walking on the Sabbath, saveto and from the means of grace, was almost a crime, and Robert assented, not without some curiosity and even alarm. The two went together insilence till they came to the deserted shore. The sun had set behindthe point on their right, and far away in the distance could he seen thebeneficent interrupted ray of the revolving light. Father and son walkedside by side. 

"Robert, " said Michael at last, "I have long wished to speak to you. Godknows I would not do it if He did not command me, but I cannot help it. I fear you have engaged yourself with a young woman who is not one of Hischildren. "

"Who told you she was not, father?"

"Who told me? Why, Robert, it is notorious. Who told me? Is she notknown to belong to the world? does she ever appear before the Lord?"

"Do you think then, father, that because she does not come to our chapelshe cannot be saved?"

"No, you know I do not. The Lord has His followers doubtless in othercommunions besides our own, but the Shiptons are not His. "

"You mean, I suppose, that they do not believe exactly what we believe, and that they go to church?"

"No, no; I mean that she has not found Him, and that she is of theworld--of the world! O Robert, Robert! think what you are doing--thatyou will mate yourself with one who is not elect, that you may havechildren who will he the children of wrath. You don't know what I havegone through for you. I have wrestled and prayed before I could bringmyself to do my duty and talk with you, and even now I cannot speak. What is it which chokes me? O Robert, Robert!"

But Robert, usually docile and tender, was hard and obdurate. The imageof Susan rose before his eyes with her head on his shoulder, and hethought to himself that it was necessary at once to make matters quiteplain and stop all further trespass on his prerogative. So it is, and soit ever has been. For this cause shall a man leave father and mother andcleave to his wife. There comes a time when the father and mother findthat they must withdraw; but it is the order of the world, and has to beaccepted, like sickness or death. 

"Father, " said Robert, "I am not a boy, and you must allow me in thesematters to judge for myself. " As he spoke his spirit rose; the image ofthe head on his shoulder, defenceless against attack save for him, becameclearer and clearer, and words escaped him which he never afterwardsforgot, nor did his father forget. "And it is a shame--I say it is ashame to speak against her. You know nothing about her. Worldly! herchildren children of wrath, just because she is not of your way ofthinking, and isn't--and isn't a humbug, as some of them are. Fromanybody else I wouldn't stand it, " and Robert turned sharply away andwent home. 

Michael leant against a groyne to support himself, and looked over thewater, seeing nothing. At first he was angry, and if his son had beenthere, he could have struck him; but presently his anger gave way topity, to hatred of the girl who had thus seduced him, and to a fixeddetermination to save him, whatever it might cost. He pondered again andagain over that verse of Paul's. He did not believe that he should beexcused if he did evil that good might come. He knew that if he didevil, no matter what the result might be, the penalty to the uttermostfarthing would be exacted. If Christ's purpose to save mankind could notprevent the Divine anger being poured out on perfect innocence, how muchgreater would not that anger have been if it had been necessary for Himto sin in order to make the world's salvation sure! Michael firmlybelieved, too, in the dreadful doctrine that a single lapse from thestrait path is enough to damn a man for ever; that there is no finitenessin a crime which can be counterbalanced by finite expiation, but that sinis infinite. Monstrous, we say; and yet it is difficult to find in thestrictest Calvinism anything which is not an obvious dogmatic reflectionof a natural fact, a mere transference to theology of what had beenpressed upon the mind of the creator of the creed as an everyday law ofthe world. A crime is infinite in its penalties, and the account isnever really balanced, as many of us know too well, the lash being laidon us day after day, even to death, for the failings of fifty years ago. 

Michael, with his slow ways, remained many weeks undecided. During theseweeks he said nothing more to his son, nor did his son say anything tohim upon the one subject. Robert was more than ever deferent, and evenmore than ever affectionate, but there were no signs of any conversion onhis part, and to his deference and affection his father paid no regard. He walked in a world by himself, shut up in it, and incessantly repeatedthe one question, how could he save his son's soul? He pictured himselfas a second Christ. If the Christ, the mighty Saviour, felt His Father'swrath on that one dreadful night, it was only fitting that he, Michael, aman who was of so much less worth, should feel it for ever to accomplisha similar end. He was a little exalted by his resolve, and spiritualpride began to show itself; so utterly impossible is it that the purestself-devotion should be, if we may use the word, chemically pure. It isvery doubtful if he ever fully realised what he was doing, just as it isdoubtful whether in the time of liveliest conviction there has been aperfect realisation of the world to come. Had he really appreciated thewords "torment" and "infinite;" had he really put into "torment" thepangs of a cancer or a death through thirst; had he really put twentyyears into "infinity, " he would perhaps have recoiled. Nevertheless, thefact remains that this man by some means or other had educated himselfinto complete self-obliteration for the sake of his child. The presenttime is disposed to over-rate the intellectual virtues. No matter howunselfish a woman may be, if she cannot discuss the new music or the newmetaphysical poetry, she is nothing and nobody cares for her. Centuriesago our standard was different, and it will have to be different again. We shall, it is to be hoped, spend ourselves not in criticism of therecord of the saints who sat by the sepulchre, but we shall love as theyloved. 

Michael comforted himself by a piece of sophistry. He had made up hismind to attempt a stratagem, a wicked lie, if we choose to call it so, for his son's sake, and he was prepared to suffer the penalty for it. Ifhe had thought that in thus sinning he was sinning as an ordinary sinner, he perhaps could not have dared to commit the crime; he could not havefaced the Almighty's displeasure. But he thought that, although bound bythe Divine justice to mete out to him all the punishment which the sinmerited, God would, nevertheless, consider him as a sinner for His glory. 

One evening--the summer had not yet departed--father and son walked outto the house on the cliff. 

"Robert, " said Michael suddenly, and with the strength of a man whogathers himself up to do what for a long time he has been afraid to do, and is even bolder apparently than if he had known no fear, "I havespoken my mind to you as God in heaven bade me about Miss Shipton, andthis is the last word I shall say. He knows that I have prayed for youfrom your childhood up--that I have prayed that, above everything, hewould grant that you should have one of His own for your wife, who shouldbring up your children in the fear of the Lord. He alone knows how Ihave wrestled for you day and night, ay, in the dark hours of the night;for you are my only son, and I looked that you and she whom God mightchoose for you should be the delight and support of my old age. But itis not to be. God has, for His own good purposes, not blessed me as Hehas blessed others, and the home for which I hoped I am not to have. Oh, my son, my son!" He had meant to say more, but at the moment he couldnot. 

"Father, father!" said Robert, much moved--the anger he usually felt athis father's references to Susan Shipton melting into pity--"why not?why not? You don't know Susan; you condemn her just because she don't goto our meeting. She shall love you like your own child. "

Another man would, perhaps, have relented, but his system was wroughtinto his very marrow--a part of himself in a manner incomprehensible. The distinction between the world and the Church is now nothing to us. We are on the best of terms with people who every Sunday are expresslyassigned to everlasting fire. But to Michael the distinction was what itwas to Ephraim MacBriar. The Spirit descended on him--whose spirit, itis not for us to say. 

"Are you sure of Miss Shipton, Robert?"

"Sure of her, father! What do you mean?"

"Do you know what she has been in time past?"

"I don't understand you. "

"Do you know why Cadman left the Shiptons?"

Robert stopped suddenly as if struck by a blow, and then his behaviourinstantly changed. He completely forgot himself and was furious. 

"Father, I say it is a wicked, cruel shame--a wicked, cruel lie. I donot care if I tell you so. I will not listen to it, " and he tore himselfaway. 

He believed it was a lie--believed it with the same distinctness as hebelieved in the existence of the hedge by his side which lacerated hishand as he turned round; and yet the lie struck him like a poisonedbarbed arrow, and he could not drag himself loose from it. No man couldhave loved Desdemona better than Othello, and yet, before there was anyevidence, did he not say of Iago--

 "This honest creature doubtless Sees and knows more, much more, than he unfolds. "

He went home, and on his way to his room upstairs he passed through thelittle office in which he and his father made out their bills and kepttheir accounts. On the desk lay half a sheet of a letter. He looked atit at first mechanically, and then began to read with the most intenseinterest. It was only half a sheet, and the other half was nowhere to befound. It ran as follows:--

"and I can assure you I cannot afford to marry. Besides, I don't knowthat she cares anything for me now. It was very wrong; but, sir, whenyou remember that I am a young man and that Susan was so attractive, Ithink I may be forgiven. I hope some day to make her amends if she stillloves me, but, sir, I must wait. --Yours truly, "WALTER CADMAN. 

"MR. MICHAEL TREVANION. "

This was the plot. The Shiptons some short time ago had an assistant intheir employ, who was dismissed for improper intimacy with a servant-girlnamed Susan Coleman, who lived next door. As was the case with mostservant-girls in those days, nobody ever heard her surname, and she wasknown by the name of Susan only. The affair was kept a profound secret, for she was a member of the congregation to which Michael belonged; andMr. Shipton, for trade reasons, was anxious that it should not be madepublic. Michael, as one of the deacons, knew all about it, but Robertknew nothing. The girl left her place before the consequences of hercrime became public; and Michael had written to the man Cadman, tellinghim he ought to support the child of which he was the father. When hereceived the answer, a sudden thought struck him. The last page might beused for a purpose, and so he hatched his monstrous scheme, and left thepaper where he knew that, sooner or later, Robert would see it. 

When Michael came home, Robert was not there; a bill-head lay nearCadman's note with the brief announcement--

"I have left for ever. --Your affectionate son, "ROBERT. "

Michael's first emotion, strange to say, was something like joy. He hadsucceeded, and Robert was removed from the wiles of the tempter. Butwhen the morning came, he looked again, and he saw the words "for ever, "and he realised that his son had gone; that he would never see him anymore; that perhaps he might have committed self-murder. His human naturegot the better of every other nature in him, divine or diabolic, and hewas distracted. He could not pray after his wont; he tried, but he hadno utterance; he felt himself rebellious, blasphemous, impious, and herose from his bedside without a word. He went out into the street anddown to the shore, trembling lest he should hear from the first man hesaw that his son's body had been thrown up on the sand; and then heremembered how Robert could swim, and that he would probably hang a stoneround his neck and be at the bottom of some deep pool. He could not goback; people would ask where his son was, and what could he say? He hadmurdered him. He had thought to save him, and he was dead. He walkedand walked till he could walk no more, and a great horror came on him--ahorror of great darkness. The Eternal Arms were unclasped, and he felthimself sinking--into what he knew not. He could not describe his terrorto himself. It was nameless, shapeless, awful, infinite; and all hecould do was to cry out in agony; the words of the Book, even in this hismost desperate moment, serving to voice the experience for him--"My God!my God! why hast Thou forsaken me?" It became intolerable, and his brainbegan to turn. He reflected though, even then, upon the disgrace ofsuicide. For himself he did not care; for had not God abandoned him? andwhat worse thing could befall him? But then his good name, and the brandof infamy which would be affixed to Robert should he still live! Couldhe not die so that it might be set down as an accident? He could swim;and although he had not been often in the water of late years, it wouldnot be thought extraordinary if on a blazing morning he should bathe. Hetook off his clothes, and in a moment was in the sea, striking out forthe river channel and the ebbing tide, which he knew would bear him awayto the ocean. He saw nothing, heard nothing, till just as he neared thebuoy and the fatal eddy was before him, when there escaped from him acry--a scream--a prayer of commitment to Him whom he believed he had soloyally served--served with such damnable, such treasonable fidelity--theGod who had now turned away from him. 

But the buoy was not reached. A hand was on him, firm but soft, graspinghim by the hair at the back of his neck, which he wore long in Puritanicfashion, and the hand held him and he knew no more. Susan Shipton, bathing that morning, had seen a human being in the water nearing thepoint where she herself so nearly lost her life. Without a moment'shesitation she made after him, and was fortunate enough to attract theattention of two men in a punt, who followed her. She came up just intime, and with their help Michael was saved. He was senseless, but aftera few hours he recovered, and asked his wife, who was standing by hisbedside, who rescued him. 

"Why, it was Susan Shipton. She was in the water and came after you, andthen, luckily, there was a boat near at hand. "

Susan was on the other side of the bed, and he did not see her. She bentover him and kissed him. 

He turned round, and thoughts rushed through his brain with a rapiditysufficient to make one short moment a thousand years; but he saidnothing, and presently, almost for the first time in his life, he brokedown into sobbing. He turned away from her and could not look at her. 

"You see, Mr. Trevanion, " she said smilingly, "just about that very placeI was nearly drowned myself--I don't know whether you ever heard ofit--and I hardly ever keep my eyes off it now when I am anywhere near it, although I am not afraid of going pretty near after what Robert told me. When you want a wash again. --I knew you could swim well, by the way, butI didn't know you ever went into the water now--you must give the buoy awider berth. " She stooped down and whispered to him--"I never told asoul before, but it was Robert who saved me. We are quits now. Robertsaved me, and I have done something to save you, though not so much asRobert, because he had no boat. " Then she kissed his forehead again, delighted at the thought that she could put something into the balanceagainst her lover's heroism. How proud he would be of her! She would beable, moreover, to stand up a little bit against him. It was verypleasant to her to think she owed so much to him, but she liked also tothink that she had something of her own. 

Michael caught hold of her round the neck, embracing her with apassionate fervour which she supposed to be gratitude, but it was notaltogether that. 

"Do you know where Robert has gone?" she said. "He was not at home lastnight. "

"He has gone on--on--some business. I must go too. "

"You cannot go just yet; not till you have got over the shock. "

"I can--I can. Leave me, and I will dress myself. It is importantbusiness, and I must see him. But, Susan, here--I want you. "

It was the first time he had ever called her Susan. She came back tohim. "Listen!" he cried. She bent her head down, but he was silent. Atlast, with his arms again around her, he said, "My child, my child, mychild!"

"Me!" she answered innocently. "Do you mean me? do you really? Icouldn't think what you wanted to say, but that's enough. My dearest, dearest father! Oh, how happy Robert will be! and so am I. We thoughtyou didn't care for me; and I know I am a poor, foolish girl, not halfgood enough for Robert; but I _do_ love him, and I never loved anybodyelse; and I _do_ love you. "

When she had left, Michael rose from his bed. His faith remainedunchanged, but it presented itself to him in a different shape. A newand hitherto unnoticed article in his creed forced itself before him. God's hand--for it _was_ God's hand--had plucked him out of the sea andbrought him back to life. What did that mean? Ah! what was he?--a wormof the earth! How dare he lift himself up against the Almighty'sdesigns? The Almighty asked him the question eternally repeated to us, which He had asked thousands of years ago, "Where wast thou when I laidthe foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding. . . . Doth the hawk fly by thy wisdom, and stretch her wings forward to thesouth?" "The hawk flies not by my wisdom, " murmured Michael to himself, "nor doth the eagle at my command make her nest on high. Ah, it is byHis wisdom and at His command; how should I dare to interfere? I seeit--I see it all now. 'I have uttered that I understood not; things toowonderful for me, which I knew not. '" After his fashion and through hisreligion he had said to himself the last word which can be uttered byman. He knelt down and prayed, and although he was much given toextempore prayer, he did not, in this his most intense moment, go beyondthe prayer of our Lord, which, moreover, expressed what he wanted betterthan any words of his own. "_Thy will_, " he repeated, "_Thy_ will. " Hisone thought now was his son, but he knew not where to find him. He wentout and he saw his man, David Trevenna. 

"He was off in a hurry; only just caught the coach, " said David. 

"Who? What coach?"

"Why, Robert; going to Plymouth. "

Michael did not answer, but hurried to his stable where his little ponywas kept, and put him in the light cart. He told his wife that he hadsome business in Plymouth with Robert, packed up a few things, took somemoney, and in a few minutes was on the Truro road. At Truro he found themail, and within twelve hours he was at Plymouth. Dismounting, he askedeagerly if they had a young man at the inn who had come from Cornwall theday before. 

"What, one as is waiting for the packet?"

"Yes, " said Michael at a venture. 

"Yes, he's here, but he isn't in just now. Gone out for a walk. "

The one point in Plymouth to which everybody naturally turns is the Hoe, and thither Michael went. It was morning in early autumn or late summer, and the whole Sound lay spread out under the sun in perfect peace. Thewoods of Mount Edgecumbe were almost black in the intense light, and faraway in the distance, for the air was clear, a sharp eye might justdiscern the Eddystone, the merest speck, rising above the water. It wasa wonderful scene, but Michael saw nothing of it. When he came out ofthe street which leads up from the town to the Hoe, he looked round as aman might look for escape if a devouring fire were behind him, and he sawhis son a hundred yards in front of him gazing over the sea. With a cryof thanks to his God Michael rushed forward, and just as Robert turnedround caught him in his arms, but could not speak. 

At last he found a few words. 

"It is all a mistake, Robert--it is all wrong. Susan is yours--she ismine. Come back with me. "

Robert, as much moved as his father, fell on his neck as if he had been awoman, and then led him gently down the slope, away from curious personswho had watched this remarkable greeting, and took Michael to be somestrange person who had accidentally met his child or a relative afterlong separation. 

"Foreigners, most likely; that's their way. It looks odd to Englishpeople, " remarked a lady to her daughter. It did look odd, and wouldhave looked odd to most of us--to us who belong to a generation whichsees in the relationship between father and son nothing more than in thatbetween the most casual acquaintances with the disadvantage of inequalityof age, a generation to whom the father is--often excusably--a person tobe touched twice a day with the tips of the fingers, a postponement of afull share in the business, a person to be treated with--respect? Goodgracious! If it were not bad form, it would be a joke worth playing toslip the chair away from the old man as he is going to sit down, and seehim sprawl on the floor. Why, in the name of heaven, does he come up tothe City every day? He ought to retire, and leave that expensive placeat Clapham, and take a cottage in some cheap part, somewhere inCambridgeshire or Essex. 

"Robert, " said Michael, "I have sinned, although it was for the Lord'ssake, and He has rebuked me. I thought to take upon myself His directionof His affairs; but He is wiser than I. I believed I was sure of Hiswill, but I was mistaken. He knows that what I did, I did for love ofyour soul, my child; but I was grievously wrong. "

The father humbled himself before the son, but in his humiliation becamemajestic, and in after years, when he was dead and gone, there was noscene in the long intercourse with him which lived with a brighter andfairer light in the son's memory. 

"You know nothing then against Susan?"

"Nothing!"

"I found a bit of a letter on your desk from Cadman. I could not helpreading it. Had that anything to do with her?"

"Nothing!"

"Father, you seem faint and you tremble; hadn't you better go in doorsand take something, and lie down? We cannot get home till to-morrow. "

The father went to the inn with difficulty; he had tasted no food formany hours, and had not slept for some time, but he could neither eat norsleep. Hitherto God's will had appeared to him ascertainable withcomparative ease, and he had been as certain of the Divine direction asif he had seen a finger-post or heard the word in his ear. But now hewas dazed and, in doubt. He was convinced that his rescue by Susan wasan interposition of Providence, and if so, then all his formerconclusions were wrong. What was he to do? How was he henceforth toknow the mind of his Master? Oh, how he wished he had lived in the dayswhen the oracle was not darkened--in the days of Moses, when God spakefrom the Mount, when there was the continual burnt-offering at the doorof the tabernacle, "where I will meet you, to speak there unto thee. "God really did intend that Robert should marry Susan! "If righteousnessand judgment, " he cried, inverting the Psalm, "are the habitation of Histhrone, clouds and darkness are round about Him. " But he submitted. "Thou art wiser than I, " he prayed. It was mere presumption then to haverisked the loss of his soul in the blind belief that it was for God'scause. The sin had been committed, the lie had been uttered; would Godpardon him? and it was mercifully whispered to him that he was forgivenfor His sake. So was he saved from uttermost despair. 

In the evening he said he would go out and breathe a little fresh airbefore bedtime. It was a perfectly unsullied night, with no moon, butwith brilliant stars. Father and son sat upon a bench facing the sea, and the lighthouse from the rock sent its bright beam across the water. There is consolation and hope in those vivid rays. They speak ofsomething superior to the darkness or storm--something which has beenraised by human intelligence and human effort. 

Robert turned round to his father. 

"Look at the light, father, fourteen miles away. "

But his father did not see any light, or, if he did, it was not theEddystone light--he was dead!

Robert never revealed his father's secret to a soul--not even to Susan. Nobody but Robert ever knew the reason for the journey to Plymouth. Hisinterpretation of God's designs turned out to be nearer the truth thanthat of his father; for Susan, the worldling, as Michael thought her tobe, became a devoted wife, and made Robert a happy husband to the end ofhis days. 

Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson and Co. Edinburgh and London.