MORE BYWORDS

Contents:

 The Price of Blood The Cat of Cat Copse De Facto and De Jure Sigbert's Guerdon The Beggar's Legacy A Review of the Nieces Come to Her Kingdom Mrs. Batseyes Chops

THE PRICE OF BLOOD

Ab ira et odio, et omni mala voluntate, Libera nos, Domine. A fulgure et tempestate, Libera nos, Domine. A morte perpetua, Libera nos, Domine. 

So rang forth the supplication, echoing from rock and fell, as thepeople of Claudiodunum streamed forth in the May sunshine to invokea blessing on the cornlands, olives, and vineyards that won vantage-ground on the terraces carefully kept up on the slopes of thewonderful needle-shaped hills of Auvergne. 

Very recently had the Church of Gaul commenced the custom of goingforth, on the days preceding the Ascension feast, to chant Litanies, calling down the Divine protection on field and fold, corn and wine, basket and store. It had been begun in a time of deadly peril fromfamine and earthquake, wild beast and wilder foes, and it had beenadopted in the neighbouring dioceses as a regular habit, as indeedit continued throughout the Western Church during the fourteensubsequent centuries. 

One great procession was formed by different bands. The childrenwere in two troops, a motley collection of all shades; the deepolive and the rolling black eye betraying Ethiopian or Moorish slaveancestry, the soft dark complexion and deep brown eye showing theRoman, and the rufous hair and freckled skin the lower grade ofCymric Kelt, while a few had the more stately pose, violet eye, andblack hair of the Gael. The boys were marshalled with extremedifficulty by two or three young monks; their sisters walked farmore orderly, under the care of some consecrated virgin of matureage. The men formed another troop, the hardy mountaineers stillwearing the Gallic trousers and plaid, though the artisans andmechanics from the town were clad in the tunic and cloak that werethe later Roman dress, and such as could claim the right folded overthem the white, purple-edged scarf to which the toga had dwindled. 

Among the women there was the same scale of decreasing nationalityof costume according to rank, though the culmination was inresemblance to the graceful classic robe of Rome instead of the lastParisian mode. The poorer women wore bright, dark crimson, or bluein gown or wrapping veil; the ladies were mostly in white or black, as were also the clergy, excepting such as had officiated at theprevious Eucharist, and who wore their brilliant priestly vestments, heavy with gold and embroidery. 

Beautiful alike to eye and ear was the procession, above all from adistance, now filing round a delicate young green wheatfield, nowlost behind a rising hill, now glancing through a vineyard, orcontrasting with the gray tints of the olive, all that wasincongruous or disorderly unseen, and all that was discordantunheard, as only the harmonious cadence of the united response waswafted fitfully on the breeze to the two elderly men who, unable toscale the wild mountain paths in the procession, had, after theprevious service in the basilica and the blessing of the nearerlands, returned to the villa, where they sat watching its progress. 

It was as entirely a Roman villa as the form of the ground and theneed of security would permit. Lying on the slope of a steep hill, which ran up above into a fantastic column or needle piercing thesky, the courts of the villa were necessarily a succession ofterraces, levelled and paved with steps of stone or marble leadingfrom one to the other. A strong stone wall enclosed the whole, cloistered, as a protection from sun and storm. The lowest courthad a gateway strongly protected, and thence a broad walk with box-trees on either side, trimmed into fantastic shapes, led through alawn laid out in regular flower-beds to the second court, which waspaved with polished marble, and had a fountain in the midst, withvases of flowers, and seats around. Above was another broad flightof stone steps, leading to a portico running along the whole frontof the house, with the principal chambers opening into it. Behindlay another court, serving as stables for the horses and mules, asfarmyard, and with the quarters of the slaves around it, and higherup there stretched a dense pine forest protecting the wholeestablishment from avalanches and torrents of stones from themountain peak above. 

Under the portico, whose pillars were cut from the richly-colourednative marbles, reposed the two friends on low couches. 

One was a fine-looking man, with a grand bald forehead, encircledwith a wreath of oak, showing that in his time he had rescued aRoman's life. He also wore a richly-embroidered purple toga, thetoken of high civic rank, for he had put on his full insignia as asenator and of consular rank to do honour to the ceremonial. Indeedhe would not have abstained from accompanying the procession, butthat his guest, though no more aged than himself, was manifestlyunequal to the rugged expedition, begun fasting in the morning chilland concluded, likewise fasting, in the noonday heat. Still, itwould scarcely have distressed those sturdy limbs, well developedand preserved by Roman training, never permitted by him todegenerate into effeminacy. And as his fine countenance and well-knit frame testified, Marcus AEmilius Victorinus inherited no smallshare of genuine Roman blood. His noble name might be derivedthrough clientela, and his lineage had a Gallic intermixture; butthe true Quirite predominated in his character and temperament. Thecitizenship of his family dated back beyond the first establishmentof the colony, and rank, property, and personal qualities alikerendered him the first man in the district, its chief magistrate, and protector from the Visigoths, who claimed it as part of theirkingdom of Aquitania. 

So much of the spirit of Vercingetorix survived among the remnant ofhis tribe that Arvernia had never been overrun and conquered, buthad held out until actually ceded by one of the degenerate Augustiat Ravenna, and then favourable terms had been negotiated, partly byAEmilius the Senator, as he was commonly called, and partly by thehonoured friend who sat beside him, another relic of the good oldtimes when Southern Gaul enjoyed perfect peace as a favouredprovince of the Empire. This guest was a man of less personalbeauty than the Senator, and more bowed and aged, but with care andill-health more than years, for the two had been comrades in school, fellow-soldiers and magistrates, working simultaneously, and withfirm, mutual trust all their days. 

The dress of the visitor was shaped like that of the senator, but ofsomewhat richer and finer texture. He too wore the TOGAPRAETEXTATA, but he had a large gold cross hanging on his breast andan episcopal ring on his finger; and instead of the wreath of bay hemight have worn, and which encircled his bust in the Capitol, thescanty hair on his finely-moulded head showed the marks of thetonsure. His brow was a grand and expansive one; his gray eyes werefull of varied expression, keen humour, and sagacity; a loftydevotion sometimes changing his countenance in a wonderful manner, even in the present wreck of his former self, when the cheeks showedfurrows worn by care and suffering, and the once flexible andresolute mouth had fallen in from loss of teeth. For this was thescholar, soldier, poet, gentleman, letter-writer, statesman, Sidonius Apollinaris, who had stood on the steps of the Imperialthrone of the West, had been crowned as an orator in the Capitol, and then had been called by the exigences of his country to give uphis learned ease and become the protector of the Arvernii as apatriot Bishop, where he had well and nobly served his God and hiscountry, and had won the respect, not only of the Catholic Gauls butof the Arian Goths. Jealousy and evil tongues had, however, prevailed to cause his banishment from his beloved hills, and whenhe repaired to the court of King Euric to solicit permission toreturn, he was long detained there, and had only just obtainedlicense to go back to his See. He had arrived only a day or twopreviously at the villa, exhausted by his journey, and thoughdeclaring that his dear mountain breezes must needs restore him, andthat it was a joy to inhale them, yet, as he heard of theoppressions that were coming on his people, the mountain gales couldonly 'a momentary bliss bestow, ' and AEmilius justly feared that thedecay of his health had gone too far for even the breezes and bathsof Arvernia to reinvigorate him. 

His own mountain estate, where dwelt his son, was of difficultaccess early in the year, and AEmilius hoped to persuade him to restin the villa till after Pentecost, and then to bless the nuptials ofColumba AEmilia, the last unwedded daughter of the house, with TitusJulius Verronax, a young Arvernian chief of the lineage ofVercingetorix, highly educated in all Latin and Greek culture, and aRoman citizen much as a Highland chieftain is an Englishman. Hishome was on an almost inaccessible peak, or PUY, which the Senatorpointed out to the Bishop, saying--

"I would fain secure such a refuge for my family in case the tyrannyof the barbarians should increase. "

"Are there any within the city?" asked the Bishop. "I rejoice tosee that thou art free from the indignity of having any quarteredupon thee. "

"For which I thank Heaven, " responded the Senator. "The nearest areon the farm of Deodatus, in the valley. There is a stout oldwarrior named Meinhard who calls himself of the King's Trust; not abad old fellow in himself to deal with, but with endless sons, followers, and guests, whom poor Deodatus and Julitta have to keepsupplied with whatever they choose to call for, being forced towitness their riotous orgies night after night. "

"Even so, we are far better off than our countrymen who have theheathen Franks for their lords. "

"That Heaven forbid!" said AEmilius. "These Goths are at leastChristians, though heretics, yet I shall be heartily glad when thecircuit of Deodatus's fields is over. The good man would not havethem left unblest, but the heretical barbarians make it a point ofhonour not to hear the Blessed Name invoked without mockery, such asour youths may hardly brook. "

"They are unarmed, " said the Bishop. 

"True; but, as none knows better than thou dost, dear father andfriend, the Arvernian blood has not cooled since the days of CaiusJulius Caesar, and offences are frequent among the young men. Sooften has our community had to pay 'wehrgeld, ' as the barbarianscall the price they lay upon blood, that I swore at last that Iwould never pay it again, were my own son the culprit. "

"Such oaths are perilous, " said Sidonius. "Hast thou never hadcause to regret this?"

"My father, thou wouldst have thought it time to take strongmeasures to check the swaggering of our young men and the foolishprovocations that cost more than one life. One would stick apeacock's feather in his cap and go strutting along with folded armsand swelling breast, and when the Goths scowled at him and calledhim by well-deserved names, a challenge would lead to a deadlycombat. Another such fight was caused by no greater offence thanthe treading on a dog's tail; but in that it was the Roman, or moretruly the Gaul, who was slain, and I must say the 'wehrgeld' washonourably paid. It is time, however, that such groundlessconflicts should cease; and, in truth, only a barbarian could besatisfied to let gold atone for life. "

"It is certainly neither Divine law nor human equity, " said theBishop. "Yet where no distinction can be made between thedeliberate murder and the hasty blow, I have seen cause to bethankful for the means of escaping the utmost penalty. Has thisoath had the desired effect?"

"There has been only one case since it was taken, " replied AEmilius. "That was a veritable murder. A vicious, dissolute lad stabbed awounded Goth in a lonely place, out of vengeful spite. I readilydelivered him up to the kinsfolk for justice, and as this proved meto be in earnest, these wanton outrages have become much more rare. Unfortunately, however, the fellow was son to one of the widows ofthe Church--a holy woman, and a favourite of my little Columba, whodaily feeds and tends the poor thing, and thinks her old father verycruel. "

"Alas! from the beginning the doom of the guilty has struck theinnocent, " said the Bishop. 

"In due retribution, as even the heathen knew. " Perfectfamiliarity with the great Greek tragedians was still the mark of agentleman, and then Sidonius quoted from Sophocles--

 Compass'd with dazzling light, Throned on Olympus's height, His front the Eternal God uprearsBy toils unwearied, and unaged by years; Far back, through ages past, Far on, through time to come, Hath been, and still must last, Sin's never-changing doom. 

AEmilius capped it from AEschylus--

But Justice holds her equal scales With ever-waking eye;O'er some her vengeful might prevails When their life's sun is high; On some her vigorous judgments light In that dread pause 'twixt day and night, Life's closing, twilight hour. But soon as once the genial plainHas drunk the life-blood of the slain, Indelible the spots remain, And aye for vengeance call. 

"Yea, " said the Bishop, "such was the universal law given to Noahere the parting of the nations--blood for blood! And yet, whereshould we be did not Mercy rejoice against Justice, and the Blood ofSprinkling speak better things than the blood of Abel? Nay, thinknot that I blame thee, my dear brother. Thou art the judge of thypeople, and well do I know that one act of stern justice often, asin this instance, prevents innumerable deeds of senseless violence. "

"Moreover, " returned the Senator, "it was by the relaxing of theancient Roman sternness of discipline and resolution that thehorrors of the Triumvirate began, and that, later on, spirit decayedand brought us to our present fallen state. "

By this time the procession, which had long since passed from theirsight, was beginning to break up and disperse. A flock of littlechildren first appeared, all of whom went aside to the slaves'quarters except one, who came running up the path between the box-trees. He was the eldest grandson and namesake of the Senator, adark-eyed, brown-haired boy of seven, with the golden bulla hanginground his neck. Up he came to the old man's knee, proud to tell howhe had scaled every rock, and never needed any help from thepedagogue slave who had watched over him. 

"Sawest thou any barbarians, my Victorinus?" asked his grandfather. 

"They stood thickly about Deodatus's door, and Publius said theywere going to mock; but we looked so bold and sang so loud that theydurst not. And Verronax is come down, papa, with Celer; and Celerwanted to sing too, but they would not let him, and he was so goodthat he was silent the moment his master showed him the leash. "

"Then is Celer a hound?" asked the Bishop, amused. 

"A hound of the old stock that used to fight battles for Bituitus, "returned the child. "Oh, papa, I am so hungry. "

He really did say 'papa, ' the fond domestic name which passed fromthe patriarch of the household to the Father of the Roman Church. 

"Thy mother is watching for thee. Run to her, and she will givethee a cake--aye, and a bath before thy dinner. So Verronax iscome. I am glad thou wilt see him, my father. The youth has grownup with my own children, and is as dear to me as my own son. Ah, here comes my Columba!"

For the maidens were by this time returning, and Columba, robed inwhite, with a black veil, worn mantilla fashion over her raven hair, so as to shade her soft, liquid, dark eyes, came up the steps, andwith a graceful obeisance to her father and the Bishop, took theseat to which the former drew her beside them. 

"Has all gone well, my little dove?" asked her father. 

"Perfectly well so far, my father, " she replied; but there wasanxiety in her eyes until the gate again opened and admitted themale contingent of the procession. No sooner had she seen themsafely advancing up the box avenue than she murmured something aboutpreparing for the meal, and, desiring a dismissal from her father, disappeared into the women's apartments, while the old man smiled ather pretty maidenly modesty. 

Of the three men who were advancing, one, Marcus AEmilius, aboutseven or eight and twenty years of age, was much what the Senatormust have been at his age--sturdy, resolute, with keen eyes, andcrisp, curled, short black hair. His younger brother, Lucius, wastaller, slighter, more delicately made, with the same pensiveItalian eyes as his sister, and a gentle, thoughtful countenance. The tonsure had not yet touched his soft, dark brown locks; but itwas the last time he would march among the laity, for, both by hisown desire and that of his dead mother, he was destined to thepriesthood. Beside these two brothers came a much taller figure. The Arvernii seem to have been Gael rather than Cymri, and themountain chief, Titus Julius Verronax, as the Romans rendered hisname of Fearnagh, was of the purest descent. He had thick, wavychestnut hair, not cut so short as that of the Romans, though keptwith the same care. His eyebrows were dark, his eyes, both in hueand brightness, like a hawk's, his features nobly moulded, and histall form, though large and stately, was in perfect symmetry, andhad the free bearing and light springiness befitting a mountaineer. He wore the toga as an official scarf, but was in his national garbof the loose trousers and short coat, and the gold torq round hisneck had come to him from prehistoric ages. He had the short Romansword in his belt, and carried in his hand a long hunting-spear, without which he seldom stirred abroad, as it served him both asalpenstock and as defence against the wolves and bears of themountains. Behind him stalked a magnificent dog, of a kindapproaching the Irish wolfhound, a perfect picture of gracefuloutline and of strength, swiftness, and dignity, slightly shaggy, and of tawny colouring--in all respects curiously like his master. 

In language, learning, and manners Verronax the Arvernian was, however, a highly cultivated Roman, as Sidonius perceived in thefirst word of respectful welcome that he spoke when presented to theBishop. 

All had gone off well. Old Meinhard had been on the watch, and hadrestrained any insult, if such had been intended, by the otherGoths, who had stood watching in silence the blessing of the fieldsand vineyards of Deodatus. 

The peril over, the AEmilian household partook cheerfully of thesocial meal. Marina, the wife of Marcus, and Columba sat on carvedchairs, the men of the family reclining on the couches constructedto hold three. The bright wit of Sidonius, an eminentconversationalist, shone the more brightly for his rejoicing at hisreturn to his beloved country and flock, and to the friend of hisyouth. There were such gleams in the storms that were overwhelmingthe tottering Empire, to which indeed these men belonged only inheart and in name. 

The meal was for a fast day, and consisted of preparations of eggs, milk, flour, and fish from the mountain streams, but daintilycooked, for the traditions of the old Roman gastronomy survived, andMarina, though half a Gaul, was anxious that her housekeeping shouldshine in the eyes of the Bishop, who in his secular days had beenknown to have a full appreciation of the refinements of the table. 

When the family rose and the benediction had been pronounced, Columba was seen collecting some of the remnants in a basket. 

"Thou surely dost not intend going to that widow of thine to-day, "exclaimed her sister-in-law, Marina, "after such a walk on themountain?"

"Indeed I must, sister, " replied Columba; "she was in much pain andweakness yesterday, and needs me more than usual. "

"And it is close to the farm of Deodatus, " Marina continued toobject, "where, the slaves tell me, there are I know not how manyfresh barbarian guests!"

"I shall of course take Stentor and Athenais, " said Columba. 

"A pair of slaves can be of no use. Marcus, dost thou hear? Forbidthy sister's folly. "

"I will guard my sister, " said Lucius, becoming aware of what waspassing. 

"Who should escort her save myself?" said the graceful Verronax, turning at the same moment from replying to some inquiries from theBishop. 

"I doubt whether his escort be not the most perilous thing of all, "sighed Marina. 

"Come, Marina, " said her husband good-humouredly, "be not always aboder of ill. Thou deemest a Goth worse than a gorgon or hydra, whereas, I assure you, they are very good fellows after all, if youstand up to them like a man, and trust their word. Old Meinhard isa capital hunting comrade. "

Wherewith the worthy Marcus went off with his little son at hisheels to inspect the doings of the slaves in the farm-court in therear, having no taste for the occupation of his father and theBishop, who composed themselves to listen to a MS. Of the letters ofS. Gregory Nazianzen, which Sidonius had lately acquired, and whichwas read aloud to them by a secretary slave. 

Some time had thus passed when a confused sound made the Senatorstart up. He beheld his daughter and her escort within the lowercourt, but the slaves were hastily barring the gates behind them, and loud cries of "Justice! Vengeance!" in the Gothic tongue, struck his only too well-accustomed ears. 

Columba flung herself before him, crying--

"O father, have pity! It was for our holy faith. "

"He blasphemed, " was all that was uttered by Verronax, on whosedress there was blood. 

"Open the gates, " called out the Senator, as the cry outside waxedlouder. "None shall cry for justice in vain at the gate of anAEmilius. Go, Marcus, admit such as have a right to enter and beheard. Rise, my daughter, show thyself a true Roman and Christianmaiden before these barbarians. And thou, my son, alas, what hastthou done?" he added, turning to Verronax, and taking his arm whilewalking towards the tribunal, where he did justice as chiefmagistrate of the Roman settlement. 

A few words told all. While Columba was engaged with her sickwidow, a young stranger Goth strolled up, one who had stood combinghis long fair hair, and making contemptuous gestures as the Rogationprocession passed in the morning. He and his comrades beganoffensively to scoff at the two young men for having taken part inthe procession, uttering the blasphemies which the invocation of ourBlessed Lord was wont to call forth. 

Verronax turned wrathfully round, a hasty challenge passed, a rapidexchange of blows; and while the Arvernian received only a slightscratch, the Goth fell slain before the hovel. His comrades wereunarmed and intimidated. They rushed back to fetch weapons from thehouse of Deodatus, and there had been full time to take Columbasafely home, Verronax and his dog stalking statelily in the rear asher guardians. 

"Thou shouldst have sought thine impregnable crag, my son, " said theSenator sadly. 

"To bring the barbarian vengeance upon this house?" respondedVerronax. 

"Alas, my son, thou know'st mine oath. "

"I know it, my father. "

"It forbids not thy ransoming thyself. "

Verronax smiled slightly, and touched the collar at his throat. 

"This is all the gold that I possess. "

The Senator rapidly appraised it with his eye. There was a regulartariff on the lives of free Romans, free Goths, guests, and trustedmen of the King; and if the deceased were merely a LITE, or freemanof the lowest rank, it was just possible that the gold collar mightpurchase its master's life, provided he were not too proud to partwith the ancestral badge. 

By this time the tribunal had been reached--a special portion of theperistyle, with a curule chair, inlaid with ivory, placed on atesselated pavement, as in the old days of the Republic, and aservant on each side held the lictor's axe and bundle of rods, whichbetokened stern Roman justice, wellnigh a mockery now. The forum ofthe city would have been the regular place, but since an earthquakehad done much damage there, and some tumults had taken place amongthe citizens, the seat of judgment had by general consent beenplaced in the AEmilian household as the place of chief security, andas he was the accredited magistrate with their Gothic masters, asSidonius had been before his banishment. 

As Sidonius looked at the grave face of the Senator, set like arock, but deadly pale, he thought it was no unworthy representativeof Brutus or Manlius of old who sat on that seat. 

Alas! would he not be bound by his fatal oath to be only too true arepresentative of their relentless justice?

On one side of the judgment-seat stood Verronax, towering above allaround; behind him Marina and Columba, clinging together, tremblingand tearful, but their weeping restrained by the looks of theSenator, and by a certain remnant of hope. 

To the other side advanced the Goths, all much larger and taller menthan any one except the young Gaulish chieftain. The foremost was arugged-looking veteran, with grizzled locks and beard, and asunburnt face. This was Meinhard, the head of the garrison onDeodatus's farm, a man well known to AEmilius, and able to speakLatin enough to hold communication with the Romans. Several youngermen pressed rudely behind him, but they were evidently impressed bythe dignity of the tribunal, though it was with a loud and fierceshout that they recognised Verronax standing so still and unmoved. 

"Silence!" exclaimed the Senator, lifting his ivory staff. 

Meinhard likewise made gestures to hush them, and they ceased, whilethe Senator, greeting Meinhard and inviting him to share his seat ofauthority, demanded what they asked. 

"Right!" was their cry. "Right on the slayer of Odorik, the son ofOdo, of the lineage of Odin, our guest, and of the King's trust. "

"Right shall ye have, O Goths, " returned AEmilius. "A Roman neverflinches from justice. Who are witnesses to the deed? Didst thoubehold it, O Meinhard, son of Thorulf?"

"No, noble AEmilius. It had not been wrought had I been present;but here are those who can avouch it. Stand forth, Egilulf, son ofAmalrik. "

"It needs not, " said Verronax. "I acknowledge the deed. The Gothscoffed at us for invoking a created Man. I could not stand by tohear my Master insulted, and I smote him, but in open fight, whereofI bear the token. "

"That is true, " said Meinhard. "I know that Verronax, theArvernian, would strike no coward blow. Therefore did I withholdthese comrades of Odorik from rushing on thee in their fury; butnone the less art thou in feud with Odo, the father of Odorik, whowill require of thee either thy blood or the wehrgeld. "

"Wehrgeld I have none to pay, " returned Verronax, in the same calmvoice. 

"I have sworn!" said AEmilius in a clear low voice, steady but fullof suppressed anguish. A shriek was heard among the women, andSidonius stepped forth and demanded the amount of wehrgeld. 

"That must be for King Euric to decide, " returned Meinhard. "Hewill fix the amount, and it will be for Odo to choose whether hewill accept it. The mulct will be high, for the youth was of highBaltic blood, and had but lately arrived with his father from thenorth!"

"Enough, " said Verronax. "Listen, Meinhard. Thou knowest me, andthe Arvernian faith. Leave me this night to make my peace withHeaven and my parting with man. At the hour of six to-morrowmorning, I swear that I will surrender myself into thine hands to bedealt with as it may please the father of this young man. "

"So let it be, Meinhard, " said AEmilius, in a stifled voice. 

"I know AEmilius, and I know Verronax, " returned the Goth. 

They grasped hands, and then Meinhard drew off his followers, leaving two, at the request of Marcus, to act as sentinels at thegate. 

The Senator sat with his hands clasped over his face in unutterablegrief, Columba threw herself into the arms of her betrothed, Marinatore her hair, and shrieked out--

"I will not hold my peace! It is cruel! It is wicked! It isbarbarous!"

"Silence, Marina, " said Verronax. "It is just! I am no ignorantchild. I knew the penalty when I incurred it! My Columba, remember, though it was a hasty blow, it was in defence of ourMaster's Name. "

The thought might comfort her by and by; as yet it could not. 

The Senator rose and took his hand. 

"Thou dost forgive me, my son?" he said. 

"I should find it hard to forgive one who lessened my respect forthe AEmilian constancy, " returned Verronax. 

Then he led Marcus aside to make arrangements with him respectinghis small mountain estate and the remnant of his tribe, since Marinawas his nearest relative, and her little son would, if he were cutoff, be the sole heir to the ancestral glories of Vercingetorix. 

"And I cannot stir to save such a youth as that!" cried the Senatorin a tone of agony as he wrung the hand of Sidonius. "I have boundmine own hands, when I would sell all I have to save him. O myfriend and father, well mightest thou blame my rashness, and doubtthe justice that could be stern where the heart was not touched. "

"But I am not bound by thine oath, my friend, " said Sidonius. "Trueit is that the Master would not be served by the temporal sword, yetsuch zeal as that of this youth merits that we should strive todeliver him. Utmost justice would here be utmost wrong. May I sendone of your slaves as a messenger to my son to see what he canraise? Though I fear me gold and silver is more scarce than it wasin our younger days. "

This was done, and young Lucius also took a summons from the Bishopto the deacons of the Church in the town, authorising the use of thesacred vessels to raise the ransom, but almost all of these had beenalready parted with in the time of a terrible famine which hadravaged Arvernia a few years previously, and had denuded all thewealthy and charitable families of their plate and jewels. IndeedVerronax shrank from the treasure of the Church being thus applied. Columba might indeed weep for him exultingly as a martyr, but, as hewell knew, martyrs do not begin as murderers, and passion, pugnacity, and national hatred had been uppermost with him. It wasthe hap of war, and he was ready to take it patiently, and preparehimself for death as a brave Christian man, but not a hero or amartyr; and there was little hope either that a ransom soconsiderable as the rank of the parties would require could beraised without the aid of the AEmilii, or that, even if it were, thefierce old father would accept it. The more civilised Goths, whosefamilies had ranged Italy, Spain, and Aquitaine for two or threegenerations, made murder the matter of bargain that had shockedAEmilius; but this was an old man from the mountain cradle of therace, unsophisticated, and but lately converted. 

In the dawn of the summer morning Bishop Sidonius celebrated theHoly Eucharist for the mournful family in the oratory, a vaultedchamber underground, which had served the same purpose in the daysof persecution, and had the ashes of two tortured martyrs of theAEmilian household, mistress and slave, enshrined together beneaththe altar, which had since been richly inlaid with coloured marble. 

Afterwards a morning meal was served for Verronax and for the elderAEmilius, who intended to accompany him on his sad journey toBordigala, where the King and the father of Odorik were known to beat the time. Sidonius, who knew himself to have some interest withEuric, would fain have gone with them, but his broken healthrendered a rapid journey impossible, and he hoped to serve thefriends better by remaining to console the two women, and toendeavour to collect the wehrgeld in case it should be accepted. 

The farewells, owing to the Roman dignity of AEmilius and the proudself-respect of the Arvernian, were more calm than had been feared. Even thus, thought Sidonius, must Vercingetorix have looked when hemounted his horse and rode from his lines at Alesia to save hispeople, by swelling Caesar's triumph and dying beneath the Capitol. Oh, ABSIT OMEN! Columba was borne up by hopes which Verronax wouldnot dash to the ground, and she received his embrace with steadfast, though brimming eyes, and an assurance that she would pray withoutceasing. 

Lucius was not to be found, having no doubt gone forward, intendingto direct his friend on his journey, and there part with him; butthe saddest part of the whole was the passionate wailings andbemoanings of the remnants of his clan. One of his attendants hadcarried the tidings; wild Keltic men and women had come down for onelast sight of their Fearnagh MacFearccadorigh, as they called him byhis true Gaulish name--passionately kissing his hands and the hem ofhis mantle, beating their breasts amid howls of lamentation, andthrowing themselves in his path, as, with the high spirit whichcould not brook to be fetched as a criminal, he made his way to thegate. 

Mounted on two strong mules, the only animals serviceable in themountain paths, the Senator and Verronax passed the gate, Marcuswalking beside them. 

"We are beforehand with the Goth, " said Verronax, as he came out. 

"Lazy hounds!" said Marcus. "Their sentinels have vanished. Itwould serve them right if thou didst speed over the border to theBurgundians!"

"I shall have a laugh at old Meinhard, " said Verronax. "Little heknows of discipline. "

"No doubt they have had a great lyke wake, as they barbarously calltheir obsequies, " said the Senator, "and are sleeping off theirliquor. "

"We will rouse them, " said the Arvernian; "it will be better thanstartling poor Columba. "

So on they moved, the wildly-clad, barefooted Gauls, with locksstreaming in the wind, still keeping in the rear. They reached thelong, low farm-buildings belonging to Deodatus, a half-bred RomanGaul, with a large vineyard and numerous herds of cattle. The placewas wonderfully quiet. The Goths seemed to be indulging in verysound slumbers after their carouse, for nothing was to be seen butthe slaves coming in with bowls of milk from the cattle. Some ofthem must have given notice of the approach of the Senator, forDeodatus came to his door with the salutation, "AVE CLARISSIME!" andthen stood staring at Verronax, apparently petrified with wonder;and as the young chief demanded where was Meinhard, he broke forth--

"Does his nobility ask me? It is two hours since every Goth quittedthe place, except the dead man in the house of the widow Dubhina, and we are breathing freely for once in our lives. Up they wenttowards the AEmilian villa with clamour and threats enough to makeone's blood run cold, and they must be far on their way to BordigalaGergovia by this time. "

"His nobility must have passed through their midst unseen andunheard!" cried old Julitta, a hardworking, dried-up woman, claspingher sinewy, wrinkled hands; "a miracle, and no wonder, since ourholy Bishop has returned. "

The excitable household was on the point of breaking out intoacclamation, but Verronax exclaimed: "Silence, children! Miraclesare not for the bloodguilty. If it be, as I fear, they have metLucius and seized him in my stead, we must push on at once to savehim. "

"Meinhard could not mistake your persons, " returned AEmilius; butwhile he was speaking, a messenger came up and put into his hand oneof the waxen tablets on which notes were written--

L. AEM. VIC. TO M. AEM. VIC. S. Q. , --Pardon and bless thy son. Meinhard assures me that I shall be accepted as equal in birth andaccessory to the deed. Remember Columba and the value of Verronax'slife, and let me save him. Consent and hold him back. Greet allthe dear ones. --VALE. 

The little tablet could hold no more than this--almost every wordcurtailed. The Senator's firm lip quivered at last as he exclaimed, "My brave son. Thus does he redeem his father's rash oath!"

Verronax, whose Roman breeding had held his impulsive Keltic naturein check as long as it was only himself that was in danger, nowbroke into loud weeping--

"My Lucius! my brother beloved! and didst thou deem Arvernian honourfallen so low that I could brook such a sacrifice? Let us hasten oninstantly, my father, while yet it is time!"

It would have been impossible to withhold him, and Marcus returnedwith the strange tidings, while his father and Verronax set forthwith a few servants, mounted like themselves on mules, to reach thebroad Roman road that led from Gergovia to Bordigala. Three wild, barefooted Gauls of Verronax's clan shook their heads at all hisattempts to send them home, and went running along after him withthe same fidelity as poor Celer, whom he had left tied up at thevilla as his parting gift to little Victorinus, but who had brokenloose, and came bounding to his master, caressing him with nose andtongue at their first halt. 

There had been, as in all Roman roads, regular posting stations atintervals along the way, where horses and mules could be hired, butthe troubles of the Empire, invasion, and scarcity had greatlydisturbed the system. Many of the stations were deserted, and atothers either the whole of the animals, or all the fleeter ones, hadbeen taken up by Meinhard and his convoy. Indeed it almost seemedthat not only Lucius was anxious not to be overtaken, but thatMeinhard was forwarding his endeavours to consummate his sacrificebefore the Arvernian could prevent it. 

Hotly did Verronax chafe at each hindrance. He would have dashedonwards with feverish head-long speed, using his own fleet limbswhen he could not obtain a horse, but AEmilius feared to trust himalone, lest, coming too late to rescue Lucius, he should bring onhimself the fury of the Goths, strike perhaps in revenge, and notonly lose his own life and render the sacrifice vain, but imperilmany more. 

So, while making all possible speed, he bound the young Arvernian, by all the ties of paternal guardianship and authority, to give hisword not to use his lighter weight and youthful vigour to outstripthe rest of the party. 

The Senator himself hardly knew what was his own wish, for if hisfatherly affection yearned over his gentle, dutiful, studiousLucius, yet Columba's desolation, and the importance of Verronax asa protector for his family, so weighed down the other scale, that hecould only take refuge in 'committing his way unto the Lord. '

The last halting-place was at a villa belonging to a Roman, wherethey heard that an assembly was being held in the fields nearBordigala for judgment on the slaughter of a young Goth of highrank. On learning how deeply they were concerned, their host lentthem two horses, and rode with them himself, as they hastened on inspeechless anxiety. 

These early Teutonic nations all had their solemn assemblies in theopen air, and the Goths had not yet abandoned the custom, so that asthe Senator and the chieftain turned the summit of the last low hillthey could see the plain beneath swarming like an ant-hill withpeople, and as they pressed onward they could see a glittering tent, woven with cloth of gold, a throne erected in front, and around it aspace cleared and guarded by a huge circle of warriors (LITES), whose shields joined so as to form a wall. 

Near the throne stood the men of higher degree, all alike to jointhe King in his judgment, like the Homeric warriors of old, asindeed Sidonius had often said that there was no better comment onthe ILIAD than the meetings of the barbarians. 

By the time AEmilius and Verronax had reached the spot, and gainedan entrance in virtue of their rank and concern in the matter, Euricsat enthroned in the midst of the assembly. He was far removed frombeing a savage, though he had won his crown by the murder of hisbrother. He and the counts (comrades) around him wore the Romangarb, and used by preference the Latin speech, learning, arms, andhabits, just as European civilisation is adopted by the Egyptian orJapanese of the present day. He understood Roman jurisprudence, andwas the author of a code for the Goths, but in a case like this hewas obliged to conform to national customs. 

There he sat, a small, light-complexioned man, of slighter make thanthose around him, holding in his hand a scroll. It was a letterfrom Sidonius, sent beforehand by a swift-footed mountaineer, andcontaining a guarantee for 1200 soldi, twice the price for a Goth ofordinary rank. On the one side stood, unbound and unguarded, theslender form of Lucius; on the other a gigantic old Visigoth, blind, and with long streaming snowy hair and beard, his face stern withgrief and passion, and both his knotted hands crossed upon thehandle of a mighty battle-axe. 

The King had evidently been explaining to him the terms of theBishop's letter, for the first words that met the ear of AEmiliuswere--

"Nay, I say nay, King Euric. Were I to receive treble the weight ofgold, how should that enable me to face my son in the halls of Odin, with his blood unavenged?"

There was a murmur, and the King exclaimed--

"Now, now, Odo, we know no more of Odin. "

"Odin knows us no more, " retorted the old man, "since we have washedourselves in the Name of another than the mighty Thor, and taken upthe weakly worship of the conquered. So my son would have it! Hetalked of a new Valhal of the Christian; but let him meet me wherehe will, he shall not reproach me that he only of all his brethrendied unavenged. Where is the slayer? Set him before me that I maystrike him dead with one blow!"

Lucius crossed himself, looked upwards, and was stepping forwards, when Verronax with a shout of 'Hold!' leapt into the midst, fullbefore the avenger's uplifted weapon, crying--

"Slay me, old man! It was I who killed thy son, I, Fearnagh theArvernian!"

"Ho!" said Odo. "Give me thine hand. Let me feel thee. Yea, thesebe sinews! It is well. I marvelled how my Odorik should havefallen by the soft Roman hand of yonder stripling; but thou art aworthy foe. What made the priestling thrust himself between me andmy prey?"

"His generous love, " returned Verronax, as Lucius flung himself onhis neck, crying--

"O my Verronax, why hast thou come? The bitterness of death waspast! The gates were opening. "

Meanwhile AEmilius had reached Euric, and had made him understandthe substitution. Old Odo knew no Latin, and it was the King, anable orator in both tongues, who expounded all in Gothic, showinghow Lucius AEmilius had offered his life in the stead of his friend, and how Verronax had hurried to prevent the sacrifice, reiterating, almost in a tone of command, the alternative of the wehrgeld. 

The lites all burst into acclamations at the nobility of the twoyoung men, and some muttered that they had not thought these Romanshad so much spirit. 

Euric made no decision. He did full justice to the courage andfriendship of the youths, and likewise to the fact that Odorik hadprovoked the quarrel, and had been slain in fair fight; but thechoice lay with the father, and perhaps in his heart the politicVisigoth could not regret that Arvernia should lose a champion sureto stand up for Roman or national claims. 

Odo listened in silence, leaning on his axe. Then he turned hisface to the bystanders, and demanded of them--

"Which of them is the bolder? Which of them flinched at my axe?"

The spectators were unanimous that neither had blenched. Theslender lad had presented himself as resolutely as the statelywarrior. 

"It is well, " said Odo. "Either way my son will be worthilyavenged. I leave the choice to you, young men. "

A brief debate ended in an appeal to the Senator, who, in spite ofall his fortitude, could not restrain himself from groaning aloud, hiding his face in his hands, and hoarsely saying, "Draw lots. "

"Yes, " said Euric; "commit the judgment to Heaven. "

It was hailed as a relief; but Lucius stipulated that the lotsshould be blessed by a Catholic priest, and Verronax mutteredimpatiently--

"What matters it? Let us make an end as quickly as may be!"

He had scarcely spoken when shouts were heard, the throng made way, the circle of lites opened, as, waving an olive branch, a wearied, exhausted rider and horse appeared, and staggering to the foot ofthe throne, there went down entirely spent, the words being justaudible, "He lives! Odorik lives!"

It was Marcus AEmilius, covered with dust, and at first unable toutter another word, as he sat on the ground, supported by hisbrother, while his father made haste to administer the wine handedto him by an attendant. 

"Am I in time?" he asked. 

"In time, my son, " replied his father, repeating his announcement inGothic. "Odorik lives!"

"He lives, he will live, " repeated Marcus, reviving. "I came notaway till his life was secure. "

"Is it truth?" demanded the old Goth. "Romans have slippery ways. "

Meinhard was quick to bear testimony that no man in Arvernia doubtedthe word of an AEmilius; but Marcus, taking a small dagger from hisbelt, held it out, saying--

"His son said that he would know this token. "

Odo felt it. "It is my son's knife, " he said, still cautiously;"but it cannot speak to say how it was taken from him. "

"The old barbarian heathen, " quoth Verronax, under his breath; "hewould rather lose his son than his vengeance. "

Marcus had gathered breath and memory to add, "Tell him Odorik saidhe would know the token of the red-breast that nested in the wingedhelm of Helgund. "

"I own the token, " said Odo. "My son lives. He needs novengeance. " He turned the handle of his axe downwards, passed it tohis left hand, and stretched the right to Verronax, saying, "Youngman, thou art brave. There is no blood feud between us. Odo, sonof Helgund, would swear friendship with you, though ye be Romans. "

"Compensation is still due according to the amount of the injury, "said the Senator scrupulously. "Is it not so, O King?"

Euric assented, but Odo exclaimed--

"No gold for me! When Odo, son of Helgund, forgives, he forgivesoutright. Where is my son?"

Food had by this time been brought by the King's order, and afterswallowing a few mouthfuls Marcus could stand and speak. 

Odorik, apparently dead, had been dragged by the Goths into the hutof the widow Dubhina to await his father's decision as to theburial, and the poor woman had been sheltered by her neighbour, Julitta, leaving the hovel deserted. 

Columba, not allowing her grief and suspense to interfere with hervisits of mercy to the poor woman, had come down as usual on theevening of the day on which her father and her betrothed had startedon their sad journey. Groans, not likely to be emitted by herregular patient, had startled her, and she had found the flooroccupied by the huge figure of a young Goth, his face and haircovered with blood from a deep wound on his head, insensible, buthis moans and the motion of his limbs betraying life. 

Knowing the bitter hatred in Claudiodunum for everything Gothic, thebrave girl would not seek for aid nearer than the villa. Thithershe despatched her male slave, while with her old nurse she did allin her power for the relief of the wounded man, with noinconsiderable skill. Marcus had brought the Greek physician of theplace, but he had done nothing but declare the patient a dead man byall the laws of Galen and Hippocrates. However, the skull andconstitution of a vigorous young Goth, fresh from the mountains, were tougher than could be imagined by a member of one of theexhausted races of the Levant. Bishop Sidonius had brought hisscience and sagacity to the rescue, and under his treatment Odorikhad been restored to his senses, and was on the fair way torecovery. 

On the first gleam of hope, Marcus had sent off a messenger, but somany of his household and dependents were absent that he had nogreat choice; so that as soon as hope had become security, he hadset forth himself; and it was well he had done so, for he hadovertaken the messenger at what was reckoned as three days' journeyfrom Bordigala. He had ridden ever since without rest, onlydismounting to change his steed, scarcely snatching even then amorsel of food, and that morning neither he nor the horse he rodehad relaxed for a moment the desperate speed with which he rodeagainst time; so that he had no cause for the shame and vexationthat he felt at his utter collapse before the barbarians. KingEuric himself declared that he wished he had a Goth who couldperform such a feat of endurance. 

While Marcus slept, AEmilius and the two young men offered theirheartfelt thanks in the Catholic church of Bordigala, and then Euricwould not be refused their presence at a great feast ofreconciliation on the following day, two of Verronax's speedy-footedfollowers having been sent off at once to bear home tidings that hisintelligence had been in time. 

The feast was served in the old proconsular house, with the Romanparaphernalia, arranged with the amount of correct imitation that isto be found at an English dinner-party in the abode of an IndianRajah. It began with Roman etiquette, but ended in a Gothic revel, which the sober and refined AEmilii could hardly endure. 

They were to set off on their return early on the morrow, Meinhardand Odo with them; but when they at length escaped from thebarbarian orgies, they had little expectation that their companionswould join them in the morning. 

However, the two Goths and their followers were on the alert as soonas they, and as cool-headed as if they had touched no drop of wine. 

Old Odo disdained a mule, and would let no hand save his own guidehis horse. Verronax and Lucius constituted themselves his guides, and whenever he permitted the slightest assistance, it was alwaysfrom the Arvernian, whom he seemed to regard as a sort of adoptedson. 

He felt over his weapons, and told him long stories, of whichVerronax understood only a word or two here and there, though theold man seemed little concerned thereat. Now and then he rode alongchanting to himself an extemporary song, which ran somewhat thus--

Maids who choose the slain, Disappointed now. The Hawk of the Mountain, The Wolf of the West, Meet in fierce combat. Sinks the bold Wolf-cub, Folds his wing the Falcon!Shall the soft priestlingStep before him to Valhal, Cheating Lok's daughterOf weak-hearted prey?Lo! the Wolf wakens. Valkyr relaxes, Waits for a battlefield, Wolf-cub to claim. Friendly the Falcon, Friendly the Gray-Wolf. 

So it ran on, to the great scandal of Lucius, who longed for betterknowledge of the Gothic tongue to convince the old man of the follyof his heathen dreams. Meinhard, who was likewise rather shocked, explained that the father and son had been recent arrivals, who hadbeen baptized because Euric required his followers to embrace hisfaith, but with little real knowledge or acceptance on the part ofthe father. Young Odorik had been a far more ardent convert; and, after the fashion of many a believer, had taken up the distinctionsof sect rather than of religion, and, zealous in the faith he knew, had thought it incumbent on him to insult the Catholics where theyseemed to him idolatrous. 

A message on the road informed the travellers that they would findOdorik at the villa. Thither then they went, and soon saw the wholehousehold on the steps in eager anticipation. A tall young figure, with a bandage still round his fair flowing locks, came down thesteps as Verronax helped the blind man to dismount; and Odo, with acry of 'My son!' with a ring of ecstasy in the sound, held the youthto his breast and felt him all over. 

"Are we friends?" said Odorik, turning to Verronax, when his fatherreleased him. 

"That is as thou wiliest, " returned the Arvernian gravely. 

"Know then, " said Odorik, "that I know that I erred. I knew not thyLord when I mocked thine honour to Him. Father, we had but halflearnt the Christian's God. I have seen it now. It was not thyblow, O Arvernian! that taught me; but the Master who inspiredyonder youth to offer his life, and who sent the maiden there towait upon her foe. He is more than man. I own in him the EternalCreator, Redeemer, and Lord!"

"Yea, " said Sidonius to his friend AEmilius, "a great work hath beenwrought out. Thus hath the parable of actual life led this zealousbut half-taught youth to enter into the higher truth. Lucius willbe none the worse priest for having trodden in the steps of Him whowas High-priest and Victim. Who may abide strict Divine Justice, had not One stood between the sinner and the Judge? Thus 'Mercy andTruth have met together; Righteousness and Peace have kissed eachother. '"

THE CAT OF CAT COPSE

A HAMPSHIRE TRADITION

I

The Dane! the Dane! The heathen DaneIs wasting Hampshire's coast again--From ravaged church and plundered farmFlash the dread beacons of alarm-- Fly, helpless peasants, fly!Ytene's green banks and forest shades, Her heathery slopes and gorse-clad glades Re-echo to the cry--Where is the King, whose strong right handHath oft from danger freed the land?Nor fleet nor covenant availsTo drive aloof those pirate sails, In vain is Alfred's sword;Vain seems in every sacred faneThe chant--'From fury of the Dane, Deliver us, good Lord. '

II

The long keels have the Needles past, Wight's fairest bowers are flaming fast;From Solent's waves rise many a mast, With swelling sails of gold and red, Dragon and serpent at each head, Havoc and slaughter breathing forth, Steer on these locusts of the north. Each vessel bears a deadly freight;Each Viking, fired with greed and hate, His axe is whetting for the strife, And counting how each Christian lifeShall win him fame in Skaldic lays, And in Valhalla endless praise. For Hamble's river straight they steer;Prayer is in vain, no aid is near--Hopeless and helpless all must die. Oh, fainting heart and failing eye, Look forth upon the foe once more!Why leap they not upon the shore?Why pause their keels upon the strand, As checked by some resistless hand?The sail they spread, the oars they ply, Yet neither may advance nor fly. 

III

Who is it holds them helpless there?'Tis He Who hears the anguished prayer; 'Tis He Who to the waveHath fixed the bound--mud, rock, or sand--To mark how far upon the strand Its foaming sweep may rave. What is it, but the ebbing tide, That leaves them here, by Hamble's side, So firm embedded in the mudNo force of stream, nor storm, nor flood, Shall ever these five ships bear forthTo fiords and islets of the north;A thousand years shall pass away, And leave those keels in Hamble's bay. 

IV

Ill were it in my rhyme to tellThe work of slaughter that befell;In sooth it was a savage time--Crime ever will engender crime. Each Viking, as he swam to land, Fell by a Saxon's vengeful hand;Turn we from all that vengeance wild--Where on the deck there cowered a child, And, closely to his bosom prest, A snow-white kitten found a nest. That tender boy, with tresses fair, Was Edric, Egbert's cherished heir;The plaything of the homestead he, Now fondled on his grandame's knee;Or as beside the hearth he sat, Oft sporting with his snow-white cat;Now by the chaplain taught to read, And lisp his Pater and his Creed;Well nurtured at his mother's side, And by his father trained to ride, To speak the truth, to draw the bow, And all an English Thane should know, His days had been as one bright dream--As smooth as his own river's stream!Until, at good King Alfred's call, Thane Egbert left his native hall. 

V

Then, five days later, shout and yell, And shrieks and howls of slaughter fell, Upon the peaceful homestead came. 'Mid flashing sword, and axe, and flame, Snatched by a Viking's iron grasp, From his slain mother's dying clasp, Saved from the household's flaming grave, Edric was dragged, a destined slave, Some northern dame to serve, or heedThe flocks that on the Saeter feed. Still, with scarce conscious hold he clungTo the white cat, that closely hungSeeking her refuge in his arm, Her shelter in the wild alarm--And who can tell how oft his moanWas soothed by her soft purring tone?Time keeping with retracted claw, Or patting with her velvet paw;Although of home and friends bereft, Still this one comforter was left, So lithe, so swift, so soft, so white, She might have seemed his guardian sprite. The rude Danes deemed her such;And whispered tales of 'disir' boundTo human lords, as bird or hound. Nor one 'mid all the fleet was found To hurt one tender paw. And when the captive knelt to prayNone would his orisons gainsay;For as they marked him day by day, Increased their wondering awe. 

VI

Crouched by the mast, the child and cat, Through the dire time of slaughter sat, By terror both spellbound;But when night came, a silence drearFell on the coast; and far or near, No voice caught Edric's wakeful ear, Save water's lapping sound. He wandered from the stern to prow, Ate of the stores, and marvelled how He yet might reach the ground;Till low and lower sank the tide, Dark banks of mud spread far and wide Around that fast-bound wreck. Then the lone boy climbed down the ship, To cross the mud by bound and skip, His cat upon his neck. Light was his weight and swift his leap, Now would he softly tread, now creep, For treacherous was the mud, and deepFrom stone to weed, from weed to plank, Leaving a hole where'er he sank;With panting breath and sore taxed strengthThe solid earth he felt at length. Sheltered within the copse he lay, When dawn had brightened into day, For when one moment there was seen, His red cap glancing 'mid the green, A fearful cry arose--"Here lurks a Dane!" "The Dane seek out"With knife and axe, the rabble routMade the copse ring with yell and shout To find their dreaded foes. And Edric feared to meet a stroke, Before they knew the tongue he spoke. Hid 'mid the branches of an oak, He heard their calls and blows. Of food he had a simple store, And when the churls the chase gave o'er, And evening sunk upon the vale, With rubbing head and upright tail, Pacing before him to and fro, Puss lured him on the way to go--Coaxing him on, with tender wile, O'er heath and down for many a mile. Ask me not how her course she knows. He from Whom every instinct flowsHath breathed into His creatures power, Giving to each its needful dower;And strive and question as we will, We cannot trace the inborn skill, Nor fathom how, where'er she roam, The cat ne'er fails to find her home. 

VII

What pen may dare to paint the woe, When Egbert saw his home laid low?Where, by the desolated hearth, The mother lay who gave him birth, And, close beside, his fair young wife, And servants, slain in bootless strife-- Mournful the King stood near. Alfred, who came to be his guest, And deeply rued that his behestHad all unguarded left that nest, To meet such ruin drear. With hand, and heart, and lip, he gaveAll king or friend, both true and brave, Could give, one pang of grief to save, To comfort, or to cheer--As from the blackened walls they drewEach corpse, and laid with reverence due;And then it was that Egbert knew All save the child were here. King Alfred's noble head was bent, A monarch's pain his bosom rent;Kindly he wrung Thane Egbert's hand--"Lo! these have won the blissful land, Where foeman's shout is heard no more, Nor wild waves beat upon the shore;Brief was the pang, the strife is o'er-- They are at peace, my friend!Safe, where the weary are at rest;Safe, where the banish'd and opprest Find joys that never end. "Thane Egbert groaned, and scarce might speakFor tears that ploughed his hardy cheek, As his dread task was done. And for the slain, from monk and priestRose requiems that never ceased, While still he sought his son. "Oh, would to Heaven!" that father said, "There lay my darling calmly dead, Rather than as a thrall be bred-- His Christian faith undone. ""Nay, life is hope!" bespake the King, "God o'er the child can spread His wingAnd shield him in the Northman's powerSafe as in Alswyth's guarded bower;Treaty and ransom may be foundTo win him back to English ground. "

VIII

The funeral obsequies were o'er, But lingered still the Thane, Hanging around his home once more, Feeding his bitter pain. The King would fain with friendly forceUrge him anew to mount his horse, Turn from the piteous sight away, And fresh begin life's saddened day, His loved ones looking yet to greet, Where ne'er shall part the blest who meet. Just then a voice that well he knew, A sound that mixed the purr and mew, Went to the father's heart. On a large stone King Alfred satAgainst his buskin rubbed a cat, Snow-white in every part, Though drenched and soiled from head to tail. The poor Thane's tears poured down like hail--"Poor puss, in vain thy loving wail, " Then came a joyful start!A little hand was on his cloak--"Father!" a voice beside him spoke, Emerging from the wood. All travel-stained, and marked with mire, With trace of blood, and toil, and fire, Yet safe and sound beside his sire, Edric before them stood. And as his father wept for joy, King Alfred blessed the rescued boy, And thanked his Maker good!Who doth the captive's prayer fulfil, Making His creatures work His will By means not understood. 

NOTE. --The remains of the five Danish vessels still lie embedded inthe mud of the Hamble River near Southampton, though parts have beencarried off and used as wood for furniture in the farm-houses. Theneighbouring wood is known as Cat Copse, and a tradition has beenhanded down that a cat, and a boy in a red cap, escaped from theDanish ships, took refuge there. 

DE FACTO AND DE JURE

I. DE FACTO

The later summer sunbeams lay on an expanse of slightly brokenground where purple and crimson heather were relieved by the goldenblossoms of the dwarf gorse, interspersed with white stars ofstitch-wort. Here and there, on the slopes, grew stunted oaks andhollies, whose polished leaves gleamed white with the reflection ofthe light; but there was not a trace of human habitation save atrack, as if trodden by horses' feet, clear of the furze and heath, and bordered by soft bent grass, beginning to grow brown. 

Near this track--for path it could hardly be called--stood a slenderlad waiting and watching, a little round cap covering his short-cutbrown hair, a crimson tunic reaching to his knee, leggings and shoesof deerhide, and a sword at his side, fastened by a belt of the likeskin, guarded and clasped with silver. His features were delicate, though sunburnt, and his eyes were riveted on the distance, wherethe path had disappeared amid the luxuriant spires of ling. 

A hunting-horn sounded, and the youth drew himself together into anattitude of eager attention; the baying of hounds and trampling ofhorses' hoofs came nearer and nearer, and by and by there came inview the ends of boar-spears, the tall points of bows, a cluster ofheads of men and horses--strong, sturdy, shaggy, sure-footedcreatures, almost ponies, but the only steeds fit to pursue thechase on this rough and encumbered ground. 

Foremost rode, with ivory and gold hunting-horn slung in a richSpanish baldrick, and a slender gilt circlet round his greenhunting-cap, a stout figure, with a face tanned to a fiery colour, keen eyes of a dark auburn tint, and a shock of hair of the samedeep red. 

At sight of him, the lad flung himself on his knees on the path, with the cry, "Haro! Haro! Justice, Sir King!"

"Out of my way, English hound!" cried the King. "This is no timefor thy Haro. "

"Nay, but one word, good fair King! I am French--French by myfather's side!" cried the lad, as there was a halt, more from theinstinct of the horse than the will of the King. 'Bertram deMaisonforte! My father married the Lady of Boyatt, and herinheritance was confirmed to him by your father, brave King William, my Lord; but now he is dead, and his kinsman, Roger de Maisonforte, hath ousted her and me, her son and lawful heir, from house andhome, and we pray for justice, Sir King?'

'Ha, Roger, thou there! What say'st thou to this bold beggar!'shouted the Red King. 

'I say, ' returned a black, bronzed hunter, pressing to the front, 'that what I hold of thee, King William, on tenure of homage, and oftwo good horses and staunch hounds yearly, I yield to no Englishmongrel churl, who dares to meddle with me. '

'Thou hear'st, lad, ' said Rufus, with his accustomed oath, 'homagehath been done to us for the land, nor may it be taken back. Out ofour way, or--'

'Sir! sir!' entreated the lad, grasping the bridle, 'if no moremight be, we would be content if Sir Roger would but leave my motherenough for her maintenance among the nuns of Romsey, and give me ahorse and suit of mail to go on the Holy War with Duke Robert. '

'Ho! ho! a modest request for a beggarly English clown!' cried theKing, aiming a blow at the lad with his whip, and pushing on hishorse, so as almost to throw him back on the heath. 'Ho! ho! fithim out for a fool's errand!'

'We'll fit him! We'll teach him to take the cross at other men'sexpense!' shouted the followers, seizing on the boy. 

'Nay; we'll bestow his cross on him for a free gift!' exclaimedRoger de Maisonforte. 

And Bertram, struggling desperately in vain among the band ofruffians, found his left arm bared, and two long and painfulslashes, in the form of the Crusader's cross, inflicted, amid loudlaughter, as the blood sprang forth. 

'There, Sir Crusader, ' said Roger, grinding his teeth over him. 'Goon thy way now--as a horse-boy, if so please thee, and know betterthan to throw thy mean false English pretension in the face of agentle Norman. '

Men, horses, dogs, all seemed to trample and scoff at Bertram as hefell back on the elastic stems of the heath and gorse, whoseprickles seemed to renew the insults by scratching his face. Whenthe King's horn, the calls, the brutal laughter, and the baying ofthe dogs had begun to die away in the distance, he gathered himselftogether, sat up, and tried to find some means of stanching theblood. Not only was the wound in a place hard to reach, but it hadbeen ploughed with the point of a boar-spear, and was grievouslytorn. He could do nothing with it, and, as he perceived, he hadfurther been robbed of his sword, his last possession, his father'ssword. 

The large tears of mingled rage, grief, and pain might well springfrom the poor boy's eyes in his utter loneliness, as he clenched hishand with powerless wrath, and regained his feet, to retrace, asbest he might, his way to where his widowed mother had found atemporary shelter in a small religious house. 

The sun grew hotter and hotter, Bertram's wound bled, though notprofusely, the smart grew upon him, his tongue was parched withthirst, and though he kept resolutely on, his breath came panting, his head grew dizzy, his eyes dim, his feet faltered, and at last, just as he attained a wider and more trodden way, he droppedinsensible by the side of the path, his dry lips trying to utter thecry, "Lord, have mercy on me!"

II. DE JURE

When Bertram de Maisonforte opened his eyes again cold waters wereon his face, wine was moistening his lips, the burning of his woundwas assuaged by cooling oil, while a bandage was being applied, andhe was supported on a breast and in arms, clad indeed in a hauberk, but as tenderly kind as the full deep voice that spoke in English, "He comes round. How now, my child?"

"Father, " murmured Bertram, with dreamy senses. 

"Better now; another sup from the flask, David, " again said the kindvoice, and looking up, he became aware of the beautiful benignantface, deep blue eyes, and long light locks of the man in earlymiddle age who had laid him on his knee, while a priest was bindinghis arm, and a fair and graceful boy, a little younger than himself, was standing by with the flask of wine in his hand, and a face ofsuch girlish beauty that as he knelt to hold the wine to his lips, Bertram asked--

"Am I among the Angels?"

"Not yet, " said the elder man. "Art thou near thine home?"

"Alack! I have no home, kind sir, " said Bertram, now able to raisehimself and to perceive that he was in the midst of a small hand ofarmed men, such as every knight or noble necessarily carried aboutwith him for protection. There was a standard with a dragon, andtheir leader himself was armed, all save his head, and, as Bertramsaw, was a man of massive strength, noble stature, and kinglyappearance. 

"What shall we do for thee?" he asked. "Who hath put thee in thisevil case?"

Bertram gave his name, and at its Norman sound there was a start ofrepulsion from the boy. "French after all!" he exclaimed. 

"Nay, David, " said the leader, "if I mind me rightly, the LadyElftrud of Boyatt wedded a brave Norman of that name. Art thou herson? I see something of her face, and thou hast an English tongue. "

"I am; I am her only son!" exclaimed Bertram; and as he told of hiswrongs and the usage he had met with, young David cried out withindignation--

"Uncle, uncle, how canst thou suffer that these things should be?Here are our faithful cnihts. Let us ride to the forest. Whereforeshould it not be with Red William and his ruffians as with ScottishDuncan and Donald?"

"Hush thee, David, my nephew. Thou knowest that may not be. Butfor thee, young Bertram, we will see what can be done. Canst sit ahorse now?"

"Yea, my lord, full well. I know not what came over me, even now, "said Bertram, much ashamed of the condition in which he had beenfound. 

A sumpter horse was found for him, the leader of the party sayingthat they would go on to his own home, where the youth's woundshould be looked to, and they could then decide what could be donefor him. 

Bertram was still so far faint, suffering, weak, and weary, that hewas hardly awake to curiosity as to his surroundings, and had quiteenough to do to keep his seat in the saddle, and follow in the wakeof the leader's tall white horse, above which shone his bright chainmail and his still brighter golden locks, so that the exhausted boybegan in some measure to feel as if he were following St. Michael onhis way to some better world. 

Now and then the tall figure turned to see how it was with him, andas he drooped more with fatigue and pain, bade one of the retainerskeep beside him and support him. 

Thus at length the cavalcade left the heathery expanse and reached avalley, green with meadow-land and waving corn, with silvery beardsof barley rippling in the evening light, and cows and sheep beinggathered for the night towards a dwelling where the river had beentrained to form a moat round low green ramparts enclosing a numberof one-storied thatched houses and barns, with one round tower, astrong embattled gateway, and at a little distance a square churchtower, and other cottages standing outside. 

A shout of ecstasy broke out from the village as the advancing partywas seen and recognised. Men, women, and children, rudely butsubstantially clad, and many wearing the collar of the thrall, ranout from their houses, baring their heads, bowing low, and each inturn receiving some kind word or nod of greeting from the lord whomthey welcomed, while one after another of his armed followers turnedaside, and was absorbed into a happy family by wife or parent. Adrawbridge crossed the moat, and there was a throng of joyfulservants in the archway--foremost a priest, stretching out his handsin blessing, and a foreign-looking old woman, gray-haired and dark-eyed, who gathered young David into her embrace as he sprang fromhis horse, calling him her heart's darling and her sunshine, anddemanding, with a certain alarm, where were his brothers. 

"In Scotland, dear Nurse Agnes--even where they should be, " wasDavid's answer. "We are conquerors, do you see! Edgar is a crownedand anointed King--seated on the holy stone of Scone, and Alexanderis beside him to fight for him!"

"It is even so, nurse, " said the elder man, turning from the priest, to whom he had more briefly spoken; "God hath blessed our arms, andyoung Edgar has his right. God shield him in it! And now, nurse, here is a poor youth who needs thy care, after one of Red William'srough jests. "

III. KING AT HOME

Weary, faint, and feverish as Bertram de Maisonforte was, he waspast caring for anything but the relief of rest, cool drink, and thedressing of his wound; nor did he even ask where he was until heawoke in broad daylight the next morning, to the sound of churchbells, to the sight of a low but spacious chamber, with stone walls, deerskins laid on the floor, and the old nurse standing by him witha cup of refreshing drink, and ready to attend to his wound. 

It was then that, feeling greatly refreshed, he ventured upon askingher in whose house he was, and who was the good lord who had takenpity on him. 

"Who should it be save him who should be the good lord of everyEnglishman, " she replied, "mine own dear foster-son, the princelyAtheling--he who takes up the cause of every injured man save hisown?"

Bertram was amazed, for he had only heard Normans speak of EdgarAtheling, the heir of the ancient race, as a poor, tame-spirited, wretched creature, unable to assert himself, and therefore leftunmolested by the conquerors out of contempt. He proceeded to askwhat the journey was from which the Atheling was returning, and thenurse, nothing loth, beguiled the tendance on his arm by explaininghow she had long ago travelled from Hungary with her charges, Edgar, Margaret, and Christina; how it had come about that the crown, whichshould have been her darling's, had been seized by the fierce dukefrom beyond the sea; how Edgar, then a mere child, had been forcedto swear oaths of fealty by which he held himself still bound; howher sweetest pearl of ladies, her jewel Margaret, had been wedded tothe rude wild King of Scots, and how her gentle sweetness andholiness had tamed and softened him, so that she had been theblessing of his kingdom till he and his eldest son had fallen atAlnwick while she lay a-dying; how the fierce savage Scots had risenand driven forth her young children; and how their uncle theAtheling had ridden forth, taken them to his home, bred them in allholiness and uprightness and good and knightly courage, and whenEdgar and Alexander, the two eldest, were full grown, had gonenorthward with them once more, and had won back, in fair field, thethrone of their father Malcolm. 

Truly there might well be rejoicing and triumph on the estate wherethe Atheling ruled as a father and had been sorely missed. He wasat his early mass of thanksgiving at present, and Bertram was somuch better that Nurse Agnes did not withstand his desire to riseand join the household and villagers, who were all collected in thebuilding, low and massive, but on which Edgar Atheling had lavishedthe rich ornamental work introduced by the Normans. The roundarched doorway was set in a succession of elaborate zigzags, birds'heads, lions' faces, twists and knots; and within, the altar-hangings and the priest's robes were stiff with the exquisite andelaborate embroidery for which the English nunneries were famed. 

The whole building, with its low-browed roof, circular chancel archstill more richly adorned, and stout short columns, was filled withkneeling figures in rough homespun or sheepskin garments, and withshaggy heads, above which towered the shining golden locks of theAtheling, which were allowed to grow to a much greater length thanwas the Norman fashion, and beside him was the still fairer head ofhis young nephew, David of Scotland. It was a thanksgiving servicefor their victory and safe return; and Bertram was just in time forthe TE DEUM that followed the mass. 

The Atheling, after all was over, came forth, exchanging greetingswith one after another of his franklins, cnihts, and thralls, all ofwhom seemed to be equally delighted to see him back again, and whomhe bade to a feast in the hall, which would be prepared in thecourse of the day. Some, meantime, went to their homes near athand, others would amuse themselves with games at ball, archery, singlestick, and the like, in an open space within the moat--whereothers fished. 

Bertram was not neglected. The Atheling inquired after his health, heard his story in more detail, and after musing on it, said thatafter setting affairs in order at home, he meant to visit his sisterand niece in the Abbey at Romsey, and would then make somearrangement for the Lady of Maisonforte; also he would endeavour tosee the King on his return to Winchester, and endeavour to pleadwith him. 

"William will at times hearken to an old comrade, " he said; "but itis an ill time to take him when he is hot upon the chase. Meantime, thou art scarce yet fit to ride, and needest more of good Agnes'sleech-craft. "

Bertram was indeed stiff and weary enough to be quite content to lieon a bearskin in the wide hall of the dwelling, or under the eaveswithout, and watch the doings with some amusement. 

He had been bred in some contempt of the Saxons. His father'smarriage had been viewed as a MESALLIANCE, and though the knight ofMaisonforte had been honourable and kindly, and the Lady Elftrud hadfared better than many a Saxon bride, still the French and theBreton dames of the neighbourhood had looked down on her, and theretainers had taught her son to look on the English race as swine, boors, and churls, ignorant of all gentle arts, of skill and grace. 

But here was young David among youths of his own age, tilting asgracefully and well as any young Norman could--making Bertram longthat his arm should cease to be so heavy and burning, so that hemight show his prowess. 

Here was a contention with bow and arrow that would not havedisgraced the best men-at-arms of Maisonforte--here again, later inthe day, was minstrelsy of a higher order than his father's ears hadcared for, but of which his mother had whispered her traditions. 

Here, again, was the chaplain showing his brother-priests with thegreatest pride and delight a scroll of Latin, copied from a MS. Psalter of the holy and Venerable Beda by the hand of his own dearpupil, young David. 

Bertram, who could neither read nor write, and knew no more Latinthan his Paternoster, Credo, and Ave, absolutely did not believe hiseyes and ears till he had asked the question, whether this wereindeed the youth's work. How could it be possible to wield pen aswell as lance?

But the wonder of all was the Atheling. After an absence of morethan a year, there was much to be adjusted, and his authority on hisown lands was thoroughly judicial even for life or death, since evenunder Norman sway he held the power of an earl. 

Seated in a high-backed, cross-legged chair--his majestic formcommanding honour and respect--he heard one after another causesthat came before him, reserved for his judgment, questions ofheirship, disputes about cattle, complaints of thievery, encroachments on land; and Bertram, listening with the interest thatjudgment never fails to excite, was deeply impressed with the clear-headedness, the ready thought, and the justice of the decision, evenwhen the dispute lay between Saxon and Norman, always with referenceto the laws of Alfred and Edward which he seemed to carry in hishead. 

Indeed, ere long, two Norman knights, hearing of the Atheling'sreturn, came to congratulate him, and lay before him a dispute ofboundaries which they declared they would rather entrust to him thanto any other. And they treated him far more as a prince than as aSaxon churl. 

They willingly accepted his invitation to go in to the feast ofwelcome, and a noble one it was, with music and minstrelsy, hospitality to all around, plenty and joy, wassail bowls goinground, and the Atheling presiding over it, and with a strange andquiet influence, breaking up the entertainment in all good will, bythe memory of his sweet sister Margaret's grace-cup, ere mirth hadbecome madness, or the English could incur their reproach of coarserevelry. 

"And, " as the Norman knight who had prevailed said to Bertram, "SirEdgar the Atheling had thus shown himself truly an uncrowned King. "

IV. WHO SHALL BE KING?

The noble cloisters of Romsey, with the grand church rising in theirmidst, had a lodging-place, strictly cut off from the nunnery, formale visitors. 

Into this Edgar Atheling rode with his armed train, and as theyentered, some strange expression in the faces of the porters andguards met them. 

"Had my lord heard the news?" demanded a priest, who hastenedforward, bowing low. 

"No, Holy Father. No ill of my sister?" anxiously inquired thePrince. 

"The Mother Abbess is well, my Lord Atheling; but the King--Williamthe Red--is gone to his account. He was found two eves ago piercedto the heart with an arrow beneath an oak in Malwood Chace. "

"God have mercy on his poor soul!" ejaculated Edgar, crossinghimself. "No moment vouchsafed for penitence! Alas! Who did thedeed, Father Dunstan?"

"That is not known, " returned the priest, "save that Walter Tyrrelis fled like a hunted felon beyond seas, and my Lord Henry toWinchester. "

Young David pressed up to his uncle's side. 

"Sir, sir, " he said, "what a time is this! Duke Robert absent, noneknow where; our men used to war, all ready to gather round you. This rule will be ended, the old race restored. Say but the word, and I will ride back and raise our franklins as one man. Thou wilt, too, Bertram!"

"With all mine heart!" cried Bertram. "Let me be the first to domine homage. "

And as Edgar Atheling stood in the outer court, with lofty head andnoble thoughtful face, pure-complexioned and high-browed, each whobeheld him felt that there stood a king of men. A shout of "KingEdgar! Edgar, King of England, " echoed through the buildings; andpriests, men-at-arms, and peasants began to press forward to do himhomage. But he raised his hand--

"Hold, children, " he said. "I thank you all; but much must come ereye imperil yourselves by making oaths to me that ye might soon haveto break! Let me pass on and see my sister. "

Abbeys were not strictly cloistered then, and the Abbess Christinawas at the door, a tall woman, older than her brother, and somewhathard-featured, and beside her was a lovely fair girl, with peach-like cheeks and bright blue eyes, who threw herself into David'sarms, full of delight. 

"Brother, " said Christina, "did I hear aright? And have they hailedthee King? Are the years of cruel wrong ended at last? Victor forothers, wilt thou be victor for thyself?"

"What is consistent with God's will, and with mine oaths, that Ihope to do, " was Edgar's reply. 

But even as he stood beside the Abbess in the porch, without havingyet entered, there was a clattering and trampling of horse, andthrough the gate came hastily a young man in a hauberk, with a ringof gold about his helmet, holding out his hands as he saw theAtheling. 

"Sire Edgar, " he said, "I knew not I should find you here, when Icame to pay my first DEVOIRS as a King to the Lady Mother Abbess"(he kissed her unwilling hand) "and the Lady Edith. "

Edith turned away a blushing face, and the Abbess faltered--

"As a King?"

"Yea, lady. As such have I been owned by all at Winchester. Ishould be at Westminster for my Coronation, save that I turned frommy course to win her who shall share my crown. "

"Is it even thus, Henry?" said Edgar. "Hast not thought of otherrights?"

"Of that crazed fellow Robert's?" demanded Henry. "Trouble notthine head for him! Even if he came back living from this Holy Warin the East, my father had too much mercy on England to leave it tothe like of him. "

"There be other and older rights, Sir Henry, " said the Abbess. 

Henry looked up for a moment in some consternation. "Ho! SirEdgar, thou hast been so long a peaceful man that I had forgotten. Thou knowest thy day went by with Hereward le Wake. See, fair Edithand I know one another--she shall be my Queen. "

"Veiled and vowed, " began the Abbess. 

"Oh, not yet! Tell her not yet!" whispered Edith in David's ear. 

"Thou little traitress! Wed thy house's foe, who takes thineuncle's place? Nay! I will none of thee, " said David, shaking heroff roughly; but her uncle threw his arm round her kindly. 

At that moment a Norman knight spurred up to Henry with somecommunication that made him look uneasy, and Christina, laying herhand on Edgar's arm, said: "Brother, we have vaults. Thy troopoutnumbers his. The people of good old Wessex are with thee! Nowis thy time! Save thy country. Restore the line and laws of Alfredand Edward. "

"Thou know'st not what thou wouldst have, Christina, " said Edgar. "One sea of blood wherever a Norman castle rises! I love my peopletoo well to lead them to a fruitless struggle with all the might ofNormandy unless I saw better hope than lies before me now! Mindthee, I swore to Duke William that I would withstand neither him norany son of his whom the English duly hailed. Yet, I will see how itis with this young man, " he added, as she fell back muttering, "Craven! Who ever won throne without blood?"

Henry had an anxious face when he turned from his knight, who, nodoubt, had told him how completely he was in the Atheling's power. 

"Sir Edgar, " he said, "a word with you. Winchester is not far off--nor Porchester--nor my brother William's Free companies, and histreasure. Normans will scarce see Duke William's son tampered with, nor bow their heads to the English!"

"Belike, Henry of Normandy, " said Edgar, rising above him in hisgrave majesty. "Yet have I a question or two to put to thee. Thouart a graver, more scholarly man than thy brother, less like to beled away by furies. Have the people of England and Normandy swornto thee willingly as their King?"

"Even so, in the Minster, " Henry began, and would have said more, but Edgar again made his gesture of authority. 

"Wilt thou grant them the charter of Alfred and Edward, with copiesspread throughout the land?"

"I will. "

"Wilt thou do equal justice between English and Norman?"

"To the best of my power. "

"Wilt thou bring home the Archbishop, fill up the dioceses, do thypart by the Church?"

"So help me God, I will. "

"Then, Henry of Normandy, I, Edgar Atheling, kiss thine hand, andbecome thy man; and may God deal with thee, as thou dost withEngland. "

The noble form of Edgar bent before the slighter younger figure ofHenry, who burst into tears, genuine at the moment, and vowed mostearnestly to be a good King to the entire people. No doubt, hemeant it--then. 

And now--far more humbly, he made his suit to the Atheling for thehand of his niece. 

Edgar took her apart. "Edith, canst thou brook this man?"

"Uncle, he was good to me when we were children together at the oldKing's Court. I have made no vows, I tore the veil mine aunt threwover me from mine head. Methinks with me beside him he would neverbe hard to our people. "

"So be it then, Edith. If he holds to this purpose when he hathbeen crowned at Westminster, he shall have thee, though I fear thouhast chosen a hard lot, and wilt rue the day when thou didst quitthese peaceful walls. "

And one more stipulation was made by Edgar the Atheling, ere he rodeto own Henry as King in the face of the English people atWestminster--namely, that Boyatt should be restored to the trueheiress the Lady Elftrud. And to Roger, compensation was secretlymade at the Atheling's expense, ere departing with Bertram in histrain for the Holy War. For Bertram could not look at the scarwithout feeling himself a Crusader; and Edgar judged it better forEngland to remove himself for awhile, while he laid all earthlyaspirations at the Feet of the King of kings. 

The little English troop arrived just in time to share in thecapture of the Holy City, to join in the eager procession ofconquerors to the Holy Sepulchre, and to hear Godfrey de Bouillonelected to defend the sacred possession, refusing to wear a crownwhere the King of Saints and Lord of Heaven and Earth had worn aCrown of Thorns. 

SIGBERT'S GUERDON

A feudal castle, of massive stone, with donjon keep and highcrenellated wall, gateway tower, moat and drawbridge, was a strange, incongruous sight in one of the purple-red stony slopes ofPalestine, with Hermon's snowy peak rising high above. It wasaccounted for, however, by the golden crosses of the kingdom ofJerusalem waving above the watch-tower, that rose like a pointingfinger above the keep, in company with a lesser ensign bearing acouchant hound, sable. 

It was a narrow rocky pass that the Castle of Gebel-Aroun guarded, overlooking a winding ravine between the spurs of the hills, descending into the fertile plain of Esdraelon from the heights ofGalilee Hills, noted in many an Israelite battle, and now held bythe Crusaders. 

Bare, hard, and rocky were the hills around--the slopes and thevalley itself, which in the earlier season had been filled with richgrass, Calvary clover, blood-red anemones, and pale yellowamaryllis, only showed their arid brown or gray remnants. The moathad become a deep waterless cleft; and beneath, on the accessiblesides towards the glen, clustered a collection of black horsehairtents, the foremost surmounted by the ill-omened crescent. 

The burning sun had driven every creature under shelter, and no onewas visible; but well was it known that watch and ward was closelykept from beneath those dark tents, that to the eyes within had theair of couching beasts of prey. Yes, couching to devour what couldnot fail to be theirs, in spite of the mighty walls of rock andimpregnable keep, for those deadly and insidious foes, hunger andthirst, were within, gaining the battle for the Saracens without, who had merely to wait in patience for the result. 

Some years previously, Sir William de Hundberg, a Norman knight, hadbeen expelled from his English castle by the partisans of Stephen, and with wife and children had followed Count Fulk of Anjou to hiskingdom of Palestine, and had been endowed by him with one of thefortresses which guarded the passes of Galilee, under thatexaggeration of the feudal system which prevailed in the crusadingkingdom of Jerusalem. 

Climate speedily did its work with the lady, warfare with two of hersons, and there only remained of the family a youth of seventeen, Walter, and his sister Mabel, fourteen, who was already betrothed tothe young Baron of Courtwood, then about to return to England. Thetreaty with Stephen and the success of young Henry of Anjou gave SirWilliam hopes of restitution; but just as he was about to conducther to Jerusalem for the wedding, before going back to England, hefell sick of one of the recurring fevers of the country; and almostat the same time the castle was beleaguered by a troop of Arabs, under the command of a much-dreaded Sheik. 

His constitution was already much shaken, and Sir William, after afew days of alternate torpor and delirium, passed away, withouthaving been conscious enough to leave any counsel to his children, or any directions to Father Philip, the chaplain, or Sigbert, hisEnglish squire. 

At the moment, sorrow was not disturbed by any great alarm, for thecastle was well victualled, and had a good well, supplied by springsfrom the mountains; and Father Philip, after performing the funeralrites for his lord, undertook to make his way to Tiberias, or toJerusalem, with tidings of their need; and it was fully anticipatedthat succour would arrive long before the stores in the castle hadbeen exhausted. 

But time went on, and, though food was not absolutely lacking, thespring of water which had hitherto supplied the garrison began tofail. Whether through summer heats, or whether the wily enemy hadsucceeded in cutting off the source, where once there had been aclear crystal pool in the rock, cold as the snow from which it came, there only dribbled a few scanty drops, caught with difficulty, andonly imbibed from utter necessity, so great was the suspicion oftheir being poisoned by the enemy. 

The wine was entirely gone, and the salted provision, which aloneremained, made the misery of thirst almost unbearable. 

On the cushions, richly embroidered in dainty Eastern colouring, layMabel de Hundberg, with dry lips half opened and panting, too wearyto move, yet listening all intent. 

Another moment, and in chamois leather coat, his helmet in hand, entered her brother from the turret stair, and threw himself downhopelessly, answering her gesture. 

"No, no, of course no. The dust was only from another swarm ofthose hateful Saracens. I knew it would be so. Pah! it has made mytongue more like old boot leather than ever. Have no more dropsbeen squeezed from the well? It's time the cup was filled!"

"It was Roger's turn. Sigbert said he should have the next, " saidMabel. 

Walter uttered an imprecation upon Roger, and a still stronger oneon Sigbert's meddling. But instantly the cry was, "Where isSigbert?"

Walter even took the trouble to shout up and down the stair forSigbert, and to demand hotly of the weary, dejected men-at-armswhere Sigbert was; but no one could tell. 

"Gone over to the enemy, the old traitor, " said Walter, againdropping on the divan. 

"Never! Sigbert is no traitor, " returned his sister. 

"He is an English churl, and all churls are traitors, " respondedWalter. 

The old nurse, who was fitfully fanning Mabel with a dried palm-leaf, made a growl of utter dissent, and Mabel exclaimed, "None wasever so faithful as good old Sigbert. "

It was a promising quarrel, but their lips were too dry to keep itup for more than a snarl or two. Walter cast himself down, and badeold Tata fan him; why should Mabel have it all to herself?

Then sounds of wrangling were heard below, and Walter roused himselfto go down and interfere. The men were disputing over somemiserable dregs of wine at the bottom of a skin. Walter shouted tocall them to order, but they paid little heed. 

"Do not meddle and make, young sir, " said a low-browed, swarthyfellow. "There's plenty of cool drink of the right sort out there. "

"Traitor!" cried Walter; "better die than yield. "

"If one have no mind for dying like an old crab in a rock, " said theman. 

"They would think nought of making an end of us out there, " saidanother. 

"I'd as lief be choked at once by a cord as by thirst, " was theanswer. 

"That you are like to be, if you talk such treason, " threatenedWalter. "Seize him, Richard--Martin. "

Richard and Martin, however, hung back, one muttering that Gil haddone nothing, and the other that he might be in the right of it; andwhen Walter burst out in angry threats he was answered in a gruffvoice that he had better take care what he said, "There was nostanding not only wasting with thirst and hunger, but besides beingblustered at by a hot-headed lad, that scarce knew a hauberk from ahelmet. "

Walter, in his rage, threw himself with drawn sword on the mutineer, but was seized and dragged back by half a dozen stalwart arms, suchas he had no power to resist, and he was held fast amid rude laughsand brutal questions whether he should thus be carried to theSaracens, and his sister with him. 

"The old Sheik would give a round sum for a fair young damsel likeher!" were the words that maddened her brother into a desperatestruggle, baffled with a hoarse laugh by the men-at-arms, who werekeeping him down, hand and foot, when a new voice sounded: "Hownow, fellows! What's this?"

In one moment Walter was released and on his feet, and the men fellback, ashamed and gloomy, as a sturdy figure, with sun-browned face, light locks worn away by the helmet, and slightly grizzled, stoodamong them, in a much-rubbed and soiled chamois leather garment. 

Walter broke out into passionate exclamations; the men, evidentlyashamed, met them with murmurs and growls. "Bad enough, badenough!" broke in Sigbert; "but there's no need to make it worse. Better to waste with hunger and thirst than be a nidering fellow--rising against your lord in his distress. "

"We would never have done it if he would have kept a civil tongue. "

"Civility's hard to a tongue dried up, " returned Sigbert. "But lookyou here, comrades, leave me a word with my young lord here, and Iplight my faith that you shall have enow to quench your thirstwithin six hours at the least. "

There was an attempt at a cheer, broken by the murmur, "We haveheard enough of that! It is always six hours and six hours. "

"And the Saracen hounds outside would at least give us a draught ofwater ere they made away with us, " said another. 

"Saracens, forsooth!" said Sigbert. "You shall leave the Saracensfar behind you. A few words first with my lord, and you shall hear. Meanwhile, you, John Cook, take all the beef remaining; make it insmall fardels, such as a man may easily carry. "

"That's soon done, " muttered the cook. "The entire weight wouldscarce bow a lad's shoulders. "

"The rest of you put together what you would save from the enemy, and is not too heavy to carry. " One man made some attempt atgrowling at a mere lad being consulted, while the stout warriorswere kept in ignorance; but the spirit of discipline and confidencehad returned with Sigbert, and no one heeded the murmur. Meantime, Sigbert followed the young Lord Walter up the rough winding stairsto the chamber where Mabel lay on her cushions. "What! what!"demanded the boy, pausing to enter. Sigbert, by way of answer, quietly produced from some hidden pouch two figs. Walter snatchedat one with a cry of joy. Mabel held out her hand, then, with agasp, drew it back. "Has Roger had one?"

Sigbert signed in the affirmative, and Mabel took a bite of theluscious fruit with a gasp of pleasure, yet paused once more to holdthe remainder to her nurse. 

"The Saints bless you, my sweet lamb!" exclaimed the old woman;"finish it yourself. I could not. "

"If you don't want it, give it to me, " put in Walter. 

"For shame, my lord, " Sigbert did not scruple to say, nor could thethirsty girl help finishing the refreshing morsel, while Walter, with some scanty murmur of excuse, demanded where it came from, andwhat Sigbert had meant by promises of safety. 

"Sir, " said Sigbert, "you may remember how some time back yourhonoured father threw one of the fellaheen into the dungeon formaiming old Leo. "

"The villain! I remember. I thought he was hanged. "

"No, sir. He escaped. I went to take him food, and he was gone! Ithen found an opening in the vault, of which I spoke to none, saveyour father, for fear of mischief; but I built it up with stones. Now, in our extremity, I bethought me of it, and resolved to trywhether the prisoner had truly escaped, for where he went, we mightgo. Long and darksome is the way underground, but it opens at lastthrough one of the old burial-places of the Jews into the thicketsupon the bank of the Jordan. "

"The Jordan! Little short of a league!" exclaimed Walter. 

"A league, underground, and in the dark, " sighed Mabel. 

"Better than starving here like a rat in a trap, " returned herbrother. 

"Ah yes; oh yes! I will think of the cool river and the trees atthe end. "

"You will find chill enough, lady, long ere you reach the river, "said Sigbert. "You must wrap yourself well. 'Tis an ugsomepassage; but your heart must not fail you, for it is the only hopeleft us. "

The two young people were far too glad to hear of any prospect ofrelease, to think much of the dangers or discomforts of the mode. Walter danced for joy up and down the room like a young colt, as hethought of being in a few hours more in the free open air, with thesound of water rippling below, and the shade of trees above him. Mabel threw herself on her knees before her rude crucifix, partly inthankfulness, partly in dread of the passage that was to come first. 

"Like going through the grave to life, " she murmured to her nurse. 

And when the scanty garrison was gathered together, as many aspossible provided with brands that might serve as torches, andSigbert led them, lower and lower, down rugged steps hewn in therock, through vaults where only a gleam came from above, and thenthrough deeper cavernous places, intensely dark, there was a shudderperceptible by the clank and rattle of the armour which each haddonned. In the midst, Walter paused and exclaimed--

"Our banner! How leave it to the Paynim dogs?"

"It's here, sir, " said Sigbert, showing a bundle on his back. 

"Warning to the foe to break in and seek us, " grumbled Gilbert. 

"Not so, " replied Sigbert. "I borrowed an old wrapper of nurse'sthat will cheat their eyes till we shall be far beyond their ken. "

In the last dungeon a black opening lay before them, just seen bythe light of the lamp Sigbert carried, but so low that there was noentrance save on hands and knees. 

"That den!" exclaimed Walter. "'Tis a rat-hole. Never can we gothat way. "

"I have tried it, sir, " quoth Sigbert. "Where I can go, you can go. Your sister quails not. "

"It is fearful, " said Mabel, unable to repress a shiver; "but, Walter, think what is before us if we stay here! The Saints willguard us. "

"The worst and lowest part only lasts for a few rods, " explainedSigbert. "Now, sir, give your orders. Torches and lanterns, saveHubert's and nurse's, to be extinguished. We cannot waste them toosoon, but beware of loosing hold on them. "

Walter repeated the orders thus dictated to him, and Sigbertarranged the file. It was absolutely needful that Sigbert should gofirst to lead the way. Mabel was to follow him for the sake of hishelp, then her brother, next nurse, happily the only other female. Between two stout and trustworthy men the wounded Roger came. Thenone after another the rest of the men-at-arms and servants, five-and-twenty in number. The last of the file was Hubert, with a lamp;the others had to move in darkness. There had been no horse of anyvalue in the castle, for the knight's charger had been mortally hurtin his last expedition, and there had been no opportunity ofprocuring another. A deerhound, however, pushed and scrambled tothe front, and Sigbert observed that he might be of great use inrunning before them. Before entering, however, Sigbert gave thecaution that no word nor cry must be uttered aloud, hap what might, until permission was given, for they would pass under the Saracencamp, and there was no knowing whether the sounds would reach theears above ground. 

A strange plunge it was into the utter darkness, crawling on handsand knees, with the chill cavernous gloom and rock seeming to pressin upon those who slowly crept along, the dim light of Sigbert'slamp barely showing as he slowly moved on before. One of the two inthe rear was dropped and extinguished in the dismal passage, a lossproclaimed by a suppressed groan passing along the line, and alouder exclamation from Walter, causing Sigbert to utter a sharp'Hush!' enforced by a thud and tramp above, as if the rock werecoming down on them, but which probably was the trampling of horsesin the camp above. 

The smoke of the lamp in front drifted back, and the air was moreand more oppressive. Mabel, with set teeth and compressed lips, struggled on, clinging tight to the end of the cord which Sigberthad tied to his body for her to hold by, while in like mannerWalter's hand was upon her dress. It became more and more difficultto breathe, or crawl on, till at last, just as there was a sensethat it was unbearable, and that it would be easier to lie still anddie than be dragged an inch farther, the air became freer, the roofseemed to be farther away, the cavern wider, and the motion freer. 

Sigbert helped his young lady to stand upright, and one by one allthe train regained their feet. The lamp was passed along to berekindled, speech was permitted, crevices above sometimes admittedair, sometimes dripped with water. The worst was over--probably thefirst part had been excavated, the farther portion was one of themany natural 'dens and caves of the earth, ' in which Palestineabounds. There was still a considerable distance to be traversed, the lamps burnt out, and had to be succeeded by torches carefullyhusbanded, for the way was rough and rocky, and a stumble might endin a fall into an abyss. In time, however, openings of sidegalleries were seen, niches in the wall, and tokens that the outerportion of the cavern had been once a burial-place of the ancientIsraelites--'the dog Jews, ' as the Crusaders called them, with ashudder of loathing and contempt. 

And joy infinite--clear daylight and a waving tree were perceptiblebeyond. It was daylight, was it? but the sun was low. Five hoursat least had been spent in that dismal transit, before theexhausted, soiled, and chilled company stepped forth into a greenthicket with the Jordan rushing far below. Five weeks' siege in anarrow fortress, then the two miles of subterranean struggle--thesemight well make the grass beneath the wild sycamore, the cork-tree, the long reeds, the willows, above all, the sound of the flowingwater, absolute ecstasy. There was an instant rush for the river, impeded by many a thorn-bush and creeper; but almost anything greenwas welcome at the moment, and the only disappointment was at theheight and steepness of the banks of rock. However, at last onehappy man found a place where it was possible to climb down to theshingly bed of the river, close to a great mass of the branchingheaded papyrus reed. Into the muddy but eminently sweet water mostof them waded; helmets became cups, hands scooped up the water, there were gasps of joy and refreshment and blessing on the coolwave so long needed. 

Sigbert and Walter between them helped down Mabel and her nurse, andfound a secure spot for them, where weary faces, feet, and handsmight be laved in the pool beneath a rock. 

Then, taking up a bow and arrows laid down by one of the men, Sigbert applied himself to the endeavour to shoot some of the water-fowl which were flying wildly about over the reeds in the unwonteddisturbance caused by the bathers. He brought down two or three ofthe duck kind, and another of the party had bethought him of anglingwith a string and one of the only too numerous insects, and hadcaught sundry of the unsuspecting and excellent fish. He had alsocarefully preserved a little fire, and, setting his boy to collectfuel, he produced embers enough to cook both fish and birdssufficiently to form an appetising meal for those who had beenreduced to scraps of salt food for full a fortnight. 

"All is well so far, " said Walter, with his little lordly air. "Wehave arranged our retreat with great skill. The only regret is thatI have been forced to leave the castle to the enemy! the castle wewere bound to defend. "

"Nay, sir, if it be your will, " said Sigbert, "the tables might yetbe turned on the Saracen. "

With great eagerness Walter asked how this could be, and Sigbertreminded him that many a time it had been observed from the towerthat, though the Saracens kept careful watch on the gates of thebesieged so as to prevent a sally, they left the rear of their campabsolutely undefended, after the ordinary Eastern fashion, andSigbert, with some dim recollection of rhymed chronicles of Gideonand of Jonathan, believed that these enemies might be surprisedafter the same fashion as theirs. Walter leapt up for joy, butSigbert had to remind him that the sun was scarcely set, and thattime must be given for the Saracens to fall asleep before theattack; besides that, his own men needed repose. 

"There is all the distance to be traversed, " said Walter. 

"Barely a league, sir. "

It was hard to believe that the space, so endless underground, wasso short above, and Walter was utterly incredulous, till, climbingthe side of the ravine so high as to be above the trees, Sigbertshowed him the familiar landmarks known in hunting excursions withhis father. He was all eagerness; but Sigbert insisted on waitingtill past midnight before moving, that the men might have time toregain their vigour by sleep, and also that there might be time forthe Saracens to fall into the deepest of all slumbers in fullsecurity. 

The moon was low in the West when Sigbert roused the party, havingcalculated that it would light them on the way, but would be set bythe time the attack was to be made. 

For Mabel's security it was arranged that a small and most unwillingguard should remain with her, near enough to be able to perceive howmatters went; and if there appeared to be defeat and danger for herbrother, there would probably be full time to reach Tiberias even onfoot. 

However, the men of the party had little fear that flight would beneeded, for, though perhaps no one would have thought of the schemefor himself, there was a general sense that what Sigbert devised wasprudent, and that he would not imperil his young lord and lady upona desperate venture. 

Keeping well and compactly together, the little band moved on, alongarid, rocky paths, starting now and then at the howls of the jackalswhich gradually gathered into a pack, and began to follow, as if--some one whispered--they scented prey, "On whom?" was the question. 

On a cliff looking down on the Arab camp, and above it on the darkmass of the castle, where, in the watch-tower, Sigbert had left alamp burning, they halted just as the half-moon was dipping belowthe heights towards the Mediterranean. Here the Lady Mabel and herguard were to wait until they heard the sounds which to theirpractised ears would show how the fight went. 

The Arab shout of victory they knew only too well, and it was to bethe signal of flight towards Tiberias; but if success was with theassailants, the war-cry 'Deus vult, ' and 'St. Hubert for Hundberg, 'were to be followed by the hymn of victory as the token that it wassafe to descend. 

All was dark, save for the magnificent stars of an Eastern night, asMabel, her nurse, and the five men, commanded by the wounded Roger, stood silently praying while listening intently to the muffled trampof their own people, descending on the blacker mass denoting theSaracen tents. 

The sounds of feet died away, only the jackal's whine and moan, wereheard. Then suddenly came a flash of lights in differentdirections, and shouts here, there, everywhere, cries, yells, darkness, an undistinguishable medley of noise, the shrill shriek ofthe Moslem, and the exulting war-cry of the Christian ringingfarther and farther off, in the long valley leading towards theJordan fords. 

Dawn began to break--overthrown tents could be seen. Mabel had timeto wonder whether she was forgotten, when the hymn began to sound, pealing on her ears up the pass, and she had not had time for morethan an earnest thanksgiving, and a few steps down the rockypathway, before a horse's tread was heard, and a man-at-arms cametowards her leading a slender, beautiful Arab horse. "All well! theyoung lord and all. The Saracens, surprised, fled without everguessing the number of their foes. The Sheik made prisoner in histent. Ay, and a greater still, the Emir Hussein Bey, who hadarrived to take possession of the castle only that very evening. What a ransom he would pay! Horses and all were taken, the spoil ofthe country round, and Master Sigbert had sent this palfrey for LadyMabel to ride down. "

Perhaps Sigbert, in all his haste and occupation, had been able todiscern that the gentle little mare was not likely to display theArab steed's perilous attachment to a master, for Mabel was safelymounted, and ere sunrise was greeted by her joyous and victoriousbrother. "Is not this noble, sister? Down went the Pagan dogsbefore my good sword! There are a score of them dragged off to thedead man's hollow for the jackals and vultures; but I kept onefellow uppermost to show you the gash I made! Come and see. "

Roger here observed that the horse might grow restive at thecarcase, and Mabel was excused the sight, though Walter continued torelate his exploits, and demand whether he had not won his spurs byso grand a ruse and victory. 

"Truly I think Sigbert has, " said his sister. "It was all hisdoing. "

"Sigbert, an English churl! What are you thinking of, Mabel?"

"I am thinking to whom the honour is due. "

"You are a mere child, sister, or you would know better. Sigbert isa very fair squire; but what is a squire's business but to put hismaster in the way of honour? Do not talk such folly. "

Mabel was silenced, and after being conducted across the baretrampled ground among the tents of the Arabs, she re-entered thecastle, where in the court groups of disarmed Arabs stood, theirbournouses pulled over their brows, their long lances heaped in acorner, grim and disconsolate at their discomfiture and captivity. 

A repast of stewed kid, fruit, and sherbet was prepared for her andher brother from the spoil, after which both were weary enough tothrow themselves on their cushions for a long sound sleep. 

Mabel slept the longer, and when she awoke, she found that the sunwas setting, and that supper was nearly ready. 

Walter met her just as she had arranged her dress, to bid nurse makeready her bales, for they were to start at dawn on the morrow forTiberias. It was quite possible that the enemy might return inforce to deliver their Emir. A small garrison, freshly provisioned, could hold out the castle until relief could be sent; but it wouldbe best to conduct the two important prisoners direct to the King, to say nothing of Walter's desire to present them and to displaythese testimonies of his prowess before the Court of Jerusalem. 

The Emir was a tall, slim, courteous Arab, with the exquisitemanners of the desert. Both he and the Sheik were invited to themeal. Both looked startled and shocked at the entrance of the fair-haired damsel, and the Sheik crouched in a corner, with a savageglare in his eye like a freshly caught wild beast, though the Emirsat cross-legged on the couch eating, and talking in the LINGUAFRANCA, which was almost a native tongue, to the son and daughter ofthe Crusader. From him Walter learnt that King Fulk was probably atTiberias, and this quickened the eagerness of all for a start. Ittook place in the earliest morning, so as to avoid the heat of theday. How different from the departure in the dark undergroundpassage!

Horses enough had been captured to afford the Emir and the Sheikeach his own beautiful steed (the more readily that the creaturescould hardly have been ridden by any one else), and their parole wastrusted not to attempt to escape. Walter, Mabel, Sigbert, and Rogerwere also mounted, and asses were found in the camp for the nurse, and the men who had been hurt in the night's surprise. 

The only mischance on the way was that in the noontide halt, just asthe shimmer of the Lake of Galilee met their eyes, under a hugeterebinth-tree, growing on a rock, when all, except Sigbert, hadcomposed themselves to a siesta, there was a sudden sound of loudand angry altercation, and, as the sleepers started up, the Emir wasseen grasping the bridle of the horse on which the Sheik satdowncast and abject under the storm of fierce indignant words hurledat him for thus degrading his tribe and all Islam by breaking hisplighted word to the Christian. 

This was in Arabic, and the Emir further insisted on his prostratinghimself to ask pardon, while he himself in LINGUA FRANCA explainedthat the man was of a low and savage tribe of Bedouins, who knew nothow to keep faith. 

Walter broke out in loud threats, declaring that the traitor dogought to be hung up at once on the tree, or dragged along with handstied behind him; but Sigbert contented himself with placing a man ateach side of his horse's head, as they proceeded on their way to thestrongly fortified town of the ancient Herods, perched at the headof the dark gray Lake of Galilee, shut in by mountain peaks. Thesecond part of the journey was necessarily begun in glowing heat, for it was most undesirable to have to spend a night in the opencountry, and it was needful to push on to a fortified hospice ormonastery of St. John, which formed a half-way house. 

Weary, dusty, athirst, they came in sight of it in the evening; andWalter and Roger rode forward to request admittance. The porterbegged them to wait when he heard that the party included women andSaracen prisoners; and Walter began to storm. However, a fewmoments more brought a tall old Knight Hospitalier to the gate, andhe made no difficulties as to lodging the Saracens in a building atthe end of the Court, where they could be well guarded; and Mabeland her nurse were received in a part of the precincts appropriatedto female pilgrims. 

It was a bare and empty place, a round turret over the gateway, witha stone floor, and a few mats rolled up in the corner, mats whichformer pilgrims had not left in an inviting condition. 

However, the notions of comfort of the twelfth century were notexacting. Water to wash away the dust of travel was brought to thedoor, and was followed by a substantial meal on roasted kid and thincakes of bread. Sigbert came up with permission for the women toattend compline, though only strictly veiled; and Mabel knelt in thelittle cool cryptlike chapel, almost like the late place of herescape, and returned thanks for the deliverance from their recentperil. 

Then, fresh mats and cushions having been supplied, the damsel andher nurse slept profoundly, and were only roused by a bell for amass in the darkness just before dawn, after which they again setforth, the commander of the Hospice himself, and three or fourknights, accompanying them, and conversing familiarly with the Emiron the current interests of Palestine. 

About half-way onward, the glint and glitter of spears was seen amida cloud of dust on the hill-path opposite. The troop drew togetheron their guard, though, as the Hospitalier observed, from the sideof Tiberias an enemy could scarcely come. A scout was sent forwardto reconnoitre; but, even before he came spurring joyously back, thegolden crosses of Jerusalem had been recognised, and confirmed histidings that it was the rearguard of the army, commanded by KingFulk himself, on the way to the relief of the Castle of Gebel-Aroun. 

In a brief half-hour more, young Walter de Hundberg, with his sisterby his side, was kneeling before an alert, slender, wiry figure inplain chamois leather, with a worn sunburnt face and keen blue eyes--Fulk of Anjou--who had resigned his French county to lead thecrusading cause in Palestine. 

"Stand up, fair youth, and tell thy tale, and how thou hastforestalled our succour. "

Walter told his tale of the blockaded castle, the undergroundpassage, and the dexterous surprise of the besiegers, ending bypresenting, not ungracefully, his captives to the pleasure of theKing. 

"Why, this is well done!" exclaimed Fulk. "Thou art a youth ofpromise, and wilt well be a prop to our grandson's English throne. Thou shalt take knighthood from mine own hand as thy prowess welldeserveth. And thou, fair damsel, here is one whom we could scarcehold back from rushing with single hand to deliver his betrothed. Sir Raymond of Courtwood, you are balked of winning thy lady at thesword's point, but thou wilt scarce rejoice the less. "

A dark-eyed, slender young knight, in bright armour, drew towardsMabel, and she let him take her hand; but she was intent onsomething else, and exclaimed--

"Oh, sir, Sir King, let me speak one word! The guerdon should notbe only my brother's. The device that served us was--our squire's. "

The Baron of Courtwood uttered a fierce exclamation. Waltermuttered, "Mabel, do not be such a meddling fool"; but the Kingasked, "And who may this same squire be?"

"An old English churl, " said Walter impatiently. "My father tookhim as his squire for want of a better. "

"And he has been like a father to us, " added Mabel

"Silence, sister! It is not for you to speak!" petulantly criedWalter. "Not that the Baron of Courtwood need be jealous, " addedhe, laughing somewhat rudely. "Where is the fellow? Stand forth, Sigbert. "

Travel and heat-soiled, sunburnt, gray, and ragged, armour rusted, leathern garment stained, the rugged figure came forward, footsoreand lame, for he had given up his horse to an exhausted man-at-arms. A laugh went round at the bare idea of the young lady's preferringsuch a form to the splendid young knight, her destined bridegroom. 

"Is this the esquire who hath done such good service, according tothe young lady?" asked the King. 

"Ay, sir, " returned Walter; "he is true and faithful enough, thoughnothing to be proud of in looks; and he served us well in my sallyand attack. "

"It was his--" Mabel tried to say, but Sigbert hushed her. 

"Let be, let be, my sweet lady; it was but my bounden duty. "

"What's that? Speak out what passes there, " demanded youngCourtwood, half-jealously still. 

"A mere English villein, little better than a valet of the camp!"were the exclamations around. "A noble damsel take note of him!Fie for shame!"

"He has been true and brave, " said the King. "Dost ask a guerdonfor him, young sir?" he added to Walter. 

"What wouldst have, old Sigbert?" asked Walter, in a patronisingvoice. 

"I ask nothing, sir, " returned the old squire. "To have seen mylord's children in safety is all I wish. I have but done my duty. "

King Fulk, who saw through the whole more clearly than some of thosearound, yet still had the true Angevin and Norman contempt for aSaxon, here said: "Old man, thou art trusty and shrewd, and maystbe useful. Wilt thou take service as one of my men-at-arms?"

"Thou mayst, " said Walter; "thou art not bound to me. England hathenough of Saxon churls without thee, and I shall purvey myself anesquire of youthful grace and noble blood. "

Mabel looked at her betrothed and began to speak. 

"No, no, sweet lady, I will have none of that rough, old masterfulsort about me. "

"Sir King, " said Sigbert, "I thank thee heartily. I would stillserve the Cross; but my vow has been, when my young lord and ladyshould need me no more, to take the Cross of St. John with theHospitaliers. "

"As a lay brother? Bethink thee, " said Fulk of Anjou. "Noble bloodis needed for a Knight of the Order. "

Sigbert smiled slightly, in spite of all the sadness of his face, and the Knight Commander who had ridden with them, a Fleming bybirth, said--

"For that matter, Sir King, we are satisfied. Sigbert, the son ofSigfrid, hath proved his descent from the old English kings of theEast Saxons, and the Order will rejoice to enrol in the novitiate soexperienced a warrior. "

"Is this indeed so?" asked Fulk. "A good lineage, even if English!"

"But rebel, " muttered Courtwood. 

"It is so, Sir King, " said Sigbert. "My father was disseised of thelands of Hundberg, and died in the fens fighting under Hereward leWake. My mother dwelt under the protection of the Abbey ofColchester, and, by and by, I served under our Atheling, and, whenKing Henry's wars in Normandy were over, I followed the Lord ofHundberg's banner, because the men-at-arms were mine own neighbours, and his lady my kinswoman. Roger can testify to my birth andlineage. "

"So, thou art true heir of Hundberg, if that be the name of thineEnglish castle?"

"Ay, sir, save for the Norman! But I would not, if I could, meddlewith thee, my young lord, though thou dost look at me askance, spiteof having learnt of me to ride and use thy lance. I am the last ofthe English line of old Sigfrid the Wormbane, and a childless man, and I trust the land and the serfs will be well with thee, who artEnglish born, and son to Wulfrida of Lexden. And I trust that thou, my sweet Lady Mabel, will be a happy bride and wife. All I look foris to end my days under the Cross, in the cause of the HolySepulchre, whether as warrior or lay brother. Yes, dear lady, thatis enough for old Sigbert. "

And Mabel had to acquiesce and believe that her old friend foundpeace and gladness beneath the eight-pointed Cross, when she and herbrother sailed for England, where she would behold the green fieldsand purple heather of which he had told her amid the rocks ofPalestine. 

Moreover, she thought of him when on her way through France, sheheard the young monk Bernard, then rising into fame, preach on thebeleaguered city, saved by the poor wise man; and tell how, when thecity was safe, none remembered the poor man. True, the preachergave it a mystic meaning, and interpreted it as meaning theemphatically Poor Man by Whom Salvation came, and Whom too few bearin mind. Yet such a higher meaning did not exclude the thought ofone whose deserts surpassed his honours here on earth. 

THE BEGGAR'S LEGACY

An Alderman bold, Henry Smith was enrolled, Of the Silversmiths' Company;Highly praised was his name, his skill had high fame, And a prosperous man was he. 

Knights drank to his health, and lauded his wealth; Sailors came from the Western Main, Their prizes they sold, of ingots of gold, Or plate from the galleys of Spain. 

Then beakers full fine, to hold the red wine, Were cast in his furnace's mould, Or tankards rich chased, in intricate taste, Gimmal rings of the purest gold. 

On each New Year's morn, no man thought it scorn-- Whether statesman, or warrior brave--The choicest device, of costliest price, For a royal off'ring to crave. 

"Bring here such a toy as the most may joy The eyes of our gracious Queen, Rows of orient pearls, gold pins for her curls, Silver network, all glistening sheen. "

Each buyer who came--lord, squire, or dame-- Behaved in most courteous guise, Showing honour due, as to one they knew To be at once wealthy and wise. 

In London Guild Hall, the citizens all, Esteemed him their future Lord Mayor;Not one did he meet, in market or street, But made him a reverence fair. 

"Ho, " said Master Smith, "I will try the pith Of this smooth-faced courtesy;Do they prize myself, do they prize my pelf, Do they value what's mine or me?"

His gold chain of pride he hath laid aside, And furred gown of the scarlet red;He set on his back a fardel and pack, And a hood on his grizzled head. 

His 'prentices all he hath left in stall, But running right close by his side, In spite of his rags, guarding well his bags, His small Messan dog would abide. 

So thus, up and down, through village and town, In rain or in sunny weather, Through Surrey's fair land, his staff in his hand, Went he and the dog together. 

"Good folk, hear my prayer, of your bounty spare, Help a wanderer in his need;Better days I have seen, a rich man I have been, Esteemed both in word and deed. "

In the first long street, certain forms he did meet, But scarce might behold their faces;From matted elf-locks eyes stared like an ox, And shambling were their paces!

Not one gave him cheer, nor would one come near, As he turned him away to go, Then a heavy stone at the dog was thrown, To deal a right cowardly blow. 

In Mitcham's fair vale, the men 'gan to rail, "Not a vagabond may come near;"Each mother's son ran, each boy and each man, To summon the constable here. 

The cart's tail behind, the beggar they bind, They flogged him full long and full sore;They hunted him out, did that rabble rout, And bade him come thither no more!

All weary and bruised, and scurvily used, He went trudging along his track;The lesson was stern he had come to learn, And yet he disdained to turn back. 

Where Walton-on-Thames gleams fair through the stems Of its tufted willow palms, There were loitering folk who most vilely spoke, Nor would give him one groat in alms. 

"Dog Smith, " was the cry, "behold him go by, The fool who hath lost all he had!"For only to tease can delight and can please The ill-nurtured village lad. 

Behold, in Betchworth was a blazing hearth With a hospitable door. "Thou art tired and lame, " quoth a kindly dame, "Come taste of our humble store. 

"Though scant be our fare, thou art welcome to share; We rejoice to give thee our best;Come sit by our fire, thou weary old sire, Come in, little doggie, and rest. "

And where Mole the slow doth by Cobham go, He beheld a small village maiden;Of loose flocks of wool her lap was quite full, With a bundle her arms were laden. 

"What seekest thou, child, 'mid the bushes wild, Thy face and thine arms that thus tear?""The wool the sheep leave, to spin and to weave; It makes us our clothes to wear. "

Then she led him in, where her mother did spin, And make barley bannocks to eat;They gave him enough, though the food was rough-- The kindliness made it most sweet. 

Many years had past, report ran at last, The rich Alderman Smith was dead. Then each knight and dame, and each merchant came, To hear his last testament read. 

I, Harry Smith, found of mind clear and sound, Thus make and devise my last will:While England shall stand, I bequeath my land, My last legacies to fulfil. 

"To the muddy spot, where they cleaned them not, When amongst their fields I did roam;To every one there with the unkempt hair I bequeath a small-toothed comb. 

"Next, to Mitcham proud, and the gaping crowd, Who for nobody's sorrows grieve;With a lash double-thong, plaited firm and strong, A horsewhip full stout do I leave. 

"To Walton-on-Thames, where, 'mid willow stems, The lads and the lasses idle;To restrain their tongues, and breath of their lungs, I bequeath a bit and a bridle. 

"To Betchworth so fair, and the households there Who so well did the stranger cheer, I leave as my doles to the pious souls, Full seventy pounds by the year. 

"To Cobham the thrifty I leave a good fifty, To be laid out in cloth dyed dark;On Sabbath-day to be given away, And known by Smith's badge and mark. 

"To Leatherhead too my gratitude's due, For a welcome most freely given;Let my bounty remain, for each village to gain, Whence the poor man was never driven. "

So in each sweet dale, and bright sunny vale, In the garden of England blest;Those have found a friend, whose gifts do not end, Who gave to that stranger a rest!

Henry Smith's history is literally true. He was a silversmith ofimmense wealth in London in the latter part of the sixteenthcentury, but in his later years he chose to perambulate the countyof Surrey as a beggar, and was known as 'Dog Smith. ' He met withvarious fortune in different parishes, and at Mitcham was flogged atthe cart's tail. On his death, apparently in 1627, he was found tohave left bequests to almost every place in Surrey, according to themanners of the inhabitants--to Mitcham a horsewhip, to Walton-on-Thames a bridle, to Betchworth, Leatherhead, and many more, endowments which produce from 50 to 75 pounds a year, and to Cobhama sum to be spent annually in woollen cloth of a uniform colour, bearing Smith's badge, to be given away in church to the poor andimpotent, as the following tablet still records:--

1627

ITEM--That the Gift to the impotent and aged poor people, shall bebestowed in Apparell of one Coulour, with some Badge or other Mark, that it may be known to be the Gift of the said Henry Smith, or elsein Bread, flesh, or fish on the Sabbath-day publickly in the Church. In Witness whereof the said Henry Smith did put to his Hand and sealthe Twenty-first day of January in the Second Year of the Reign ofour most gracious Sovereign Lord King Charles the First. 

A REVIEW OF NIECES

GENERAL SIR EDWARD FULFORD, K. G. C. , TO HIS SISTER MISS FULFORDUNITED SERVICE CLUB, 29TH JUNE. 

My Dear Charlotte, --I find I shall need at least a month to getthrough the necessary business; so that I shall only have a week atlast for my dear mother and the party collected at New Cove. Youwill have ample time to decide which of the nieces shall be asked toaccompany us, but you had better give no hint of the plan till youhave studied them thoroughly. After all the years that you haveaccompanied me on all my stations, you know how much depends on theyoung lady of our house being one able to make things pleasant tothe strange varieties who will claim our hospitality in a place likeMalta, yet not likely to flag if left in solitude with you. Shemust be used enough to society to do the honours genially andgracefully, and not have her head turned by being the chief younglady in the place. She ought to be well bred, if not high bred, enough to give a tone to the society of her contemporaries, andabove all she must not flirt. If I found flirtation going on withthe officers, I should send her home on the spot. Of course, allthis means that she must have the only real spring of good breeding, and be a thoroughly good, religious, unselfish, right-minded girl;otherwise we should have to rue our scheme. In spite of all youwould do towards moulding and training a young maiden, there will beso many distractions and unavoidable counter-influences that theexperiment would be too hazardous, unless there were a character andmanners ready formed. There ought likewise to be cultivation andintelligence to profit by the opportunities she will have. I shouldnot like Greece and Italy, to say nothing of Egypt and Palestine, tobe only so much gape seed. You must have an eye likewise to goodtemper, equal to cope with the various emergencies of travelling. N. B. You should have more than one in your eye, for probably thefirst choice will be of some one too precious to be attainable. --Your affectionate brother, EDWARD FULFORD. 

MISS FULFORD TO SIR EDWARD FULFORD1 SHINGLE COTTAGES, NEW COVE, S. CLEMENTS, 30TH JUNE. 

My Dear Edward, --When Sydney Smith led Perfection to the Pea becausethe Pea would not come to Perfection, he could hardly have had suchan ideal as yours. Your intended niece is much like the 'notimpossible she' of a youth under twenty. One comfort is that suchis the blindness of your kind that you will imagine all these charmsin whatever good, ladylike, simple-hearted girl I pitch upon, andsuch I am sure I shall find all my nieces. The only difficulty willbe in deciding, and that will be fixed by details of style, and theparents' willingness to spare their child. 

This is an excellent plan of yours for bringing the whole familytogether round our dear old mother and her home daughter. This isthe end house of three on a little promontory, and has a charmingview--of the sea in the first place, and then on the one side ofwhat is called by courtesy the parade, on the top of the sea wallwhere there is a broad walk leading to S. Clements, nearly two milesoff. There are not above a dozen houses altogether, and the hotelis taken for the two families from London and Oxford, while theDruces are to be in the house but one next to us, the middle onebeing unluckily let off to various inhabitants. We have one bedroomfree where we may lodge some of the overflowings, and I believe thewhole party are to take their chief meals together in the large roomat the hotel. The houses are mostly scattered, being such asfortunate skippers build as an investment, and that their wives mayamuse themselves with lodgers in their absence. The church is theweakest point in this otherwise charming place. The nearest, andactually the parish church, is a hideous compo structure, built inthe worst of times as a chapel of ease to S. Clements. I am afraidmy mother's loyalty to the parochial system will make her secure apew there, though at the farther end of the town there is a newchurch which is all that can be wished, and about a mile and a halfinland there is a village church called Hollyford, held, I believe, by a former fellow-curate of Horace Druce. Perhaps they willexchange duties, if Horace can be persuaded to take a longer holidaythan merely for the three weeks he has provided for at Bourne Parva. They cannot come till Monday week, but our Oxford professor and hisparty come on Thursday, and Edith will bring her girls the next day. Her husband, our Q. C. , cannot come till his circuit is over, but ofcourse you know more about his movements than I do. I wonder youhave never said anything about those girls of his, but I suppose youclass them as unattainable. I have said nothing to my mother orEmily of our plans, as I wish to be perfectly unbiased, and as Ihave seen none of the nieces for five years, and am prepared todelight in them all, I may be reckoned as a blank sheet as to theirmerits. --Your affectionate sister, CHARLOTTE FULFORD. 

JULY 4. --By noon to-day arrived Martyn, {127} with Mary his wife, Margaret and Avice their daughters, Uchtred their second son, andpoor Harry Fulford's orphan, Isabel, who has had a home with themever since she left school. Though she is only a cousin onceremoved, she seems to fall into the category of eligible nieces, andindeed she seems the obvious companion for us, as she has no home, and seems to me rather set aside among the others. I hope there isno jealousy, for she is much better looking than her cousins, withgentle, liquid eyes, a pretty complexion, and a wistful expression. Moreover, she is dressed in a quiet ladylike way, whereas grandmammalooked out just now in the twilight and said, "My dear Martyn, haveyou brought three boys down?" It was a showery, chilly evening, andthey were all out admiring the waves. Ulsters and sailor hats wereappropriate enough then, but the genders were not easy todistinguish, especially as the elder girl wears her hair short--noimprovement to a keen face which needs softening. She is much toolike a callow undergraduate altogether, and her sister follows suit, though perhaps with more refinement of feature--indeed she looksdelicate, and was soon called in. They are in slight mourning, andappear in gray serges. They left a strap of books on the sofa, ofsomewhat alarming light literature for the seaside. Bacon's ESSAYSAND ELEMENTS OF LOGIC were the first Emily beheld, and while shestood regarding them with mingled horror and respect, in ran Aviceto fetch them, as the two sisters are reading up for the Oxfordexam--'ination' she added when she saw her two feeble-minded auntslooking for the rest of the word. However, she says it is only Picawho is going up for it this time. She herself was not consideredstrong enough. Yet there have those two set themselves down withtheir books under the rocks, blind to all the glory of sea andshore, deaf to the dash and ripple of the waves! I long to go andshout Wordsworth's warning about 'growing double' to them. I amglad to say that Uchtred has come and fetched Avice away. I canhardly believe Martyn and Mary parents to this grown-up family. They look as youthful as ever, and are as active and vigorous, andfull of their jokes with one another and their children. They arenow gone out to the point of the rocks at the end of our promontory, fishing for microscopical monsters, and comporting themselves boyand girl fashion. 

Isabel has meantime been chatting very pleasantly with grandmamma, and trying to extricate us from our bewilderment as to names andnicknames. My poor mother, after strenuously preventingabbreviations in her own family, has to endure them in herdescendants, and as every one names a daughter after her, there issome excuse! This Oxford Margaret goes by the name of Pie or Pica, apparently because it is the remotest portion of Magpie, and herLondon cousin is universally known as Metelill--the Danish form, Ibelieve; but in the Bourne Parva family the young Margaret Druce isnothing worse than Meg, and her elder sister remains Jane. "Nobodywould dare to call her anything else, " says Isa. Avice cannot butbe sometimes translated into the Bird; while my poor name, in mysecond London niece, has become the masculine Charley. "I shallknow why when I see her, " says Isa laughing. This good-natureddamsel is coming out walking with us old folks, and will walk onwith me, when grandmamma turns back with Emily. Her great desire isto find the whereabouts of a convalescent home in which she and hercousins have subscribed to place a poor young dressmaker for a sixweeks' rest; but I am afraid it is on the opposite side of S. Clements, too far for a walk. 

JULY 5. --Why did you never tell me how charming Metelill is? Inever supposed the Fulford features capable of so much beauty, andthe whole manner and address are so delightful that I do not wonderthat all her cousins are devoted to her; Uchtred, or Butts, as theyare pleased to name him, has brightened into another creature sinceshe came, and she seems like sunshine to us all. As to my namesake, I am sorry to say that I perceive the appropriateness of Charley;but I suppose it is style, for the masculine dress which in Pica andAvice has an air of being worn for mere convenience' sake, and isquite ladylike, especially on Avice, has in her an appearance ofdefiance and coquetry. Her fox-terrier always shares her room, which therefore is eschewed by her sister, and this has made achange in our arrangements. We had thought the room in our house, which it seems is an object of competition, would suit best for JaneDruce and one of her little sisters; but a hint was given by eitherPica or her mother that it would be a great boon to let Jane andAvice share it, as they are very great friends, and we had thelatter there installed. However, this fox-terrier made Metelillprotest against sleeping at the hotel with her sister, and hermother begged us to take her in. Thereupon, Emily saw Isa lookingannoyed, and on inquiry she replied sweetly, "Oh, never mind, auntydear; I daresay Wasp won't be so bad as he looks; and I'll try notto be silly, and then I daresay Charley will not tease me! Only Ihad hoped to be with dear Metelill; but no doubt she will prefer herBird--people always do. " So they were going to make that poor childthe victim! For it seems Pica has a room to herself, and will notgive it up or take in any one. Emily went at once to Avice andasked whether she would mind going to the hotel, and letting Isa bewith Metelill, and this she agreed to at once. I don't know why Itell you all these details, except that they are straws to show theway of the wind, and you will see how Isabel is always thesacrifice, unless some one stands up for her. Here comes Martyn tobeguile me out to the beach. 

JULY 6 (Sunday). --My mother drove to church and took Edith, who wasglad neither to walk nor to have to skirmish for a seat. Isa walkedwith Emily and me, and so we made up our five for our seat, which, to our dismay, is in the gallery, but, happily for my mother, thestairs are easy. The pews there are not quite so close to one'snose as those in the body of the church; they are a little wider, and are furnished with hassocks instead of traps to preventkneeling, so that we think ourselves well off, and we were agreeablysurprised at the service. There is a new incumbent who is strivingto modify things as well as his people and their architecturepermit, and who preached an excellent sermon. So we triumph overthe young folk, who try to persuade us that the gallery is ajudgment on us for giving in to the hired pew system. They maybanter me as much as they like, but I don't like to see them jestwith grandmamma about it, as if they were on equal terms, and shedoes not understand it either. "My dear, " she gravely says, "yourgrandpapa always said it was a duty to support the parish church. ""Nothing will do but the Congregational system in these days; don'tyou think so?" began Pica dogmatically, when her father called heroff. Martyn cannot bear to see his mother teased. He and his wife, with the young ones, made their way to Hollyford, where they found aprimitive old church and a service to match, but were terribly late, and had to sit in worm-eaten pews near the door, amid scents ofpeppermint and southernwood. On the way back, Martyn fraternisedwith a Mr. Methuen, a Cambridge tutor with a reading party, who has, I am sorry to say, arrived at the house VIS-A-VIS to ours, on theother side of the cove. Our Oxford young ladies turn up their nosesat the light blue, and say the men have not the finish of the dark;but Charley is in wild spirits. I heard her announcing the arrivalthus: "I say, Isa, what a stunning lark! Not but that I was up toit all the time, or else I should have skedaddled; for this placewas bound to be as dull as ditchwater. " "But how did you know?"asked Isa. "Why, Bertie Elwood tipped me a line that he was comingdown here with his coach, or else I should have told the mater Icouldn't stand it and gone to stay with some one. " This BertieElwood is, it seems, one of the many London acquaintance. He looksinoffensive, and so do the others, but I wish they had chosen someother spot for their studies, and so perhaps does their tutor, though he is now smoking very happily under a rock with Martyn. 

JULY 7. --Such a delightful evening walk with Metelill and Isa asEmily and I had last night, going to evensong in our despisedchurch! The others said they could stand no more walking and heat, and yet we met Martyn and Mary out upon the rocks when we werecoming home, after being, I must confess, nearly fried to death bythe gas and bad air. They laughed at us and our exertions, all inthe way of good humour, but it was not wholesome from parents. Marytried to make me confess that we were coming home in a self-complacent fakir state of triumph in our headaches, much inferior toher humble revelling in cool sea, sky, and moonlight. It was likethe difference between the BENEDICITE and the TE DEUM, I could nothelp thinking; while Emily said a few words to Martyn as to howmamma would be disappointed at his absenting himself from Church, and was answered, "Ah! Emily, you are still the good home child ofthe primitive era, " which she did not understand; but I faced aboutand asked if it were not what we all should be. He answered rathersadly, "If we could'; and his wife shrugged her shoulders. Alas! Ifear the nineteenth century tone has penetrated them, and do notwonder that this poor Isabel does not seem happy in her home. 

9. --What a delightful sight is a large family of young thingstogether! The party is complete, for the Druces arrived yesterdayevening in full force, torn from their bucolic life, as Martyn tellsthem. My poor dear old Margaret! She does indeed look worn andaged, dragged by cares like a colonist's wife, and her husband isquite bald, and as spare as a hermit. It is hard to believe himyounger than Martyn; but then his whole soul is set on Bourne Parva, and hers on him, on the children, on the work, and on making bothends meet; and they toil five times more severely in one month thanthe professor and his lady in a year, besides having just twice asmany children, all of whom are here except the schoolboys. Margaretdeclares that the entire rest, and the talking to something notentirely rural, will wind her husband up for the year; and it isgood to see her sitting in a basket-chair by my mother, knittingindeed, but they both do that like breathing, while they purr awayto one another in a state of perfect repose and felicity. Meantimeher husband talks Oxford with Martyn and Mary. Their daughter Janeseems to be a most valuable helper to both, but she too has a worn, anxious countenance, and I fear she may be getting less rest thanher parents, as they have brought only one young nursemaid withthem, and seem to depend on her and Meg for keeping the middle-sizedchildren in order. She seems to have all the cares of the world onher young brow, and is much exercised about one of the boxes whichhas gone astray on the railway. What do you think she did thismorning? She started off with Avice at eight o'clock for the S. Clements station to see if the telegram was answered, and they wenton to the Convalescent Home and saw the Oxford dressmaker. It seemsthat Avice had taken Uchtred with her on Sunday evening, made outthe place, and gone to church at S. Clements close by--a very longwalk; but it seems that those foolish girls thought me too fine alady to like to be seen with her in her round hat on a Sunday. Iwish they could understand what it is that I dislike. If I objectedto appearances, I am afraid the poor Druces would fare ill. Margaret's girls cannot help being essentially ladies, but they havenot much beauty to begin with--and their dress! It was chiefly madeby their own sewing machine, with the assistance of the Bourne Parvamantua-maker, superintended by Jane, 'to prevent her from making itfoolish'; and the effect, I grieve to say, is ill-fitting dowdiness, which becomes grotesque from their self-complacent belief that itdisplays the only graceful and sensible fashion in the place. Itwas laughable to hear them criticising every hat or costume theyhave seen, quite unaware that they were stared at themselves, tillCharley told them people thought they had come fresh out of LadyBountiful's goody-box, which piece of impertinence they took as agreat compliment to their wisdom and excellence. To be sure, thefashions are distressing enough, but Metelill shows that they can betreated gracefully and becomingly, and even Avice makes her sergeand hat look fresh and ladylike. Spite of contrast, Avice and Janeseem to be much devoted to each other. Pica and Charley are anotherpair, and Isa and Metelill--though Metelill is the universalfavourite, and there is always competition for her. In earlymorning I see the brown heads and blue bathing-dresses, a-mermaiding, as they call it, in the cove below, and they come in allglowing, with the floating tresses that make Metelill look socharming, and full of merry adventures at breakfast. We all meet inthe great room at the hotel for a substantial meal at half-past one, and again (most of us at least) at eight; but it is a moot pointwhich of these meals we call dinner. Very merry both of them are;Martyn and Horace Druce are like boys together, and the girls screamwith laughter, rather too much so sometimes. Charley is very noisy, and so is Meg Druce, when not overpowered by shyness. She will notexchange a sentence with any of the elders, but in the general laughshe chuckles and shrieks like a young Cochin-Chinese chickenlearning to crow; and I hear her squealing like a maniac while sheis shrimping with the younger ones and Charley. I must except thosetwo young ladies from the unconscious competition, for one has nomanners at all, and the other affects those of a man; but as to therest, they are all as nice as possible, and I can only say, "Howhappy could I be with either. " Isa, poor girl, seems to need ourcare most, and would be the most obliging and attentive. Metelillwould be the prettiest and sweetest ornament of our drawing-room, and would amuse you the most; Pica, with her scholarly tastes, wouldbe the best and most appreciative fellow-traveller; and Jane, if shecould or would go, would perhaps benefit the most by being freedfrom a heavy strain, and having her views enlarged. 

10. --A worthy girl is Jane Druce, but I fear the Vicarage is noschool of manners. Her mother is sitting with us, and has beendiscoursing to grandmamma on her Jane's wonderful helpfulness andactivity in house and parish, and how everything hinged on her lastwinter when they had whooping-cough everywhere in and out of doors;indeed she doubts whether the girl has ever quite thrown off theeffects of all her exertions then. Suddenly comes a trampling, abounce and a rush, and in dashes Miss Jane, fiercely demandingwhether the children had leave to go to the cove. Poor Margaretmeekly responds that she had consented. "And didn't you know, "exclaims the damsel, "that all their everyday boots are in thatunlucky trunk?" There is a humble murmur that Chattie had promisedto be very careful, but it produces a hotter reply. "As ifChattie's promises of that kind could be trusted! And I had _TOLD_them that they were to keep with baby on the cliff!" Then came areal apology for interfering with Jane's plans, to which we listenedaghast, and Margaret was actually getting up to go and look afterher amphibious offspring herself, when her daughter cut her offshort with, "Nonsense, mamma, you know you are not to do any suchthing! I must go, that's all, or they won't have a decent boot orstocking left among them. " Off she went with another bang, whileher mother began blaming herself for having yielded in haste to thepersuasions of the little ones, oblivious of the boots, thussacrificing Jane's happy morning with Avice. My mother showedherself shocked by the tone in which Margaret had let herself behectored, and this brought a torrent of almost tearful apologiesfrom the poor dear thing, knowing she did not keep up her authorityor make herself respected as would be good for her girl, but if weonly knew how devoted Jane was, and how much there was to grind andtry her temper, we should not wonder that it gave way sometimes. Indeed it was needful to turn away the subject, as Margaret was thelast person we wished to distress. 

Jane could have shown no temper to the children, for at dinner aroly-poly person of five years old, who seems to absorb all the fatin the family, made known that he had had a very jolly day, and heloved cousin Avice very much indeed, and sister Janie very muchindeeder, and he could with difficulty be restrained from anexpedition to kiss them both then and there. 

The lost box was announced while we were at dinner, and Jane is gonewith her faithful Avice to unpack it. Her mother would have done itand sent her boating with the rest, but submitted as usual whencommanded to adhere to the former plan of driving with grandmamma. These Druce children must be excellent, according to their mother, but they are terribly brusque and bearish. They are either seen andnot heard, or not seen and heard a great deal too much. Even Janeand Meg, who ought to know better, keep up a perpetual undercurrentof chatter and giggle, whatever is going on, with any one who willshare it with them. 

10. --I am more and more puzzled about the new reading of the FifthCommandment. None seem to understand it as we used to do. Theparents are content to be used as equals, and to be called by allsorts of absurd names; and though grandmamma is always kindly andattentively treated, there is no reverence for the relationship. Iheard Charley call her 'a jolly old party, ' and Metelill respondthat she was 'a sweet old thing. ' Why, we should have thought suchexpressions about our grandmother a sort of sacrilege, but when Iventured to hint as much Charley flippantly answered, "Gracious me, we are not going back to buckram"; and Metelill, with her caressingway, declared that she loved dear granny too much to be so stiff andformal. I quoted--

"If I be a Father, where is My honour?"

And one of them taking it, I am sorry to say, for a line of secularpoetry, exclaimed at the stiffness and coldness. Pica then put inher oar, and began to argue that honour must be earned, and that itwas absurd and illogical to claim it for the mere accident ofseniority or relationship. Jane, not at all conscious of being anoffender, howled at her that this was her horrible liberalism andneology, while Metelill asked what was become of loyalty. "Thatdepends on what you mean by it, " returned our girl graduate. "LOI-AUTE, steadfastness to principle, is noble, but personal loyalty, tosome mere puppet or the bush the crown hangs on, is a perniciousfigment. " Charley shouted that this was the No. 1 letter A point inPie's prize essay, and there the discussion ended, Isa only sighingto herself, "Ah, if I had any one to be loyal to!"

"How you would jockey them!" cried Charley, turning upon her soroughly that the tears came into her eyes; and I must have put onwhat you call my Government-house look, for Charley subsidedinstantly. 

11. --Here was a test as to this same obedience. The pupils, who areby this time familiars of the party, had devised a boating andfishing expedition for all the enterprising, which was satisfactoryto the elders because it was to include both the fathers. Unluckily, however, this morning's post brought a summons to Martynand Mary to fulfil an engagement they have long made to meet anAmerican professor at ---, and they had to start off at eleveno'clock; and at the same time the Hollyford clergyman, an oldfellow-curate of Horace Druce, sent a note imploring him to take afuneral. So the voice of the seniors was for putting off theexpedition, but the voice of the juniors was quite the other way. The three families took different lines. The Druces show obediencethough not respect; they growled and grumbled horribly, butsubmitted, though with ill grace, to the explicit prohibition. Non-interference is professedly Mary's principle, but even she said, with entreaty veiled beneath the playfulness, when it was pleadedthat two of the youths had oars at Cambridge, "Freshwater fish, mydears. I wish you would wait for us! I don't want you to attendthe submarine wedding of our old friends Tame and Isis. " To whichPica rejoined, likewise talking out of Spenser, that Proteus wouldprovide a nice ancient nymph to tend on them. Her father thenchimed in, saying, "You will spare our nerves by keeping to dry landunless you can secure the ancient mariner who was with usyesterday. "

"Come, come, most illustrious, " said Pica good-humouredly, "I'm notgoing to encourage you to set up for nerves. You are much betterwithout them, and I must get some medusae. "

It ended with, "I beg you will not go without that old man, " themost authoritative speech I have heard either Martyn or Mary make totheir daughters; but it was so much breath wasted on Pica, whomaintains her right to judge for herself. The ancient mariner hadbeen voted an encumbrance and exchanged for a jolly young waterman. 

Our other mother, Edith, implored, and was laughed down by Charley, who declared she could swim, and that she did not think Uncle Martynwould have been so old-womanish. Metelill was so tender andcaressing with her frightened mother that I thought here at last wassubmission, and with a good grace. But after a turn on theesplanade among the pupils, back came Metelill in a hurry to say, "Dear mother, will you very much _MIND_ if I go? They will be sodisappointed, and there will be such a fuss if I don't; and Charleyreally ought to have some one with her besides Pie, who will heednothing but magnifying medusae. " I am afraid it is true, as Isasays, that it was all owing to the walk with that young Mr Horne. 

Poor Edith fell into such a state of nervous anxiety that I couldnot leave her, and she confided to me how Charley had caught herfoolish masculine affectations in the family of this very BertieElwood, and told me of the danger of an attachment between Metelilland a young government clerk who is always on the look-out for her. "And dear Metelill is so gentle and gracious that she cannot bear torepel any one, " says the mother, who would, I see, be thankful topart with either daughter to our keeping in hopes of breaking offperilous habits. I was saved, however, from committing myself bythe coming in of Isabel. That child follows me about like a tamecat, and seems so to need mothering that I cannot bear to snub her. 

She came to propound to me a notion that has risen among theseOxford girls, namely, that I should take out their convalescentdressmaker as my maid instead of poor Amelie. She is quite wellnow, and going back next week; but a few years in a warm climatemight be the saving of her health. So I agreed to go with Isa tolook at her, and judge whether the charming account I heard was allyouthful enthusiasm. Edith went out driving with my mother, and webegan our TETE-A-TETE walk, in which I heard a great deal of thedifficulties of that free-and-easy house at Oxford, and how oftenIsa wishes for some one who would be a real guide and helper, instead of only giving a playful, slap-dash answer, like good-natured mockery. The treatment may suit Mary's own daughters, but'Just as you please, my dear, ' is not good for sensitive, anxiousspirits. We passed Jane and Avice reading together under a rock; Iwas much inclined to ask them to join us, but Isa was sure they weremuch happier undisturbed, and she was so unwilling to share me withany one that I let them alone. I was much pleased with thedressmaker, Maude Harris, who is a nice, modest, refined girl, andif the accounts I get from her employers bear out what I hear ofher, I shall engage her; I shall be glad, for the niece's sake, tohave that sort of young woman about the place. She speaks mostwarmly of what the Misses Fulford have done for her. 

Jane will be disappointed if I cannot have her rival candidate--apet schoolgirl who works under the Bourne Parva dressmaker. "What arecommendation!" cries Pica, and there is a burst of mirth, at whichJane looks round and says, "What is there to laugh at? MissDadworthy is a real good woman, and a real old Bourne Parva person, so that you may be quite sure Martha will have learnt no nonsense tobegin with. "

"No, " says Pica, "from all such pomps and vanities as style, shewill be quite clear. "

While Avice's friendship goes as far as to say that if AuntCharlotte cannot have Maude, perhaps Martha could get a little moretraining. Whereupon Jane runs off by the yard explanations of theadmirable training--religious, moral, and intellectual--of BourneParva, illustrated by the best answers of her favourite scholars, anecdotes of them, and the reports of the inspectors, religious andsecular; and Avice listens with patience, nay, with respectfulsympathy. 

12. --We miss Mary and Martyn more than I expected. Careless andeasy-going as they seem, they made a difference in the ways of theyoung people; they were always about with them, not as dragons, butfor their own pleasure. The presence of a professor must needsimpose upon young men, and Mary, with her brilliant wit and charmingmanners, was a check without knowing it. The boating party cameback gay and triumphant, and the young men joined in our late meal;and oh, what a noise there was! though I must confess that it wasnot they who made the most. Metelill was not guilty of the noise, but she was--I fear I must say it--flirting with all her might witha youth on each side of her, and teasing a third; I am afraid she isone of those girls who are charming to all, and doubly charming toyour sex, and that it will never do to have her among the staff. Idon't think it is old-maidish in us to be scandalised at her walkingup and down the esplanade with young Horne till ten o'clock lastnight; Charley was behind with Bertie Elwood, and, I grieve to say, was smoking. It lasted till Horace Druce went out to tell them thatMetelill must come in at once, as it was time to shut up the house. 

The Oxford girls were safe indoors; Isa working chess problems withanother of the lads, Avice keeping Jane company over the putting thelittle ones to sleep--in Mount Lebanon, as they call the Drucelodging--and Pica preserving microscopic objects. "Isn't sheawful?" said one of those pupils. "She's worse than all the dons inCambridge. She wants to be at it all day long, and all through thevacation. "

They perfectly flee from her. They say she is always whipping out amicroscope and lecturing upon protoplasms--and there is some truthin the accusation. She is almost as bad on the emancipation ofwomen, on which there is a standing battle, in earnest with Jane--injoke with Metelill; but it has, by special orders, to be hushed atdinner, because it almost terrifies grandmamma. I fear Pica triesto despise her!

This morning the girls are all out on the beach in pairs and threes, the pupils being all happily shut up with their tutor. I see theinvalid lady creep out with her beach-rest from the intermediatehouse, and come down to her usual morning station in the shade of arock, unaware, poor thing, that it has been monopolised by Isa andMetelill. Oh, girls! why don't you get up and make room for her?No; she moves on to the next shady place, but there Pica has aperfect fortification of books spread on her rug, and Charley issketching on the outskirts, and the fox-terrier barks loudly. Willshe go on to the third seat? where I can see, though she cannot, Jane and Avice sitting together, and Freddy shovelling sand at theirfeet. Ah! at last she is made welcome. Good girls! They haveseated her and her things, planted a parasol to shelter her from thewind, and lingered long enough not to make her feel herself turningthem out before making another settlement out of my sight. 

THREE O'CLOCK. --I am sorry to say Charley's sketch turned into acaricature of the unprotected female wandering in vain in search ofa bit of shelter, with a torn parasol, a limp dress, and draggingrug, and altogether unspeakably forlorn. It was exhibited at thedinner-table, and elicited peals of merriment, so that we eldersbegged to see the cause of the young people's amusement. My bloodwas up, and when I saw what it was, I said--

"I wonder you like to record your own discourtesy, to call itnothing worse. "

"But, Aunt Charlotte, " said Metelill in her pretty pleading way, "wedid not know her. "

"Well, what of that?" I said. 

"Oh, you know it is only abroad that people expect that sort ofthings from strangers. "

"One of the worst imputations on English manners I ever heard, " Isaid. 

"But she was such a guy!" cried Charley. "Mother said she was sureshe was not a lady. "

"And therefore you did not show yourself one, " I could not butreturn. 

There her mother put in a gentle entreaty that Charley would notdistress grandmamma with these loud arguments with her aunt, and Iadded, seeing that Horace Druce's attention was attracted, that Ishould like to have added another drawing called 'Courtesy, ' andshown that there was _SOME_ hospitality _EVEN_ to strangers, andthen I asked the two girls about her. They had joined companyagain, and carried her beach-rest home for her, finding out by theway that she was a poor homeless governess who had come down to stayin cheap lodgings with an old nurse to try to recruit herself tillshe could go out again. My mother became immediately interested, and has sent Emily to call on her, and to try and find out whethershe is properly taken care of. 

Isa was very much upset at my displeasure. She came to meafterwards and said she was greatly grieved; but Metelill would notmove, and she had always supposed it wrong to make acquaintance withstrangers in that chance way. I represented that making room wasnot picking up acquaintance, and she owned it, and was reallygrateful for the reproof; but, as I told her, no doubt such a rulemust be necessary in a place like Oxford. 

How curiously Christian courtesy and polished manners sometimesseparate themselves! and how conceit interferes with both! I acquitMetelill and Isa of all but thoughtless habit, and Pica wasabsorbed. She can be well mannered enough when she is not defendingthe rights of woman, or hotly dogmatical on the crude theories shehas caught--and suppose she has thought out, poor child! And Jane, though high-principled, kind, and self-sacrificing, is too narrowand--not exactly conceited--but exclusive and Bourne Parvaish, notto be as bad in her way, though it is the sound one. The wars ofthe Druces and Maronites, as Martyn calls them, sometimes ragebeyond the bounds of good humour. 

TEN P. M. --I am vexed too on another score. I must tell you thatthis hotel does not shine in puddings and sweets, and Charley hasnot been ashamed to grumble beyond the bounds of good manners. Iheard some laughing and joking going on between the girls and thepupils, Metelill with her "Oh no! You won't! Nonsense!" in justthat tone which means "I wish, I would, but I cannot bid you, "--thetone I do not like to hear in a maiden of any degree. 

And behold three of those foolish lads have brought her gilt andpainted boxes of bon-bons, over which there was a prodigiousgiggling and semi-refusing and bantering among the young folks, worrying Emily and me excessively, though we knew it would not do tointerfere. 

There is a sea-fog this evening unfavourable to the usualpromenades, and we elders, including the tutor, were sitting with mymother, when, in her whirlwind fashion, in burst Jane, dragging herlittle sister Chattie with her, and breathlessly exclaiming, "Father, father, come and help! They are gambling, and I can't getMeg away!"

When the nervous ones had been convinced that no one had been caughtby the tide or fallen off the rocks, Jane explained that Metelillhad given one box of bon-bons to the children, who were to be servedwith one apiece all round every day. And the others were put up byMetelill to serve as prizes in the 'racing game, ' which some one hadrouted out, left behind in the lodging, and which was now spread onthe dining-table, with all the young people playing in high glee, and with immense noise. 

"Betting too!" said Jane in horror. "Mr. Elwood betted threechocolate creams upon Charley, and Pica took it! Father! Come andcall Meg away. "

She spoke exactly as if she were summoning him to snatch her sisterfrom ROUGE ET NOIR at Monaco; and her face was indescribable whenher aunt Edith set us all off laughing by saying, "Fearfuldepravity, my dear. "

"Won't you come, father?" continued Jane; "Mr. Methuen, won't youcome and stop those young men?"

Mr. Methuen smiled a little and looked at Horace, who said--

"Hush, Janie; these are not things in which to interfere. "

"Then, " quoth Jane sententiously, "I am not astonished at thedissipation of the university. "

And away she flounced in tears of wrath. Her mother went after her, and we laughed a little, it was impossible to help it, at the bathosof the chocolate creams; but, as Mr. Methuen said, she was reallyright, the amusement was undesirable, as savouring of evil. Edith, to my vexation, saw no harm in it; but Horace said very decidedly hehoped it would not happen again; and Margaret presently returned, saying she hoped that she had pacified Jane, and shown her that todescend as if there were an uproar in the school would only do muchmore harm than was likely to happen in that one evening; and shesaid to me afterwards, "I see what has been wanting in our training. We have let children's loyalty run into intolerance and rudeness. "But Meg was quite innocent of there being any harm in it, and onlyneeded reproof for being too much charmed by the pleasure for onceto obey her dictatorial sister. 

13, TEN A. M. --Horace has had it out with sundry of the young ladies, so as to prevent any more betting. Several had regretted it. "Onlythey did so want to get rid of the bon-bons! And Jane did make suchan uproar. " After all, nobody did really bet but Charley and theyoung Elwood, and Pica only that once. Jane candidly owns that alittle gentleness would have made a difference. 

Again I see this obtuseness to courtesy towards strangers. Ourdespised church has become popular, and so many of the young folkschoose to accompany us that they overflowed into the free seats inthe aisle, where I had a full view of them from above. Thesebenches are long, and I was sorry to see the girls plantingthemselves fast at the outer end, and making themselves square, soas to hinder any one else from getting in, till the verger came andspoke to them, when Charley giggled offensively; and even then theydid not make room, but forced the people to squeeze past. Isa couldnot help herself, not being the outermost; but she was muchdistressed, and does not shelter herself under Charley's plea thatit was so hot that the verger should have been indicted for crueltyto animals. Certainly they all did come home very hot from walkingback with the pupils. 

Pica and Avice were not among them, having joined the Druces ingoing to Hollyford, where Horace preached this morning. Their grayserges and sailor hats were, as they said, "not adapted to the towncongregation. "

"It is the congregation you dress for?" said their uncle dryly, whereupon Pica upbraided him with inconsistency in telling his poorpeople not to use the excuse of 'no clothes, ' and that the heart, not the dress, is regarded. He said it was true, but that he shouldstill advocate the poor man's coming in his cleanest and best. "There are manners towards God as well as towards man, " he said. 

I was too much tired by the heat to go to church again this evening, and am sitting with my mother, who is dozing. Where the youngpeople are I do not know exactly, but I am afraid I hear Charley'sshrill laugh on the beach. 

14. --Who do you think has found us out? Our dear old Governor-General, "in all his laurels, " as enthusiastic little Avice washeard saying, which made Freddy stare hard and vainly in search ofthem. He is staying at Hollybridge Park, and seeing our name in theS. Clements' list of visitors, he made Lady Hollybridge drive himover to call, and was much disappointed to find that you could notbe here during his visit. He was as kind and warm-hearted as ever, and paid our dear mother such compliments on her son, that we tellher the bows on her cap are starting upright with pride. 

Lady Hollybridge already knew Edith. She made herself verypleasant, and insisted on our coming EN MASSE to a great gardenparty which they are giving to-morrow. Hollybridge is the S. Clements' lion, with splendid grounds and gardens, and some fine oldpictures, so it is a fine chance for the young people; and we aregoing to hire one of the large excursion waggonettes, which willhold all who have age, dress, and will for gaieties. The pupils, asMr. Methuen is a friend of the Hollybridge people, will attend us asoutriders on their bicycles. I am rather delighted at thus catchingout the young ladies who did not think it worth while to bring aSunday bonnet. They have all rushed into S. Clements to furbishthemselves for the occasion, and we are left to the company of thesmall Druces. Neither Margaret nor Emily chooses to go, and willkeep my mother company. 

I ventured on administering a sovereign apiece to Isa and JaneDruce. The first blushed and owned that it was very welcome, as herwardrobe had never recovered a great thunderstorm at Oxford. Jane'sawkwardness made her seem as if it were an offence on my part, buther mother tells me it made her very happy. Her father says thatshe tells him he was hard on Avice, a great favourite of his, andthat I must ask Jane to explain, for it is beyond him. It is allright about the Oxford girl. I have engaged her, and she goes hometo-morrow to prepare herself. This afternoon she is delighted toassist her young ladies in their preparations. I liked her much inthe private interview. I was rather surprised to find that it was'Miss Avice, ' of whom she spoke with the greatest fervour, as havingfirst made friends with her, and then having constantly lent herbooks and read to her in her illness. 

15. --S. Swithun is evidently going to be merciful to us to-day, andthe damsels have been indefatigable--all, that is to say, but thetwo Londoners, who have lawn tennis dresses, and their mother's maidto turn them out complete. Isa brought home some tulle and whitejessamine with which she is deftly freshening the pretty compromisebetween a bonnet and a hat which she wears on Sunday; also acharming parasol, with a china knob and a wreath of roses at theside. She hopes I shall not think her extravagant, but she had alittle money of her own. 

Jane Druce displays two pairs of gloves and two neckties for herselfand her sister; and after all Meg will not go; she is so uncouththat her mother does not like her to go without her own supervision;and she with true Bourne Parva self-appreciation and exclusivenesssays--

"I'm sure I don't want to go among a lot of stupid people, who carefor nothing but fine clothes and lawn tennis. "

There was a light till one o'clock last night in the room whereAvice sleeps with Charley and the dog; and I scarcely saw either ofthe Oxford sisters or Jane all this morning till dinner-time, whenPica appeared very appropriately to her name, turned out in an oldblack silk dress left behind by her mother, and adorned with whitetulle in all sorts of folds, also a pretty white bonnet made up byAvice's clever fingers, and adorned with some soft gray sea-birds'feathers and white down. Isa and Metelill were very well got up andnice. Metelill looks charming, but I am afraid her bouquet is fromone of those foolish pupils. She, as usual, has shared it with Isa, who has taken half to prevent her cousin being remarkable. And, after all, poor Avice is to be left behind. There was no time tomake up things for two, and being in mourning, she could not borrow, though Metelill would have been too happy to lend. She says sheshall be very happy with the children, but I can't help thinkingthere was a tear in her eye when she ran to fetch her dress cloakfor Jane, whom, by the bye, Avice has made wonderfully more likeother people. Here is the waggonette, and I must finish to-morrow. 

16. --We have had a successful day. The drive each way was a treatin itself, and the moon rising over the sea on our way home was asight never to be forgotten. Hollybridge is charming in itself. Those grounds with their sea-board are unique, and I never saw suchSpanish chestnuts in England. Then the gardens and the turf! Onemust have lived as long in foreign parts as we have to appreciatethe perfect finish and well-tended look of such places. Your dearold chief does not quite agree. He says he wants space, and isoppressed with the sense of hedges and fences, except when he looksto the sea, and even there the rocks look polished off, and treatedby landscape gardeners! He walked me about to see the show places, and look at the pictures, saying he had been so well lionised thathe wanted some one to discharge his information upon. It was greatfun to hear him criticising the impossibilities of a battle-piece--Blenheim, I think--the anachronisms of the firearms and uniforms, and the want of discipline around Marlborough, who would never havewon a battle at that rate. You know how his hawk's eye takes noteof everything. He looked at Metelill and said, "Uncommonly prettygirl that, and knows it, " but when I asked what he thought ofIsabel's looks, he said, "Pretty, yes; but are you sure she is quiteaboveboard? There's something I don't like about her eyes. " I wishhe had not said so. I know there is a kind of unfriendly feelingtowards her among some of the girls, especially the Druces andCharley. I have heard Charley openly call her a humbug, but I havethought much of this was dislike to the softer manners, and perhapsjealousy of my notice, and the expression that the old lord noticedis often the consequence of living in an uncongenial home. 

Of course my monopoly of the hero soon ended, and as I had noacquaintances there, and the young ones had been absorbed intogames, or had fraternised with some one, I betook myself toexplorations in company with Jane, who had likewise been left out. After we had wandered along a dazzling stand of calceolarias, shesaid, "Aunt Charlotte, papa says I ought to tell you something; Imean, why Avice could not come to-day, and why she has nothing towear but her round hat. It is because she and Pica spent all theyhad in paying for that Maude Harris at the Convalescent Home. Theyhad some kind of flimsy gauzy bonnets that were faded and utterlydone for after Commemoration week; and as Uncle Martyn is alwaysgrowling about ladies' luggage, they thought it would be a capitalplan to go without all the time they are down here, till anotherquarter is due. Avice never thought of its not being right to go toChurch such a figure, and now she finds that papa thinks the commandto "have power on her head" really may apply to that sort offashion, we are going to contrive something for Sunday, but it couldnot be done in time for to-day. Besides, she had no dress but aserge. "

"She preferred dressing her sister to dressing herself, " I answered;and Jane began assuring me that no one knew how unselfish that dearold Bird is. The little money she had, she added to Pica's smallremnant, and thus enough had been provided to fit the elder sisterout. 

"I suppose, " I said, "that Isa manages better, for she does not seemto be reduced to the same extremities, though I suppose she has lessallowance than her cousins. "

"She has exactly the same. I know it. " And Jane caught herself up, evidently checking something I might have thought ill-natured, whichmade me respond something intended to be moralising, but which wasperhaps foolish, about good habits of economy, and how thisdisappointment, taken so good-humouredly, would be a lesson toAvice. "A lesson? I should think so, " said Jane bluntly. "Alesson not to lend her money to Isa"; and then, when I asked whatshe meant, she blurted out that all Isa's so-called share of thesubscription for Maude Harris had been advanced by Avice--Pica hadtold her so, with comments on her sister's folly in lending what shewell knew would never be repaid; and Alice could not deny it, onlydefending herself by saying, she could not sacrifice the girl. Itwas a very uncomfortable revelation, considering that Isa might havegiven her cousin my sovereign, but no doubt she did not think thatproper, as I had meant it to be spent for this outing. 

I will at least give her the benefit of the doubt, and I would notencourage Jane to say any more about her. Indeed, the girl herselfdid not seem so desirous of dwelling on Isa as of doing justice toAvice, whom, she told me very truly, I did not know. "She is alwaysthe one to give way and be put aside for Pie and Isa, " said Jane. And now I think over the time we have had together, I believe it hasoften been so. "You are very fond of her, " I said; and Janeanswered, "I should _THINK_ so! Why, she spent eight months with usonce at Bourne Parva, just after the great row with Miss Hurlstone. Oh, didn't you know? They had a bad governess, who used to meet alover--a German musician, I think he was--when they were outwalking, and bullied Avice because she was honest. When it all cameto light, Pica came out and Isa was sent to school, but Avice hadgot into a low state of health, and they said Oxford was not goodfor her, so she came to us. And papa prepared her for Confirmation, and she did everything with us, and she really is just like one ofourselves, " said Jane, as the highest praise imaginable, though anyone who contrasted poor Jane's stiff PIQUE (Miss Dadsworth's turn-out) with the grace even of the gray serge, might not think it acompliment. Jane was just beginning to tell me that Avice alwayswrote to her to lay before her father the difficulties about rightand wrong faith and practice that their way of life and habits ofsociety bring before the poor child, when Isa descended upon us with"Oh! Aunt Charlotte, I could not think what had become of you, whenI saw the great man without you. "

I begin to wonder whether she is really so very fond of me, orwhether she does not like to see me with one of the others. 

However, I shall be able to take Jane's hint, and cultivate Avice, for, as my mother did not come yesterday, Lady Hollybridge has mostkindly insisted on her going over to-day. The carriage is takingsome one to the station, and is to call for her and me to bring usto luncheon, the kind people promising likewise to send us back. SoI asked whether I might bring a niece who had not been able to comeyesterday, and as the young people had, as usual, become enamouredof Metelill, they begged for her likewise. Avice looks very well inthe dress she made up for Pica, and being sisters and in mourning, the identity will only be natural. She is very much pleased andvery grateful, and declares that she shall see everything she caresabout much more pleasantly than in the larger party, and perhaps'really hear the hero talk. ' And Uncle Horace says, "True, youBird, you are not like some young folk, who had rather hearthemselves talk than Socrates and S. Ambrose both at once. " "Oh!"said saucy Pica, "now we know what Uncle Horace thinks of his ownconversations with father!" By the bye, Martyn and Mary come hometo-morrow, and I am very glad of it, for those evening diversions onthe beach go on in full force, and though there is nothing tangible, except Charley's smoke, to object to, and it is the present way ofyoung people, there is something unsatisfactory in it. Edith doesnot seem to mind what her daughters do. Margaret has no occasion tobe uneasy about Jane, who always stays with the little ones whilethe maids are at supper, and generally takes with her the devotedAvice, who has some delicacy of throat forbidding these eveningexcursions. Meg gets more boisterous and noisy every day, Uchtredbeing her chief companion; but as she is merely a tomboy, I believeher parents think it inexpedient to give her hints that might onlyput fancies in her head. So they have only prohibited learning tosmoke, staying out later than nine o'clock, and shrieking louderthan a steam whistle!

17. --Yesterday was a great success. Avice was silent at first, butMetelill drew her out, and she had become quite at her ease beforewe arrived. You would have been enchanted to see how much was madeof our dear mother. Lord Hollybridge came out himself to give herhis arm up the stone steps and across the slippery hall. The goodold chief talked to her by the hour about you, and Avice's eyesshone all the time. After luncheon our kind hostess arranged thatdear mother should have half an hour's perfect rest, in a charminglittle room fitted like a tent, and then had a low chair with twolittle fairy ponies in it to drive her about the gardens, while Iwalked with the two gentlemen and saw things much better than in theformer hurly-burly, though that was a beautiful spectacle in itsway. Avice, who has seen scores of FETES in college grounds, muchpreferred the scenery, etc. , in their natural state to a crowd ofstrangers. The young people took possession of the two girls, andwhen we all met for the five o'clock tea, before going home, LadyGeorgina eagerly told her father that Miss Fulford had made out thesubject of 'that picture. ' It was a very beautiful Pre-Raffaelite, of a lady gathering flowers in a meadow, and another incontemplation, while a mysterious shape was at the back; the ladiesstiff-limbed but lovely faced, and the flowers--irises, anemones, violets, and even the grass-blossom, done with botanical accuracy. A friend of Lord Hollybridge had picked it up for him in someobscure place in Northern Italy, and had not yet submitted it to anexpert. Avice, it appeared, had recognised it as representing Leahand Rachel, as Action and Contemplation in the last books of Dante'sPURGATORIO, with the mystic griffin car in the distance. Our hostswere very much delighted; we all repaired to the picture, where shevery quietly and modestly pointed out the details. A Dante washunted up, but Lady Hollybridge and I were the only elders who knewany Italian, and when the catalogue was brought, Avice knew all thenames of the translators, but as none were to be found, LordHollybridge asked if she would make him understand the passage, which she did, blushing a little, but rendering it in very goodfluent English, so that he thanked her, and complimented her so muchthat she was obliged to answer that she had got it up when they werehearing some lectures on Dante; and besides it was mentioned byRuskin; whereupon she was also made to find the reference, and markboth it and Dante. 

"I like that girl, " said the old Governor-General, "she isintelligent and modest both. There is something fine about theshape of her head. "

When we went home, Metelill was as proud and delighted as possibleat what she called the Bird's triumph; but Avice did not seem at allelated, but to take her knowledge as a mere outcome of her ordinaryOxford life, where allusions, especially Ruskinese and Dantesque, came naturally. And then, as grandmamma went to sleep in hercorner, the two girls and I fell into a conversation on that wholequestion of Action and Contemplation. At least Metelill asked theexplanation, but I doubt whether she listened much while Avice and Italked out the matter, and I felt myself a girl again, holding theold interminable talks with the first dear Avice, before you madeher my sister for those two happy years, and--Well, it is no usepaining you and myself with going back to those days, though therewas something in the earnest thoughtfulness and depth of her youngnamesake and godchild that carried me back to the choicest day ofcompanionship before you came on the scene. And to think what ajewel I have missed all this time!

18. --I am deeply grieved, and am almost ashamed to write what I haveto tell you. I had been out to see my mother with Margaret andEmily settle in their favourite resort on the beach, and was comingin to write my letters, when, in the sitting-room, which has openFrench windows down to the ground, I heard an angry voice--

"I tell you it was no joke. It's no use saying so, " and I beheldCharley and Isa in the midst of a violent quarrel. "I've looked onat plenty of your dodges, sucking up to Aunt Charlotte to get takenout with her; but when it comes to playing spiteful tricks on mysister I will speak out. "

By this time I was on the window-step, checking Charley's veryimproper tone, and asking what was the matter. Isa sprang to me, declaring that it was all Charley's absurd suspicion andmisconstruction. At last, amid hot words on both sides, I foundthat Charley had just found, shut into a small album which Metelillkeeps upon the drawing-room table, a newly taken photograph of youngHorne, one of the pupils, with a foolish devoted inscription uponthe envelope, directed to Miss Fulford. 

Isa protested that she had only popped it in to keep it safe untilshe could return it. Charley broke out. "As if I did not knowbetter than that! Didn't you make him give you that parasol andpromise him your photo? Ay, and give it him in return? You thoughthe would keep your secret, I suppose, but he tells everything, likea donkey as he is, to Bertie Elwood, and Bertie and I have such funover him. And now, because you are jealous of poor Metelill, andthink Aunt Charlotte may take a fancy to you instead of her, you aresticking his photo into her book just to do her harm with the aunts. I'm not strait-laced. I wouldn't mind having the photos of ahundred and fifty young men, only they would be horrid guys and alljust alike; but Aunt Charlotte is--is--well--a regular old maidabout it, and you knew she would mind it, and so you did it onpurpose to upset Metelill's chances. "

Isa clung to me in floods of tears, desiring me not to believeanything so cruel and false. Every one always was so hard upon her, she said, and she had only put the thing inadvertently there, to getit out of sight, into the first book she saw, but unfortunately shedid not know I had heard her trying to pass it off to Charley as ajest. However, as there was no proof there, I asked about theparasol. While the shopping was going on, she and young Horne hadbeen in another street, and this was the consequence! I wasperfectly confounded. Receive presents from young men! It seemedto me quite impossible. "Oh, Isa thinks nothing of that!" saidCharley. "Ask her where she got those bangles, and that bouquetwhich she told you was half Metelill's. You think me awful, I know, Aunt Charlotte, but I do draw a line, though I would never have saidone word about it if she had not played this nasty trick onMetelill. " Isa would have begun some imploring excuse, but our twogentlemen were seen coming up towards the window, and she fled, gasping out an entreaty that I would not tell Uncle Martyn. 

Nor did I then and there, for I needed to understand the matter andlook into it, so I told Martyn and Horace not to wait for me, andheard Charley's story more coolly. I had thought that Mr. Horne wasMetelill's friend. "So he was at first, " Charley said, "but he isan uncommon goose, and Isa is no end of a hand at doing the patheticpoverty-stricken orphan! That's the way she gets so many presents!"Then she explained, in her select slang, that young Horne's loveaffairs were the great amusement of his fellow-pupils, and that she, being sure that the parasol was no present from me, as Isa had giventhe cousins to understand, had set Bertie Elwood to extract thetruth by teasing his friend. "But I never meant to have told, " saidCharley, "if you had not come in upon us, when I was in the midst ofsuch a wax that I did not know what I was saying"; and on mydemanding what she meant by the elegant expression she had usedabout Isa and me, she explained that it was the schoolboy's word forcurrying favour. Every one but we stupid elders perceived the game, nay, even the Druces, living in full confidence with their children, knew what was going on. I have never spoken, but somehow peoplemust read through one's brains, for there was a general convictionthat I was going to choose a niece to accompany us. I wonder ifyou, my wise brother, let out anything to Edith. It is what menalways do, they bind women to silence and then disclose the secretthemselves, and say, "Nothing is safe with these women. "

Any way, these girls have been generous, or else true to theirESPRIT DE CORPS, I do not know which to call it; for though theylooked on at Isa's manoeuvres and my blindness with indignantcontempt, they never attempted to interfere. Jane Druce was seizedwith a fit of passionate wrath and pity for me, but her fatherwithheld her from disclosures, assuring her that I should probablyfind out the girl's true disposition, and that it would be wrong todeprive Isa of a chance of coming under a fresh influence. 

Poor girl, she must be very clever, for she kept up her constantwooing of me while she also coquetted with Mr. Horne, being really, as her contemporaries declare, a much worse flirt than Metelill, butthe temptation of the parasol threw her off her guard, and she wasvery jealous of my taking out Metelill and Avice. I see now that ithas been her effort to keep the others away from me. This spitefultrick, if it be true that she meant it, seems to have been done onMetelill, as being supposed to be her only real rival. Avice alwaysyields to her, and besides, is too inoffensive to afford her anysuch opportunity. 

When I talked to Mary, she said, "Oh yes, I always knew she was ahorrid little treacherous puss. Nature began it, and that governessworked on a ready soil. We sent her to school, and hoped she wascured, but I have long seen that it has only shown her how to bemore plausible. But what can one do? One could not turn out anorphan, and I did not see that she was doing our own girls any harm. I'm sure I gave her every chance of marrying, for there was nothingI wished for so much, and I never told Martyn of her littlemanoeuvres, knowing he would not stand them; and now what he willdo, I can't think, unless you and Edward will take her off ourhands. I believe you might do her good. She is an unfathomablemixture of sham and earnest, and she really likes you, and thinksmuch of you, as having a certain prestige, and being a woman of theworld" (fancy that). "Besides, she is really religious in a sort ofa way; much good you'll say it does her, but, as you know, there's acertain sort of devotion which makes no difference to people'sconduct. "

It seems to be the general desire of the family that we should takethis unfortunate Isabel off their hands. Shall we? Cruelly as Ihave been disappointed in the girl, I can't help liking her; she isobliging, pleasant, ladylike in manners, very affectionate, and Ican't help thinking that with the respect and fear for you she wouldfeel she might be restrained, and that we could be the saving ofher, though at the same time I know that my having been soegregiously deceived may be a sign that I am not fit to deal withher. I leave it to your decision altogether, and will say no moretill I hear. Metelill is a charming girl, and I fancy you preferher, and that her mother knows it, and would send her for at least awinter; but she gets so entirely off her balance whenever a youngman of any sort comes near, that I should not like to take charge ofher. It might be good for the worthy Jane, but as she would take agreat deal of toning down and licking into shape, and as she woulddespise it all, refer everything to the Bourne Parva standard, andpine for home and village school, I don't think she need beconsidered, especially as I am sure she would not go, and could notbe spared. Pica would absorb herself in languages and antiquities, and maintain the rights of women by insisting on having full time tostudy her protoplasms, snubbing and deriding all the officers whodid not talk like Oxford dons. Probably the E. E. Would be the onlypeople she would think fit to speak to. Avice is the one to whom Ifeel the most drawn. She is thoroughly thoughtful, and her religionis not of the uninfluential kind Mary describes. Those distressesand perplexities which poor Isa affected were chiefly borrowed fromher genuine ones; but she has obtained the high cultivation andintelligence that her Oxford life can give in full measure, andwithout conceit or pretension, and it is her unselfish, yieldingspirit that has prevented me from knowing her sooner, though whennot suppressed she can be thoroughly agreeable, and take her part insociety with something of her mother's brilliancy. I think, too, that she would be spared, as Oxford does not agree with her, and asouthern winter or two would be very good for her. Besides, theothers might come and see her in vacation time. Could we not takeboth her and Isabel at least for the first winter?

19. --A stormy wet day, the first we have had. Poor Isa has made anattempt at explanation and apology, but lost herself in a mist ofwords and tears. I suppose I was severe, for she shrinks from me, and clings to Avice, who has stood her friend in many a stormbefore, and, as Jane indignantly tells me, persists in believingthat she is really sorry and wishes to be good. She is veryattentive and obliging, and my dear mother, who is in happyignorance of all this uproar, really likes her the best of all thegirls. 

21. --We have had a great alarm. Last evening we went to the parishchurch; Horace Druce had been asked to preach, and the rain, whichhad fallen all the morning, cleared off just in time for the walk. Emily, Margaret, two of her children, and I sat in the gallery, andAvice and Isa in the free seats below. Avice had been kept at homeby the rain in the morning, but had begged leave to go later. Darkness came on just as the first hymn was given out, and theverger went round with his long wand lighting the gas. In thegallery we saw plainly how, at the east end, something went wrongwith his match, one which he thought had failed, and threw aside. It fell on a strip of straw matting in the aisle, which, being verydry, caught fire and blazed up for a few seconds before it wastrampled out. Some foolish person, however, set the cry of 'Fire!'going, and you know what that is in a crowded church. The vicar, inhis high old-fashioned desk with a back to it, could not see. Horace in a chair, in the narrow, shallow sanctuary, did see that itwas nothing, but between the cries of 'Fire!' and the dying peal ofthe organ, could not make his voice heard. All he could do was toget to the rear of the crowd, together with the other few who hadseen the real state of things, and turn back all those whom theycould, getting them out through the vestry. But the main body werequite out of their reach, and everybody tried to rush scramblinginto the narrow centre aisle, choking up the door, which was acomplicated trap meant to keep out draughts. We in the gallerytried vainly to assure them that the only danger was in the crowd, and the clergyman in his desk, sure that was the chief peril, at anyrate, went on waving and calling to them to wait; but the cries andshrieks drowned everything, and there was a most terrible time, assome 600 people jammed themselves in that narrow space, fighting, struggling, fainting. 

You may suppose how we watched our girls. They had let themselvesbe thrust up to the end of the seat by later comers: Avice theinnermost. We saw them look up to us, with white faces. To ourjoy, Avice seemed to understand our signs and to try to withholdIsa, but she was too wild with fright not to try to push on to theend of the pew. Avice held her dress, and kept her back. Then, asthe crowd swayed, the two girls stood on the seat, and presently Isaw Avice bend down, and take from some one's arms a little child, which she seated on the edge of the pew, holding it in her arms, andsoothing it. I don't know how long it all lasted, Horace says itwas not ten minutes before he had got men and tools to break downthe obstruction at the door, and pull out the crowded, crushedpeople, but to us it seemed hours. They were getting calmer too inthe rear, for many had followed the lead through the vestry door, and others had found out that there was no fire at all. 

Wonderful to tell, no one was killed. There were some broken arms, three I think, and some bad bruises. Many people were fainting, andmuch hurt by the horrible heat and crush, but when at last the waywas free, we saw Horace come into the church, looking about in greatanxiety for the two girls, whom he had failed to find in thetrampled multitude. Then Avice came up to him, with the child inher arms, and Isa followed, quite safe! How thankful we all were!Avice says she remembered at once that she had been told of theAmerican fireman's orders to his little girl always to keep still insuch an alarm, for the crowd was a worse peril than the fire. Bythe time we had come down the stairs and joined them, the child'sfather had come for it in great anxiety, for its sister had beentrampled down fainting, and had just only revived enough to miss it!I shall never forget what it was to see people sucked down in thatsurging mass, and the thankful thrill of seeing our girls standingthere quietly with the child between them, its little fair head onAvice's breast. We went home quietly and thankfully. Horace tookAvice to the hotel that he might explain all to her parents, and letthem know how well she had behaved; Isabel was shaken and tearful, and her voice sounded weak and nervous as she bade her cousin good-night and embraced her with much agitation. So I went to her roomto see whether she needed any doctoring, but I found Metelillsoothing her nicely, so I only kissed her (as I had not done thesetwo nights). "Ah, dear aunt, you forgive me!" she said. The tonethrew me back, as if she were making capital of her adventure, and Isaid, "You have not offended _ME_. " "Ah! you are still angry, andyet you _DO_ love me still a little, " she said, not letting me go. "The more love, the more grief for your having done wrong, " I said;and she returned, "Ah! if I always had you. " That chilled me, and Iwent away. She does not know the difference between pardon andremission of consequences. One must have something of the spirit ofthe fifty-first Psalm before that perception comes. Poor dearchild, how one longs for power to breathe into her some suchpenitence!

Avice is quite knocked up to-day, and her mother has kept her inbed, where she is very happy with her Jane. I have been to see her, and she has been thanking me for having suggested the making way forfresh comers in a pew. Otherwise, she says, she could not havewithstood the rush. 

SIR EDWARD FULFORD TO MISS FULFORD22D JULY. 

My Dear Charlotte, --I decidedly object to the company of a younglady with such a genius for intrigue as Isabel Fulford seems topossess. If we had only ourselves to consider, no doubt it would bewell for you to take her in hand, but in the sort of house ours willbe, there must be no one we cannot depend upon in our own family. 

I suppose I am guilty of having betrayed my thoughts to Edith. Ihad certainly wished for Metelill. She is an engaging creature, andI am sorry you take so adverse a view of her demeanour; but Ipromised to abide by your judgment and I will not question it. Wewill ask Arthur and Edith to bring her to visit us, and then perhapsyou may be better satisfied with her. 

The learned young lady is out of the question, and as Avice is mydear wife's godchild as well as mine, I am very glad she hasdeserved that your choice should fall upon her. It seems as if youwould find in her just the companionship you wish, and if her healthneeds the southern climate, it is well to give her the opportunity. You had better propose the scheme at once, and provide what she willneed for an outfit. The last touches might be given at Paris. Ihope to get time to run down to New Cove next week, and if you andthe niece can be ready to start by the middle of August, we willtake Switzerland by the way, and arrive at Malta by the end ofSeptember. 

I shall be curious to hear the result of your throwing thehandkerchief. --Your affectionate brother, E. F. 

MISS FULFORD TO SIR EDWARD FULFORD

JULY 24. --I threw the handkerchief by asking Martyn and Mary tospare their daughter. Tears came into Mary's eyes, the first I eversaw there, and she tried in vain to say something ridiculous. Martyn walked to the window and said huskily, "Dr. A--- said itwould confirm her health to spend a few winters in the South. Thankyou, Charlotte!" They did not doubt a moment, but Martyn feels theparting more than I ever thought he would, and Pica and Uchtred goabout howling and bewailing, and declaring that they never shallknow where to find anything again. 

Avice herself is much more sorrowful than glad, though she is toocourteous and grateful not to show herself gracious to me. She didentreat me to take Isa instead, so earnestly that I was obliged toread her your decided objections. It was a blow to her at first, but she is rapidly consoling herself over the wonderful commissionsshe accepts. She is to observe Mediterranean zoophytes, and sendthem home on glass slides for the family benefit. She is to sendher father photographs and drawings to illustrate his lectures, andJane has begged for a pebble or rock from S. Paul's Bay, to show toher class at school. Indeed, I believe Avice is to write a specialjournal, to be published in the BOURNE PARVA PARISH MAGAZINE;Charley begs for a sea-horse, and Freddy has been instructed by oneof the pupils to bargain for nothing less than the Colossus ofRhodes; Metelill is quite as cordial in her rejoicing, and Edithowns that, now it has come to the point, she is very glad to keepher daughter. 

And Isa? Well, she is mortified, poor child. I think she must havecried bitterly over the disappointment, for she looked very wretchedwhen we met at dinner. 

Meanwhile, Martyn had a walk with Emily, who found that he was verysorry not to be relieved from Isabel, though he knew you were quiteright not to take her. He thought Oxford not a good place for sucha girl, and the absence of the trustworthy Avice would make thingsworse. Then Emily proposed to take Isabel back to the Birchwoodwith her. Grandmamma really likes the girl, who is kind andattentive. There are no young people to whom she could do harm, Emily can look after her, and will be glad of help andcompanionship. The whole family council agreed that it will be areally charitable work, and that if any one can do her good, it willbe the mother and Aunt Emily. 

Isa has acquiesced with an overflow of gratitude and affection tothem for taking pity on her. It sounds a little fulsome, but Ibelieve some of it is genuine. She is really glad that some onewishes for her, and I can quite believe that she will lose in Aviceall that made life congenial to her under Mary's briskuncompromising rule. If she can only learn to be true--true toherself and to others--she will yet be a woman to love and esteem, and at Birchwood they will do their best to show that religioussentiment must be connected with Truth. 

And so ends my study of the manners of my nieces, convincing me themore that as the manners are, so is the man or woman. The heart, orrather the soul, forms the manners, and they _ARE_ the man. 

C. F. 

COME TO HER KINGDOM

'Take care! Oh, take care!'

Whisk, swish, click, click, through the little crowd at Stokesley ona fine April afternoon, of jocund children just let loose fromschool, and mothers emerging from their meeting, collecting theirprogeny after the fashion of old ewes with their lambs; SusanMerrifield in a huge, carefully preserved brown mushroom hat, with abig basket under one arm, and a roll of calico under the other; hersister Elizabeth with a book in one hand, and a packet of ambulanceillustrations; the Vicar, Mr. Doyle, and his sister likewise loaded, talking to them about the farmer's wedding of the morning, for whichthe bells had been ringing fitfully all day, and had just burst outagain. Such was the scene, through which, like a flash, spun atricycle, from which a tiny curly-haired being in knickerbockers wasbarely saved by his mother's seizing him by one arm. 

'A tricycle!' exclaimed the Vicar. 

'A woman! Oh!' cried Susan in horror, 'and she's stopping--at theGap. Oh!'

'My dear Susie, you must have seen ladies on tricycles before, 'whispered her sister. 

'No, indeed, I am thankful to say I have not! If it should be MissArthuret!' said Susan, with inexpressible tones in her voice. 

'She was bowing right and left, ' said the Vicar, a littlemaliciously; 'depend upon it, she thought this was a welcome fromthe rural population. '

'Hark! here's something coming. '

The Bonchamp fly came rattling up, loaded with luggage, and with aquiet lady in black seated in it, which stopped at the same gate. 

'The obedient mother, no doubt, ' said Elizabeth. 'She looks like alady. '

There had been a good deal of excitement at Stokesley about theproperty known by the pleasing name of the Gap. An old gentlemanhad lived there for many years, always in a secluded state, andlatterly imbecile, and on his death in the previous year no one hadfor some time appeared as heir; but it became known that theinheritrix was a young lady, a great-niece, living with a widowedmother in one of the large manufacturing towns in the north ofEngland. Her father had been a clergyman and had died when she wasan infant. That was all that was known, and as the house had becomealmost uninhabitable, the necessary repairs had prevented theheiress from taking possession all this time. It was not a verylarge inheritance, only comprising a small farm, the substantialvillage shop, four or five cottages, and a moderate-sized house andgrounds, where the neglected trees had grown to strange irregularproportions, equally with the income, which, owing to the outgoingsbeing small, had increased to about 800 or 900 pounds a year, and ofcourse it was a subject of much anxiety with Admiral Merrifield'sfamily to know what sort of people the newcomers would prove. 

Of the large family only the two eldest daughters were at home;Susan, now nearly forty, had never left it, but had been thedaughter-of-all-work at home and lady-of-all-work to the parish eversince she had emerged from the schoolroom; her apricot complexionshowing hardly any change, and such as there was never perceived byher parents. The Admiral, still a light, wiry, hale man, as activeas ever, with his hands full of county, parish, and farmingbusiness; an invalid for many years, but getting into that healthwhich is LA JEUNESSE DE LA VIEILLESSE. 

Elizabeth had, from twenty-five to thirty-two, been spared from homeby her father to take care of his stepmother in London, where shehad beguiled her time with a certain amount of authorship under aNOM DE PLUME, and had been introduced to some choice society boththrough her literary abilities and her family connections. 

Four years previous the old lady had died, leaving her a legacy, which, together with her gains, would have enabled her to keep sucha home in town as to remain in touch with the world to which she hadbeen introduced; but she had never lost her Stokesley heart enoughfor the temptation to outweigh the disappointment she would havecaused at home, and the satisfaction and rest of being among her ownpeople. So she only went up for an occasional visit, and had becomethe brightness of the house, and Susan's beloved partner in all herworks. 

Her father, who understood better than did her mother and sisterwhat she had given up, had insisted on her having a sitting-room toherself, which she embellished with the personal possessions she hadaccumulated, and where she pursued her own avocations in theforenoon, often indeed interrupted, but never showing, and not oftenfeeling, that it was to her hindrance, and indeed the family lookedon her work sufficiently as a profession, not only to acquiesce, butto have a certain complacency in it, though it was a kind oftransparent fiction that MESA was an anagram of her initials andthat of Stokesley. Her mother at any rate believed that none of theneighbours guessed at any such thing. 

Stokesley was a good deal out of the world, five miles from thestation at Bonchamp, over hilly, stony roads, so that the cyclistmovement had barely reached it; the neighbourhood was sparse, andMrs. Merrifield's health had not been conducive to visiting, anymore than was her inclination, so that there was a little agitationabout first calls. 

The newcomers appeared at church on Sunday at all the services. Abright-faced girl of one-and-twenty, with little black eyes likecoals of fire, a tight ulster, like a riding habit, and a smallbillycock hat, rather dismayed those who still held that bonnetsought to be the Sunday gear of all beyond childhood; but the mother, in rich black silk, was unexceptionable. 

Refusing to be marshalled up the aisle to the seat which persistenttradition assigned to the Gap in the aristocratic quarter, daughterand mother (it was impossible not thus to call them) sat themselvesdown on the first vacant place, close to a surviving white smock-frock, and blind to the bewildered glances of his much-bent friendin velveteen, who, hobbling in next after, found himself displacedand separated alike from his well-thumbed prayer and hymn book andthe companion who found the places for him. 

'It ain't fitty like, ' said the old man confidentially to Susan, 'nor the ladies wouldn't like it when we comes in with our old coatsall of a muck with wet. '

'The principle is right, ' said Bessie, when this was repeated toher; 'but practice ought to wait till native manners and customs arelearnt. '

The two sisters offered to save their mother the first visit--leaveher card, or make her excuses; but Mrs. Merrifield held that a cardthus left savoured of deceit, and that the deed must be womanfullydone in person. But she would not wait till the horses could bespared, saying that for near village neighbours it was more friendlyto go down in her donkey-chair; and so she did, Bessie driving her, and the Admiral walking with them. 

The Gap had, ever since Bessie could remember, been absolutelyshrouded in trees, its encircling wall hidden in ivy bushes, overwhich laburnums, lilacs, pink thorns, and horse chestnuts towered;and the drive from the seldom-opened gate was almost obstructed bythe sweeping arms of laurels and larches. 

It was obstructed now, but by these same limbs lying amputated; and'chop, chop!' was heard in the distance. 

'Oh, the Arbutus!' sighed Bessie. 

'Clearing was much needed, ' said her father, with a man's propensityfor the axe. 

The donkey, however, thought it uncanny, 'upon the pivot of hisskull, turned round his long left ear, ' and planted his feet firmly. Mrs. Merrifield, deprecating the struggle by which her husband wouldon such occasions enforce discipline, begged to get out; and whilethis was going on, the ulstered young lady, with a small axe inhand, came, as it were, to the rescue, and, while the donkey wascommitted to a small boy, explained hastily, 'So overgrown, there isnothing to be done but to let in light and air. My mother is athome, ' she added; 'she will be happy to see you, ' and, conductingthem in with complete self-possession--rather, as it occurred toBessie, as the Queen might have led the way to the Duchess of Kent, though there was a perfect simplicity and evident enjoyment abouther that was very prepossessing, and took off the edge of the senseof conceit. Besides, the palace was, to London eyes at least, solittle to boast of, with the narrow little box of a wooden porch, the odd, one-sided vestibule, and the tiny anteroom with the worncarpet; but the drawing-room, in spite of George IV furniture, wasreally pretty, with French windows opening on a well-mown lawn, andfresh importations of knick-knacks, and vases of wild flowers, whichmade it look inhabited and pleasant. There was no one there, andthe young lady proceeded to fetch her mother; and the unguardedvoice was caught by Bessie's quick ears from the window. 

'Here are Admiral and Mrs. Merrifield, and one daughter. Comealong, little mammy! Worthy, homely old folks--just in your line. '

To Bessie's relief, she perceived that this was wholly unheard byher father and mother. And there was no withstanding the eager, happy, shy looks of the mother, whose whole face betrayed that aftermany storms she had come into a haven of peace, and that she wasproud to owe it to her daughter. 

A few words showed that mother and daughter were absolutelyenchanted with Stokesley, their own situation, and one another--theyoung lady evidently all the more because she perceived so much tobe done. 

'Everything wants improving. It is so choked up, ' she said, 'onewants to let in the light. '

'There are a good many trees, ' said the Admiral, while Bessiesuspected that she meant figuratively as well as literally; and asthe damsel was evidently burning to be out at her clearingoperations again, and had never parted with her axe, the Admiraloffered to go with her and tell her about the trees, for, as heobserved, she could hardly judge of those not yet out in leaf. 

She accepted him, though Bessie shrewdly suspected that the advicewould be little heeded, and, not fancying the wet grass andbranches, nor the demolition of old friends, she did not follow thepair, but effaced herself, and listened with much interest to thetwo mothers, who sat on the sofa with their heads together. EitherMrs. Merrifield was wonderful in inspiring confidence, or it wasonly too delightful to Mrs. Arthuret to find a listener of her ownstanding to whom to pour forth her full heart of thankfulness anddelight in her daughter. 'Oh, it is too much!' occurred so often inher talk that, if it had not been said with liquid eyes, chokingvoice, and hands clasped in devout gratitude, it would have beentedious; but Mrs. Merrifield thoroughly went along with it, and wasdeeply touched. 

The whole story, as it became known, partly in these confidences, partly afterwards, was this. The good lady, who had struck thefamily at first as a somewhat elderly mother for so young adaughter, had been for many years a governess, engaged all the timeto a curate, who only obtained a small district incumbency in atown, after wear and tear, waiting and anxiety, had so exhausted himthat the second winter brought on bronchitis, and he scarcely livedto see his little daughter, Arthurine. The mother had struggled onupon a pittance eked out with such music teaching as she couldprocure, with her little girl for her sole care, joy, and pride--achild who, as she declared, had never given her one moment's pang oruneasiness. 

'Poor mamma, could she say that of any one of her nine?' thoughtBessie; and Mrs. Merrifield made no such attempt. 

Arthurine had brought home all prizes, all distinctions at the HighSchool, but--here was the only disappointment of her life--a lowfever had prevented her trying for a scholarship at Girton. Inconsideration, however, of her great abilities and high qualities, as well as out of the great kindness of the committee, she had beenmade an assistant to one of the class mistresses, and had worked onwith her own studies, till the wonderful tidings came of theinheritance that had fallen to her quite unexpectedly; for since herhusband's death Mrs. Arthuret had known nothing of his family, andwhile he was alive there were too many between him and thesuccession for the chance to occur to him as possible. The reliefand blessing were more than the good lady could utter. All thingsare comparative, and to one whose assured income had been 70 poundsa year, 800 pounds was unbounded wealth; to one who had spent herlife in schoolrooms and lodgings, the Gap was a lordly demesne. 

'And what do you think was the first thing my sweet child said?'added Mrs. Arthuret, with her eyes glittering through tears. 'Mammy, you shall never hear the scales again, and you shall havethe best Mocha coffee every day of your life. '

Bessie felt that after this she must like the sweet child, thoughsweetness did not seem to her the predominant feature in Arthurine. 

After the pathos to which she had listened there was somewhat of acomedy to come, for the ladies had spent the autumn abroad, and hadseen and enjoyed much. 'It was a perfect feast to see how Arthurineentered into it all, ' said the mother. 'She was never at a loss, and explained it all to me. Besides, perhaps you have seen herarticle?'

'I beg your pardon. '

'Her article in the KENSINGTON. It attracted a great deal ofattention, and she has had many compliments. '

'Oh! the KENSINGTON MAGAZINE, ' said Mrs. Merrifield, ratheruneasily, for she was as anxious that Bessie should not be suspectedof writing in the said periodical as the other mother was thatArthurine should have the fame of her contributions. 

'Do you take it?' asked Mrs. Arthuret, 'for we should be very gladto lend it to you. '

A whole pile was on the table, and Mrs. Merrifield looked at themwith feeble thanks and an odd sort of conscious dread, though shecould with perfect truth have denied either 'taking it' or readingit. 

Bessie came to her relief. 'Thank you, ' she said; 'we do; some ofus have it. Is your daughter's article signed A. A. , and doesn't itdescribe a boarding-house on the Italian lakes? I thought it veryclever and amusing. '

Mrs. Arthuret's face lighted up. 'Oh yes, my dear, ' slipped out inher delight. 'And do you know, it all came of her letter to one ofthe High School ladies, who is sister to the sub-editor, such aclever, superior girl! She read it to the headmistress and all, andthey agreed that it was too good to be lost, and Arthurine copied itout and added to it, and he--Mr. Jarrett--said it was just what hewanted--so full of information and liveliness--and she is writingsome more for him. '

Mrs. Merrifield was rather shocked, but she felt that she herselfwas in a glass house, was, in fact, keeping a literary daughter, soshe only committed herself to, 'She is very young. '

'Only one-and-twenty, ' returned Mrs. Arthuret triumphantly; 'butthen she has had such advantages, and made such use of them. Everything seems to come at once, though, perhaps, it is unthankfulto say so. Of course, it is no object now, but I could not helpthinking what it would have been to us to have discovered thistalent of hers at the time when we could hardly make both endsmeet. '

'She will find plenty of use for it, ' said Mrs. Merrifield, who, asthe wife of a country squire and the mother of nine children, didnot find it too easy to make her ends meet upon a larger income. 

'Oh yes! indeed she will, the generous child. She is full of plansfor the regeneration of the village. '

Poor Mrs. Merrifield! this was quite too much for her. She thoughtit irreverent to apply the word in any save an ecclesiastical sense;nor did she at all desire to have the parish, which was consideredto be admirably worked by the constituted authorities, 'regenerated, ' whatever that might mean, by a young lady of one-and-twenty. She rose up and observed to her daughter that she saw papaout upon the lawn, and she thought it was time to go home. 

Mrs. Arthuret came out with them, and found what Bessie could onlyregard as a scene of desolation. Though gentlemen, as a rule, haveno mercy on trees, and ladies are equally inclined to cry, 'Woodman, spare that tree, ' the rule was reversed, for Miss Arthuret wascutting, and ordering cutting all round her ruthlessly withsomething of the pleasure of a child in breaking a new toy to provethat it is his own, scarcely listening when the Admiral told herwhat the trees were, and how beautiful in their season; while evenas to the evergreens, she did not know a yew from a cedar, anddeclared that she must get rid of this horrid old laurustinus, whileshe lopped away at a Portugal laurel. Her one idea seemed to bethat it was very unwholesome to live in a house surrounded withtrees; and the united influence of the Merrifields, working on hermother by representing what would be the absence of shade in a fewmonths' time, barely availed to save the life of the big cedar;while the great rhododendron, wont to present a mountain of shiningleaves and pale purple blossoms every summer, was hewn down withoutremorse as an awful old laurel, and left a desolate brown patch inits stead. 

'Is it an emblem, ' thought Bessie, 'of what she would like to do toall of us poor old obstructions?'

After all, Mrs. Merrifield could not help liking the gentle mother, by force of sympathy; and the Admiral was somewhat fascinated by thefreshness and impetuosity of the damsel, as elderly men are wont tobe with young girls who amuse them with what they are apt to view asan original form of the silliness common to the whole female worldexcept their own wives, and perhaps their daughters; and Bessie wasextremely amused, and held her peace, as she had been used to do inLondon. Susan was perhaps the most annoyed and indignant. She waspresiding over seams and button-holes the next afternoon at school, when the mother and daughter walked in; and the whole troop startedto their feet and curtsied. 

'Don't make them stand! I hate adulation. Sit down, please. Where's the master?'

'In the boys' school, ma'am, ' said the mistress, uncomfortablyindicating the presence of Miss Merrifield, who felt herself obligedto come forward and shake hands. 

'Oh! so you have separate schools. Is not that a needless expense?'

'It has always been so, ' returned Susan quietly. 

'Board? No? Well, no doubt you are right; but I suppose it is at asacrifice of efficiency. Have you cookery classes?'

'We have not apparatus, and the girls go out too early for it to beof much use. '

'Ah, that's a mistake. Drawing?'

'The boys draw. '

'I shall go and see them. Not the girls? They look orderly enough;but are they intelligent? Well, I shall look in and examine them ontheir special subjects, if they have any. I suppose not. '

'Only class. Grammar and needlework. '

'I see, the old routine. Quite the village school. '

'It is very nice work, ' put in Mrs. Arthuret, who had been lookingat it. 

'Oh yes, it always is when everything is sacrificed to it. Good-morning, I shall see more of you, Mrs. --ahem. '

'Please, ma'am, should I tell her that she is not a school manager?'inquired the mistress, somewhat indignantly, when the two ladies haddeparted. 

'You had better ask the Vicar what to do, ' responded Susan. 

The schoolmaster, on his side, seemed to have had so much advice andoffers of assistance in lessons on history, geography, and physicalscience, that he had been obliged to refer her to the managers, andexplain that till the next inspection he was bound to abide by thetime-table. 

'Ah, well, I will be one of the managers another year. '

So she told the Vicar, who smiled, and said, 'We must elect you. '

'I am sure much ought to be done. It is mere waste to have twoseparate schools, when a master can bring the children on so muchbetter in the higher subjects. '

'Mrs. Merrifield and the rest of us are inclined to think that whatstands highest of all with us is endangered by mixed schools, ' saidMr. Doyle. 

'Oh!' Arthurine opened her eyes; 'but education does all _THAT_!'

'Education does, but knowledge is not wisdom. Susan Merrifield'sinfluence has done more for our young women than the best classteaching could do. '

'Oh, but the Merrifields are all so BORNES and homely; they stand inthe way of all culture. '

'Indeed, ' said the Vicar, who had in his pocket a very favourablereview of MESA's new historical essay. 

'Surely an old-fashioned squire and Lady Bountiful and their verynarrow daughters should not be allowed to prevent improvement, pauperise the place, and keep it in its old grooves. '

'Well, we shall see what you think by the time you have lived herelong enough to be eligible for--what?'

'School manager, guardian of the poor!' cried Arthurine. 

'We shall see, ' repeated the Vicar. 'Good-morning. '

He asked Bessie's leave to disclose who MESA was. 

'Oh, don't!' she cried, 'it would spoil the fun! Besides, mammawould not like it, which is a better reason. '

There were plenty of books, old and new, in Bessie's room, magazinesand reviews, but they did not come about the house much, unless anyof the Rockstone cousins or the younger generation were stayingthere, or her brother David had come for a rest of mind and body. Between housekeeping, gardening, parish work, and pottering, Mrs. Merrifield and Susan never had time for reading, except that Susanthought it her duty to keep something improving in hand, whichgenerally lasted her six weeks on a moderate average. The Admiralfound quite reading enough in the newspapers, pamphlets, andbusiness publications; and their neighbours, the Greville family, were chiefly devoted to hunting and lawn tennis, so that there wassome reason in Mrs. Arthuret's lamentation to the Vicar that dearArthurine did so miss intellectual society, such as she had beenused to with the High School mistresses--two of whom had actuallybeen at Girton!

'Does she not get on with Bessie Merrifield?' he asked. 

'Miss Bessie has a very sweet face; Arthurine did say she seemedwell informed and more intelligent than her sister. PerhapsArthurine might take her up. It would be such an advantage to thepoor girl. '

'Which?' was on Mr. Doyle's tongue, but he restrained it, and onlyobserved that Bessie had lived for a good many years in London. 

'So I understood, ' said Arthurine, 'but with an old grandmother, andthat is quite as bad as if it was in the country; but I will seeabout it. I might get up a debating society, or one for studyingGerman. '

In the meantime Arthurine decided on improving and embellishing theparish with a drinking fountain, and meeting Bessie one afternoon inthe village, she started the idea. 

'But, ' said Bessie, 'there is a very good supply. Papa saw thatgood water was accessible to all the houses in the village streetten years ago, and the outlying ones have wells, and there's thebrook for the cattle. '

'I am sure every village should have a fountain and a trough, and Ishall have it here instead of this dirty corner. '

'Can you get the ground?'

'Oh, any one would give ground for such a purpose! Whose is it?'

'Mr. Grice's, at Butter End. '

The next time Susan and Bessie encountered Arthurine, she began--

'Can you or Admiral Merrifield do nothing with that horrid oldGrice! Never was any one so pigheaded and stupid. '

'What? He won't part with the land you want?'

'No; I wrote to him and got no answer. Then I wrote again, and Igot a peaked-hand sort of note that his wife wrote, I should think. "Mr. Grice presented his compliments" (compliments indeed!), "andhad no intention of parting with any part of Spragg's portion. "Well, then I called to represent what a benefit it would be to theparish and his own cattle, and what do you think the old brutesaid?--that "there was a great deal too much done for the parishalready, and he wouldn't have no hand in setting up the labourers, who were quite impudent enough already. " Well, I saw it was of nouse to talk to an old wretch like that about social movements andequal rights, so I only put the question whether having pure watereasily accessible would not tend to make them better behaved andless impudent as he called it, upon which he broke out into atirade. "He didn't hold with cold water and teetotal, not he. Why, it had come to _THAT_--that there was no such thing as getting afair day's work out of a labouring man with their temperance, andtheir lectures, and their schools, and their county councils andwhat not!" Really I had read of such people, but I hardly believedthey still existed. '

'Grice is very old, and the regular old sort of farmer, ' saidBessie. 

'But could not the Admiral persuade him, or Mr. Doyle?'

'Oh no, ' said Susan, 'it would be of no use. He was just as badabout a playground for the boys, though it would have preventedtheir being troublesome elsewhere. '

'Besides, ' added Bessie, 'I am sure papa would say that there is nonecessity. He had the water analysed, and it is quite good, andplenty of it. '

'Well, I shall see what can be done. '

'She thinks us as bad as old Grice, ' said Susan, as they saw herwalking away in a determined manner. 

The next thing that was heard was the Admiral coming in from theservants' hall, whither he had been summoned by 'Please, sir, JamesHodd wishes to speak to you. '

'What is this friend of yours about, Bessie?'

'What friend, papa?'

'Why, this Miss Arthur--what d'ye call her?' said the Admiral (whoon the whole was much more attracted by her than were hisdaughters). 'Here's a deputation from her tenant, James Hodd, with"Please, sir, I wants to know if 'tis allowed to turn folks out oftheir houses as they've paid rent for reg'lar with a week's notice, when they pays by the year. "'

'You don't mean it!' exclaimed Mrs. Merrifield and Susan together. 

'Poor old Mrs. West, ' said the mother. 

'And all the Tibbinses!' exclaimed Susan. 'She can't do it, canshe, papa?'

'Certainly not, without the proper notice, and so I told James, andthat the notice she had sent down to him was so much waste-paper. '

'So at least she has created a village Hampden, ' said Bessie, 'though, depend upon it, she little supposes herself to be the pettytyrant. '

'I must go and explain to her, I suppose, to-morrow morning, ' saidthe Admiral. 

However, he had scarcely reached his own gate before the ulsteredform was seen rushing up to him. 

'Oh! Admiral Merrifield, good-morning; I was coming to ask you--'

'And I was coming to you. '

'Oh! Admiral, is it really so--as that impudent man told me--thatthose horrid people can't be got out of those awful tumbledown, unhealthy places for all that immense time?'

'Surely he was not impudent to you? He was only asserting hisright. The cottages were taken by the year, and you have no choicebut to give six months' notice. I hope he was not disrespectful. '

'Well, no--I can't say that he was, though I don't care for thosecap-in-hand ways of your people here. But at any rate, he says hewon't go--no, not any of them, though I offered to pay them up tothe end of the time, and now I must put off my beautiful plans. Iwas drawing them all yesterday morning--two model cottages on eachside, and the drinking fountain in the middle. I brought them up toshow you. Could you get the people to move out? I would promisethem to return after the rebuilding. '

'Very nice drawings. Yes--yes--very kind intentions. '

'Then can't you persuade them?'

'But, my dear young lady, have you thought what is to become of themin the meantime?'

'Why, live somewhere else! People in Smokeland were always shiftingabout. '

'Yes--those poor little town tenements are generally let on shortterms and are numerous enough. But here--where are the vacantcottages for your four families? Hodd with his five children, Tibbins with eight or nine, Mrs. West and her widow daughter andthree children, and the Porters with a bedridden father?'

'They are dreadfully overcrowded. Is there really no place?'

'Probably not nearer than those trumpery new tenements at Bonchamp. That would be eight miles to be tramped to the men's work, and theWests would lose the washing and charing that maintains them. '

'Then do you think it can never be done? See how nice my plansare!'

'Oh yes! very pretty drawings, but you don't allow much outlet. '

'I thought you had allotments, and that they would do, and I mean toget rid of the pig-sties. '

'A most unpopular proceeding, I warn you. '

'There's nothing more unsanitary than a pig-sty. '

'That depends on how it is kept. And may I ask, do you mean also todispense with staircases?'

'Oh! I forgot. But do you really mean to say that I can nevercarry out my improvements, and that these people must live allherded together till everybody is dead?'

'Not quite that, ' said the Admiral, laughing; 'but most improvementsrequire patience and a little experience of the temper and habits ofthe people. There are cottages worse than these. I think two ofthem have four rooms, and the Wests and Porters do not require somuch. If you built one or two elsewhere, and moved the people intothem, or waited for a vacant one, you might carry out some of yourplans--gradually. '

'And my fountain?'

'I am not quite sure, but I am afraid your cottages are on thatstratum where you could not bring the water without great expense. '

Arthurine controlled herself enough for a civil 'Good-morning!' butshe shed tears as she walked home and told her pitying mother thatshe was thwarted on every side, and that nobody could comprehendher. 

The meetings for German reading were, however, contrived chiefly--little as Arthurine guessed it--by the influence of BessieMerrifield. The two Greville girls and Mr. Doyle's sister, togetherwith the doctor's young wife, two damsels from the next parish, anda friend or two that the Arthurets had made at Bonchamp, formed animposing circle--to begin. 

'Oh, not on WILHELM TELL!' cried Arthurine. 'It might as well bethe alphabet at once. '

However, the difficulties in the way of books, and consideration forgeneral incompetency, reduced her to WILHELM TELL, and she beganwith a lecture first on Schiller, and then upon Switzerland, and onthe legend; but when Bessie Merrifield put in a word of such historyand criticisms as were not in the High School Manual, she was sureeverything else must be wrong--'Fraulein Blumenbach never said so, and she was an admirable German scholar. '

Miss Doyle went so far as to declare she should not go again to seeBessie Merrifield so silenced, sitting by after the first sayingnothing, but only with a little laugh in her eyes. 

'But, ' said Bessie, 'it is such fun to see any person having it soentirely her own way--like Macaulay, so cock-sure of everything--andto see those Bonchamp girls--Mytton is their name--so entirelyadoring her. '

'I am sorry she has taken up with those Myttons, ' said Miss Doyle. 

'So am I, ' answered Susan. 

'You too, Susie!' exclaimed Bessie--'you, who never have a word tosay against any one!'

'I daresay they are very good girls, ' said Susan; 'but they are--'

'Underbred, ' put in Miss Doyle in the pause. 'And how theyflatter!'

'I think the raptures are genuine gush, ' said Bessie; 'but that isso much the worse for Arthurine. Is there any positive harm in thefamily beyond the second-rate tone?'

'It was while you were away, ' said Susan; 'but their father somehowbehaved very ill about old Colonel Mytton's will--at least papathought so, and never wished us to visit them. '

'He was thought to have used unfair influence on the old gentleman, 'said Miss Doyle; 'but the daughters are so young that probably theyhad no part in it. Only it gives a general distrust of the family;and the sons are certainly very undesirable young men. '

'It is unlucky, ' said Bessie, 'that we can do nothing but inflict acourse of snubbing, in contrast with a course of admiration. '

'I am sure I don't want to snub her, ' said good-natured Susan. 'Only when she does want to do such queer things, how can it behelped?'

It was quite true, Mrs. And Miss Arthuret had been duly called uponand invited about by the neighbourhood; but it was a scanty one, andthey had not wealth and position enough to compensate for the girl'sself-assertion and literary pretensions. It was not a superior orintellectual society, and, as the Rockstone Merrifields laughinglydeclared, it was fifty years behindhand, and where BessieMerrifield, for the sake of the old stock and her meek bearing ofher success--nay, her total ignoring of her literary honours--wouldbe accepted. Arthurine, half her age, and a newcomer, was dislikedfor the pretensions which her mother innocently pressed on theworld. Simplicity and complacency were taken for arrogance, and themother and daughter were kept upon formal terms of civility by allbut the Merrifields, who were driven into discussion and oppositionby the young lady's attempts at reformations in the parish. 

It was the less wonder that they made friends where their intimacywas sought and appreciated. There was nothing underbred aboutthemselves; both were ladies ingrain, though Arthurine was abruptand sometimes obtrusive, but they had not lived a life such as torender them sensitive to the lack of fine edges in others, and werequite ready to be courted by those who gave the meed of appreciationthat both regarded as Arthurine's just portion. 

Mr. Mytton had been in India, and had come back to look after an oldrelation; to whom he and his wife had paid assiduous attention, andhad been so rewarded as to excite the suspicion and displeasure ofthe rest of the family. The prize had not been a great one, and theprosperity of the family was further diminished by the continualfailures of the ne'er-do-well sons, so that they had to make thebest of the dull, respectable old house they had inherited, in thedull, respectable old street of the dull, respectable old town. Daisy and Pansy Mytton were, however, bright girls, and to themArthurine Arthuret was a sort of realised dream of romance, raisedsuddenly to the pinnacle of all to which they had ever durst aspire. 

After meeting her at a great OMNIUM GATHERUM garden party, theacquaintance flourished. Arthurine was delighted to give theintense pleasure that the freedom of a country visit afforded to thesisters, and found in them the contemporaries her girl nature hadmissed. 

They were not stupid, though they had been poorly educated, and werequite willing to be instructed by her and to read all she told them. In fact, she was their idol, and a very gracious one. Deeply didthey sympathise in all her sufferings from the impediments cast inher way at Stokesley. 

Indeed, the ladies there did not meet her so often on their ownground for some time, and were principally disturbed by reports ofher doings at Bonchamp, where she played at cricket, and at hockey, gave a course of lectures on physiology, presided at a fancy-dressbazaar for the schools as Lady Jane Grey, and was on two or threecommittees. She travelled by preference on her tricycle, though shehad a carriage, chiefly for the sake of her mother, who was still ina state of fervent admiration, even though perhaps a little worriedat times by being hurried past her sober paces. 

The next shock that descended on Stokesley was that, in greatindignation, a cousin sent the Merrifields one of those Americanmagazines which are read and contributed to by a large proportion ofEnglish. It contained an article called 'The Bide-as-we-bes andparish of Stick-stodge-cum-Cadgerley, ' and written with the samesort of clever, flippant irony as the description of the mixedcompany in the boarding-house on the Lago Maggiore. 

There was the parish embowered, or rather choked, in trees, theorderly mechanical routine, the perfect self-satisfaction of allparties, and their imperviousness to progress, --the two squires, onea fox-hunter, the other a general reposing on his laurels, --theschool where everything was subordinated to learning to behaveoneself lowly and reverently to all one's betters, and to do one'sduty in that state of life to which it _HAS_ pleased Heaven to callone, --the horror at her tricycle, the impossibility of improvement, the predilection for farmyard odours, the adherence to tumbledowndwellings, the contempt of drinking fountains, --all had their meedof exaggeration not without drollery. 

The two ancient spinsters, daughters to the general, with theirpudding-baskets, buttonholes, and catechisms, had their full share--dragooning the parish into discipline, --the younger having so farmarched with the century as to have indited a few little tracts ofthe Goody Two-Shoes order, and therefore being mentioned by herfriends with bated breath as something formidable, 'who writes, 'although, when brought to the test, her cultivation was of thevaguest, most discursive order. Finally, there was a sketch of theheavy dinner party which had welcomed the strangers, and of theponderous county magnates and their wives who had been invited, andthe awe that their broad and expansive ladies expected to impress, and how one set talked of their babies, and the other of G. F. S. Girls, and the gentlemen seemed to be chiefly occupied in abusingtheir M. P. And his politics. Altogether, it was given as a lessonto Americans of the still feudal and stationary state of countrydistricts in poor old England. 

'What do you think of this, Bessie?' exclaimed Admiral Merrifield. 'We seem to have got a young firebrand in the midst of us. '

'Oh, papa! have you got that thing? What a pity!'

'You don't mean that you have seen it before?'

'Yes; one of my acquaintances in London sent it to me. '

'And you kept it to yourself?'

'I thought it would only vex you and mamma. Who sent it to you?'

'Anne did, with all the passages marked. What a horrid littletreacherous baggage!'

'I daresay we are very tempting. For once we see ourselves asothers see us! And you see 'tis American. '

'All the worse, holding us, who have done our best to welcome herhospitably, up to the derision of the Yankees!'

'But you won't take any notice. '

'Certainly not, ridiculous little puss, except to steer as clear ofher as possible for fear she should be taking her observations. "Bide as we be"; why, 'tis the best we can do. She can't pick ahole in your mother though, Bess. It would have been hard to haveforgiven her that! You're not such an aged spinster. '

'It is very funny, though, ' said Bessie; 'just enough exaggerationto give it point! Here is her interview with James Hodd. '

Whereat the Admiral could not help laughing heartily, and then hepicked himself out as the general, laughed again, and said:'Naughty girl! Bess, I'm glad that is not your line. Littletracts--Goody Two-Shoes! Why, what did that paper say of youressay, Miss Bess? That it might stand a comparison with Helps, wasn't it?'

'And I wish I was likely to enjoy such lasting fame as Goody Two-Shoes, ' laughed Bessie, in a state of secret exultation at this bitof testimony from her father. 

Mrs. Merrifield, though unscathed, was much more hurt and annoyedthan either her husband or her daughter, especially at Susan andBessie being termed old maids. She _DID_ think it very ungrateful, and wondered how Mrs. Arthuret could have suffered such a thing tobe done. Only the poor woman was quite foolish about her daughter--could have had no more authority than a cat. 'So much for moderneducation. '

But it was not pleasant to see the numbers of the magazine on thecounters at Bonchamp, and to know there were extracts in the localpapers, and still less to be indignantly condoled with by neighbourswho expressed their intention of 'cutting' the impertinent girl. They were exactly the 'old fogies' Arthurine cared for the least, yet whose acquaintance was the most creditable, and the home partyat Stokesley were unanimous in entreating others to ignore the wholeand treat the newcomers as if nothing had happened. 

They themselves shook hands, and exchanged casual remarks as ifnothing were amiss, nor was the subject mentioned, except that Mrs. Arthuret contrived to get a private interview with Mrs. Merrifield. 

'Oh! dear Mrs. Merrifield, I am so grieved, and so is Arthurine. Wewere told that the Admiral was so excessively angry, and he is sokind. I could not bear for him to think Arthurine meant anythingpersonal. '

'Indeed, ' said Mrs. Merrifield, rather astonished. 

'But is he so very angry?--for it is all a mistake. '

'He laughs, and so does Bessie, ' said the mother. 

'Laughs! Does he? But I do assure you Arthurine never meant anyplace in particular; she only intended to describe the way things goon in country districts, don't you understand? She was talking oneday at the Myttons, and they were all so much amused that theywanted her to write it down. She read it one evening when they werewith us, and they declared it was too good not to be published--andalmost before she knew it, Fred Mytton's literary friend got hold ofit and took it to the agency of this paper. But indeed, indeed, shenever thought of its being considered personal, and is as vexed aspossible at the way in which it has been taken up. She has everyfeeling about your kindness to us, and she was so shocked when PansyMytton told us that the Admiral was furious. '

'Whoever told Miss Mytton so made a great mistake. The Admiral onlyis--is--amused--as you know gentlemen will be at young girls'little--little scrapes, ' returned Mrs. Merrifield, longing to say'impertinences, ' but refraining, and scarcely believing whatnevertheless was true, that Arthurine did not know how personal shehad been, although her mother said it all over again twice. Bessie, however, did believe it, from experience of resemblances where shehad never intended direct portraiture; and when there was a somewhatearnest invitation to a garden party at the Gap, the Merrifields notonly accepted for themselves, but persuaded as many of theirneighbours as they could to countenance the poor girl. 'There issomething solid at the bottom in spite of all the effervescence, 'said Bessie. 

It was late in the year for a garden party, being on the 2d ofOctober, but weather and other matters had caused delays, and theIndian summer had begun with warm sun and exquisite tints. 'Whatwould not the maple and the liquid amber have been by this time, 'thought the sisters, 'if they had been spared. ' Some of the PETITENOBLESSE, however, repented of their condescension when they saw howlittle it was appreciated. Mrs. Arthuret, indeed, was makingherself the best hostess that a lady who had served noapprenticeship could be to all alike, but Arthurine or 'Atty, ' asDaisy and Pansy were heard shouting to her--all in white flannels, aman all but the petticoats--seemed to be absorbed in a little courtof the second-rate people of Bonchamp, some whom, as Mrs. Grevilleand Lady Smithson agreed, they had never expected to meet. She waslaughing and talking eagerly, and by and by ran up to Bessie, exclaiming in a patronising tone--

'Oh! my dear Miss Bessie, let me introduce you to Mr. Foxholm--sucha clever literary man. He knows everybody--all about everybody andeverything. It would be such an advantage! And he has actuallymade me give him my autograph! Only think of that!'

Bessie thought of her own good luck in being anonymous, but did notexpress it, only saying, 'Autograph-hunters are a great nuisance. Iknow several people who find them so. '

'Yes, he said it was one of the penalties of fame that one mustsubmit to, ' returned Miss Arthuret, with a delighted laugh ofconsciousness. 

Bessie rejoiced that none of her own people were near to see thepatronising manner in which Arthurine introduced her to Mr. Foxholm, a heavily-bearded man, whose eyes she did not at all like, and whobegan by telling her that he felt as if he had crossed the Rubicon, and entering an Arcadia, had found a Parnassus. 

Bessie looked to see whether the highly-educated young lady detectedthe malaprop for the Helicon, but Arthurine was either too well-bredor too much exalted to notice either small slips, or even bad taste, and she stood smiling and blushing complacently. However, just thenSusan hurried up. 'Bessie, you are wanted. Here's a card. Thegentleman sent it in, and papa asked me to find you. '

Bessie opened her eyes. The card belonged to the editor of one ofthe most noted magazines of the day, but one whose principles shedid not entirely approve. What could be coming?

Her father was waiting for her. 

'Well, Miss Bessie, ' he said, laughing, 'Jane said the gentleman wasvery urgent in wanting to know when you would be in. An offer, eh?'

'Perhaps it is an offer, but not of _THAT_ sort, ' said Bessie, andshe explained what the unliterary Admiral had not understood. Heanswered with a whistle. 

'Shall you do it, Bessie?'

'I think not, ' she said quietly. 

The editor was found waiting for her, with many apologies forbringing her home, and the Admiral was so delighted with hisagreeableness as hardly to be able to tear himself away to bringhome his wife. 

The offer was, as Bessie expected, of excellent terms for a serialstory--terms that proved to her what was her own value, and in whichshe saw education for her sister Anne's eldest boy. 

'Of course, there would be a certain adaptation to our readers. '

She knew what that meant, and there was that in her face which drewforth the assurance. 

'Of course nothing you would not wish to say would be required, butit would be better not to press certain subjects. '

'I understand, ' said Bessie. 'I doubt--'

'Perhaps you will think it over. '

Bessie's first thought was, 'If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, then letmy right hand forget her cunning. ' That had been the inward mottoof her life. Her second was, 'Little Sam! David's mission room!'There was no necessity to answer at once, and she knew theperiodical rather by report than by reading, so she accepted the twonumbers that were left with her, and promised to reply in a week. It was a question on which to take counsel with her father, and withher own higher conscience and heavenly Guide. 

The Admiral, though not much given to reading for its own sake, andperhaps inclined to think ephemeral literature the more triflingbecause his little daughter was a great light there, was anythingbut a dull man, and had an excellent judgment. So Bessie, with allthe comfort of a woman still with a wise father's head over her, decided to commit the matter to him. He was somewhat disappointedat finding her agreeable guest gone, and wished that dinner and bedhad been offered. 

Mrs. Merrifield and Susan were still a good deal excited aboutArthurine's complimentary friend, who they said seemed to belong toFred Mytton, of whom some of the ladies had been telling mostunpleasant reports, and there was much lamentation over the set intowhich their young neighbour had thrown herself. 

'Such a dress too!' sighed Mrs. Merrifield. 

'And her headmistress has just arrived, ' said Susan, 'to make herworse than ever!'

'How comes a headmistress to be running about the country at thistime of year?' asked Bessie. 

'She has been very ill, ' said Mrs. Merrifield, 'and they wrote toher to come down as soon as she could move. There was a telegramthis morning, and she drove up in the midst of the party, and wastaken to her room at once to rest. That was the reason MissArthuret was away so long. I thought it nice in her. '

'Perhaps she will do good, ' said Bessie. 

Dinner was just over, and the Admiral had settled down with hisshaded lamp to read and judge of the article that Bessie had givenhim as a specimen, when in came the message, 'Mrs. Rudden wishes tospeak to you, sir. '

Mrs. Rudden was the prosperous widow who continued the business inthe village shop, conjointly with the little farm belonging to theGap property. She was a shrewd woman, had been able to do very wellby her family, and was much esteemed, paying a rent which was aconsiderable item in the Gap means. The ladies wondered together atthe summons. Susan hoped 'that girl' did not want to evict her, andBessie suggested that a co-operative store was a more probableperil. Presently the Admiral came back. 'Do any of you know MissArthuret's writing?' he said. 

'Bessie knows it best, ' said Susan. 

He showed a letter. 'That is hers--the signature, ' said Bessie. 'Iare not sure about the rest. Why--what does it mean?'

For she read--

'The Gap, 2D OCT. 

'MRS. RUDDEN, --You are requested to pay over to the bearer, Mr. Foxholm, fifty pounds of the rent you were about to bring me to-morrow. --I remain, etc. , 'ARTHURINE ARTHURET. '

'What does it mean?' asked Bessie again. 'That's just what Mrs. Rudden has come up to me to ask, ' said the Admiral. 'This fellowpresented it in her shop about a quarter of an hour ago. The goodwoman smelt a rat. What do you think she did? She looked at it andhim, asked him to wait a bit, whipped out at her back door, luckilymet the policeman starting on his rounds, bade him have an eye tothe customer in her shop, and came off to show it to me. That youngwoman is demented enough for anything, and is quite capable of doingit--for some absurd scheme. But do you think it is hers, or aswindle?'

'Didn't she say she had given her autograph?' exclaimed Susan. 

'And see here, ' said Bessie, 'her signature is at the top of thesheet of note-paper--small paper. And as she always writes verylarge, it would be easy to fill up the rest, changing the first sideover. '

'I must take it up to her at once, ' said the Admiral. 'Even if itbe genuine, she may just as well see that it is a queer thing tohave done, and not exactly the way to treat her tenants. '

'It is strange too that this man should have known anything aboutMrs. Rudden, ' said Mrs. Merrifield. 

'Mrs. Rudden says she had a message this morning, when she had comeup with her rent and accounts, to say that Miss Arthuret was verymuch engaged, and would be glad if she would come to-morrow! Couldthis fellow have been about then?'

No one knew, but Bessie breathed the word, 'Was not that youngMytton there?'

It was not taken up, for no one liked to pronounce the obviousinference. Besides, the Admiral was in haste, not thinking it wellthat Mr. Foxholm should be longer kept under surveillance in theshop, among the bread, bacon, cheeses, shoes, and tins of pottedmeat. 

He was then called for; and on his loudly exclaiming that he hadbeen very strangely treated, the Admiral quietly told him that Mrs. Rudden had been disturbed at so unusual a way of demanding her rent, and had come for advice on the subject; and to satisfy their mindsthat all was right, Mr. Foxholm would, no doubt, consent to waittill the young lady could be referred to. Mr. Foxholm did verydecidedly object; he said no one had any right to detain him whenthe lady's signature was plain, and Admiral Merrifield had seen himin her society, and he began an account of the philanthropicalpurpose for which he said the money had been intended, but he wascut short. 

'You must be aware, ' said the Admiral, 'that this is not an ordinaryway of acting, and whatever be your purpose, Mrs. Rudden mustascertain your authority more fully before paying over so large asum. I give you your choice, therefore, either of accompanying usto the Gap, or of remaining in Mrs. Rudden's parlour till wereturn. '

The furtive eye glanced about, and the parlour was chosen. Did heknow that the policeman stationed himself in the shop outside?

The dinner at the Gap was over, and Miss Elmore, the headmistress, was established in an arm-chair, listening to the outpouring of herformer pupil and the happy mother about all the felicities andglories of their present life, the only drawback being the dullnessand obstructiveness of the immediate neighbours. 'I thought MissMerrifield was your neighbour--Mesa?'

'Oh no--quite impossible! These are Merrifields, but the daughtersare two regular old goodies, wrapped up in Sunday schools and pennyclubs. '

'Well, that is odd! The editor of the --- came down in the trainwith me, and said he was going to see Mesa--Miss ElizabethMerrifield. '

'I do think it is very unfair, ' began Arthurine; but at that momentthe door-bell rang. 'How strange at this time!'

'Oh! perhaps the editor is coming here!' cried Arthurine. 'Did youtell him _I_ lived here, Miss Elmore?'

'Admiral Merrifield, ' announced the parlour-maid. 

He had resolved not to summon the young lady in private, as hethought there was more chance of common-sense in the mother. 

'You are surprised to see me at this time, ' he said; 'but Mrs. Rudden is perplexed by a communication from you. '

'Mrs. Rudden!' exclaimed Arthurine. 'Why, I only sent her word thatI was too busy to go through her accounts to-day, and asked her tocome to-morrow. That isn't against the laws of the Medes andPersians, is it?'

'Then did you send her this letter?'

'I?' said Arthurine, staring at it, with her eyes at their fullestextent. 'I! fifty pounds! Mr. Foxholm! What does it mean?'

'Then you never wrote that order?'

'No! no! How should I?'

'That is not your writing?'

'No, not that. '

'Look at the signature. '

'Oh! oh! oh!'--and she dropped into a chair. 'The horrible man!That's the autograph I gave him this afternoon. '

'You are sure?'

'Quite; for my pen spluttered in the slope of the A. Has she goneand given it to him?'

'No. She brought it to me, and set the policeman to watch him. '

'What a dear, good woman! Shall you send him to prison, AdmiralMerrifield? What can be done to him?' said Arthurine, not lookingat all as if she would like to abrogate capital punishment. 

'Well, I had been thinking, ' said the Admiral. 'You see he did notget it, and though I could commit him for endeavouring to obtainmoney on false pretences, I very much doubt whether the prosecutionwould not be worse for you than for him. '

'That is very kind of you, Admiral!' exclaimed the mother. 'Itwould be terribly awkward for dear Arthurine to stand up and say hecajoled her into giving her autograph. It might always beremembered against her!'

'Exactly so, ' said the Admiral; 'and perhaps there may be anotherreason for not pushing the matter to extremity. The man is astranger here, I believe. '

'He has been staying at Bonchamp, ' said Mrs. Arthuret. 'It wasyoung Mr. Mytton who brought him over this afternoon. '

'Just so. And how did he come to be aware that Mrs. Rudden owed youany money?'

There was a pause, then Arthurine broke out--

'Oh, Daisy and Pansy can't have done anything; but they were allthree there helping me mark the tennis-courts when the messagecame. '

'Including the brother?'

'Yes. '

'He is a bad fellow, and I would not wish to shield him in any way, but that such a plot should be proved against him would be agrievous disgrace to the family. '

'I can't ever feel about them as I have done, ' said Arthurine, intears. 'Daisy and Pansy said so much about poor dear Fred, andevery one being hard on him, and his feeling my good influence--andall the time he was plotting this against me, with my chalk in hishand marking my grass, ' and she broke down in child-like sobs. 

The mortification was terrible of finding her pinnacle of fame themere delusion of a sharper, and the shock of shame seemed tooverwhelm the poor girl. 

'Oh, Admiral!' cried her mother, 'she cannot bear it. I know youwill be good, and manage it so as to distress her as little aspossible, and not have any publicity. '

'1 will do my best, ' said the Admiral. 'I will try and get aconfession out of him, and send him off, though it is a pity thatsuch a fellow should get off scot-free. '

'Oh, never mind, so that my poor Arthurine's name is not broughtforward! We can never be grateful enough for your kindness. '

It was so late that the Admiral did not come back that night, andthe ladies were at breakfast when he appeared again. Foxholm had, on finding there was no escape, confessed the fraud, but threw mostof the blame on Fred Mytton, who was in debt, not only to him but toothers. Foxholm himself seemed to have been an adventurer, whopreyed on young men at the billiard-table, and had there been insome collusion with Fred, though the Admiral had little doubt as towhich was the greater villain. He had been introduced to the Myttonfamily, who were not particular; indeed, Mr. Mytton had no objectionto increasing his pocket-money by a little wary, profitable bettingand gambling on his own account. However, the associates had nodoubt brought Bonchamp to the point of being too hot to hold them, and Fred, overhearing the arrangement with Mrs. Rudden, hadcommunicated it to him--whence the autograph trick. Foxholm wasgone, and in the course of the day it was known that young Myttonwas also gone. 

The Admiral promised that none of his family should mention thematter, and that he would do his best to silence Mrs. Rudden, whofor that matter probably believed the whole letter to have beenforged, and would not enter into the enthusiasm of autographs. 

'Oh, thank you! It is so kind, ' said the mother; and Arthurine, wholooked as if she had not slept all night, and was ready to burstinto tears on the least provocation, murmured something to the sameeffect, which the Admiral answered, half hearing--

'Never mind, my dear, you will be wiser another time; young peoplewill be inexperienced. '

'Is that the cruellest cut of all?' thought Miss Elmore, as shebeheld her former pupil scarcely restraining herself enough for thefarewell civilities, and then breaking down into a flood of tears. 

Her mother hovered over her with, 'What is it? Oh! my dear child, you need not be afraid; he is so kind!'

'I hate people to be kind, that is the very thing, ' said Arthurine, --'Oh! Miss Elmore, don't go!--while he is meaning all the time thatI have made such a fool of myself! And he is glad, I know he is, heand his hateful, stupid, stolid daughters. '

'My dear! my dear!' exclaimed her mother. 

'Well, haven't they done nothing but thwart me, whatever I wanted todo, and aren't they triumphing now in this abominable man'streachery, and my being taken in? I shall go away, and sell theplace, and never come back again. '

'I should think that was the most decided way of confessing afailure, ' said Miss Elmore; and as Mrs. Arthuret was called away bythe imperative summons to the butcher, she spoke more freely. 'Yourmother looks terrified at being so routed up again. '

'Oh, mother will be happy anywhere; and how can I stay with thesestick-in-the-mud people, just like what I have read about?'

'And have gibbeted! Really, Arthurine, I should call them verygenerous!'

'It is their thick skins, ' muttered she; 'at least so the Myttonssaid; but, indeed, I did not mean to be so personal as it wasthought. '

'But tell me. Why did you not get on with Mesa?'

'That was a regular take-in. Not to tell one! When I began myGerman class, she put me out with useless explanations. '

'What kind of explanations?'

'Oh, about the Swiss being under the Empire, or something, and she_WOULD_ go into parallels of Saxon words, and English poetry, suchas our Fraulein never troubled us with. But I showed her it wouldnot _DO_. '

'So instead of learning what you had not sense to appreciate, youwanted to teach your old routine. '

'But, indeed, she could not pronounce at all well, and she lookedever so long at difficult bits, and then she even tried to correct_ME_. '

'Did she go on coming after you silenced her?'

'Yes, and never tried to interfere again. '

'I am afraid she drew her own conclusions about High Schools. '

'Oh, Miss Elmore, you used to like us to be thorough and notdiscursive, and how could anybody brought up in this stultifyingplace, ages ago, know what will tell in an exam?'

'Oh! Arthurine. How often have I told you that examinations are noteducation. I never saw so plainly that I have not educated you. '

'I wanted to prepare Daisy and Pansy, and they didn't care about herprosing when we wanted to get on with the book. '

'Which would have been the best education for them, poor girls, anexample of courtesy, patience, and humility, or _GETTING ON_, as youcall it?'

'Oh! Miss Elmore, you are very hard on me, when I have just been socruelly disappointed. '

'My dear child, it is only because I want you to discover why youhave been so cruelly disappointed. '

It would be wearisome to relate all that Arthurine finally told ofthose thwartings by the Merrifields which had thrown her into thearms of the Mytton family, nor how Miss Elmore brought her toconfess that each scheme was either impracticable, or might havebeen injurious, and that a little grain of humility might have madeher see things very differently. Yet it must be owned that the goodlady felt rather like bending a bow that would spring back again. 

Bessie Merrifield had, like her family, been inclined to concludethat all was the fault of High Schools. She did not see Miss Elmoreat first, thinking the Arthurets not likely to wish to be intrudedupon, and having besides a good deal to think over. For she and herfather had talked over the proposal, which pecuniarily was sotempting, and he, without prejudice, but on principle, had concurredwith her in deciding that it was her duty not to add one touch ofattractiveness to aught which supported a cause contrary to theirstrongest convictions. Her father's approbation was the crowningpleasure, though she felt the external testimony to her abilities, quite enough to sympathise with such intoxication of success as tomake any compliment seem possible. Miss Elmore had one long talkwith her, beginning by saying--

'I wish to consult you about my poor, foolish child. '

'Ah! I am afraid we have not helped her enough!' said Bessie. 'Ifwe had been more sympathetic she might have trusted us more. '

'Then you are good enough to believe that it was not all folly andpresumption. '

'I am sure it was not, ' said Bessie. 'None of us ever thought itmore than inexperience and a little exaltation, with immense goodintention at the bottom. Of course, our dear old habits did lookdull, coming from life and activity, and we rather resented hercontempt for them; but I am quite sure that after a little while, every one will forget all about this, or only recollect it as onedoes a girlish scrape. '

'Yes. To suppose all the neighbourhood occupied in laughing at heris only another phase of self-importance. You see, the poor childnecessarily lived in a very narrow world, where examinations came, whatever I could do, to seem everything, and she only knew thingsbeyond by books. She had success enough there to turn her head, andnot going to Cambridge, never had fair measure of her abilities. Then came prosperity--'

'Quite enough to upset any one's balance, ' said Bessie. 'In fact, only a very sober, not to say stolid, nature would have stood it. '

'Poor things! They were so happy--so open-hearted. I did long tocaution them. "Pull cup, steady hand. "'

'It will all come right now, ' said Bessie. 'Mrs Arthuret spoke oftheir going away for the winter; I do not think it will be a badplan, for then we can start quite fresh with them; and the intimacywith the Myttons will be broken, though I am sorry for the poorgirls. They have no harm in them, and Arthurine was doing themgood. '

'A whisper to you, Miss Merrifield--they are going back with me, tobe prepared for governesses at Arthurine's expense. It is the onlything for them in the crash that young man has brought on thefamily. '

'Dear, good Arthurine! She only needed to learn how to carry hercup. '

MRS. BATSEYES

I. FATHER AND DAUGHTER

SCENE. --THE DRAWING-ROOM OF DARKGLADE VICARAGE. MR. AVELAND, ANELDERLY CLERGYMAN. MRS. MOLDWARP, WIDOW ON THE VERGE OF MIDDLE AGE. 

MR. A. So, my dear good child, you will come back to me, and dowhat you can for the lonely old man!

MRS. M. I know nothing can really make up--

MR. A. Ah! my dear, you know only too well by your own experience, but if any one could, it would be you. And at least you will letnothing drop in the parish work. You and Cicely together will beable to take that up when Euphrasia is gone too. 

MRS. M. It will be delightful to me to come back to it! You know Iwas to the manner born. Nothing seems to be so natural!

MR. A. I am only afraid you are giving up a great deal. I don'tknow that I could accept it--except for the parish and these poorchildren. 

MRS. M. Now, dear father, you are not to talk so! Is not this myhome, my first home, and though it has lost its very dearest centre, what can be so dear to me when my own has long been broken?

MR. A. But the young folks--young Londoners are apt to feel such achange a great sacrifice. 

MRS. M. Lucius always longs to be here whenever he is on shore, andCicely. Oh! it will be so good for Cicely to be with you, dearfather. I know some day you will be able to enjoy her. And I dolook forward to having her to myself, as I have never had beforesince she was a little creature in the nursery. It is so fortunatethat I had not closed the treaty for the house at Brompton, so thatI can come whenever Phrasie decides on leaving you. 

MR. A. And she must not be long delayed. She and Holland havewaited for each other quite long enough. Your dear mother beggedthat there should be no delay; and neither you nor I, Mary, couldbear to shorten the time of happiness together that may be grantedthem. She will have no scruple about leaving George's children nowyou and Cicely will see to them--poor little things!

MRS. M. Cicely has always longed for a sphere, and between thechildren and the parish she will be quite happy. You need have nofears for her, father!

II. BROTHER AND SISTER

SCENE--THE BROAD WALK UNDER THE VICARAGE GARDEN WALL, LUCIUSMOLDWARP, A LIEUTENANT IN THE NAVY. CICELY MOLDWARP. 

C. Isn't it disgusting, Lucius?

L. What is?

C. This proceeding of the mother's. 

L. Do you mean coming down here to live?

C. Of course I do! Without so much as consulting me. 

L. The captain does not ordinarily consult the crew. 

C. Bosh, Lucius. That habit of discipline makes you quite stupid. Now, haven't I the right to be consulted?

L. (A WHISTLE)

C. (A STAMP)

L. Pray, what would your sagacity have proposed for grandpapa andthe small children?

C. (HESITATION. )

L. (A SLIGHT LAUGH. )

C. I do think it is quite shocking of Aunt Phrasie to be in suchhaste to marry!

L. After eleven years--eh? or twelve, is it?

C. I mean of course so soon after her mother's death. 

L. You know dear granny herself begged that the wedding might notbe put off on that account. 

C. Mr. Holland might come and live here. 

L. Perhaps he thinks he has a right to be consulted. 

C. Then she might take those children away with her. 

L. Leaving grandpapa alone. 

C. The Curate might live in the house. 

L. Lively and satisfactory to mother. Come now, Cis, why are youso dead set against this plan? It is only because your augustconsent has not been asked?

C. I should have minded less if the pros and cons had been setbefore me, instead of being treated like a chattel; but I do notthink my education should be sacrificed. 

L. Not educated! At twenty!

C. Don't be so silly, Lucius. This is the time when the mostimportant brain work is to be done. There are the art classes atthe Slade, and the lectures I am down for, and the Senior Cambridgeand cookery and nursing. Yes, I see you make faces! You sailorsthink women are only meant for you to play with when you are onshore; but I must work. 

L. Work enough here!

C. Goody-goody! Babies, school-children, and old women! I'm meantfor something beyond that, or what are intellect and artisticfaculty given for?

L. You could read for Cambridge exam. All the same. Here are tonsof books, and grandpapa would help you. Why not? He is not a bitof a dull man. He is up to everything. 

C. So far as _YOU_ know. Oh no, he is not naturally dense. He isa dear old man; but you know clerics of his date, especially whenthey have vegetated in the country, never know anything but theFathers and church architecture. 

L. Hum! I should have said the old gentleman had a pretty goodintelligence of his own. I know he set me on my legs for my exam. As none of the masters at old Coade's ever did. What has made youtake such a mortal aversion to the place? We used to think it nextdoor to Paradise when we were small children. 

C. Of course, when country freedom was everything, and we knewnothing of rational intercourse; but when all the most intellectualhouses are open to me, it is intolerable to be buried alive herewith nothing to talk of but clerical shop, and nothing to do butread to old women, and cram the unfortunate children with thecatechism. And mother and Aunt Phrasie expect me to be in raptures!

L. Whereas you seem to be meditating a demonstration. 

C. I shall tell mother that if she must needs come down to wallowin her native goodiness, it is due to let me board in Kensingtontill my courses are completed. 

L. Since she won't be an unnatural daughter, she is to leave thepart to you. Well, I suppose it will be for the general peace. 

C. Now, Lucius, you speak out of the remains of the old tyrannicalbarbarism, when the daughters were nothing but goods and chattels. 

L. Goods, yes, indeed, and betters. 

C. No doubt the men liked it! But won't you stand by me, Lucius?You say it would be for the general peace. 

L. I only said you would be better away than making yourselfobnoxious. I can't think how you can have the heart, Cis, such apet as you always were. 

C. I would not hurt their feelings for the world, only myimprovement is too important to be sacrificed, and if no one elsewill stand up for me, I must stand up for myself. 

III. BRIDE-ELECT AND FATHER

SCENE. --THREE WEEKS LATER. BREAKFAST TABLE AT DARKGLADE VICARAGE, MR. AVELAND AND EUPHRASIA READING THEIR LETTERS. THREE LITTLECHILDREN EATING BREAD AND MILK. 

E. There! Mary has got the house at Brompton off her hands and cancome for good on the 11th. That is the greatest possible comfort. She wants to bring her piano; it has a better tone than ours. 

MR. A. Certainly! Little Miss Hilda there will soon be strummingher scales on the old one, and Mary and Cis will send me to sleep inthe evening with hers. 

E. Oh!

MR. A. Why, Phrasie, what's the matter?

E. This is a blow! Cicely is only coming to be bridesmaid, andthen going back to board at Kensington and go on with her studies. 

MR. A. To board? All alone?

E. Oh! that's the way with young ladies!

MR. A. Mary cannot have consented. 

E. Have you done, little folks? Then say grace, Hilda, and run outtill the lesson bell rings. Yes, poor Mary, I am afraid she thinksall that Cecilia decrees is right; or if she does not naturallybelieve so, she is made to. 

MR. A. Come, come, Phrasie, I always thought Mary a model mother. 

E. So did I, and so she was while the children were small, exceptthat they were more free and easy with her than was the way in ourtime. And I think she is all that is to be desired to her son; butwhen last I was in London, I cannot say I was satisfied, I thoughtCissy had got beyond her. 

MR. A. For want of a father?

E. Not entirely. You know I could not think Charles Moldwarp quiteworthy of Mary, though she never saw it. 

MR. A. Latterly we saw so little of him! He liked to spend hisholiday in mountain climbing, and Mary made her visits here alone. 

E. Exactly so. Sympathy faded out between them, though she, poordear, never betrayed it, if she realised it, which I doubt. And asCissy took after her father, this may have weakened her allegianceto her mother. At any rate, as soon as she was thought to haveoutgrown her mother's teaching, those greater things, mother'sinfluence and culture, were not thought of, and she went to schooland had her companions and interests apart; while Mary, good soul, filled up the vacancy with good works, and if once you get into theswing of that sort of thing in town, there's no end to the demandsupon your time. I don't think she ever let them bore her husband. He was out all day, and didn't want her; but I am afraid they dobore her daughter, and absorb attention and time, so as to hinderfull companionship, till Cissy has grown up an extraneous creature, not formed by her. Mary thinks, in her humility, dear old thing, that it is a much superior creature; but I don't like it as well asthe old sort. 

MR. A. The old barndoor hen hatched her eggs and bred up her chicksbetter than the fine prize fowl. Eh?

E. So that incubator-hatched chicks, with a hot-bed instead of ahovering wing and tender cluck-cluck, are the fashion! I was inhopes that coming down to the old coop, with no professors to runafter, and you to lead them both, all would right itself, but itseems my young lady wants more improving. 

MR. A. Well, my dear, it must be mortifying to a clever girl tohave her studies cut short. 

E. Certainly; but in my time we held that studies were subordinateto duties; and that there were other kinds of improvement than inmodel-drawing and all the rest of it. 

MR. A. It will not be for long, and Cissy will find the people, orhas found them, and Mary will accept them. 

E. If her native instinct objects, she will be cajoled or bulliedinto seeing with Cissy's eyes. 

MR. A. Well, Euphrasia, my dear, let us trust that people are thebest judges of their own affairs, and remember that the world hasgot beyond us. Mary was always a sensible, right-minded girl, and Icannot believe her as blind as you would make out. 

E. At any rate, dear papa, you never have to say to her as to me, 'Judge not, that ye be not judged. '

IV. MOTHER AND DAUGHTER

SCENE. --DARKGLADE VICARAGE DRAWING-ROOM. 

MRS. M. So, my dear, you think it impossible to be happy here?

C. Little Mamsey, why _WILL_ you never understand? It is not aquestion of happiness, but of duty to myself. 

MRS. M. And that is--

C. Not to throw away all my chances of self-improvement byburrowing into this hole. 

MRS. M. Oh, my dear, I don't like to hear you call it so. 

C. Yes, I know you care for it. You were bred up here, and knownothing better, poor old Mamsey, and pottering suits you exactly;but it is too much to ask me to sacrifice my wider fields of cultureand usefulness. 

MRS. M. Grandpapa would enjoy nothing so much as reading with you. He said so. 

C. Oxford half a century old and wearing off ever since. No, Ithank you! Besides, it is not only physical science, but art. 

MRS. M. There's the School of Art at Holbrook. 

C. My dear mother, I am far past country schools of art!

MRS. M. It is not as if you intended to take up art as aprofession. 

C. Mother! will nothing ever make you understand? Nothing ought tobe half-studied, merely to pass away the time as an _ACCOMPLISHMENT_(UTTERED WITH INFINITE SCORN, ACCENTUATED ON THE SECOND SYLLABLE), just to do things to sell at bazaars. No! Art with me means workworthy of exhibition, with a market-price, and founded on a thoroughknowledge of the secrets of the human frame. 

MRS. M. Those classes! I don't like all I hear of them, or theirattendants. 

C. If you _WILL_ listen to all the gossip of all the old women ofboth sexes, I can't help it! Can't you trust to innocence andearnestness?

MRS. M. I wish it was the Art College at Wimbledon. Then I shouldbe quite comfortable about you. 

C. Have not we gone into all that already? You know I must go tothe fountain-head, and not be put off with mere feminine, lady-likestudies! Pah! Besides, in lodgings I can be useful. I shall givetwo evenings in the week to the East End, to the Society for theDiversion and Civilisation of the Poor. 

MRS. M. Surely there is room for usefulness here! Think of thechildren! And for diversion and civilisation, how glad we should beof your fresh life and brightness among poor people!

C. Such poor! Why, even if grandpapa would let me give a lectureon geology, or a reading from Dickens, old Prudence Blake would goabout saying it hadn't done nothing for her poor soul. 

MRS. M. Grandpapa wanted last winter to have penny readings, onlythere was nobody to do it. He would give you full scope for that, or for lectures. 

C. Yes; about vaccination and fresh air! or a reading of JohnGilpin or the Pied Piper. Mamsey, you know a model parish stiflesme. I can't stand your prim school-children, drilled in theCatechism, and your old women who get out the Bible and the cleanapron when they see you a quarter of a mile off. Free air and openminds for me! No, I won't have you sighing, mother. You havereturned to your native element, and you must let me return to mine. 

MRS. M. Very well, my dear. Perhaps a year or two of study in townmay be due to you, though this is a great disappointment tograndpapa and me. I know Mrs. Payne will make a pleasant and safehome for you, if you must be boarded. 

C. Too late for that. I always meant to be with Betty Thurston atMrs. Kaye's. In fact, I have written to engage my room. So there'san end of it. Come, come, don't look vexed. It is better to makean end of it at once. There are things that one must decide foroneself. 

V. TWO FRIENDS

SCENE--OVER THE FIRE IN MRS. KAYE'S BOARDING-HOUSE. CECILIAMOLDWARP AND BETTY THURSTON. 

C. So I settled the matter at once. 

B. Quite right, too, Cis. 

C. The dear woman was torn every way. Grandpapa and Aunt Phrasiewanted her to pin me down into the native stodge; and Lucius, like atrue man, went in for subjection: so there was nothing for it butto put my foot down. And though little mother might moan a littleto me, I knew she would stand up stoutly for me to all the rest, andvindicate my liberty. 

B. To keep you down there. Such a place is very well to breathe inoccasionally, like a whale; but as to living in them--

C. Just hear how they spend the day. First, 7. 30, prayers inchurch. The dear old man has hammered on at them these forty years, with a congregation averaging 4 to 2. 5. 

B. You are surely not expected to attend at that primitiveChristian hour! Cruelty to animals!

C. If I don't, the absence of such an important unit hurts folks'feelings, and I am driven to the fabrication of excuses. Afterbreakfast, whatever is available trots off to din the Catechism andGenesis into the school-children's heads--the only things myrespected forefather cares about teaching them. Of course backagain to the children's lessons. 

B. What children?

C. Didn't I explain? Three Indian orphans of my uncle's, turnedupon my grandfather--jolly little kids enough, as long as one hasn'tto teach them. 

B. Are governesses unknown in those parts?

C. Too costly; and besides, my mother was designed by nature for anursery-governess. She has taught the two elder ones to bewonderfully good when she is called off. 'The butcher, ma'am'; or, 'Mrs. Tyler wants to speak to you, ma'am'; or, 'Jane Cox is come fora hospital paper, ma'am. ' Then early dinner, of all thingsdetestable, succeeded by school needlework, mothers' meeting, andchildren's walk, combined with district visiting, or reading to oldwomen. Church again, high tea, and evenings again pleasingly variedby choir practices, night schools, or silence, while grandpapaconcocts his sermon. 

B. Is this the easy life to which Mrs. Moldwarp has retired?

C. It is her native element. People of her generation think ittheir vocation to be ladies-of-all-work to the parish ofStickinthemud cum-Humdrum. 

B. All-work indeed!

C. I did not include Sundays, which are one rush of meals, schools, and services, including harmonium. 

B. No society or rational conversation, of course?

C. Adjacent clergy and clergy woman rather less capable of aughtbut shop than the natives themselves! You see, even if I did offermyself as a victim, I couldn't do the thing! Fancy my going onabout the six Mosaic days, and Jonah's whale, and Jael's nail, anddoing their duty in that state of life where it _HAS_ pleased Heavento place them. 

B. Impossible, my dear! Those things can't be taught--if they areto be taught--except by those who accept them as entirely as ever;and it is absurd to think of keeping you where you would be totallydevoid of all intellectual food!

SCENE. --ART STUDENT AND DISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR A YEAR LATER. SOIREE IN A LONDON DRAWING-ROOM. PROFESSOR DUNLOP AND CECILIA. 

PROF. D. Miss Moldwarp? Is your mother here?

C. No; she is not in town. 

PROF. D. Not living there?

C. She lives with my grandfather at Darkglade. 

PROF. D. Indeed! I hope Mr. And Mrs. Aveland are well?

C. Thank you, _HE_ is well; but my grandmother is dead. 

PROF. D. Oh, I am sorry! I had not heard of his loss. How longago did it happen?

C. Last January twelvemonth. My aunt is married, and my mother hastaken her place at home. 

PROF. D. Then you are here on a visit. Where are you staying?

C. No, I live here. I am studying in the Slade schools. 

PROF. D. This must have greatly changed my dear old friend's life!

C. I did not know that you were acquainted with my grandfather. 

PROF. D. I was one of his pupils. I may say that I owe everythingto him. It is long since I have been at Darkglade, but it alwaysseemed to me an ideal place. 

C. Rather out of the world. 

PROF. D. Of one sort of world perhaps; but what a beautifulcombination is to be seen there of the highest powers with thelowliest work! So entirely has he dedicated himself that he reallyfeels the guidance of a ploughman's soul a higher task than thegrandest achievement in science or literature. By the bye, I hopehe will take up his pen again. It is really wanted. Will you givehim a message from me?

C. How strange! I never knew that he was an author. 

PROF. D. Ah! you are a young thing, and these are abstrusesubjects. 

C. Oh! the Fathers and Ritual, I suppose?

PROF. D. No doubt he is a great authority there, as a man of hisability must be; but I was thinking of a course of scientific papershe put forth ten years ago, taking up the arguments againstmaterialism as no one could do who is not as thoroughly at home ashe is in the latest discoveries and hypotheses. He ought to answerthat paper in the CRITICAL WORLD. 

C. I was so much interested in that paper. 

PROF. D. It has just the speciousness that runs away with youngpeople. I should like to talk it over with him. Do you think Ishould be in the way if I ran down?

C. I should think a visit from you would be an immense pleasure tohim; and I am sure it would be good for the place to be stirred up. 

PROF. D. You have not learnt to prize that atmosphere in whichthings always seem to assume their true proportion, and to promptthe cry of St. Bernard's brother--'All earth for me, all heaven foryou. '

C. That was surely an outcome of the time when people used tosacrifice certainties to uncertainties, and spoil life for the sakeof they knew not what. 

PROF. D. For eye hath not seen, nor ear heard. 

STRANGER. Mr. Dunlop! This is an unexpected pleasure!

C. (ALONE). Well, wonders will never cease. The great ProfessorDunlop talking to me quite preachy and goody; and of all people inthe world, the old man at Darkglade turning out to be a greatphysiologist!

VII. TWO OLD FRIENDS

SCENE. --DARKGLADE VICARAGE STUDY. MR. AVELAND AND PROFESSOR DUNLOP. 

PROF. D. Thank you, sir. It has been a great pleasure to talk overthese matters with you; I hope a great benefit. 

MR. A. I am sure it is a great benefit to us to have a breath fromthe outer world. I hope you will never let so long a time go bywithout our meeting. Remember, as iron sharpeneth iron, so doth aman's countenance that of his friend. 

PROF. D. I shall be only too thankful. I rejoice in the having metyour grand-daughter, who encouraged me to offer myself. Is shepermanently in town?

MR. A. She shows no inclination to return. I hoped she would do soafter the last competition; but there is always another stage to bemounted. I wish she would come back, for her mother ought not to beleft single-handed; but young people seem to require so muchexternal education in these days, instead of being content to workon at home, that I sometimes question which is more effectual, learning or being taught. 

PROF. D. Being poured-upon versus imbibing?

MR. A. It may depend on what amount there is to imbibe; and Iimagine that the child views this region as an arid waste; as ofcourse we are considerably out of date. 

PROF. D. The supply would be a good deal fresher and purer!

MR. A. Do you know anything of her present surroundings?

PROF. D. I confess that I was surprised to meet her with Mrs. Eyeless, a lady who is active in disseminating Positivism, and alltending that way. She rather startled me by some of her remarks;but probably it was only jargon and desire to show off. Have youseen her lately?

MR. A. At Christmas, but only for a short time, when it struck methat she treated us with the patronage of precocious youth; and Ithought she made the most of a cold when church or parish wasconcerned. I hinted as much; but her mother seemed quite satisfied. Poor girl! Have I been blind? I did not like her going to live atone of those boarding-houses for lady students. Do you knowanything of them?

PROF. D. Of course all depends on the individual lady at the head, and the responsibility she undertakes, as well as on the tone of theinmates. With some, it would be only staying in a safe and guardedhome. In others, there is a great amount of liberty, the girlsgoing out without inquiry whether, with whom, or when they return. 

MR. A. American fashion! Well, they say young women are equal totaking care of themselves. I wonder whether my daughter understandsthis, or whether it is so at Cecilia's abode. Do you know?

PROF. D. I am afraid I do. The niece of a friend of mine wasthere, and left it, much distressed and confused by the agnosticopinions that were freely broached there. How did your grand-daughter come to choose it?

MR. A. For the sake of being with a friend. I think Thurston isthe name. 

PROF. D. I know something of that family; clever people, but bredup--on principle, if it can be so called, with their minds a blankas to religion. I remember seeing one of the daughters at the partywhere I met Miss Moldwarp. 

MR. A. So this is the society into which we have allowed our poorchild to run! I blame myself exceedingly for not having made moreinquiries. Grief made me selfishly passive, or I should have openedmy eyes and theirs to the danger. My poor Mary, what a shock itwill be to her!

PROF. D. Was not she on the spot?

MR. A. True; but, poor dear, she is of a gentle nature, easily led, and seeing only what her affection lets her perceive. And now, sheis not strong. 

PROF. D. She is not looking well. 

MR. A. You think so! I wonder whether I have been blind, and lether undertake too much. 

PROF. D. Suppose you were to bring her to town for a few days. Weshould be delighted to have you, and she could see the doctor towhom she is accustomed. Then you can judge for yourself about herdaughter. 

MR. A. Thank you, Dunlop! It will be a great comfort if it can bemanaged. 

VIII. AUNT AND NIECE

SCENE. --IN A HANSOM CAB. MRS. HOLLAND AND CECILIA. 

MRS. H. I wanted to speak to you, Cissy. 

C. I thought so!

MRS. H. What do you think of your mother?

C. Poor old darling. They have been worrying her till she has gothipped and nervous about herself. 

MRS. H. Do you know what spasms she has been having?

C. Oh! mother has had spasms as long as I can remember; and themore she thinks of them the worse they are. I have often heard hersay so. 

MRS. H. Yes; she has gone on much too long overworking herself, andnot letting your grandfather suspect anything amiss. 

C. Nerves. That is what it always is. 

MRS. H. Dr. Brownlow says there is failure of heart, not dangerousor advanced at present, but that there is an overstrain of all thepowers, and that unless she keeps fairly quiet, and free from hurryand worry, there may be very serious, if not fatal attacks. 

C. I never did think much of Dr. Brownlow. He told me mypalpitations were nothing but indigestion, and I am sure they werenot!

MRS. H. Well, Cissy, something must be done to relieve your motherof some of her burthens. 

C. I see what you are driving at, Aunt Phrasie; but I cannot goback till I have finished these courses. There's my picture, there's the cookery school, the ambulance lectures, and oursketching tour in August. Ever so many engagements. I shall befree in the autumn, and then I will go down and see about it. Itold mother so. 

MRS. H. All the hot trying months of summer without help!

C. I never can understand why they don't have a governess. 

MRS. H. Can't you? Is there not a considerable outgoing on yourbehalf?

C. That is my own. I am not bound to educate my uncle's childrenat my expense. 

MRS. H. No; but if you contributed your share to the housekeeping, you would make a difference, and surely you cannot leave your motherto break down her health by overworking herself in this manner. 

C. Why does grandpapa let her do so?

MRS. H. Partly he does not see, partly he cannot help it. He hasbeen so entirely accustomed to have all those family and parishdetails taken off his hands, and borne easily as they were when yourdear grandmamma and I were both there at home, that he cannotunderstand that they can be over much--especially as they are sosmall in themselves. Besides, he is not so young as he was, andyour dear mother cannot bear to trouble him. 

C. Well, I shall go there in September and see about it. It isimpossible before. 

MRS. H. In the hopping holidays, when the stress of work is over!Cannot you see with your own eyes how fagged and ill your motherlooks, and how much she wants help?

C. Oh! she will be all right again after this rest. I tell you, Aunt Phrasie, it is _IMPOSSIBLE_ at present--(CAB STOPS). 

IX. THE TWO SISTERS

SCENE. --A ROOM IN PROFESSOR DUNLOP'S HOUSE. MRS. MOLDWARP AND MRS. HOLLAND. 

MRS. H. I have done my best, but I can't move her an inch. 

MRS. M. Poor dear girl! Yet it seems hardly fair to make my healththe lever, when really there is nothing serious the matter. 

MRS. H. I can't understand the infatuation. Can there be any loveaffair?

MRS. M. Oh no, Phrasie; it is worse!

MRS. H. Worse! Mary, what can you mean?

MRS. M. Yes, it _IS_ worse. I got at the whole truth yesterday. My poor child's faith has gone! Oh, how could I let her go and lether mingle among all those people, all unguarded!

MRS. H. Do you mean that this is the real reason that she will notcome home?

MRS. M. Yes; she told me plainly at last that she could not standour round of services. They seem empty and obsolete to her, and shecould not feign to attend them or vex us, and cause remarks bystaying away, and of course she neither could nor would teachanything but secular matters. 'My coming would be nothing but painto everybody, ' she said. 

MRS H. You did not tell me this before my drive with her. 

MRS. M. No, I never saw you alone; besides, I thought you wouldspeak more freely without the knowledge. And, to tell the truth, Idid think it possible that consideration for me might bring my poorCissy down to us, and that when once under my father's influence, all these mists might clear away. But I do not deserve it. I havebeen an unfaithful parent, shutting my eyes in feeble indulgence, and letting her drift into these quicksands. 

MRS. H. Fashion and imitation, my dear Mary; it will pass away. Now, you are not to talk any more. 

MRS. M. I can't-- (A SPASM COMES ON. )

X. AUNT AND NEPHEW

SCENE. --SIX MONTHS LATER, DARKGLADE VICARAGE, A DARKENED ROOM. MRS. HOLLAND AND LUCIUS. 

MRS. H. Yes, Lucius, we have all much to reproach ourselves with;even poor grandpapa is heart-broken at having been too much absorbedto perceive how your dear mother was overtasked. 

L. You did all you could, aunt; you took home one child, and causedthe other to be sent to school. 

MRS. H. Yes, too late to be of any use. 

L. And after all, I don't think it was overwork that broke the poordear one down, so much as grief at that wretched sister of mine. 

MRS. H. Don't speak of her in that way, Lucius. 

L. How can I help it? I could say worse!

MRS. H. She is broken-hearted, poor thing. 

L. Well she may be. 

MRS. H. Ah, the special point of sorrow to your dear mother wasthat she blamed herself, for--

L. How could she? How can you say so, aunt?

MRS. H. Wait a moment, Lucius. What grieved her was the giving into Cissy's determination, seeing with her eyes, and not allowingherself to perceive that what she wished might not be good for her. 

L. Cissy always did domineer over mother. 

MRS. H. Yes; and your mother was so used to thinking Cissy'sjudgment right that she never could or would see when it was time tomake a stand, and prevent her own first impressions from beingtalked down as old-fashioned, --letting her eyes be bandaged, infact. 

L. So she vexed herself over Cissy's fault; but did not you try tomake Cissy see what she was about?

MRS. H. True; but if love had blinded my dear sister, Cissy wasdoubly blinded--

L. By conceit and self-will. 

MRS. H. Poor girl, I am too sorry for her now to use those hardwords, but I am afraid it is true. First she could or would not seeeither that her companions might be undesirable guides, or that herduty lay here, and then nothing would show her that her mother'shealth was failing. Indeed, by that time the sort of blindness hadcome upon her which really broke your mother's heart. 

L. You mean her unbelief, agnosticism, or whatever she chooses tocall it. I thought at least women were safe from that style ofthing. It is all fashion and bad company, I suppose?

MRS. H. I hope and pray that it may be so; but I am afraid that itgoes deeper than you imagine. Still, I see hope in her extremeunhappiness, and in the remembrance of your dear mother's last wordsand prayers. 

XI. GRANDFATHER AND GRAND-DAUGHTER

A MONTH LATER. MR. AVELAND AND CECILIA. 

MR. A. My dear child, I wish I could do anything for you. 

C. You had better let me go back to London, grandpapa. 

MR. A. Do you really wish it?

C. I don't know. I hate it all; but if I were in the midst ofeverything again, it might stifle the pain a little. 

MR. A. I am afraid that is not the right way of curing it. 

C. Oh, I suppose it will wear down in time. 

MR. A. Is that well?

C. I don't know. It is only unbearable as it is; and yet when Ithink of my life in town, the din and the chatter and the bustle, and the nobody caring, seem doubly intolerable; but I shall work offthat. You had better let me go, grandpapa. The sight of me can benothing but a grief and pain to you. 

MR. A. No; it gives me hope. 

C. Hope of what?

MR. A. That away from the whirl you will find your way to peace. 

C. I don't see how. Quiet only makes me more miserable. 

MR. A. My poor child, if you can speak out and tell me exactly howit is with you, I think it might be comfortable to you. If it isthe missing your mother, and blaming yourself for having allowed herto overdo herself, I may well share with you in that. I feel mostgrievously that I never perceived how much she was undertaking, norhow she flagged under it. Unselfish people want others to think forthem, and I did not. 

C. Dear grandpapa, it would not have been too much if I had comeand helped. I know that; but it is not the worst. You can't feelas I do--that if my desertion led to her overworking herself, AuntPhrasie and Lucius say that what really broke her down was theopinions I cannot help having. Say it was not, grandpapa. 

MR. A. I wish I could, my dear; but I cannot conceal thatunhappiness about you, and regret for having let you expose yourselfto those unfortunate arguments, broke her spirits so that herenergies were unequal to the strain that I allowed to be laid onher. 

C. Poor dear mother! And you and she can feel in that way aboutthe importance of what to me seems--pardon me, grandpapa--utterlyunproved. 

MR. A. You hold everything unproved that you cannot work out like amathematical demonstration. 

C. I can't help it, grandpapa. I read and read, till all thepremises become lost in the cloud of myths that belong to allnations. I don't want to think such things. I saw dear mother reston her belief, and grow peaceful. They were perfect realities toher; but I cannot unthink. I would give anything to think that sheis in perfect happiness now, and that we shall meet again; butnothing seems certain to me. All is extinguished. 

MR. A. How do you mean?

C. They--Betty and her set, I mean--laughed at and argued one thingafter another, till they showed me that there were no positivegrounds to go on. 

MR. A. No material grounds. 

C. And what else is certain?

MR. A. Do you think your mother was not certain?

C. I saw she was; I see you are certain. But what am I to do? Icannot unthink. 

MR. A. Poor child, they have loosed you from the shore, because youcould not see it, and left you to flounder in the waves. 

C. Well, so I feel it sometimes; but if I could only feel thatthere was a shore, I would try to get my foothold. Oh, with all myheart!

MR. A. Will you take my word, dear child--the word of one who candare humbly to say he has proved it, so as to be as sure as of thefloor we are standing on, that that Rock exists; and God grant thatyou may, in prayer and patience, be brought to rest on it once more. 

C. Once more! I don't think I ever did so really. I only did notthink, and kept away from what was dull and tiresome. Didn't youread something about 'If thou hadst known--'

MR. A. 'If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things that belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid fromthine eyes. ' But oh, my dear girl, it is my hope and prayer, notfor ever. If you will endure to walk in darkness for a while, tillthe light be again revealed to you. 

C. At any rate, dear grandfather, I will do what mother entreated, and not leave you alone. 

XII. 

TWO YEARS LATER. ST. THOMAS'S DAY. 

C. Grandpapa, may I come with you on Christmas morning?

MR. A. You make me a truly happy Christmas, dear child. 

C. I think I feel somewhat as St. Thomas did, in to-day's Gospel. It went home to my heart

MR. A. Ah, child, to us that 'Blessed are they who have not seenand yet have believed, ' must mean those who are ready to know byfaith instead of material tangible proof. 

CHOPS

You ask me why I call that old great-grandmother black cat Chops?Well, thereby hangs a tale. I don't mean the black tail which isstanding upright and quivering at your caresses, but a story thatthere will be time to tell you before Charlie gets home from market. 

Seven years ago, Charlie had just finished his training both at anagricultural college and under a farmer, and was thinking of goingout to Texas or to Canada, and sending for me when he should havebeen able to make a new home for me, when his godfather, Mr. Newton, offered to let him come down and look after the draining andotherwise reclaiming of this great piece of waste land. It had cometo Mr. Newton through some mortgages, I believe, and he thoughtsomething might be made of it by an active agent. It was the firsttime Mr. Newton had shown the least interest in us, though he was acousin of our poor mother's; and Charlie was very much gratified, more especially as when he had 150 pounds a year and a house, hethought I might leave the school where I was working as a teacher, and make a home with him. 

Yes, this is the house; but it has grown a good deal since wesettled down, and will grow more before you come to it for good. Then it was only meant for a superior sort of gamekeeper, and hadonly six rooms in it--parlour, kitchen, and back kitchen, and threebedrooms above them; but this we agreed would be ample for ourselvesand Betsey, an old servant of our mother's, who could turn her handto anything, and on the break-up of our home had begged to join usagain whenever or wherever we should have a house of our own oncemore. 

We have half a dozen cottages near us now; but then it seemed to uslike a lodge in a vast wilderness--three miles away from everything, shop, house, or church. Betsey fairly sat down and cried when sheheard how far away was the butcher, and it really seemed as if wewere to have the inconveniences of colonisation without the honourof it. However, contrivances made us merry; we made our roomspretty and pleasant, and as a pony and trap were essential toCharlie in his work, we were able to fetch and carry easily. Moreover, we had already a fair kitchen garden laid out, and therewere outhouses for pigs and poultry, so that even while draining andfencing were going on, we raised a good proportion of our ownprovisions, and very proud of them we were; our own mustard andcress, which we sowed in our initials, tasted doubly sweet when wereaped them as our earliest crop. 

Mr. Newton had always said that some day he should drop down and seehow Charles was getting on, but as he hardly ever stirred from hisoffice in London, and only answered letters in the briefest and mostbusiness-like way, we had pretty well left off expecting him. 

We had been here about six months, and had killed our first pig--'apretty little porker as ever was seen, ' as Betsey said. It was hardto understand, after all the petting, admiration, and back-scratching Betsey had bestowed on him, how ready she was to sentencehim, and triumph in his death; while I, feeble-minded creature, delayed rising in the morning that I might cower under thebedclothes and stop my ears against his dying squeals. However, when he was no more, the housekeeping spirit triumphed in ourindependence of the butcher, while his fry and other delicacieslasted, and Betsey was supremely happy over the saltings of thelegs, etc. , with a view to the more distant future. 

It was a cold day of early spring. I had been down the lanes andbrought in five tiny starved primroses with short stems, for whichBetsey scolded me soundly, telling me that the first brood ofchickens was always the same in number as the first primrosesbrought into the house. I eked them out with moss in a saucer, andthen, how well I remember the foolish, weary feeling that I wishedsomething would happen to break the quiet. We were out of the reachof new books, and the two magazines we took in would not be due forten long days. I did not feel sensible or energetic enough to turnto one of the standard well-bound volumes that had been Charlie'sschool prizes, and at the moment I hated my needlework, both steadysewing and fancy work. It was the same with my piano. I had no newfashionable music, and I was in a mood to disdain what was good andclassical. So, as the twilight came on, I sat drearily by the fire, fondling the cat--yes, this same black cat--and thinking that mylife at the ladies' college had been a good deal livelier, and thatif I had given it up for the sake of my brother's society, I hadvery little of that. 

The hunt had gone by last week--what a treat it would be if some onewould meet with a little accident and be carried in here!

Behold, I heard a step at the back door, and the loud call of'Kitty! Kitty!' There stood Charlie, as usual covered with claynearly up to the top of his gaiters--clay either pale yellow, orhorrid light blue, according to the direction of his walk. He wasbeginning frantically to unbutton them, and as he beheld me he criedout, 'Kitty! he's coming!' and before I could say, 'Who?' he wenton, 'Old Newton. His fly is working through the mud in DraggletailLane. The driver hailed me to ask the way, and when I saw who itwas, I cut across to give you notice. He'll stay the night to adead certainty. '

What was to be done? A wild hope seized me that, at sight of theplace, he would retain his fly and go off elsewhere for betteraccommodation. 

Only, where would he find it? The nearest town, where the onlyrailway station then was, was eight miles off, and he was not likelyto plod back thither again, and the village inn, five miles away, was little more than a pot-house. 

No, we must rise to the occasion, Betsey and I, while Charlie wasmaking himself respectable to receive the guest. Where was he tosleep? What was he to eat? A daintily fed, rather hypochrondriacalold bachelor, who seldom stirred out of his comfortable house inLondon. What a guest for us!

The council was held while the gaiters were being unbuttoned. Hemust have my room, and I would sleep with Betsey. As to food, itwas impossible to send to the butcher; and even if I could havesacrificed my precious Dorking fowls, there would have been scanttime to prepare them. 

There was nothing for it but to give him the pork chops, intendedfor our to-morrow's dinner, and if he did not like them, he mightfall back upon poached eggs and rashers. 

'Mind, ' called Charlie, as I dashed into my room to remove myproperties and light the fire, so that it might get over its firstsmoking fit, --'mind you lock up the cat. He hates them likepoison. '

It was so long before the carriage appeared, that I began half tohope, half to fear, it was a false alarm; but at last, just as itwas perfectly dark, we heard it stop at the garden gate, and Charliedashed out to open the fly door, and bring in the guest, who waspanting, nervous--almost terrified, at a wild drive, so contrary toall his experiences. When the flyman's demands had been appeased, and we had got the poor old gentleman out of his wraps, he turnedout to be a neat, little, prim-looking London lawyer, clean-shaved, and with an indoor complexion. I daresay Charlie, with his bigframe, sunburnt face, curly beard, and loud hearty voice, seemed tohim like a kind of savage, and he thought he had got among theAborigines. 

After all, he had written to announce his coming. But he had notcalculated on our never getting our letters unless we sent for them. He was the very pink of politeness to me, and mourned so much overputting me to inconvenience that we could only profess our delightand desire to make him comfortable. 

On the whole, it went off very well. I gave him a cup of tea towarm and occupy him while the upstairs' chimney was coming to itssenses; and then Charles took him upstairs. He reappeared inprecise evening dress, putting us to shame; for Charles had not adress-coat big enough for him to get into, and I had forgotten tosecure my black silk before abandoning my room. We could not askhim to eat in the best kitchen, as was our practice, and he showedhimself rather dismayed at our having only one sitting-room, sayinghe had not thought the cottage such a dog-hole, or known that itwould be inhabited by a lady; and then he paid some prettycompliment on the feminine hand evident in the room. We had laidthe table before he came down, but the waiting was managed byourselves, or rather, by Charles, for Mr. Newton's politeness madehim jump up whenever I moved; so that I had to sit still and do thelady hostess, while my brother changed plates and brought in relaysof the chops from the kitchen. They were a great success. Mr. Newton eyed them for a moment distrustfully, but Betsey had turnedthem out beautifully--all fair and delicate with transparent fat, and a brown stripe telling of the gridiron. He refused the eggalternative, and greatly enjoyed them and our Brussels sprouts, speaking highly of the pleasure of country fare, and apologisingabout the good appetising effects of a journey, when Charlie temptedhim with a third chop, the hottest and most perfect of all. 

I think we also produced a rhubarb tart, and I know he commended ourprudence in having no wine, and though he refused my brother's ale, seemed highly satisfied with a tumbler of brandy and water, when Iquitted the gentlemen to see to the coffee, while they talked overthe scheme for farm-buildings, which Charlie had sent up to him. 

When I bade him good-night, a couple of hours later, he wasevidently in a serene state of mind, regarding us as very superioryoung people. 

In the middle of the night, Betsey and I were appalled by atremendous knocking on the wall. I threw on a dressing-gown andmade for the door, while Betsey felt for the matches. As I opened acrack of the door, Charlie's voice was to be heard, 'Yes, yes; I'llget you some, sir. You'll be better presently, ' interspersed withheavy groans; then, seeing me wide awake, he begged that Betseywould go down and get some hot water--'and mustard, ' called out asuffering voice. 'Oh, those chops!'

Poor Mr. Newton had, it appeared, wakened with a horrible oppressionon his chest, and at once attributing it to his unwonted meal ofpork chops, he had begun, in the dark, knocking and calling withgreat energy. Charlie had stumbled in in the dark, not waiting tolight a candle, and indeed ours were chiefly lamps, which took timeto light. Betsey had hers, however, and had bustled into someclothes, tumbling downstairs to see whether any water were still hotin the copper, Charlie running down to help her, while I fumbledabout for a lamp and listened with awe to the groans from within, wondering which of us would have to go for the doctor. 

Up came Charlie, in his shirt sleeves, with a steaming jug in onehand and a lamp in the other. Up came Betsey, in a scarletpetticoat and plaid shawl, her gray locks in curl-papers, and atallow-candle in hand. The door was thrown open, Charlie observing, 'Now, sir, ' then breaking out into 'Thunder and turf' (his favouriteHibernian ejaculation); 'Ssssssss!' and therewith, her green eyesall one glare, out burst this cat! She was the nightmare! She hadbeen sitting on the unfortunate man's chest, and all her weight hadbeen laid to the score of the chops!

No doubt she had been attracted by the fire, stolen up in theconfusion of the house, remained hidden whilst Mr. Newton was goingto bed, and when the fire went out, settled herself on his chest, asit seems he slept on his back, and it was a warm position. 

Probably his knockings on the wall dislodged her; but if so, imagination carried on the sense of oppression, and with felinepertinacity she had returned as soon as he was still again. 

Poor old gentleman! I am afraid he heard some irrepressiblelaughter, and it was very sore to him to be ridiculous. His gravedignity and politeness when he came down very late the next morningwere something awful, and it must have been very dreadful to himthat he could not get away till half the day was over. 

So dry and short was he over matters of business that Charlesactually thought we might begin to pack up and make our arrangementsfor emigrating. Grave, dry, and civil as ever, he departed, and Inever saw him more, nor do I think he ever entirely forgave me. There did not, however, come any dismissal, and when Charlie hadoccasion to go up to his office and see him, he was just the same asever, and acceded to the various arrangements which have made this acivilised, though still rather remote place. 

And when he died, a year ago, to our surprise we found that thissame reclaimed property was left to my brother. The consequencewhereof you well know, my dear little sister that is to be. Poorold Chops! you had nearly marred our fortunes; and now, will you gowith me to my home at the Rectory, or do you prefer your old abodeto your old mistress?

Footnotes:

{127} [In the book this genealogy is a diagram. It is rendered astext here. --DP] John Fulford: sons: John Fulford {127a} (marriedMargaret Lacy) and Henry {127b}. 

{127a} John Fulford and Margaret Lacy: Sir Edward Fulford (marriedAvice Lee--died after two years), Arthur, Q. C. (married EdithGanler) {127c}, Martyn (Professor, married Mary Alwyn) {127d}, Charlotte, Emily, Margaret (married Rev. H. Druce) {127e}. 

{127b} Henry had a son called Henry--whose son was also Henry--whose daughter was Isabel. 

{127c} Arthur, Q. C. And Edith Ganler: Margaret called Metelill, Charlotte called Charley, Sons not at New Cove. 

{127d} Martyn (Professor) and Mary Alwyn: Margaret called Pica, Avice and Uchtred. 

{127e} Margaret and Rev. H. Druce: Jane and large family.